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Updated: June 10, 2025
But Stephen himself stayed on in the old house until he grew old too, for he loved the place where Adelais had lived, and could not bear to leave it for another.
But when he knelt alone by the couch whereon Adelais lay, and held her white blue-veined hands in his and told his errand, she turned her face from him and wept sore, as women weep over the dead. "Adelais, O Adelais," he cried in his despair, "Why will you refuse me always? Don't you see my heart is breaking for love of you? Come home with me and be my wife at last!"
All the evening, throughout the conversation and the forfeits and the merry-making, Stephen Gray spoke and moved and thought only for Adelais, and she for Stephen's twin brother.
She remembered that the Marquis of Falmouth rarely smiled; and once only at a bull-baiting had she heard him laugh. It needed bloodshed, then, to amuse him, Adelais deduced, with that self-certainty in logic which is proper to youth; and the girl shuddered. But through the scarlet coppices of the garden, growing fainter and yet more faint, rang the singing of Fulke d'Arnaye. Roger is Explicit
Adelais was wooed by, and betrothed to, the powerful old Comte de Vaudremont; but died just before the date set for this second marriage, in October, 1429. She left two sons: Noel, born in 1425, and Raymond, born in 1426; who were reared by their uncle, Olivier d'Arnaye.
"Oh, infamy!" the girl cried. "You have planned this, you coward!" "Yes, I planned it," said Roger Darke. "Yet I take no great credit therefor, for it was simple enough. I had but to send a feigned message to your block-head brother. Ha, yes, I planned it, Adelais, and I planned it well. But I deal honorably. To-morrow you will be Mistress Darke, never fear."
But when Stephen talked to him of Adelais, and told him she was gone to the sea-side, Maurice only laughed and answered lightly, that she was a sweet lovable girl, and that he grieved to hear of her illness; no doubt the southern breezes would bring back the color to her cheeks, and he should hear before he had been long gone that she was quite well and strong again. At least he hoped so.
His voice was quiet, and his smile never failed him. It was this steady smile which set her heart to aching. Adelais knew that no natural power could dissuade him; he would go back with her; but she knew how constantly he had hoped for liberty, with what fortitude he had awaited his chance of liberty; and that he should return to captivity, smiling, thrilled her to impotent, heart-shaking rage.
"That is true," Vernon assented; "but the match is a good one, and she is bent upon it." So presently he rode with his men to the north coast. An hour later Roger Darke and Adelais set out for Winstead, in spite of all Lady Brudenel's protestations that Mistress Vernon had best lie with her that night at Halvergate.
He grasped at her cloak as she shrank from him. The garment fell, leaving the girl momentarily free, her festival jewels shimmering in the moonlight, her bared shoulders glistening like silver. Darke, staring at her, giggled horribly. An instant later Adelais fell upon her knees. "Sweet Christ, have pity upon Thy handmaiden! Do not forsake me, sweet Christ, in my extremity!
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