To Shield the Queen

by FIONA BUCKLEY

  However, for over a month I had lived with Amy’s fears, and I couldn’t forget that someone had tried to send a covert message, of unknown content and destination, through John Wilton. Nor could I forget that my attention had been drawn to Peter Holme by de Quadra, almost in the same breath as his warnings that the rumours surrounding Lady Dudley could be the smoke which meant, somewhere, a genuine fire.

  If I cared for Amy, I thought, then I ought not take anything or anyone for granted. Be alert to everything that goes on in that house, de Quadra had said. He was right. It was part of the business of protecting her, just as tasting her food was. She wanted to know what was going on between Verney, Holme and Forster, over in Forster’s wing, and she might well have good reason. It was therefore my duty to find out. It was that simple.

  Only it wasn’t simple at all, because I couldn’t for the life of me see how to do it.

  Midday came. Amy ate in her room and after I had performed my usual service of tasting her food, Pinto stayed with her while I went downstairs to the dining room and ate with Dale. Though dining at the same table as myself, Dale knew her place and did not try to talk, which was as well, because I was still trying to think.

  They were muddled thoughts. In truth, I knew that I wanted nothing to do with this, that I longed to be elsewhere, back at court, or in the Sussex cottage with Bridget and Meg. I ached for Meg, grieved for Gerald . . . and yet, when I tried to imagine Gerald’s face, it kept on turning into Matthew’s face instead. I wanted Matthew most of all. I should have followed my instinct, I said to myself. I should have agreed to marry him and left Cumnor with him. But all the time, another part of my mind was wondering how, just how, I could carry out Amy’s orders.

  The afternoon was quiet. I sat sewing in the parlour with Dale. I stitched at the white silk sleeves I had been making on the day when I was called to see the queen and Dudley. I was still embroidering them. When, at last, barking dogs, cackling geese and the sound of hoofs announced that Mr. Forster had ridden home, I went down to meet him.

  If I could manage to be the one who told him that he had guests, he just might say something about them which would tell me why they were here. Mrs. Odingsell, however, was there first. When I came up, she was already in the courtyard and telling her brother-in-law about the new arrivals.

  “. . . they’ve spent the afternoon strolling round the home farm but they’re in their room now. Do you want them called down to the parlour?”

  “Can I be of service?” I enquired helpfully, coming to Mrs. Odingsell’s side. “Shall I call them for you?”

  “Oh, not yet.” Forster seemed irritated. He swung down from his horse. The dour-faced groom, Roger Brockley, was waiting to lead it away. Brockley, in fact, though unsmiling, was really one of the better features of Cumnor for he was extremely competent. “I’m covered in dust from my ride,” Forster said. “I want to wash and change. Tell Ellis I want supper for three at the usual time, in the little dining room. We shall wish to be private, if you will excuse us.”

  “Naturally.” Mrs. Odingsell inclined her head with dignity. “I will speak to Ellis. Thank you for offering your help, Ursula, but there’s no need, this time.”

  They went indoors and I returned slowly to Amy’s parlour. Dale was still sewing. Outside, clouds were gathering and she remarked that the sky was getting dark. “Going to rain cats and dogs in a minute and I just hope it don’t thunder. I can’t—”

  “Abide thunder,” I said absently. I stood gazing across the courtyard towards Forster’s part of the building. I knew where the small dining room was, and from where I stood, I could see its windows, four of them, regularly spaced and identical. The room was on the first floor, above the sloping roof of the cloister, but I could hardly climb on to the cloisters and crouch there to eavesdrop. Nor could I very well press my ear to the door inside the house. How would Ellis or the maids get in and out with the dishes or fresh supplies of wine? The idea was so ridiculous that I had to stifle a giggle. Then a mental picture rose before me, of the inside of the small dining room. I had laid the table in there on occasion. Surely . . . ?

  “Dale,” I said, “I have something to do for Lady Dudley. Tell the kitchen to leave me a cold supper. I shall be back later. And don’t ask questions.”

  “Yes, ma’am. No, ma’am,” said Dale, startled.

  Suppertime was not far off. I must hurry. I had the forethought to use the privy first: if it proved possible to carry out my plan, a call of nature could ruin it. I was already dressed in clothes which allowed me some freedom of movement. When one’s work involves fetching and carrying, not to mention turning mattresses, elaborate dresses are a nuisance. I had never again put on the cream gown I wore when Matthew came. Today, I was in a dark gown with no farthingale and now I had only to remove a rustling silk underskirt and change noisy shoes for quiet slippers.

  The doors of the three households, both inside and out, were usually unlocked by day; the internal doors were even left unlocked at night. People could come and go much as they chose. I went openly to Forster’s small dining room. If anyone saw me there, I would say I was making sure that all was in order. The servants might think me somewhat officious, but nothing more. After all, I thought wryly, they were used to seeing me lay tables. A few minutes later, I was giving colour to my story by adjusting the position of the candlesticks. I was also berating myself for stupidity. I was obviously out of my wits. My idea wasn’t going to work; how could I ever have thought it would?

  What I had remembered, and seen in my mind’s eye, were the tapestries round the walls of the room. There were gaps for the windows and the door and a stretch of panelling on either side of the door, but otherwise, the walls were hidden. If, I had thought, I could conceal myself behind those tapestries . . .

  A foolish notion. For one thing, they didn’t come right down to the floor. I couldn’t hide behind them because my feet would show. In fact, even the rest of me would make a noticeable bulge, for the hangings were close against the wall. Ursula, my dear, you are a silly girl. You’ll never make a spy and there’s nothing to spy on, anyway. You’re imagining all this. You’ve let Amy infect you.

  However, I was at Cumnor to help Amy and to take her orders, and she had told me to find out what Verney was up to, so I paused for a moment to look round carefully. There were no other possible hiding places in the room. I couldn’t squeeze into the cupboard under the sideboard, because I knew it was full of glassware, and although the deep window seats lifted up and had storage chests beneath, I knew that they were full of tablecloths and napkins. I looked at them with annoyance. Three windows, three useless window seats . . .

  Three? But the small dining room, viewed from across the courtyard, had four windows. I went to the hangings and peered behind them. Oh yes, of course, and how typical of Forster.

  The tapestries in the small dining room represented the virgin goddess Artemis turning her ardent pursuer Acteon into a stag and setting his own hounds on him: a dramatic and spirited tale to which the design did not do justice. Artemis was portrayed as a female so fat and blank of face that one couldn’t imagine any handsome youth bothering to chase her, and Acteon wasn’t handsome anyway. In the panel where he was reaching up to clutch in alarm at the antlers sprouting on his head, he looked like a bucolic amateur actor whose headdress was slipping. The bodily proportions of the hounds were odd to the point of deformity.

  It was a poor, cheap tapestry, and it had obviously been bought ready-made instead of commissioned to fit the room. In fact, it was several feet too long and Forster had simply ordered the extra footage to be hung over one of the windows, obscuring it.

  Here was the fourth window, complete with a recessed seat on which one might perch without causing a bulge, one’s feet well clear of the foot of the hangings.

  Voices were approaching. I had half a second to decide whether or not I was to do this crazy and dangerous thing.

  I couldn’t! Yet Amy was afraid and perhaps had
cause, and the experienced de Quadra had thought her danger could be real. I hitched myself quickly on to the window seat. I at once discovered that my toes still stuck into the tapestry and pushed it outwards. In a panic, I twisted half-sideways, so that my feet were parallel to the fabric instead. It was awkward but it would have to do. There was no going back now. The door of the dining room was opening.

  The people who came in, however, were the butler Ellis and a maidservant. I couldn’t see them but I heard them speak to each other, heard wine being unstoppered and Ellis saying something about another serving spoon. I heard the maid scurry off to fetch it, and then come back. Presently, I heard them both leave.

  The wall of fabric in front of my nose was frustrating. I felt stealthily at my girdle, where I had a huswife pouch containing a case of needles, a thimble, a couple of spools of thread and a little pair of scissors. I listened intently to make sure that the room really was empty, and then, using the point of the scissors, I made a small hole in the hangings. With my eye to this I could see the table.

  When the door opened and Forster ushered his guests through it, I drew back at once, illogically sure that because I could see them, they could see me. I sat trembling, while they took their places. I heard Ellis’s voice again, and wine being poured, and then Forster said, “All right, Ellis; that will do. We’ll look after ourselves now. See that we’re not disturbed, will you?”

  The door closed. Fearfully, I ventured once more to apply my eye to the slit I had made. Forster and his guests were indeed alone, helping themselves to wedges of pie. Candles had been lit because of the dark weather. I had quite a good view, since none of them had his back to me. Verney’s proud profile and Forster’s blunt one were outlined against the light from a branched candelabra on the sideboard and Holme was facing me. I could see his upper half quite well although his face was shadowed.

  Forster was observing, in the tone of one who is not starting the discussion but bringing it to a close, that it seemed to him that all the details were now settled. “We can only hope that everything goes smoothly,” he observed, and without waiting for an answer, engulfed a mouthful of pie.

  Whatever their business was, they had already discussed it. Forster hadn’t waited until supper to talk to his guests, after all. Silently, I cursed. Holme did say something in reply, but as he too now had his mouth full, I couldn’t make out what it was. It was difficult to hear, anyway. The threatened rain had begun and the wind was throwing squalls of it against the window behind me. When I picked up the thread of the conversation again, they were talking about Amy’s ex-physician, Dr. Bayly.

  “. . . shocking behaviour on the part of Lady Dudley’s doctor,” Verney was saying, in the drawling voice which went so naturally with that arrogant profile. “His wild accusations must have been an appalling embarrassment.”

  “He’s an opinionated old fool,” said Forster irritably. “I threatened to have him in court for defaming my character if I had any more of his nonsense. The vicar was scandalised by it. He said to me . . . ”

  Rain hit the window again, as though the sky were emptying its slops. When the squall had passed, the conversation had again changed course. For some reason, they were now discussing Abingdon Fair, which was due to begin in just over a week, on 7 September.

  “I hope it won’t rain,” Forster said. “One year, it poured steadily throughout all four days of the fair.”

  “That certainly would be a disaster,” Verney remarked, “and it would also be very bad luck.”

  Forster laughed. “My dear sister-in-law is very shocked to hear that the fair will be open on the Sunday. She thinks it most ungodly. Mrs. Odingsell believes that people should go to church on Sunday morning and read the Bible all the rest of the day. She runs the house well but a merry and enlivening presence she is not.” They definitely weren’t lovers, I thought. “More wine?” enquired Forster, and leaned forward to replenish the goblets which his guests at once held out.

  There was a pause, broken only by the sound of mastication. Then Forster remarked, changing his tone, “What about my contract, by the way? I understood that you were bringing it with you. I’m not prepared to proceed without it, as I hope I’ve made clear. I ought to have thought of it much sooner.”

  I peered intently, trying to get a better look at Holme. I couldn’t somehow place him. He had a wide, pugnacious jaw and squashed-together features, as though a giant had put a palm on the top of his head and rammed it downwards. His voice was lightly countrified in accent, but not in grammar. He was broad shouldered and neatly clad in a russet doublet which any man might wear, from a farmer on a Sunday to a lord at ease by his hearth. In the presence of Sir Thomas Smith and the Earl of Derby, he had been obsequious, and when I saw him in the Cumnor stableyard, I had supposed that he was Verney’s manservant. However, at this table, he seemed to be on equal terms with Verney and Forster.

  “I have it with me,” Holme was saying. “Sir Richard here was so keen to get on with settling details, up in the bedchamber, that I didn’t have a chance to mention it before your butler announced supper.”

  “Though our principals are not happy about it,” Verney observed. “You would get your remuneration without this, Forster. I never like to put such confidential matters in writing. I was not pleased when you wrote to me to ask for the contract, and still less when you sent the letter by your man Bowes.”

  Bowes was one of Forster’s staff, a versatile individual (Forster’s servants had to be) who seemed equally willing to clean silver under Ellis’s eye, tune Forster’s musical instruments or ride to London with letters. I had thought him a decent type of man. Verney and Holme evidently didn’t agree with me.

  “I don’t trust Bowes,” Verney said, “and you put me in a position where I virtually had to reply with another letter, to let you know that the contract was coming. Naturally, the letter was carefully worded, but all the same, I felt strongly that discretion was required.”

  “I tried to find a messenger—not Bowes, but someone who wasn’t connected with us,” Holme said. “I made a mistake in the first instance, and picked on one of those honest types who want to know exactly what’s going on even when it’s not their business . . . ”

  I went rigid. The honest type sounded remarkably like John Wilton. Holme’s voice continued, slightly self-justifying.

  “In the end, we just had to rely on Bristow. He can’t read too well and probably wouldn’t try to look at any letters he was asked to carry. Actually, I shouldn’t think Bowes did. Why should he, after all? But Sir Richard here wasn’t happy. I’ve kept your contract carefully hidden, Mr. Forster.”

  No, I thought. Holme wasn’t quite among equals. He gave the impression of being just, barely, within their social boundaries, and hanging on to his position with fingertips and teeth.

  “I preferred not to have it on my own person,” Verney said candidly. “Fortunately, Holme here was willing to keep it on his.”

  “You’d better give it to me immediately after supper, Holme,” Forster said. “You should have done so at once.”

  “Oh, you needn’t wait till after supper; I can hand it over now.” Holme gave Verney a grin. It was an impertinent kind of grin, to which Verney did not respond. “And you needn’t have worried about carrying it. There’s ways and means of keeping things secret when they’re on your person.”

  He turned sideways, revealing a booted foot, and with some difficulty tugged the boot off. He took a moment to fill his mouth again with pie, and then plunged his hand inside the boot, apparently doing something to the inner sole. Then he turned the boot upside down and shook it, and what looked like a wooden plug came out into his palm. He put this on the table and reached inside the boot again. He then grunted crossly, picked up a spoon and hit the upended heel with it, several times. At last, he drew out a piece of folded paper caught between two fingers, which he handed to Forster.

  I watched this performance with increasing amazement, and forgetting to b
e afraid, I tried so hard to get a good view of the document that I made the tapestry stir, and drew back quickly. I had seen a seal, but no other details. I waited while Forster read the document to himself. When he finally spoke, his words were not informative.

  “Thank you. I suppose this will do, though it’s so discreet that I could still have trouble extracting the money if anyone chose to be difficult. But it’s better than nothing. All right. I accept it.”

  “It’s the best you’ll get,” Verney told him. “It’s a promise of reimbursement when matters have reached a satisfactory conclusion, and the signatures of the principals. Since they won’t allow their names to be spoken even in private, you can imagine how eager they were to sign anything, no matter how discreetly worded.”

  “I said, I accept it,” Forster repeated, folding the paper away inside his doublet. “The fact that it is addressed to me and involves such a large sum of money would be interesting to some people. I agree: it’s still a lever. I fancy the payment will be forthcoming.”

  “Of course it will. There was no need for the contract anyway,” Verney said shortly. Then, maddeningly, there followed a silence during which the three of them continued merely to consume their supper.

  Growing stiff with the effort of keeping my feet turned so that they wouldn’t poke at the hangings, I tried to make sense of all these cryptic remarks. Something was going on that ought not to be—a child of two could have told that—but what? The emphasis seemed to be on money more than anything else. Quite possibly, this dubious trio were merely pawns in a plot to steal money or land from Dudley. In fact, since the avaricious Forster was involved, such an explanation seemed more than likely. But I had overheard what I surely should not and I shuddered to think what would happen if I were found.

  I longed to escape from my perch, but I dared not stir or even breathe carelessly. I discovered that I was also hungry. The supper was inviting. They had salad as well as pie and what looked like almond fritters with cream awaiting their attention as a dessert. The kitchen had functioned well for a change. To my alarm, my stomach rumbled. Fortunately they didn’t hear it.