To Shield the Queen

by FIONA BUCKLEY

  After some time, they began to talk to each other again, but once more, what with Holme’s unpleasant habit of speaking with his mouth full, and the sound of the worsening wind and rain, I heard little of what was said. What I did hear appeared to concern the buying and selling of wool by people I didn’t know, and then the harvest prospects and how promising the Cumnor apple orchard looked. The rest of that supper seemed interminable.

  • • •

  I had to wait until Forster and his guests had left the table and the maids had cleared. Not until the candles were out and the house quiet, did I dare to leave my hiding place. I then realised how little thought I had given to the matter of getting back to my room. Outside, it was still raining, and in any case, the outer doors were locked at sunset. I could not return across the courtyard. Within the house, the doors would be left unfastened, but I now realised that I must traverse the house in the dark, as I dared not take a candle. I went to the door of the little dining room and paused, uneasily, not wanting to step out into the antechamber beyond.

  I was not unduly timid, but few people like the dark, and this monastery-turned-dwelling-place was not friendly. Besides, I was afraid of making a noise or disturbing the dogs, who would be inside in such weather; what if one of them barked? If I were found creeping about in Forster’s or Mrs. Owen’s quarters at night like this, excuses would be impossible.

  However, I must get back to Amy’s wing somehow. Trembling, I set off.

  Fortunately, the dogs now knew me well. They came up and sniffed at me in the dark, and one let out a subdued woof of greeting, but no one heard and the dog was quiet after I had petted him. As I crept through Mrs. Owen’s parlour—most of the rooms led out of one another—I accidentally kicked a footstool over. I also, at one point, startled a cat which sprang away with a yowl. No one heard that either, but by the time I reached my bedroom door, the sweat was streaming down my back, and I entered my room almost at a run.

  Dale was there, waiting for me by candlelight, still fully dressed, her eyes watchful and scared.

  “Oh, ma’am, wherever have you been? That Pinto’s been asking for you. I referred her to Lady Dudley and Lady Dudley said Pinto wasn’t to bother; that it was all right. But I’ve been worried!”

  “Well, here I am, safe enough. I can’t tell you where I’ve been, Dale, but I haven’t been doing anything wrong.” Forster and his friends wouldn’t agree with that, I thought grimly. “Now, I want you to fetch the cold supper that’s waiting for me, and then I want to sleep.”

  I ate my supper and went to bed. I felt wretched. I was lost in a world of mystery and hidden dangers, full of uncertainty. I must make a report to Lady Dudley in the morning, but what on earth was I to say? How much could I tell her? How much, indeed, did I know? I had learned very little.

  Between my doubts and fears, and my sense of responsibility for her, I felt more lonely than I had been even in the days after Gerald died.

  When I slept that night, I dreamed not of Gerald but of Matthew de la Roche, so vividly and in such a manner that I woke to find a deep pulse beating within me as though the act of love in my unguarded night-time vision had been real.

  I also woke to find that overnight, some—not all, but some—of my ideas had crystallised.

  Not into certainty, much as I longed for certainty, but into doubt renewed, and a deepening dread.

  8

  A Time of Waiting

  “I did manage to overhear a little of their talk, Lady Dudley. I hid behind the dining-room tapestries,” I said. It raised a very small, difficult smile. I had gone to Amy as soon as I awoke, and found her far from well. Pinto and I changed the dressing on her nipple and gave her a painkilling draught but she was clearly miserable. She wouldn’t let me taste the gruel Pinto brought her for breakfast. “What if it is poisoned? It will shorten my pain.”

  Presently, she found an excuse to send Pinto out of the room. She told me that she had guessed, from what Dale had told her the night before, that I had gone to Forster’s wing to try and learn something, and said, “Go on.”

  “There’s very little to tell. Your name was never mentioned, Lady Dudley, and nor was your husband’s name. Holme gave Mr. Forster a document of some kind and there was talk of the difficulties of finding messengers for confidential letters and some discussion of money owing to Mr. Forster which he is afraid he may never receive. There was nothing, Lady Dudley, absolutely nothing to suggest that . . . that what you suspect may be true.”

  “To suggest that they are planning my murder. You can say it outright, Ursula.”

  “Lady Dudley, there was nothing to suggest that they were planning anyone’s murder.”

  Amy made a movement with her hand. “Thank you, Ursula. You tried. I’m grateful. I’d like to rest now. Send Pinto to me.”

  I went back to my own quarters and sat down, once again trying my best to think clearly.

  I had not exactly lied to Lady Dudley, but I had certainly edited my report. There was no point in alarming her when I had learned nothing definite and therefore could do nothing definite. The indications were so vague.

  All the same, they were there. Something questionable was afoot. Forster, Verney and Holme were acting on behalf of people they called their principals, and these principals were afraid to have their names mentioned, even in private, an extreme degree of caution which suggested that whatever the matter in hand might be, it was dangerous or dubious or both. It also suggested that the names in question belonged to people of position.

  There had been that reference to Dr. Bayly too. He had defamed Forster’s name. By saying that Forster was trying to murder Amy? Forster was outraged. But if Bayly were right, it would be most inconvenient for Forster to have the doctor bruiting the truth round the countryside! The mysterious matter in which Verney, Holme and Forster were concerned, might be only a financial swindle. But what if, after all, it were something to do with Amy, and something sinister, at that?

  If someone with a famous name were prepared to pay what Forster had described as a large sum of money to bring about Amy’s death, then who was it likely to be?

  Dudley, of course. I couldn’t believe that he had got Elizabeth with child, but he might be afraid that she would slip away from him into the arms of some foreign prince. Yes, that was possible. In that case, he might indeed want to speed Amy’s departure.

  Now I found a new powder train of thought in my head. Oh no, I said to myself desperately, no, please, not that, no.

  I had begun to admire Elizabeth very greatly, and besides, she was the queen. If she were involved in such a thing and it became known, the whole country could be overturned.

  No, I said to myself. She would never be so foolish, so insane. Surely, surely, however much she desired Dudley, Elizabeth would wait for him?

  People in love were often insane. It was one of the arguments in favour of arranged marriages. Aunt Tabitha had often said so. She had cited my mother’s misfortune, frequently, as the sad result of passion without permission.

  Dale now came to help me with my toilette for the day. I had gone to Lady Dudley in my wrapper, and while Dale brushed my hair and assisted me into sleeves and bodice and kirtle, I went on struggling with my thoughts. I had now lived for some time with the unpleasant idea that Dudley had sent me here to create an appearance of uxorious anxiety for Amy, while he plotted her death. Could he also be trying to convince Elizabeth of his innocence?

  This made quite a lot of sense, and was comforting, for in that case, Elizabeth herself would be innocent. But how was I to know? My ideas now went uselessly round and round and no inspiration came.

  Amy slept for a while that morning and woke feeling a little better. We were called to help her get up and put on a loose gown, then she went as usual to her prie-dieu. I braced myself for more heartrending prayers. But no, this time, to my surprise, there was a change. With a new air of calm, she simply said a paternoster and then repeated “Thy will be done” twice. She set
tled in a chair and asked me to read to her.

  Later on, Verney sent a somewhat perfunctory request to pay his respects that morning, but Amy said she wasn’t feeling quite well enough to see visitors. After dinner, I saw Verney and Holme ride away.

  That was a Friday. I spent the weekend fretting. I had no definite information, only suspicion, and I didn’t know how reasonable that suspicion was. I was at sea—in a fog, I said sourly to myself, and without a rudder. There had been intrigues in Sir Thomas Gresham’s household, and life at Faldene had been markedly unpleasant, but in neither establishment had I come across any murderous plots. I didn’t, as it were, know the hallmarks.

  I needed advice, but to whom could I turn? Lying awake at night, wrestling with the problem, I thought of doing the boldest possible thing and writing to Dudley himself. If he knew of my suspicions, perhaps he would abandon any plots he was considering. If he wasn’t after all plotting anything, he might start enquiries and find out what was really going on. But if he was guilty . . . In that case, he might find a way to get rid of me as well as Amy! In the small hours of the night, my mind played with horrors.

  When dawn came, these ghastly thoughts always seemed ridiculous, but as soon as night fell again over the old, chill walls of Cumnor, and the candles were lit, and the shadows gathered in the corners, they returned.

  Suppose, instead of to Dudley, I were to write to the queen? However, the tiny, hateful fear that after all she was a party to some evil scheme, would not quite go away. I could scarcely believe it, but while even the smallest question remained, I dared not approach her either.

  But there was Cecil! As I tossed restlessly in my bed on Sunday night, I remembered that Cecil and his wife had said I should go to them if ever I were in any difficulty. Yes. I would ask the advice of Sir William Cecil, and John Wilton should be my messenger.

  • • •

  It now transpired that at Cumnor Place, writing a letter, which I had always regarded as a simple and everyday task, was nearly as complicated as mounting a siege.

  Amy Dudley, though hardly an intellectual, was not stupid either, and on her good days, one could tell that in health she would have been a pretty young woman with quite a practical turn of mind and a pleasant sense of humour. Even ill and frightened, she was still capable, as I had now seen, of surprisingly dignified moments.

  She was not, however, well educated. Certainly Amy could read and write but she never practised either skill beyond occasionally writing her signature or verifying someone else’s. Forster or Ellis read letters out to her when necessary. I gathered from her servants that before she became ill, she had taken an interest in estate matters and had often dictated letters to a clerk, but now Forster and Ellis (who was steward as well as butler) had taken over all such tasks and dismissed the clerk. That was when the writing room fell into disuse and was locked up. The only pens, ink or paper in Amy’s home were in that room, and if I wanted to write a letter, I needed the key.

  Amy had mislaid it. She was in pain again that day, and was lying on her bed. I did not persist, beyond saying gently that with her permission I would look in likely places myself. She nodded and then leaned back, closing her eyes. I tried various drawers and presses in her bedchamber but found nothing, and went to the parlour to try my luck there. I was upending vases in case the key were inside one of them when Pinto came in and caught me and demanded angrily to know what I thought I was doing.

  “Looking for the writing-room key. Do you know where it is, by any chance?”

  “The writing-room key?” Pinto drew herself up, flinty eyes gleaming with suspicion. “And what might you be wanting with that, may I ask?”

  “I want to write a letter.”

  “You? A letter?”

  I stared at her in amazement. Literacy was normal in my family. Even my aunt and uncle, who held me so light, made little demur over letting me study with my cousins. The Blanchards had a similar attitude and Sir Thomas Gresham took literacy for granted. Now it struck me that Pinto, whose own command of it was so poor, and who so hated to hear me read, probably regarded my abilities as presumptuous accomplishments in a woman. If I wanted to write a letter, I was up to no good.

  “I have a little girl,” I said quietly. “She lives in Sussex, with her nurse. I just want to write to Bridget—that’s the nurse—to ask after them and send my love to my daughter Meg. I’ve heard nothing from them for so long,” I added, and did not have to act my sadness because it was real. I would put a letter to Bridget in with the one to Sir William Cecil, I thought, and ask John to deliver that as well.

  “Oh. I see.” For the first time, I detected a very faint air of apology in Pinto. I followed it up.

  “Pinto, I wish you weren’t so suspicious of me. Believe me, I am here in good faith, to help you look after your mistress. I have a very real regard for her and I think I could have regard for you, too, if you would let me.”

  The flinty eyes went cold again. “I’d be a fool to trust anyone who comes from him.”

  “Sir Robin Dudley?”

  “That’s right,” said Pinto harshly. “I’ve been with my lady since she was little. Used to serve her mother, I did. She’s all I’ve got and I love her and I won’t see her cozened by anyone who may mean ill to her. I’ve no means of being sure and I won’t take chances.”

  “I wouldn’t expect you to, but how do I harm her by writing to my daughter’s nurse?” She stared at me blankly, trying to assimilate this new idea of me as a mother, anxious for news of my child. “Pinto,” I said, “please, I do have a regard for Lady Dudley. I wish you would believe me.”

  She went on staring. Then she said abruptly, “Oh, what’s it matter? I’m going to lose her anyhow. She’s dying. I’ve got the writing-room key. I’ll fetch it for you. Write to who you please.”

  As she turned away, I thought I heard her sob.

  • • •

  It was a careful letter. The Cecils, being in constant contact with the queen and the court, must know I was at Cumnor, but I explained anyway, stating that I had been asked to stay with Lady Dudley and try to persuade her that no one meant harm to her, that the current rumours lied. Then I said that now that I was here, I was no longer sure of this myself; that by chance I had overheard a scrap of conversation which frightened me. I needed help and advice. I mentioned no names. There was no need. Cecil would guess at Dudley’s name, anyway, but no one could accuse me of indiscretion.

  When I had sealed the letter, I penned a few lines to Bridget, too, and went to find John Wilton.

  He was in the stable. John had started life as a groom and seemed to be content, taking care of Bay Star and the other horses we had brought with us and which were still at Cumnor. I found him seated on a mounting block, burnishing a bridle and whistling cheerfully. My commission made him less cheerful, however.

  “You’re writing to Cecil, ma’am?” He studied my face carefully. “Does that mean something’s worrying you?”

  “Yes, John, it does. I need advice, but to get it I must ask for it. Will you come back as fast as you can?” Somehow, I felt better when John was near. He was so trustworthy.

  “I’ll do that, ma’am. I hope I don’t have to chase about too much to find the court, that’s all.”

  “There’s a letter for Bridget, as well. You’ll have to take it into Sussex and you’ll want to see your sister, of course, but please—don’t be too long. You might collect Cecil’s answer on the way back. He may need a day or two to think.”

  “Don’t you worry, Mistress Blanchard,” said John.

  He was on his way in less than half an hour. I walked beside Bay Star to the gatehouse and out into the road to say farewell, and as he rode off, he turned in the saddle and doffed his cap in a parting salute. I saw his spiky hair sticking up, outlined against the clear September sky. I envied him, riding off into a sunny day while I must go back to Amy’s room with its shadowy fears and its odour of disease.

  • • •

&
nbsp; I found Amy in tears, enduring a bad attack of pain and in great distress of mind as well.

  “I’m dying. Dr. Bayly was right. Well, Robin will be glad! I wish he would come to see me. I wouldn’t be frightened of him now, why should I? If he strangled me with his own hands he’d only be saving me from misery. I wish I could die quickly and get it over. It’s so disgusting and oh God, oh God, it’s like a spear going through me.”

  Over the next few days, there were several scenes like this. They kept us all busy. I wondered, now and then, whether John had found Cecil or not and when he would come back, but I was too preoccupied to think about it much.

  Amy’s condition was not the only focus of interest that week, however. Abingdon Fair was approaching and apparently it was a big and exciting occasion to which everyone looked forward. The weather had turned fine again; people looked anxiously at the sky and hoped it would hold.

  I said to Dale that I was glad the servants were to have an outing, especially the younger ones, because the grim atmosphere of the house wasn’t good for them. Dale told me that both Forster and Mrs. Owen had given leave to their own servants to go on the Sunday if they liked and that Forster intended to visit the fair himself that day. Gathering from her faintly aggrieved tone that she wanted to visit it too, I gave my consent before she asked for it. Pinto said she would stay at home and I decided to do likewise.

  On the Sunday morning, Amy woke up early, said that she felt well enough to rise and dress, told Pinto to assemble all the servants in the parlour and then, in the tone of voice that means an order, announced that every single one of us, without exception, including Pinto and myself, was to go to the fair, straight after church, and stay away all day.