The Poison Bed: 'Gone Girl meets The Miniaturist'

by E C Fremantle

  Father was there when Anne and I arrived, pacing the hall, restless, barking orders to the servants. ‘He’s been asking for you.’ He sounded brittle and vindictive. As a child I’d learned to avoid him in that mood, but on that day, there was no choice. ‘Over here first!’

  He yanked me to one side, handling me roughly. ‘I’ve learned that it was your husband,’ he spat, as if he couldn’t bear to say Robert’s name, ‘who recommended the appointment of Winwood.’ He had my finger bent back. I shook off his hold. ‘Explain to me how that happened.’ His face was pushed up close to mine. ‘I thought we could trust you.’

  ‘I did everything in my power to stop him, but he wouldn’t listen.’ I was up against the panelling and turned my face so I didn’t have to look at him. I often wondered if Father’s dislike of me stemmed from Uncle’s fondness. He must have known of the rumours, the doubts about my paternity.

  ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t become a fly in our ointment.’ His mouth was a pinched line but, for all his posturing, Father had never really had Uncle’s talent for intimidation. ‘In future keep your husband in line.’

  My retort was sharp: ‘Or what?’

  His lip curled but Anne’s small cough made his eyes flick up to the stairs where she was on the half-landing, looking down on us. ‘Just do as you’re told.’

  Uncle’s room was quiet as a church and the scent of incense hung in the air, only half masking the stench of decay. Dr Mayerne was with him, which puzzled me, for Uncle had always seemed to disapprove of what he called Mayerne’s ‘unconventional methods’. Methods, he’d always maintained, that had brought on the prince’s death. The doctor stepped aside as Anne and I approached, going to the far end of the chamber where Uncle’s greyhound was curled in the only small patch of sun that penetrated the heavily curtained space.

  Uncle seemed small and feeble, dwarfed by the expanse of bed and acres of spotless linen emblazoned with the Howard arms. In a weak and ponderous voice, he told us he’d recently heard mass. ‘The priest will still be loitering, no doubt, waiting to come back and give me extreme unction.’ Shock rendered me dumb.

  Though he had been deteriorating for some months, I hadn’t fully registered the extent of his physical diminishment until that moment. His bony wrists poked from the crisp, bright cuffs of his nightshirt, and his face was grey with pain, eyes opaque. I did my best to hide my response but Uncle knew me too well. ‘It’s monstrous what the march of death does to us, isn’t it, Frances?’

  I didn’t answer. I couldn’t patronize him with a lie, and silently asked God to give me strength. Anne hovered half in and half out of the door. ‘Is that Mistress Turner?’ he asked. ‘Come here. Let me see you properly.’ Anne approached to stand beside the bed. ‘Time has been kind to you, my dear.’

  She leaned forward to place a hand over his. ‘I will pray for you.’ I could see she was holding back tears.

  ‘And I for you.’ He began to reminisce, talking of when he’d first known her and employed her to take care of me as a child.

  I was reminded that Anne had known Uncle long before she had known me, that they had a separate connection to each other that I had no part in. I didn’t want to think about it – didn’t want to poison the moment with my suspicions. ‘Now, if you wouldn’t mind, dear, I’d like a little time alone with my great-niece. And would you kindly also ask the doctor to wait with you in the hall.’

  As they were leaving he said, ‘Mayerne has some very odd ideas but he has a talent for finding remedies to relieve my pain. They make me a little muddleheaded but have helped me feel more comfortable. It became excruciating, you see.’ He rasped as he spoke, like an ancient pair of bellows. ‘I find my belief a great source of succour. I’m profoundly thankful that I embraced the true faith before it was too late.’ I knew he was going to allude to my own faith, for he always did. ‘I’d like to think you might follow my lead. I sense that young husband of yours is opening to our ways. Perhaps he will persuade you once I’m gone.’

  I felt myself teetering on the edge of an abyss. ‘I don’t know, Uncle. I feel too deeply mired in sin.’

  ‘In sin?’ He held my forearm with his big claw of a hand and drew me close to speak in my ear. ‘In the true faith you can be forgiven if you confess. I’ve felt it as my salvation to be able to leave my sins behind on this earth. There’s no such comfort for Protestants. They must carry their sins for eternity.’

  I could feel panic slicing through me, bringing a desperate desire to stop time. I wanted to ask what he meant by leaving his sins behind. I believed I was the receptacle for all that wrongdoing.

  ‘I don’t want to see you upset, Frances. I don’t want weakness to be the last impression I have of you.’

  ‘Of course not, Uncle.’ I was fragmenting, crumbling to dust.

  ‘I want to think of you carrying the banner for the Howards when I’m gone. You have been the culmination of my life’s work, my greatest legacy.’ I expected him to rail about my failure over Winwood but he didn’t mention it. ‘And you’ve been magnificent lately. You’ve not been married half a year and yet you have the King’s confidence. I know you’ll help him to forge our alliance. England will find herself again.’

  I didn’t want to say what I really thought, that he was wrong, that England wouldn’t want a Spaniard as queen, that the people would rise up to prevent it, that even I was against it. His great vision was nothing but a delusion.

  ‘I’ll be watching you when I’m gone.’ He seemed to find some strength from somewhere as he still had hold of my hand, tourniquet tight, as if he might drag a vital part of me out of the world with him.

  ‘Please don’t talk of that.’ I shook my head.

  ‘Frances, it’s not like you to shy away from the truth.’

  ∞

  The day after the lieutenant’s visit someone else arrives. He is a young man with a pronounced under bite who looks at Frances with a mixture of fear and contempt, as if she is leprous. He gets down on his knee, but reluctantly so. Normally Frances would say there is no need for such formality but she doesn’t because of the scorn he takes no trouble to conceal.

  Nelly watches the visitor carefully as she plays peekaboo with the baby.

  ‘What’s your business?’ Frances asks, and he tells her he’s come on the King’s orders. She is glad there is no matting between his knee and the cold stone floor.

  ‘I am to deliver your infant into the care of Lady Knollys.’ He is speaking to her feet. He dares not meet her eye while telling her she is to be separated from her baby. It makes her think less of him than she already does.

  ‘I’m sure she will be well looked after by my sister.’ This means the trial really is to go ahead. Nervousness threads through her but she’d rather die than let it show.

  ‘The wet-nurse is to go with the infant, until other arrangements are made.’

  Frances wonders what he means by this: until someone more suitable can be employed, probably. She sits at the table and pens a letter to Lizzie, recommending the girl.

  ‘Why don’t you get up off the floor?’ Her tone makes it seem as if it is the young man’s own fault he is still kneeling. He stands, looking unsure of what to do with himself, until she tells him to wait outside while they prepare the baby.

  Frances folds and seals the letter. Nelly mumbles her gratitude. Her lower lip wobbles. ‘Don’t cry, for goodness’ sake,’ Frances tells her firmly. ‘Here, give the baby to me, while you get your things ready.’

  Its small hand grips the edge of her dress, and she wonders why she doesn’t feel more. She has seen mothers who suffered at having to hand their babies to a nurse for an afternoon. She is not like those women. She never was. She is Uncle’s unsentimental creation. The child smiles, a wide gummy beam. Frances remains unmoved. She cannot allow herself to indulge in emotion – it might engulf her.

  Nelly has gathered her paltry belongings and tucked them in with the baby’s things. Frances rummages in the box that houses h
er few valuables, pulling out her purse to give Nelly a few crowns. ‘This should see you all right for a while in case my sister doesn’t take to you.’ A beaded string slithers to the floor without Frances noticing and the girl crouches to retrieve it, holding it out for her.

  But then, with a small pant, Nelly draws her hand back to inspect the pearls and rubies, wrapping it around her wrist, unwrapping it, looking hard at Frances. ‘You described exactly this bracelet. It’s the one you gave to that girl – the child that stood in for you.’

  ‘It was one of a pair.’ Frances takes it from her with a firm smile, stuffing it back into the box, then holding out the coins.

  ‘You never said what happened to that girl.’ Nelly is concentrating on Frances, as if she is a sum that needs to be calculated.

  ‘That’s because I never knew.’ Nelly seems to be weighing up whether to believe her or not. Frances places the coins in her palm. ‘I don’t know how I can ever repay you for your kindness to me.’

  Nelly stares at the coins as if they might burn her. For an endless moment, she appears to deliberate. Then she pours them into her apron pocket and, looking up, says, ‘I’ve never seen so much money in one place.’

  ‘Mind you keep it safe.’ The baby is becoming restless on Frances’s hip.

  ‘You’ve been very kind to me too.’ Nelly sounds choked.

  ‘Let’s not get mawkish. Now remember,’ Frances drops her voice, ‘it is highly likely you will be questioned about me. They will want to know anything I might have told you to help their investigation. You won’t hold back trying to protect me, will you, Nelly? I don’t want to think of you being forced to speak.’

  Nelly pales and seems suddenly very young. She must be thinking of the terrified howls they hear at night. ‘What’ll they do to you?’

  ‘Most likely hang me,’ Frances says, in a matter-of-fact way, holding out the baby.

  ‘But you’ve done nothing wrong.’ Nelly looks aghast.

  ‘It’s not what actually happened but how it looks that counts.’ Frances hands her the child. ‘Do you know what the punishment for poisoning was in the old King Henry’s day?’

  Nelly shakes her head.

  ‘Boiling alive!’

  The girl almost loses her grip on the infant, and Frances thinks she may have gone too far with that last comment.

  ‘I doubt they’d do that to me. Not to the Countess of Somerset.’ She pauses while the girl pulls herself together. ‘Perhaps they will hear what you have to say and I’ll be set free.’

  ‘I’ll tell them that you’ve done nothing – nothing at all but obey your great-uncle.’ Nelly seems invested with new purpose. ‘He’s the one deserves boiling alive – and your husband isn’t much better. The pair of them deserve to burn in –’

  ‘That’s enough, Nelly.’ Frances senses everything falling beautifully into place. She has strung the instrument and is wielding the bow, playing it to her own harmony, everyone dancing to it. ‘All you have to do is tell the truth.’

  She laughs inwardly and thinks of something she once said to Uncle: There’s no such thing as the truth.

  A couple of lads come in to take the luggage, balancing the wicker cradle on top of it. Frances will be glad to see the last of that creaking thing.

  They stand opposite each other. ‘I wish you all the very best, Nelly. I’m grateful to you for all you’ve done and for judging me kindly. Most wouldn’t have, you know.’

  Frances is relieved to see that the girl’s eyes are dry. Nelly fumbles in the folds of her apron, pulling out her treasured pack of cards. ‘Here, have these.’ Frances is touched and thanks her warmly.

  ‘I …’ she begins, and Frances expects her to say she’ll pray for her but she doesn’t. ‘I wish you luck,’ is what she says.

  Oh, luck has nothing to do with it, Frances thinks, as she watches them leave. She goes to the window and can see the lads loading the trunk. They drop the cradle, breaking one of the rockers, and it is left abandoned beside the gutter. Nelly climbs up into the cart. It is high but she refuses to hand over the baby to make it easier for herself.

  Frances shuts the window and turns to regard the empty room, imagining the girl being questioned and convincing them all of Frances Howard’s innocence, rendering her confession null and void.

  A victor’s smile moves over her face. There is always another truth – another Frances Howard.

  The Other Frances Howard

  Her

  Uncle still clung to Frances’s hand, as if she were the only thing left to moor him to the world.

  ‘The truth? There’s no such thing as the truth.’ Her tone was bald. ‘Is there?’ He looked as if he had been slapped. ‘Is there?’ she repeated.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’ His voice was a rattle.

  ‘Oh, you do.’ She puffs out a disdainful snort. ‘You won’t be watching me. Not from where you’re going.’

  ‘Frances?’ He was horror struck – confused. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Don’t you know me, Uncle? You made me. You wanted a device to do your bidding so you created me.’ She offered him a frost-bitten smile. ‘I was your instrument to gain power but now I have my own instrument: the man you matched me with, the man who has the King’s ear. Does your invention frighten you, Uncle?’

  ‘Frighten?’ His breath was coming in short, urgent bursts.

  ‘The difference between you and me is that you care about it all so much. That’s your weakness. Your pretty speech about me being your legacy – oh dear, do you think your legacy means anything to me?’

  ‘But I love you. I’ve always loved you as if you were my own daughter.’

  ‘Your own daughter? You’ve never behaved as a father to me, have you?’ She gave him a moment to consider that, to remember. ‘But if you say something often enough to yourself, I imagine you must end up believing it.’

  ‘I beg your forgiveness, my dearest, dearest girl.’ He brought his hands together. His eyes were soupy with tears. She was disgusted. ‘What I did, I did for love.’

  ‘Love?’ Her bitterness rings through the room. ‘I predict the next thing you ask of me is to call your Catholic priest, so you can have your deathbed absolution. Poor Uncle, all those wicked deeds will be too heavy for you to carry up to Paradise. No! You shall plummet to the other place.’

  ‘Sins.’ He could hardly rasp the word out. ‘I have sinned. None of us is free of sin.’ He then appeared completely lucid, clutching at her with his damp gaze. ‘But not murder – never murder.’

  ‘I know that. You never had the courage to deal with things properly. Never the strength to look someone in the eye as you extinguished their life.’ A frisson of pleasure runs through her body as she remembers the feeling of omnipotence. It had been a shame to dispatch one so innocent, but she had known too much. The girl was so like herself, Frances thought, almost a mirror image. It was as if she were doing away with the last vestiges of her own virtue.

  ‘But who else will believe it,’ she continued, ‘when everything points to you? You always thought yourself a step ahead. It’s not how things are but how they seem that matters: that was your great lesson to me. See how well I have learned it.’ She had her face right up to his, close enough to smell the death-stench hanging over him. He turned his head away. ‘Do I frighten you?’

  ‘Frances, please.’ His breath whistled and laboured, and she had the satisfaction of seeing his terror – his eyes shot through with it, his face collapsing.

  She placed the point of her elbow on his sternum, pressing all her weight down. She didn’t want to cover his face, not if it wasn’t necessary. She wanted to watch.

  He began to cough and flail, as if his body was trying to expel the devil. For an instant, she slipped back into childhood with his big hand pushing her face into the water, sputtering, drowning, panicking. ‘You trained me well.’

  He croaked, ‘Father, Father.’

  ‘You’ll need to call louder if the priest’s going to
hear you.’ She watched his terror crystallize as he recognized the blunt fact of what lay ahead.

  ‘I beg of you, Frances. I beg of you.’

  She stood back as a seizure took hold in him, violent spasms tossing his body. And then he was still. She’d expected more of a struggle.

  His greyhound stood, stretched, and ambled over to the bed, resting the tip of its chin on the pillow with a sigh. She felt for a pulse, held her palm close to his open mouth to see if she could feel his breath. There was nothing.

  She opened the door, descended to the half-landing and, arranging her expression into one of distress, said very quietly to the gathered company below, ‘He’s asked for the priest.’

  Him

  Thomas came to me in a dream. He stood before me laughing, then turned to reveal the flesh of his back, blackened, suppurating, decomposed so his scapulae poked through, like the wings of an avenging angel. I couldn’t shake the image out of my mind.

  He was there in my study, floating behind Winwood, who was trying to restrain himself. ‘I can’t respond to these without having the full picture of our foreign policy.’ He was waving a sheaf of papers. His eyes bulged with rage and his face was flushed. ‘I feel as if I’m working with one hand tied behind my back.’

  ‘Sit, why don’t you?’ I didn’t try to hide my impatience. It was not the first such outburst.

  He huffed down into the chair opposite. His suit was a bilious shade of green that made his face seem redder, and he was bleating on about being kept in the dark about foreign policy.

  ‘Ah, that, yes.’ Thomas would have known how to appease Winwood without damaging his pride. I could feel his hand on my shoulder, had his voice in my head: You betrayed me, Robin. ‘His Majesty is keen to keep foreign and domestic affairs separate.’