But it was not a spirit who was crying—unless it was a spirit who could also blow its nose and sigh. At the end of the corridor, just beyond Kate’s chamber, there was a small alcove with a window set in the wall. It was half concealed by a velvet drape, yet Kate glimpsed the embroidered hem of a pale satin gown, the toe of a velvet slipper. Another sob shivered through the air.
Kate worried that someone was ill. “Hello?” she called our carefully. “May I help?”
There was a sudden, surprised rustling, and a pale face peeked around the edge of the drape. It was Amelia Wrightsman who cried there in private. “Oh, Mistress Haywood! You did startle me. I thought everyone was abed by now. I didn’t want to wake my aunt, so I came here.”
Kate hurried to Amelia’s side. “Are you ill? Should I fetch Mistress Berry and her possets?”
Amelia frowned. “Nay, not her. I am not ill. I just needed a quiet moment.”
“Oh,” Kate said, embarrassed that she had intruded. Quiet moments were few and precious in palaces. She started to turn away. “I am sorry. I shall just—”
“Do stay for a moment, Mistress Haywood! Unless you are very tired and must seek your bed. It’s not as comforting being alone as I thought it would be.”
Kate studied Mistress Wrightsman’s face. She looked very different from when she was laughing and dancing in company. Her eyes were reddened with crying, and she seemed younger, unsure of herself. Just as Kate so often felt. “Of course I can stay.” She sat down next to Amelia on the narrow window seat and arranged her skirts around her. “Fontainebleau is beautiful, but also rather cold and lonely, I have found.”
Amelia gave a wry laugh and wiped at her eyes. Her lacy handkerchief wafted the scent of her violet perfume. “Crowded palaces are the loneliest places of all, I think.”
“Mayhap you are right. I’ve found I can always lose myself in music. It can feel like an entirely different world, even in a banquet hall filled with people.”
Amelia sighed. “I do envy you such an escape.” She wiped at her eyes again, and her shoulders seemed to stiffen, as if she found her armor and wrapped it around herself. “Tell me, Mistress Haywood. Have you ever been in love?”
Kate laughed in surprise at the sudden change. “I—I am not sure.” She thought of Rob leaning close to her as they studied a piece of music, the thrill that shivered through her at his nearness. And she thought of Anthony, the steady, warm touch of his hand on hers, the feeling of safety she had in his presence. “Maybe.”
Amelia laughed. “If you truly had been, you would be sure. You are fortunate, Mistress Haywood, not to know its pain. You should always guard your heart most carefully.”
Kate studied her closely. Amelia looked fierce but also frightened. Kate thought of Queen Elizabeth and Robert Dudley, Catherine Grey and Lord Hertford, her father living without her mother for so many years—all the love affairs that ended in sorrow. “I have much work to do. There is no time to worry about love.”
Amelia nodded. “Work, yes. That is what we must do. The only way to escape.” She gave her eyes another dab with her perfumed handkerchief and smiled a brilliant, shimmering smile that Kate could see now had always been part of that armor. She wished she could learn it for herself, but she also wished she could somehow help Amelia in her sadness.
Would her own future, after years at royal courts, be like this—false smiles and secrets?
“Work is our own to claim,” Amelia said. “Men are merely trouble.”
All men? Kate hoped that was not true. “Even though you have so very many suitors?”
“Do I?” Amelia murmured. “Suitors, admirers. They are mostly useless. Unless one finds the right one, which is most unlikely.”
She suddenly rose to her feet and smoothed her golden hair beneath her pearl-edged headdress. “Thank you for listening to my ramblings, Mistress Haywood. I am sure you have many things to do with your evening hours.”
“I always like to talk to people. They are constantly fascinating, like a poem waiting to be set to music.”
Amelia’s smile flickered. “You are so kind, Mistress Haywood. I seldom meet anyone with even a morsel of kindness left in their souls after life at court.”
Kate swallowed hard. Sadly, she knew what Amelia meant, for she saw it herself too often. A desire to serve the queen, to serve England, became twisted and selfish. She thought again of that quiet, respectable attorney’s house that would one day be Anthony’s. “What is the use of our courtly work, then, if not to help others when we can?”
Amelia looked startled, but then she laughed. “I am sure my aunt and uncle would quite agree with you, Mistress Haywood! As long as the people being helped are their own family. More for someone else means less for them. But never mind that; there are surely more serious matters to worry about now. Are you coming to Queen Catherine’s garden festivities tomorrow night?”
Kate found herself once again dizzy at Amelia’s changes of topic. She did remember Lady Barnett mentioning a garden party, to be held near the decorative pond so Queen Catherine could show off some of her new work on the pavilion there. “Aye. But will it not be rather cold in the gardens?”
“Not for Queen Catherine! She loves to display her grand creations here at Fontainebleau, to show it is her palace now. It should be a most entertaining evening.”
“I will be there.”
“Good. Then I shall see you there. Good night, Mistress Haywood.”
Before Kate could answer, could ask if Mistress Wrightsman was sure she was well now after crying, Amelia rushed away in a rustle of satin and whiff of violet perfume. Kate found herself alone in the silence.
Kate shivered as a draft from one of the windows swept around her. It was too cold to stay in that stone alcove all alone, pondering the changeable nature of Amelia Wrightsman and her friends. She was tired and had much to think about. She turned back toward her own chamber but found she couldn’t seek her bed quite yet. Mistress Berry waited outside her door, pacing back and forth.
“Mistress Berry,” she called as she hurried closer. “May I assist you with something? Is Lady Barnett ill?”
Mistress Berry swung around to face her. For an instant she looked almost worried, but that was quickly banished. Just as Amelia’s smile could cover any flicker of her true thoughts, so could Mistress Berry’s placidity. “Not at all, Mistress Haywood. I was putting away some of my books before I retired, and I remembered you said on the ship that you would like to learn more of my herbal work. I thought you might like to borrow this.”
She held out a slim volume, and as Kate took it she saw it was well used and bound in worn green leather. The crackling pages were filled with sketches of plants, recipes for household cures. “Thank you, Mistress Berry. This will be most helpful. But it looks as if you use it a great deal.”
Mistress Berry smiled. “Indeed I have, so much that I have it memorized. Others should learn from it now. Keep it as long as you like.”
“Then I thank you. Have Lady Barnett and Mistress Wrightsman learned from it as well?”
“My cousins? Nay, it takes too long to read a recipe when one can employ a stillroom maid for such things.” She studied Kate carefully. “You seem rather more self-sufficient.”
Self-sufficient. Kate sighed. She would have to be that now, wouldn’t she? Her father, her only family, was gone, and she was adrift in a strange country.
Except for Rob. He was there at Fontainebleau with her. Surely Amelia was not entirely correct; not every man was useless.
“I look forward to reading it, Mistress Berry,” she said.
“Of course. I fear I am keeping you from your rest.” Mistress Berry nodded and turned to walk away. She paused for a moment and glanced back at Kate. “Was that Mistress Wrightsman I saw leaving this corridor?”
“We met on the way to retire and talked about the evening for a moment,” Kate sa
id.
“Of course. Strange that she would be so far from her own chamber now.”
“Fontainebleau is rather confusing.”
“True. Confusing indeed. I do hope that you don’t believe everything you are told here, Mistress Haywood.”
With that, Mistress Berry hurried on her way. And Kate opened her own door to find a fire crackling in the small grate. She sat down beside it to study the herbal and go over all she had heard that night.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Kate had never seen anything like the gardens at Fontainebleau before, all lit up for Queen Catherine’s party. For an instant, as they stepped out from beneath the covered terrace landing from the gallery to the jardin anglais, she was so dazzled that she froze in her tracks, causing the ladies behind her to bump into her. She stood in awe of the artful jumble that was such a contrast to the usual careful symmetry of English gardens, and the ladies giggled over her English manners.
Kate had to laugh at herself, too, for she felt like the smallest mouse from the countryside, gawking at the lavishness of royalty. Yet surely the gardens were meant to dazzle in just such a way. Even a hardened, lifelong courtier would be arrested by just such a display.
Arrested—and distracted from any conflicts and woes that beset the reign of the new young king and his warring factions.
Brigit Berry came to her side, and Kate turned to see the older lady smiling wryly as she studied the lavish garden scene.
“Beautiful, is it not?” Mistress Berry said as she smoothed the white ruffled trim of her black sleeves. She wore her usual serviceable garments, which made her stand out amid the shining satins and lustrous furs of the others.
“I have never seen anything like it,” Kate answered truthfully.
“Of course you have not,” Mistress Berry said. “We are in a world apart here, are we not? None can judge us by everyday rules now.”
“Hurry along, Brigit!” Lady Barnett called from the pathway ahead. She was arm in arm with two of Queen Catherine’s ladies, laughing with them. Amelia was nowhere to be seen.
Brigit nodded and followed her kinswoman as Lady Barnett and her friends vanished through a thick stand of pine trees toward the carp pond, where the party was to be held. The darkness of the night was gathering fast, a thick, heavy blue-black curtain, with only the swirl of stars overhead and the flickering lanterns to light their way. The pale fur of the ladies’ cloaks made them look like ghosts as they drifted between the trees, appearing and disappearing again.
Kate followed them, drawing her hood up over her hair. It was a cold night but very still, no wind brushing through the trees. Everything had a glasslike, frozen quality to it. Even the laughter that hung in the air seemed to belong to spirits. She shivered and had the sudden feeling that she certainly didn’t want to be caught alone in those dark shadows.
She hurried down the path, following the sound of voices as they grew louder and were joined by the strains of music, a melancholy, sweet song she had never heard before. She found herself by the edge of the pond, which looked like a fine flat sheet of Venetian glass under the light of the hundreds of lanterns.
It was exactly like the scenes Queen Elizabeth wished to conjure through her royal masquerades—otherworldly in its beauty. On the far side of the water stood a octagonal pale marble pavilion, its windows glowing with amber light. On its steps Kate glimpsed a small figure in black: the Queen Mother surrounded by her beautiful ladies in white, her hand raised as if to summon people into her fairy realm.
To get to the pavilion, boats festooned with wreaths of greenery and fluttering ribbons waited to ferry everyone across. Kate saw Toby Ridley help Amelia into one as she laughed at something he said to her. She wore white-figured brocade with his black velvet cloak draped carelessly over her shoulders. He looked up into her face with eagerness written large in his expression.
Lady Barnett and Brigit were already gone, and Kate couldn’t see anyone else she knew nearby. She studied the faces of the gentlemen, hoping to find Rob, but he was nowhere among them.
“How much coin do you think was spent on this nuisance?” someone behind her grumbled.
She glanced back to see two Guise kinsmen waiting for a boat, their faces scowling above the lace collars of their finery.
“The Queen Mother should listen to the advice of the duc,” the other one answered. “Instead she gives too much to these Huguenots, and look where that has gotten us!”
“She should heed King Philip’s example,” said the first one. “Just as the duc has. The Spanish know how to deal with heretics.”
“Mistress Haywood?” she heard Charles Throckmorton call, and she turned away from the discontented Guise. She stood on tiptoe to see over the shoulders of the people gathered in front of her and glimpsed him waving at her.
“Pardon, messieurs,” she murmured, squeezing through the crowd. She smelled wine and strong perfumes as she tried to make her way through the press, felt elbows catch her in the side. She stumbled, and instinctively held out her hand to catch herself.
She found herself clutching at a smooth satin sleeve, and a strong hand set her upright again. She glanced up, muttering apologies, and found herself looking up into the eyes of Jacques d’Emours, Amelia’s erstwhile lover. He gave her an abrupt nod, his blue eyes icy, before he let her go. He was handsome with those unusual eyes—Kate would give Amelia that—but so very distant and cold, she wondered he did not freeze everyone around him. Perhaps he was one of the Guise angry about Queen Catherine’s “lenient” behavior?
She spun away and stumbled out of the crowd at the edge of the pond. Charles was there to find her and caught her arm to lead her to one of the boats. She sank down onto the velvet cushions of the narrow seat with a relieved sigh.
As they pushed out onto the water, leaving the crowd behind, the music grew louder. It seemed to be rising from the depths of the pond itself, as if sung by mermaids, and Kate was enchanted by the sound. She couldn’t help herself and leaned over to peer into the dark waves. A sudden splash made her fall back with a startled laugh.
A large boat shaped like a golden chariot floated past, and she saw that was where the music came from. A man dressed as Neptune in filmy blue and green draperies, with a golden crown and trident, sat high up in the prow of the boat while nymphs in thin white silk fluttered around him, singing.
Smaller boats followed, each one shaped like a gilded seashell and steered by mermaids in green satin with flowing waves of hair, each of them adding their own clear, high voice to the song.
Kate was amazed. “I have not seen such a thing in England.”
Charles gave her a weary-looking smile. “Not even by the queen’s ardent suitors, each of them seeking to impress her more than any other?”
Kate laughed, and remembered the classical tableaux of the Earl of Arundel at Nonsuch, the whimsical gifts of Robert Dudley, the gilded and painted coaches of Eric of Sweden. “I have seen much that amazes from them, aye, but no sea pageants such as this.”
“I am sure once word of entertainments of this sort make their way back to England, as they are designed to do, you will see many like it. Probably you will even be asked to arrange one, once everyone knows you have seen the French court and its splendors in person.”
Kate watched a gilded sea horse float past. She lowered her voice to ask, “How are such things possible? Is the court not still in mourning for Queen Mary’s husband? Yet Queen Catherine speaks of hunts and parties at her play dairy . . .” Not to mention the financial troubles and religious squabbles that led to so much despair, so many burned homes and deaths. Not that money meant a great deal to courtly splendor—Queen Elizabeth had inherited an empty treasury from her sister, which made it more important than ever that the English court look splendid.
For France, the pinnacle of European culture, surely that was even more important. The turmoil that bu
bbled beneath the surface had to be kept hidden.
“Queen Catherine has a kingdom to build on the shoulders of a ten-year-old boy,” Charles answered. “She stands between the Guise and the Huguenots, neither of whom will give up power easily. She must keep the peace now at all costs, and distractions can be one way to help with such a task.”
Kate nodded. Surely distractions would paint a rosy picture of Paris for other monarchs as well. “And where does Queen Mary fit in all of this?”
“Queen Mary? She does not. Queen Catherine will not countenance the Duc de Guise’s proposal that Mary wed her brother-in-law King Charles. Lord James Stewart will lose power if his sister returns to Scotland, and the grand marriage scheme to Don Carlos of Spain looks less and less likely,” Charles said. “My uncle says she should stay here and live comfortably on her French estates, but she does not seem like the quiet, comfortable sort, does she?”
Kate frowned, wondering again what Elizabeth really wanted from her Scottish cousin. What Kate herself should encourage here in France. She had written down all she had seen and heard thus far at Queen Catherine’s court and carefully coded it, but she could make little sense yet of what was real and important and what was mere courtly subterfuge.
Their boat bumped against the shore, and one of Neptune’s acolytes in white-and-gold classical draperies leaped forward to help her alight. The crowd made their way from the boats, twisting up the pathway to the pavilion, while tritons at either side blew their shell horns. Charles vanished into the gathering, and Kate looked about in confusion.
One of the tritons, in white chiton and golden half mask, caught her arm and spun her in a circle. At first her heart leaped with startled fear, as it had on the ship. She instinctively raised her hand to slap him, but then she recognized the bright blue eyes sparkling from behind the mask, the mischievous smile. Even though his short golden hair was covered by a curled, blue-tinted wig, it was undoubtedly Rob.
“What are you doing?” she whispered.
He laughed merrily. “I am to take a role tonight, fair Kate. Signorina Isabella arranged it.”
Murder at Fontainebleau Page 12