The Sixth Wife

by Suzannah Dunn

  ‘When it happens,’ she echoed in a whisper, awed.

  And we looked at each other. There we were, the two of us; the two of us and our little secret.

  And then we were grinning, and then laughing, because – suddenly – how exhilarating: that there were still surprises to be had, great big, life-changing surprises.

  Fifteen

  And she was changed. She wanted to come down to dinner, was insistent. Flapping away those useless girls of hers, I refreshed, tidied and dressed her. Her helplessness and exasperation were clean gone now and my task was easy if we took it slowly. She was impatient with herself, dismissive of the sickness. ‘Oh, it’s only a bit of sickness! I have so much to do. I haven’t even met Roger, the girls’ new tutor, yet; can you believe that? And the cooks have been clamouring to see me for weeks but I haven’t felt able even to talk about food. Well, I’m just going to have to, aren’t I?’ From time to time, though, she did have to stop and sit still on the edge of the bed, her feet listless among the angular ambers on her bedside oriental carpet. White and perfectly proportioned, those feet could have been a pair of shy creatures, or weathered from rock or shell. Motionless though she sometimes had to be, her eyes were alive again, had been blinked back into life, and her gaze flashed around us, drinking us down, making up for lost time. She chose a red gown. It was new; I’d never seen it before. She’d always favoured stately reds but this one was brighter, holly red, with golden embroidery – intricate flourishes, tiny rosettes – running across her shoulders and down her arms. Apart from there being perhaps as many as twenty yards of velvet in that gown, at perhaps almost twenty shillings a yard, there were weeks and weeks of needlecraft in it. I made an appreciative sound – lost for words – and she replied with a mere, ‘Lucas de Lucca’. A dressmaker with whom we both had dealings. He’d never come up with something this grand for me. But then if he had, could I – would I – have dared afford it?

  Clearly, a great deal of money had been and was still being spent at Sudeley Some of it would have been necessary, of course: the place had been long neglected, apparently. But I was thinking back to the stables, to my arrival, my first impression: the new, crimson livery. A whole new livery. And not just any livery, either: those jackets were made of broadcloth and lined with flannel. They’d been edged with gold cord, too, and even the buttons were bigger and brighter than any I’d ever seen on any household staff anywhere else. As if the stables aren’t already by far the most costly part of a household.

  I hadn’t been sure that the new red dress was right for Kate, couldn’t imagine how she’d stand up to it, imagined she’d fade to nothing in it, but actually she wore it well; it brought out the best in her, lit her up. When she was dressed, I fastened her usual choker around her throat: a rope of gold-set rubies alternating with twinned pearls. And then there she stood, transformed, ready. Unlike me. While she went to prayers, I made do with a quick change into something serviceable.

  We visitors had been well prepared for: dinner was spectacular. Kate did a good job of appearing to at least sample most of the dishes, but there were so many that even sampling alone would have been a tall order for someone in the best of health. Boiled beef, roast veal, rabbit, partridge and pigeon. Those at the tables lower down the room were enjoying a lot of fish; obviously there were remarkably well-stocked ponds at Sudeley From the top table I could see my travelling companions, their relieved, appreciative faces. Flickering among them were the faces of the servers. Those boys were having a hard time of it, run off their feet, their fingers burned by steaming silverware. Could have been my boys there; could so easily have been Harry and Charlie, biding their time in a neighbouring household, learning the ropes and making connections, gathering favours before moving on up to court in someone’s retinue and then, later, establishing themselves there. If we weren’t who we are, if we weren’t the Suffolks but were almost any other family, that’s how it would have been for my boys.

  I was of course sitting next to Kate. On my other side was Elizabeth. She seemed to be over the death of her tutor, was excitedly talking about his successor. Elizabeth is good at pleasantries – very good – but I’d been hoping for more interesting company. I was particularly keen to spend some time with Miles Coverdale. The Reverend Coverdale had arrived to live in Kate’s own household. Forget the fabulous food, the lavish décor, and that red dress: under Kate’s roof was the very best mind of our generation. Actually, on reflection, it was a blessing that it was Elizabeth next to me rather than Miles, because, amid the noise and bustle of the evening, conversation had to be minimal.

  On Kate’s other side was Thomas; she separated us. When she and I had arrived in the hall, Thomas – his jacket of cloth-of-gold – had taken her by the hand, laced his fingers with hers and squeezed. He did something similar with his smile, kept it to his eyes so that they sparkled full of it. All he said was, ‘You.’

  And she just smiled, an easier smile.

  To me he said, ‘You’ve already done her the world of good. I knew you would.’

  Kate retired early; she wasn’t long gone when Thomas came up behind me to ask if he could have a word. In private, was the implication. ‘Library,’ he suggested. ‘Follow me,’ and I did so, in silence, anxious not only as to what the problem might be, but also at the prospect of being alone with him, of there being no one else to fill any awkward silences. The library had been prepared for us, or he’d not long ago been in there: there were candles and a fire lit, and a jug of sweet, spiced wine stood with two glasses on a fireside table. He offered me a drink, which I declined, having had enough. He poured himself a glass – his cuffs of lawn so fine as to be mere clouds around his wrists – and we took chairs on either side of the fire.

  ‘So,’ he began, ‘I’m to be a father.’ His face softened but stopped just above a smile, his eyes on mine as if for confirmation.

  A jolt, a burn. ‘She told you.’ No longer our little secret, Kate’s and mine. His smile said, Of course she did. Yes, of course. Of course she did. She was married to him; he was the father of the coming baby. I tended to forget all that. ‘It’s early days,’ I warned. Had to. Men don’t understand. Oh, they claim they do – make a show of it, frowning and nodding – but they don’t.

  ‘Yes.’ He seemed keen to defer to me. ‘Yes.’ Then, ‘You weren’t scared, were you?’

  ‘Scared?’

  ‘When you had the boys.’

  Very direct. Which took me by surprise. I’d been braced for silliness. Directness, though: I like it, I can respond to it. This was easy. I said, ‘I was a child, Thomas.’ Meaning that I hadn’t known what it was to be scared. Hadn’t known what there was to be scared of.

  This he warmed to. ‘You were, weren’t you. It’s funny to see you all together: you’re so friendly with them; you could be their sister.’

  ‘Oh’ – don’t worry – ‘I’m very much their mother.’ I added, ‘Boys seem to need a mother so much more than girls do.’

  A breezy, ‘Boy or girl, mine will have the very best.’

  ‘I don’t doubt it.’

  We both smiled, careful. Why, I was wondering, was I here? Was this it? Did he just want to talk to someone about impending fatherhood? ‘You know, come to think of it, I was Elizabeth’s age,’ I said. His smile dissolved in his eyes; he was puzzled, so I had to explain. ‘When I had the boys: Elizabeth’s age, I was.’ Incredible to think it. The same age as that girlish girl who was playing at being grown-up, trying it on for size. She’d rise to it, though, if she had to. ‘And – you see? – Elizabeth’s not scared, is she.’

  ‘Of?’

  ‘Of anything. Is she.’

  He opened his mouth, then closed it.

  ‘Comes later, doesn’t it,’ I said, ‘being scared.’

  ‘Oh, you’re never scared,’ he teased.

  Gone, that directness. He was falling back on an idea of me, a simple one, the usual one. It bores me. I answered him back: ‘Oh, yes, I am. I am scared, some
times.’

  ‘Not you,’ he tried again, tiresomely.

  ‘I’m scared for those I love.’Thank God, then, that there are so few of them.

  ‘Scared of?’

  I shrugged. ‘Of what could happen to them.’

  He lowered his eyes; he couldn’t argue with that; there was so much that could happen. Then he said, ‘But you’d fight for them.’ For a moment, I thought he’d said ‘pray’: You’d pray for them.

  Which is what anyone else would have said, piously. He was right, though: I’d fight; that’s what I’d do. ‘Yes,’ I allowed. ‘I’d fight for them. As long as there were a way to do it.’

  ‘Have a drink.’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m exhausted.’

  His smile broadened. ‘All the more reason for a drink,’ but there was no insistence, he’d already given up on me. He’d be content to sit alone, I knew, as I stood to go. It was something he’d been doing often, lately, I imagined, with Kate having been so sick. Suddenly tiredness welled up from somewhere deeper than the last few days and I could do nothing but stay where I was. My room was so far away in this huge house; I didn’t even quite know where. Down shadowy, chilly corridors. If I ever managed to reach it, then there’d be the wearisome business of getting ready for bed. I was too tired even to acknowledge Bella; I wanted nothing but to stay where I was.

  So, I sat back down again, which Thomas took as acquiescence. He brightened, reached for the jug of wine and a glass. He could do the talking. I didn’t even have to listen; I could just drink.

  ‘You know’ – he handed me a ruby-filled glass of hippocras – ‘I’d just accepted that I wouldn’t be having children.’ He said it casually; it was me who felt exposed by the revelation. He’d told me what I’d wanted to know but hadn’t dared ask. He’d read my mind and hadn’t spared me.

  I was unsettled, and fended him off with a suitable platitude: ‘Well, you’ve been pleasantly surprised.’ Dutifully, we raised our glasses to his good fortune. As the hippocras twinkled in my mouth, I was thinking again, Why, then, did you marry her? Did he love Kate so very much that he’d been willing to forego the chance of an heir? I’d never come across a man from a wealthy family who hadn’t at least one eye on the future of the family fortune. No one gave up on an heir for love. No one. True, he was impulsive, but there are other – better – ways to be impulsive than to marry the love of your life. He could have married sensibly – with an heir in mind – and then found other ways to enjoy life, couldn’t he. Although not, of course, with Kate; she would never have been his mistress.

  Again, he seemed to read my mind. ‘All I wanted, in all my unmarried years, was to be happily married.’ Gone was the lazy, confident smile; in its place, a tentative one, and I saw that he was offering me the truth. Not so far-fetched, either. Boys need mothers, men need wives. ‘And I’ve known for years that Kate’s the only one I could be happily married to. She’s -’ He shrugged. ‘Well, you know what she is, all the things she is.’

  ‘She’s perfect.’

  ‘Yes,’ and we both laughed, as if it were a joke between us, her perfection. Or our being in the shadow of it: perhaps that was the joke. ‘I’ve been lucky,’ he said, and took a mouthful of wine. ‘Very, very lucky. And now I’m even luckier.’

  Because of the baby.

  But suddenly he looked all at sea. ‘Anyway,’ he changed the subject, ‘what do you think of Sudeley?’

  Safer ground: we talked about the house, the building work, his plans and the difficulties of hiring good craftsmen. Then we couldn’t avoid the subject of last year’s poor harvest, the prospect of food shortages. We moved from that to my journey, and to other journeys that we’d both made, which led us to places we knew, and people. Nothing much, in the end, and it was easy – indeed, surprisingly pleasurable – to sit talking with him about nothing much. When the courtyard clock struck two, I was reminded that I should try to get some sleep, and made a move to go. He stayed, glass in hand. During the walk to my room, I revisited our conversation, dipping into pockets of it so far unexplored: other places, people we hadn’t yet mentioned. Arriving, I signalled for a bleary Bella to settle back down on her mattress, and, still dressed, gave myself up to the big bed. As I melted into sleep, Thomas’s voice was still with me, on me, in me, murmuring along with my blood.

  Sixteen

  The next day, I didn’t – as I’d expected – sleep in, but woke in good time. I didn’t get up, though, before savouring my surroundings. That’s what the room demanded, glimmering beyond my bedposts, and I gave myself up to it. First, the ceiling: deep blue and lush with fat, gilded, sharp-pointed stars. If only the real sky were like that, rather than ruffled with cloud and smeared with chill, silvery dust. Then the walls: tapestries in which the thread was so rich and new that it gleamed, changing hue if I moved my head.The scenes were biblical but the scene-stealers were their gardens, trees resplendent with sun-rich fruits: oranges, lemons, pomegranates. Not for this room the usual English grassy hills and grey castles, the pale horses and feeble deer. And this was just a guest room.

  I took my time in getting ready. There was no rush; I had nothing in particular to do that day, or any day I was here, being free of the responsibilities of running my own household. Bella took several gowns from their buckram bags before I made my choice. Sleeves, too: we had time to try pair after pair.Then, when I was as ready as I’d ever be, and had learned that Kate was still in her rooms, that’s where I headed.

  At Kate’s bedroom door, I could hear voices, but not the respectful murmuring of servants or attendant ladies. It was busy in there. Something was going on.

  Kate was dressed, but lying on her bed. Queen of this house. Beside her bed were those who could have been said to be her jesters: Elizabeth,Thomas and Mrs Ashley. No sign of Jane Grey. Elizabeth was sitting on a chair; Thomas was positioned behind her, plaiting her hair under Mrs Ashley’s supervision and making a spectacle of his incompetence, feigning helplessness. Mrs Ashley was responding heartily to his little show: laughing, flushed, fingertips to her breastbone. Across the room, a cluster of attending ladies – Marcella, Agnes, Frankie – were agog and giggling. Quite an audience Thomas had. Elizabeth, though, held herself still, as required. She was good at it. A regal bearing, definitely: that long neck, the held-high chin.

  Mrs Ashley was squealing, ‘What are you doing?

  Thomas hissed, ‘But this is what you’re telling me to do!’

  Elizabeth chimed in,‘Oh,Thomas!’Trying to be scathing, raising her glimmering, sketchy eyebrows.

  Thomas protested, ‘You’ve been doing this all your lives, you women.’

  Elizabeth gave in to impatience and raised a hand to the back of her head, feeling her way.

  ‘Uh-uh!’Thomas again. ‘Stay still. Have a little faith. I’m nearly there. Don’t meddle.’

  Elizabeth dropped the hand back into her lap. ‘Meddle,’ she repeated, mock-disdainful.

  ‘We have to get you respectable,’ he murmured, the show now of concentration. ‘This’ – he scooped up a heavy skein of her hair – ‘has a life of its own. It’s not to be trusted.’ Then, ‘Why do you women make life so difficult for yourselves?’

  Elizabeth smirked, ‘You just said it was easy for us.’

  ‘For you, yes, practised as you all are. But it’s all so complicated. Well, isn’t it?’

  Mrs Ashley trilled, ‘Oh, Thomas…’

  ‘I do try. At least I try. D’you want to try shaving me? Hmm?’

  Elizabeth’s eyes glinted, her mouth twitched. ‘I have a fairly steady hand.’

  Kate had been smiling that warm, full smile at me: Come over here, it said. She patted the bed, and I perched. She looked at Thomas, Elizabeth and Mrs Ashley, and then back to me, the look wry, knowing, amused.

  ‘Yes,’ I agreed, because I had to, was being asked to. Agreed to what precisely, though, I didn’t know. I hated it, being sucked into Thomas and Elizabeth’s audience just because I happened to be ther
e. Hated having to watch – and, worse, applaud – a grown man behaving like a schoolboy. What had happened to the interestingly straightforward man I’d been talking with in the library, only a matter of hours ago? What on earth was he doing, behaving like this with Elizabeth? And what was Mrs Ashley thinking, letting him – worse, encouraging him to – behave like this? But that was just it: Mrs Ashley wasn’t thinking at all, was she. I turned away, to Kate. ‘You’re dressed,’ I said.

  ‘I am.’ She inclined her head, a tiny bowing. ‘And that’s how it’s to be from now on, I’ve decided. No languishing.’ She said it emphatically, as if chiding someone else, ribbing someone else.

  Elizabeth’s voice cut in: ‘He might want you to stay there, in bed; that might be what he wants. To have you all to himself.’

  I hadn’t realised she could hear us amid Mrs Ashley and Thomas’s high jinks. Or that she’d want to, that she’d try to. What was alarming, though, was that she seemed to be talking about Thomas: Thomas wanting Kate in bed. A horribly forward, inappropriate comment. I realised my mistake when she stretched towards Kate – confounding Thomas again (‘Stay still!’) - and laid a hand on Kate’s stomach.They looked into each other’s eyes, exchanged smiles. Kate placed a hand over Elizabeth’s and, giving it something between a pat and a squeeze, held it there. She knows, I realised, shocked: Elizabeth knows about the pregnancy.

  Thomas huffed, ‘Right, I give up. I’ve done my best,’ and Mrs Ashley took over with an exaggerated sigh, tied the two plaits up in an instant and then settled a hood over them. ‘Done,’ she announced to Elizabeth.

  ‘Come on, then.’ Elizabeth rose, echoing Mrs Ashley’s sigh. ‘Lessons. Jane’ll be tapping her foot.’

  Thomas said something about going hawking and suddenly they were all leaving. When the door had closed, and the three attending girls clearly weren’t listening, having relapsed into chatter, I said, ‘Elizabeth knows.’ I kept my tone light – a mere remark, a passing observation – but it did indicate my surprise. Surprise, not dismay: I was careful with the distinction.