Mistress of Mourning

by Karen Harper

  Christopher had been most annoyed that I’d hired a new groom, a frivolous female expense, he’d said, since I owned but four horses. I had told him that I had the money to hire and support Jamie, which was quite true, although it was coin from Her Majesty’s purse. I told him that no one could keep death from the doorstep, so the continual sale of waxen shrouds and funeral and mass candles would pay for Jamie.

  Though we made and sold more funeral candles than festive ones, everyone wanted Christmas candles to light their yule logs being dragged onto their hearths, so the chandlery was doing well enough. Our own hearth in our upstairs solar smelled not only of wood smoke but also of ivy, bay, rosemary, and laurel. Garlands of holly were strung along mantels and banisters as our own huge yule log crackled merrily each night. But how I wished I could rid my brain of one chorus from the yule log carol we oft sang. It seemed to haunt me, to warn me of something dire yet coming:

  Part must be kept wherewith to light

  The Christmas log next year;

  And where ’tis safely kept,

  The fiend can do no evil here.

  Was that fiend who murdered Firenze still out there beyond my well-lit shop and home? Or even standing here in this small crowd? Her Majesty, who had resided for a time now at Windsor Castle, must believe so, or she would not have sent Jamie. Did she look over her shoulder as I did now, or gaze out of her windows and yet seethe with fury that someone had murdered her royal brothers? How I wished the king had not sent Nick with Prince Arthur and Princess Catherine to distant, wild Wales. Why did they need so many guards there? I’d counted nigh on sixty when my son and I had waved farewell to Nick as he left with the prince’s entourage.

  I sighed as the mystery play ended with bewigged men as angels blowing trumpets and everyone cheering the performance. Was Nick in Wales yet? I had scarcely been out of London and, like my father, longed to see more of the world. However, I did not long to see Christopher heading for me, his magi’s crown in hand, an avid look on his face.

  “Let’s away up to your solar,” he said with a smile, and took my arm to steer me toward my house. “We can have it to ourselves before everyone else comes up. I have a gift for you.”

  One, I thought, that was ruby red and would almost match the garnet necklace I so cherished. “Christopher, I regret I have not given you a definite answer before, but you really would not listen,” I began as he hustled me through the shop and up the holly-garlanded stairs to traverse the hall that led to the solar.

  It was here that I had walked lately at night when the house was silent, my pacing well lit by candles, anxious for Nick’s safety and my own, trying to decide when to tell Christopher I could not wed him. By the saints, I was a bit of a coward, for he had said more than once that his vouching for me had kept me from being more stringently questioned by the constable about my relationship to Roberto Firenze—“When I know for certain that nothing untoward passed between you!” he had said, emphasizing each word.

  “With all that has gone on in my life lately, I must tell you that I am not ready to wed,” I told him now. “Not you, not anyone.”

  “Then we will set a day a month or so hence, so you can get used to it.”

  “You have been generous and kind, but I can put off my refusal no longer. It isn’t fair to you.”

  “By hell’s gates, it isn’t, woman!” he said, though I had seldom heard him curse. His hand on me tightened so hard that I flinched. He hurried me along even faster. “Do you not know which side your bread is buttered on?” he demanded. “The benefits of our union and the guild for you? Was there something between you and that volatile Italian, you two artists always chatting about paint and colors? And in my own house, when I left you alone?”

  “Of course not. Let me go. You are hurting m—”

  “I’ll not let you go! You’ve been hurting me. Everyone knows you’ve been putting me off, and it doesn’t help my reputation! Or was there someone at the palace you favored while carving your pretty candles?”

  “The palace is in my past,” I insisted, shaking his hand off and turning to face him in the doorway of our solar, where the yule log snapped and crackled. Susan, our maid, who had been tending the fire, fled the room through the back servants’ door before I could call her back.

  “But your service to the queen doesn’t have to be in your past—our past,” he insisted, seizing both my elbows, pulling me toward him into the room, nearly lifting me off my feet. “Surely the queen will want more carved candles—the Spanish princess too. United, with the correct connections, we could have the premier chandlery of all England, catering to the Tudors, and our own children to follow in our footsteps. A Tudor dynasty—a Gage dynasty. Gil and Maud know what’s best, and I’ll win Arthur over.”

  “Christopher, you aren’t listening. I am wedding no one now, perhaps ever.”

  “You do realize I can ruin you in more ways than one, Varina,” he said, his voice a menacing whisper, his face furrowed in a frown. That voice—so like the man in the crypt. “Gil needs to be accepted in the guild; you need pardon for selling carved angel candles without permission—and if the authorities caught wind that you had a personal relationship with that dead Italian—”

  “The crowner didn’t rule for murder, but he should have!”

  “That’s my point—an inquiry can always be reopened. I said if they were to learn that you had a personal relationship with the Italian, they might just do so, and you just might be the one under suspicion.”

  “There was no personal relationship between us, but an interesting acquaintance!”

  “Ah, I can see it now,” he went on, his voice taunting, “a lovers’ quarrel that day in such a holy place. You slapped him or mayhap pushed him away; he fell and broke his neck; you dragged him out where other bodies lay in the dark, interred forever.”

  I was aghast at his tirade, his implications. And at how such an accusation might force me to expose my duties for the queen. Would she help me or abandon me if I were arrested and sent to trial?

  As frightened as I was, I was even more furious. “Leave my house!” I told him. “That is a pack of lies, and I will appeal it beyond the city authorities if I must.”

  He locked the door to the hall. He put his magi crown down on a table and slapped his gloves there too—black gloves. “Swear to me you will wed me, or I swear to you I will do all I said,” he whispered.

  Undecided whether to stand my ground to defy him or flee, I crossed my arms. “If so,” I countered, “I will claim that you were the tall man in the crypt with the black gloves and the lantern. I will say you wrongly believed that the Maestro and I were having the relationship you claim, and your overweening pride was hurt. You had set it up that Firenze and I would be in the chapel alone together. You came back early from the beekeepers in Kent, not only for the secret rites but to kill both of us, only I fled from you. Take your lies to the constable, and I will swear you were that man.”

  He had stared at me all through that, his mouth agape. I warrant he had locked the door because he meant to make love to me, whether I was willing or not. He had certainly not expected a mere woman to turn his threats against him. And the fact that he had obviously thought all this out—could he be the killer? I needed protection indeed not by Christopher Gage, rather from him.

  He leaped at me, and I ran. He yanked me back into his harsh embrace and ripped off my cape, nearly choking me as he tore the ties. I tried to scream, but he clamped a hand over my mouth, twisting my head back against his shoulder. Why didn’t the others come in? Perhaps Arthur and Jamie were having another snowball fight in the street. I needed Gil or Jamie or someone.… I feared he meant to break my neck—perhaps as he had Firenze’s.

  I bit Christopher’s hand hard; he yelped and let go. I started to scream, but as if my panic had summoned him, Jamie leaped into the room through the servants’ entry by which the maid had gone. He pulled Christopher off me and slammed his gloved fist into his face. Christop
her’s head snapped back. Blood spurted from his mouth as he slid to the floor, holding his jaw in his hand.

  “Damn you, bastard, you broke a tooth! I’ll have your head, you bootlicking cur!”

  “This bootlicking cur,” I cried, “is not only in my employ, but was once a guard from the palace!” I looked down at my former friend—my husband’s former friend, at least. Regretful that I had given that away, I yet knew it was the only way to keep this man from causing me and Jamie—my family—more trouble. I put my hand on Jamie’s sleeve to stay further violence.

  “You—you still have ties to the palace?” Christopher asked me, spitting blood and a tooth into his hand. “I knew it! And you’re keeping it secret from the guild.”

  “I am not in the guild; nor is a weak woman likely to be, and you’ve been keeping Gil out, haven’t you? I repeat, leave my house now and admit this chandlery through Gilbert Penne into the Worshipful Guild of Wax Chandlers, even if he never becomes a member of your Holy Order of the Name of Jesus, our dear Lord who said to turn the other cheek and forgive seventy times seventy.”

  “You’ll not preach Scripture to me, woman,” Christopher mumbled, still bleeding. “Or hide behind the queen’s skirts just because you carved a few pretty candles for her to give the Spanish princess.”

  “Nor shall I ever wear your bloodred ring. Just call me Eve, then, off on her own, gazing at the tree of the knowledge of good and evil—and I see a snake in the grass here before me.”

  Whether those words finally shocked him to silence or Jamie’s hulking menace convinced him to leave, Christopher Gage rose shakily to his feet and stalked from the room through the servants’ door. Jamie followed him down the steps to be certain he did no more mischief.

  I felt both elated and rueful. I should not have invoked the power of the palace. The queen had given me permission to tell those closest to me that I had, at least, carved candles for her. But Christopher was no longer close to me—he had made himself my enemy. Perhaps that would force him to stay away, not to tamper with my life or with Gil’s. And surely I had not spoken the truth when I’d accused him of being the man in the crypt.

  Trembling, I went over to the hearth and braced myself against the mantel, stiff-armed, with both hands, staring down into the red-gold flames. As they slowly devoured the large log, I wished so bright a light could chase away the cold and the dark from my heart.

  PART II

  “And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and the bride shall be heard no more.…”

  —REVELATIONS 18:23

  “In my true and careful heart there is

  So much woe, and so little bliss

  That woe is me that ever I was born;

  For all that thing which I desire I miss,

  And all that ever I would not, I have.”

  —“A COMPLAINT TO HIS LADY,”

  GEOFFREY CHAUCER

  CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH

  Queen Elizabeth of York

  “Enter!” I called out at the flurry of knocks on my privy chamber door at Richmond Palace, where we had resided since leaving Windsor after Christmas.

  I knew something was wrong when Sibil Wynn rushed in rather than walking circumspectly. I glimpsed her flushed face before she nearly collapsed in a curtsy.

  “Word from the king,” she said in a trembling voice. “He wishes your presence forthwith. A courier has come from Wales.”

  It was April the fourth, just after dark. Dared I hope Arthur’s bride was with child? “What news?” I demanded, striding for the door.

  “I know not, only that the king sent for you in haste and—”

  With Sibil and several other ladies scurrying behind me, I walked as fast as I could, covering the eternal length of corridors between us. What would it have been like, I thought erratically, to be a commoner, to live in a small place, to make one’s own meals and clean one’s house, to always share the same board and bed? Why, it took a retinue of attendants to pad the mattress, check for concealed weapons, perfume the sheets and blankets, and draw the curtains of the royal bed.

  Fear stabbed me as others sank into bows or curtsies as I passed. Faces blurred by. Could someone who was cleaning Westminster have stumbled on my secret chamber with the wax effigies and sent word to the king? Perhaps he had news for me of who had harmed my brothers in the Tower? No, no, he was secretive about all that. Besides, I’d heard he had allowed James Tyrell to return to France, so surely he had questioned him and cleared his name. The courier from Wales—it must be something concerning our dear Arthur and Catherine.

  My heart sank when I saw my husband, slumped, silent. Worse, his confessor, Father Martin, was with him, gaunt and grim faced. “My lord, what has happened?” I demanded.

  Henry leaned against the back of a chair, gripping it with both hands. He opened his mouth to speak but could not. Breathing in and out, in and out, he had not yet looked at me.

  In a soothing voice, Father Martin said, “As I have told His Majesty, if we receive good things at the hands of God, why may we not endure evil things? Your Majesty,” he said to me, “your dear son Arthur has departed to God.”

  At first I was so stunned I could not catch his meaning. I gaped at him, even as the king shuffled toward me—suddenly looking old, so old—and pulled my cold hands into his trembling ones.

  “Arthur…” he choked out. “Took ill—died. A chill, ague—I know not, but more details will come forthwith.”

  My knees gave way, but Henry held me up. My dear son, firstborn and heir—another lost child—the hope of England’s future, the next Tudor king…dead? Had he said dead?

  Dry gasps racked me. I swayed on my feet; we swayed together.

  “C-Cather-ine,” Henry stuttered. “She t-took ill too, but is better. But so sudden—our Arthur…”

  I held him, tried to comfort him as I heard Father Martin leave the room and close the door. “My dear lord, we must see that he is cared for—a fine burial,” I choked out.

  “Not clear back here. At the abbey in Worcester. I swear it shall become a cathedral, a shrine! Now only willful Henry, a mere boy, stands between us and oblivion for the Tudor throne, for our daughters can never secure the kingdom. Fighting—battles—chaos again.”

  I know not where I found strength to so much as speak. “Do not say so. We are yet young, my lord. We have lost children but have hale and hearty ones. But there will never be another Arthur, so beloved, so—”

  I needed to sit down. I felt ill, faint. I tried to get to the chair but instead fell into Henry’s arms. He lowered me to the floor and sat beside me, both of us wailing and weeping and tearing our hair and clothes. Curse royal restraint or decorum, however much we were alone. My two brothers gone, my two babies, now our hope for the future in our dear Prince Arthur. Despite his weak health, sudden, so sudden. Too sudden?

  I sat up straighter. Had we—the king—sent our son into danger to a distant Welsh castle just as blindly as Mother and I had sent young Richard to the Tower with our young King Edward V? No, no, I must not imagine a traitor in every tower, and yet…

  “We shall make plans from here for his burial,” Henry was saying, his voice not his own.

  “Indeed we shall.” I got to my knees to rise. “The necessary things must not go undone, and I shall see to that.”

  Mistress Varina Westcott

  Though the early April breeze was brisk, I kept my bedroom window ajar so I would not feel so closed in. After many sleepless nights, fearing, despite Jamie’s watchfulness, that the man who had killed Firenze would seek me out, I was sleeping somewhat better lately. As I had expected, Christopher had also become my enemy, though he was evidently wary enough of my court connection that he had proposed Gil as a guild member. Still, I had heard naught from the palace or Nick and steeled myself that I might never again. I’d gleaned no word from customers that the Prince and Princess of Wales and their retinue would be returning this spring.


  As the night bells of St. Mary Abchurch and St. Swithin’s ended their twelve tolls for midnight, I heard a horse. That alone was unusual, for there was a curfew and the night watchmen walked their routes. The hoofbeats came fast, close, on cobbles. A rider in our courtyard beneath my window? But had Jaime not locked the gate?

  I slipped from bed and peered out into the darkness, kneeling in the new spring rushes on the floor. One wan lantern threw a square of pale light into the courtyard. Yes, a rider here, dismounted. Men’s voices. Oh, thank God, Jamie was greeting him. He must know him and have let him in.

  But who could it be? My stomach cramped. Jamie had said he would not admit anyone at night. Who would know to knock on the shop door where Jamie slept on a pallet he removed each day? Now the two tall men bent in huddled talk before they disappeared beneath my window.

  He was letting the stranger into the house! No doubt through the door leading to stairs that came directly up into the back hall near the bedchambers!

  All the fears I’d fought to keep at bay beat against me. That murderer who had pursued me in the crypt…I should not have trusted Jamie—was he just biding his time? I had believed that the queen had sent him to guard me, that she could have naught to do with silencing Firenze.

  At least my Arthur’s chamber was down the hall. Should I hide? No. Then they would search for me and rouse or harm the others. I had no weapon here but a heavy pewter washbowl and ewer.

  I shot the bolt on the door and darted over to dump the rest of the wash water from the ewer, accidentally spilling most of it down my breasts so that my night rail clung to me. The floor was slippery, but I stood beside the door and lifted the heavy thing with both hands like a club. Though it came muted, the rapping on the wooden door thudded through me.