The Poison Bed: 'Gone Girl meets The Miniaturist'

by E C Fremantle

  ‘Don’t you ever feel jealous?’ I asked, desperate for her to tell me she was eaten away by it.

  ‘Should I be?’

  ‘What he wants usually from me is affection and friendship.’ I feared the truth would repulse her, feared most that she would stop loving me.

  ‘Usually?’ She laughed baldly. ‘You look as if you wish the floor would swallow you. I understand my part of the bargain.’ She stroked my head, taking a lock of hair, tugging it sharply. ‘There has long been speculation about the exact nature of your relationship with the King. The depravity.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I felt my hackles rise as if I’d been threatened. She laughed again. In that instant, she became something monstrous. Grabbing her by the hair, I spat, ‘Don’t laugh at me!’ I could sniff the fear on her.

  She spoke softly. ‘Oh, my love, I didn’t mean to suggest … It’s nothing. But people like to imagine things. That’s all. Nobody really believes that it’s less than pure, what you have with him.’

  I let her go, horrified by myself, distraught, apologizing repeatedly.

  ‘It’s all right, Robert. I understand.’ She took my hand and kissed each of its fingers. ‘Nothing you could do or have done could make me love you less.’

  I was aghast that I’d cast her as my enemy, even for a moment. ‘Once there might have been more to tell but there was an incident that changed things.’ I found myself telling her about how Thomas had come upon us at Royston and how it was never the same between the King and me after that. ‘It felt as if something innocent had been sullied.’

  ‘So, Overbury tried to blackmail the King.’ The word ‘blackmail’ rolled off her tongue in the way a thief might talk of diamonds.

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘You didn’t need to.’ We were silent for a moment, and I hoped she wouldn’t press me further for details, but she simply said, ‘Well, he’s gone now, God rest his soul.’ She tried to pull herself out of my arms. ‘You’d better be off.’

  But I held her. ‘What he wants most is for us to have a child. You said it yourself. If I spend all my time with him and none with you –’

  She made a small sound that was half sigh, half moan and pressed her mouth over mine. Her tongue tasted of aniseed. We crumpled to the floor and with the efficiency of a surgeon she unlaced me.

  When she was done, I wanted to linger, to bask a while in the aftermath, hold her in my arms, but she pulled herself back together with brutal swiftness and returned to the paring of her toenails.

  Her

  The early-morning bustle had started in the yard and she could hear the servants padding along the corridor. Frances pulled back the curtains so light flooded over the bed. Robert lay in a tangle of sheets looking as if he hadn’t slept for a month. Dark smudges ringed his eyes. Frances was ebullient. Fortune was smiling on her, or perhaps it was a darker force that had taken her part and swung the wheel to her advantage. She didn’t care which.

  ‘I’ve decided.’ Robert was wrapped up in his own small world, oblivious to her good mood. ‘I’m going to offer the King the money Winwood gave me for his appointment.’

  ‘What – all of it? Whatever for?’ The idea was preposterous. No one gave money to the King. It simply wasn’t how things worked.

  ‘I was put in charge of delivering the Spanish marriage and I’ve failed abysmally.’

  ‘I don’t see why that has anything to do with Winwood’s money.’

  ‘James is desperately short of funds. He was counting on the dowry.’ He paused. ‘I want to make amends.’

  She wanted to shake him – shake the kindness out of him, tell him it made him weak. ‘You should have come to me.’ She was annoyed with herself for not being aware of the situation. Villiers’s rise had been distracting her, but now she had a trump to play.

  He began to whine about his failure, saying how he wished her great-uncle were still alive as he’d have surely had more success. Uncle had been gone almost a year.

  Frances didn’t miss him.

  Robert looked downcast. ‘I thought I could show James my talent for diplomacy in the face of that upstart Villiers.’

  She forced a smile and took his hand. It was clammy. ‘I thoroughly approve of your proposed donation.’ Preposterous as it had initially seemed, the gesture would certainly remind the King that Robert was a ‘giver’ not a ‘taker’. That conversation of a month ago remained at the forefront of her mind.

  ‘There are people who wish me ill. They watch my every move.’ His fingers clenched around hers. ‘I fear someone will try to read something sinister into my Spanish dealings.’

  His weakness repulsed her but she tried to reassure him by saying that the accrual of enemies was a sign of his success and that he’d have plenty of opportunity to impress the King with his loyalty on the coming royal progress.

  He still looked stricken with worry. ‘Someone might try to construe it that I was negotiating for personal reasons – spreading papism. It was all done under such secrecy, you see.’

  ‘I shouldn’t worry about that.’ She hardly recognized him. Familiarity had made his beauty commonplace, muting the desire she’d once felt so fiercely. He began to talk of his enemies, how they might levy a charge of treason against him without the King’s knowledge.

  He wrapped himself around her, too tightly. Nausea ground through her gut. She pulled away, getting up to open the window, taking a few deep breaths of fresh air, watching one of the grooms trying to control a nervous young horse in the paddock. He whispered gently close to its ear and the creature fell instantly into his thrall. She knew she must shore herself up against potential disaster, with or without her husband.

  ‘And if that happened, James would have no choice but to see me tried.’ He was still gnawing at his fingers.

  ‘Ask the King for a general pardon,’ she said. A refreshing draught penetrated the thin fabric of her nightgown. ‘So if there’s any trouble you will have recourse directly to him, no matter what. I’m sure he won’t refuse you that. It’s not unusual.’

  ‘A pardon?’ Robert looked at her in wonder. ‘Of course. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it.’

  ‘It’ll give you peace of mind, at least. Not that you’ve really done much wrong.’ But she was thinking that a person doesn’t need to have done anything wrong to be found guilty. She explained that all he had to do was make the request, the King would order it, and the lord chancellor would ratify it. ‘Et voilà!’ She opened her hands, like a magician who has made a dove disappear.

  ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you.’ She noticed a new cloud pass over his face. ‘But what if he refuses?’

  ‘I shouldn’t worry about that. He’ll be more than willing, I’m sure, when he hears your news.’

  ‘What news?’

  ‘We’re going to have a baby.’

  His face transformed, a little of his old allure restored. ‘When?’

  ‘Not until December. It’s still very early. I wasn’t going to say yet, in case. But you seemed so desolate.’

  ‘A Christmas infant.’ He was looking at her as if she were a miracle. He had waited such a long time for this baby – they all had. She was relieved to see him cheerful once more. No one, least of all the King, wanted to be confronted by his pitiful long face. ‘But are you sick with it, my darling?’

  ‘Not a bit.’ She had been, horribly so, but she had no intention of admitting to the same weakness other women complained of. ‘Go and tell him. What are you waiting for?’

  He wanted her to go with him but she refused. ‘This is your moment.’ She imagined the scene: Villiers being shoved down to make space for Robert to sit beside the King, toasts drunk for the baby. ‘And use your advantage to ask for the pardon.’

  He had only been gone a short while when Anne appeared, looking ashen.

  ‘Franklin’s here,’ she said, under her breath, pointing to the door that led to the antechamber.

  ‘I hope to God he has
n’t been seen. What does he want?’

  ‘Money. He’s still owed money from –’ Anne didn’t say it. She didn’t need to. Her eyes were scudding back and forth.

  ‘How much?’ Frances had barely given Thomas Overbury a thought since he’d been buried almost three years before, and felt annoyed that he should infringe upon her contentment from beyond the grave in such a way.

  ‘He says five hundred.’

  ‘That’s a fortune. Uncle promised him that much? Typical that he should leave me to clear up his mess.’ She looked at Anne to see if she would contradict her, but she didn’t. Frances had been very careful to give her the impression that Uncle had pulled the strings.

  ‘He says it’s owed him.’ Anne was wringing her hands.

  ‘I can’t imagine why he thinks I’d keep that kind of sum lying around here. You’d better show him in.’ She hurriedly threw a gown over her nightclothes. Time was pressing. If Robert returned and found Franklin in her rooms it would be difficult to explain.

  He limped in like a ghoul. Frances had forgotten how grotesque-looking he was. Anne was wavering near the door, clearly perturbed. Frances told her to wait outside and head off any of the servants, then turned to her unwelcome guest. ‘Have you lost your mind, coming here in broad daylight?’

  ‘A debt’s a debt,’ he said bluntly. ‘You owe me –’

  ‘It is not I who owes you, Master Franklin. If you remember, the debt was my great-uncle’s and should have died with him.’ Thinking of Uncle, the terror on his dying face, gave her an unexpected frisson of power. ‘But I intend to honour his debt.’ She looked him right in the eye. ‘Even if it was accrued for wicked purpose.’

  ‘With respect, it was you who ordered the …’ he hesitated ‘… the final batch of – of substances. The dose that did him in.’

  ‘I think you’ll find you are mistaken.’ She smiled. ‘It was a long time ago, wasn’t it? It’s no wonder you’ve forgotten.’ He gripped his hands together and brought the knuckles up to cover the lower part of his face. She could see the seed of doubt germinating in him: it was written in his frown and the confusion in his eyes. ‘I was merely the one who conveyed my great-uncle’s letter to you. Don’t you remember? When you read it you were so agitated you spilled a bottle of ink down your front. You must remember that.’

  He pinched the fabric of his shirt, looking at it, frowning. ‘I do. Yes, I do. Ruined a good shirt.’ He seemed glad to have a hard memory to hang on to. ‘Of course.’

  He had spilled the ink but there had been no letter. ‘Indeed,’ she said. ‘I was nothing but the messenger, never knew of the letter’s contents. Not until Anne told me. Terrible business – that poor, poor man. I don’t know why you let yourself become embroiled in it, procuring poisons. I hope you destroyed that letter. These things always have a way of resurfacing.’

  She rummaged for her purse, handing it to him. ‘This is all I have on me. You’ll have to wait for the rest.’ He inspected the little pouch, knowing from its weight that it came nowhere near to repaying the debt. His hand was shaking slightly and she knew she had him exactly where she wanted.

  ‘Listen.’ She patted his shoulder lightly. He flinched, and it occurred to her that, looking as he did, he must rarely have been touched by anyone. ‘Your secret’s safe with me. No point digging all that up now, is there?’

  Him

  The going was painfully slow in the July heat with the ground unforgiving as granite. We were on the coast road and still a fair way from our destination at Lulworth when my mare lost a shoe. The royal party continued, Villiers up front beside James, leaving me on edge, contemplating the flat expanse of sea, while my groom went to find a blacksmith.

  As Frances had predicted, news of the baby had worked like a magic elixir and I was reinstated in James’s affections. But it was not as it once had been. Villiers nipped at my heels and I suspected James enjoyed watching us vie for his favour. A rumour had been circulating that he might be made master of the horse, a position James knew I coveted. Apparently, people were laying bets on us.

  The court’s divisions were laid bare, each faction seeking a way to score points against the other, as if our lives were a game of chess: my baby was a point in our favour, as was the granting of my general pardon, but the refusal to ratify it was a point scored to them. Villiers and I stood facing each other across the board wearing counterfeit smiles, James the amused invigilator. I found myself wishing Northampton were still alive. He would have had no qualms about dealing with the upstart.

  The luggage carts lumbered past, followed by the stragglers, and I was surprised to see, beyond, Winwood’s carriage hurtling my way. Winwood was meant to be answerable to me and as far as I knew he was more than a hundred miles away at Whitehall. Something was not right. I waved him down.

  As the carriage drew to a halt, I flung the door open, abandoning formalities: ‘Why wasn’t I informed of your visit?’

  ‘There wasn’t time. A matter’s come up that needs urgent attention.’ He seemed furtive, fidgeting with his treasured timepiece and shading his eyes from the sun – but also from me. I supposed he was regretting his infringement of protocol. ‘I thought it best I get immediately on the road.’

  ‘So what is this urgent matter?’ I was wondering why he hadn’t sent a messenger and it occurred to me, sickeningly, that he might have happened on something he shouldn’t have seen.

  Winwood rubbed a finger slowly over his nose. ‘For His Majesty’s ears only.’ He smiled. I’d never seen him smile before. His two front teeth were large and grey, like a pair of gravestones. He didn’t attempt to hide his air of self-satisfaction, continuing to swivel the lid of his timepiece. I longed to snatch it from him and fling it into the sea.

  ‘Just tell me what it’s about and I’ll deal with it.’ I’d meant to sound authoritative rather than exasperated, but unease was weaving through me. ‘The King won’t want to be disturbed with state matters after his journey.’

  ‘With respect’ – he looked quite triumphant – ‘this is a matter for the King alone.’ He patted the seat beside him. ‘Would you care to travel with me?’

  I didn’t relish the idea of spending a couple of hours cooped up with the man and made an excuse about wanting to be sure my horse was properly shod.

  ‘As you wish.’ He rapped the roof of the carriage and they rumbled away.

  I immediately regretted my decision, realizing I shouldn’t have let Winwood and his shady matter out of my sight. As I waited an interminable time for my groom to return, I became increasingly apprehensive, believing that Winwood’s surprise visit in some way involved me.

  The luggage carts were still being unloaded when I finally arrived. Harry Howard was waiting for me in the yard, reminding me, with a jolt of longing, of my wife. Lulworth was their brother’s house and I was glad at least to be on Howard territory where my enemies would be at a disadvantage.

  ‘Where’s the King?’ I said, before he had a chance to greet me, making my way up the steps into the house.

  He tugged me back by my coat. ‘What’s the hurry? Shouldn’t you wash and change first?’

  I looked down at my clothes. I was filthy, covered with a film of dust, my fingernails black. ‘Never mind that. I need to see him.’

  ‘You can’t!’ His face screwed up in sympathy. ‘He’s said he’s not to be disturbed.’

  ‘Where’s Winwood? Where’s Villiers?’

  ‘Not with him. He’s alone.’

  That at least was a small relief. ‘Something’s going on, Harry. Have you heard anything?’

  He shrugged, seeming evasive. ‘Let me show you to your room. You can settle in and see him later.’ He led me up the stairs to the back of the house and a spacious, light-filled room that smelt faintly of sage. My belongings were already there and unpacked but there was no sign of Copinger, my servant.

  The large bed was hung with finely embroidered curtains and strewn with fat pillows. The plasterwork ceiling was beaut
ifully wrought in a pattern of ivy, which spilled on to the wall above the hearth, winding about the Howard arms in relief at its centre. Beneath it were inscribed the words: sola virtus invicta – courage alone is invincible. I could have done with some of the Howard courage rubbing off on me.

  From the window, there was a view over a courtyard where a boy was beating a length of matting, making a rhythmic thwacking sound. Through an arch, I could see the fishponds and, far beyond, a range of hills, purple in the evening light. I wished Frances were with me. The thought of our baby taking shape inside her was soothing and pushed my worries into the background.

  ‘Not what you’re used to, I’m afraid,’ said Harry, dragging me from my thoughts.

  ‘But it’s lovely. King’s rooms through there?’ I asked, pointing to a second door.

  He shook his head and looked to the floor. ‘His Majesty’s at the front of the house.’

  ‘But he always insists I’m adjacent –’ A new wave of disquiet sluiced through me. ‘Villiers? He’s put bloody Villiers next to him, hasn’t he? What in Hell’s name’s going on, Harry?’ I grabbed him roughly by the shoulders. ‘Tell me!’

  He pushed me away. ‘Look, I’m on your side. I don’t know what’s going on but, whatever it is, I’m sure we can handle it.’ He sounded reassuring but couldn’t look at me. ‘I’m sorry. Listen, my brother’s going to make sure you’re beside the King at supper. You can talk to him then.’

  At supper, though, I was seated at a distance. James appeared distracted and Villiers was where I should have been, next to him. I felt the company retract slightly from me, weighing up whether the balance of power had shifted permanently. I barely ate, fuming silently through the courses. Once the tables were cleared Villiers approached, all long legs and winsome smile, offering ingratiating compliments about the fit of my suit and what fine shoes I was wearing. He wore a jewel that the King had offered me not long before. I had refused it, told him he wasn’t to give me expensive presents, given the state of his finances. And there it was, pinned to the breast of my adversary. I wanted to rip it off him, stab him in the eye with the pin.