B009RYSCAU EBOK

by Gillian Bagwell

  * * *

  “BESS, YOU MUST HAVE SOME PROTECTION.” LIZZIE’S EYES, THE color of the hard brown shells of hazelnuts, were earnest.

  “Why, I do, I have Will. If he can see to the queen’s safety, surely he can see to mine!”

  “That’s not what I mean. If Ned St. Loe has used poison, it may be that he is also employing enchantments and charms against you. You must get something to ward against whatever forces of evil he is recruiting.”

  Bess stared at Lizzie.

  “You think he is using witchcraft to harm Will and me?”

  Lizzie shrugged. “I don’t know, but it may be. Poison is an underhanded weapon, and if he would stoop to that, why would he not call upon the powers of darkness, too?”

  The powers of darkness. Did such powers exist? Lizzie seemed to believe so. If they did, surely it was best to be protected. And nothing lost if there were no dark forces.

  “I wouldn’t even know where to go to get such a charm.”

  “But I do,” Lizzie said. “I have had need of help in the past years, and have learned where to find it.”

  * * *

  BESS HAD NEVER BEEN IN THE NARROW STREET TO WHICH LIZZIE led her. It was close to the river, and a chill wind gusted, making Bess glad of the heavy layers of wool of her gown and cloak. She wore high pattens, to keep her skirts from dragging in the muddy slush, and picked her way gingerly on the uneven ground.

  Here were no grand houses, but ancient, ramshackle, half-timbered structures, their stories jutting out over the street, each thrusting farther than the one below, so that the topmost stories almost met, blocking out the wintry sun and creating a murky tunnel.

  Lizzie stopped before a house on which a sign painted with an image of a cockatrice swung, creaking. The diamond window panes were obscured with dirt, but Bess could make out a grotesque shape hanging within, which bore a resemblance to the fantastical beast on the sign. It was about the size of a cat, looking somewhat fishlike, with a tail and fins, but with a face that was eerily human, with lank hair falling over it. Bess looked away.

  A low arch opened onto a dingy yard strewn with rubble.

  “Here?” she asked.

  Lizzie nodded and Bess followed her into the yard. Narrow galleries on each story ringed the space. The building was an inn, then, or had been at one time, though it would be a desperate traveler who would seek shelter there, Bess thought.

  Lizzie climbed a rickety stairway, its timbers creaking as she and Bess made their way upward, and Bess prayed that it would not collapse beneath their weight. When they reached the uppermost gallery, Lizzie led her to the corner farthest from the street, and knocked at the weathered door.

  The door opened a crack, revealing a pair of piercing blue eyes peering out at them.

  “Gammer Joan,” Lizzie said. “I’ve brought a friend who needs your help.”

  “Your ladyship.” The voice was that of an old woman. Her words carried no surprise at seeing Bess and Lizzie. She opened the door to admit them, and in the dim light Bess saw a withered form in garments so old and worn that they were shapeless and of no determinate color.

  The room was tiny, no bigger than the closet off Bess’s bedchamber that contained her close stool. The only furnishings were a small table, a bench, a stool, and a chest. A rolled pallet lay in one corner, and in another stood a waste bucket. Bunches of dried herbs hung on the walls and from strings stretched overhead, permeating the air with their scents. A tallow candle guttered on the table, its flickering light barely breaking the gloom. A tiny fire burned in the grate, but still the room was bitter cold.

  Joan waved Lizzie and Bess to be seated on the bench. She remained standing, her gaze sweeping over them. She nodded, as if her glance had confirmed some earlier suspicion.

  “My friend Bess has been poisoned,” Lizzie said. “She needs something to work against the poisoner, and to protect both her and her husband. Can you provide such a thing?”

  “Certainly, my lady.” Joan turned to Bess. “Have you anything of the poisoner’s own body? Hair? Nail parings? Or perhaps summat he has worn?”

  “No.” Bess shook her head.

  “No matter. We will make do without, have no fear.”

  The old woman knelt and opened the chest, and Bess saw that within it lay a shallow tray containing numerous little bundles, pots, and jars. Joan’s clawlike hands ranged over them, hovering before seizing on a little bundle of rag tied with twine and a tiny cloth pouch. She brought them to the table, worked the bindings of the bundle loose, and drew forth a small white object that looked like a splinter of white wood. She held it up for Bess to see, turning it so that the candlelight shone gold upon it.

  “A bit of the horn of the unicorn. The most powerful protection against poison, my lady.”

  Her face was grave, and in the eerie light, it seemed entirely possible to Bess that what Joan held was indeed a piece of unicorn’s horn. She glanced at Lizzie, who only nodded.

  Joan put the horn into the pouch, and then gazed around her at the forest of hanging herbs and flowers. She broke off a few leaves from one bunch and desiccated blossoms from another, thrust them into the pouch, and tied the neck of it tight with a bit of twine. She fetched a little bottle from the trunk and removed the cork.

  “Give me your hand.”

  Bess did as she was bid. Joan placed the tiny bundle into her palm, unstoppered the bottle, and poured a few drops of amber liquid onto the bundle. It gave off a pungent scent that Bess couldn’t identify. Joan curled Bess’s hand shut around the little pouch and made the sign of the cross over it. She closed her own hands over Bess’s, and shut her eyes. In the silence, Bess was keenly conscious of the sound of her own breathing, and that of Lizzie and Joan.

  Joan opened her eyes. “Wear that close to your heart. It will protect you from poison.”

  “I will.”

  “You wish to protect your husband, too?”

  “Yes. But he would never—” Bess tried to imagine asking Will to wear a pouch containing the horn of a unicorn. “Have you something that I can use without telling him?”

  A faint smile lit Joan’s lips. “Certainly, my lady. It is ever the way with men that we must quietly go about things that are for their own good. Take a shirt belonging to your man, and soak it in his urine. Then burn it. That will work against the poisoner. And to protect all in your household, burn sage upon the fires.”

  Joan turned to Lizzie, then, and looked upon her steadily for a few moments, seeming to read her as she had done with Bess.

  “You have prospered since I saw you last, my lady.”

  “Yes. My fortunes have turned for the better.”

  “The queen favors you.”

  Bess glanced at Lizzie, wondering if she had told Joan that she was now serving the queen, but Lizzie looked surprised at the remark, and only nodded.

  Bess looked around the room and its meager furnishings, shivering as she drew her heavy cloak tighter about her. Old Joan had a roof over her head, but not much more than that. How did she keep herself fed? she wondered. She took out her purse, drew out two silver shillings, and put them into Joan’s hand.

  Joan’s brows rose, and she inclined her head in gratitude. “I thank your ladyship.” She smiled then, showing her few remaining teeth. “I will pray that your bounty will delay the deaths of a dozen souls.”

  Bess’s confusion must have showed on her face.

  “I am a searcher,” Joan said. “It is my employment to examine the newly dead, and report the cause of the death to the parish clerk. Last year was a good one for me, but a hard one for the parish. Men must die—and women and babes, too—that I may eat.”

  There had been an outbreak of the plague in London the previous year. That must be what Joan meant, Bess realized with a shudder.

  “A hard way to get your living,” she said.

  Joan shrugged. “Easier than dying.” Her eyes flickered from Bess to Lizzie and back. “Though to be sure, in the end, there
are none of us escape that.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  THE FRIGHT OVER BESS’S NEAR ESCAPE RIPPLED THROUGH THE queen’s court, already fearful that there might be an attempt on Elizabeth’s life. For she had recently angered the French by sending ships to blockade Scotland and preventing shipments of arms from reaching their destination. Now Cecil issued orders that no one but the inward circle of the queen’s attendants should handle her clothes or anything she would touch. She must not accept gifts of perfume or objects such as gloves, which could easily be impregnated with poison. She must eat and drink nothing that had not been prepared by trusted cooks and brought to her straight from them. Will doubled the guards who attended her and ordered that they be even more alert to the possibility of danger than usual.

  Will’s inquiries traced the pie’s origins back to an inn at Bristol, not far from Sutton Court, owned by a man named Hugh Draper, who had previously been suspected of witchcraft and poisonings. He was imprisoned in the Tower, and soon some apparent accomplices were with him, including a St. Loe cousin named Elizabeth. Will’s mother, back at her home in Somerset, was apparently in no doubt about Ned’s guilt.

  I am sure that Will would not mislike his brother without a great cause, she wrote, and I am sure he is in the right. Many have said to me they hear say that Edward should go about to poison his brother and you, and I fear that this was the goodwill he bore you when he came up to London to see you, for he liked nothing your marriage. His good friendship to you, as to me, is all one. God defend us from such friends. I know that Will is seeking out the truth of the matter, and I pray you, madam, send me word how this devil’s devices began, and how it came to light. Thanks be to God you know about it and can be on your guard. I pray God send you both long life and good health. Yours most assuredly as long as I live, Margaret St. Loe.

  Bess was shocked at the ferocity of Margaret’s denunciation of Ned. He must have committed black deeds, she thought, for his own mother to be brought to the point of calling him a devil.

  Will was sure his brother was to blame, and that he, not Bess, had been the intended victim of the poison. He continued to pay informants in Somerset and Gloucestershire, and gave orders to his men guarding Ned’s cohorts at the Tower to note down any incriminating statements. But infuriatingly, no positive evidence could be found linking Ned to the pie or to poisoning it, and eventually, Ned was freed and Will and Bess could do no more against him.

  * * *

  THE QUEEN WOULD SPEND SOME WEEKS IN THE SUMMER ON PROGRESS, and Will would have to be with her. He still feared for Bess’s safety, and the queen agreed with him that Bess should return to the protection of Chatsworth in his absence.

  As the house came into sight after the arduous journey from London, Bess felt suffused with joy, knowing that she would very shortly be reunited with her children. She corresponded with them regularly, of course, even four-year-old May laboriously inscribing the letter M at the bottom of a letter written by her nurse, but it was a far cry from holding them in her arms, hearing their voices, sharing the joy of each day with them.

  And the house! It rose impossibly grand and impressive, its white stone standing out against the green hills, the crenelated roofline and four turrets of the façade echoing those of a castle, and yet somehow the whole was modern and new. Much work had been done since she had last been there, and she fairly ached to inspect the progress.

  “Mother!”

  Bess saw Frankie tearing across the grass toward her, her cap falling off so that her red hair streamed behind her.

  “My darling!” Bess called, waving.

  Frankie had grown, she thought, and if she had not been running pell-mell she would have looked like a young lady instead of a little girl. She was twelve now, just the age that Bess had been when she left Hardwick for Codnor Castle. Time to think about finding a suitable lady for Frankie to serve; someone who would help assure her rise in the world.

  “My dearest, what a joy to see you!” Bess cried, pulling Frankie onto the litter with her and holding her close. “And plenty of time we’ll have together now, for I’ll not go back to London until the queen returns.”

  And maybe she would take Frankie with her then, Bess thought. She could take her to court and let her be seen, for she was a glorious sight as she looked smiling up at Bess, bright and bonny and blithe.

  Supper that night was joyous, the children all talking over each other in their eagerness to tell Bess of their doings. Harry and Willie, nine and eight years old, were full of excitement about their enrollment at Eton, where they would go in the autumn, their first foray into the world away from home.

  “Why can’t I go, too?” Charlie demanded.

  “You’re too little; you’re only six,” Harry pronounced, and Charlie’s face crumpled.

  “You will go soon enough, poppet,” Bess said, gathering him onto her lap before tears could erupt. “And when you do, your brothers will be there to keep you company.”

  “What about me?” asked Bessie, only just turned five.

  “You and May will do your learning here at home with me and your grandmother and auntie,” Bess said, smiling across the table at her mother and Aunt Marcella. “For one day you will be great ladies, and they don’t teach that at Eton.”

  “I going to be great lady,” May echoed solemnly, and put her fingers in her mouth.

  “Oh, it’s wonderful to be home!” Bess cried. “London is all very well, but nothing compares with home.”

  * * *

  THE GREAT HALL WAS READY FOR DECORATIVE PLASTERWORK, AND Bess wrote to John Thynne, asking if he would send his plasterer from Longleat. There was still a platoon of men at work at Chatsworth, however, and Will replied to Bess’s letter describing the state of the house by addressing her as “chief overseer of my works.”

  “Ah, dear love, how I miss you,” she murmured, bringing the letter to her nose to see if she could catch his scent on the paper. He wrote every couple of days, as the court made its way from Winchester to Basing to Windsor, and Bess faithfully dispatched long letters in return, full of news of the family and estate.

  She found it comforting to be back in the country, and felt her body and mind fall in with the rhythms of nature. It gave her joy to watch the lambs and calves and colts grow bigger, to see the wheat ripen in the fields, to oversee the cheese making, the brewing of beer, the harvesting of honey from the buzzing hives, the picking of the orchard’s riches. Chatsworth had lost its air of incompleteness and now seemed a part of the land and at one with the seasons.

  Jem rode over from Hardwick for a visit of several days. Bess had not seen her brother since her wedding, and then there had been little time for real visiting. When had they last sat and spoken at length? Bess wondered. It must have been two years earlier, when she had retreated to Chatsworth after William Cavendish’s death. But then she had been so sunk in grief and despair that she had barely been herself.

  As they sat in the shade beside the house sipping cool cider, she noticed for the first time that Jem’s clothes were far behind the London fashions and even a little shabby, and then felt guilty for the observation. Why should he trouble with what was in or out in London, after all? His business was the running of the estate, not flattering or seeking to impress with costly apparel.

  “Your wife is well?” she asked.

  “Aye, faith, well enow,” he answered, and it struck her that even his speech was far different from hers. Had she truly sounded like that? She must have, she supposed, and realized that it was she, not he, who had changed. Did he resent her? Regard her as a poseur or superficial time-pleaser?

  “So it’s all come out well for thee,” he said suddenly. “I recall how frighted and nervous you were when I took you to Codnor. But look at you, a grand lady now, inward with the queen and all the high and mighty folks.”

  “Aye. Mother knew what she was about when she sent me away, reluctant though I was to go.”

  What would her life have b
een like if she had had her way and stayed? She would likely have married some boy of a neighboring family and would now be overseer to a manor house and a few acres. Not chatelaine of a great estate such as Chatsworth and the sprawl of land about it. Not mistress to an army of servants in four great houses. Not on intimate terms with the queen and her court, with the highest people in the land, those who determined what happened for all the rest.

  Jem coughed into his sleeve and Bess noted how tired he looked.

  “You’ve been ill?” she asked.

  “Faith, it comes and goes, but never seems to go completely,” he said. “A rackety breathing, I seem to have.”

  “And how do things go on at Hardwick?”

  Jem shrugged. “With difficulty. It’s hard to make the place keep itself, and then I must always be riding off to see to the coal mine at Heth or the other bits of property here and there.”

  Bess thought that it must be even harder since Jem had no sons to help him in the running of Hardwick. He and his wife had no children though they had been married for a few years, but Bess knew from her mother that he had sired at least one bastard child. She wished that she could offer to help him, but until the matter of her debt to the crown was resolved, she worried constantly about her finances. And, she thought, Jem’s pride might be offended if she offered him money.

  * * *

  IN EARLY SEPTEMBER, THE COURT WAS AT WINDSOR, AND preparing to return to London. Will wrote to Bess that he had visited Eton, where Harry and Willie would begin their studies in the Michaelmas term.

  It is a fair place, and I visited with the almoner, who sends you his compliments, and assures me that no gentleman’s children in England shall be better welcome, nor better looked unto, than our boys, so I pray you set your heart at rest about sending them thither.