nodded. ‘Very well. I agree. So, let us begin. I should like you to close your eyes, Joanna, and relax.’ He was watching her hands, fisted in her lap. ‘Completely relax, beginning with your toes …’
‘It takes longer each time,’ Sarah commented when Jo was at last in a deep trance.
Carl nodded. ‘She is becoming more and more afraid of what might happen and fighting it. I doubt if we could have progressed much further with her in this state of mind anyway.’
Jo was lying back in her chair passively, her eyes closed, her hands hanging loosely over the armrests. Nick had seated himself unobtrusively in a corner of the room, his eyes fixed on Jo’s face.
‘Do you think this will work?’ he asked softly.
Bennet shrugged. ‘It will if it is what she really wants.’
He pulled up a chair next to Jo’s and took her hand gently. ‘Joanna, can you hear me?’
Jo moved her head slightly. It might have been a nod.
‘And you are relaxed and comfortable, still thinking about your weekend at sea?’
She smiled. This time the nod was more definite.
‘Good. Now I want you to listen to me, Jo. It is twenty-five days since I first saw you here and you were first regressed. Since then the regressions have caused you much unhappiness and pain. I want you to forget them now, because you yourself want to forget them. When you wake up you will remember only that you had a few strange unimportant dreams and in time even that memory will fade. Do you understand me, Joanna?’
He paused, watching her closely. Jo was motionless but he could see the tension had returned to her hands. Abruptly she opened her eyes and looked at him. ‘I can’t forget them,’ she said softly but distinctly.
Bennet swallowed. ‘You must forget, Joanna. Matilda is dead. Let her rest.’
Jo smiled sadly. ‘She cannot rest. I cannot rest … The story has to be told …’ Her gaze slipped past him. ‘Don’t you see, I have to go back, to find out why it all happened. I have to remember. I have to live again that first meeting with John …’
‘Stop her!’ Nick had jumped to his feet. ‘Stop her, man! She’s regressing on her own. Can’t you see?’ He grabbed Jo by the shoulders. ‘Jo! Wake up! For God’s sake wake up. Don’t do it!’
‘Leave her alone!’ Bennet’s peremptory order cut through his shout. Jo had gone rigid in her chair, looking straight through him.
‘Jo.’ It was Bennet who took hold of her now, forcing her to turn her head towards him. ‘Jo, I want you to listen to me …’
‘Listen to me! Listen!’ William de Braose was standing furiously in front of her. ‘You will say nothing to the King of what happened on your journey, nothing, do you understand me?’
For a moment Matilda felt the familiar surge of defiance. She met his gaze squarely, mocking his fear, then she looked away. If she fought with him now he would refuse to take her to the King’s presence, and that, above all, she wanted. Meekly she lowered her eyes. ‘I shall say nothing, my lord,’ she whispered.
Gloucester was crowded. The encampment of the King’s followers was laid out between the royal castle and the King’s palace north of the city where King Henry habitually held his Christmas courts, a colourful array of tents with the leopards of the King’s standard rippling from the flagstaff on the great central keep.
As they had arrived they had glimpsed the gleaming Severn river with the fleet of royal galleys moored in lines to the quays, but it was evening before they reached it and the castle and the de Braose tents were raised next to those of their Marcher neighbours who had come to attend the betrothal of the King’s youngest son, John, to the Earl of Gloucester’s daughter, Isabella, and even later before William, arrayed in his finest clothes, took Matilda at last to wait upon the King.
They found him in one of the upper rooms of the palace, seated at a large table on which were unrolled several maps. Beside him stood William Fitzherbert, Earl of Gloucester, who had arrived from his castle at Cardiff only two days previously, escorting his wife and small daughter, and several other nobles. Wine goblets had been used to hold maps flat as together they pored over the rough drawn lines in the light of a cluster of great wax candles. There was no sign of Richard de Clare, she saw at a glance, as she curtseyed low before the King, her heart thumping nervously. She had so desperately hoped he would be there.
‘Glad to see you made it, Sir William.’ Henry acknowledged his bow. ‘My son is to be your neighbour in the Marches if our plans work out and we get a dispensation for this marriage.’ He peered at Matilda, half hidden behind her husband. ‘Your wife, Sir William? She can wait on young Isabella tomorrow. See if she can stop the wench blubbering.’ He snorted, holding his hand out to Matilda, who came forward eagerly.
‘Your Grace,’ she murmured, bowing low. She glanced up at the heavy lined face and wiry red hair dusted with white, and found the King surveying her closely with brilliant blue eyes. She sensed at once the appreciation in his gaze and uncertainly drew closer to her husband.
‘Your father Sir Reginald was a good man, my dear.’ The King held on to her hand. ‘The best dapifer I’ve had to attend me. And you’ve the look of him about you.’ He grinned at William. ‘Lucky man. She’s a lovely girl.’
Matilda blushed and stepped back as the King released his grasp, glancing nervously up at him from lowered eyes, but already his attention was on the maps before him once more. William was drawn immediately into the discussion around the table, so she moved quietly to the hearth where the King’s two great sable dogs lay basking in the heat, and she stood gazing down into the flames, wondering whether she should withdraw.
A moment later a door near her was flung open and a boy came striding into the room. He stopped short and looked her up and down arrogantly.
‘I saw you this afternoon with Sir William’s party,’ he announced, coming to stand near her. His sandy hair was disarrayed and damp from riding in the rain. ‘Your mare was lame. You should have dismounted and led her.’
‘I beg your pardon.’ Matilda blushed hotly. ‘She was not lame.’
‘She was.’ He made a face at her. ‘I saw her. She was stumbling badly.’
‘She was tired.’ Matilda was furiously indignant. ‘There was nothing whatsoever wrong with her. I should never have ridden her if there was.’ She looked at the boy with dislike, noting his torn tunic and the scuffed shoes. ‘Anyway it’s got nothing to do with you. You’ve no business to tell me what I should or should not do.’ Her voice had risen slightly and she was conscious suddenly of a silence at the table behind her.
She turned, embarrassed, and met the King’s cool gaze as he surveyed her, one eyebrow raised, over the maps.
‘I hope my son is not being a nuisance, Lady de Braose,’ he commented quietly. And then, louder, ‘Come here, John.’
Matilda gasped and, blushing, looked back at the Prince, but already he had turned his back on her and gone to stand beside his father. From the safety of his position at the King’s side he stuck out his tongue defiantly.
His father may not have seen, but one or two of the others at the table certainly had, including William. She saw him glare sharply at the boy, raising his hand as if he wanted to clout him, then, obviously remembering where he was, he too bent once again to the map before him. The King, suppressing with difficulty the amusement in his face, bowed slightly towards Matilda and once more lowered his own eyes. Her cheeks flaming, she turned back to the fire, wishing she could run from the room.
‘He’s an odious, precocious little prig,’ she burst out later to Elen when she was at last back in her tent. She turned so that the woman could begin to unlace her gown. ‘Heaven help that poor child Isabella if they are to be wed. The boy needs a thrashing.’
‘Hush!’