Murder in the Queen's Garden

by Amanda Carmack

  Anthony helped Kate to her feet, holding her close as she struggled to compose herself. She was glad of his steady arms holding her up, for she felt so numb she feared she would topple back to the ground.

  Sir Robert looked fearsome, almost like a demon himself with his dark hair and beard in the red-gold light of the flames. He wore no doublet, only his shirt and boots over his hose, as if he had dressed in haste. “Are you injured, Mistress Haywood?” he demanded. “Is there anyone to be saved in the temple? The queen saw the flames from her window and was most alarmed. She wanted to rush down here herself, but I persuaded her to let me come instead.”

  “Thank heavens for that,” Kate said. She shuddered to think of the queen in the midst of this dangerous mess, her royal life in danger at every side. “Aye, there were people in there, but they won’t have survived, I am sure.”

  Dudley gestured to his men to stay back from the flames. Instead, one of them helped Violet to her feet. She was sobbing hysterically, and the man wrapped his cloak around her to still her violent shivers. The rest of them fanned out to secure the banks of the lake and try to put out the last of the fire.

  “What happened here, Mistress Haywood?” Dudley asked, gently but firmly. He still held his sword, his gaze scanning the dying flames.

  Anthony’s arms tightened around Kate. “You don’t need to talk yet, Kate, if you don’t feel strong enough. You have had a most terrible experience.”

  Kate drew in a shuddering breath. “Nay, I can talk now. Everyone should know what happened.”

  Robert Dudley focused closely on her, and she knew that ultimately they both had the same goal—to keep the queen safe. That was all that really mattered. She quickly told him all that had happened. Of how Master Roland had killed Constable, of his scheme to marry the queen to Lord Arundel and thus gain his own ambitions, of the part the horoscopes played in it all.

  She glanced up at the cold, indifferent stars and had the sudden, most irrational urge to curse them. Humans were fools to think they could harness the powers of something so very far away.

  Dudley rubbed his hand over his jaw, his expression weary. “Dr. Dee will be glad at least to know what happened to his pupil, and to his old teacher.”

  Kate thought of Master Macey’s cottage, all those herbs and bubbling cauldrons, and the strange volumes. “But what of you, Sir Robert? You know Dr. Dee, and his student, very well, I think.”

  Anger flashed across his dark, starkly carved face, but then he gave a wry laugh. “Ah, Mistress Haywood. You do see more than you ever should. ’Tis a blessing and a curse, as I well know.”

  Anthony’s arm tightened around her again, and Kate felt a cold tiredness sweep over her. “I want the same thing as you—to keep the queen safe.”

  Dudley nodded. “It is no secret, really. I have been fascinated by Dr. Dee’s work ever since I was a student of his as a lad. His work is very important. He seeks no less than the secrets of the heavens, to harness them to serve the forces of good here on earth. He has always served Queen Elizabeth, too, even at risk of his own life. When he wanted to set up a laboratory here to pursue Dr. Macey’s unfinished work, as well as continue at his own house at Mortlake, I happily agreed to help.”

  “And Master Constable?”

  Dudley shook his head. “I merely thought him Dr. Dee’s assistant. Dee has many of those. Until . . .”

  “Until?”

  “Until I saw him hovering too closely around Her Majesty, and you saw him outside her rooms when he should not have been. Then, as you know, I asked you to keep watch on him. I thought perhaps he would use Dr. Dee’s studies for his own ends, but not quite in this way. I didn’t think him quite clever enough. But anyone can be greedy without being clever. ’Tis another lesson, I suppose, that I should be more careful in judging others.”

  Kate looked to the last fiery embers of the temple. It was a lesson she needed to remember, too. Forgetting it had almost cost her life. But how could she have been suspicious of Anne, who was her own friend? Anne—who had died for love.

  Suddenly, it felt like the night sky was collapsing down on her. Everything that had happened was too much to bear for another instant. Her knees collapsed under her as her mind turned heavy and foggy. She felt Anthony catch her up in his arms, heard him call her name.

  Then there was only darkness.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  The queen’s court was preparing to leave Nonsuch, in a chaotic fervor as great as that with which they had arrived. From her seat at the top of a hill, near the now-deserted banquet hall, Kate watched the servants scurrying around the line of carts like liveried ants. They heaved chests and bits of furniture into piles, Kat Ashley watching them with her wary eye and her lists that missed nothing.

  Robert Dudley, followed by his own vast retinue, saw to the queen’s horses. They pawed at the ground as if they, too, were most eager to be away from the ruined fairy tale of the palace.

  Except for the wisps of smoke that still drifted over the trees from beyond the lake, there was no sign of the terrible events of only a few days past. The rubble of the temple had been cleared, and Master Roland and Lady Anne Godwin buried—along with their secrets. Violet Roland and Master Green were betrothed, with permission of the queen, and the eventful stay at Nonsuch ended with a banquet and a play by Rob Cartman and his troupe. Almost as if nothing had happened.

  Kate watched the flurry of activity, feeling numb, removed from the whole bustling scene. In only a few days, they would all be at Windsor, but what would have changed? The queen’s enemies would always be near.

  Kate looked down at the bouquet of bright yellow primroses in her hand, along with a folded letter she had yet to read. When Anthony Elias had departed with Master Hardy in the train of the Duchess of Somerset, whose visit had gained no advantage for her son, Kate was closeted with William Cecil, telling him all she had learned from Master Roland. Anthony had left those tokens, and now she clung to them as if they were a last rope on a stormy sea.

  Anthony’s friendship meant so much to her amid all the uncertainty of court, all the secrets and ever-shifting loyalties. She missed him already.

  Yet how certain was his friendship, truly? He had his work, and she could not see how she could fit into such a life. How she could be the mate he needed, a wife like Mistress Hardy?

  There were so very many things Kate was confused about now. Her family, her place in the world, her purpose—she had no idea of any of it. Music and her little family with her father had been her life for so very long, and now she had the court, the queen, which was so very different. Would she ever learn to be a part of it? To know whom to trust?

  Aye. She knew that no matter how she might long for it in her secret heart and how much she cared for Anthony, she could not make a life for them such as the comfortable, prosperous one the Hardys enjoyed. She had seen too much, learned too much, longed for too much. Love was dangerous, just as her horoscope warned. Master Constable had been fatally wrong about so many things, but he was right about that.

  And also, she realized with a spark of hope, she was only beginning to learn her own strength.

  Kate looked down at the letter and carefully refolded it, tucking it away in the purse tied at her belt. Anthony asked if she would write to him from Windsor, and she would. She just didn’t know yet what she would say.

  My dearest Kate, the letter read, in Anthony’s neat, legalistic handwriting.

  Forgive me for departing court so quickly. Master Hardy’s business has called us away, and much work awaits us in London. Yet I fear so many of my thoughts will stay here at Nonsuch.

  I beg you, my dear friend, to be careful always until I can be with you to help you again. Court is most dangerous; I see it in my work now every day, and I also see that your good heart leads you into trouble. I wish you could be more cautious.

  But I confess, it
is your tender heart, your courage, your great care for all your friends, that I adore so very much, that keeps drawing my thoughts back to you. Without it, you would not be my Kate, and that would be a great sadness indeed.

  Be careful, I beg you, and God willing we shall meet again very soon. My work increases, and soon I shall be at liberty to form my own career and life. Then, I hope you will allow me to speak more freely. To tell you all the hopes I have in my heart.

  Write to me, I beg you. I stand ready to help you, and will always be.

  Your Friend,

  Anthony Elias

  “Mistress Haywood!” she heard someone call. She scrambled to her feet, leaning on the elaborately carved walking stick Queen Elizabeth had sent her, and turned to see Timothy Macey hurrying up the hill. His cuts and scrapes were beginning to heal, as hers were, and he looked eager to move forward. His wife stood at the bottom of the hill, their child in her arms, and she waved and smiled up at Kate.

  “Master Macey,” she said with a smile. “I am glad to see you looking most recovered after such an ordeal.”

  “And I you, Mistress Haywood,” he answered. He shuffled his booted feet, looking rather abashed. “I fear I can never thank you enough for all you have done for my family. I am sorry for ever doubting your motives when you first came to the cottage.”

  “Your work requires much secrecy,” Kate said. Especially if men like Robert Dudley were involved. “I do understand, Master Macey. I hope you and your wife and mother will be well now, and in a place where you can carry out your studies in peace.”

  “Dr. Dee has found us a cottage near his own home at Mortlake, where we will have room for our work together. And a garden for the child to play in, of course. Bett is happy about that.” He turned and waved to his wife, as the baby laughed back. “My mother will go with us, now that we know my father is truly at rest.”

  Kate shivered, thinking of those bones with their strange black stone ring and that royal emerald. At least none of them had ended up thus now. “I am truly sorry about Dr. Macey.” Once she had thought perhaps the two murders were connected, Macey and Constable. Now she knew they were only connected by an ambition that burned out of control.

  “Nay, now we know the truth,” Master Macey said with a frown. “He should never have become involved in schemes with the likes of old King Henry and his wives. Trying to hide what he knew of that poor Queen Catherine led to his doom. I hope I have learned my own lesson from that.”

  And Kate hoped she, too, had learned a lesson from it all. She just wasn’t sure what it could be yet. “I do have something that rightfully belongs to you.” Kate took the fragile old book from its wrappings and held it out to him. “I believe Master Constable took it when he should not have, along with Catherine Howard’s old horoscope. It is why I wanted to see you before I left, to make sure it was again safely in your hands. I cannot read its secrets, but I know there are those who would give so much to possess it.” Who would kill for it.

  Master Macey looked down at it, his face stunned. “My father’s book?”

  Kate nodded. “Master Roland was right about that—I did have it. I found it the night Master Constable had his séance in Lady Knollys’s chamber, and I knew not what to do with it. You are its rightful owner.”

  He nodded slowly, turning the book slowly over in his hands. “My mother has long mourned my father, as have I, fearing his work was lost. I hope I shall never give my own wife reason to so grieve. Thank you, Mistress Haywood, for returning him to us at last.”

  Kate nodded, fearing she might cry at his words. She thought of her own mother, her father who had always grieved for Eleanor Haywood’s loss. Of King Henry and the loves he had thrown away.

  She glanced toward Mistress Macey and saw that Rob Cartman stood with her now. He studied Kate with solemn eyes, for once not masked with his usual careless charm, and she tried to ignore the strange feeling she suddenly felt deep inside.

  “Kate,” Rob called, hurrying up the hill toward her. “Her Majesty bade me to fetch you to her. It is almost time to depart.”

  Kate nodded, glad of the distraction. “Godspeed to you, Master Macey,” she said. “I hope all your ghosts shall be at rest now.”

  “And I hope the same for you, Mistress Haywood,” he said, bowing over her hand. “Though I fear it may be some time for both of us to see that come to pass.”

  He hurried away to his wife’s side, and Kate hobbled down the hill to take Rob’s offered arm. She had not spoken with him since a few words before his final performance here at Nonsuch, though she had watched his play most carefully from her place in the gallery. He looked more handsome than ever, his hair brighter in the summer sun, his features as carefully carved as the classical statues on the palace’s walls. Yet there was a new wariness in his eyes, as if he had seen far too much now—and Kate feared she looked the same.

  “I did hear from Lady Knollys that Lord Hunsdon has asked you to perform at Eastwick House next month,” she said. She peeked up at him to see his reaction, but there was only a polite smile. “My congratulations. You have succeeded in your errand here at Nonsuch.”

  He looked down at her, his smile widening. “At one of my errands, perhaps. But I fear I failed to make my apologies to you, Kate. You have been a true friend to me, and I should have been more honest about my goal here at court. I should have been of more help when you were in danger.”

  Kate nodded, though she didn’t know how she felt about his words. How she felt when he touched her hand like that. “We have both had more adventures here than we bargained for, I think,” she said with a laugh. “I look forward to some quiet days at Windsor for a time, with only my lute for company.”

  “Not too quiet, I am sure,” Rob said. “You would run mad in a week with no adventures at all, Kate.”

  “I . . .” Kate wasn’t sure how to answer that. She certainly wanted no more adventures involving fires and daggers! But a quiet life, like the one she had once known at Hatfield with her father . . . did she really want that again? “I do not think so.”

  “Nay, I know it to be so,” Rob said. “Because we are alike in that way. I saw it when I first met you at Hatfield House. We are too curious to stay quiet at our hearth. We need to see the world, hear people’s tales. Find ourselves useful. People like us, Kate, we need art and adventure to feel alive. We cannot be content with an ordinary life.”

  Kate was startled by his words. Could he be right? She had enjoyed her life at court, all the people she met, the different countries and faraway lands she heard tales of, the music and the dancing. She had come to crave the life of it all.

  But that life also came with danger and pain. With no knowledge of what lurked around every corner.

  She wasn’t sure how to answer him. They reached the edge of the graveled drive, where servants and courtiers alike scurried around the waiting carts, making sure all was in readiness for the complexities of the queen’s journey. Kate glimpsed Elizabeth standing on the marble steps. Her gloved hand shielded her eyes from the sun as she scanned the crowd. Did she look for Kate?

  “I have something I want to give you, Kate,” Rob said quickly, eagerly.

  Something in his tone pulled her attention back fully to him. “Something for—for me?”

  He reached into the pouch tied at his belt and withdrew a tiny silk-wrapped bundle. He took her hand in his and placed the bundle carefully on her palm.

  Kate stared down at it, at their hands joined together, and she felt a reluctant tiny thing like hope touch her deep inside.

  “Aren’t you going to open it?” he said. She glanced up to see he was smiling, but there was something shadowed in his beautiful blue eyes.

  Kate swallowed hard and nodded. She carefully folded back the silk—and her breath caught when she saw what was there.

  It was a lute, tiny and perfectly made in every detail. Po
lished enamel made up the chestnut-brown body, while hair-thin gold cords made up the strings. Tiny sparkling diamonds looked just like the inlay of her mother’s lute. It was strung on a satin ribbon for a pendant.

  “Oh, Rob,” she whispered, enchanted by its delicate beauty. By the care that must have gone into it. Care Rob had for her.

  “Do you like it?” he said, and Kate heard a most uncharacteristic note of doubt in his voice. “I tried to remember the design of your lute, but perhaps my memory was faulty. It can be remade . . .”

  Kate laughed and sobbed at the same time, more confused than she had ever been. She had thought Rob was drawing away from her for some reason, ever since that afternoon by the lake. “It is the most perfect thing I have ever seen. But it must have taken so much time, and care. And—and coin.”

  “I have a friend who is a goldsmith. He began working on it in the spring. I knew I would have to wait to give it to you at the very right time.”

  “The right time?” Kate whispered, her head still whirling.

  “When I could feel worthy to give you gifts. When I had something more to offer than a starving player’s lot.” He suddenly smiled, like the beautiful sun breaking through a cloudy day. “That was why I could not tell you at first why I came here, to meet with Lord Hunsdon. I only wanted to tell you when I knew for certain I would have a place.”

  Kate shook her head in confusion. “What are you telling me, Rob?”

  He took the tiny lute from her hand and leaned forward to tie it around her neck. For an instant, he was so close to her she could feel the warmth of his skin. His lips brushed her cheek.

  “Lord Hunsdon is going to be the patron for my troupe, to give us a place in his household. You have made me want this, Kate,” he said with another smile. “You have made me want to be a better person. To strive to be a gentleman. Please, give me a chance to show you that I can do that. That I can make a better life. That is all I ask right now.”

  “Kate Haywood!” Elizabeth called out impatiently. “To me.”