The Poison Bed

by Elizabeth Fremantle

  ‘You’ve heard about Lady Essex.’

  I turned, with an abrupt intake of breath, to Thomas, shocked, fearing he had read my thoughts.

  ‘What about her?’ I tilted slightly away from him so my hair obscured my eyes.

  ‘She’s carrying on with the prince.’

  ‘I doubt it. Surely he has better taste.’ I was deliberately putting him off the scent. If Thomas got wind of my developing obsession with Frances Howard he’d be appalled. Guilt slithered through my gut. Thomas knew me better than anyone. There had been a time when we’d shared everything, but now I had secrets that were seeping into our friendship – polluting it.

  The prince had circled round and reached the pier. We watched him climb up the ladder and vault on to the boards, shaking the water from his hair like a dog.

  ‘It makes sense,’ said Thomas. ‘If he’s to take a mistress then it’ll have to be someone’s wife and I hear there’s trouble in the Essex marriage. Hardly surprising. The young earl’s misery personified and she looks like a fistful of trouble to me.’

  His words sent a pang of jealousy through me as I imagined her already Prince Henry’s mistress, and suddenly she was in my head again, whispering about love and death: I only say what I see. If she would be anyone’s mistress she would be mine.

  He didn’t let up. ‘None of the Howards can be trusted but she’s thick as thieves with that great-uncle of hers. He’s the worst of them.’

  ‘The King likes him,’ I said, with a noncommittal shrug. Thomas didn’t need to know of my new-fledged friendship with Northampton. He’d have been horrified to know I was considering his offer of the hand of one of the Howard girls – even in the face of my desire for Frances. I could see my life veering in a new direction and Thomas becoming a thorn in my flesh. The thought pulled me up, made me feel uncharacteristically hard-hearted.

  ‘Believe me, Robin, there’s nothing good about that man.’ He stopped to look around, seeming to make sure there was no one in earshot, and came in close. ‘You and I, we could do something about him – set him up.’

  ‘What in Hell’s name are you getting at?’ There was a spark in his grey eyes that I’d never seen before.

  He slid his gaze to meet mine. ‘Come on, Robin, don’t play dumb.’

  I turned, without responding, walking towards the long grass in the direction of the palace gardens. He followed, catching up, slinging an arm over my shoulders and picking a burr off my sleeve. ‘I get the impression that the King would like to see the Howards and the Essex crowd fight it to the death. Do you suppose it’s a strategy of divide and rule?’

  ‘He never talks of it as such.’ It was often hard to interpret the King’s intentions but he had mentioned recently that the Howards might see off the Essex faction. It was not something I was going to divulge to Thomas.

  ‘Doesn’t like sharing his power. He’s showing himself to be a weak leader. Needs more integrity. Needs to learn to curb his extravagance, or people will turn on him.’

  ‘Think you could do better?’

  ‘You know perfectly well what I think.’ He squeezed my arm. ‘And with you so well placed ...’

  ‘Stop!’ I pointed towards a labourer digging nearby, thankful for an excuse not to continue the conversation. I knew Thomas could read me too easily.

  We had reached the barns to the back of the stables and took the path that ran behind them. It smelt dank and loamy and was shaded by a row of chestnut trees. The only sounds were the soft tread of our footfall and the occasional call of a bird. We walked in silence, the air thick with what wasn’t being said.

  ‘What’s that?’ He put up a hand to halt me, listening, and I heard it too, a crack, like the snap of a branch, followed by a moan of pain. We followed the source of the sound to a small yard scattered with new-cut logs. A man, big and barrel-chested, clutching a whip in his raised fist, didn’t see us. Wedged in a corner on the ground in front of him was a grubby shirtless boy. He couldn’t have been older than about twelve, still carrying the yielding plumpness of childhood. His back was slashed to ribbons. He was begging for mercy.

  Thomas and I exchanged a look, and as he snatched the whip from the man’s hand, I grabbed him, pulling his arms behind his back and pinning them there. He struggled, kicking out and hurling abuse, shouting that the ‘wretch deserved it’.

  ‘That’s punishment enough. You might have killed him.’ Thomas helped the boy to his feet and sent him to the safety of the stables.

  The man spat on the ground, calling after him, ‘Next time, I’ll have your guts.’

  Possessed by a sudden rage, I smashed the brute hard in the face, feeling my knuckles crunch into the gristle of his nose. He staggered and fell. I pulled him up by his collar, swinging my fist again, but Thomas got between us, pushing me away. ‘What are you doing? Don’t meet anger with anger.’ The man slunk away, and Thomas dragged me by the sleeve back out on to the path. ‘What’s the matter with you?’

  ‘I can’t bear to see that.’

  ‘Nor me – but there’s a proper way of dealing with things.’

  I was annoyed with him because he was right. My breath was heavy. But I was annoyed with myself too. It had been a long time since I’d boiled over like that and I was struggling to control my rage.

  I calmed as we made our way through the gardens towards Thomas’s lodgings. And thankfully so, because unbeknown to us we were being watched. We became aware of it only as we passed close by the palace walls and saw the Queen with one of her women framed in a window just above.

  ‘There goes Rochester’ – she said it as if she patently didn’t believe I merited my new title – ‘and his puppet master.’ She spoke to her companion but her words, articulated as if from a stage balcony, were clearly designed to reach our ears.

  My fist throbbed, reminding me to keep cool. Managing to make my tone light and jocular, I countered, ‘Do you mean to imply I have no mind of my own, madam?’

  ‘Mindless–yes, that describes you rather well.’ She seemed pleased with her insult.

  Thomas blurted, ‘The pot calls the kettle black,’ with a burst of spiteful laughter. There had been nothing light about his tone. I knew he disliked the Queen, thought her shallow and despised her Catholicism, but I was shocked that he dared be so openly rude to her. Perhaps he was still charged by our rescue of the boy. Something had got into him as he continued laughing loudly, seeming not to see her bitter expression.

  I should have said something to mollify her, insist he apologize at the very least but, without thinking, I took his arm and led him firmly away.

  ‘You can talk – telling me there’s a proper way of dealing with things,’ I said, once we were out of earshot. ‘She’ll take it as a great insult. We’ll be in trouble for it.’

  He was suddenly serious. ‘But I won’t have her belittle you in that way.’

  I reminded him that she had a right to feel aggrieved towards me, given our situation, but he wouldn’t have it. ‘She doesn’t dislike you because of the King. She was perfectly accepting of your predecessor. It’s your low birth that offends her and I won’t have it.’ That was Thomas all over, standing up to small injustices. ‘Oh dear.’ His expression changed to one of worry, as if he’d just grasped the consequences of his outburst. ‘We will be in trouble, won’t we?’

  ‘I’ll talk to James. He’ll make sure nothing comes of it.’

  ‘You’ll be fine, Robin. But the King’s affection doesn’t stretch to me.’

  ‘I’ll make sure of it.’ I tried to bolster him as he began to list all the promises I had made him recently that I hadn’t kept.

  ‘She’s right. I am your puppet master. You can barely sneeze without asking me whether you should or not.’

  He knew how to get under my skin and my temper escalated once more. ‘You, the King, you both seem to think I’m not a person in my own right.’

  ‘You’d never have been noticed by anyone, never mind the King, if it hadn’t been for
my guidance.’

  ‘Not this again, Tom.’ I was bristling and it was taking all my will-power not to give him the slap he deserved. ‘At least I genuinely care for James.’ I knew by his taut expression that my comment had hit its mark and regretted it instantly.

  ‘Just like you’ – his eyes were clamped on to me – ‘always trying to take the moral high ground, but you forget how well I know you. You want to be seen as a good person because you believe the opposite of yourself.’ He walked away, calling over his shoulder, ‘So go to him if you care for him so much.’

  Still smarting I made my way to James’s rooms, where I found him seated at his desk amid a stack of paperwork.

  ‘Ah, Robbie! Come to cheer me up?’ He looked tired, his eyes baggy and bloodshot. I could hear the prince and his party still out on the pier below, larking about.

  ‘What’s all this?’ I pointed at the contents of the desk. ‘Shouldn’t your secretary of state be dealing with it?’ I perched on the corner, facing him, and he brought a hand to rest on my thigh. My mind flashed an image of a female hand there in its place, a spot of blood where its nail had been torn off. I felt myself begin to harden and forced my mind away from the gush of thoughts that followed the image.

  ‘Salisbury’s still unwell, so it falls to me.’ The weariness in his voice was evident.

  ‘Give it to someone else until he’s better.’ I knew Thomas would have jumped at the chance to fill the role. I heard a loud splash, then laughter, and assumed someone had been thrown into the river.

  ‘These matters are delicate. I can’t trust anyone to be discreet. Everyone in this place serves themselves. At least Salisbury serves me first.’

  ‘I serve you first.’

  ‘I know that.’ He took my hand and planted a wet kiss on it. ‘You take offence so easily. You know how I rely on you. If I had my way I’d have you with me day and night – every night.’ He went on, damning the duty rota that dictated the nights each of his gentlemen slept in his chamber. ‘Can’t we do away with it and leave them all to their wives?’

  ‘You know it’s impossible. Imagine the gossip. It would harm you, and I couldn’t bear that.’ It was true. I couldn’t have borne the idea of bringing harm to his door, when he’d been nothing but good to me. But it was convenient too, as I feared he might notice the diminishing of my desire for him. I might be thought insincere, given the secret fetish I’d begun to harbour for Frances, but the love I felt for the King was of a particular kind and is difficult to explain.

  ‘If I am thought of as your favourite it is one thing but quite another if we are thought of as –’

  ‘I know, I know.’ He stood with a sigh. ‘Come here.’ His arms opened and I was drawn into his embrace. I only say what I see, she whispered.

  ‘Perhaps if I were to find a suitable wife it would help.’ My voice was muffled in the folds of his shirt. He was stroking my hair. I knew he would happily have seen me married, in the ordinary way, to a girl I didn’t care for.

  ‘It’s an idea,’ he said, but suddenly the thought of marrying Frances’s sister – Howard or not – was abhorrent.

  ‘Let’s not think of it just yet,’ I said, and felt his arms squeeze about me.

  ‘I hear you’ve upset the Queen.’

  I pulled back to meet his eye, puzzled as to how he already knew this.

  ‘News travels quickly in this place.’

  I began to explain what had happened.

  ‘She’s insisting on Thomas Overbury’s dismissal.’ He studied my expression.

  All those secrets I was keeping from Thomas were weighing me down and it occurred to me that, with him out of the way, I might find a little freedom to woo Frances on the sly. I don’t know where I truly thought it could go at that stage. But all who succumb to desire can understand that there is no logic to the way in which its force can drag you back and forth between joy and misery, and how believing the impossible possible is the very thing that sustains its victims.

  ‘You must give your wife what she wants,’ I said, suppressing the twinge of shame that caught me.

  He looked puzzled. ‘I expected you to defend your friend – you usually do.’

  ‘All I want is what’s best for you.’ I tucked my hand around his neck and pulled him towards me. ‘If it makes your life easier, then my sacrifice is a small one.’

  ‘You always were kind, Robbie.’ The King pressed the palm of his hand to my heart, holding it there. ‘Kindness is a rare commodity. It sets you apart from all the others.’

  My prevailing thought was that I wasn’t being kind to Thomas.

  ‘I’ll send Overbury away, then.’ He paused, as if waiting for me to protest, but I remained silent.

  It hadn’t occurred to Thomas that he might no longer be pulling my strings.

  Her

  Frances wakes in a sweat. The storm is still blowing hard and the broken catch knocks repeatedly against the windowsill. A shadowy figure looms. In her half-sleep, she thinks it is Death come to claim her, rendering her paralysed in the sodden sheets. Something, a rope, a serpent, is twisted about her throat. She struggles for breath. Fingers brush her cheek.

  ‘You’re having a nightmare. Wake up. It’s me, Nelly. Let me light a candle.’

  She comes back haloed in a yellow glow. ‘Your hair’s come unpinned. Might’ve strangled yourself.’ She unwinds the long plait from around Frances’s neck. Frances would never admit it but she is profoundly thankful for the girl’s presence, though neither can she bear that she has come to depend on her. Sometimes she thinks Nelly is all that stands between her and a pit of madness. As if the waif of a girl is a pin fixing her to a still point in a world spinning out of control.

  ‘You were talking in your sleep.’

  Frances feels disturbed, wondering what she might have revealed. ‘What did I say?’

  ‘All sorts.’ Nelly opens a pot of lavender salve and begins to rub it into Frances’s temples. ‘A right chatterbox, you are.’ The scent fills the room with summer, but summer feels hopelessly distant to Frances. Perhaps it will never come: she will be tried before then.

  ‘What did I say?’ Frances repeats, her reedy tone betraying her.

  ‘You were mostly on about Essex.’

  Frances is trying to remember her dream and is sure he didn’t appear in it. If Nelly wants to find out more about her time with him then she will be disappointed.

  ‘There’s not much to say about him.’ She feels her composure return. ‘Uncle had other plans for me.’

  We were invited to St James’s soon after our return to the capital but Essex, still steeped in melancholia, refused to join me. I knew the place well and, as I passed through the bustling panelled corridors, I felt the old grip of anticipation that I had missed in my year at Chartley. At court, you never knew who might appear or what might occur.

  The hall was a large bright space with smooth chequered flagstones, looking out over a cobbled courtyard where a fountain danced prettily. Familiar faces were gathered into groups, a rowdy corner of dice-players, a colourful gaggle of women and a number of men around the prince, helping him into his fencing armour.

  He looked up as I entered and I spotted the delight plastered over his features. Before my departure, the prince and I had become close. It was a friendship that was entirely innocent, a youthful infatuation on the prince’s part, but had provoked a good deal of gossip, for which the court had an insatiable appetite.

  I joined the women, one or two of whom I knew quite well. I felt their appraisal, seeking outward clues as to the state of my marriage – a marriage that hadn’t produced a child would always be a source of speculation – and responded vaguely to their interrogations about my condition.

  ‘You never know what lies ahead,’ I said.

  ‘But I thought you could tell the future.’ A young girl I’d never seen before said this. I wondered how she knew, remembering the impossibility of keeping secrets at court.

  ‘I’m no expert
,’ I told her. ‘It’s just something my childhood nurse taught me.’ But glad for an excuse to deflect the attention away from my own situation I said I’d read her palm. She tentatively offered me her hand. It was fragile and trembled slightly.

  ‘I wouldn’t do that in public,’ said a po-faced woman, who was known for her sanctimony.

  ‘She’s hardly making spells,’ laughed someone in my defence.

  ‘It’s only a bit of harmless fun,’ added another, and the woman moved away, with a roll of the eyes, while the rest gathered in a tight circle to listen.

  The girl looked at me, credulous, asking, ‘Will I be wed soon?’

  It was then I became aware of Robert Carr standing in the doorway, surveying the room. He had changed in the time I’d been away, seemed instilled with a new confidence. He’d always been beautiful, with his chiselled pout and pale eyes, intense beneath the sullen, knitted brow, which gave him his beguiling anguished air. But there was something different, a kind of feral physicality that threatened to burst out from his clothes, and his gaze had taken on a cryptic edge that, when it alighted on me, made me wonder what sort of thoughts were brewing in him.

  I sensed a ripple run through my companions when they, too, noticed Carr, as if they were sending out invisible shoots to wrap about him and draw him in. He wasn’t interested in the women, though, and strode eventually to the group around the prince. I noticed a tense exchange take place between him and Henry so, once finished with the girl’s palm, I moved towards them, eager to know what it was about.

  A sudden loud clatter caused the room to turn. A page had dropped half a dozen fencing foils on to the stone floor and was on his knees recovering them. Southampton kicked one out of his reach. A few bursts of laughter came from the onlookers. The boy crawled to fetch it. ‘Good dog,’ said Southampton, kicking the foil away again. The laughter escalated and the boy looked mortified.

  ‘Leave him be.’ It was Carr who spoke, crouching to pick up the stray weapon, handing it to the boy with a few words of encouragement. The support in the room shifted and I felt my curiosity swell.