The Queen's Dwarf A Novel (44 page)

“Don’t. My mother’s madness honed me into a tool worthy of the duke. She made me skillful at reading people’s tempers, able to guess what action they might take. She made me understand consequences should I fail, which is why I took steps to guarantee that you would do His Grace’s bidding.” Was there a touch of regret in his voice?

“What steps?”

“Your brother and his schoolmaster are languishing in Fleet Prison.”

Bile rose in my throat. “They cannot be! They’ve done no wrong!”

“Everyone knows the Jesuits tried to blow up King Charles’s family. They’ve spread insurrection throughout England, sneaking onto our shores, infecting everyone they meet.”

“Samuel is no Jesuit!”

“His tutor is one of the most dangerous in England.”

“I do not believe it! The duchess of Buckingham arranged for Quintin to be Samuel’s tutor! Buckingham ordered her to do it.”

“When you marched in with your demands that day, it was obvious you were going to prove more troublesome than the duke first expected. This was the only solution to assure that His Grace would have your continued cooperation.”

“You bastard! I will go to the king. Tell him everything. The duchess of Buckingham has as much to lose as I do, since she was consorting with Jesuits!”

“Even if you could bring yourself to betray the good duchess, the king would believe she was duped. Jesuits are notoriously cunning. What chance would a woman like her have, matched against a force of such evil?”

Unease prickled my nape as I remembered the duchess’s feverish expression the day I thanked her for her kindness to Samuel. I had never seen her so fierce, as when she condemned Buckingham’s detractors. She claimed she would do whatever she could to prove Buckingham’s worth to those who scorned him. I had pitied her, dismissing the outburst as words spoken in the heat of the moment, never to be acted upon. But what if I was wrong? Was it possible the duchess had knowingly placed Samuel with a Jesuit to provide her husband with leverage to force my hand? Make me sprinkle whatever this hellish concoction was into the queen’s goblet?

If that was true, perhaps the kind duchess was more dangerous than the countess of Carlisle.

Master Quintin’s image rose up in my mind—his painful hip, his useless hand. The way he had carried Samuel to bed, the courage he had shown saving Phineas from a murderous mob.

“Buckingham has taught me what evil is,” I said. “So have you.”

“Are your father’s dogs evil when they tear out a bull’s throat? Or are they just trying to save their own lives? Doing what greater powers force them to do? We are dogs, fool Jeffrey. You and I. Sometimes we even regret the lengths we must go to in the name of our masters. God knows, I do now. It grieves me to tell you that His Grace has taken one step more to assure you will poison the queen’s womb. There is a guard at Fleet Prison who awaits a missive from the duke. The minute it is in the guard’s hand, the man will go to your brother’s cell and cut Samuel’s throat.”

In that instant, I was flung back into Oakham, saw my father’s big hand yank back a lamb’s head, bare its white throat. I saw the flash of my father’s knife, the gush of blood. Smelled the metallic scent of terror and death. But it was Samuel’s throat in danger this time, Samuel’s eyes filled with horror. Samuel, knowing, as an animal could not, what was to come. I staggered to the chamber pot and retched.

“You must give me a few days. Even if I decide to do as Buckingham asks, I have to collect myself first. Look how my hand is shaking.” I held up the hand, the cross on the ring Buckingham had forced me to wear reflecting the candle’s flame.

“Your predicament grieves me sorely, Jeffrey. I have come to have affection for Samuel as I have observed him these past months. He reminds me a little of my father. That is why…” Ware looked away, his cheekbones darkening. “I experienced some difficulty over Samuel’s letters.”

“You stole Samuel’s letters?”

“At first I intercepted them under Buckingham’s orders so he could gather more ways to blackmail you. Once I had gleaned whatever was of use, I was supposed to return them to Clemmy so that he could deliver the letters to you.”

“Then Clemmy was your creature all along?”

“Jeffrey, we both know that His Grace can make decent men do the unthinkable to protect those they love. In the end, Clemmy could not endure the guilt. He took the sister His Grace had threatened, and the pair of them ran off. I traced them as far as Liverpool, but they had already sailed on a ship bound for Ireland. I was not as vigorous in my efforts to hunt them down as Buckingham believes. The Irish are half-mad savages. Let Watson and his sister take their chances there.”

Even in light of Clemmy’s betrayal, part of me hoped he was safe.

“Why didn’t you return Samuel’s letters?” I asked.

A pink flush spread across Ware’s cheekbones. “Sometimes even the most solitary man longs for some sort of connection. Human warmth. Samuel’s faith is so different from the one my mother raised me in.”

“If you know what a bright soul Samuel is, do something to help him!”

“I cannot. You see, at the bottom of it all—Protestant, Catholic, Puritan—most churchmen are scrabbling for mortal power, not God. Goodwife Felton, your brother Samuel, and, yes, even the king may strive for goodness. The rest of the world will trample them to gain control.”

“Ware, I beg you—”

“I cannot help you. I know things look ill for you now, Jeffrey. But still, I envy you. I do not have your gift for inspiring friendship.” Ware cleared his throat. “I will return for your answer once I finish my business. A fortnight should give you time to consider the consequences to Samuel if you should fail to follow the duke’s command.” He placed his twisted paper full of poison atop the writing box the queen had given me. “This respite is only delaying the inevitable. I am sorry, Jeffrey. But it is time for you to choose between your brother and the queen.”

Ware turned and walked from the room.

I paced, half-mad with terror and fury and helplessness. Clemmy was fleeing, God knew where, because of me. Samuel might soon be dead. And Ware? Was he the cold manipulator who implemented Buckingham’s schemes, or was he a victim, as tangled in Buckingham’s toils and his parents’ wreckage as I was?

God, what I would not have given for Will’s counsel. I wanted to race to his chamber, beg him to aid me. I knew in my gut that he would. But I could not draw anyone else into Buckingham’s trap. The duke was too powerful, the king too blind with love of him, the queen too vulnerable.

I tore through ideas, trying to find some way to cut free of these coils. I crossed to the writing desk, took up the paper cone filled with powder. I wanted to throw it into the fire, but I would need it in the future. I hid the deadly package beneath Will’s blotted attempts at the alphabet, pages I had not been able to bring myself to throw away: ghosts of the friendship that had changed my life.

I could not go to my death without telling Will Evans what he had meant to me.

I scribbled a note, folded it before the ink was dry, and dripped hot wax to seal it. I drew off the ring Buckingham had given me and pressed it into the seal.

To Sergeant Porter William Evans,
I wrote beneath the wax gobbet that glistened in the candlelight like blood.

I slipped down to the deserted menagerie’s lodgings. Pug chattered from the cage Rattlebones had been forced to confine him in so he would not rend Wellingborough’s tapestries. Pug stretched his hairy fingers out, tugging at the latch. I had no time to release him now. I crossed to the mismatched cupboard where Boku kept the makings of his illusions. Drawing the lock pick from inside my boot, I tripped the lock’s tumblers as I had once before. Opening the doors, I took the supplies I might need: five paper tubes filled with a blend of gunpowder and some other substance that filled a room with smoke; a bundle of herbs he’d used to make his audience drowsy; a tinderbox to light them. From a peg on the wall I grabbed a gray drape softened with gauze. I had seen Boku vanish using such implements, distracting his audience so effectively, he managed to cross the stage without anyone knowing where he had gone. I prayed that when the time came, I could vanish, as well.

I stuffed my contraband into a leather saddlebag, then pulled the letter I had written to Will out of my doublet. I set it at his place at the table. The chair, despite how heavy its timbers, was listing to one side from evenings spent leaning toward Dulcinea. His whittling knife lay beside a wooden horse he had been carving for the child now buried under the rose shrub. He had not been able to stop himself from working on the toy even so many months later.

Grief washed through me as I tucked my letter beneath the knife so Will would be certain to find it.

Forgive me, my friend.

The last lines I’d written pounded in my head like the drums Boku sometimes beat when the moon was full. I strapped on the sword the queen had given me. I stuffed my pistol in my belt and threw a dark cloak over my shoulders. There was only one way to stop the duke of Buckingham from poisoning the queen or ordering his minion to take Samuel’s life.

The duke of Buckingham must die.

T
WENTY-
S
IX

I had never ridden through unfamiliar country alone and I had little notion of where I was going. Time and again, I took the wrong road and often I had to hide in the woods to keep someone from stealing my horse when I heard voices before or behind me.

My childlike size, the horse, and trappings, richer than any highway robber was likely to find elsewhere, made me appear an easy target, but I could not reach Portsmouth in time without a horse. I could not assassinate Buckingham without the weapons forged in my size. I could not fail, or Samuel would die.

Yet I had not slept for so long that I did not see the crabbed soldier make a lunge for my horse’s bridle until it was too late.

The horse reared, and I might have fallen were it not for the harness built into the saddle. It bruised my thighs as I fumbled for my pistol, my attacker’s grizzled countenance a blur before me. I swore as the man knocked the weapon from my grasp.

I thought of Samuel, struggled harder as the man knotted his hand in my cloak and dragged me from my saddle. I struck the ground so hard, black dots swirled before my eyes.

“Release him,” a calm voice ordered.

The robber did so with the instinctive obedience of one used to following commands, then cursed under his breath. “Who are you to tell me so?” he snarled.

“Do it, Riggs.” There was something in his tone I could not quite understand. “I don’t want to have to hurt you.” The brigand must have let go of my horse. I could hear hoofbeats pounding away. How would I ever catch the beast now?

“What are you doing here, sir?” Riggs asked. “I thought you’d be with the fleet!”

“The duke of Buckingham decided to pass over me for promotion in order to raise up some son of a nobleman or one of his cousins or such. God forbid an able officer be given command of able soldiers like you,” my savior said. “Riggs, I know you are in dire straits. The duke owes me eighty pounds back pay. I can only imagine what plain soldiers are owed. But I cannot let you make war on children.”

“I am no child,” I said, struggling to my feet.

Both men gaped down at me as I shoved back the tangle of cloak and shook my hair out of my face. “What deviltry is this?” The grizzled man made a sign to ward off the evil eye.

“No devil. I am Jeffrey Hudson, Queen Henrietta Maria’s fool.”

“Hudson?” my savior echoed. “You cannot be … John Hudson’s brother?”

I staggered a step, knocked more off balance by my brother’s name than by my fall. “You knew my brother?”

“I fought with your brother in France. John Hudson died saving my life.” The man extended one arm. His cuff fell back. I could see the ruin of his hand. Something glinted in the sleeve—the blade of a knife.

He followed my gaze. “It is a dangerous road we travel. My hand cannot grip a weapon, but it is strong enough to drive a blade home once I get close enough. I am Lieutenant John Felton.”

“I know. The queen made inquiries into my brother’s fate.”

“You are fortunate. Most families will never know. Your horse must be a league away by now. You can hire men at the next public house to go in search of the animal. That is the only way you will catch your mount. It is a fine one.”

“It was a gift from the king.” I rubbed my bruised elbow, remembering how the horse had been trained to be first mount to the prince or princess the king and Henrietta Maria so longed for. If I did not put an end to Buckingham, those children would never be. The duke would find someone else to dump the powder into the queen’s cup. Someone like the countess of Carlisle?

The whole plan hinged on my having that horse and the special saddle to ride him. I knew I must not only reach Buckingham and kill him, I would also have to race back to the queen, confess everything, and beg her to intercede on Samuel’s behalf before I was arrested. I would be a murderer the next time I looked into Henrietta Maria’s beloved face. I would never see her smile at me again. Desolation swept through me, mingling with resolve. She would know what vipers had surrounded her, though. It would be worth it. Even if the betrayer she hated most was me.

“Where are you headed, Jeffrey Hudson?” Felton asked.

I considered telling him but decided it was better not to. The fewer people who knew I’d been to Portsmouth, the better. “I have never seen the sea,” I said. “Now that John lies across it, it seems the only way I can bid him farewell.”

Felton looked away, and I could see the weight of my brother’s death upon his shoulders. “You are right to honor him. A soldier who bleeds for his country deserves to be paid the respect he is owed.”

We walked together until we reached the nearest inn, Felton telling me of John’s exploits in France, and of his own return home: The weary, painful days at his mother’s home, trying to regain some use of his hand. It reminded me of what Ware had said.