The Elizabeth Tudor Conspiracy

by Alexandra Walsh

  “Well, I’ve found a record of a gift of linen for ‘the Lady Anne, sister to the king’ — which was Anne of Cleves’s legal status after Henry VIII divorced her — sent by ‘Lady Tudor’ who we know is Catherine ‘for her kyndness in sheltering my daughter, late November last on her northwards journee…’.”

  “What? Let me see!” Perdita sprang from her seat and leaned over Kit, examining the ancient text. “The dates are incorrect for Anne’s supposed baby but a tweaked date here or there is the least of our worries. I also remember that the child who was found was a boy but it’s possible Anne said that in order to hide the true identity,” she said, thinking out loud. “This proves that the little girl, Elizabeth, if the Tudor graffiti in Marquess House is correct, survived but that she was sent away almost immediately. I wonder why? And where was she sent?”

  “Somewhere north,” supplied Kit.

  “Helpful, thanks,” said Perdita. “I wonder why the daughter was sent away and not the son? Surely as a male heir, the longed-for second son, the duke of York, he would have been in more danger. There were already two Tudor princesses — Mary and Elizabeth. This little girl would have been way down the list of succession.” Perdita wandered back to the table and picked up one of the pastries Kit had brought with him earlier. “It doesn’t make much sense yet, does it?” she sighed.

  A few hours later, Piper stuck her head around the door, bringing with her a smell of turpentine.

  “Food, anyone?”

  “Definitely,” said Perdita and they headed for the enormous kitchen where lunch was served every day. Perdita explained their discoveries to Piper and then asked how Piper’s portrait of Megan and Pablo was coming along.

  “I’m really pleased with it; I hope Megan and Pablo will like it.”

  “If it’s anywhere near as good as the sketch you did of them, they’ll love it,” said Kit. “Although, if I’m honest, the sooner this wedding is over the better. Megan is crazy. If I try to talk to her about work, I can’t get a sensible word out of her.”

  “Only another few weeks,” said Piper, patting his arm consolingly. “Poor Megan, she must be tearing her hair out. I was crazy in the weeks running up to my wedding.”

  Kit was tapping away on his phone, scowling. “See you later,” he said, his tone gruff, before wandering away.

  “What was that about?” asked Piper, watching his retreating back.

  “No idea,” said Perdita. “He’s been fine all morning.”

  “Ah, there you both are,” said a cheerful voice. Perdita and Piper had finished eating and were sprawled on the squashy armchairs in front of the enormous roaring fire, discussing what to wear to Megan and Pablo’s upcoming wedding. Dr Deborah Black, the chief librarian at Jerusalem was beaming at them. In her early 60s, Deborah was a slim, energetic woman with deep auburn hair cut in a short pixie cut. “I have the results from the tests on the boxes.”

  Perdita sat bolt upright. “And?”

  Before fleeing Marquess House, Perdita and Kit had found a ruby ring they believed to have once belonged to Catherine Howard. It had been protected for the intervening centuries by a wooden box, inside which was a leather jewellery case. Deborah had offered to run a series of dating tests on the boxes.

  “Both boxes can be dated to the seventeenth century…”

  “Which fits with all the information we’ve discovered about Penelope Fitzalan, who I think might have been the person who hid the ring,” interrupted Perdita in excitement. “After all, she was the one who made us realise the significance of the pieces of jewellery. She claimed in one of her letters she would die to protect the secret of the ring.”

  “Yes, it does, but there’s more. This is the report which you’ll want to read in its entirety later,” said Deborah, handing them both a bound copy. “In summary, though, the most interesting piece is the outer wooden box. The X-ray showed it had once been painted. There’s a picture of it in the appendixes.” She paused while Perdita and Piper flicked through until they found the relevant page. “In the top left-hand corner of the box’s lid were written the words Luncta Sanguine, Luncta is at the top and underneath it is a red star, the letter ‘A’ and what we think may have been a green dot but it’s very faded so we can’t be certain of the original colour, with the word Sanguine at the bottom of this arrangement. On the right-hand side the pattern repeats but with a few differences: the top word is Semper, while the word at the bottom is Sorores, Sisters Always. The red star is there again, but the letter ‘A’ is changed to a ‘C’ and there is what looks like a faded blue dot underneath it.”

  “Those phrases are on the frontispiece of The Catherine Howard Codex,” said Perdita, “and the words Luncta Sanguine were engraved on the inside of the ruby ring we found…”

  “Exactly,” said Deborah. “There’s more though. If you look closely at the image, you’ll see there is a curved line beside each of these patterns. I do wonder if they were jewelled or made from some form of gold leaf because they’re very faint but they seem to have points at the ends as though they are directional arrows.”

  “Oh yes,” said Piper, tracing her finger over first one line, then the other on the image, “one points to the left, the other the right.”

  “What’s this at the bottom?” Perdita asked. “Oh my goodness, it says Spe et Nereidum — Hope and Mermaids — that’s what was written on Catherine Howard’s gravestone.”

  “Look at what else is there,” added Deborah. “A curved line and in the dome of that is the letter P with a white star underneath. There’s also a tiny mermaid engraved under the words Spe et Nereidum.”

  Perdita considered the image for a moment, then flicked over the page where there was a picture of the leather jewellery box that had been interred within the wooden box. The interior of this had been padded with what had once been white velvet, which had long since crumbled and discoloured, and had three specific areas within it — two slots for holding the rings and an indentation that would have held an oval locket.

  “The markings in the lid correspond with the positions of the pieces of jewellery as they would have been stored in the leather case,” said Perdita. “The ring we found was in the left-hand corner and it had Luncta Sanguine engraved inside. I think I’ve realised something.” Perdita looked up and scanned the cavernous interior of the room. Kit was sitting at the large round wooden table in one corner deep in conversation with Megan’s fiancé, Pablo. “Kit!” she called. “Do you have a minute?”

  “What’s up?” he asked, hurrying over.

  Perdita explained what Deborah’s team had discovered. “This pattern corresponds with the position in the box where we found our ruby ring,” she said. “What if the red star represents the ruby, the green dot represents the emerald on the clip…”

  “And the letter ‘A’?” asked Kit.

  “Anne,” said Perdita.

  “You mean, Anne of Cleves, who had the rings made for her and Catherine so they could pass messages to each other?” clarified Piper.

  “Yes. We’ve found Anne’s ring, not Catherine’s.”

  “But, Perdita, if that’s the case,” said Deborah, “why would Lady Anne’s ring be at Marquess House?”

  “I don’t know but this does corroborate something that was written in the story of the Llyn Cel mermaid. The noble woman in the story, who don’t forget was named Catherine, gave her children tokens so they would be able to recognise each other. What if the story is referring to these pieces of jewellery: she gave one child her ruby ring and the other her locket? So, her ring wouldn’t be at Marquess House, it would be with whichever child it was given to at the time.”

  “It’s possible,” agreed Kit.

  “It’ll also gives us something to look out for in the account books,” Perdita continued. “We know Catherine’s daughter was sent away on a journey after her birth but there are records for a wet-nurse for the little boy, so he must have stayed at Marquess House. You never know, we might get lucky and find a
reference to the item of jewellery that was left behind for him, then we’ll know definitively which child was given which piece.”

  “If we’re suggesting the ‘A’ inscribed in the lid refers to Anne, then it follows the ‘C’ will probably indicate Catherine, so who is ‘P’?” Deborah asked.

  “I would guess it’s probably Penelope Fitzalan,” said Perdita. “It was Penelope who wrote a series of letters referring to a secret hidden within Marquess House that she would be prepared to die rather than reveal. Catherine was the inspiration for the Llyn Cel mermaid, which is a story included in the anthology of legends written by Penelope, so somehow Penelope must have been given a ruby ring.”

  “Do you think she knew it was Anne’s and not Catherine’s?” asked Piper.

  “She must have done, if she was the one who hid the ring in these two boxes with all this symbolism attached.”

  “But who was Penelope Fitzalan and how is she connected to everything?” asked Kit.

  Perdita gave him a rueful smile. “I have no idea but she does seem to have a link to the story.”

  “The letters you mentioned, Perdita — when were they dated from?” asked Deborah.

  “Mid-seventeenth century,” she replied, “which is too late for her to be Catherine’s daughter but she might be a granddaughter or even a great-granddaughter. I would guess she was a descendant but until we do some more research, we won’t know.”

  Chapter Three

  Perdita hurried down the stairs, her computer bag bumping on her hip as she headed towards the suite of offices in the west wing. She and Piper were meeting Alistair to discuss all aspects of their inheritance and what it meant to their lives, including an update on the situation with Randolph Connors. Alistair had promised to tell them everything, assuring her there would be no more secrets but as she headed towards his office, she realised she was experiencing some trepidation. The last time she had felt anything similar was when she and Kit had sat beside Llyn Cel while he told the truth about her mother’s death.

  Piper, who had been struck by inspiration for the wedding portrait, had promised she would be 20 minutes behind her sister and not to wait.

  “Good morning, my dear,” said Alistair as Perdita entered. “I hope you’ll indulge us for a few moments. Kit bid for this document shortly after you moved into Marquess House. It arrived yesterday. Would you care to see?”

  “Yes, please,” she said, hurrying over to join them at the table.

  The document was held down with soft padded weights and Kit was examining the extravagant swirling letters across the top of the page.

  “Morning Perds,” he grinned.

  “It was a document allegedly showing ownership of the islands of New Zealand going back to the 1500s, therefore, predating Captain Cook who didn’t discover them until April 1769, wasn’t it?” she said, putting her bags on the floor before pulling a band from off her wrist and twisting her hair into a ponytail. “You were sure it was a fake. What do you think now you’ve seen it?”

  “There are loads of tests to be done but I’m pretty certain this is an eighteenth-century forgery,” he said. “The parchment is wrong and, look at that…”

  She laughed. “In January 1558, the English monarch was Mary I, not Elizabeth as this claims! Elizabeth ascended the throne on 17 November 1558. And is that a Roman number four? Both of them were simply Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth — there would have been no regnal number. Mary only became Mary I when the Stuarts put William and Mary on the throne as joint monarchs and Elizabeth only needed a regnal number, when Elizabeth II became queen in 1952.”

  Kit picked up a magnifying glass and examined the mark.

  “It does look like a Roman numeral,” he agreed. “How many monarchs have reached four in the regnal number?”

  “There were six,” Perdita replied.

  “Really?” said Alistair.

  “Yes, the English kings Henry IV and Edward IV, then George IV in 1820 but he was king of Great Britain, rather than only England.”

  “What’s the difference?” asked Kit.

  “In 1707, the last Stuart monarch, Queen Anne united the country under the Act of Union,” explained Perdita. “It was when the Scottish and English parliaments agreed to form one political union, making her the first monarch of Great Britain. George IV was on the throne for ten years, then he was followed by William IV who died 1837. Apart from that there was a Malcolm IV in Scotland and the final one was James IV. He married Margaret Tudor, the sister of Henry VIII and mother of both James V of Scotland and with Archibald Douglas, her second husband, Lady Margaret Douglas, later the countess of Lennox.”

  “You’re like our own walking search engine,” said Kit, grinning, when Perdita finished.

  “Always happy to be of service,” she laughed. “What happens to the document next?”

  “I’ll hand it over to Dr Black and her team. We can do a lot of tests in the labs here but if need be, we’ll send it back to The Dairy at Marquess House to ascertain authenticity.”

  The smile faltered on Perdita’s face. “You’re right,” she said, moving away from the table. “We can’t take any supposed fakes at face value anymore.”

  There was a knock on the door and Dr Deborah Black arrived.

  “Morning,” she said.

  “Good morning, Deborah,” said Alistair.

  “Is this it?” she asked, appraising the document with her expert eye.

  “Yes,” replied Kit. “What are your first impressions?”

  Deborah was silent as she examined the ancient parchment, then taking off her glasses, she tapped them against her teeth before speaking.

  “The parchment is suspect. It feels too thick to be Tudor. It’ll be interesting to see what the carbon dating gives us but I can guarantee it won’t be sixteenth century.”

  “Thank you, Deborah,” said Alistair. “Is there any news on Callum?”

  “Much better — he’s flying back with Stuart in time for the wedding. I’ll be relieved when he’s home though.”

  “It’s good news to hear he’s recovering at last.”

  “Who’s Callum?” asked Perdita.

  “My youngest son,” explained Deborah. “He’s been working in the US but caught glandular fever, then pneumonia. We’ve been very worried about him. He’s much improved, although he’s still battling bouts of intense fatigue.”

  “What about his job?” asked Kit.

  “He was on a short contract and it ended a week before his illness — they’ve tendered it out to someone else now.”

  “We have a vacancy,” said Alistair. “Only when he’s well enough, though. We could use his IT expertise with all our upgrades and increased levels of security.”

  “Oh, Alistair, thank you,” smiled Deborah. “I’m sure he’ll be delighted; he’s been saying for a while he misses it here. Now, Kit, will you help me with this, please?”

  Between them, they rolled the parchment, stowing it in a protective tube. Tucking it under her arm, Deborah bustled off with a cheery goodbye.

  Voices in the corridor announced Piper’s arrival as she chatted to Deborah.

  “Hi all, sorry I’m late,” she called, hurrying in, her wild red hair tamed in a long plait and her glasses, rather than her usual contact lenses, perched on her nose. “The portrait is ready to be framed.”

  “You’re not late,” said Alistair, heading for the round table in the corner of the room.

  “Are you staying, Kit?” asked Perdita, following Alistair.

  “If you have no objections.”

  Before Alistair could speak, Perdita took command of the meeting.

  “Alistair — Piper and I would like to begin with an apology to you, Jerusalem and the Mackensie family,” she stated. “With all that’s been going on, we’ve neglected our obligations concerning the running of Marquess House. We’ve realised that apart from living in the property, we’ve made no offer to you and your team to help to run the estate in the way our grandmothe
r did. From now on, we want to be as involved with Marquess House and its running as Granny Mary was when it was her home.”

  “Perdita, there is no need for either of you to apologise,” said Alistair. “You’ve had rather a lot to deal with in the past few months. If it helps, when Mary inherited the house on her 21st birthday, my father, Kenneth Mackensie, fulfilled my role and he told me it was at least a year before Mary began to involve herself in the minutiae of Marquess House.”

  “What was she doing in the meantime?” asked Piper.

  “Enjoying herself,” replied Alistair. “She had inherited a huge house, full of history, which always was her raison d’être, as well as vast wealth at a time when rationing was ending and there was lots available to buy. I believe she spent quite some time in Paris and was a fan of the Christian Dior ‘New Look’. I think some of her outfits are currently on loan to the Victoria and Albert museum.”

  “Something else we didn’t know…” said Perdita and even to her own ears her voice sounded petulant.

  “Enough, Perdita,” said Alistair, his tone clipped. “You and Piper have been in possession of your inheritance for barely four months — you cannot possibly be expected to know everything that is going on or has taken place there. It took Mary years to be as conversant with the property and land as she became and, remember, as Kit is learning from me, I learned from my father how to administer your estate and it’s taken most of my adult life. While I appreciate your need to understand what is going on, you’re putting unrealistic expectations on yourselves. At the moment, your research skills and your expertise in the history of jewellery are far more precious and important than knowing what your grandmother spent her money on in the 1950s.”

  Kit was watching her with a guarded expression. Alistair, meanwhile was staring at her, awaiting her response.