There was no time now to demand Rob tell her what he truly meant, to sort out her own tangled ball of feelings. He took her hand in his and raised it to his lips. The warm touch on her skin made her shiver.
He smiled up at her over her curled fingers. “I shall see you soon, Kate, I am sure,” he said with a grin. That was more the Rob she knew, the man who hid all darker, deeper feelings behind teasing smiles and jests. “When Lord Hunsdon bids us perform before the queen, mayhap?”
“Kate!” the queen called again.
Rob turned on his heel and left in a swirl of his short satin cloak, and Kate had no choice but to go to the queen. She clutched Anthony’s bouquet close to her side, walking slowly with the aid of the queen’s gift of an elaborately carved stick, and felt the tingle of Rob’s kiss on her other hand.
The queen’s coach was waiting, but Elizabeth sent her other ladies away with a short word and a wave to Robert Dudley to stay the horses. Kate gave a careful curtsy.
Elizabeth shook her head and took Kate’s hand firmly in her gloved grasp. “None of that now, Kate. You must be most careful. You have kept my physicians too busy of late.”
Kate certainly intended not to do that again. She had had enough of their bleeding blades and noxious potions. “Your Majesty has been most kind.”
Elizabeth looked at her, her pale face strained behind her smile. “It was the very least I could do, sending you my own physicians and apothecaries, and Mistress Ashley with her infamous possets, after you risked your life to rid my court of a villain’s schemes—again. I fear I have had little enough gratitude of late for those who have served me most faithfully.”
Kate was bewildered by the queen’s words. “Your Majesty?”
Elizabeth’s dark gaze swept over the swirl of the crowd in front of them. “Come, let us walk for a moment. We will not go far. Lean on my arm, Kate.”
Kate slowly took the queen’s offered arm. Her heavy satin sleeve was warmed by the sun, and she smelled of roses, stronger and sweeter than the gardens around them. They left the others behind, even as they stared after the queen curiously.
“William Cecil and Mistress Ashley, who have both long been like parents to me when I had none, urge me to marry now, as you have seen,” Elizabeth said. She stared off into the distance, at the trees of the woods where she had hunted, the lake where the fire had carried off the temple. “They say it is my first duty, and I neglect it at England’s peril. Do you agree, Kate?”
“I think only Your Majesty can know what is best for you—and for England,” Kate said carefully.
Elizabeth gave a deep sigh. She suddenly looked tired, paler, older than her twenty-six years. It had been a most merry summer progress, endless warm days of dancing and games, only to end in danger at the prettiest palace of all. “Ah, Kate. Always so careful, so kind. I fear I have found being queen to be—not all I once dreamed of.”
“How so, Your Majesty? Surely you have always been destined to be where you are now.”
They came to a stop beneath the shade of a grove of trees. The wind stirred at the rich green leaves above their heads, adding to the hum of the distant crowd. Elizabeth watched it all with a distant frown on her lips, as if she saw the palace not as it was now, but as it had once been, the half-finished folly of an old king desperate to impress his young wife. To turn back the hands of time. As if Elizabeth saw only the ends of things in Nonsuch’s rare beauty, and not joyous beginnings.
“When I was a very little girl, when my mother—died,” Elizabeth began, “I was sent far away from court, and there it seems I was forgotten. My governess, Lady Brian, who was an excellent woman, had to write begging letters to have my outgrown clothes replaced, food for our table. I was but three, but I knew everything had changed when I was suddenly called ‘lady’ and not ‘princess.’ I learned then that no one could ever be relied upon—and everything that happened from there only proved that to me. Stepmothers came and went, my brother rejected me, my sister hated me. I had only myself.”
Kate nodded slowly. She knew how that felt, the hollowness at the pit of the stomach that could only be loneliness. “But you are queen now.”
Elizabeth’s rosebud lips twisted into a semblance of a smile. “Ah, yes—I am queen. Once, I thought a crown, if I was ever strong enough to win it, would set me free at last. I would be beholden to no one else for my fortunes, for my very existence. I would control my destiny, and nothing, not even Dr. Dee’s horoscopes or the voices of his spirits, would gainsay me. I would control the very stars. But that is not so.”
“Nay, Your Majesty?” Kate said. If the queen could control nothing, what hope was there for the rest of them? The stars would always pull them hither and yon.
Elizabeth shook her head. The white plumes of her hat danced in the breeze. “I am tossed about on the waves of fortune even more than before, and nothing can steady me but my own hand. What is more, I carry so many other people’s fortunes with me, which I have forgotten. Cecil says I have been careless this summer.”
“Surely even a queen deserves to enjoy a warm summer’s day,” Kate said, thinking of all the palaces they had seen in the last weeks, all the dances. The queen riding off to so many hunts with Robert Dudley laughing at her side.
“Nay, he is right,” Elizabeth said. “I am twenty-six years old, Kate, and I have not known a light moment since I was three. Now there is dancing and feasting, all for me. I am the one who is courted, sought after. I can keep company with all those I enjoy. But I forgot many of those hard lessons of my youth.”
Kate glanced back at the crowd, and she saw Robert Dudley observing them, his gloved hand resting on his horse’s bridle. He watched the queen with such longing it made Kate’s heart ache.
“I must be ever vigilant,” Elizabeth continued. “When I am not, the people I care about—people like you, my Kate—are put in harm’s way, and I can do nothing to save them. I have been careless this summer, but no more, I vow.”
Kate took a deep breath. She thought of her own carelessness, her own wild desires she could not fathom. What did she want in this new life, this new England of Elizabeth’s? She was no longer sure at all.
“I think I, too, must look to the future, Your Majesty,” she said.
Elizabeth glanced back at her sharply. “I do hope you see your future here at my court, Kate. I could not do without you. I have little enough family as it is, and you have proved your loyalty and bravery over and over. These unfortunate matters here at Nonsuch have shown me that so clearly.”
Kate nodded. She did need her music, and she needed to serve the queen. England was never safe without Elizabeth. But was that all she wanted? “I hope so, too, Your Majesty. As you say—family is most important.”
Elizabeth laughed. “For better or worse. Often for worse, I fear. That is why I need you, and my Carey cousins. Without my mother’s family, I would have only the Greys, Mary of Scots, and Margaret Lennox. Vipers all. You are like my family now.”
Kate thought of the queen’s tangled family, and of the Rolands and the Maceys. Family was a strange thing indeed, but one could never do without them. Nothing could ever be taken for granted. “I will always be at Your Majesty’s service. But I fear I must ask for a few days’ leave before I travel to Windsor. There is something I must do.”
“What matter is that, Kate, that is so important it will take you from us?”
Kate squared her shoulders. “I must see my father. Things between us have been unsettled for too many months. He is the only one who can tell me the truth about my mother . . .”
And if she could come to know her mother, perhaps she could come to know herself. Just as Queen Elizabeth must. The stars had spoken.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Kate Haywood and her adventures are, of course, a work of imagination (even though she often feels like a real friend to me, now that I’ve been lucky enough
to follow her through three books!). But one of the fun perks of writing, I’ve always found, is the research. The chance to jump into a time hundreds of years in the past, discover the people and places and events, and try to make it feel “real” again—I love all of that.
Ever since I did a history report on Anne Boleyn in elementary school (complete with costume and a lute made of cardboard), the Tudor era has held a special fascination for me. It was an exciting time of enormous social and political change, as well as amazing artistic achievement (especially in poetry and the theater) at a level beyond anything before or since. Bawdy, colorful, fast-paced, and populated by so many fascinating characters—what’s not to love?
I also discover new things every time I happily dive into my research library. For Murder in the Queen’s Garden, I loved exploring the worlds of the Elizabethan fascination with astrology and the occult; the intriguing figure of Dr. John Dee; and the gorgeous (and now sadly vanished) Nonsuch Palace.
The building of Nonsuch Palace, in Surrey, started on April 22, 1538, about six months after Prince Edward was born, but it took several years to complete. In fact, it was still incomplete when Henry VIII died in 1547. It was meant to compete with the glorious châteaus of France and cost more than twenty-four thousand pounds to construct (almost 104 million today). Though it was a simple layout, built around two inner courtyards, with a fortified gatehouse and several outer courtyards, it was gorgeously decorated with elaborate ornamental stucco panels depicting classical gods and goddesses, and tall octagonal towers at every corner that gave it a fairy-tale look. The gardens were said to be some of the most beautiful in England.
After Henry’s death, the palace lay neglected for some time, until Queen Mary sold it to Lord Arundel, one of the richest noblemen in England, in 1556. Queen Elizabeth managed to buy it back in the 1580s, but it met a sad fate. Charles II gave it to his favorite mistress, Barbara Castlemaine, who tore it down to pay some gambling debts in 1682. It was excavated in 1959, and there is a lovely scale model of it that I used for much research. (I am not sure King Henry actually brought Catherine Howard there in 1541, but they did go on a long progress. Wouldn’t he have wanted to show it off to her? Queen Elizabeth did visit in the summer of 1559, at which time Lord Arundel hoped to persuade her to marry him. It was always a vain hope, poor man. . . . )
Queen Catherine Howard was, of course, another sad story in King Henry’s complicated marital history. Born in 1523, her real birthday is unknown, so I assigned her one in this story so she could have her horoscope drawn up. (She seemed like she could have been a Leo, though!) Her fate is well-known. She was young and full of fun, never prepared for the dangerous career of being Henry’s wife, and was executed in 1542, convicted of treason by way of adultery (with Thomas Culpeper, among others, who it seems was not a nice man).
Dr. John Dee (1527–1608/09) is one of the most fascinating figures of the period. He was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, philosopher, traveler, occultist, and possible spy, and his work has resonance even today. He attended St. John’s College, Cambridge, while still a boy (from 1542 to around 1546). In 1555, he was arrested by Queen Mary’s government, accused of secretly drawing up horoscopes for the queen, her husband, King Philip, and Princess Elizabeth (which would have been treason). He was questioned in the notorious Star Chamber but then released. He went abroad, until Elizabeth ascended the throne and summoned him back to England. He became one of her most trusted advisers, given such important tasks as choosing the best date for her coronation. He was a tutor and adviser to almost all the important figures of the day, including Robert Dudley, his nephew Philip Sidney, and Sir Christopher Hatton. For more information, you can check out the Web site of the John Dee Society (johndee.org).
Robert Dudley, later Earl of Leicester (1532/3–1588) was one of the favorites of Elizabeth I (and whom many consider the love of her life), a leading statesman of the time. He, like Dee, lived a complicated life. During this early part of Elizabeth’s reign, when she was nearly inseparable from him (and when he was married to the ill-fated Amy Robsart), he caused a great deal of gossip, both at the English court and abroad. The Venetian ambassador wrote in April 1559, “My lord Robert Dudley is very intimate with Her Majesty,” while the Spanish ambassador wrote to King Philip, “Lord Robert has come so much into favor he does whatever he likes . . . it is even said that Her Majesty visits him in his chamber day and night.” He fell from favor for a time in 1578, when he secretly married Lettice Knollys, cousin to the queen and widow of the Earl of Essex.
We briefly glimpsed the beautiful, lively, flirtatious Lettice at her mother’s séance in this story—but we will be seeing more of her in later books, I’m sure! Her mother, Catherine Carey, Lady Knollys (1524–1569), was one of the queen’s favorite ladies-in-waiting. The daughter of Mary Boleyn and (purportedly) Sir William Carey, she was often rumored to be the natural daughter of Henry VIII. She was always acknowledged as the queen’s closest cousin and married Sir Francis Knollys in 1540. They went on to have fourteen children, which didn’t keep the queen from constantly summoning her to court. She served as lady-in-waiting to both Anne of Cleves and Catherine Howard and was said to have stayed with her aunt Queen Anne in the Tower before her execution (though this is probably a legend). During the reign of Queen Mary, she and her family lived in exile, only to be summoned back to royal service by Elizabeth. Catherine Carey was buried with much fanfare in Westminster Abbey.
Her brother, Henry Carey, was made the first Baron Hunsdon by Elizabeth in 1559. The queen also gifted him many estates, including Hunsdon and Eastwick in Hertfordshire, and many titles, including eventually Lord Chamberlain of the Household. He was long married to Anne Morgan but was notoriously unfaithful. (One of his mistresses was the musician Amelia Lanier, possibly Shakespeare’s “Dark Lady,” who was forty years his junior and gave him a son.) He was most famous for being a great patron of the theater. Shakespeare’s Lord Chamberlain’s Men were under his protection.
Lady Catherine Grey (1540–1568), another cousin of Queen Elizabeth, didn’t fare so well as the Boleyns. As the granddaughter of Henry VIII’s sister Mary Brandon, Dowager Queen of France, she had the closest claim to the throne after Elizabeth (Henry VIII having excluded his sister Margaret’s Scots descendants from the throne, including Mary, Queen of Scots), but the position didn’t serve her well. Elizabeth was always suspicious and mistrustful of her, and Lady Catherine was not the most clever of politicians. She secretly married Lord Hertford, and—well, we will see what happens to her later!
I hope you’ve enjoyed reading Kate’s adventures as much as I’ve loved writing them! Watch for more of her tales in 2015 and 2016. In the meantime, be sure to visit my Web site, http://amandacarmack.com, for more behind-the-scenes history and excerpts. If you’d like to read more about the period, here are a few sources I found particularly helpful in writing Murder in the Queen’s Garden:
Lacey Baldwin, Catherine Howard (1961)
Martin Biddle, Nonsuch Palace: The Material Culture of a Noble Jacobin Household (2005)
Peter J. French, Dr. John Dee: The World of an Elizabethan Magus (1972)
Eugenio Garin, Astrology in the Renaissance: The Zodiac of Life (1990)
M. Levine, The Early Elizabethan Succession Question 1558–1568 (1966)
Derek Wilson, The Uncrowned Kings of England: The Black History of the Dudleys and the Tudor Throne (2005)
Frances A. Yates, The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age (1979)
Turn the page for a sneak peek at the next
Elizabethan Mystery from Amanda Carmack,
MURDER AT WHITEHALL
Available from Obsidian in November 2015.
The Christmas season, 1559
Whitehall Palace
“‘Holly and ivy, box and bay, put in the house for Christmas Day! Fa la la la . . .’”
Kate Haywood laughed at hearing the
notes of the old, familiar song, the tune always sung as the house was bedecked for Christmas. Queen Elizabeth’s gentlewomen of the privy and presence chambers, along with the young maids of honor, had been assigned to festoon the great hall of Whitehall Palace and its long corridors for the night’s feast, the first of the Twelve Days of Christmas.
Long tables had been set up along the privy gallery and covered with piles of holly, ivy, mistletoe, and evergreen boughs brought in from the countryside that morning, along with multicolored silk ribbons and spangles. Under the watchful eye of Kat Ashley, Queen Elizabeth’s Mistress of the Robes, they were meant to turn all those random bits into glorious holiday artistry.
Kate sat at the end of the table with her friend Lady Violet Green, who was expecting her first child after the new year. They twisted together loops of ivy and red ribbon as they watched two of the queen’s maids, Mary Howard and Mary Radcliffe, lay out long swags of greenery to measure them. The Marys sang as they worked, sometimes stopping to leap about with ribbons like two wild morris dancers, until Mistress Ashley sternly admonished them to sit down and cease acting like children who had eaten too many sugary suckets.
Kate laughed at their antics. Surely Christmas was the time for everyone to behave like children again. To dance and sing, to feast on delicacies until one was about to burst, to tell stories by the fire until the night was nearly gone. She had always loved this time of year the best of all, these twelve days when the gloomy darkness of winter was set aside for a little while, buried in music, wine, and bright silk ribbons—and then more music again. Always music for Kate, as one of the queen’s principal musicians.
Kate snatched a ribbon from one of the twirling Marys and laughed. She might have been missing her father, her only family, that Christmas, but she was surrounded by such merriment that she scarcely had time to feel melancholy.
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