A Net for Small Fishes

by Lucy Jago

  In the laughter that followed, it was Villiers and not the King who noticed Frankie. He bowed deeply and I had a sudden and ridiculous urge to giggle. Handsome men have ever unseated me. Frankie did not curtsy, Villiers’s rank being lower than her own. The King looked suddenly exhausted.

  ‘Your Majesty,’ she said, only then sinking low.

  ‘Rise, Lady Somerset,’ he said, showing less warmth than he had a few weeks before. Frankie wobbled slightly as she stood and smiled shyly. I saw this for the masquerade it was, but the King was instantly alert.

  ‘My Lady Somerset, are you ailing?’

  ‘Sire, I am with child,’ she said.

  ‘Christ alive and all hail Him!’ swore the King, who sought the happiness of those close to him as long as it did not impinge on his own. ‘That’s a good business. Rabbie must be cock-a-hoop?’

  ‘My lord is very pleased.’ Frankie smiled. The King looked her up and down, as if to assess whether she was likely to behave as embarrassingly as her husband, then said, ‘Lady Somerset, this is George Villiers.’

  Frankie dipped her head in a friendly manner. She, at least, behaved with grace towards the King’s new dog.

  ‘I am your servant, madam,’ said Villiers. The King clapped his hands in appreciation of his new favourite showing such courtesy to the pregnant wife of the rival incumbent.

  Although he was but twenty at most, Villiers’s manners were more refined than those of Carr. His voice, as I had noticed at Larkin’s studio, was high and for the English at least, easy to understand. He moved with grace and his beauty was unadorned but for the sumptuous yet sober materials of his clothes and six strings of fat pearls bubbling across his chest like spume crusting a black sea. Nothing about him was gaudy yet there was boldness. In his hat was a profusion of red ostrich plumes at which I stared a fraction longer than was entirely polite.

  The King moved away on Villiers’s arm, leaving Frankie to face the earls of his entourage, even the one by whom she had been violated. She looked at the floor until those of her rank had passed and then whispered to me.

  ‘They have mortgaged their estates to dress him. The outlay has borne fruit.’ Her voice was as sharp as her mother’s.

  We moved towards the open doors of the Queen’s bed chamber but made no attempt to enter. The King and Villiers were standing near the foot of the great bed, in which Queen Anna had spent most of her time since her eldest son’s death. The two monarchs spoke formally to each other, as if from a script.

  ‘The King has not looked this happy for months,’ said Frankie.

  ‘You will hurt the child if you worry too much before it is moving,’ I said. There was laughter from within and we craned forward.

  ‘My lord,’ said the Queen, whom we could not see, ‘as George Villiers is so great in your esteem, should he not be ever close by you as a gentleman of the bed chamber?’ There was clapping and cheering, and it was clear that this delightful surprise had been anticipated by a good number of those present.

  At that moment a shout from the gallery made us turn, as did other courtiers in the doorway, to be met by the extraordinary sight of Robert Carr marching as if to fight a fire. He was flushed, his silk hose splashed with mud and his cape hanging askew from his shoulder. Frankie walked quickly towards him.

  ‘My love, what are you about?’ she said, forcing him to a halt. Carr stared through her.

  ‘I’ve no time to talk,’ he said, ‘there’s rumours that the King’s new cur is to be knighted. I’ve to stop it.’

  ‘Stop it?’ said Frankie, rearranging his cloak and poking his frizzed hair into place. ‘No, Robin, you must not. The whole Court is gathered. He is only to be made a gentleman of the bed chamber, it’s nothing to …’

  ‘Him in the bed chamber? I’ll not have it!’

  ‘Think of the child, do not go in!’ whispered Frankie with furious urgency, trying to hold on to her husband, but he barged past her, dislodging his cloak again from his shoulder. The Queen’s guard barred the door to him, which was as shocking to see as Carr’s panic, but he forced his way through and plunged into the crowd.

  The King scowled at this dramatic arrival and no one bowed, perhaps unwilling to disturb the proceedings, perhaps because they could see which way the King’s favour was streaming.

  ‘Sire,’ said Carr, ‘any gentleman of the bed chamber must be a knight. This one’s too low-born to be by your side.’ Frankie and I were not alone in staring at him in horror. His wits appeared to have been entirely overridden by fury. Robin Carr would surely be arrested for challenging his monarch in so public and insolent a manner, but the King’s voice was calm when he spoke.

  ‘Tha’s a good notion, my dear Somerset, a good notion indeed.’

  Carr blanched. The King did not look at him but at his wife.

  ‘It is St George’s Day,’ announced Queen Anna, loudly, ‘the best of days to knight our George.’

  ‘Have we a sword?’ asked the King, looking about theatrically, as if a sword might appear from behind a courtier’s ear. Carr turned his head from one monarch to the other, stupid with rage.

  ‘God help us,’ whispered Frankie. We were pressed close by the crowd and I could feel her hands fidgeting. ‘The King will not suffer this much longer. Robin will ruin us.’

  ‘Here, my lord,’ said the Queen, her voice clear and bright in the embarrassed silence within the chamber. I could see only her hand as she drew a large ceremonial sword from its hiding place on her bed, struggling with its weight. The knighthood had been planned all along and Carr looked even more the fool for not knowing of it.

  ‘This cannot be,’ he said. ‘I’m head of the bed chamber and I do not approve it …’

  ‘You’ll nae tell me what to approve! Be silent or I’ll send you out in chains,’ the King snapped, shaking with anger. He glared until Carr lowered his eyes, cheeks aflame, then took the sword from the Queen and patted the back of her hand, clearly relieved that she approved this new favourite despite her glee at the embarrassment of the old.

  Turning to Villiers, the King said gently, ‘Kneel, George.’ Villiers stepped forward, eyes fixed upon his monarch.

  The King touched the great sword to Villiers’s shoulders, while Robin Carr shifted on his feet like a spooked horse, then passed the sword to the Earl of Pembroke and held out his hand for the new knight to kiss. Villiers did so with touching humility, a blush on his pale cheek as he rose.

  The King acted then as if Carr were not in the room. He wished his wife good health and, having waited for George to offer her the deepest of bows, processed out with him. Carr barged his way to the front of the line that followed, at the heels of his monarch and Villiers.

  24

  ‘Sit,’ I commanded.

  Frankie sat.

  ‘Weston has been arrested,’ I told her.

  Frankie jumped up. Her eyes were huge and full of questions. She flapped a hand at me, unable to speak. I helped her back on to the stool.

  ‘I do not know the charge. He was taken at dawn and is held close prisoner at Sir Thomas Parry’s house. I cannot see him.’

  Frankie’s fright helped me calm the terror that had been building within me since William Weston had knocked on my door, too early for it to be good news.

  ‘Parry?’ repeated Frankie, her wits reviving. ‘He is a privy councillor. Robin helped him to the position. I shall ask for news,’ she said, standing and moving to the door. I grabbed her arm.

  ‘Do not go out there until you are calm.’

  Frankie looked blankly at me until the implication of my words struck home. Weston was arrested. She must appear to be above suspicion.

  ‘He will not talk, I am sure of it,’ I said.

  William’s face was before my eyes. He had delivered his news a word or two at a time, gasping after his sprint to Whitehall. I had heard it with lowered head then hurried back through familiar rooms, now filled with threat. In Frankie’s privy chamber a maid had been lighting candles to banis
h the darkness of the morning and her mistress, nearly seven months with child, was sitting with other noble ladies. We spent more time at Court since Villiers was made a knight, to entertain and charm the wives of men whose loyalty the Howards needed. My three younger children grumbled at the loss of their country playgrounds, but frequent visits from Mr Palmer compensated them somewhat. He was teaching them to play tennis and he and I had reached the stage of kissing. It was so pleasant that I was in no rush to hurry matters along.

  In May, Frankie’s brother-in-law had been made a Garter knight at the same time as Lord Fenton, a noble from the Essex camp. The Court had split down the middle in choosing which retinue to favour. The King had forbidden George Villiers to join either, keeping him close on the steps of Denmark House, the Court of his Queen. Carr had ridden with Baron Knollys, the seventy-year-old husband of Frankie’s sister Elizabeth. This lord was judged to have slightly more knights in his train, over three hundred of them, all dressed in black and white with matching feathers in their hats, but those of Fenton were better dressed, in yellow and gold, on finer horses, and he was thought to have carried the day. The King smiled with obvious pleasure on the effort expended to gain his favour. By the end of the month, it was clear that Villiers would supplant Carr.

  ‘We stand too high for justice to reach us,’ said Frankie, her usual poise returning.

  ‘To reach you.’

  ‘I will protect you.’

  ‘I know you will try. If I am arrested, please look to my children.’

  ‘It will not come to that,’ said Frankie. ‘Robin and my family will have Weston released. Someone must warn Franklin.’

  ‘He talks such copious rot it will be hard to stop up his mouth.’

  ‘Then we must give him sufficient cause. Robin will convince him that …’ Her voice trailed off as she saw the difficulty of enlisting her husband to silence the corrupt apothecary who had provided the poison to kill his closest friend. ‘Robin will never forgive me,’ said Frankie, so quietly I could barely hear. ‘We cannot tell him.’

  ‘How not? If I am arrested, he will be told why. Will you deny all knowledge?’ I said, frightened as never before that Frankie might turn from me.

  ‘He will not abandon us,’ she said with such conviction I was slightly cheered. ‘I will get his help without telling him the problem.’

  By evening, Franklin had been summoned; Carr was listening to his wife’s breathless and confused attempts to explain why Weston had been arrested. Love, fear and pregnancy were working magic; she looked more beautiful than I had ever seen her. A clock on the mantelpiece interrupted, and for all ten chimes she gazed at her husband, who appeared soothed by the beauty of her face. The final note faded as gently as twilight, but I was full of foreboding.

  ‘Why would anyone accuse Weston of hurting Overbury? He could not cause injury as a close prisoner, it was all bluff to get my attention,’ said Carr. ‘Frank, you are making no sense.’ He looked at me. ‘What do you know?’

  I shook my head, my thoughts too confused to risk speaking.

  ‘There is a chance,’ said Frankie, ‘that Mistress Turner and I will be questioned because Weston is known to us.’

  Carr drank the wine Frankie handed to him and held up the glass, watching firelight jump off its cut surfaces. A man angling to replace Overbury as Carr’s secretary had given it to them. Carr put the glass on the floor and rested his foot on its rim.

  ‘My love,’ said Frankie. Carr pressed and pressed his foot, but the glass did not break. ‘Let me take that,’ she said, crouching down. Carr stamped, making no more noise than if he’d been crushing a beetle. Splinters exploded outwards batting against Frankie’s skirt, one lodging in the silk like a large diamond. She rose quickly.

  ‘I’ve concerns enough of my own! Speak plain. Why is it that Weston’s arrest alarms you so?’ Since Villiers’s arrival, an anger we had never suspected in Carr surfaced at the slightest provocation.

  We had arrived at the moment I had anticipated since being drawn into Frankie’s world; the moment when she would either show that our friendship was unbreakable or prove George’s fears correct, that ultimately I would be sacrificed as payment for riding high on her shoulders. Previously, Frankie had always had something to gain from our friendship; now the opposite was true. Protecting me would not serve her. Overbury’s death could so easily be portrayed as my doing; Weston, Forman and Franklin were all my connections. Frankie could play the innocent, unhappy girl, manipulated by an older, greedy, jealous confidante … she could throw me to the dogs and save herself. I saw blood soaking into the sand of the lion pit and knew that the sacrifice would not be mine alone, but also that of my children.

  ‘The coroner testified that your friend died of a consumption. But now your enemies seek any excuse to unseat you. They are whispering that Overbury did not die naturally but was murdered.’

  ‘What?’ Carr interrupted. ‘Why? By whom?’

  ‘My love, it is pure invention! They say that Weston could have killed Overbury with poisons from an apothecary called Franklin. It seems this Franklin is mad with the French pox and will say anything to anybody. You must tell him to keep his mouth shut.’

  Carr stared at his wife as if she was made of wax and was melting before his eyes. She stepped towards him, but he flinched.

  ‘Be calm, my love,’ she said.

  Before he could reply there was a knock at the door.

  ‘It will be Franklin,’ Frankie said. ‘Talk sternly to him, husband.’

  ‘Here?’ said Carr. ‘A man accused of abetting murder, in the chambers of the King’s closest adviser? Do you want me hanged for treason?’

  ‘Impress upon him the importance of silence,’ Frankie said, touching his arm tenderly. Carr jerked away. I felt truly sorry for him, drawn into something of which he had no notion, that would bring him no good. I felt yet sorrier as I opened the door.

  Carr stared, appalled by what manner of man was Franklin. His stench went before him and he was drunk. Carr gave his wife one long look, brimming with hurt and mystification, then excused himself to his privy chamber, shutting the door on her pleas.

  Franklin spoke without invitation. ‘What’s amiss?’ he asked, nodding at Frankie’s belly. I could not look upon him without picturing George’s cat, turning and mewling, as if the poor animal were still at my feet.

  ‘Weston has been arrested,’ said Frankie.

  ‘Back to his old tricks, is he?’ said Franklin, laughing.

  I could contain myself no longer.

  ‘You had better hope he says nothing to send you to the rope!’

  Franklin looked confused.

  ‘It’s not for me to worry about. Never my idea.’

  ‘Lord save us,’ I said, desperation worming its way in.

  ‘My husband will save us,’ said Frankie. ‘He will save us as long as we say nothing, admit to nothing. There is no evidence. Keep quiet, do you understand?’

  Franklin shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘Are you mad!’ I shouted.

  ‘You must deny everything,’ Frankie repeated very slowly. ‘If you speak, you will be hanged.’

  The wretch pretended to strangle himself and made his eyes bulge.

  I stared at the strange performance, suddenly cold. I was back on my knees at Paul’s cross in the grey light of dawn.

  ‘No, Frankie,’ I said, very quietly, lifting my eyes to hers. ‘It is I shall hang for you both.’

  25

  Three days passed in a strange lull, as if we were becalmed; I stayed in the apartment and kept the children close, allowing nothing to distract my attention from them, and yet the speed of my heartbeat and lack of appetite were constant reminders that, elsewhere, Richard Weston was answering questions about his time as Overbury’s gaoler. Killing Overbury could bring us down, but not in the way we had expected. Had he been alive when George Villiers was first brought to Court, he might have counselled Carr to befriend this young rival and keep the
King’s favour, then no one would have dared move against him.

  Barbara, not yet betrothed, had left Lady Catherine’s household, or perhaps was sent away because of the scandal. She refused to say that was the case, but she would not have added to my troubles for the world. I was glad that John, at least, would not know for a day or two what was unfolding. My brother Eustace visited, to know how I did, but other than him, Frankie and I received no visitors at all, not even from our families, although Frankie was summoned briefly to her father.

  ‘My father has told Weston that his son will be hurt if he confesses,’ Frankie informed me. I was horrified, but she was impatient. ‘Neither of us wants that, but it is the only way that we can all escape justice. If Weston does not confess, then there is no principal to charge with the crime, and the case cannot be tried. There is no one on this earth who can frighten me into confessing guilt, not even the Lord Chief Justice.’

  I did not ask what she had told her father to enlist his help. The knowledge might damage us further if I were tortured. Although I was terrified of being questioned, it seemed that Weston and Frankie would deny everything and it was now up to me to keep quiet. Yet I wondered, again and again, would Weston or Frankie sacrifice me if great pressure were put upon them? Only when it was all over would I know if they had held fast or failed me.

  Frankie’s father had been informed of the events that led to Weston’s arrest, which meant that Carr had been too, although he said nothing to us. The Lieutenant of the Tower, Sir Gervase Elwes, had lost his job and was seeking another from Baron Ellesmere, that same for whom Arthur was steward and in whose household John and Barbara had served. Elwes, in an attempt to disprove his reputation for drunkenness and corruption, informed Lord Ellesmere that he had thrown away poison intended for a prisoner, even though he would have stood to gain had the prisoner died. Lord Ellesmere saw immediately how magnificently he could profit from this information, given that the prisoner was Sir Thomas Overbury.

  Frankie was beside herself with fury at Elwes, but I saw it as inevitable. Just as Weston had never been paid what he was promised, Frankie and Carr had been neglectful of Elwes. Had he been cosseted by them, he would have had no cause to make so horrendous a blunder. Elwes’s confession had been sent to the King some months before. It was he who had ordered the investigation, behind Carr’s back, which had led to Weston’s arrest. The last line of his letter burnt across my mind’s eye: if you cause me to call you ingrate, no earthly plague shall be worse than my wrath. He had given up on Carr, and now the King himself was our enemy.