“Now their feet,” said Woodforde, and with that our captors secured our ankles as well. “All right,” Woodforde said, straightening up. “We can leave them there for the time being, while I talk some sense into you, Roland. Come along. You too, Ambrosia. The fact is, Roland, unless you want to spend the rest of your life in exile …” They went out of the room, closing the secret door behind them and Woodforde’s voice was lost. Wat and I were alone in the stuffy shadows, lying on a dusty floor that caused me to sneeze.
“I don’t understand. I don’t understand. Whass happening? What are they goin’ to do to us?” Wat moaned.
“I think,” I said grimly, “that Master Woodforde wants to convince Master Jester that it would be a good idea to kill us.”
“But why?”
“Listen,” I said. “I’m not just a cookmaid and my name isn’t really Mistress Faldene. I was sent here from the court …”
“What, the royal court?”
“Yes. Because the playlet made people there suspicious and they thought … thought it might mean some harm to the queen.”
“But how could it?” Wat was anything but bright.
“Well, some people thought it might.” I didn’t feel equal to complicated explanations. “I came here,” I said to Wat, “pretending to be just a harmless servant girl, and I’ve found out that it’s true, there is something going on, some sort of plot, to do with the playlet but I don’t exactly know what it is. Only, I was caught looking at Master Jester’s letters and dragged in here. They were trying to make me tell them what I knew. And then you walked in. I wish you hadn’t!”
Wat twisted in his bonds, trying to loosen them, and groaned in misery. “Mistress Ursula, they’re not really goin’ to kill us, are they?”
“I hope not. But I’m horribly afraid …”
I was lanced through with fear. Out there on the other side of the door, our fate was being decided but in a way it was decided already. Whatever Woodforde was plotting was obviously serious. Was he planning to kill the queen? I wondered. Could he and Lady Lennox actually be conspirators? Did she want the queen out of the way to make room for Mary of Scotland, to whom she hoped to marry her son? And was her apparent anger with Woodforde, his dismissal from her service, just a blind?
If so—and it might be—then Woodforde could scarcely let me live. To conspire against the queen, even if the conspiracy were never carried out, was treason, as serious as actually attempting her life. If such a plot existed, even in embryo, and he knew that I suspected it and would report my suspicions, then he had no option now but to murder me, and Wat as well. Once he had talked his brother into cooperating—and I was quite sure he would—we were as good as dead.
Unless …
Were there any chinks of hope? Ambrosia was worried about me and probably about Wat. She might evade her father and uncle and release us. She might well want me to escape, in case her father, after thinking it over, began to wonder if perhaps I was lying when I said I didn’t know where Mistress Smithson lived, and tried to put me to the test. Or in case I tried to use my knowledge to bargain with him.
If necessary, I thought feverishly, and if I had the chance—if when Woodforde came back to finish us, Jester came with him—I might do precisely that. For some reason, Woodforde’s plans—assassination of the queen, I supposed—apparently needed Jester’s help, and knowledge of Sybil’s whereabouts seemed to be the hold that Woodforde had over his brother. I would be sorry to betray her but if it would save my life and Wat’s …
If. It might not. If he could, Woodforde would probably kill me before I could speak, because if I did, his power would be broken.
I would try to use Sybil Jester’s address to bargain with if I had to but I feared it would be a poor, weak tool. I lay tense, straining to hear any conversation that might be going on in the adjoining attic, but I could hear nothing. The partition and the secret door between the two rooms were stout. Only raised voices would penetrate them. How long would the business of persuasion take? And then what would happen? Roland was right about the messiness of cutting our throats but now that we were helpless we could just as easily be throttled.
Or would they just—leave us here to die? That might please Jester better. Perhaps he would agree more easily if agreeing meant just doing nothing, just forgetting that we were here.
Wat had begun to whimper, like the big child he mostly was. I clenched my teeth so as not to do the same, wondering why I had ever let myself be coaxed away from home and safety. I wanted to be studying Latin with Meg, sitting by the window while the summer breeze blew in, bringing the scent of flowers from the garden at Withysham. I wanted to be on the walls of Blanchepierre, watching the Loire flow past below, standing there with Matthew, feeling his strong arms around me. I didn’t want to die. I didn’t want to die. I …
I opened my eyes. They had adjusted to the poor light by now, and with a new jolt of terror I saw that in one corner was a roundish papery object that I recognized because when I first took charge in Withysham, there had been such an object hanging in a dark corner of a spare bedchamber. It was a wasps’ nest. I lay staring at it in fright, until I realized that the room was quite silent. Nothing was humming and no insects were flying in and out. It was a dead nest. My gaze slid thankfully away from the papery globe and then, just below it, I noticed distractedly that there was a low, square door.
Our prison apparently had a cupboard. In the gloom I hadn’t seen it before. The attic went the full depth of the house from front to back and the door through which Wat and I had entered was near the front. The cupboard was near the back. It jutted out a little and looked as though its rear wall must be the outer wall of the house. Since the premises were at the end of the line of houses, there was no adjacent property beyond that wall.
I lay staring toward it. It had a lock, quite an ordinary one. It was just a plain, shallow cupboard. Only …
This room was made as a place to hide and there’re ways out of the house, as well, so that if hiding wasn’t enough, if someone needed to get right away …
When Jester said that, I had wondered whether he meant that there was a way out of the attic. Could he have meant the cupboard? It would be possible for someone to crawl through its door; it was big enough, just.
If only, if only, we could get free of these ropes. And what was I about, lying here so passively, not even struggling? I rolled over, moving my ankles against each other, trying to ease their bonds. I failed, but in my hidden pocket, the drawings I had stolen rustled and the other contents of the pocket knocked against the floor. I jerked up to a sitting position. “I must be going silly. How could I have forgotten? I’ve got a dagger! Wat, listen! Stop that moaning and listen. I’ve got a dagger!”
“Ladies don’t carry daggers,” Wat said miserably.
“This one does and they haven’t taken it. Listen …”
“But what’s the use of it when we’re all tied up?” Wat twisted again, in a further useless struggle. “I can’t get free. How’ll we use a blade even if we’ve got one?”
“Will you listen?” I kept my voice low, but made it fierce. “I’m wearing an open overskirt and I’ve got a pouch sewn inside it. It’s on the left side. My left, I mean. Can you roll over here and get hold of my overskirt with your fingers? You can use your fingers, can’t you, even if they’re behind you? You may be able to get the dagger out. Come on, try!”
I had to explain what I wanted twice more before he grasped my meaning, but once he had done so, he tackled the task with energy. It was more difficult than I expected, but eventually he succeeded in turning my overskirt back, exposing the pocket. “Now,” I said, “can you feel the dagger?”
Wat’s brain was not the brightest I have ever come across but his physical coordination was good. He squinted over his shoulder for a moment so that he could see what he was dealing with, and then, resuming a position with his back to me, groped for the top of the pouch and pushed his fists down into it. The po
uch was deep, which I had arranged on purpose, to make it more secure, and my dagger was small, very much a lady’s weapon although it had a lethally sharp blade. It took him a little time to find and get hold of it. I was listening all the while for sounds from the other room, afraid that at any moment Woodforde would appear with murderous intent, and only with a great effort could I hold my impatience down so as not to upset Wat.
At last, he gave a grunt of satisfaction and I saw him draw the dagger out of the pocket. “Got it, mistress!”
“All right,” I said. “Now can you draw the blade and hold it firm while I try to saw through this rope round my wrists?”
Unsheathing the blade proved to be much harder than dragging the dagger out of my pocket. The hand holding the hilt and the hand holding the sheath needed to move apart in order to draw the blade, and Wat’s firmly bound wrists made this so difficult that in the end, we did the job between us, back to back, straining our necks in order to peer behind us while I got hold of the sheath and Wat grasped the hilt. Then we pulled them in opposite directions and the dagger was out.
We then encountered more difficulties. Wat was able to hold the dagger firmly enough, but it was awkward for him and he couldn’t see what he was doing. There was more play between my wrists than between his, but the blade kept catching me. The point jabbed into one wrist and then the sharp edge bit into the other, and I felt the warmth of blood trickling down my hands. I tried again, twisting my hands into a different position, but the same thing happened.
“Try it t’other way about,” Wat said. “You hold the ould dagger and I’ll try and saw my hands free instead.”
This was nearly disastrous. Wat cut himself quite badly. “For God’s sake!” I said. “There must be a way. There must.”
“What’ll we do even if we do get free, anyhow?” Wat asked, showing signs of sinking back into lethargy and despair. “We goin’ to jump on ’em when they come back?”
“If necessary! But what I hope is that we’ll escape. There’s a door over there.” I jerked my head toward the small door. “It may only lead into a cupboard. But it just could be something more than that. Something that Master Jester said, before you arrived, makes me think so.”
“That just looks like a cupboard to me,” said Wat dolefully. “An’ what if it’s locked?”
“First of all,” I said, “let’s get out of these ropes! If only we could … I know! Let me pass the dagger back to you for a moment. I want to try something.”
I had had an inspiration. If I could push myself somehow through the loop made by my arms and my bound hands, and then as it were, draw my feet back through the loop as well, I could get my hands in front of me instead of behind. Then I would be able to see what I was doing.
Wat took back the dagger in what were now rather gory fingers and I tried my new plan out. My efforts were more ridiculous than anything. In theory, it seemed easy. After all, I was still quite young and an active life with plenty of riding and dancing had kept me supple. In practice, hampered as I was by my skirts, it was nearly impossible. It would have been completely impossible if I had been wearing a farthingale. My cookmaid’s skirts at least didn’t have that disadvantage but nevertheless, they made me quite bulky enough. After a struggle, I did succeed in pushing my rear end through my arms but the strain on my wrists was agony and my wretched skirts kept tangling round my feet. My endeavors reached an impasse.
Wat watched me anxiously and then actually produced an idea of his own. “Look here, mistress, you can see your feet. You can put them just how you want them. Maybe it ’ud be easier if I hold the dagger and you saw them free, and then perhaps you could step back with them one at a time.”
He shuffled into position with his back to me, presenting the dagger blade. I managed to kick my feet clear of the skirts, and delicately, gingerly, I began to work my bonds against the blade.
It was awkward but slowly, slowly, it worked. One loop of rope gave way and then another and then all the rope around my feet fell away. “Done it,” I said. “Just a minute.” Once again I tried to persuade my feet to follow my rear end back through my pinioned arms, but still my skirts seemed determined to defeat me. However, a new idea came to me. I rolled and kicked, flapping my skirts until they rode up, and there were my bloodstained wrists and hands, visible between my parted feet. “Sit still,” I said to Wat, “and hold that blade as tight as you can. I’m going to shuffle close up behind you. I think I can do it now.”
Another minute, and my hands were free as well. They felt numb and awkward, but I worked my fingers furiously, rubbing and flexing, and then took the dagger from Wat and cut his bonds, too. At least now, if Woodforde came in, we were not helpless. We could fight and if necessary, we would. We sat side by side, vigorously massaging our feet and our wrists and noting with relief that though we had both cut ourselves on the dagger, and Wat’s cut was quite deep, our wounds were ceasing to bleed. There was still no sound from beyond the partition. “Now,” I said. “Now for that little door.”
19
Jackman’s Way Out
I sheathed my dagger, thrust it back into its pouch, and scrambled over to the door. As Wat had surmised, the cupboard was locked. The lock, though, was a commonplace type and I did not think the lockpicks that shared my pocket with the dagger and—just now—the stolen drawings, would have much trouble with it.
Nor did they. Before Wat’s astonished gaze, I produced my spindly lockpicking wires and set to work. My hands were shaky with nerves but nevertheless, the lock yielded so easily that I was fairly sure it had been oiled. I peered inside. So, crouching behind me and leaning over my shoulder, did Wat.
To my disappointment, all I could see was the inside of a most ordinary cupboard, maybe three feet by three, and a foot deep. The back of it wasn’t the brick wall of the house, but was made of planks, with some shelves attached, on which sat a few cracked and chipped pieces of disused crockery. I could have wept. My only comfort at that moment was the thought of the resistance we could now put up with our freed hands, if Woodforde suddenly came back to kill us.
Wat was evidently thinking along similar lines. “Looks like we’ll have to lie in wait and brain ’em when they come back. Any of these things heavy enough, you reckon?” Edging past me, he pulled out a tall earthenware ewer and then, pausing, ran a hand over the plank wall at the rear of the cupboard. “No knothole this time,” he said regretfully.
As he backed out, however, I peered in. There were indeed no knotholes in the planking. There was, however, a vertical crack where it looked as though two pieces of planking had been used instead of one longer one. The crack was where the two ends met. On impulse, I reached forward, hooked my fingertips into the crack, and pulled sideways. Nothing happened.
“What you doin’, mistress?” Wat whispered, peering over my shoulder.
“Nothing useful,” I said, and would have given up, except that Wat muttered urgently: “Turn the other way, mistress. Pull left instead of right.”
“It won’t go left either … oh, wait a minute.” I had been using my right hand. I changed to the left one, which gave me a better purchase. A section of plank obligingly slid a few inches, leaving an square opening big enough for a hand to be thrust through.
“Here,” Wat said. Dumping the earthenware ewer on the floor of the cupboard, he leaned past me, pushed his massive paw through the hole, and groped downward. “Got it!” There was a click, and the back of the cupboard swung open. It was the same principle, evidently, as the door to the secret room.
“Wat! You’re a wonder!” I could have kissed him but this was no time for playing games. Death could walk in on us at any moment. “Come on,” I said. “You first, so that I can shut this door behind us. God knows where this leads but it must lead somewhere.”
Wat went through on all fours and then stopped. “What’s the matter?” I demanded. “Go on!”
“Just a minute,” said Wat, shuffling awkwardly. Then at last, he went forward
and out of my path, and following in too much haste, I first knocked over the ewer with a clatter that terrified me, and then realized too late what had caused Wat to stop. Had he not been there to block the way with his bulk, I would have pitched headfirst down the stone spiral staircase which was immediately beyond the back of the cupboard.
Wat, fortunately, was there to catch hold of me. I twisted about, got my skirt caught on something, wrenched it free, somehow maneuvered my feet in front of me, and slithered down onto the stair.
Peering around, I realized that the back of the cupboard opened straight into what must be one of the ornamental buttress towers at the corners of the Jackman’s Lane terrace. This would be the one at the back corner of the pie shop. The towers were evidently not as slender as they looked, though they were scarcely roomy. We were inside a tall brick cylinder, with a stone pillar rising through the middle, around which ran a very narrow, very precipitous, very tightly wound spiral staircase of stone. A pattern of chinks in the wall provided weak light, just enough to make out this much.
I could still hear nothing to suggest that our foes were returning. Delay scared me but if I had time to close the way behind us, I must use it. Urging Wat down a few steps farther, to give myself room, I set about shutting the cupboard.
By edging down a couple of steps myself, I could reach a point from which I could lean into the cupboard and try to lock its outer door again. In this, however, I failed. The lock, which had been easy enough to open, resisted my attempts to secure it. Since I was stretched across the cupboard floor, I was too awkwardly placed to work efficiently and I dared not waste time. Below me, Wat was muttering: “Come on, mistress, do; we did ought to get on!” And he was right. I gave up and slithered backward. As I did so, my fingers unexpectedly touched something soft.
Momentarily I recoiled and then, peering, saw that it was nothing worse than a roll of what looked like quite fresh linen, which had half slid out of the overturned ewer. I finished scrambling out of the cupboard, got myself onto the stairs again, and then, inquisitively, reached in to pick the linen roll up. I found that I was holding a solid object, about two feet long and narrow, apparently wrapped in cloth.
Queen of Ambition Page 20
