“Have you seen him, Bess?” asked Cicely.
“No. I am only now come from Greenwich.”
“And I imagine none of us would want to!” said Ann, who had followed them, with a toss of her dainty head.
“But I have!” shouted Margaret triumphantly, emerging from the billows of satin which were being drawn over her rumpled head.
“You have seen him?” repeated the Queen in surprise. “Where?”
“From the window of that little anteroom beside the King's work-closet. It looks down on to a tiny walled garden where the monks used to walk. And Perkin Warbeck is allowed to walk there now. I saw him when I went to write my signature on some marriage documents. And the secretary told me that my father sometimes stands there and looks down too.”
If Margaret had hoped to spring a surprise on her relatives, her sense of importance was satisfied. It was beneath a Queen's dignity to ask what so base an imposter looked like, but Elizabeth was glad when one of her sisters did.
“Oh, very ordinary,” replied Margaret superciliously. “A fair, slight young man in plain worsted such as merchants wear. I could not see so much as a gash on him and he did not look even ashamed. After all the trouble he has caused, my father should have sent him whipped to Tyburn.”
“Your father the King knows best,” reproved Elizabeth sharply. “And it would become you to remember that your future husband was not so long ago this Perkin Warbeck's friend.”
But the child's words had disturbed her.
“Why do you suppose Henry watches him like that?” she asked, returning with her sisters to her own apartments.
“Curiosity, I suppose,” shrugged Cicely. “After all, whoever he is, this Perkin person has had rather an amazing run for his money.”
“Like a cat watching a caught mouse,” mused Elizabeth. “I sometimes wish he had put him to death. It might have been kinder. Henry did not even suggest making him a scullion. I wonder— what he is waiting for.”
Cicely surveyed her anxiously. “Bess, you are not still fancying that he might really be Dickon? Not after what that awful Tyrrell man said—”
“No, no. Of course not. But, all the same, I should like to see him—just once.”
After Cicely had rejoined her husband Elizabeth sat idly by her open window, watching summer thunder-clouds pile up above the sunset. The approaching storm made the evening still and airless. There was much to do for the entertainment of her Scottish guests, but her mind was not on her daughter's affairs. It had gone back to the things which Margaret had said with such young callousness. “Why is it that other people are allowed to see him and not I?” she wondered. “Why, half the people in London must have seen him. And I was always allowed to see Lambert Simnel. I went down into the kitchens that day. And I could see him now any day I liked, about the Palace or out hawking. And why was Henry so anxious to keep me away from Westminster?”
The storm spent its fury and passed, freshening the earth, and the morning of the proxy wedding dawned bright and cloudless. Yet, in spite of all the happy hospitable duties she had to perform, the thought nagged absurdly at the back of Elizabeth's mind. She could have asked Henry to let her see Perkin, of course. But even when their guests had retired, befriended and impressed, she could not bring herself to do so. He would probably laugh at her. Or refuse. And if he refused she would know that he himself, as she had once suspected, was not quite sure. That he was afraid that she, like her Aunt Margaret, might recognize him. The old quick fire of hope which she had supposed to be extinguished began to run through her again. In the evening, returning from vespers, she made occasion to walk with her ladies beside the old garden wall. Stopping for a moment or two and calling to one of them to adjust her shoe, she gave herself time to observe the strong iron gate. Seeing her, a couple of men-at-arms who had been sitting dicing on a log of wood beside it rose hurriedly and stood to attention. They were Perkin's guards, she supposed. A heavy old key hung from the belt of one of them.
When she went back into the Palace she found the King and the proxy bridegroom awaiting her. The Earl had come to make his adieux. He would be leaving in the morning. His master, he assured her, would count himself a very happy man.
“He will probably need to be a very firm one sometimes,” laughed Elizabeth, with her usual candour. “But, happy as we are about this union, we shall be glad to have our daughter with us for a year or two longer.”
“If Margaret is a little imperious sometimes, it is probably the effect of all this sudden ceremony and importance,” said Henry, not liking to hear his favourite daughter even lightly criticized. “After so much excitement I think, Madam, it would be well if you took her to the quiet of our palace at Richmond to-morrow.”
Elizabeth looked up quickly. “To-morrow?” she repeated involuntarily.
“I will tell them to prepare the barge.”
But quite suddenly and definitely Elizabeth knew that she could not go to-morrow. There was something she must do first, even if it meant defying him. “If, by your Grace's leave, we might make it the following day—with all the clothes we brought—my own and the children's, it would be a little difficult to depart so soon. And I had hoped to spend a little time with Arthur before he returns to Ludlow—” she improvised. And because she was so seldom difficult—or because a guest was present—he could not well refuse to gratify so reasonable a request. “The day afterwards, then,” he agreed pleasantly enough; but Elizabeth knew that it was a command.
“That gives me twenty-four hours,” she thought, and wasted several of them lying awake. “He may change his mind and put this Perkin to death, and then I shall never see him,” she thought. “But who is there to help me? Surely, among all the courtiers who daily pay me compliments, there is at least one who would arrange so small a thing?” Her mind roved over them, but not one, she decided, would risk the King's displeasure. She thought of Stafford, but he was married and a King's man now. Her mind moved down the social scale a little. Surely there was one of her own household—or one of the royal servants—who would find a way to serve her in this matter. And towards morning she remembered that there was someone who had said that he would do anything for her—anything at all.
Elizabeth rose early and, going to feed the parrot which Lord Stanley had given her, made loud lamentation that her new pet was ailing. And what more normal than to send for the King's head falconer?
“Why, of course, Madam,” agreed her ladies. “He is so clever with birds.”
Whatever important personages may have been going hawking that sunny morning, Simnel came immediately. He stood before her, feathered cap in hand and Tudor rose on jerkin, looking sturdy and dependable. And when, after asking him to examine the parrot, she managed to be alone with him for a few moments he made no elaborate protests of loyalty nor asked any inconvenient questions. He merely waited there, with the bird in his hands, ready to serve her.
“I want to get into that little old walled garden between the Palace and the Abbey,” she told him as they stood beside the gilded cage. “But it is locked.”
For a moment or two all his attention appeared to be concentrated upon the gaily hued wing outspread between his expert fingers. “How soon could your Grace be there?” he asked.
“In an hour from now?” The Queen's whisper sounded eager as a young girl's.
“It will be unlocked,” was all he said.
The very simplicity of his loyalty disarmed her. “You will be taking a grave hazard, Simnel,” she warned. “Even the Tudor does not forgive a man twice.”
“Life is full of hazards, Madam,” he said cheerfully, putting her parrot back carefully into its cage. “But with the ointment I shall send—a little on the wing daily—I think your Grace need have no further anxiety,” he added in a louder voice as some of her ladies returned from the errand upon which she had sent them. He bowed then, feathered hat in hand again, and excused himself. “One of the King's favourite falcons has escaped, Madam,” he explain
ed. “So I must hurry.”
“Oh, Simnel!” exclaimed the women sympathetically.
“I shall soon get her back, ladies,” he assured them. “She may have flown into the yard of a private house or over some garden wall. But everyone will willingly let me in to search.”
He was so goodnatured and such a general favourite that the Queen made no doubt they would. Even those two guards whom she had seen dicing away their tedium. “How long will it take you, Simnel?” she asked anxiously.
“No longer than to persuade people to lend me their keys in the King's name. And, of course,” he added with an engaging grin as he bent near her to make sure the gilded cage was latched, “to see first that a falcon really escapes!”
IT WAS VERY QUIET in the little walled garden. Only the birds sang as they darted between the tangled bushes or strutted unafraid upon the daisy-strewn grass. The air was sweet with the scent of honeysuckle and the high walls shut out all sound of the everyday world.
Letting the heavy gate close behind her, Elizabeth felt as if she had stepped outside her normal life into a dream. Warmth and peace enfolded her and time seemed to stand still. Yet she found herself hurrying. As she followed one of the overgrown paths her feet began to run and her breath to come more quickly. Trailing brambles caught at the rich material of her skirts, and cobwebs, still dew-starred, brushed softly through her fingers; but she scarcely heeded them. She had waited so long for this encounter, yet knew not whom she would meet.
“It will be like the day I went to see Simnel in the kitchens,” she assured herself, as she penetrated deeper into the garden. “This Perkin impostor will turn round and my heart will go blank as it did then. There will be the same sharp disappointment, like the cutting of a surgeon's knife, and then I shall be cured.”
Suddenly, at a bend in the path, she came upon him. So suddenly that she stopped short with a hand on her racing heart. He was standing in the morning sunlight, a slim graceful figure outlined against a sunwashed wall. The light burnished his golden head as he bent over a book. This time there was to be no short, decisive cure. He might have been Dickon, grown to manhood, standing there.
“No wonder they all believed in him!” she thought.
Elizabeth supposed that she must have spoken the words aloud, for he turned then and saw her. Some grand lady in green and gold, staring at his solitude. Whatever surprise he may have felt, he had sufficient social poise to conceal it. He came forward a step or two, courteously, to greet her. “Madam, the morning was beautiful before your beauty adorned it,” he said, with a delighted smile, “but now—”
Clearly, he had not recognized her. Elizabeth drew closer, looking into his face. Her eagerness may have betrayed her, or the rare jewels she wore. His mind worked like quicksilver. “But now it is home,” he submitted smoothly, and stretched out both his shapely hands towards her.
It had never occurred to her that she might see him and still not be sure. But this was a man's face, with no boyish curves left. The fair skin was bronzed a little by the weather, the smooth flesh of cheek and chin tightened by shaving. There was about it a jauntiness, a wariness, and even an unfamiliar suggestion of hardness. Only the mouth was tender, as she had remembered Dickon's. Of course he, too, might feel uncertain and be taking a chance. But whoever he was he had the advantage over her, for he must often have seen her recent portrait in Margaret of Burgundy's house. Elizabeth withdrew her half-extended hands which had moved so spontaneously to meet his. “Are you the person they call Perkin Warbeck?” she asked.
By turning to lay his book aside upon the seat he gained a moment for reflection. But he must have decided to make no effort to gainsay her. “Or Osbeck,” he shrugged, as if amused. “They never seem quite certain. And you, Madam,” he said, bowing profoundly, “must be Elizabeth, the Queen.”
“I came to see how you fared,” she lied, “after all that they did to you.”
“That was heavenly gracious of you. But their tormentings did not amount to much,” he said, gathering up his cloak and spreading it for her across the stone bench. “Will your Grace deign to sit here?”
Elizabeth's limbs were trembling and she could not have refused him if she would. She sank down thankfully in the pleasant shade of an old mulberry tree. “Surely it was hard to bear, the hooting and the—things they threw?”
He winced, but she guessed that his fastidious pride was suffering less from the memory than because she had heard of it. He stood easily before her, expounding his philosophy of life. “One can always keep one's thoughts on something else,” he said. “On a lark that is singing, on the thought of how badly the man in front rides, or upon the woman one loves.”
“And that would help?” The Queen's voice was low and pitiful.
“Imagination can always rise above reality.”
“You have certainly not been wanting in imagination! Imagination for which others have suffered,” she said scornfully. He made an expressive gesture of regret and she relented. “But—when you read aloud your confession and they mocked you?”
“Ah, there I found it paid to employ other tactics,” he told her, entering into the matter with absurd zest. “It was not my confession, of course. But, even so, one should join in the baiting, giving back shaft for shaft, steering their sense of the ridiculous, whenever possible, towards something else. Always with wit and good humour, bien entendu. For there is nothing your Londoner likes better than a good laugh. I assure you, Madam, I am becoming so experienced in these matters that I thought of employing my tedium here by writing a book for my fellow-unfortunates. 'Eloquence through rotten eggs,' perhaps, or 'Suitable sayings from the stocks.'”
“Don't!”
Grinning down at her, he looked more than ever like her memories of Dickon. “But why should you care?” he asked, teasing her with mock amazement.
“Because you remind me—”
“Ah!” He grew grave again, but did not pursue the advantage.
The precious time was passing, and she had so much to ask him—so many traps to set. “Tell me about my aunt, the Dowager Duchess,” she commanded.
“She is in good health and entrusted me with her love to you.”
“Then she really supposed that you would get so far as to see me?”
“And so I have,” he reminded her.
“But scarcely in the way that she intended.”
“That will be a great disappointment to her,” he admitted. “The Duchess was extraordinarily good to me.”
“And you adored her.” Illusion was so strong that it was on the tip of Elizabeth's tongue to add, “You always did adore her.”
“Although I was grateful, I did not enjoy being beholden. Her Grace had too much the ordering of my life. And she could be vindictive. Particularly to the Tudors, of course.”
“And it was she, I suppose, who really taught you English?”
“Heaven forbid!” he exclaimed, with a boyish burst of laughter. “She has acquired an execrable Lowland accent.”
His own was pure native as the English hills.
“But she taught you all about us. Our names and habits, and how we looked and talked, so that you could speak of us familiarly. And about King Edward.”
“There was no need. I remember my father perfectly.”
“Jean de Warbeck, the merchant of Tournay?”
“If you say so, Madam.”
Quite unreasonably, his good-tempered agreement angered her more than his pride. “Why do you so meekly say everything that is put into your mouth? Oh, I know that you had no choice—out there—when the King made you. But here—with me?”
His smile was both diffident and engaging. “Having failed, would it not be but poor kindness to persuade you?”
“You mean,” she said, quick to pick up his thought, “that, so long as there was any question of your succeeding, it was my son or you?”
“And since my day is done let it be indubitably your son.”
The insolence of his
presuming to give her peace of mind infuriated her. “And probably not pressing his claim is just a clever way to avoid my questioning,” she thought.
“How can anything that you do affect my son? Or anyone seriously suppose you to be a Plantagenet?” she demanded. “Men of my family do not persuade their allies to retreat. They fight like the third Richard fought at Bosworth, or ride out alone to face an angry mob like the second Richard did in the Peasants' Revolt.”
The colour rose hotly in his cheeks. “Neither of them had to see their own country ravaged for the sake of destroying it, or Englishwomen raped by foreigners,” he said.
He was too readily plausible, she decided. And then, just when she was sure of his guile, he was down on one knee beside her, neither parrying nor posing, but unfeignedly sincere. “I pray you give me news of my wife,” he beseeched. “I hear that she is with you.”
“She is well,” said Elizabeth, looking down into his ardent face and thinking what a lover he would make. “I should like to be able to tell you that she is happy. But at least she is kindly treated.”
“Everybody says you are the kindest Queen in Christendom!” he cried gratefully, bending to kiss the hands that lay in her lap.
In spite of herself, she was pleased with the compliment. She would have liked to touch his bent head. “Your Kate is easy to be kind to,” she said smilingly.
“She gave up everything to follow me. She is sweet as the heather on the Scottish hills,” he said. “Could you tell her that you have seen me? That I am shamefully well. And give her my undying love—”
Elizabeth released her hands from his eager hold and held up one to stay his importunity. “How can I tell anyone that I came here?” she reminded him. “Do you not suppose that I took some risk to do so?”
“Of course you must have done, ingrate that I am!” he agreed, rising to his feet.
But, seeing the disappointment upon his sensitive face, Elizabeth found the same difficulty in refusing him which had so often betrayed her into doing things for her young brothers. “She is coming to Richmond with me to-morrow, and one day I shall probably find means to reassure her,” she half promised him.
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