by Maeve Haran
‘I see.’
His smile widened. ‘Thought you that there were other reasons I should be grateful to you? Useful criticism of my verse, perhaps? Maidenly ideas on how I might improve my morals? I am very grateful for both, I assure you.’
‘I am sure you do not need such from one so young and inexperienced as I.’ I tried to keep the annoyance from my voice for I feared he toyed with me, as a cat does with a mouse.
Despite his tender words to Master Wotton, he had clearly seen the rashness in acting on them. Perhaps he had even recovered his equilibrium.
And then, when I was least expecting it, he took my hand in his.
Quietly, gently, he overturned the palm and kissed the tender flesh so that, without warning, I quaked throughout my whole being as if some deep volcano had erupted within me like unto distant Vesuvius.
I know not what might have happened after, whether all my maid’s modesty could have quenched the fire that suddenly raged through all my senses.
Yet I was not to discover, for the door of his chamber opened and Wat stood there, his look telling of the dog that fears its master’s displeasure, and informed Master Donne that he was needed on the instant by the Lord Keeper.
At that I gathered my skirts over my arm, looking at neither Master Donne nor Wat, and ran towards the great staircase and from thence back into the hall where, to my great agitation, Master Manners stood lounging against the oaken table. At sight of him my face flamed up, and as he looked at me his eyes narrowed.
‘Good even, Master Manners.’ I held my head high and told myself to be calm, that he possessed not the powers of the Devil to see the sin in our hearts. I asked the first question of him that flew into my head. ‘Have you seen my father for I must needs talk with him?’
He bowed low. ‘No, Mistress More, I have not had sight of Sir George this day. Perhaps like all in Parliament and Council he concerns himself with the crisis in Ireland.’
‘Yes, yes you are right. I will find a boy to take a message to him there.’
‘If it would please you, I would take such a message myself,’ he offered, staring into my eyes with so penetrating a gaze that I had to look away.
‘No, no. I am making too much of a trifle. I will speak with him later.’
As I left the hall I felt his eyes follow me and hoped with all my heart that Master Donne chose not this moment to make his appearance.
Thankfully he did not.
‘Ann, Ann,’ my aunt’s voice was as welcome as the angels’ from heaven, ‘the very one I need to help me brew a remedy on the morrow for Thomas the steward’s palsy. What was that herb my lady mother bade you find in the gardens?’
The next morning as I heated up the herbs for the healing brew, my mind pondered on quite another and far more perplexing fire. What was the explanation of my deep confusion? Was it but the promptings of the flesh, so unknown to me before now? In the words of my sister’s sampler, were my senses erring and leading my reason astray?
‘Ann! Take care!’
My aunt’s advice could be against a far greater threat than any she suspected.
I found the brew had boiled over the top of the phial and scalded my fingers.
‘Silly wench!’ my aunt berated me. ‘Here am I come to cure the sickness of my steward and my niece adds her injury to his!’ She made me dip my fingers in cold water.
‘I am sorry, Aunt. Here, the brew is finished now.’
My aunt took the phial from me and sniffed it, which made her cough heartily. ‘Excellent,’ she pronounced. ‘I find with many ailments the fouler the draught, the sooner a cure is affected. With a foul potion, I fancy the sufferer remarks the treatment more and so feels the benefit.’
She poured the mixture into smaller phials and added a stopper to each, as I tried to be helpful and dutiful and think not of my present difficulty, at which point our purposes were interrupted by the arrival of her servant Mercy.
‘Mistress Ann! A pair of ragged children have arrived asking for you and the steward is all for sending them away. He asked me if I knew aught of their arrival.’ Mercy sniffed her disapproval. ‘I said that knowing yourself, mistress, a troop of one-legged vagrants or a pack of stray dogs might have been bidden to sup with us.’
‘Thank you, Mercy,’ I answered her loftily. ‘I shall come and talk to Thomas myself.’ I picked a phial from the still-room rack where my aunt had been ranging them, adorning each with one of her beautiful labels, written in her own hand, illustrated with plants and leaves in green and gold leaf, works of art in themselves. ‘And I shall give him this to ease all the suffering I cause him.’
‘Ann, Ann.’ My aunt shook her head as I skipped from the still room. ‘Remember to tell Thomas they are not to annoy him or they will be sent away forthwith.’
‘Yes, Aunt.’
I found the two, a boy of about ten and one small maid, quaking under the towering gaze of my uncle’s steward, who was a huge man near six feet tall, dressed from head to toe in black like some giant crow. They both stood staring up at the gilded ceiling and the statues, as if wondering whether they found themselves at the gates of Heaven or of Hell.
‘Welcome.’ I dipped down to my knees. ‘Now you must each tell me your names.’
‘I be Stephen,’ announced the boy. ‘And this is my sister Hope.’
‘Hope,’ I took the maid’s small hand in mine, ‘what a very excellent name to be sure.’
‘The midwife gave it to me,’ Hope announced with a touch of pride. ‘She said that with my mother dying I was like to need it.’
Behind us, Thomas grunted.
I heard no more of the children for the rest of the day, and deemed it safer not to ask. I was sure, if there was a problem I would soon be called on to solve it.
Instead I fulfilled my other duties, walking in the garden, down by the river, to take some air and stock up my aunt’s store of herbal remedies. Here I spent a busy hour amongst the agrimony and the feverwort, admiring the flowers of the deadly nightshade and picking the clary sage and a bunch of cinquefoil which my grandmother swore was the best remedy she knew against the night sweats. I wondered then about Wat’s sister Sarah, and whether there was aught I could do to help her fever. At that the thought of Bett came into my mind and how I had not been able to aid her for all my learning about herbs and potions.
Before I knew it, the supper bell sounded and I ran up and threw on the nearest gown, hardly thinking how I looked, my hair all blown about, my cheeks whipped into colour by the sharp evening wind. My uncle was just beginning grace when I arrived and I saw with mixed emotions that my father sat at his left hand and the Countess of Straven on his right.
I sensed, rather than saw, the presence of Master Donne, and willed myself to look not in his direction, lest the memory of that encounter, and the fires it stoked, made me give away more than I intended. My eyes strayed in the other direction and found those of Master Manners regarding me intently. He reached out and found a wild strand of my hair that had escaped from the wire of my headdress.
‘Have you ridden abroad today, Mistress More?’ To my great confusion he added, ‘What think you, Master Donne, is not Mistress More’s colour as fresh as if she had hunted the hart all afternoon long?’ What had he noticed passing between we two that made him thus question Master Donne?
‘I cannot answer, Master Manners, for I hunt not,’ was his calm reply.
‘Then you miss much. Hunting adds spice to life as cinnamon does to a hot codling.’
‘Yet it is too dangerous for my taste,’ replied Master Donne. ‘And the outcome over-bloody.’
‘Yet does not danger make us feel alive, think you not?’
‘Do you hunt a great deal, Master Manners?’ I asked, to fill the deep trench of silence that suddenly surrounded us.
‘I do.’ His eyes fixed onto mine. ‘And always on horses that I have broken myself, the wilder the better.’
His meaning was so clear that I had to look away.
‘My lady Straven,’ I enquired swiftly, ‘do you hunt also?’
‘Whenever I may. I have found that hunting is the second best pastime I have yet discovered.’
At this all the table laughed heartily and my aunt, ever the diplomat, swiftly returned the talk to modesty by praising the Queen’s prowess on horseback and how she could stay all day in the saddle and jump fences greater than those of all her courtiers.
As the repast unfolded, I fell silent until I sensed the eyes of all upon me and saw that my lady Straven had asked me a question.
‘Is it true,’ she repeated, ‘as the Lord Keeper’s steward informed me, that you have picked up brats from the gutter and given them a home?’
‘Until their sister is recovered, yes,’ I replied as calm as I could. ‘Their brother Wat is the new servant to Master Donne and is doing very well, is he not?’
‘Excellent well,’ replied Master Donne with a bow. ‘He is a thousand times better than my last boy, though he was of gentler breeding. Mistress More has an excellent eye.’
I thought of how it was not my excellent eye but my guilt at my own good luck that had made me rescue Wat the day he came careering into me, and, in truth, I welcomed not having his brother and sister foisted upon us also.
‘I hear you are given to rash acts, Mistress More,’ the Countess commented, ‘which later you may come to regret.’
My gaze darted anxiously to Master Donne at that, wondering if he had vouchsafed my secret over our encounter upstairs or, worse still, the episode in Southwark.
Yet his gaze was steady, looking staunchly forward, giving naught away.
I breathed again that there were to be no more eruptions tonight; but my relief came too soon, I realized, when I heard the next words from my father.
‘I have had the ill fortune to come across one of your satires, Master Donne,’ he announced, pulling from his sleeve a piece of parchment from which he began to read aloud to the company in a disparaging voice.
‘Shall I, none’s slave, of high-born or raised men
Fear frowns? And my mistress Truth, betray thee
To the huffing braggart, puffed nobility?’
‘So, Master Donne,’ demanded my father, his colour rising, ‘am I one of these “raised men” that you speak of so scathingly in your verses? Or mayhap you do me greater honour and I am among the number of your “puffed nobility”?’
Master Donne bowed. ‘Sir George, I thought not of you, nor any hard-working member of Parliament when I penned those words but rather the idle courtier or the scheming Court official.’
‘Yet though you despise so many of us, you have a goodly notion of your own consequence, I warrant, since Truth chooses only to be your mistress.’
I could hear the cold fury in my father’s voice and knew that in his eyes Master Donne, poet and scholar, trusted employee of the Lord Keeper though he might be, was nothing but a jumped-up servant and a troublesome meddler in the ways of his betters. And his witty verses, esteemed and valued by his contemporaries, were to my father merely harsh, discordant and, worst of all, critical of the current social order. To stoke up his ire still further I feared he suspected a dangerous quickening of interest in me.
I longed to say my piece at this criticism, to cry, ‘Father, you are wrong! It is the canker of corruption Master Donne seeks to root out not to pull down honest nobility!’ And yet I knew to challenge the authority of my father thus, and express opinions that were the prerogative of men in front of this great assembly, would do naught but damage to myself and to Master Donne himself. So I stayed silent.
‘I wish that Truth were indeed my mistress…’ Master Donne began.
‘Truth! You know naught of truth in your seditious verses!’ ranted back my father. ‘The bishops wish to burn all satires such as yours and I support them with my whole heart! If it were myself I would burn them into ashes to stop them from poisoning godfearing people’s minds!’
My eyes flew to Master Donne’s, silently apologizing.
Hoping to clear the air, my aunt suggested we adjourn to the chamber in the tower and leave the servants to their clearing. But first she requested that I fetch another phial of medicine, this time for her ailing husband.
I was but halfway down the great passageway, all around me bustling servants carrying wine and ale, and bearing trays of sweetmeats towards the withdrawing room in the tower when I heard a voice call to me.
It was the Countess of Straven.
‘Mistress More, stay one moment.’ To my surprise, she took my hand and led me to an alcove behind the statue of Julius Caesar. With our great hooped dresses there was hardly room for us both and she had to list towards me like a ship in a storm to speak privately.
Yet when I heard her words I wished myself a hundred miles away. ‘I see it writ upon your face that you are smitten by Master Donne. I have noted how you follow his every word, as if he were your tutor and you the aptest of his pupils. You yearn to defend him when your father goes to the attack like a lioness does her mate. And who can blame you? He is a man of great address, with a fine mind to boot.’ She dropped her voice still further so that I had almost to strain to hear. ‘Yet, Mistress More, think awhile. Your father plainly hates him and will never consent that you should be his wife. What would you then, his mistress?’
I gasped as if she had slapped me hard across the face. How dare this painted insolent Countess imagine I was victim to the libertine charms of Master Donne?
And then, like to the door opening on a dungeon, out swept the forces of truth, swords drawn, and I had to ask myself if she was right. Did I indeed feel for him as she implied?
She laughed fruitily. ‘I am sure he would oblige in making you his mistress, since he has obliged many others.’
And now I turned angrily away, fighting back the itch to run my nails down the white skin of her exposed neck.
‘I see I have offended your innocent nature, but consider for one moment.’ Her voice, though quietly spoken, was now full of persuasive candour. ‘Let us imagine that Master Donne burns for you also, that he is so afire for Mistress Ann More that, for her, he will risk everything, advancement, reputation, all. And since your father continues refusing to sanction your union you decide to wed clandestinely? And what would be the outcome of that? The ruin of your good name and his future. Open your eyes, Ann, and see the truth. Master Donne is not for you. Marry Master Manners and have a dozen blue-eyed offspring.’
In that moment I hated the Countess of Straven with a bright white flame. The words she spoke were no more than the truth, but why did she choose to speak them? Did she want him to herself? Or merely to brook no competition from so green a one as I?
I had no more time to ponder the answer since I saw my father had come and stood behind me, his face, which was commonly the colour of whey, as red as an angry boil, his eyes shining with righteous anger. And I wondered how much of the private conversation between the Countess and I he had overheard.
‘Father, I…’ My thought was to try and stem the tide of his anger.
‘Ann, I have heard enough from you since you first came to stay in this house. You ignore your family’s wishes for you at the Court. You resist even the Queen’s good offices. The company you keep in London is not what I would wish for you. For your own protection you will leave tomorrow for Loseley. Your aunt is happy to excuse you and I will send a message to your grandparents that you arrive on the morrow.’
‘Please, Father…’ I attempted, assaying to put my hand on his arm.
‘No, Ann.’ He shook it off as if I were a leper begging for alms at Cripplegate. ‘You have had more freedom than a young woman should, and this is the result. You will go tomorrow.’
As I turned sadly towards my chamber, I saw a smile upon the lovely face of Isabella Straven.
‘Good luck, my lady,’ I said so softly she had to lean forward to hear me. ‘The field is yours now, I wish you joy of it. Though I hope your husband reads no verse
s or he may learn of your indiscretion sooner than you hope.’
The Countess raised a haughty brow. ‘My husband reads not poetry. His interests lie in animal husbandry.’
Our eyes locked. ‘Then mayhap some well-meaning soul should encourage him to.’
My aunt came to my chamber that night as I undid my hair.
‘Ann, my child,’ she reached out a hand and stroked my face, ‘I wish you went not from me thus. Yet your father is right, you must learn to do what others counsel and remember you are a weak and gentle woman.’
‘Are you a weak and gentle woman, Aunt? Is Her Majesty? Or indeed the Countess of Straven?’
‘For shame, Ann, you can hardly compare yourself with our sovereign. And if we are not as weak as others would have us, we learn to hide it, and so also must you.’
‘Why must I?’
‘It is the way of the world. It may seem heavy to you, yet a common wench who spoke out as you do might have found she wore a scold’s bridle.’
I shuddered at the thought of such inhumanity, that a woman who argued could be thus reduced by cruel metal clamping her tongue.
‘Ann, Ann,’ my aunt was ever a busy, brusque lady, and yet the tenderness in her voice made all my anger melt away like the snows in March, ‘while you are at Loseley you must think on your future and learn to accept it humbly.’
‘My father would have had me married betimes had not Master Manners’s father proved so stubborn in negotiation on the matter of my jointure.’
‘Then he will find you another suitor.’
I bowed my head and began to undo my bodies.
When I had finished my aunt lifted them gently over my head.
‘Ann,’ she hung the bodies on the hook by my press, ‘the other suitor your father will find…’ Her eyes briefly held mine. ‘It will never be Master Donne.’
I dropped my gaze and silently untied my skirts from their farthingale. Was I so obvious a book that all thought they could read me?
