Murder in the Queen's Garden

by Amanda Carmack

  More servants followed with dishes of almond cakes and fruit suckets, sugar wafers stamped with the queen’s initials, and even more wine. The queen cooed over them, for she loved sweets above all else, some days eating nothing else. Yet Sir Robert still looked on with that sharp-edged smile.

  At Kate’s own table, Roland and Green were talking together in low, harsh voices, too quiet for any words to be made out. Violet looked as if she was about to cry, and Anne chattered on with renewed determination. The sweets did not seem to be working their magic for any of them.

  Yet the queen was above it all on her gilded dais, happy and seemingly secure. “We must have dancing now!” she cried. “A galliard. I insist.”

  She gestured to the musicians in the gallery, and Lord Arundel leaped up to instruct his servants to push back the tables and make room for the queen’s desires. If Elizabeth wanted dancing, dancing she would have, immediately. She moved lightly around the room on Sir Robert’s arm, urging everyone to dance, even a reluctant-looking Catherine Grey.

  Kate felt a touch on her hand, and she looked around to find Rob Cartman looking down at her, his beautiful face expressionless. He had changed from his sunset-bright tights into a more somber purple doublet sewn with a lattice pattern of brass buttons. His blond hair was brushed back from the sharp, elegant angles of his face, revealing a new pearl earring. Despite his new elegance, he was still the same Rob—complicated and unreadable.

  “May I be your partner, Kate?” he asked, his tone wary.

  Kate remembered their half quarrel by the lake, her nagging suspicions that he had not told her the whole tale of why he was at Nonsuch. But she could not deny him, and she did not even know why.

  She nodded, and he took her hand to lead her into the forming pattern of the dance. The queen led them off, partnered as always by Robert Dudley. The two of them still laughed together, while Lord Arundel glared and the Spanish whispered. Violet stood in front of Kate in the line of dancers, partnered by her brother, while Lord Hertford danced not with Lady Catherine but with Anne Godwin.

  The musicians launched into the queen’s galliard, a lively tune written in her father’s time, perhaps when Nonsuch was first built. Rob took Kate’s hand and drew her into the opening skipping step as they circled each other, then spun back around, her feet automatically moving in time to the familiar music. It was a quick dance, an intricate pattern around the other dancers, then back like a loop of lace, and she could think of nothing else but the movement, the notes that got into her blood every time.

  She couldn’t help but laugh with delight as Rob caught her around the waist and spun her in a wide circle, her skirts flying out like a bell. She did so love to dance, but so seldom had the chance, as she always played for the queen’s banquets, for the other dancers. And Rob was a fine partner, quick and light, easily covering her little stumbles.

  They twirled faster and faster, until the room was only a buttery blur around her, and she threw back her head to laugh, forgetting everything for one blessed moment.

  But it could not last for long. The music ended amid a rush of laughter, but the gust of merriment was suddenly cut off by an angry shout. The sound of it was like an ugly splash of mud on a shimmering tapestry, and Kate heard Violet gasp as they all spun toward the noise.

  “You are a lying whoreson!”

  It was the handsome Master Green shouting out from near the abandoned dais, and Kate strained up on tiptoe to glimpse his face. Rage, and probably too much wine—a dangerous combination in the banked fireworks of the royal court—distorted his features. He lunged forward as the ladies nearby shrieked, and his fist shot out to catch another man’s jaw with a horrible, audible crack.

  Kate’s eyes shifted to the man who reeled from Master Green’s blow. Master Constable, Dr. Dee’s pasty-pale ghostly student. Surely the two men could barely know each other, let alone hate with such fire that they brawled at the queen’s own banquet! Yet Green leaped on Constable and his hands circled the astrologer’s throat with a feral intent.

  “Pig! Varlet! You lie!”

  “Enough of that, you hedgepigs!” Elizabeth shouted, her merriment vanished. “Enough, I say! I will have none of this guttersnipe behavior at my court. We are not a Shoreditch bear pit.”

  Lord Arundel started toward them, but his secretary, Violet’s brother, Master Roland, reached them first. He seized his friend by the back of his doublet and dragged him off the shrieking Constable.

  Master Green swung around as if he would hit Master Roland, too, and Violet cried out in horror. But Green restrained himself at the last instant and backed away with a look of stark fear on his face, as if he had only just realized what he had done. What he had been about to do.

  Dr. Dee walked toward the men like a great black bird in his swirling robes and helped his student to his feet. Blood and tears mixed together and dripped from Constable’s face in a terrible mess.

  Kate felt like she was caught in a bad dream, as did everyone else around her, judging from their gleefully horrified expressions.

  Amid the stunned silence of the hall, Queen Elizabeth whirled around and snatched up a goblet from one of the tables. At first, Kate was sure from the dark look on her face that she would throw it at someone’s head.

  But Elizabeth merely swallowed the wine in one quick draft and thrust the empty vessel at Lord Arundel. He looked as stunned as everyone else and took the goblet without a word. Surely the groveling apologies would come anon.

  “Too much of your fine wine has flowed tonight, I fear, Lord Arundel,” Elizabeth said tightly. “Master Roland, take your friend away and dunk his hot head in cold water.” She turned her glare on Master Constable. “I will speak with both of you young men tomorrow, but for now I am most weary of you all.”

  Elizabeth whirled around and stalked from the hall, leaving her ladies to scramble after her. Kate looked around for Violet, but she was already being led away by Lady Anne. Violet’s pretty face looked startled at the sudden violent scene involving both her brother and her favorite suitor, and she went with Anne with no protest. At the doors, Master Longville stepped forward hopefully, but Anne waved him away.

  Only then did Kate realize that Rob Cartman had vanished into the chaos of the hall. She stood in the middle of the banqueting hall alone as servants scurried to clean away the mess. Whispered speculation flowed all around her. The queen’s courtiers loved nothing more than disgrace when it was not their own.

  Lady Catherine Knollys appeared beside her and gently touched her arm. Startled, Kate turned to look at her and found her dark Boleyn eyes flash with sympathy. Her hand, as white and elegant as the queen’s, rested on her softly rounded belly. She expected yet another child, but everyone knew the queen would not let her leave her side until it was almost time for the babe to be born.

  “Shall we walk together back to the queen’s rooms, Mistress Haywood?” she said. “I fear my brother and my daughter, Lettice, have both quite disappeared, and I don’t wish to walk alone in the night.”

  “Of course, my lady,” Kate said. They walked together in silence along the gallery back toward the palace, Lady Knollys smiling at her friends. It was a subtle difference, but Kate noticed how everyone made room for the queen’s cousin, their whispers quieter, their smiles quicker. Oh, how the Boleyn fortune had changed.

  “You are a fine dancer, Mistress Haywood, as well as an accomplished musician,” Lady Knollys said with one of her serene smiles. She seemed so friendly, so kind to everyone, yet she was as adept at hiding her thoughts as everyone else.

  “Thank you, my lady,” Kate answered, not knowing what else to say.

  “I saw you were partnered with Master Cartman, the actor.”

  “You know him?” Kate was so surprised, she blurted out the words, then ducked her head as she felt her cheeks turn warm.

  Lady Knollys laughed. “My brother invited
him here, with Her Majesty’s approval. Lord Hunsdon is much interested in the theater, you know, and has heard much of the talents of Master Cartman and his troupe. We would be interested in hearing your opinion of him later. I do think my brother seeks to start his own theater.”

  “I—I know him but little, my lady,” Kate said, half truthfully. She and Rob had certainly seen much together, murder and loss, yet she really barely knew him. He was too good at his trade, and she was learning to be. It was interesting he had come here to meet with Lord Hunsdon, which would be an ambitious move indeed.

  Why had he not told her of that? Was Hunsdon the wealthy lord who might seek to be the actor’s patron?

  They had reached the queen’s privy chamber, which was once again crowded with those who could not quite seek their own rooms until the queen retired. Laughter could be heard from behind the door of the royal bedchamber, loud with wine and the remembered drama of the banquet.

  “I am having some friends in my chamber for a small supper tomorrow evening, Mistress Haywood,” Lady Knollys said. “Perhaps you would care to join us? I fear I cannot promise such interest as we had tonight, though.”

  Once again, she had surprised Kate. She often wondered what they knew about her mother—and what she should say, or not say. This was a kindness indeed. “Thank you. I would be honored.”

  Lady Knollys gave her one more smile before gliding toward the bedchamber. Her daughter, Lady Lettice, joined her, the two of them whispering together, and Kate hurried toward her own lodgings, her thoughts whirling. Only a few days at Nonsuch, and so much had happened.

  Anne and Violet were already in their small chamber when Kate opened the door. Violet huddled on the edge of her bed, her shoulders shaking as she cried into a handkerchief, while Anne tried to soothe her with an offered cordial.

  “’Tis nothing to get so dramatic about, I vow, Violet,” Anne said, making a tsking noise. “Men get ale-shot and fight all the time. The queen will forget it all by tomorrow, and your Master Green will be entirely forgiven. He is too handsome for it to be otherwise. And some other scandal will quickly take its place.”

  “’Tis very true,” Kate said. She hurried to sit on Violet’s other side, patting her friend’s hand. There were so many scandalous romances just waiting to erupt—including Catherine Grey’s. Surely a small quarrel between two young men was nothing.

  “But why would he fight with that Master Constable, of all people?” Violet wailed. “How can they even have dealings with each other? Is it because Constable told my horoscope?”

  And did it very ill indeed, Kate thought, remembering how Violet had said Constable declared her of a “melancholic disposition.” “I am sure that cannot be so. Master Constable did not behave improperly toward you, did he?”

  Violet sniffled. “N-nay.”

  “And that was ages ago,” Anne said. “I am sure Master Green just did not like something about Master Constable’s look tonight, and who could blame him? The man looks like a two-day-old fish left in the sun.”

  Violet reluctantly giggled, and they went on to speak of other things, but Kate’s thoughts were still in a whirl. She thought of the sudden burst of anger tonight, the cottage to which Master Constable had tiptoed in the middle of the night. Robert Dudley and Dr. Dee, and the long-missing Dr. Macey. All so strange.

  And also a supper in the rooms of Lady Knollys. Tomorrow already promised to hold surprises.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “I will have no such foul behavior in my court! Is that rightly understood?” Queen Elizabeth’s shout was so loud that the very rafters of the privy chamber seemed to ring with it. Even Kate, standing far from the throne dais, instinctively stepped back from the fearful sound of it, bumping into the man behind her.

  Master Green, standing with Lord Arundel at the queen’s feet along with Master Constable and Dr. Dee, went scarlet. All the men bowed their heads before the queen’s wrath, their faces hidden.

  “My palaces are not a tavern for brawling,” she went on, slapping her palm hard on the carved and gilded armrest of her chair. “And you, Master Green—to shame your friend’s master thus, when he has gone to such lengths for our visit . . .”

  Lord Arundel cuffed Master Green on the back of his head. His florid, jowled face did indeed look thunderous. He had planned every instant of this lavish visit to Nonsuch, carefully choreographed every moment to advance his suit with the queen. But he hadn’t accounted for a fistfight.

  Would masquerades erase the brawl?

  Kate thought she saw a flash of raw fury contort Master Green’s famously handsome features, but it was gone so swiftly she wondered if she had imagined it. A young man in his position could not afford such anger.

  But then, nor could he afford to start fights at a royal banquet. Especially not with a man said to be learning magical arts. Master Constable’s black cap hid his face, but Kate could see the greasy curtain of his hair.

  “It will not happen again, Your Majesty, I do hasten to assure you,” Lord Arundel said. “If we should send young Green back to his father, I shall speak to Lord Hunsdon . . .”

  Elizabeth gave a weary sigh and glanced away from the penitential scene before her. Kate recognized the sure signs of the queen’s boredom, so quick to come upon her in those summer days. Her dark eyes constantly changed, flashing from laughter to fury and back in an instant. “There will be no need for that. Tempers do flare at times in this hot weather, and Master Green here is young. I am sure he will learn to restrain himself in the future.” Her smile suddenly gleamed. “Besides, he does sing so prettily. My ladies would be desolate without his songs to lighten the days. Begone now. We shall speak no more of this.”

  Lord Arundel bowed so low Kate was sure his head would scrape the edge of the brocade-draped dais. Then he turned and stalked through the staring, gaping crowd, hauling Master Green with him.

  Violet, who stood next to Kate, tense with fear, tried to say something to him as he passed, but he wouldn’t look at her. Violet looked as if she would burst into tears again.

  “Come, Mistress Roland. These are not fit proceedings for your sweet ears,” her oft-rejected suitor Master Longville said, close to Violet’s “sweet” ear. “Let us walk in the garden for a time.”

  Violet looked as if she would refuse, but then something in her teary-soft eyes hardened. She nodded and took Longville’s arm to leave the room. Kate hoped her friend would not let her disappointment with one man lead her to folly with another.

  Nor could she ever afford such folly herself. She glanced across the room to where Rob Cartman stood with some of his actors, his arms crossed over his chest. He looked uncharacteristically solemn as he watched the gathering. She turned away from the sight.

  “Dr. Dee, stay a moment, if you will,” Queen Elizabeth said. “There is a small matter I would consult with you about. The rest of you may all go about your business. Today’s lesson is ended.”

  A great rustle like a cresting wave rolled over the chamber as everyone quickly bowed and curtsied and then dispersed. Kate saw a number of emotions written on their faces: relief, boredom, curiosity. Any ripple of change on a summer progress amid a small court was welcome. Dr. Dee approached the dais, slow and dignified, his black robes swirling around him.

  Kate looked again toward where she had glimpsed Rob. If she had a free hour, she knew she should consult with him about the masquerade Lord Arundel had requested. It was an elaborate undertaking with time so short, and she could not avoid him forever if she was to impress Arundel and thus the queen. But Rob had vanished, and she was reprieved for the moment.

  “Mistress Haywood,” the queen suddenly called. “To me for a moment.”

  Kate shook away thoughts of Rob and hurried to the dais. “Your Majesty?”

  “I did forget that an important guest is arriving soon,” Elizabeth said, clearly distracted by whatever she
was talking about with Dr. Dee and eager to get back to it. “Can you take Mistress Ashley and perhaps Mary Sidney and await her arrival for us?”

  “Her, Your Majesty?” Kate said, confused.

  “’Tis Anne, the Dowager Duchess of Somerset,” Elizabeth said with an impatient wave of her hand. A frown flickered over her face, and Kate recalled why the queen might be reluctant to talk with the duchess. Anne Seymour, the widow of Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset and once Protector of Edward VI, was now the wife of the lowly Francis Newdigate, and though she kept her fine title, had long been renowned at court for her pride and difficult nature. Her complicated family history made her place at court difficult. Luckily she usually stayed at her own estate, but her children attended on the queen.

  And caused their own troubles.

  Kate nodded carefully. “It has been long since Her Grace was at court.”

  “Aye, her health does not permit her to leave her estate at Hanworth often. But someone must take charge of Lord Hertford once and for all, and who better than his mother? He has been meddling in things not his business of late, or so I hear. If only all such surly boys were so easily dealt with. Eh, Dr. Dee?”

  Dr. Dee’s solemn expression did not alter as he bowed. “I fear I would not know, Your Majesty. I have no children of my own as yet.”

  “Just misbehaving apprentices, hm?” Elizabeth said with a laugh. “Go, go, Kate, see the duchess to her rooms for me.”

  Kate curtsied and went to find Mistress Ashley, the Mistress of the Robes, and Mary Sidney to tell them of this errand. In the corridor, she found her steps suddenly joined by those of Robert Dudley. He was as handsomely dressed as ever, in blue and green satin, but his smile was nowhere in evidence.

  “Sir Robert,” Kate said, surprised to find him there instead of keeping near to the queen or seeing to his duties as Master of the Horse. His coterie, young men who were always tumbling after him, were also nowhere to be seen. But she had not spoken to him directly since their adventures at the queen’s coronation. “How do you fare today?”