The Dark Lady's Mask

by Mary Sharratt

  12

  IGHT WAS AEMILIA’S FAVORITE time, when the cage that contained her by day sprang apart. In blessed darkness, she soared free, as in the ancient tales of village wives who left behind their sleeping husbands and flew away on the backs of beasts to some lofty mountaintop, where they cavorted like heathens until sunrise.

  Clad as a young man, she galloped out of Longditch astride Bathsheba, one of her few keepsakes from her days at Grimsthorpe Castle when she was a maid as stainless as any, translating Plutarch. At twenty, the mare was a venerable age. Alfonse said the old nag was worthless and that it cost too much to feed her, but Aemilia would sooner beg in the streets than part ways with her mare. Her booted legs clung to Bathsheba’s flanks as they passed the church of Saint Martin-in-the-Fields and fared forth into the pristine countryside between Westminster and London where the gentry dwelled. With the night wind singing in her ears, she was no longer Mistress Lanier but an entirely different person, her heart opening as wide as the starry sky. The full moon shone bright enough to cast skittering shadows, which sent Bathsheba leaping and snorting.

  Sometimes Aemilia dreamt of remaining in this guise permanently, of making her way in the great world as a man. Let Aemilia die. Become Emilio. Such a thrill it gave her to swagger in boots and breeches instead of mincing along under heavy skirts. To boldly shoulder past the men who would otherwise leer at her.

  Cattle lowed beyond hedgerows fragrant with honeysuckle and elderflower. She breathed in the scent of freshly mown hay. Her many burdens seemed to lift as she skirted the slumbering village of Saint Giles-in-the-Fields. When she arrived at the great iron gates of Southampton House, the gatekeeper let her in at once.

  “Lovely evening, Master Emilio, sir. The Earl is expecting you.”

  Aemilia’s heart thrilled, as it always did when her male guise passed muster. She swung down from the saddle and stood for a moment in the moonlight, aware that the gatekeeper was admiring the sword and rapier hanging from her belt. Pray God she looked every inch the daring young blade—a person with whom one would not wish to meddle.

  Interloper though she was, she strode through the gardens with their gushing fountains and stone nymphs. The scent of night-blooming jasmine intoxicated her as she gazed at the mullioned windows radiant with candlelight. Entering the house, she caught sight of herself in a long oval looking glass. Though small of stature, she cut a dashing figure with her slender legs, well muscled from riding, and her slanting cheekbones. She appeared as a youth of seventeen summers, wavy dark hair spilling from beneath her cap.

  Her host awaited her in the great parlor, its every window open to the moon-drenched garden. Huge bouquets of roses and larkspur—all the beauty this midsummer’s night could offer—adorned each table.

  Nineteen years old, Henry Wriothesley, the third Earl of Southampton, was as pretty as a girl, his face framed in flowing golden hair. He was arrayed with a collar of the most exquisite Venetian lace money could buy and an elaborate double earring with a pendant pearl. The color was high in his face, as if she had barged in at an inopportune moment, though she could not see anyone else in the room.

  “Aemilia-Emilio,” he said, stooping to kiss her hand. “How now, my master-mistress?” His blue eyes locked with hers. “The most exquisite creature in all Middlesex.”

  She and the Earl had befriended each other during her time at court when they had performed together in the masques. As different from her husband as a peacock was from a pigeon, Harry was as frivolous as only the wealthy could be. She had to remind herself to look behind his mask. His childhood had been wretched. His father had cast out his mother, accusing her of adultery with a commoner. Then his father died, leaving Harry with a disgraced mother—not just a presumed adulteress but also Catholic. So Lord Burghley, Master of the Court of Wards and Lord High Treasurer, had taken charge. His eye on the boy’s family fortune, Burghley had arranged for Harry to marry his own staunchly Protestant granddaughter, Elizabeth de Vere, when Harry turned twenty-one.

  Except, in a fit of pique, the boy declared he would never wed, that he disdained the institution of marriage, that he despised the entire female sex. But if Harry disobeyed Lord Burghley and refused to marry his granddaughter, he would have to pay Burghley the unheard-of fine of five thousand pounds. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Aemilia certainly did not envy Harry the prospect of marrying into the de Vere clan.

  In his rebellion against Burghley’s rule, Harry had invited Aemilia to secretly visit him by night and play the virginals on the condition that she appear in breeches so no one could accuse him of giving up his hatred for her sex. For her part, Aemilia didn’t care for Southampton in a romantic sense and therefore he had no power to break her heart, but she was happy enough to take his gold. Being paid to dress as a young man and visit the Earl in his mansion seemed a harmless enough way to keep herself from penury, though if Alfonse discovered that she rode out by night, he would probably have her publically flogged for adultery, never mind that the greatest liberty Harry had taken was kissing her hand.

  “I hope you brought me some poetry,” the Earl said, his voice both affectionate and imperious.

  Bless the boy—he actually paid her for her poems. But she had been too busy of late to write any new verses for him. Humbly, she bowed her head.

  “No poetry this time, my lord.” As befitting their masquerade, she kept her voice in its lowest registers so that she would sound like a young man. “Instead, I bring you a song.”

  Then she began to sing in her natural soprano.

  Over hill, over dale,

  Through bush, through briar,

  Over park, over pale,

  Through flood, through fire,

  I do wander everywhere,

  Swifter than the moon’s sphere.

  And I serve the Faery Queen

  To dew her orbs upon the green.

  When her song ended, she discovered that she and the young Earl were not alone. From out of a shadowy corner stepped a man who gazed at her as though her song had left him undone. A slender man with hazel eyes and soft brown hair. Her pulse quickened when she recognized the poet she had met outside the astrologer’s. Though he must have been wearing his finest garments, he looked utterly out of place in this manor house. How had he earned his invitation? And why had he been hiding? Was this one of Harry’s elaborate jokes? If so, then who was the laughingstock, the poet or herself? Likely both of us, she thought.

  “Is our nightingale not enchanting?” Harry asked, glancing from the poet to her. “Aemilia-Emilio, this is my dear friend, sweet William. He writes the most enthralling sonnets just for me.”

  Such a gulf separated the two men in wealth, station, even age—the poet was probably a decade older than the boy. Yet Harry took his place at the poet’s side, his hand on his shoulder as though claiming possession of him. How the poet quivered at Harry’s touch—surely this gesture was too intimate for her eyes. Her skin flushed when she deduced what secrets they must share. Then she remembered the poet’s sonnet that she had read that very morning, those verses that still held her in their thrall. So true a fool is love that in your will, though you do anything, he thinks no ill.

  Adoration blazed in the poet’s eyes. Poor besotted wretch. Aemilia tried to glance away but the poet now held her with his gaze, perhaps struggling to remember where he had seen her before. His mien then darkened, as if in jealousy. It seemed the poet truly saw her as a young man, a rival for Southampton’s affections.

  “Sir,” she said, speaking plainly as a woman. “Do you not recognize me? We met earlier this day.”

  “Why this is very midsummer madness.” The poet took a faltering step backward. “You sing and speak like a very young boy and yet you are grown. Are you a castrato?”

  Harry collapsed on a chair and writhed in hilarity, as though she and the poet were players acting in a comedy just for his pleasure.

  “In Thames Street,” she said. “Outside the astrologer’s.”
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br />   The poet reeled, as though fearing he’d lost his senses.

  “My maid knocked you down,” she said, which made Harry laugh all the harder.

  “Had I only been there!” Harry cried. “If only you could see your face, Will Shakespeare!”

  The poet looked scalded, as though someone had tipped a boiling cauldron over his head. “This morning I saw a lady.”

  “And now you see a lady.” She removed her cap and shook out her long black hair.

  “A lady in breeches!” Harry pounded his thighs.

  Aemilia remained as sober as Will. “In faith, you have never heard a trained female soprano before. We are not allowed to perform in public, sir. It’s considered too vulgar. Only at court or at manor houses such as this might you hear a woman virtuosa sing.”

  The poet looked humiliated. She longed to take his shoulders and whisper in his ear, No need to explain. Southampton has made us both his fools!

  She turned to Harry who struggled to make his face serious again.

  “More music, my lord?”

  When Harry nodded, she sat at the virginals and began to play, her back to the men. In truth, she came here as much for Harry’s virginals as his gold. As her fingers walked in gentle gait over the painted wooden keys, she prayed that she could lose herself in the melody and forget Southampton and his friend were even there. But it was no use—she heard every word of their ensuing spat.

  “Is Master-Mistress Aemilia not a marvel?” Harry asked his friend.

  “The most exquisite creature in all Middlesex?” the poet cried. “Why do you make me your ass?”

  Aemilia played on, pretending that she inhabited her own universe far away from Harry’s whims and jests. But her stomach dropped to hear them speak of her.

  “Her people were denizens of Venice,” Harry said, lolling the name of that fabled city on his tongue as though savoring a sweetmeat. “Have you heard how inventive Venetian courtesans are?”

  She gritted her teeth to keep from striking a wrong note. Was Harry trying to convince his friend that she was such a courtesan who knew every lascivious trick? Big words from Harry who had never bedded a woman in all his nineteen years.

  From behind her back came the sound of Harry opening a drawer.

  “This,” she heard him say, “is a portrait of a Venetian temptress painted in that very city.”

  She nearly laughed in derision. Once Harry had shown her that selfsame painted miniature, his one piece of pornography, the jewel of his curiosity cabinet. She didn’t need to lift her eyes from the keyboard to envision Will’s befuddlement. At first glance, it resembled a staid enough picture of a richly dressed woman with an elaborate coiffure, a white handkerchief, and an ostrich feather fan. How was anyone to recognize this creature as a courtesan? However, it wasn’t an ordinary miniature but a cleverly constructed novelty piece. Harry had only to lift the central panel of the lady’s skirt to reveal that she wore breeches and a codpiece beneath. That the same woman could appear as a lady on the outside but conceal a codpiece under her silken skirts appeared to fascinate Harry to no end. She heard him cackling like a schoolboy to the poet whose silence was deafening.

  “The Venetian ladies of pleasure are an entirely different class,” the Earl said in his aristocratic drawl. “They are educated and quite refined.”

  Why couldn’t Harry put that silly miniature away and talk about something sensible? The tone of conversation was starting to make her skin itch. Thankfully, the poet seemed just as eager as she was to change the subject.

  “My lord, I have written a poem for you, not just a sonnet this time but an epic.”

  From behind her arpeggios, Aemilia could hear the rustle of paper.

  “Venus and Adonis,” said Harry. “What a title! So saucy.” His voice was gently mocking, but then his tone grew tender. “Ah, sweet William, you dedicated it to me.”

  “All my work is for you!” The poet couldn’t hide his yearning if he tried. “The love I dedicate to your lordship is without end. What I have done is yours; what I have to do is yours, being part in all I have, devoted to you.”

  In her mind’s eye, Aemilia saw the poet’s love-struck face. How could he squander his devotion, let alone his priceless poetry, on one as inane as Harry? Passion was a treacherous game. She couldn’t fathom surrendering her heart to that vain boy, even supposing he desired women in the first place.

  As Harry began to read aloud, Aemilia could not help but prick her ears to drink in every word, imbibing the poetry that intoxicated her like wine. She found herself altering her rhythm so that she played in time with his verses. Yet again, the poet wrote of the anguish of unrequited love.

  Even as the sun with purple-colour’d face

  Had ta’en his last leave of the weeping morn,

  Rose-cheek’d Adonis hied him to the chase;

  Hunting he loved, but love he laugh’d to scorn;

  Sick-thoughted Venus makes amain unto him,

  And like a bold-fac’d suitor ’gins to woo him.

  “Thrice-fairer than myself,” thus she began,

  “The field’s chief flower, sweet above compare,

  Stain to all nymphs, more lovely than a man,

  More white and red than doves or roses are;

  Nature that made thee, with herself at strife.”

  “Am I then the handsome Adonis?” Harry asked. “So strenuously resisting the charms of Venus herself?”

  Will replied in a voice too soft for Aemilia to hear. All went silent except for swallowed murmurs and rustlings. She burned when she guessed what must be passing between them. Surely now she must tiptoe away, give the two men their privacy. She lifted her hands from the keys only for Harry to rebuke her in a voice so haughty she longed to stuff a rag down his throat.

  “What, no more music? But I pay you for your music, Aemilia-Emilio! If you would earn my gold, play on.”

  Biting her lip, she obeyed.

  “Why do men seek out whores?” the Earl of Southampton asked his friend, as though making a deeply philosophical inquiry. “To seek carnal pleasures when they lack a wife to provide such delights. Or when they grow tired of their wives. Like you, Will!”

  The poet attempted to interject only to have Harry cut him off.

  “When it comes to whores, pleasure is fleeting. Our common English harlot soon bores a man of any intelligence. And why, sweet William, do men seek out the company of other men?” Harry ended on a note of wicked mirth.

  The poet answered in a heartbeat. “To seek true companionship of the soul and intellect. The noblest form of love, not mere animal urges. The marriage of true minds if you will.”

  Aemilia decided she despised them both. Was that all women were to them, witless whores to service their beastly urges? If Southampton wished for a tête-à-tête with his poet, why had he summoned her?

  The poet then had the temerity to quote the recently deceased Kit Marlowe, as though claiming those words for his own. “If the male form once defined beauty in heaven, men on earth are fairer still.”

  “Now imagine, if you will,” said Harry, “a sensuous woman with a man’s intellect and learning. Our delectable Aemilia has a humanist education. Not only does she possess male attire—she has a mind to match.”

  Aemilia told herself that her utter debasement was complete. That she had sunk as low as this, having to listen to Southampton gossip about her, literally behind her back, only a few yards away from where she played the virginals. Did he think she had no feelings? She certainly wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her tears. If she were indeed Emilio, not Aemilia, she would have leapt from the virginals and pummeled his gut.

  “Our beauty caught the eye of the Lord Chamberlain who taught her the arts of hawking as well as amour. But, alas, he put her aside when she revealed herself to be pregnant with his bastard—our dear Aemilia fainted and landed upon my very person during the masque, can you imagine the uproar? The Lord Chamberlain hastily married her off to a ri
diculous French gudgeon who squanders her money. And so she is forced to fall back on her old profession.”

  Southampton made her life sound so tawdry, as though she were the heroine of some second-rate play penned by the likes of Thomas Middleton. Both Harry and Alfonse cast her as the eternal whore beyond redemption, even though she had only given herself to one man, Lord Hunsdon, the father of her child.

  “The Lord Chamberlain must be nearly seventy,” the poet said. He spoke as though listening to her tale discomfited him. As though he, for all his poverty, felt sorry for her. At least he had a heart beating in his chest. Unlike Southampton.

  “Her loss is our gain,” said Harry. “You should try her some time.” The Earl spoke archly, as if imparting advice to a backward younger brother. “She’d be good for you, I dare say.”

  In her imagination, Aemilia landed a smart slap across the Earl’s face. So that was Southampton’s game—praising her as the paragon of whores for the sole purpose of whipping his lover into a jealous frenzy. Yet she went on playing, not missing a single note. She reminded herself that she was here in his mansion to save herself and Enrico from ruin. That was all.

  When the poet spoke, his voice rasped like ice. “And you, my lord. Have you tried her?”

  “How am I to entertain the thought of marriage if I’ve never even known a woman? And such a woman! The closest thing we have to the hetairai of ancient Athens.”

  The poet’s silence opened as deep as a chasm.

  “Ah, I forgot,” the Earl said. “They never taught you Greek at your provincial grammar school. You don’t even know what hetaira means.”

  “I think I must go.” The poet’s voice was stretched as tightly as a rope about to snap.