Authors: Anna Kendall
Crossing Over (14 page)
“Then why did you say I do?”
“I didn’t! I was making a jest . . . green wood . . . it was but a jest.”
“It wasn’t funny.”
“I know,” I said humbly. “Please forgive me.” I started to go down on one knee. She grabbed my hand and pulled me up.
“Stop! You can’t kneel to me while the queen is in the room! But you didn’t think about that, did you?” She peered at me. “You really are just an ignorant savage.”
All at once her mood changed with that quicksilver speed that now, I belatedly realized, had in it something of hysteria. “I know! I shall be your teacher! I shall teach you to be a courtier—to play the lute, and gamble, and . . . oh, all sorts of things! It will be the greatest amusement!”
“My lady . . .”
“And we shall start now! With the lute! Come!”
“We can’t now,” I said with enormous relief. “The queen is calling for dancing.”
Queen Caroline had just raised her hand to the musicians who waited obediently in a corner of the room. “The jereian!” she called. Ladies began to form one line, gentlemen another facing them. Those not dancing crowded back to the walls, I among them. The queen’s fool did not dance; not even Lady Cecilia was mad enough to think that. She skipped away to join the line of ladies, and the dance began.
Like all the court dances, it was slow, stately, sedate. More suited to the old queen than to Queen Caroline. I remembered the drunken masquers tumbling into the kitchen on the eve of the prince’s wedding, and knew there was wildness caged among these courtiers, just as there was in Cecilia. It was troubling. But why didn’t Queen Caroline introduce other, more vigorous dances? They existed; I had seen them at faires, among villagers exhilarated with holiday, with ale, with a day’s freedom from labor.
But I did not understand the queen. She contained mazes, labyrinths. Crafty, kind, passionate, ruthless, just, deceitful—she was all of these. The one thing that never changed was her determination to obtain the throne that should already rightly have been hers. I had no doubt that she would do nearly anything to that end—as she had once told me herself.
The queen chose to watch, not dance. She sat on a big, carved chair beside the fire, Lord Robert beside her on the stool that Lady Jane Sedley had vacated. I scurried to take my place at the queen’s feet, now that the sour-faced stranger had left the room. From here I could watch Lady Cecilia move her graceful little body in and out of the figures of the dance, weaving slowly forward and back, her slim waist swaying and her green skirts changing color in the flickering firelight. . . .
“Enough,” the queen said. She raised her hand and immediately the musicians stopped playing. “I find I do not want dancing, after all. I am weary. Good night.”
It was still very early. Courtiers and ladies gazed at each other in bewilderment. The queen turned to walk through her rooms, and the ladies of the bedchamber picked up their skirts to scurry after her. Cecilia was not one of these. She stood with a disappointed pout in the middle of the room. “Could we not dance anyway . . . ?”
But, of course, they could not. Not without the queen. Some courtiers, the older ones, left the room, including a reluctant Lord Robert. I knew he would be back later, much later, alone, to be admitted to the queen’s privy chamber. And then Lady Margaret left, one hand on her belly. “If you will excuse me . . . the pork at dinner . . . will not you young ladies retire as well?”
“It’s so early,” murmured Lady Jane.
“So early . . .” “Not at all tired . . .” “So very early. . . .”
With a sad smile, Lady Margaret walked from the room, her hand still on her aching belly. The younger courtiers’ eyes sharpened. They would stay, and without the sharp and intelligent eyes of Lady Margaret upon them. Or the eyes of their queen.
I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. Usually the queen retired very late and her ladies at the same time, and I went to my alcove to sleep. But Lady Jane was right—it was far too early to sleep . . .
Should I stay here? What should I do?
Should I stay here? What should I do?
Learn all you can
, the queen had told me once.
Nobody notices a fool
.
, the queen had told me once.
Nobody notices a fool
.
I would stay. I wanted to stay. Lady Cecilia was here.
“Let us wager!” Lady Jane cried. She seized a pair of dice in a golden cup.
“I’ll wager with you, pretty Jane,” said Lord Thomas Bradley, “but not for a coin.”
“For what then?” Lady Jane asked, widening her eyes with mock innocence. “A kiss?”
“Oh, I think more than a kiss.”
“How much more?”
“A game is no good unless the stakes are very high. Such as . . . everything.”
Lady Jane smiled at him over her fan. “Everything against what? What do you put up for your side of the wager?”
“My best mare.”
“Done, my lord!”
I was shocked. This did not happen in the queen’s presence. Queen Caroline liked gambling, and she was good at dice and cards. Nor did she cheat. I had watched Hartah cheat often enough to know it when I saw it. If the queen lost, she smiled and paid up. Nor did she try to keep her ladies from flirting and kissing. But I had been at court long enough to know that an unmarried lady must stay a virgin. It was one thing for the queen to take Lord Robert as a lover; she was a widow, and a queen. But her ladies must remain chaste until marriage, to preclude all doubt about who fathered their husband’s eventual heirs. So why was Lady Jane Sedley laughing like that at Lord Thomas and eagerly sitting down to wager with him for “everything”? Or had I misunderstood?
I had not. More pairs of courtier-and-lady formed, sitting opposite each other at different small tables, the dice between them. Those not willing to gamble, or perhaps unchosen, clustered with excited envy around the players.
Lady Cecilia stood in the middle of the floor, her expression tense but otherwise unreadable. She was not one to join watchers, to be left out of whatever amusement presented itself.
Sudden jealousy tore through me like a gale. If she paired with one of these young lords to wager her chastity, if she lost, if she went with him to some secluded chamber . . . I couldn’t breathe. All at once I could feel again Hartah’s knife in my hand, sliding into his flesh, and I knew I could do the same to any man who wagered with Cecilia for her sweet and untouched body. Stupid, irrational,
insane
. . . who was I to have such thoughts? Yet I had them.
insane
. . . who was I to have such thoughts? Yet I had them.
A handsome minor courtier, Lord Dillingham, walked toward Cecilia. His sword gleamed at his hip. He grinned at her but she, for once, did not flirt back. Instead she rushed forward and grabbed me by both hands. “Roger! I shall wager with you! For a silver coin with Her Grace’s image stamped upon it! Come!”
Jane Sedley, seated opposite Lord Thomas, looked up and gave a derisive laugh. But before I knew it, Lady Cecilia and I were seated at one of the little tables, people crowding around to watch this new amusement. One of the queen’s ladies, wagering with the queen’s yellow-faced fool!
But Cecilia faced me quietly, all at once as sedate and sober as Lady Margaret herself, and laid a silver coin upon the table. “The game shall be fifty points,” she said. That was an incredibly high number; a single game would last all night. We began, and she stayed sedate, barely talking, her eyes upon only the dice. After a while the watchers, disappointed, drifted to other tables. No flirting, no bawdy jokes, no forbidden crossing of the boundaries of rank. We were too dull.
Bewildered, I threw the dice and counted points, as I was told. What was Cecilia doing? Was she secretly as shocked as I at the licentiousness of these young ladies and gentlemen, and so, choosing this method of preserving her chastity? But surely she could have just announced that she preferred not to play, or even retired for the night? One other lady, besides Lady Margaret, had done that. What was truly happening here?
We played on. Cecilia never looked at me. Finally a great shout arose from one of the other tables; someone had won. Or lost. Under cover of the babble that followed, Cecilia bent her head over the dice and said, “Roger, are you my friend?”
How to answer that? A lady-in-waiting could not be friends with the queen’s fool. But I let my heart answer.
“Yes, my lady.”
“And friends do favors for each other, do they not?”
“Yes.” My stomach grew cold.
“I need a favor from you, Roger.”
“I am in attendance on the queen . . .”
“Not always. Not right
now
. Please . . . please. It is very important.”
now
. Please . . . please. It is very important.”
She raised her head and I saw that tears gleamed in her green eyes. Tears, and fear. I would have gone anywhere, done anything, to erase that look from her lovely face.
“Go out the kitchen gate—you came from the kitchens, didn’t you? The queen found you that night in the kitchen? ” Some private memory twisted her face with grief. “Go into the city. Ask your way to Mother Chilton, it’s not far. Tell her you need a milady posset. And you must go masked, and in plain clothes.”
I reeled with all these instructions. The only thing I found to say was, “What’s a milady posset?”
“Never you mind. It’s merely a thing that I need. Oh, Roger, don’t fail me now!”
“But you have other friends . . . men with swords . . .”
“I cannot tell any of them! Oh, for sweet sake, smile, Sarah is looking at us—” Cecilia trilled with laughter. She cried loudly, “You have won, you swine!” She pushed the silver coin across the table to me.
Lady Sarah strolled over, smiling maliciously. “So the fool won! A good thing you did not make Jane’s wager with him, Cecilia. For now Jane must pay up.”
Lady Jane stood and pushed over the table, stamping her foot in its high-heeled slipper. But even I could see that her anger wasn’t real. Was she really going to allow her chastity to be won in a dice game? Or was Lord Thomas not the first?
The queen, whatever her own reputation, would not approve of this. Neither of the queens.
The courtiers, making bawdy jests, crowded around Lady Jane and Lord Thomas. Lady Sarah turned to watch. I felt another, larger coin thrust into my hand, and then Cecilia flounced away toward the others, crying, “Jane! I will be your lady of the bedchamber!”
The coin in my hand was gold.
I put both in my pocket and slipped out the door from the outer chamber to the presence chamber. If Cecilia saw me go, she gave no sign. In my alcove I drew the curtain and stood there, shivering in the dark. The tiny space had neither fire nor candle. But usually I was there only when asleep, and Queen Caroline had given me three warm blankets. I wished I could crawl under them and never come out.
What was I going to do?
I couldn’t bear to see Cecilia so unhappy. Was she sick, and the milady posset a cure for some illness? But then why not tell the queen and ask for a physician? Was the posset some herb that brought temporary—if deluded—happiness? Such things existed, I knew. But ale or wine would do the same thing if enough was drunk, and it didn’t cost a gold piece. I had never even
seen
a gold piece before.
seen
a gold piece before.
What was I going to do?
Slowly I took off my green-and-yellow fool’s suit. At the same time, I faced the truth. I was afraid to go into the city alone.
Slowly I drew on my old rough trousers and patched boots.
I was a coward.
I pulled on the tunic that Kit Beale had given me.
I had always been a coward. When I stayed under Hartah’s beatings, when I begged Lady Conyers to keep me by her, when Queen Caroline threatened me with torture if I didn’t do her bidding. A coward.
With my knife I cut off a section of a blanket, cut two holes in it to make a mask, and thrust it into my pocket. I put on my hooded cloak, a gift from the queen.
I was going out into the city. For Cecilia.
14
THE QUEEN’S ROOM
emptied soon enough; the lords and ladies all went to put Lady Jane and Lord Thomas to bed. That whole business shocked me still—a lady, allowing herself to be gambled for like a whore! There was so much different about the court from what I had vaguely imagined when I arrived here with Kit Beale. Even Queen Caroline—why had she retired so early? Who was the sour-faced man in black whose conversation had so upset Her Grace?
emptied soon enough; the lords and ladies all went to put Lady Jane and Lord Thomas to bed. That whole business shocked me still—a lady, allowing herself to be gambled for like a whore! There was so much different about the court from what I had vaguely imagined when I arrived here with Kit Beale. Even Queen Caroline—why had she retired so early? Who was the sour-faced man in black whose conversation had so upset Her Grace?
I crept through the darkened presence chamber. Just before my hand touched the doorknob, I realized my mistake. Green guards stood on the other side. If I, the queen’s fool, walked past them in rough dress, the queen would know it within minutes. So, I was beginning to realize, would everyone else in the palace, which was a web of spies. If the queen had me searched, the gold piece would be found. Then what of Cecilia’s secrecy?
I went back to my alcove, put my fool’s garb back on, tightly rolled my old clothes in my cloak, and walked back through the presence chamber. This time I opened the door.
“Good morning, queen’s men!” I said, and kicked up both legs like a frisky colt.
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