Green Darkness

by Anya Seton

  Celia gasped and clutched at Ursula’s hand. “Behind bars . . .” They each made a silent curtsy, and now there were many curious stares as they walked down the presence chamber. A page guided them out to the courtyard. They mounted their horses, and rode again on the Strand to London Bridge. They did not speak until they were back at Southwark in the little priory lodgings.

  Wat Farrier received them anxiously. “I’d begun to fear fur ye two, ye should’ve ta’en Simkin—traipsin’ London streets alone’s not seemly, ye might run into trouble.”

  “We did,” said Celia, sitting down with a plop on a bench. “Oh, Wat . . .” She clasped her hands tight, and began to cry like a frightened child.

  Wat stared at her, then at Lady Ursula, whose face was drawn and very pale. Brother Anselm crouched over the fire, stirring a rabbit stew for their supper. Simkin was flinging knives, trenchers, pewter spoons and mugs on the oak table.

  “Naow, naow, lass,” said Wat putting his arm around Celia’s shoulders. “Wot’s ado—wot ’appened?”

  “We’ll sup first,” said Ursula, “then I’ll tell you.” She had passed the age of easy tears, and could find no relief like Celia’s, but her hands trembled as she forced herself to eat, and she fought the panic she had not recognized during the ordeal.

  They finished restorative mugs of ale, and white bread and stew, then together told Wat their story. He was more dismayed than the women, since he knew many factors of which they had no inkling.

  Wat gathered that Ursula’s chief resentment was that the Duke had broken her crucifix, and that she had been treated with rude disrespect, like any common wench. Celia, the shock having dissipated, began to look on the episode as an adventure. “That Duke—” she said, “he wasn’t really fearsome, he did say he might’ve put us ‘behind bars,’ but no doubt he didn’t mean it.”

  “He meant it,” said Wat grimly. “Fleet, King’s Bench or Marshalsea, that’s where ye’d have gone save for Lord Clinton.”

  “Well, it didn’t happen,” said Celia. “Jesu, but that ugly little man lives in a fine palace, such gildings, tapestries, carpets and glass. It’s even grander than Cowdray. Wat . . . where’s Hunsdon?”

  “Hunsdon?” Wat repeated in a startled voice. “Was there mention o’ Hunsdon?”

  “Aye,” said Ursula, pushing back her plate. “His Grace asked if we were to stop at Hunsdon on the way north. I’ve never heard of the place.”

  Wat sighed. Despite the King’s visit—after all, a glittering interlude in which these women took scant part—the two lived at Cowdray as sequestered and innocent as in a nunnery. More so, thought Wat, remembering the worldly frivolities at Easebourne. Their ignorance was obviously becoming dangerous to themselves and to the interests of his master. He wiped his mouth on his leather sleeve, and spoke firmly. “The Lady Mary’s at Hunsdon. ’Tis in Hertfordshire, and her favorite seat. We are stopping there on the way north.”

  Ursula swallowed. “The Princess Mary?” she said incredulously.

  Wat shook his head. “Not so called now, another thing ye better remember, or ye’ll get the lot of us hanged at Tyburn yet, m’lady.”

  This morning Ursula would have rebuked such a speech, now she merely said, “What have we to do with the Lady Mary?”

  Wat hesitated. He glanced at the old monk, who was swabbing the stewpot with bread and mumbling the savory morsels between toothless gums. He glanced at his son leaning against the plaster wall making calf’s eyes at the unconscious Celia, who was listening intently for his answer.

  “Message from Sir Anthony,” said Wat briefly. “Natural to pay our respects. She’s still heir to the throne.”

  “Still?” cried Ursula pouncing. “There’s no question about it. ’Twas in the late King’s will. Everyone knows that!”

  “Ah . . .” said Wat, “knowledge’s one thing, wot happens is another. The Lady Mary’s a stubborn Catholic, the saints preserve her!”

  “And Princess Elizabeth is not . . .” said Ursula frowning.

  “The Lady Elizabeth is not. By all accounts she’s a mealy-mouthed little piece, dresses in sad colors, forever given to swoons and megrims, wouldn’t say ‘Boo’ to a goose. I’d not speak thus, m’self, except the King’s Grace now dislikes both his sisters. Won’t see ’em.”

  “Nonetheless,” said Ursula anxiously. “He can’t alter his father’s will.”

  “A King may do as ’e pleases.” Wat clamped down his lips, then mentioned a bearbaiting they might attend to distract their minds from the day’s event. He was no surer of the vague conspiracy afoot than was Sir Anthony, who had confided in him a little. But rumors ran fast underground. Servants knew more than their masters ever guessed, and during the King’s visit Wat had enjoyed a drinking bout with Lord Clinton’s valet. The fellow hinted that the Duke of Northumberland had terrifying ambitions. Though what they could reasonably be, nobody knew.

  “You may take Mistress Celia to the bearbaiting,” said Ursula. “I wish to be quiet. Guard her well.”

  “Ye’ll bide here?” asked Wat. “Aye, rest, lady, we’ll be off to Hunsdon by sunrise.”

  Ursula nodded absently. She wanted to be alone. She watched the excited Celia go off to the bearbaiting between Wat and Simkin. She glanced at Anselm who had collapsed by the fire.

  Ursula pulled the broken gold chain from her waist-pouch, and stared at the twisted link which had held the crucifix. Her eyes watered, she blinked them rapidly, then began to pace the stone floor in unhappy confusion. A longing for guidance seized her, for a priest—but she knew not where to find a priest—for sanctuary then, some hallowed place where she might see the dear familiar symbols which had ever been channels towards prayer and inspiration. She looked out of the window to St. Saviour’s four little spires, put on her mantle, went downstairs into the old cloister garth, and so entered the church.

  Its bleakness confounded her. The painted windows had all been smashed, a dull grayish glass replaced some of them. Below the Gothic vaulting, the fluted pillars had been scribbled on, names and a few obscene sketches drawn with coal. There was no rood screen before the chancel and no altar. A bare oak communion table stood on the altar steps. On the left, the statue of the Holy Virgin was gone, and somebody, a charwoman, no doubt, had left there a faggot broom and cleaning rags. Ursula’s slow footsteps echoed through the empty nave.

  There was no place to sit, but Ursula knelt on the medieval tiles in the chancel and began to tell her beads on the rosary her mother had given her fifty years ago at her first communion. Except during the King’s visit it always dangled from her belt—a plain little chaplet of onyx and crystal ending in a tiny silver crucifix. Her mantle had hidden it at Durham Place, or it would certainly have been destroyed like the ivory crucifix. As it was, she looked around warily before she began the Ave Marias, hating the need to be furtive, as she hated the ugly impersonality of the desecrated church which rendered the prayers meaningless.

  She murmured on, doggedly, seeking a kind of reassurance she had never sought before. There was none. A door slammed somewhere far off and she jumped, hiding the rosary in her pouch. The world has gone mad, she thought. I’m an old woman, and I don’t know what to do. They could have put us in prison. They’re strong—strong and evil. Our Dear Lord and His Blessed Mother have fled this land. Yet, if Celia can be safe . . . Her love for the girl was warm, touchable, while all other loves were not.

  She got up, noting with remote surprise how agile she was, and still aimless, still uncomforted, walked out of the south door.

  The sun was lowering. She glimpsed it misty red, reflected on the Thames where swans glided imperturbably amongst the wherries and barges of the river traffic.

  Ursula wandered along Bankside to the region of brothels and frowsty alehouses called “The Liberty of the Clink,” unaware of the curiosity she aroused amongst the whores who lolled in their doorways waiting for trade. They stared at the tall elderly lady in black velvet who moved past them with utter indiffe
rence. Nobody molested her. She was protected by her dignity, and something in her quite handsome face which they were able to recognize as dolefulness. Sorrow and bereavement were respected in the Clink.

  Ursula continued to walk. She returned through fetid alleys to Borough High Street where she turned north once more towards the Thames. Near the “George” she was impeded by a jostling pack train of laden mules carrying woven goods into the South Country. She drew against a wall, and heard her name called. So deep was her abstraction that she scarcely heeded, and thought she must have mistaken one of the peddlers’ continuous hoarse cries.

  She started when a hand fell on her arm, and a voice repeated, “Lady Southwell!” Ursula looked around and saw Master Julian smiling at her.

  “No more astonished than I,” he said, chuckling at her expression. “To meet again in Southwark!”

  Ursula, after a startled second, felt pleasure and a mysterious relief. Her face lit up. “How happy this is,” she exclaimed, seizing his hand. “I was in sore distress!”

  “I grieve to hear it,” said Julian, amused, a little touched at the warmth of her greeting. He knew lovelight in a woman’s eye, and was far too wise to disdain it, whatever its source. Besides, he liked Ursula, and found her unexpected appearance agreeable.

  They walked along together towards the priory. Julian had just been to inspect a baffling case at St. Thomas’s Hospital hard by—a flaxen-haired girl called Bessie. Her fair face and neck were turning brown as a chestnut, and were further disfigured by inky patches. Moreover, the patient retained no food and was dwindling to monkey size. Bessie was a cousin of Julian’s mistress, Alison, who attributed the repulsive condition to witchcraft, since the girl had ensnared the husband of a notorious and brutal fishwife who cast spells for a sixpence.

  Julian was uncertain. Witchcraft might be possible, yet he suspected that the cause lay somewhere inside the scarlet secret body. The girl was obviously dying, and Julian itched to anatomize the corpse later, as he had seen Vesalius and his own master Fracastorius dissect cadavers at Padua. In England it was legally impossible to procure a corpse. He had been trying to bribe the hospital porter to save him the body of the mottled brown girl when she expired but had scant hope of success. Julian, still impoverished, could offer only half a crown, which was not sufficient to inveigle the porter into crime.

  He temporarily forgot the subject in listening to Ursula’s troubles. She poured them out to him, after they reached the cloister garth and sat down on a stone bench. Julian understood that it was not so much the fright of the arrest by Northumberland’s guard which disquieted Ursula now as a new apprehension in general, and the collapse of values she had thought to be the foundations of living. It was, Julian realized, the first time in Ursula’s sheltered life that she had encountered ruthlessness.

  “And that poor church . . .” she said gesturing, “St. Mary Overies—I’ll not use its new name—what they’ve done to it, why didn’t God and Our Lady protect their own?”

  “One wonders . . .” said Julian, half to himself. “Yet, throughout history evil often triumphs. Or what seems to us evil, how can we be sure?”

  She stared. “Not sure what’s evil? You jest, Master Julian! Or the Devil’s hot breath is corrupting you too, in this wicked town.”

  Julian shrugged. “Possibly, I’ve never seen him, but then I’ve never seen an angel either.” His gray eyes twinkled, and Ursula gave him an uncertain answering smile before reverting to her worries.

  “Will there be more dangers on the way north, d’you think? I mistrust our stop at Hunsdon to see the Princess Mary. Why didn’t Sir Anthony tell me! And that man—the Duke—he sits on his throne like a huge spider spinning webs.”

  “Da veto—” agreed Julian, as it occurred to him that any present association with Ursula might prejudice his own interests. The impulsive woman had made herself conspicuous in dangerous quarters. John Cheke had joined the King’s Progress at Portsmouth, but Julian had first had one encouraging interview with his friend. There was still hope of preferment at Court. Northumberland would also soon join the King. If discovered—any intimacy with a known Catholic was scarcely wise.

  Julian rose from the bench, picking up his medical staff. “Well, cara donnas,” he said pleasantly, “I must return to Alison who awaits news of her sick cousin. May good fortune be yours!”

  Ursula started. “You’re not leaving!” Her cry was so woeful that Julian took her hand and kissed it in a courtly manner.

  “I regret, but I must. At least . . .” he added smiling, “you’ve got the little Celia away from the entanglement you feared at Cowdray. That is gained.”

  “Aye,” said Ursula swallowing. “And my Celia is destined for a brilliant future. You said so . . . her nativity, her palms!”

  Julian bowed, concealing an interior chill. He had seen other things in Celia’s future, but there were no certainties in the fuzzy realms of prognostication, and of late he had refused to explore them.

  “Master Julian!” Ursula cried involuntarily, “will you marry your leman—that Alison?” Her thin cheeks flushed.

  “Per Bacco, no!” Julian was outraged. “A Ridolfi di Piazza wed a barber’s daughter! You insult me, Lady!”

  Ursula’s flush deepened, but her eyes showed relief. “I’m sorry, Master—to be sure you can find a much better match, if you so incline.”

  His frown cleared, he gave her a kind look, far more aware than she of the attraction he held for her. Had she been rich, had she lofty position, her ten years or so of seniority would not have deterred him. She was healthy, and she loved him—besides, all cats are gray at night. As it was, he bowed, said, “Good-bye, Lady Southwell, no doubt we’ll meet when you return,” strode from the cloister garth and forgot Ursula as he regained High Street. That girl in St. Thomas’s, she might be dead by now. If I could have a look at the liver, he thought. It must be the liver, or that little bladder above it which makes gall . . . yet though we often see jaundice, what could turn the skin to bronze—to black?—except plague. He glanced down at the hyacinth he wore around his neck in deference to custom rather than belief. The girl did not have plague, she had none of the symptoms, but if he told the porter she had? Then he’d give me the body, shovel it out dead or alive. Fool not to think of it sooner! Julian hurried back to St. Thomas’s.

  Ursula, left alone on the bench under the cloister, and even more dispirited than before she met Julian, sighed, and wandered upstairs to await Celia’s return from the bearbaiting.

  On the following afternoon when Ursula’s party reached Hunsdon in Hertfordshire, they were soaked from a steady downpour, and very hungry. Yet it was a long while before they were admitted to the rambling brick mansion. Unknown visitors were rare at Hunsdon, and always viewed with anxious suspicion. The guard left them standing by the gatehouse while he scurried off to consult higher authorities.

  Finally Princess Mary’s steward, Sir Thomas Wharton, appeared.

  “State your business to me,” he barked at Ursula, who by her dress and bearing must be the most important one of the wet bedraggled party. “Her royal grace is unwell, and cannot be bothered by petitioners.”

  Wat stepped forward authoritatively. “We come, sir, from Cowdray. I’ve a message from Sir Anthony Browne, he wants it delivered in person.”

  Wharton frowned, noting the buck-head badge. Sir Anthony had been Catholic, but now, obviously, had turned heretic like so many other scoundrels, otherwise the King would not have visited him. Moreover, there was the alliance between Browne’s stepmother and Lord Clinton, a notorious Dudley-ite.

  “Give me the message, fellow . . .” said Sir Thomas. “If I think it meet, I’ll relay it.”

  Wat’s little bear eyes hardened, his underlip thrust out. “Message’s in me head—master wants it delivered in person.”

  “That you’ll not do,” cried Sir Thomas, angered by the varlet’s tone. “I told you her grace is unwell. Be off with ye . . .” He gestured towards th
e guard, then froze, startled as they all were by a deep mannish voice calling from a window across the courtyard. “What’s ado, Sir Thomas? Who is it?”

  They looked up and saw a woman’s head in a jeweled coif leaning out the window. “Bring them in!” the voice called.

  He made an exasperated gesture, but he dared not disobey.

  When they entered the Hall, Princess Mary stood by a great snapping fire awaiting them.

  How small the royal lady was, Celia thought, as she copied Ursula’s curtsy—small and pinched-looking under a glitter of jewels and gold-threaded brocade. You’d never look at her twice if you saw her dressed in jersey. Her hair, once the true Castilian gold, had faded to drab. Her thin mouth was stubborn. Her eyes sunken and set in a frown of pain.

  Though Mary was but thirty-five, Celia thought her old and negligible. She thought the whole visit tiresomely uncomfortable, since she was cold and hungry, nor had she much curiosity about the mysterious message. She stood aside and idly counted the panes in the latticed windows, while Mary questioned Wharton in her harsh, deep voice. Wat was seething impatiently, but held his tongue. Ursula watched the Princess’s little face grow increasingly suspicious; she saw that Wharton’s attitude would prevail and they would all be packed off into the cold drizzle again. She then perceived the elaborate gold crucifix amongst the other jewels on Mary’s flat chest.

  Ursula reached in her pouch and drew out her own shabby rosary. She waited until the gesture caught Mary’s eye, then slowly kissed the silver cross.

  The Princess started, her face was transfigured, her thin lips relaxed into a singularly sweet smile. “Ah-h . . . so . . .” she murmured. “You are welcome to Hunsdon,” she said, “in the name of Our Blessed Lord.”

  She gave orders to the reluctant Wharton, and commanded that Ursula should sup with her. “You shall tell me, Lady Southwell, about my brother, the King’s Grace—how he looked, what he said, at Cowdray. ’Tis long since I’ve seen him, and never alone any more. He loved me once,” she added beneath her breath, “Holy Virgin, he can not have grown to hate me. He can not!”