The Serpent Garden - Judith Merkle Riley

by The Serpent Garden (epub)

  Behind us was a boy driving pigs. The stifling smell of them hovered over us on the wind. Something heavy seemed to be oppressing me. At Charing Cross we paused, and I looked all about us. I thought I saw that same man slipping along in the crowd, but there are so many people with black cloaks, I couldn’t be sure. To the south on the right were the tilt yards, and we could hear even there the clatter of noblemen practicing fighting at the Barriers. On the left were the great tenements and wealthy houses that gave way to the walls, gates, and towers of the archbishop’s great palace, York House. I could feel the hairs rising on the back of my neck. Yes, it had been the same one. I was sure we were being followed.

  “Oh, what dreadful air! I’m sure there’s a storm coming, and as far as I’m concerned, it will be a relief.” Nan tugged at her headdress with one hand, while with the other she held the case with my paints. A sudden gust tugged at my skirts. I stopped and pulled at them, turning suddenly. There seemed to be an ugly muttering in the air above us. Could it be distant thunder? The gray clouds were moving swiftly now. Behind us, I thought I saw the figure in black vanish into an open doorway. Was it that ghastly murderer, Septimus Crouch? Who was it, trying to find me alone?

  “Nan,” I whispered. “I swear I saw him—that man. He’s following us. Suppose it’s a hired bravo from that murdering lord?” Nan looked suddenly horrified. We were near the gatehouse to the great courtyard of York House now. He won’t bother us inside, I thought. There are servants everywhere. There are guards at the gate. I began to run, frantic with blind panic. Nan followed, as best she could, the heavy case bumping and rattling as she ran. The first drops of rain had begun to fall. Warm rain, not yet enough to clean the air. We were nearly there now; the gatehouse loomed before us. I put my head down and ran toward it. But, unseeing, I had bumped into someone. A man’s heavy arms grabbed me. I regained my footing and tried to pull away, screaming. The man in black had caught me.

  “Quiet, be quiet there. Look before you scream. Would you have the guards on me?” He put his hand over my mouth, and I could feel him pulling me through the little wicket gate.

  “Susanna, you goose, it’s Master Ashton. He’s in front of you, not behind you. Shut your mouth and open your eyes.” I did open my eyes and found myself looking directly into the angry, confused ones of Robert Ashton, Wolsey’s secretary. His arms were still tight about me to keep me from struggling, and I realized with some embarrassment that I had kicked him in the shins. I could feel my face turning hot.

  “And what new mischief have you done, that you flee as if the Devil himself were chasing you?” I could tell he regretted his shin.

  “There’s a man—all in—black,” I managed to croak out. “He’s following me. I—I thought you were he.”

  “I saw no man in black,” he said. “Mistress Dallet, could it be that at last your conscience pursues you?” He paused a long time and looked very odd indeed. “Search your heart. Have you not…been a part of a man’s betrayal to his death?”

  “Death? You know? I saw him do murder in secret. A—a great lord—” Suddenly I realized Robert Ashton would never believe me. Crouch was his friend, a gentleman, received in Wolsey’s house. Who would believe a woman nobody? And telling would betray me to Crouch. What could he do, an important man like that? Have someone else arrested for the crime? Tom? Master Ailwin? Ashton’s face seemed to collapse and sink inward.

  “He was right,” he whispered, though I didn’t understand why. “You are quick to invent a story,” he said, his eyes bitter and sorrowful. “Clever. I always knew you were clever.” He shook his head. “And what makes you think, Mistress Dallet, that a great lord who had done murder would bother to follow you around? A great lord would send his retainers to wait for you at your door, or perhaps have you arrested on some false charge.” As he spoke, he seemed slumped, as if he had taken on a great load. Now, straightening himself up, as if determined to show nothing, he accompanied us up the steps and through the winding corridors and public chambers of the archbishop’s great palace. What was wrong with the man? “No, admit now that you lie, in the name of your own salvation.” He still had my arm. I looked up at him, puzzled. He waited for my answer, then turned away. “God, twice a fool,” he muttered to himself. Then he turned again to me and said, “Yes. Here we are. Past the antechamber, there, where you see the workmen hanging the tapestries, is his new cabinet. He’s waiting for you.” He pushed me through the arch into the antechamber and vanished like a shadow.

  Oddly enough, I found Wolsey by himself. Even Master Tuke, the lapdog, wasn’t there. But outside the open door, I thought I heard footsteps, as if some man were lingering outside, trying to listen in. Wolsey was seated in a heavy oak chair, all carved and cushioned like a throne. After I had kissed his ring, he told me to send Nan away into the outer chamber and ask her to leave the door closed but for six inches, so people would know he was occupied. Oh dear, I thought. This is a dreadful proposition that he is going to make. And I don’t dare refuse him.

  “Mistress Dallet, I want you to vow on this holy book here that you will never reveal what has transpired in this chamber.” Now I was really frightened. Suppose he changed his mind someday about how well I could hold my tongue and decided I could hold it better in the bottom of a dungeon?

  “I’ll swear, Your Grace. I’ll beg that God will strike me dead if I utter a word.” The oath was not short, and by the end of it I was thoroughly frightened.

  “Now,” said the Archbishop of York, leaning forward in terrifying intimacy and smiling in a way that made me almost certain what he wanted was dishonorable, “now, I want to have you paint a portrait of me, for my own private closet. No one is to know it exists. It is for myself alone.”

  Oh, dear, I thought. As if Adam weren’t enough. I was sure he wouldn’t be satisfied with vines or a large lake of water. Well, at least it isn’t an indecent proposal.

  “Do you see this material, the weight, the shine of it? Can you paint it?” Wolsey had taken out a sample of crimson silk, glimmering with light, approximately two hands’ breadth in size.

  “Yes, Your Grace.”

  “I want you to paint me in profile—the good side, the left, wearing a gown cut as the one I have now, but in this color.” A flood of relief went through me. I can paint anybody dressed.

  “Of course I could do that. But why profile?”

  “My right eye—I would not have you paint that.”

  “If I may beg your pardon, Your Grace, if I can paint you in a gown you are not wearing, I can paint your right eye as fair as your left. Three quarters is very distinguished. It is the new fashion in portraits. Profiles look antique.”

  “I doubt that you can paint this in three quarters. This is what I wish upon my head. The same color as the gown.” Now it was all clear. He had brought from his desk drawer an old medallion bearing the profile of some ancient cardinal. It was a cardinal’s hat he wanted painted on his head. In the privacy of his winter nights, he would stare at this picture to gather his ambitions like troops to scale a city wall. He would be cardinal, no matter what.

  “Then you wish it like the medallion?”

  “Exactly like it.” I began to set out my colors. “I am a busy man,” he said, “I want it done quickly.”

  “I’ll begin it here and finish it in the studio,” I said.

  “I don’t want you taking it to the studio. Who goes to your studio? I hear travelers make a stop there to see the wonders, these days, exactly as they pay a visit to see Paul’s jacks beat the hour in the steeple clock. No, you’ll stay here until it’s finished, where no one can see you.” Outside the window, there was a rattle of thunder and the sound of battering rain, as if a sluice gate had been opened. I hurried to close the window. Suddenly I was frightened.

  “I will need candles, Your Grace, if the clouds make it darker. I can finish before nightfall…I think…”

  “If the rain has stopped, I’ll send you home with an escort. If not, you can rem
ain here with your maidservant until it is finished,” he said, folding his hands in his lap and settling his chins while I sketched in the profile on the carnation.

  “Hold your head so…yes, that’s the most becoming,” I said, trying to stop him from moving.

  “You will need to be packing soon, anyway,” he said.

  “Your Grace, what do you mean?”

  “Why? Didn’t Tuke or Ashton tell you? I’ve made arrangements for you to travel to France with the Princess Mary’s wedding party. You are to paint a pair of commemorative miniatures for His Majesty and divers portraits of the court of France for my private collection. I have made you a list. Ashton has it. Have you seen the portrait in large of the King of France that Perréal has made? No? Well, we English must show them that we are not backward in the arts. No, not at all. Even our women paint better than Perréal. Are you sure you didn’t see the portrait when you were at Greenwich?”

  “Your Grace, I have not yet had the honor of seeing the paintings at Greenwich.”

  “Oh—well, then, it must be arranged, it must be arranged, so you will be able to compare them with those of the King of France when you are there. The King of England has asked me what paintings in the new style the King of France possesses. He would have greater ones. Masterpieces. England must not be backward in paintings. You will subtly inquire, so that no one will know, and you will send me an inventory. My agents fail me in this. They write, ‘a fine great nativity,’ but not how great, or in what style, or even who has painted it. Yes. That you will send me. Then our king will have a bigger one, in better style, hanging more favorably. Then, casually, you understand, casually, I will accompany the French envoys on a stroll in the gallery, past the paintings. And when they say, ‘What a provincial, piquant charm this little nativity has. Have you nothing by Leonardo?’ I will know they lie, lie!”

  As I painted, I began to wonder about the negotiations with France. Clearly, arranging to marry off a princess was more complicated than I imagined.

  “You look downcast. Why do you not rejoice at this honor?” asked the great man.

  “Your Grace, it is my pleasure to obey you in all things, but I was thinking what I would do if some French courtier said my paintings had piquant provincial charm.”

  The mighty Wolsey chuckled. “I have imagined that myself,” he said. “Let me see the sketch.” Silently, I held up to him the portrait of his secret desire. “Very good,” he said, nodding. I stayed the night, and by the light of the next morning, in a secret chamber, finished the glimmering red and jewels of the secret portrait.

  “I have been ordered to escort you home.” I looked up quickly from the basin of water in which I was scrubbing up my brushes and the little mother-of-pearl palette. Robert Ashton stood in the doorway, looking disheveled. There were dark circles under his eyes, and he stared at me with a long, haunted look.

  “And what makes you think I want escorting? Especially by a man who has clearly been up all night drinking and even now can scarcely stand? Go back to bed until you can enjoy the day again.”

  “And I suppose you enjoy it all too well. Why did I never guess? Why did he do this to me? To rub my nose in the dirt? Did he see what I felt? Did it double his pleasure, to use me as his pander? And you, it is the morning of your triumph. No wonder you have risen in favor. You have perfected the ability to seem what you are not. Your husband vanishes conveniently when you know his secrets. Then with your pictures, you worm your way into great men’s houses. How clean, how hypocritical! And when you have pandered to their filthy lusts, they can pretend the payment is for a painting or two. All on the account books, as openly as the cost of a chapel singer or a side of beef. I could never have believed it if I had not seen with my own eyes. You make me sick.” He had come into the room now and stood directly in front of me. His shirt was undone at the neck and I could see a bit of his collarbone, and the place where the tendons of the neck join. Adam betrayed, after the apple. Blaming the snake, blaming the apple, blaming Eve, but never blaming himself. An interesting new composition, very realistic. But monks wouldn’t buy it. Definitely not the sort of thing a man would want to own. Nan looked alarmed.

  “I hope you are not saying what I think you are.”

  “I am saying that and more. Do you think I don’t know with whom you were closeted yesterday? For an hour and a half? The man who takes anything he wants. How perfectly matched with the woman who will stop at nothing.”

  “What were you doing? Snooping outside the door? Then you will know that Nan was with me, and you should be ashamed for thinking to blacken a widow’s reputation.” Nan nodded vigorously in agreement with me.

  “Don’t worry about your reputation,” he said, his voice bitter. “You stand too well with my master now for me to dare breathe a word. But I know this, too. He made your serving woman wait outside.”

  “And left the door to the inner chamber open.”

  “Open by six inches only. What a virtuous six inches! How much can be done in a chamber behind six hypocritical inches!”

  “And what was your interest in these six inches? That they were too small for your prying nose? Or was Master Tuke lurking behind you to keep you from daring to spy?”

  At the mention of the slippery and politic Tuke, he turned so crimson I thought he might explode. I’ve hit it square on at the first try, I thought. Master Tuke has been taken into confidence, and he has not. And Wolsey is rubbing it in by asking him to see me home.

  “What bad sprite has made you so surly and suspicious? You go beyond yourself, Master Ashton. If you were more humble and took more care to please, you would advance more in favor, as Master Tuke does,” I said, just to annoy him further. I was rewarded by seeing him wince.

  “Jezebel,” he hissed, as he followed us from the room. Silently, he followed us through the muddy streets. When we reached the Sign of the Standing Cat, he turned and left without a word. Nan and I stood and watched him go, his hose wrinkled, his hat askew, and his walk angry. Gone. Too bad. He really would have made a good-looking Adam.

  “What ever possessed a great man like the archbishop to have such an obnoxious person about him?” asked Nan.

  “They say he does well on foreign assignments,” I answered. Suddenly, my heart froze with horror. His crazy suspicions were one thing, but what if he went around talking about them? He could spread rumors and ruin my custom along with my reputation. Everything I’d done, all my work, my hard-earned living, could be spoiled in a moment with a few ugly, careless words. That’s what he’d do. He’d ruin me.

  “As a diplomat?” snorted Nan. “Clearly foreigners are less demanding about manners than we English.”

  The Sixth Portrait

  Jean Clouet. ca. 1520? Marguerite of Navarre. 4½ × 3½ cm. Gouache on vellum. Gold frame, encircled with diamonds. Obverse: arms of d’Alençon. Louvre.

  This early portrait of the future Queen of Navarre and celebrated authoress of the Heptameron and Miroir de l’âme pécheresse depicts her sometime in her early twenties, during her first marriage to the Duc d’Alençon. The exquisite workmanship and characteristic use of the sky blue background are derived from the French school of manuscript illumination, which, developed in the masterful hands of Clouet, influenced the works of Holbein, predating the so-called “English school” of miniature painting by at least two decades.

  —R. Dupré. HISTOIRE DE LA PEINTURE FRANÇAISE

  The DUCHESS MARGUERITE HAD A VERY LONG NOSE, ALTHOUGH HER BROTHER’S WAS LONGER. But I think she was the cleverer of the two, and it is too bad she was not born the boy, given that she had more sense. Their mother, Louise of Savoy, only had an ordinary nose, so I think the noses as well as the brains must have come from their father, who was long dead so I couldn’t see whether my idea was true. But they say he not only collected books but had his own illuminator, which is what made Marguerite such a good judge of painting and so quick to like my works in small. I painted her in three-quarters view in the new st
yle, and I think I got the eyes just right though I must admit to shortening the nose just the tiniest bit because it was too long for the fashion.

  But my greatest problem with the painting was that it was nearly stolen by that arrogant bully, Duke Francis’s friend Bonnivet, who thinks he is such a great lover and handsome stallion, which irritates me terribly because even if he is a lord, he is not what I count handsome. He came into my studio while I was working, pretending to be “just visiting” with that big show-off Fleurange and maybe thinking about having his portrait done, and then he “accidentally” picked up the duchess’s portrait to look at. It was about to disappear when I just as accidentally snatched it back, which is a big offense to a lord, and said, “Thank you for praising my work so when it is only half done, but I am sure Duchess Marguerite will let me make a copy for you.” He looked totally shocked, and Fleurange put back his head and roared with laughter, which meant I was safe. But it also meant Bonnivet had wicked desires for the duchess, so I was not at all surprised when I heard a very long time later that he hid in her bedroom and tried to force her and she took several bruises fighting him off before her servants could come. Even so, he was too important for anyone to do anything, and besides, it was all considered just good sport. I’m sure his friends just cuffed him on the arm and made fun of him for not being able to finish the job. That is how it is with those lords, and you have to know it if you want to get on at court.

  Fourteen

  A light rain had fallen the previous night, and the damp had brought the cranes to the rolling meadows beyond the Loire to feed in the hours after dawn. The old King of France, unable to resist the auspicious signs, had ordered out his falconers, huntsmen, and harriers while the light was still rosy. The hunting of four-footed beasts, with noisy horns, baying hounds, and feats of strength, bored him. But falconry was a science; it required a perfect knowledge of beasts, of birds, and of men. Silence and strategy were more important than boastful prowess. Too frail to sit a horse, he was borne, gaunt and gray faced, in a litter carried by two quiet bay jennets to the damp, green meadows beyond the Château de Blois. On his wrist was his favorite gerfalcon, and riding beside his litter were his old councilors, dressed in the dark, earth-toned hunting clothes that kept the birds they stalked from startling and taking flight. A dozen falconers rode at a distance, and the masters of the harriers walked beyond, their shaggy gray hounds quiet beside them. Yet another party of mounted falconers circled beyond the feeding cranes. The crane, sharp beaked, much larger than the falcon, was the noblest prey. The most difficult art was to hunt them with a cast, that is, several trained birds attacking the crane at the same time in the air.