Chapter Thirteen
Catherine and Benjamin were sitting at the table in the dining room while Digweed served them breakfast. Catherine watched with morbid fascination as Benjamin added two raw eggs to a jug of cold coffee. She was almost entirely certain that her brother was not actually going to drink the foul concoction up until the point that he proved her wrong by taking a deep gulp.
"What in the name of God is that ghastly stuff you're drinking?!" she cried, her eyes wide as she watched him knock back the mud coloured foulness.
"People drink it to line their stomachs before they consume alcohol. It stops them from getting sick and having a headache the morning after." Benjamin replied.
"But you drink it every morning!"
Her brother merely shrugged and raised the jug to his lips again.
"Benjamin, why do you drink so much?" Catherine asked quietly, unable to actually look him in the eye, "Not that awful stuff, I mean…What I mean is, I'm forever seeing you wandering about the house with a decanter in hand. Port, whiskey, sherry - I don't think you really care what you drink. Why is that?"
An uncomfortable silence descended. Benjamin put the jug down a little heavily, causing all the crockery on the table to shudder. When Catherine worked up the courage to actually look at him, she found that he could barely look at her either; instead he stared with furrowed brow straight down at his hand which had curled into a tight fist upon the table.
"You're sad, aren't you? That's why you drink." she finally said, her voice no more than a whisper, "You're always sad, I realise that now. But what has made you this way?" From the corner of her eye, she saw Digweed shift uncomfortably where he was poised in the doorway, a tray of bacon in hand. Benjamin sensed the movement too and raised his eyes to give the man-servant a warning look. Plainly there was a message in that look which Catherine did not understand; Digweed obviously did though, for, with lips compressed into a straight line, he placed the tray upon the table and hurried out of the room. Now they were alone but still Benjamin said nothing.
"What is it? Digweed knows something, I can tell, but you don't want him to say. What is it that I can't know? Are you still sad over mother's death? No, wait. That's not it, is it? This goes back much longer than that…I remember now. While I was away at school you used to send me letters all the time, long funny letters with drawings and sometimes presents. But when I was about thirteen you stopped sending regular letters. I was lucky if I received two or three letters a year from you, and they were all so brief and…cold almost. What happened to you while I was at school?"
"Catherine, be quiet!" Benjamin suddenly exploded, making her jump. Catherine was utterly dumbfounded, never in her life had she ever heard Benjamin raise his voice - least of all to her. Not even when she was three years old and had snuck into his room and ruined several of his books by scrawling pictures of unicorns across their pages. No, seventeen year old Benjamin had merely laughed and called her a charming little artist.
But now it was different and Catherine turned her face away to hide the tears which rose immediately to her eyes. In doing so, she caught a glimpse out the French Doors of something which made her blood run cold. Surely not, she thought, leaning back in her chair. She swung the chair onto its back legs to get a better view…and promptly fell backwards with a shriek, hurting her elbow and derriere. Digweed, who had only just cautiously slunk back into the room with a rack of toast, hurried forward to help her up while Benjamin gaped at her, open-mouthed. She risked another glance out the window; the sight of Robin de Noir pacing back and forward on the garden wall while spinning his hat on his finger had shocked her into falling from her chair - she couldn't see him now though, he had probably wandered out of view along the wall.
"Excuse me!" she gasped and quickly ran from the room.
Catherine was furious as she stalked through the gardens to find where the fool had wandered off to, furious with Benjamin for keeping secrets and then shouting at her, furious with Robin de Noir for thinking he could just turn up at the most inopportune moment and swagger about like he owned the place. She eventually found him in an ancient Oak tree which grew right up against the garden wall, he sat on a large overhanging branch, swinging his legs and grinning from ear to ear.
"It's about time too, kitten! I've been waiting out here for almost an hour!" he said in a mock-serious voice. Catherine, who knew very well that he was joking, bristled nonetheless; he has the audacity to scold her for not coming out to speak to him quickly enough while he acts like - well, his normal, disagreeable, petulant self?!
"What on Earth do you want?" she hissed.
"To speak with you." he replied, quite unfazed by the venomous tone to her voice.
"Well, I have no desire whatsoever to speak with you. Please leave." Catherine didn't even wait for a reply, merely turned on her heel and began to walk away.
"What a pity!" Robin called after her, "I suppose I shall just have to keep coming back to sit here every day until you listen to me!"
This made Catherine stop abruptly in her tracks and wheel around, "You do realise we can see you from the house, don't you? What if my brother sees you? He isn't blind or stupid. Then you'll be in hot water, won't you?"
"Ah! I see you're worried for my wellbeing, kitten." Robin said triumphantly, "You're not quite the Ice Queen I thought you were."
"No. If Benjamin sets Wrolf on you for trespassing then I'm not going to lose any sleep. You won't be pestering me anymore."
"I think your heart would break."
"It wouldn't. Now get down. Not on this side of the wall!"
Robin laughed as he pulled himself back up into the tree, "I'm here to make a deal with you." he said seriously once he had calmed and seemingly no longer found Catherine's anger and distress that he had been just about to actually set foot on Merryweather soil quite so hilarious.
"I'm not going to make a deal with you!" Catherine snapped, outraged, "Goodbye." Nevertheless, she couldn't help but linger, a little curious of his proposed deal.
Robin smiled to himself when he realised that she had grudgingly gave him her attention, "I believe you have something which belongs to me."
"And I believe you have a couple of things which belong to me!" Catherine replied sardonically.
Robin seemingly chose to ignore this, "I want you to give me my ring back. It has my family crest on it. I believe it slipped into your hand that night I helped you to escape."
"And what do I get in return?"
"Well, how about this pretty brooch?" he said, taking Catherine's mother's brooch from his pocket.
"Fine. Alright." Catherine relented after some thought, "And I want my scarf back too."
"No, because then you'd have two things and I'd only have gotten one."
"They were mine to begin with!" Catherine pointed out indignantly, "And besides, it's odd that you keep wearing my scarf all the time like that." Robin merely smiled down at her.
"Go and fetch the ring and when you come back we can talk about the scarf." he said. Catherine was more than a little put out at being ordered around by such a horrid boy but, nevertheless, ran to her room anyway to retrieve the ring from where she had hidden it in her jewellery box.
When she returned, Robin had jumped down from the branch and was standing in the garden waiting for her.
"You shouldn't have done that." she said disapprovingly, "What if someone sees you?"
"My dear lady Catherine, could it be that you are actually concerned for me?" Robin taunted.
"Not in the slightest." Catherine said stiffly, "I am, however, concerned that I might be caught having dealings with a De Noir. Here is your ring."
"Thank you, and here is your brooch. Now, about this here scarf…" he trailed off and pretended to be in deep contemplation while Catherine glowered at him.
"Aha! I know! In order to win back this scarf you must do one thing for me." Robin said, smiling slyly. Catherine didn't like the look of that smile.
"What is it?" she said impatiently.
"Kiss me."
