The Dark Lady's Mask

by Mary Sharratt

  “Why, then, if you don’t find it too lowering, I would offer it as a domicile for you and your family. You say Alfonse still struggles with debt and ill health.”

  “Sweet Margaret, how can I thank you?” Moved to tears, Aemilia took her friend’s hand. “Maybe one day you will visit me there.”

  “God willing.”

  Margaret’s hand enclosing hers was the only warmth on that November day.

  BENEATH THE GREAT OAK tree, Anne awaited them. From the look of her red swollen eyes, the girl had been crying. When Margaret went to console her daughter, Aemilia turned to gaze out over the hills and fallow fields, the villages and valleys, the Thames mirroring the dull sky. A blast of wind swept right through her, as though she were a skeleton with no flesh to clothe her knocking bones, no heart beating inside her rib cage. But when Anne came to hug her, she held the girl and wept over her as if she were her own lost Odilia.

  “I shall never forget our lessons,” Anne told her. “Every time I sing a French chanson or an Italian madrigal, I shall think of my Mistress Aemilia.”

  “Godspeed, my brilliant girl.” Her breath turning to mist in the cold air obscured her view of Anne’s young face. “You shall become a great lady. As magnificent as your mother.”

  Aemilia and Anne turned to Margaret and caught her in the act of embracing the towering oak.

  “Mother is kissing the tree,” Anne whispered in wonder, as though her mother had become a pagan before her eyes.

  WHEN MARGARET AND HER daughter set off downhill, Aemilia remained behind. Opening her arms as wide as they would go, she pressed her body against the riveled rind of the tree trunk, allowing the rough bark to imprint its pattern on her cheek. Her lips sought out the precise spot Margaret had chosen. Closing her eyes, she stole her friend’s kiss from the tree. Why should a mere senseless oak possess so rare a favor?

  Only then did she turn and head down the path where mother and daughter had stopped to wait for her. Anne took her hand before they continued on their way, three women cast out of Eden. Their idyll couldn’t last. But Aemilia made a silent vow that her poetry for Margaret would endure.

  This last farewell to Cookham here I give,

  When I am dead thy name in this may live,

  Wherein I have perform’d her noble hest,

  Whose virtues lodge in my unworthy breast,

  And ever shall, so long as life remains,

  Tying my heart to her by those rich chains.

  VII

  A Woman’s Writing of Divinest Things

  32

  OU MUST TELL ME all about Anne’s wedding!” Aemilia could scarcely contain her excitement as she filled Margaret’s goblet with claret and offered her another portion of Winifred’s lamb pie with rosemary and wild garlic.

  How her heart gloried to see her friend again for the first time in five years. They supped in the dining chamber of the modest house in Clerkenwell Green where Margaret had invited Aemilia and Alfonse to live rent free. Though Aemilia’s pride smarted under living off her friend’s largess, Margaret insisted it was only fitting to offer patronage to a gifted poet.

  Without Margaret’s help, she and Alfonse might have descended into squalor. Despite Harry’s promise, the patent on the weighing of hay and straw had not yet come through and they remained deep in debt. At least Alfonse still drew his yearly forty-eight pounds from the King’s Musicke even though he no longer played the flute, for his fingers had grown too swollen and stiff from the disease that devoured him from within like slow poison. Yet it hadn’t dampened his yearning to advance himself by seeking out the company of high-ranking gentlemen who might champion him as Margaret had championed her. Aemilia sensed it was her husband’s dearest wish to die a man of noble esteem rather than a debtor and a failure.

  This very evening, Alfonse was out dining with Thomas Jones, the visiting Archbishop of Dublin, with whom he had served in Ireland. This left Aemilia free to direct her full attention on Margaret, who had come down from Westmoreland for her daughter’s recent wedding at the Knole estate in Kent. Margaret was staying the night with Aemilia, the first station on her long journey back north.

  Aemilia couldn’t be happier for her former pupil, who had written a letter to her full of infatuated praise of her bridegroom, Richard Sackville, Earl of Dorset. Knole was by all accounts one of the grandest houses in the realm and boasted its own deer park. She pictured nineteen-year-old Anne riding out in the hunt, as fleet as the goddess Diana.

  “To Anne, Countess of Dorset!” Aemilia lifted her goblet.

  Margaret raised her glass but not her spirits from the look of it. At first, Aemilia assumed her friend was merely weary from the long ride, but now she saw that something distressed her.

  “I only hope I made the right match for her,” Margaret said. “Pray God Dorset proves a man of honor.”

  “Have you any cause to doubt his honor?” Aemilia asked, as gently as she could.

  “Once I counted myself blessed,” her friend said brokenly, “that God saw fit to grant me the power of prophecy. Yet, when I needed the gift most, it failed me.”

  This was the closest thing to sacrilege Aemilia had ever heard her friend utter. She drank in Margaret’s anguish. Having suffered such a harrowing marriage, it must have been Margaret’s worst fear that her daughter might endure the same fate. And Margaret must return to Westmoreland, as far away from Knole and her daughter as she could be without leaving England. Anne had married in late February. Only now, in May, had Margaret wrenched herself away to return to her northern residence.

  “I fear Dorset will use every sugared word to persuade Anne to stop fighting for her inheritance and accept the monetary settlement,” Margaret said. “So that he might spend it as he pleases.”

  Aemilia reached across the table to take her hand. “As if any daughter of yours would abandon the battle for justice.”

  With those words, a genuine happiness seemed to bloom in Margaret’s face. “How good it is to see you again. If only you knew how much I’ve missed you.”

  Aemilia basked in the warmth of their friendship. “I wish you could stay longer.”

  But she knew without being told that every day Margaret remained away jeopardized her claim on Brougham Castle, which she had chosen as her residence rather than the dower house assigned to her. Brougham Castle, near Penrith, was one of the most ancient seats of the Clifford dynasty. By living there, she was claiming it for her daughter. The castle had fallen into disrepair, but Margaret was working to restore it.

  “I wish you could ride north with me,” Margaret said. “The journey seems endless. If my health takes a turn for the worse, I fear I might never see the south of England again.”

  Never see Anne or me again. Aemilia tried to push away her sense of forboding.

  “Pray, don’t speak so,” she said. “You’ve all your alchemical remedies. You’re a stalwart soul.”

  But Margaret was forty-nine and there was no telling how long the fight for Anne’s inheritance would drag on. Aemilia saw how it wore her friend down.

  “Let us speak of happier things,” said Margaret. “The poem you wrote in honor of Anne’s wedding was a loving tribute. I’m sure she’ll treasure it always.”

  “It was my pleasure, truly.”

  What a luxury it was to write poetry. These days Aemilia spent her days teaching music, Italian, and French to the daughters of the gentry and aspiring middling classes that thronged in Clerkenwell.

  “Will you never publish your poems?” Margaret asked her.

  Aemilia flushed at the very notion. “Marry, they’re too private.” Though once she had longed more than anything to see her writing in print, now she thought it would be like opening up her innermost soul to public mockery. “I’d much rather you and Anne treasure your copies.”

  She had transcribed her poetry into two small quarto volumes, one for Margaret and one for Anne, with each poem penned in her finest italic handwriting. Poets, after all, published t
o seek patronage, but she already had her beloved patron and Muse. It seemed churlish to ask for more.

  “What nobler audience could I possibly seek?” she asked Margaret.

  “Your inspiration is a gift of divine grace to be shared with the world. Surely other ladies would rejoice in your verses. In ‘Eve’s Apology’ you defend all womankind.”

  Margaret’s praise enveloped Aemilia in a soft, sheltering cloak.

  THEY SAT UP LATE and sipped from a flask of Margaret’s aqua vitae. As the liquor warmed her within and without, Aemilia could nearly believe they had been transported back to Cookham. She listened to her friend describe the harsh, wild beauty of Westmoreland, so pristine and sparsely populated, a land of wind-scoured fells and icy lakes. Aemilia told her about Henry, sixteen years old and well on his way to becoming a royal musician. Then she read from the verses she had written in honor of Anne’s marriage.

  That sweet Lady sprung from Clifford’s race,

  Of noble Bedford’s blood, fair stem of Grace;

  To honorable Dorset now espoused,

  In whose fair breast true virtue then was housed.

  She recited her poetry as if it had the power to bless Anne’s marriage and keep her eternally happy.

  After Margaret had retired to the guest bed, Aemilia waited up for Alfonse, who finally stumbled through the door full of wine and good cheer. Shushing him so he wouldn’t awaken their guest, she steered him to bed.

  WHILE ALFONSE SLEPT ON, Aemilia shared an early breakfast with Margaret before walking her to the livery stables where Margaret’s groom awaited with the horses.

  Flinging her arms around her friend, Aemilia could not keep herself from weeping. Margaret wept as well, even as she brushed Aemilia’s tears away.

  “In your lap desk you’ll find a small gift,” her friend told her. “Your husband needn’t know about it.”

  “Margaret,” Aemilia murmured, understanding that it was money she had left. “You mustn’t. I shall return it to you this instant. Wait here.”

  “Nonsense,” Margaret said. “Every woman must have something that is hers that can’t be taken away. For all I know, I’ll not have another chance to offer such a gift.”

  Aemilia held her so tightly, she could feel their hearts beating as one. What her friend was saying was that they might not see each other again. This could truly be their last farewell.

  “This is what I told Anne when I left Knole: I am always with you in spirit, even when we are far apart. Remember, my dear, through every trial, the spirit remains free.”

  With that, they kissed and Aemilia reluctantly let her go. She helped Margaret into the saddle of her dark bay mare and walked at the mare’s shoulder until they reached the edge of Clerkenwell where the northern road stretched off into the green hills with their hedges of flowering hawthorn and gorse. As she stood waving, Aemilia thought of dear Bathsheba, who had died two winters ago. If only I had a horse, I would ride after you, my friend. Ride all the way to Brougham Castle and no one would be able to stop me.

  AEMILIA RETURNED HOME TO find the pouch heavy with coins that Margaret had hidden inside her lap desk. Her friend’s generosity and her own neediness left her floundering in both humility and gratitude. Along with the improbable sum of money, Margaret had enclosed a note.

  Remember, my friend, to publish is to immortalize.

  COMING HOME AFTER GIVING a virginals lesson to the neighbor’s daughter, Aemilia brightened to hear Ben’s booming voice in her parlor. She found him sitting with Alfonse. Both men appeared grave, and her cousin’s face was red and shining in sweat, as though he had galloped from London. What could the matter be? She hoped there wasn’t another plague outbreak. Six years ago Ben had lost a son to the pestilence.

  When she rushed forward to greet her cousin, Alfonse threw her such a look of betrayal that she hadn’t seen from him since the fraught early months of their marriage. Stung, she watched her husband rear away and leave the room without a word.

  “He would have found out eventually,” Ben told her. “Better he hear it from me than a stranger.”

  “Hear what?” she asked.

  Without another word, Ben handed her a quarto volume.

  Shake-speares

  Sonnets

  Never before Imprinted

  She shook her head, still not comprehending. “What has this to do with me? Why is Alfonse so vexed?”

  “It has everything to do with you. Read for yourself.” Ben opened to a page and placed the book in her hands.

  My mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun,

  Coral is far more red than her lips’ red,

  If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun,

  If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

  As the shock of recognition ripped through her, Aemilia nearly dropped the volume. Her legs trembled so hard, she had to sit down.

  “So he published a sonnet about me?” She seethed. This certainly explained Alfonse’s reaction. Did Will fear he would lose money if a new plague outbreak closed the theaters? Maybe publishing these verses was his way of insuring his continued wealth.

  “Not just one, alas. Read on, dear cousin. Ipsa scientia potestas est. To be fair to Will, they were published without his permission by one Thomas Thorpe, and this book might give our erstwhile poet as much grief as it does you. Imagine if his wife should lay her hands on a copy!”

  “His wife can’t read,” Aemilia said thinly, as she pored over each sonnet of lust and guilt, of disgust and blame, of bitterness and rejection, those barbed verses ripping into her flesh.

  And beauty slandered with a bastard shame.

  She blinked and turned the page.

  When my love swears that she is made of truth,

  I do believe her, though I know she lies.

  “This is defamation,” she said, gazing at Ben through the red mist of her rage. She turned the page again and found no respite.

  The better angel is a man right fair,

  The worser spirit a woman colored ill

  To win me soon to hell, my female evil.

  He compares me with Harry! She wanted to hurl the book across the room and yet she could not tear her eyes away from the page.

  For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright,

  Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.

  And here he unmasked her as an adulteress.

  In loving thee thou know’st I am forsworn,

  But thou art twice forsworn, to me love swearing,

  In act thy bed-vow broke, and new faith torn,

  In vowing new hate after new love bearing.

  But only when she paged backward did she find the poem that cut deepest of all, the very sonnet he had written for her during their time in Bassano, before they had become lovers. His poetry of impassioned longing, gazing at her while she played the virginals for Jacopo.

  How oft, when thou, my music, music play’st

  Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds

  With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway’st.

  Unable to read another word, she attempted to give the volume back to Ben.

  “Keep it,” he said. “In faith, you have earned it.”

  “This is my ruin.” Her tears scalded her.

  Unlike the plays, this attack on her was not veiled, but direct and personal. Will had painted a hideous but unmistakable caricature of her, Aemilia Bassano Lanier, a dark woman with musical accomplishments, a woman of bastard birth, unfaithful to her husband, who had tempted Will into adultery. A woman who had aroused the poet’s desire, driving him into a sickened frenzy. Anyone reading might guess her identity. Will’s sonnets had stripped her bare for all the world. How could she live this down? Alfonse and Henry would never forgive her for heaping such shame upon them.

  Abruptly, she charged out of the room.

  “Where are you going?” Ben asked, his voice rising in alarm.

  “To Brougham Castle in Westmoreland.”
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  She wondered if she still had her breeches. She’d ride forth as Emilio, gallop on until she caught up with Margaret, and never look back. But when she tried to open the bedchamber door, she discovered that Alfonse had bolted it from within.

  “Come, don’t be so hasty.” Ben took her hand and led her back into the parlor, where he poured her a glass of Margaret’s aqua vitae. “A woman of your years can’t just run away.”

  “A woman of my years?”

  Hadn’t she once said something similar to Will many summers ago at Southampton House? A man of your years has no business leaping out of windows. Unable to contain herself, she tore open the book of sonnets again and read the love poems at the beginning of the book that were filled with the most idealized love and admiration, written not for her but for a golden-haired youth.

  Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

  Thou art more lovely and more temperate.

  “Thy eternal summer shall not fade,” she read aloud. “I shall give this book to the Earl of Southampton.”

  Harry, here you have your proof that he truly loved you and never forgot you.

  Knocking back Margaret’s aqua vitae, she remembered her friend’s secret message to her. To publish is to immortalize. Slowly an idea formed, taking shape with each breath. Her patron and friend would not want her to run away like an outcast. No, Margaret would urge her to stand her ground, defend her own honor. And Margaret had given her enough money to print her own quarto volume.