Pour The Dark Wine

by Deryn Lake

  It might have been guessed, or so his steward thought, that the Duke would not make for Court, from whence he had fled so fast when the King turned against the Howards. Nor was it likely that he was bound for his son Henry, Earl of Surrey, who was uneasily keeping in the King’s favour because of his old association with Henry Tudor’s bastard son, the much lamented Duke of Richmond who had died when he was seventeen. Very much as the man suspected, Norfolk headed in the direction of Greenwich, and the one child he could rely on to counsel him well. Dr Zachary was obviously to have a surprise visitor.

  As he made his way through the ripening countryside, it occurred to Thomas Howard that it had been many years since he had seen his grandchildren, and in the case of the boy Sylvanus, never. Now he looked forward to the reunion, but there was to be disappointed. For the house was deserted, empty of servants even, the only living thing Zachary’s vast and malevolent cat, glaring at him from its one remaining eye. Constant banging finally summoned a small kitchen wench who bobbed uncomfortably and said her master had gone to read for a fine lady.

  ‘Read?’ repeated Norfolk, irritably.

  ‘The stars, Sir.’

  ‘Oh!’ He nodded, enlightened. ‘And where are the young people, pray? And your Mistress?’

  ‘They have accompanied him, Sir. But all will be back before nightfall.’

  ‘Then I shall enter and wait for them,’ said the Duke determinedly and took his place before the fire without further ado, sending his two servants into the kitchen to keep the girl company which, if the sound of distant giggling and song were anything to go by, they did well.

  Left alone, Norfolk looked round for something with which to amuse himself and found, at random, a leather-bound book lying on its side, half hidden amongst some others. He flicked the pages idly and then was suddenly riveted. In small neat but unfamiliar handwriting were inscribed the words, ‘To cure the Pestilence. Take a handful of sage, yarrow, tansy and feverfew, and bruise them well together. Then let the sick party make water in the herbs …’

  Thomas Howard’s eyebrows rose. ‘For Emrods or Piles’ he read on, ‘Stew the powder of fine-beaten amber upon hot coals and let the sufferer sit down over it, so that the smoke may ascend up into the place aggrieved.’

  Thomas mopped his brow. As this could not be identified as Zachary’s handwriting it would seem likely that this might be the work of that other Romany who was now a member of his family.

  ‘So,’ said Norfolk to himself, ‘my new daughter-in-law is as skilled as her husband.’

  He flipped over several pages. ‘To take away a man’s memory or even to kill him, let him drink a surfeit of Black Poppy juice, also called Opium.’ So she really was a powerful creature, this girl of his son’s. Well, thought Thomas Howard wryly, they burned his mother; let it be hoped his bride will survive her knowledge.

  The Duke closed his eyes, putting the book to one side. When he opened them again it was to see a dark-haired, pretty creature observing him from the doorway. Instantly he recognised her from the days of Jane Seymour’s brief reign.

  ‘So you are Zachary’s wife?’ he said, rising to his feet and looking at the diminutive creature along the length of his nose. ‘I remember you very well. I simply had not associated the name.’

  Cloverella gave a deep curtsey. ‘Lord Duke, it is nice to meet you again and to be able to offer you hospitality as your dutiful daughter. Stay and eat with us, I beg you.’

  ‘I may remain longer than that. I am not officially in London you understand.’

  Cloverella smiled. ‘Then stay as long as you wish, Sir.’

  The Duke inclined his head gratefully, glad of shelter, for the fortunes of the Howards were now at their lowest ebb. Those in the Tower had been found guilty of treason, in that they had concealed Catherine’s unchastity, and had been sentenced to perpetual imprisonment and the forfeiting of all their worldly goods. Only the Duke and his son Surrey still teetered on the knife’s edge of disaster, hanging on by the merest thread.

  ‘Thank you, my dear,’ answered Norfolk formally and would have kissed the hand of his new daughter-in-law if the door had not opened to reveal Zachary’s sons, Jasper and Sylvanus, staring at him wide-eyed, their contrasting looks, raven and rose, never more marked than at this moment of surprise. Behind them followed their father, holding the hand of a spectacular girl. Norfolk gaped at the transformation in Sapphira. When he had last seen her she had been a pretty child but now, on the threshold of her teens, she was beautiful.

  ‘Well, well, well,’ said the Duke, shaking his head. ‘Can this lovely young woman really be my Sapphira?’

  But as she rushed to him and put her arms round his neck, kissing his cheeks again and again, she was all little girl. With that cue, Jasper followed suit. Only Sylvanus, sturdily correct, made formal bows, though his face was the colour of poppies with the excitement of everything.

  All that evening the three of them played with their Howard grandfather, and when the darkness came the children sat with him by the fire, roasting chestnuts and telling him of their adventures in France. In a strange way, even though she could not speak, it was as if Sapphira communicated without words. Sylvanus, once over his shyness, said enough for two, while Jasper would listen carefully and then put in a shrewd or witty observation that had the Duke wiping his eyes with both laughter and joy.

  After they had gone and Cloverella with them, supervising the bedtime as she always did, the Duke turned to his much loved son.

  ‘You have done splendidly. Those children are a credit to you. The years of learning in France obviously did them no harm at all, in fact great good.’

  Zachary smiled. ‘I hope so, for I love them dearly. And is not Cloverella a wonderful stepmother for them?’

  ‘She is perfect in every way. You come from the same people and deep has called to deep. She is the wife that you both deserve and need.’

  He meant it sincerely and Zachary felt it hardly necessary to say, ‘And the fact that she is Seymour?’

  ‘She is Wentworth,’ answered the Duke stoutly. ‘And that’s that.’ He took a draught of wine, then said, ‘My son, would you consider letting your children come to Kenninghall for a while? In our present troubles we have a whole army of young people within our walls. They are learning so much from Surrey’s old tutor and enjoying themselves at the same time.’

  ‘And hopefully better supervised than in the Dowager Duchess’s day?’

  It was a wicked remark and the Duke winced, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. In the end he did neither. ‘My wife is a boring woman, it’s true,’ he said honestly. ‘But she is very honourable. She cares for her kinsmen’s children as if they were her own. Under her auspices they are learning to conduct themselves well.’

  ‘Lord Duke, my father,’ answered Zachary seriously, ‘I have not been a conventional parent as you know, so I will ask the children their wishes. If they would like to go, they shall. I will not stand in their way. It might be a great opportunity for them to learn courtly manners.’

  ‘And what of Cloverella?’

  ‘She shall be consulted too.’

  The Duke leant forward confidentially, muttering, ‘She is not in earshot, is she?’

  Zachary looked about him. ‘No, why?’

  ‘Because I need help, my son, and would not have her know. I have written to His Grace but with no reply. Something must be done to strengthen my position if I am to return to Court.’

  The astrologer stared at him blankly. ‘But what can I do? I have no influence. How can I possibly help you?’

  The Duke lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘Magic,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Magic. It was done once before when you were in the Tower. Sapphira got you out.’

  ‘Sapphira is kept away from all that now. It cost her too dear when she was struck speechless.’

  ‘But you could do it, surely?’

  Zachary stood up, pacing the floor. ‘But Lord Duke, I
rarely practice my arts. I am old and respectable.’

  ‘How boring for you,’ answered his father, and they both laughed, very alike at that moment.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ asked Zachary, thrusting a poker into a tankard to mull the wine in it.

  ‘Persuade His Grace that he still trusts and needs me.’

  ‘Hmm.’ His son looked thoughtful.

  ‘Can it be done?’

  ‘Of course it can be done. The question is how. If the spell is to work I must have something personal of the King’s.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Hair clippings, nail clippings. Some recently worn clothing.’

  ‘A bribe to the laundresses perhaps?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Zachary grew brisk. ‘Anyway that you can leave to me.’

  ‘So you will do it?’

  Zachary both nodded his head and shook it. ‘Lord Duke my father, you have persuaded me. Yet what a naughty thing it is that a reformed character like myself should be led astray by his own sire.’

  ‘But who else?’ exclaimed the Duke, before once again the two of them burst into uproarious laughter.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The terrible winter during which Catherine Howard had gone to her death was one that none of her courtiers would ever forget. Those who had not been caught up in the scandal, those so innocent that they had not even heard a whisper of an adulterous affair until the matter was made public, found it hard to recover from the haste with which they had been summoned by the Lord Chancellor and given instant dismissal.

  It had almost been a relief to Katherine Latymer. Old men had been her lot since puberty and she had never realised until the moment Thomas Seymour kissed her that within her mild and rather devout nature lurked a prurient streak. Katherine, the devoted young wife and eternal stepmother, had only known then that she was wild.

  She had come home to her old bullfrog, thankful to avoid temptation, only to realise with shock that he was ill, like a dimming candle, the light of his life beginning to fade. A welter of love seized Katherine, for after all had she not accepted John Latymer because she had been bored and lonely, though he had later become her dear friend, her companion, her sweet old partner. So what did it matter if the vigour in him had long since departed?

  Yet still when he had retired early to bed and she had sat alone before the fire, dropping her detested needlework on to the floor and staring instead at the flames, she had thought of Thomas Seymour. In each spark from the logs she had seen his face, in each burning ember Katherine had relived their kiss. Then, when she had finally gone upstairs and silently crept into bed beside her stertorously breathing husband, she had dreamed of Thomas till morning.

  In a way, the winter in which the Queen had died had claimed John Latymer, and probably thousands if the truth were known. Just before Katherine came home, her husband had developed a severe chest condition and never quite recovered from it. And she had known when she had first seen him that her friend of many years, the man with whom she had grown up, was now preparing himself for death.

  Lord Latymer was a staunch Catholic, quite unshaken by the new wave of religious thinking, to which Katherine in the greatest secrecy leaned, and now his faith comforted him enormously throughout his long illness.

  ‘I go to God, child,’ he had said during the recent January, ‘but you, who are still in your twenties, must go to man. It is my wish that you marry again and this time to someone of your age. You should have a child, Kate. Remember that.’

  And she did now, staring out of the window of their fine mansion, standing only a few miles from London. For it was in the capital that her husband had finally and rather suddenly died. In some respects Katherine was glad, for his body rested in St Paul’s where many more people could pay their respects to him than if he had been buried in Well Churchyard in Yorkshire, as he had originally requested.

  The funeral had not been as bleak as his widow had feared, for, on the one occasion they had talked about it, her wise old bullfrog had bidden her give the mourners good refreshment so that they might remember John, Lord Latymer, with stout hearts. And this she had done, so much so that some had left the wake quite merry, while even Katherine had taken too much wine, though on her it had had the reverse effect. Instead of her spirits rising they had sunk. Now she felt lonely and depressed, wondering what move to make next.

  A tap on the door revealed Katherine’s stepdaughter Mary, a great deal older than she and today a most comforting presence to have around the house.

  ‘My dear Kate,’ said Mary cheerfully, advancing into the room, ‘how are you feeling?’

  ‘Tired suddenly. Would it be thought amiss if I go to bed?’

  ‘Not at all. I shall take you there myself.’

  Katherine put her arms round the comfortable waist of her matronly relative. ‘Oh, Mary, I shall miss him so much.’

  ‘Of course. But do not miss him longer than you need.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘My father told me often that he wanted you to have your own child, having been such an excellent stepmother. Do as he wishes, make your life rich. In that way you will give him the greatest respect of all.’

  ‘Do you really believe that?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mary firmly, kissing Katherine on the brow. ‘Now come along. You are looking pale. I’ve a mind to take you back with me and make you bloom again.’

  Her stepmother wept with sheer relief. ‘Would you do that? Would you Mary dearest?’

  ‘Yes, on one condition.’

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘That you come back to this house when you are recovered. I do not want to think of you wasting away in Yorkshire.’

  ‘Then I promise I will.’

  ‘In that case, put yourself in my hands.’

  ‘Gladly,’ said Katherine with a sigh. ‘Very gladly indeed.’

  *

  It had been agreed by all concerned that the best time for Zachary’s children to leave home for their stay in Kenninghall Castle was when the Duke of Norfolk was restored to favour. And this had eventually come about. The spell, as Zachary later admitted, though somewhat reluctantly, had been more difficult than he thought. Nonetheless, by a combination of Thomas Howard’s constant apologies for his family, the Earl of Surrey’s swaggering bravado and pretence that nothing was wrong, and Zachary’s locking himself away for a whole two days, chanting over one of the King’s cast-off gloves, a reconciliation was made. Henry Tudor received the Duke courteously but Norfolk was not deceived. From now on the Howard family must prove themselves with every step they took, though as a gesture of his magnanimity, the King released all the prisoners from the Tower, even the old and grumpy Dowager Duchess.

  With their respective parents returned to their greatly depleted homes, it was felt that most of the children who had been delivered hurriedly into the Duke’s care would have a better life if they remained in his custody, it being the normal custom of the time to send young people to board with a family of higher social standing than one’s own. So Norfolk’s youthful establishment remained intact and in the spring of 1543 Zachary Howard’s offspring set off to join it.

  The boys were now ten and nine respectively, though only six months separated them, while Sapphira had entered her teens. Yet though they were still young, Zachary and Cloverella took them only as far as the border with Suffolk. The Duchess of Norfolk was not overfond of her husband’s bastard and the children’s origins were being kept deliberately vague. So at the county boundary the young people were handed over to the Duke’s steward and his escort, the astrologer riding alongside as far as he dared, then turning back to where his wife waited for him.

  ‘It will be good for them,’ she said.

  ‘I know, I know. And yet I am uneasy.’

  He looked so worried that Cloverella felt quite concerned. ‘Why?’

  Zachary shook his head, the rough curls flying out. ‘Just a strange feeling. But I am probably being over-p
rotective, particularly of Sapphira.’

  But as he turned for home, not the happiest man in the kingdom, his offspring were trotting quite cheerfully into the courtyard of Kenninghall Castle, where their grandfather, the Duke, stood waiting to greet them.

  ‘Jasper, Sylvanus,’ he shouted and hurried forward as the boys jumped from their horses. ‘Come at once to meet the Duchess of Norfolk, my wife, who will be your mother for the next two years.’

  They had been taught how to bow respectfully and now they did their very best, so much so that Elizabeth Howard, a faded grey woman whose looks hid a steely nature and strong principles, was delighted with them, particularly Jasper who resembled the Duke and who took her hand and kissed it, French style.

  But it was to Sapphira, being lifted down from horseback by a servant, that her gaze was drawn in fascination. The Duchess had never seen such a perfect little thing, such a living embodiment of spring, with hair like fine gold crocuses and eyes a deep mysterious iris-blue. Moreover the girl-had a touching dignity, for though she was still a child she held her head well, like a woman, yet was shy.

  ‘How enchanting!’ said the Duchess involuntarily.

  ‘That is the dumb child I told you of,’ whispered her husband. ‘What a tragedy, especially for one so flawless. But can she hear?’

  ‘Oh yes, perfectly. The complaint was caused by an — accident.’

  ‘Then perhaps she can be cured.’

  ‘It would be a wondrous thing if so.’

  But his wife was no longer listening, running forward to take both Sapphira’s hands in hers.

  ‘My dear,’ she said, ‘tell me your name.’

  At once the poor woman realised what she had done but none of the children seemed concerned. The rosy boy stepped forward promptly and answered, ‘This is my half-sister Sapphira, Madam. She cannot speak but she can read and write and will put down any answers you wish. She also uses sign language which I can teach you if you so require.’