LITMIR.BIZ

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that now.

      What none of them knew, however—though God presumably did—was that what he felt for Liza, and what she felt for him, was real and would remain real all the rest of their lives, even if they never met again. They were sworn to each other, whatever Father Meadowes and the Weavers might say. He said aloud, “I will go on praying for her all my days.”

      Yes, he would! And there was nothing anyone could do to interfere with either his private prayers or his memories.

      Meanwhile, this priory and this cell were to be his home. Very well. His future had been ruthlessly reorganised and his life sold away. Soldier of God? No, he was a slave, and for life. But his love was unchanged and would remain so until he died.

      CHAPTER TEN

      CLOUD BLOWING IN

      The Valley of the Rocks was a curious place. On the moor and among its surrounding, greener foothills, the water had sculpted the land and was still doing so. Streams ran through nearly every one of the deep, narrow combes that dented the hills as though a giant had repeatedly pressed the side of his hand deep into a collection of vast and well-stuffed cushions. The valley, by contrast, was dry.

      It didn’t run down to the sea, but lay parallel to it. Its floor was flat and broad, but on either side, hillsides of bracken and goat-nibbled grass rose steeply to curious crests where grey rock outcrops, weathered into extraordinary shapes, adorned the skylines. Richard knew that the hills to his right were a thin wall between valley and sea, with a drop of hundreds of feet from the hillcrests to the water, most of it sheer cliff with broken rock at its feet.

      Ahead, the seaward hillside broke in one place, though even from there, the drop below was still hair-raising. The heights resumed with a tall conical hill topped by an extraordinary mass of rock which looked, from a distance, so like the ruins of an old fortress that most people called it Castle Rock.

      There was no one about, except for a goatherd encouraging his flock from one piece of grass to another, up on the slope to the left. He was high up and moving away from them, and showed no sign of having seen them. He certainly wouldn’t disturb them. “Mistress Locke,” said Richard, “as I said, I wish to talk with you. I came here today to find you. I have something to tell you and something to ask you. I hope you will listen.”

      “Well, what might all that be about?” asked Marion.

      She said it with a smile in her voice, and provocation, too, and when he turned to look at her face, that provocation was in her eyes, as well. The white fire leaped again, shockingly, filling him up. Her hand burned on his arm. He hardly knew how to go on just talking to her. He wanted to throw words and politeness and every last vestige of civilised behaviour away and her clothing with them and his own as well and turn this bleak, lonely valley into a Garden of Eden, with him and Marion as Adam and Eve.

      To steady his mind, he quickened the pace, leading her toward the foot of the goat path that wound its way up and around Castle Rock. With a great effort he kept his voice normal as he said, “Mistress Locke, you must understand, even if it disappoints you, that I’ve plans for my son Peter and that there can be no question of a marriage between you. However, I can see very well why he’s lost his heart and his head over you. You are as lovely a wench as I ever saw.”

      It was a poor description of her, he thought, nearly as inadequate as when her mother called her pretty. Marion Locke was no conventional beauty. His first impression had been the right one. She was ripe, like a juicy plum. She gave off the very scent of ripeness, of readiness.

      “Tell me,” he said, still keeping his voice even with the greatest difficulty, “what if I asked you to think about me instead? I’m a widower these many years and I’d like a wife. Specially, I’d like a wife like you.”

      “Oh,” said Marion, and dropped her hand from his arm.

      “Why oh?” He caught her hand back and drew her to him. “Come! I’m older than you, but I’m hale enough. You’d get used to farm life, though it’s different from what you know. Marion…”

      “But I…no, please,” said Marion, shaking her head and pulling her hand free. She edged away, arousing in him a sudden huntsman’s instinct to give chase.

      “Now, don’t shy away from me, sweeting. There’s no need. I just want you to listen to me.” He stepped after her, repossessed himself of her hand and then changed his grasp to her elbow, drawing her back to him, clamping her to his side and walking her steadily on. “There’s nothing to be afraid of. I’m not an enemy. Just listen, my dear.”

      Marion didn’t know what to do. The young men she’d flirted with and, well, given way to once or twice—and she knew that she’d taken a risk and been lucky that no harm had come of it—had been easy to manage, even a little shy. She had never felt out of control. She had never encountered anyone like Richard Lanyon before. He was handsome, but he had an aura of danger, something new to her. Besides, this wasn’t decent. She had made love with this man’s son, and here in this very valley, at that. It wasn’t right. Marion’s morals were broad, but not broad enough for that.

      But she couldn’t break Richard’s hold and if she did, she knew she couldn’t outdistance him. She could still see the goatherd but he was far away; there was no help there.

      They had reached the foot of the path up the Rock. “Let’s climb a little way and see if we can see the coast of Wales,” Richard said, and steered her upward. The path wound, bringing them to the seaward side of the Rock, giving them a view across the Channel and westward down it. He looked down at her, smiling, but then, unable to stop himself, suddenly swung her in front of him, bending forward to kiss her.

      His forebear Petroc, the one who had brought the Lanyons to Exmoor, had started life as a Cornish tin miner. That meant a free man, even in the days of villeinage, but it was a hard life of digging and panning, which produced men with muscles like steel ropes.

      Petroc had hated it and given it up to breed sheep, though with poor success at first, for Cornish pastures were thin and sheep reared on them grew poor fleeces. However, when the Black Death tore holes in the population and opened, for those who still lived, chances hitherto unimaginable, he had snatched his opportunity and travelled to Somerset, where the grazing, even on the moors, was far better. Here he found success at last with his sheep. But if he had left the harsh days of failure behind him, he hadn’t lost his tin miner’s physique. To those of his descendants who survived, he had handed it down. Richard Lanyon had the thick shoulders and knotted muscles of his ancestors and he scarcely knew his own strength.

      Marion, feeling his fingers grip her like pincers of steel, cried out, turning her head away from him. “Master Lanyon, don’t! You’re frightenin’ me!”

      Realising that he must have hurt her, he let go. This was no way to go courting. “It’s all right. Don’t be afraid.” Better keep walking; it gave his overheated body something to do. He turned her and guided her onward and up. “Watch your footing—the ground’s rough,” he said, and used that as an excuse to put a heavy arm around her shoulders. “I’d treat you kindly,” he assured her, “and you’d eat well, on the farm. Not so much fish, but much more cream and good meat. The farmworkers’ wives would show you how to do this and that, and…”

      “Weather’s changin’,” said Marion.

      It was. It was growing colder and the west wind was strengthening. There was no more blue in the sky and the high brown-and-white clouds had given place to low grey ones, flowing in from the far Atlantic. The path had brought them quite high up by now and wisps of cloud were blowing around them, bringing a hint of drizzle. Wales, which had indeed been visible at first though neither of them had paid any attention to it, had vanished.

      Marion was shivering, partly with cold, partly with what was now serious alarm. When Richard had come to Lynmouth to see her parents, he’d been just Peter’s father, a farmer in a brown wool jerkin and a hooded cloak, darker than most Somerset men were, and good-looking—she was never unaware of good looks in a man—but all the same, one of her own

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