by Lily Reynard
But Lady Anne Edmonton was there, sitting apart from the others, ostracized because of her connection to Thornsby. As nobleman after nobleman announced her brother's guilt, she began to weep noisily, her shoulders shaking.
At the front of the hall, the Lord High Steward broke his rod of office, signaling that the trial was now concluded. The sharp crack of breaking wood echoed from the high, vaulted ceiling, then a hubbub rose as the peers made their exits.
Antonia let out a long sigh of relief. It was over.
All around her, people were speculating avidly about what would happen next.
Lady Anne collapsed in a faint, and Antonia felt a moment of pity for the girl, her career as lady-in-waiting finished and her only prospects a quick marriage to some country squire willing to wed a noblewoman with only a paltry dowry.
As Antonia and Kit left the courtroom, wagers were running three-to-one against the king's mercy sparing the Earl of Thornsby from the hangman's noose, since Chelmsford had been one of His Majesty's favorites.
Antonia hurried past, Kit at her side. The queen had told her privately that Thornsby would hang if his peers found him guilty.
Kit squeezed Antonia's hand as they approached their carriage. "What now, my lady-love?"
"Take me home, Sir Christopher," she said. "And in return, I'll marry you come next Sunday."
"You have made me the happiest man on Earth," he said, with a slow, wicked smile as they left the building, together.
* * *
The Duke of Selborough came personally to the Tower of London to deliver the verdict. He stood in the middle of Julian's cell, radiating grim satisfaction as he spoke.
"...and so, you will hang in three days' time, Lord Thornsby, and may the Devil take your wicked soul."
"He may take yours before then," Julian snapped, observing Selborough's ashy skin and bluish lips.
Selborough gave a thin, triumphant smile. "Even so, I will still have seen justice done. I bid you good day, Lord Thornsby, and enjoin you to have a care for your eternal soul."
Julian spat on the carpet as Selborough and his men departed.
Then he crossed the whitewashed chamber, which had been furnished with his own bed, a chair, and his writing-table, and poured a slopping-full goblet of wine from a bottle on the window-sill.
What did he care for Selborough's pious prating? He would defy them all by drinking and making merry until they loaded him on the cart to Tyburn, and then he'd stop and buy the hangman a drink at a tavern along the way. That would win the approval of the crowd come to see him executed.
I must compose a witty speech for my final statement from the gallows...
Outside, the grassy courtyard of the Tower was quiet. It was raining, and the air was filled with the scent of wet charcoal from the ruins of the city just beyond the Tower's walls.
Julian leaned by the window, and watched the water run down the window-panes.
It was damned difficult to make merry when no one came to see him. Even Anne hadn't visited in days. Perhaps the little ninny had taken to heart his last snarled command to leave off weeping or leave entirely.
He sighed. What irony! All the deeds that had led him to this cell had been done for the sake of his family, so that the Thornsby title would continue for a while longer. And yet, in the end, all of them had turned their back on him, repudiating him as a murderer.
Was he no better than Kit, then, who had spent years as a hired killer on the Continent?
And damn Kit, anyway, who had stolen the rich and titled bride that Julian had marked for his own, and was enjoying mighty comfortable circumstances as a result. It was humbling to think that Kit had succeeded in providing for his family where Julian had tried and failed.
Now Julian had only the hangman's noose to look forward to, while Kit had every expectation of a prosperous future and perhaps more children.
Children...perhaps God was punishing him for having murdered Polly and her babe. For in doing so, Thornsby also sealed the fate of his own bloodline.
There would be no children of his loins now, and his title, entailed through the male line, would go extinct.
Julian threw his goblet against the wall, taking perverse pleasure in seeing the engraved crystal shatter and splatter the plain white wall with purple stains.
Picking up the bottle, he drank straight from it. It was an abominable liquid, scarcely deserving to be called wine, but if he downed enough of it, perhaps he would stop hearing the incessant chorus of regret.
That was the problem with the Tower...it was too quiet here. A man might go mad from the silence, his thoughts devouring him with razor-sharp teeth.
More wine, then, and try not to mind that it tasted like day-old piss, and all the while, steer away from contemplating what would happen after his execution.
His mother and sister would most likely be turned out as bankrupts when the estate reverted to the king. What would happen to them then?
Julian could not count on the charity of Kit and his bride to care for them, and the only other kin they had were all distant cousins.
The daylight began to fade. Julian gradually stopped drinking the revolting wine. It didn’t have sufficient spirit to warm him, much less make him drunk.
He sat at his writing table for hours, listening to the rainwater washing the ancient blood from the Tower's stones.
He had never been a particularly godly man, but Selborough's words gnawed at him.
Would he be punished in the afterlife? Was there really a Hell, and was he doomed to it? And, most importantly, how could he redeem his failures in this life?
Everything he had done, he had done for his family. He had broken most of the ten commandments during his short life, but his duty to his family had never wavered.
Surely that counts for something!
When dawn finally came, turning the rainy darkness to shades of silver and smoke, he realized that all was not lost. He still had one card left, and if he played it skillfully, he might yet save his mother and sister.
To do it meant giving up the last vestige of his own pride, but he was the Earl of Thornsby. For the sake of his name and his title, he could do nothing else.
He rubbed his eyes, scratchy from lack of sleep. Then he lit a candle, drew out a sheet of paper, and sharpened his quill.
Most Excellent Majesty,
I humbly beg your gracious pardon for my many misdeeds against you, which were the Ill-considered effort to save my Family from certain Ruin.
I do not wish to beg Mercy for myself, for I am richly deserving of the judgment Meted out by my Peers. But rather, I implore you to keep in mind my Years of faithful Service unto Your Majesty and the Affection you once Bore me. For the sake of these Past vertues, I beg you to Preserve my family's title and estate by the ennobling of my brother, Sir Christopher Fitzgeorge, thus allowing him to assume the title of ninth Earl of Thornsby.
For let this missive mark that I recant my Previous testimony and affirm that Sir Christopher is indeed a natural-born son of the sixth earl, who was also mine own Father.
I furthermore pray Sir Christopher to have a tender care of my mother and my sister, and to do all in his power to see them well provided for.
And thereunto I most humbly and faithfully do submit and oblige myself, and beg that my just punishment erase any lingering ill-will against those who share my blood.
In witness that this is my last will and testament I have hereunto set my hand and seal.
Julian Thomas Edmonton, 8th Earl of Thornsby
He sealed the letter with candle-wax stamped with his signet.
He felt empty and strangely peaceful as he blew out the candle. He had discharged his final duty to the Thornsby name.
All that was left for him to do was to die well. The crowds come to see him hanged would not be disappointed in how he comported himself.
Outside, the rain stopped. Thornsby rested his head on his arms, and slept at last.
Afterword: His
torical Lies and other Poetical Licenses
While writing this book I tried to stick as closely as possible to verifiable facts about the politics, people, and everyday life in England during the summer of 1666.
The Diary of Samuel Pepys provided an invaluable day-by-day account of the events of 1666, and a fascinating look of how a bureaucrat of middling stature conducted himself towards his women servants, female acquaintances, and long-suffering wife. I also relied heavily on Victor Slater's High Life, Low Morals: the Duel That Shook Stuart Society for vivid descriptions of late seventeenth century English society and the legal and social aspects of dueling.
But the true inspiration for this work came from The Weaker Vessel, Antonia Fraser's immensely readable account of the lives of 17th-century Englishwomen.
However, Guarding the Countess is a work of fiction, so I did take a few liberties, most notably in sending Antonia and Kit to the Theater Royal in May of 1666, though the theater was actually closed for a year between 1665-66. Also, Beaumont and Fletcher's play, The Maiden Queen, was not performed on stage until 1667.
A note about the use of titles in this book: during this period, the forms of address for titled members of the peerage had not become as fixed as in later periods, such as the Regency. According to contemporary sources, such as Pepys, it was both correct and acceptable to refer to any titled member of the peerage—even dukes—in speech as "my lord" or "my lady."
For those curious about the nature of Kit's injury, I owe a description of the symptoms and weaknesses to Patricia Stillman of Santa Rosa, CA, who suggested that a torn rotator cuff might be a useful injury to inflict upon my swordsman-hero.
And, finally, the scandalous poem circulated at Court about Antonia and Kit in the aftermath of the duel is freely adapted from Andrew Marvell's 1667 satire upon Lady Castlemaine.
The End
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I am currently hard at work on my next book, putting my history degree to a use that would make my professors blush!
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