The Serpent Garden - Judith Merkle Riley

by The Serpent Garden (epub)

  So it was that I was busy in the long gallery just after Saint Nicholas Day looking at a painting of King Charles the Seventh’s mistress as the Holy Virgin in a scandalous state of undress done by that Maître Jean Fouquet they all spoke so highly of. It was when I was thinking that if he’d known more about female anatomy, he wouldn’t have painted her right breast in the shape of a large cannonball practically on her shoulder, that I heard footsteps behind me in the gallery. Nan was dozing out of pure boredom on a bench, with her mending almost sliding off her lap, and a couple of ugly cats had come to rub their heads on my skirts as if I could give them something to eat, which I couldn’t. I had my magnifying glass in my hand to look at the brushstrokes on the draperies, and my attention was very concentrated, so I didn’t look around.

  “Not as undressed as The Temptation of Eve and not as pink, either,” said a voice behind me. Outside, the rain was rattling on the lead roofs, pouring down the steep towers in sheets. The long gallery was cold and stank of urine. I turned and saw Robert Ashton standing there, in a damp gray cloak, as thin and pale as a ghost.

  “Master Ashton! They told me you were dead, and then I saw Tom, and he said you had lived. But…but I thought you’d gone back to England.”

  “They told me I’d find you here.” Ashton came closer, and I could see that he limped. He looked wan and frail, and his eyes were sunken in dark circles. He could have been a ghost, except that he made my heart jump. I wanted him to embrace me again; I wanted to put my arms around him, but there was something in him that said I couldn’t. And oh, he was thin. I felt the strangest urge coming over me. The urge to feed him. Joints and cheese and heavy English ale and thick pottage laden with parsnips and onions and carrots came all unbidden to my mind. I was never much of a cook, but I could feel it all rising inside me. He needed feeding up.

  “Tom is a good boy. He stayed with me, when I…he stayed. We talked. You were right. There was a man who did murder, and he is one that I knew and whose word I trusted. I trust him no more. Did you know that Tom was in love with you?” That odd gesture again, the stiffened shoulder, the nervous unrolling of one hand with the other.

  “Always. But I didn’t lead him on. I knew he’d grow out of it and find someone more suitable.” Ashton paused, as if thinking.

  “While I was…lying ill…they gave me up, you know…while I was at Calais, one thing haunted me. There is something I must hear from you alone. Then I’ll go and not bother you again. How did…how did your husband pass from this life?” What was wrong with him? He looked as if he had some disease of the soul. Why come so far, to ask a thing like that once more, a thing he already knew? Had I just imagined the magic of that night before we left Dover? Was it just some wistful dream hatched of solitude and disappointment?

  “Master Dallet was murdered in bed with another man’s wife. Why do you want to bring up old things that cause me pain?”

  “I need to know…how the husband knew to return home at that very instant.”

  “You mean that Captain Pickering? That I never knew myself until later. Someone sent him a letter. I found out from Sir Septimus Crouch that it was a man called Ludlow—a dreadful carrion crow of a lawyer who wanted to get his hands on something my husband had and wouldn’t give him.”

  “Ludlow. And Crouch. Jesus! It fits. It all fits. You didn’t rejoice when he died?”

  “Rejoice? My God, you think that? What do you imagine me to be? A ghoul? He left me without a penny, and I found the man his funeral money. Ask anyone! He was buried like a gentleman, even if he did live like a whoremaster. I did it! I paid his debts with my parents’ wedding bed, which they died on! What do you imagine I did? Carouse in some tavern with all the money he left me? Every penny, every gift, went to his mistress! She had a fine big son who looked like him, and I had a dead baby! Ask Nan what he left me! Nothing! Less than nothing! Everything I have, every debt was paid, with the arts my father taught me. He took everything and left me with nothing. And I was married in church with God’s blessing! Where was God’s blessing then?” I burst into tears, and he stepped back, aghast.

  What with all this shouting in English, Nan woke up with a start, and her mending dropped on the floor. The cats went and hid in the gallery fireplace, which was piled with wood, but unlit. Ashton’s face had turned sheet white, and his jaw dropped.

  “Your father taught you?”

  “Of course. He was a great master. How do you think I learned? Out of the air? Do you take me for a freak? Master Dallet only married me to find out my father’s secrets when he wouldn’t sell them. Once he had become great with my father’s wisdom, he left Nan and me to starve.”

  “Wrong. I was wrong on every count,” I could hear him mutter to himself, as he shook his head. He seemed torn between fleeing and speaking. I suddenly realized that whatever it was he believed about me, it was far worse than being Wolsey’s doxy, which in itself was insulting enough.

  “What was it you heard? Who told you?” He hesitated a long time before he answered.

  “Sir Septimus Crouch. He…he said…you’d sent the letter.” He hung his head down. I was cold all the way to my heart.

  “That monster,” I whispered. “That lying monster.”

  I remembered him now, all disheveled and crazy. I remembered Crouch, standing by his side, so confidential and cozy. I thought of his fits and starts, his silences, the way he watched me when I was in company. He must have been in love then, maybe always, as much as Tom. But what kind of love is it that hurries to believe the worst? Bad love. He looked at my face. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m not your minder anymore, so I’ve no right to speak. I’ll go now. I’ll write to Wolsey about you. I’ve been put on another task anyway….” Stiff and pale, he turned and limped away.

  “Master Ashton, you stop now!” said Nan, barring his way. “You should be ashamed.”

  “I am.” I could hear his voice respond, even though it was low.

  “And proud, too. Too proud to see what you’ve done to my darling. Turn around and look at her face, you selfish man.” He looked over his shoulder, but I couldn’t see him very well, on account of the blurriness caused by the tears. It was so stupid standing there in that cold, urine-soaked gallery, and sobbing so; the rain was crying down out of the cold, gray sky, and my face was all wet and my heart broken open in a hundred places and dripping away all my joy. It all matched, me and nature, which is not original. As a work of art, it should have been better composed.

  “You’ve made too much of a mess to walk away without a word. You haven’t the right,” Nan said firmly. He stopped. “Oh, I always knew you were no good for her. Do you think I didn’t try to keep you apart? But since you’re here, I expect you to make good on what you’ve done. You go back. You go back now and make it right with her, or I swear, my ghost will haunt you until the end of your days.”

  “I can’t,” he said.

  “You mean, you can’t make it right with you,” said Nan. “But you owe it to her to make it right with her. You apologize, and beg forgiveness, as Our Lord says you must do, before you just dance off into a cloud of self-pity and start preening yourself for being such a tragical, lonely figure.” He looked shocked and horrified.

  “You know I’m right, don’t you! Let me say this. I may be old, Master Ashton, but I am not stupid. Speak now, before you lose your chance forever.” The gallery seemed very long at that moment. The uneven sound of his boots as he limped the length of it seemed to echo unnaturally in the silence. Outside, the rain gusted against the stone wall and roared like waterfalls from the mouths of the gargoyle rainspouts.

  “Mistress…Dallet. I believed…what no man of honor…should believe of a woman…I…I beg your forgiveness,” he said.

  “I never would have done such a thing. You were wicked to believe it….” I rubbed my knuckles in my eyes, but they just wouldn’t quit being wet.

  “Susanna, you have not forgiven. You must.” Nan’s voice was firm. Just as when I
was ten years old, and my brother, Felix, spoiled my drawing of the Virgin, just because it was better than his. I didn’t forgive for a whole week. But then he grew ill, and after I forgave him, he died, and things were never the same. I should have forgiven sooner, even though I didn’t want to. I looked at Master Ashton’s pale face. He didn’t like apologizing either. He would rather make excuses for himself. So would I. He could die. We all could die. Life is no good with a hard heart.

  “Master Ashton, you are…forgiven. I forgive you.”

  “I truly forgive you,” prompted Nan. I could see a little spark of something, something faded but humorous, in Master Ashton’s hazel eyes. The gray light from the window picked up a hidden chestnut tint in his dark brown curls. He’s one, too, I thought suddenly.

  “Did she have to do this often, when she was small?” he asked.

  “Of course,” said Nan.

  “So did I,” he said in a small voice.

  “Two of a kind,” said Nan. “It’s the hair.”

  “My hair is not red, Nan, only a little gingery.”

  “And mine is really brown. A dark brown, almost black, if you look at it right. Not red a bit,” said Robert Ashton. I couldn’t help smiling. I touched his curls.

  “Your hair’s caught fire, then,” I said.

  “And how long has yours been smoldering?” he asked, running a finger along one of those little bits I can never get to stay under my headdress.

  “Since birth, Master Ashton, since birth,” announced Nan.

  “Do you always have to be right, Nan?” I asked.

  “Always. Who is older and wiser?”

  “You,” said Robert Ashton and I together, and Nan nodded happily.

  “Mistress Dallet, may I have your permission to pay you court? I am only a younger son, without prospects. I inherited ten pounds and a horse when my father died, but the horse died and the money is spent. I rise no further in the archbishop’s service because Brian Tuke blocks my way. Say yes or say now that you scorn me, and let me go. I will feel none the worse for it. I have been scorned by ambitious women before, and I am hardened.”

  “Master Ashton, I have only the work of my hands as my dowry, and should any man take my work from me, then he shall have no marriage portion at all. Consider that, before you pay me your addresses, if they be honorable. And remember that for all your wicked imaginings I am a reputable widow, and will accept no dishonorable propositions.”

  “Then I fear we are well matched, in fortune as well as hair.”

  “In hair? Never,” said I. “But as for fortune, I have never bothered much about that. God makes our fortunes.”

  “Then you are different from all the women in the world, for which difference I am grateful,” he said.

  “Then I take it you still plan to address your suit to me?”

  “I do, for as long as it takes to convince you that I am not a hateful villain and a gossip. I rue the day I ever let that odious Septimus Crouch twist my mind with his venomous calumnies.”

  “Crouch? He is the vilest monster I’ve ever known. I saw him do a murder and walk away as if he’d been to a supper party. He killed the lawyer Ludlow, and all for some book that could hardly be worth it. I supposed it was fate. Ludlow took the baby’s cradle, you know, and it was accursed because the baby died in it. And now I’ve found that Crouch is here, too. I’ve had a terrible time, hiding from him.”

  “Here? Susanna, does he know where you are?”

  “He might know I’m here, but he hasn’t found me yet. He goes about with some horrible Italian fellow, these days.”

  “Signor Belfagoro. I know. He is a hero to the English. And even the French court him now. I dare say nothing about him; they can find no words high enough to praise the two of them. And yet I am sure that they are up to no good.” He shook his head slowly, and his eyes were serious.

  “Do they have anything to do with why you are here?”

  “I don’t think so, but I would be happy if it were so.”

  “Why happy?”

  “Because it would solve a mystery. There is someone—or perhaps many someones—linked in a conspiracy to destroy the alliance. They believe that the failure will cause the House of Valois to fall and they will achieve supreme power. I have been asked to find out who is involved with this secret organization, and who leads them. I stayed overlong in Calais, thinking I might find a clue among the captains there. But no, in spite of his name, he is no sailor.”

  “I’m glad. I’ve had enough of sailors, especially captains.”

  “But in all your travels among the great, keep your ears open for me, for the archbishop, and for England. Somewhere, most probably at court, there is a man of power who calls himself the Helmsman.”

  The great Salle Pavé at Les Tournelles was hung with rare tapestries and silk banners ornamented with Tudor roses and King Louis’s boar. The light from hundreds of candles glittered on the green-and-yellow designs in the celebrated faience floor. Musicians played from the gallery, and the glistening tiles swarmed with dancers of both sexes as Suffolk, the victor, led the queen herself in the first figure of the dance. Those who felt themselves too old, or too infirm from their recent battles to dance, contented themselves with clustering by the walls, gossiping while they admired the grace of the ladies and the elegant figures cut by the men.

  On the dais, the king sat on a high, cushioned seat beside a similar one still warm from the impression of the queen’s young body. How she had wanted to dance! First her finger had tapped on the arm of the seat, then her toe had tapped as well, and he could hear her breath coming in time to the music. But the old king’s joints hurt too much to carry him out on the floor, and he was beginning to regret the young queen’s giddiness, her animal spirits, her enthusiasms. Perhaps he should have married the older sister, after all. Someone steadier, soberer, less inclined to dance. He had given her another jewel the night before, the night after Suffolk’s triumph over the giant challenger, but she had not seemed as delighted as usual. She did not turn pink, or clap her hands, and her kiss of thanks seemed cool and obligatory.

  Now she had danced with d’Alençon, with Dorset, and was cavorting with Suffolk. The Dauphin, however, was a model of rectitude, the king mused. He was maturing, beginning to understand his duties. There he was, bringing a cup to his duchess. Claude, how like her mother she looked, thought the king. Suppose she could only produce living daughters, like her mother? The house of Valois was at risk. Civil war might ensue. Disaster. He must, he must get a son with this new wife. “Monsieur,” he said, gesturing to Francis to join him, “the queen dances too much with the English duke. Escort her back to me.” As he watched the queen squirm among the cushions on her chair, barely able to suppress the petulant look on her face, he realized more than ever that quiet evenings such as pleased him would not suit her. He must keep her busy, he must keep her amused, he must show himself to be still-young and gallant at heart. Was he not king? Had he not been victor in greater tournaments in his day? He would show them; he would show them all that he was still young. He would attract her eyes to him and only him.

  Francis glanced sideways with his narrow, sly eyes at his lord and king, then at the fidgeting girl beside him. His eyes sought out her creamy profile, then the bulge where her bodice compressed two white, delicious breasts upward. Cleverly, he concealed his thirst for the delights he imagined beneath her gown. The old king’s face was gray, jealous, determined. You are not fit for her, he thought. I will be the victor. Beneath his long nose, the corners of his mouth turned upward as he imagined the sweetness of his victory, the look on her face…

  Across the great hall, Crouch, who was now an honored guest of the English, was pointing out to the foreign Archduke Belfagoro of Tartarus, the famous horse breeder, the various great persons who were in the room, and doing his best to explain French royal genealogy to him. “Now, the House of Valois is the cadet branch of the Capetians, who include King Philip the Fair, and the thr
one has come to this, the cadet branch of the Valois, through the failure of King Charles the Eighth to have a son. That is why this king, Louis the Twelfth, is a generation older, being the son of the late king’s great-granduncle, the Duc d’Orléans. He, too, has had no living son.”

  “Ugh, branches, cousins, cadets, what a tangle! But you say this king has no son? Why then, looking at him, all pale and old like that, I shall soon be free,” muttered Belphagor. Crouch, who, though wide, was taller than Belphagor, looked down at him and smirked. How little you know, he thought. Belphagor, surveying the roomful of branches, cousins, and cadets, said, “So, Crouch, tell me more of King Charles’s father, the illustrious Louis the Eleventh. Now there was a fellow I would have enjoyed knowing! Murder, rapine, torture! Now, how was it that he maintained his power?”

  “The Spider King shut himself in Plessis-les-Tours, surrounded by a Scottish guard loyal only to him…”

  “Now who is that fellow over there—the tall, thin, dark-haired one, who stands by himself? I like the look on his face. Arrogant. Treacherous. He seems like the sort of fellow I’d get along with.”

  “That is the most noble Charles de Bourbon, a great warrior and hero, who has just married the heiress to most of the lands in central France.”

  “Has he a claim to the throne?”

  “Only a most distant and dubious one. But his possession of the heiress, a direct desendant of the Valois through the female line, will give any son born to him a mighty claim…”

  “Ah, perfect, perfect,” said Belphagor, rubbing his hands as he gazed possessively at the dark man with the smoldering, rebellious glance. “If this king dies without sons, I can set the country at civil war.”

  “But any contender you support would meet with powerful opposition from the king’s cousin, the offspring of the Angoulêmes, who is not only the closest male heir but married to the king’s eldest daughter and named Dauphin, unless the current queen has a son.”