The Thornless Rose (32 page)

Watching his movements, still grinning, Anne quipped, “Dahling, you look mahvelous!”

“Drink your coffee, woman,” he said, his blue eyes sparkling over the rim of his mug.

Anne smiled at him before shifting her gaze to the flames dancing in the hearth. Minutes of quiet warmth passed. Neither spoke, though Anne knew she should say something about the unused rags in her nightstand. She had put it off for days, but now the moment was perfect. She hesitated anyway, wondering how best to put a voice to her jumble of nervous emotions. She wanted to get a handle on it herself, first.

Finally, she stirred. She placed her mug on the table, took his, and put it next to her own. She sat on his lap, and he wrapped his arms around her, then rested his cheek on her shoulder.

She snuggled against him. “Jonathan,” she began, then paused.

He looked at her, curiosity wrinkling his brow. “Yes, darling?”

“I think...” Her voice faltered as she felt his muscles tense, saw his frown.

“Anne, I know what you’re going to say.”

Her eyes widened. “How could you?”

“I’m worried about Norfolk, too.”

“Oh.” She nodded to herself, glad for his misinterpretation. Maybe it was too early to tell him. She had no right to play with his emotions when she wasn’t really sure. What she wouldn’t give for a home pregnancy test!

“I’m keeping a close eye on the bastard,” Jonathan said. “I’m certain you’re safe here with me, but you must promise to stay by my side. No leaving St. Bart’s on your own.”

“I know. I’ve learned that lesson.”

“In spite of the situation with Norfolk, I am well pleased with how things are going. I was a trifle worried during the inquest, but it appears history has not been disrupted. I’m sure the final hearing will determine Amy Dudley was not murdered. I think because of our help, Her Majesty and Dudley shall be solidly in our corner from now on.”

“I wouldn’t mind if history did change a bit—well, a lot,” Anne said.

“How?”

She gave him a dreamy smile. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Dudley and the queen could find happiness together, like us?”

“Yes, darling.” His embrace tightened and he drew her face toward his. With a determined, yet tender insistence, he kissed her eyelids, her cheeks, and finally her mouth.

“Mmm, you are my warrior-dandy,” she said, smiling. His robe had opened, revealing his chest, and her gaze drifted lower. “Or maybe my Marmite soldier?”

“Anne!” he said, feigning shock, although his tone suggested a challenge. “You wouldn’t dare!”

“Is there any left in the jar?” Grinning, she drew his hand to her lips, but instead of kissing it, she covered a finger with her mouth, slowly caressing its length with her tongue, then gently nibbling at the tip. “Mmmm, dandy.”

The corners of his mouth twitched as he watched. “You are a very wicked woman.”

She shifted slightly on his lap, sensing his physical response. “You’re pretty randy for an old man.”

“Old man?”

“When’s your birthday?” She nibbled on his ear. “When were you born?”

He groaned. “4 June...1911.”

“Oh, shit!” she said, sitting up. “You
are
old!”

“Afraid you’ve married a geezer?” Jonathan pushed open her robe and kissed her breast. “Remember, I’ve only been here nineteen months. That puts me at a comfortable thirty-six, which is not so very old—in my prime, actually.”

She shifted again and touched him, then opened his robe fully and stroked him. “I’m in my prime, too.”

“Dear Lord,” he groaned.

She glanced around, sure they wouldn’t be interrupted, and straddled his hips.

“Anne––”

Her teasing turned to liquid heat as she moved on him, gently at first, but then speeding up as she enjoyed his fevered response and lack of control. She continued, urging him on with her body, her hands, her words, and it didn’t take long until he grimaced, arched, and shuddered in ecstasy.

When he relaxed, tilting his head against the back of the chair, she held him, feeling the beat of his heart.

“I love you,” she said.

“You’ve had your way with me, vixen.” He kissed her hair and heaved a sigh of contentment. “You certainly are in your prime.”

She heard the smile in his voice. “How are you ever going to keep up with a young thing like me?”

“When were you born?”

“September 5, 1984.”

He was silent for a moment. “You’re thirty, then. In your time, I’d be over a hundred years old, so I suppose I could be accused of robbing the cradle.” He kissed her again.

“Rob away,” she whispered, kissing him back.

Chapter Thirty-Five

“It rained last night,” Katherine Ashley noted as she plumped one of the queen’s bed pillows, “but the gloom hath parted, and ’tis a fair morn.”

“Open the curtains, Kat,” Elizabeth said.

Lady Ashley placed the pillow on the bed and clapped her hands. A few serving women pulled the drapes aside, revealing a great bay window made of hundreds of diamond-shaped, sparkling panes.

The queen sat in her bed, studying the rain-washed garden. Her headache was gone, replaced by gnawing hunger. How long had it been since she had eaten a true repast? Three days ago? Four?

“I am famished,” she told Lady Ashley in a cheerful tone. “I believe I couldst eat a horse.”

“When Dr. Brandon left two days ago, he gave strict orders for me to serve thee light meals ’til Friday week. This morn, we have broth o’ chicken, dry toasted bread, and his medicinal tea, ah, er—nothing more.”

“Blast, Kat, fetch me some real victuals!” As Elizabeth thrust the covers aside and rose from her bed, she was seized with a sudden, overwhelming dizziness. “Blessed Mercy,” she whispered as she fell back onto her pillows.

“Majesty!” Lady Ashley exclaimed. “Thou must not walk. Use thy chaise today as thou art still weak as a kitten.”

At that moment, Lettice Knollys entered the bedchamber, followed by William Cecil and Dr. Lopez, each of them making their obeisance.

Elizabeth glared at Lopez, who avoided her eyes. Behind him, a serving woman placed the tray on a table, then set a kettle of water to heat on a nearby brazier.

Lettice smiled and indicated the tray with a sweep of her hand. “’Tis time to break the fast. The food taster hath pronounced it wondrous good.”

Elizabeth looked at Cecil. “Food taster?”

He bowed again. “Precautions, Majesty. I wouldst have discussed this with thee, but thou wast indisposed. I also insisted thy ladies-in-waiting allow a woman who knoweth all manner of poisons and their use to check thy wardrobe, especially the garments that touch thy body bare, for some poisons need not be ingested.”

“God’s death, Cecil.” Elizabeth turned and glared at Lopez. “I suppose this wast thy idea, for thou art still trying to insinuate thyself back into mine own good graces. Out, Lopez! Out, I say! Thou art naught to me now!”

Stunned, Lopez dropped to his knees, groveling, pleading, despicable. “
Por favor, desculpe. Perdao, por favor.”

Cecil frowned. “Majesty, he must examine thee, for ’tis most important to have his approval if thou means to attend today’s final hearing into Lady Dudley’s death.”

The queen closed her eyes.
The hearing. Robin’s future. Sweet Christ,
she thought,
how could I have forgotten?

She knew she had to attend. Even if she had been on her deathbed, she would have found a way to go, but the thought of the loathsome Lopez making his pronouncements, breathing on her, touching her body—
Merciful God!

Yet, she knew once Cecil set his mind on a course of action he was tenacious, like a hound on the scent. He would get his way. He always got his way, damnable hound that he was.

“Quickly then,” Elizabeth whispered, angry for giving in so soon, yet too weak to argue any further. “Examine me quickly, for I wouldst break mine own fast with all haste, afore I waste away to nothingness.”

…

Nervous, Lopez reassured himself it was going as planned.
The arrogant upstart will be driven out and punished, and I shalt return to mine own rightful place by Her Majesty’s side.

He rose, then glanced at the table which now held the queen’s food tray, along with a bottle containing Brandon’s elixir. His own blue bottle was a perfect match.

He bowed. “Majesty, I must needs listen to thy heart.”

“Aye, aye, get on with it. ’Tis a terrible shame thou hast not the learning to use a leather cone like Dr. Brandon,” she grumbled. Then, with a frown of impatience, she pulled down the coverlet and waited.

Irritated by the slight, Lopez affected a quiet composure he did not feel. “I shall look into acquiring a cone, ma’am, but for now...” He moved to the queen’s bedside with an air of professional regard, while feeling utter contempt for her unwomanly arrogance and sickly-pale body, as thin as any stripling lad’s.

He placed his ear against her chest. Her heart was strong and slow—
a warrior’s heart
, he noted wryly. He counted the beats and tried to ignore the weight of the blue bottle secreted in his pocket, a potion of chamomile, lavender, valerian root, yarrow, and foxglove, deadly foxglove, precisely extracted from the plant’s second-year leaf growth. He’d added the merest drop of the toxin to a formula exactly matching Brandon’s pretentious elixir. It would accomplish what Norfolk had requested—no, insisted upon—during yesterday’s clandestine meeting.

Still holding himself against Elizabeth’s chest, he shifted uncomfortably. He had been told to render the queen ill enough to implicate Brandon and his bride in an attempted poisoning. Yet his own heart quailed at what he was about to do.
Keep thy thoughts on the greater goal,
he admonished himself. The queen’s precarious humors required a learned hand, not that of a charlatan newcomer. Lopez knew he alone could lead her into illness before returning her to health, and this poisonous, yet needful, ploy served only to regain her trust.

Lopez looked into Elizabeth’s bright eyes. Soon, they would be clouded with pain. Soon, her heart would pound at an unnatural pace, fast as a warrior’s battle drumbeat.

“She shalt be able to attend the final hearing, my lord secretary,” Lopez pronounced, “but care must be taken she does not become overstrained.”

“Aye, aye,” Cecil said, nodding.

Lopez studied him with a forced air of calm. “I wouldst also request that I taste Her Majesty’s food. It wouldst not help her black bile if too much salt hath been stirred into the broth.”

Cecil peered down his nose at the queen, as if daring her to complain.

“Have a taste, then, Lopez,” Elizabeth said, glaring back at Cecil.

Moving to the table, Lopez could barely hide his pleasure. To his relief, no one seemed to be paying attention to him now. He placed his hand in his pocket, looked about, and switched bottles.

He jumped when Lady Ashley appeared at his elbow.

Lopez shoved Brandon’s bottle deep into his pocket. Thankfully, the woman’s gaze had been on the simmering kettle, instead of his hands.
¡
O Deus
!
Oh God!
Dr. Dee wast banished for a loathsome horoscope. If found out for what I do this day, I shalt not be treated as mercifully.

He reached out, willing his fingers to remain steady, then made a great show of grasping the spoon and slurping the queen’s broth. “Excellent. ’Twill do no harm to Her Majesty, the queen.”

“Excuse me, Doctor,” Lady Ashley said impatiently as she reached for the blue bottle, “but I must prepare Her Majesty’s tea. Might I have the table?”

Nodding, Lopez backed away and took a deep breath.

The deed was done.

…

Damn them all
, Norfolk fumed, working and tugging on his ring of braided leather.
Get on with it and make the pronouncement!
Despite his nerves and the forgone conclusion they would reach, he needed to appear relaxed to the members of Her Majesty’s Privy Council who sat around him. Smythe was a babbling fool, competent only to run the inquest at Cumnor, not hold sway here. How Norfolk wished he was twisting the man’s spindly neck, instead of a bit of hide.

Spineless and an idiot to boot! Smythe will never carry the evidence gathered to what should be its logical conclusion
. Norfolk’s gaze flicked from face to face, knowing no one would dare take a stand against Dudley, for Dudley and the queen were united as one.

The queen. There she was, dramatically lounging on her infirmary chaise as though her presence in this chamber would no more sway the vote than shooting a boar would cause the moon to fall from the sky.

Norfolk looked at the secretary of state, standing beside the queen’s chaise.
Not even Cecil will have the courage to do what is right, for to accuse Dudley would be to throw the realm into turmoil, even cleanse it of the Jezebel who has made us the butt of jokes told ’round the world.
He scanned the crowded room
. But you see it not, none of you. Ye’re all blind and timid as Smythe
, Norfolk admitted bitterly,
too timid to take such a bold stand.

Pain throbbed suddenly and he glanced down. He’d wrapped the leather so tightly around his fingers the tips had turned violent red. He worked them out of the cord and continued his caustic reverie.
In spite of all of my careful planning, in spite of the excellent execution of those plans and the perfectly reasonable, nay, obvious motives that Dudley himself hath provided, ’tis a certainty they will all choose to turn their quaking hearts from the verdict I long to hear.

Norfolk’s gaze shifted back to Elizabeth. Looking frail and nervous, she had been uncharacteristically quiet since her arrival. Did he dare hope Lopez was successful? He glanced surreptitiously at the Portuguese, who stood in a corner biting his nails.

The crowd grew silent as Smythe opened the paper holding the vote tally dramatically. “The decision of Her Majesty’s Privy Council,” his strong voice rang out, “is that the evidentiary findings of the inquest into the death of Lady Amy Robsart Dudley are as follows. Whilst tragic beyond measure in so many regards, the death of said woman has been concluded to be one of grievous mischance only. Nothing more. May God rest her soul.”

“I knew it!” Norfolk muttered, seething. But no one heard, for everyone had erupted into a clamor of happy congratulations and claps on the back. Above it all, the queen, who had been listless until now, clasped her hands together and raised her voice in a cry of thankfulness.

As the sound left Elizabeth’s lips, the happy cry turned to one of whimpering as she clutched at her heart, attempted to pull at her stays, and give herself room to breathe. But her fingers lost their strength as her skin lost its color.

“Let me alone,” she cried. “I must lie flat, flat—can’t...” Shaking, barely able to support her weight, she struggled to get off her chaise and fell to the floor, her arms flung wide.

Cecil gaped, unable to grasp what was occurring. Courtiers scrambled, swarming around her in panic, terrified by her sudden collapse.

One man dared to touch her chest. “I fear the queen hath no rhythm!” he shouted.

Other voices rose in the background, joining the din, everyone jostling for a view. “Are her lips blue?” “Blue-black?” “Might she have been poisoned?” “Nay, ’tis her heart that fails!” “Call her surgeons—quickly!”

Norfolk looked at the mass of tangled, red-blond hair, all he could see of the queen’s person. Rising from his seat, he swiftly moved to a dark recess nearer the tumult, avidly listening and watching.

While the others squawked and fretted, the Portuguese physician knelt and leaned in to smell Elizabeth’s breath. The courtiers fell silent, awaiting his pronouncement.

“She smells of lavender, but there is something more.” Lopez leaned in again.

Exquisite, Doctor, exquisite
. Norfolk smiled at the man’s show of marvelous concern.

Elizabeth’s hands twitched, grasping weakly at the cloaks and hands of those who crowded around her. “Sweet Christ, I die,” she wept. “Are ye becoming angels with me, that I can see such halos as ye bear?”

“Halos?” Many of the courtiers backed away, terrified and crossing themselves.

“Doctor!” One of the lesser court physicians grabbed Lopez’s arm.

Norfolk tensed. Wasn’t that the new German surgeon? He’d better not foul their plans!

“Might this not be the effect of foxglove?” the too-eager German went on. “’Tis known to give visions of halos to the afflicted.”

“Aye—Dr. Burset is it?” Lopez asked, glancing briefly at Norfolk.

“
Nein
. The name is Burcot, sir. I’ve powdered Wort of St. John in my bags. ’Twill calm her reaction. Shall I?”

“Aye, quickly then,” Lopez said.

“Make way! Make way!” Dr. Burcot ran toward the door, pushing aside any who stood in his path.

“Foxglove,” Lopez loudly proclaimed, shaking his head and frowning to considerable effect. “May the Lord strike down the evil forces at work here.”

Norfolk was startled by Lopez’s naked display of self-righteousness and looked sharply to him. The Portuguese stared after Burcot, the shadow of a smile playing from within his goatee, before he turned to look directly at Cecil.

“My lord Cecil,” Lopez said, “lavender was among the ingredients Dr. Brandon used in his elixir, and it carries a strong odor, an odor which might mask the presence of other less beneficial ingredients. We’d best examine his bottles. I have a dreadful concern young Burcot may be correct. If Brandon put foxglove in the elixir, well...” Lopez paused, letting the insinuation of poisoning sink in, while watching Cecil’s scowl. “Thank God, Dr. Burcot carries a
remedío
close at hand. With it, we might yet save the queen.”

“God’s sufferance and death, man,” Cecil shot back, “I do not care to hear accusations when she is in such dire need of treatment.”

“I assure thee she shalt be quickly improved once Burcot brings the
remedio
. As to Brandon, I merely meant––”

“Enough!” Cecil said. “It doth not escape me, Lopez, that thou mislike Brandon, and I wouldst not have him accused on hatred alone. We must call for all of the queen’s barber-surgeons to make a determination in the matter. Meanwhile, take goodly care of Her Majesty.”

You nearly lost the game, you fool of a Portuguese, but well played withal,
Norfolk thought, happily spinning the twist of hide on the tips of his fingers.

Carefully avoiding Lopez’s gaze, he watched the tumult. As soon as Burcot arrived with his remedy, Lopez ordered the room cleared.

Norfolk slipped out the door, leaving the chaos behind, intent on reaching London before nightfall.