“I am relieved to hear you say so, your lordship. I am glad we understand each other. I have been wanting to get this out in the open for some time now. Enough secrecy, don’t you agree? At least between you and me. I, personally will never breathe a word.”
“I trust you, Will. I am glad you understand I cannot take the chance anyone might know I am the author.”
“Of course I do.”
“Let me get to work now. You may have the drawing room to yourself. I shall work here.”
Footsteps moved toward the door. Cassandra scurried away down the hall, nearly running into the housekeeper.
“Good sir, where be you off to in such a hurry?” she wanted to know.
“Nowhere, mistress,” Cassandra replied in a low voice. “Forgive me.”
The old woman shook her head as she walked on. “There’s something wrong with that fellow if you ask me,” she said as if to herself, though making no particular effort to lower her voice.
Cassandra had just entered the Great Hall when Shakespeare went hurrying past her. “Forgive me my haste, Ganymede.” He winked at her.
“I quite understand, sir,” she replied. Did what she’d just heard reveal what she thought it did?
Alone again, she strolled down the back stairs and wandered a bit until she found the door to the rear gardens, passing the occasional servant as she went. Oxford had a lot of them though he always seemed to be strapped for cash. When one was an earl, one had to keep up appearances, she supposed. The sun was trying to warm the day without much success. She walked through the maze of hedges until she found a bench that looked out over a stretch of lawn, ending in the riverbank. She perched there.
Though the air was cold, the riverbank was beginning to come alive with the approaching spring. A hint of green tinged the tall grasses on the far side of the bank. There, a willow tree flaunted the chartreuse color of leaves on the verge of unfurling. Others held back their new growth for now, but the waving branches of oak and birch seemed to tremble with the anticipation of new life.
A flock of swans glided along the calm water, as did boats of every kind. A wherryman, skimming close to Oxford’s quay, noticed her and stared. She pulled her hat low. If Nick had survived the bludgeoning she’d given him, he would come back through the portal again to look for her. He obviously knew she knew Oxford―he knew everything about her―he could find her if he wanted to. She should not be lingering in plain sight. A chill came over her. She took one more glimpse at the bucolic scene before her, and made her way back inside.
That night, she dreamt of Lauro again. She was naked on a bed of white linens. He kissed her breasts, then slowly licked each one in turn, around and around the nipple. His bare skin was warm against hers. She ran her hands over his sinewy arms. He flipped her over on top of him and she straddled him. She positioned him inside her and began to move up and down, circling her hips at the same time to feel him at every point of pleasure. He smiled. She bent to kiss him. She continued her rhythm, his tongue deep in her mouth. He touched her as she rode astride him, touched her perfectly, with just the right pressure so that she felt pleasure inside and out, in every place it was possible to feel it. The sensations grew, intensified. She grabbed his hair. He raised his hips and she exploded in ecstasy, suddenly awakening, still reclined in her bed. She clapped a hand over her mouth so she wouldn’t scream as she continued to orgasm. When the spasms subsided, she parted the drapes around the bed and glanced over at Shakespeare, sleeping peacefully on his mat on the floor. He looked handsome in the moonlight that filtered in through a crack in the curtains, his skin pale, his crescent-shaped eyelids lined with dark lashes. She sighed and lay back down. Neither he nor Oxford had let her see what they had written that day. By the end of the next day, surely one would have a worthy draft.
In the morning, she rose early and dressed quietly while Shakespeare still slept. She crept down the stairs and into Oxford’s drawing room where the younger of the two men had been working. A houseboy was lighting a fire there. She nodded to him, and nonchalantly approached the desk. The first thing to meet her eye was the outline Sir Robert had written. She nudged it aside to look at the papers beneath. The one on top was filled with doodles and children’s rhymes: “Ring around the rosie, a pocket full of posies….” Had Shakespeare let one of the servant’s children amuse themselves with paper and ink? Surely not. Such materials were expensive, and many young children of the servant class could not even read or write.
She picked up the paper to see what was beneath. At the top of the page was the title: “Rosalind…or Ganymede…As One Likes.” Her heart began to pound. What she thought she’d heard the two men discussing yesterday was not what she’d assumed. William Shakespeare himself was history’s greatest playwright! She read on:
Act One, Scene I – a forest
Julia: Dearest Cousin, be of good cheer. Though thou art banished, I do keep thee company as best I can.
Rosalind: My dear Julia, I thank thee for thy cheery words, yet how can I merry be when we must fend, alone in these woods, for our very sustenance? I, bereft of father, and my love, Urbino…
Her pounding heart slowed to a thud. This was not even close to how the play Cassandra was so familiar with began, and it did not improve with further reading. Shakespeare’s scrawl was so untidy as to be practically illegible, and from what she could tell, the language was awkward, and the plot drifted oddly. She skimmed through the rest. Not more than ten pages in total. She rushed out, through the Great Hall, to the library. She knocked on the closed door but there was no answer. She went in to find it empty. On the writing table there was a large stack of paper. She picked up the one on top and began to read. The handwriting was flowery, but precise. The language was better too, the wording elegant. However, the plot was a million miles from what it should be and really no better than Shakespeare’s. Even if Oxford had written something that wasn’t the same as As You Like It, yet still quite good, the Queen might decide she liked it well enough to free James.
Unfortunately, what he had written was not good. Even if he and Shakespeare combined the two, and if they let her work with them so she could mold the thing into what she knew it should be, she certainly didn’t know the play word for word, not well enough to write something that would pass as Shakespeare, or rather, what Shakespeare’s work would come to be known as. A cold sweat worked its way from her forehead to her feet.
“Ganymede!”
Cassandra turned quickly to find Oxford standing there in his house robe. His thin, grayish blond hair was neatly combed, his wispy beard formed into a point below his chin.
“I see you have been perusing my work.”
“I am sorry, my lord. I did not mean to pry―”
“Cassandra,” he whispered. “You must not tell anyone, anyone that I am writing.”
“No, of course not.”
“Do you understand what is at stake?”
“I do.”
“Not only my favor with the Queen, which is again in peril, but my very livelihood. It will all be stripped from me if anyone finds out.”
“I understand, truly.”
“Very well then.” He smiled. “What think you of my work?” He gestured to the papers on the desk.
“I, um, it is very good, my lord, but I am not the one to judge.”
“Thank you. Your opinion means much to me.” He closed the door behind him. “I have said before, you must call me Edward…”
“No, I could not…”He pulled her into his arms. “Please. I desirest thee to know the more I write with thee as my inspiration, the more I fall in love.”
“In love, with me?”
“Surely thou must have perceived that. Dost thou not recall the words I wrote thee the day after our first meeting?”
“The sonnet?”
He laughed gently. “I would hardly call it a sonnet.”
“I did not take it to mean you loved me,” she replied.
“My desire for t
hee knoweth no bounds. I am mad with jealousy knowing thou sharest Shakespeare’s room. He hath not been unseemly, hath he?”
It did not escape her notice that Oxford had reverted to the familiar form of address. “No, of course not.”
“I am relieved to hear it. My love, I felt so betrayed when I found thou hadst lied to me about whom thou truly art, and yes, I must say, disappointed that thou art not a Duchess. But my love for thee hath never diminished.” He smiled and the corners of his eyes crinkled. Up close, his face was creased with many tiny lines.
“But, my lord, you know James and I must flee London as soon as we can, never to return.”
“I know. And I shall go with thee. When we arrive at thy father’s home, thou wilt tell him I am merely a gentleman from London, a merchant such as himself and that we intend to marry.”
Her web of lies was ensnaring her more and more every minute.
“We will have to go to Italy then,” Oxford continued, in a reverie, his hazel eyes looking into hers dreamily. “Somewhere we can never be discovered. Just think, in Venice we will kiss on the Bridge of Sighs.” He pressed his lips to hers.
She gently pushed him away. “But your wife―”
“I will leave her. I care not.”
A gentle clearing of a throat at the door prompted Oxford to let Cassandra go. They turned to find the head man of the house standing there.
“Master Cecil is arrived. Shall I show him to you?” He seemed not at all surprised to see his lord embracing a young man.
“Yes, please,” Oxford replied, smoothing his hair.
The man left.
“We will speak of this later, my lord,” Cassandra said. “But I tell you now, it will not do to have you go with us when we leave. ‘Tis not possible.”
“There is still time to change thy mind,” Oxford replied.
As she shook her head, the earl’s brother-in-law appeared in the doorway of the library. He frowned when he saw Cassandra and Oxford standing close together. She took a step backward.
“Good morrow, Edward, young sir.”
“His name is Ganymede,” Oxford stressed.
“Ah, Ganymede. Good morrow.”
“Good morrow, sir,” Cassandra replied with a bow.
“I have come to tell you I have seen your son in the Tower,” Sir Robert continued.
Cassandra’s heart leapt. “How fares he?”
“He is well, my…boy. Anxious about you, very anxious. I dared not tell him of your return to London. ‘Tis too dangerous. He knows not that you are here. But he does know of our plan to free him with the play, and with this knowledge he relented to forgive me my part in this debacle. ”
“I am glad to know it.”
“The Lady Susannah was helpful in softening his heart toward me. She took a great risk in going to see him yesterday. Poor lass, I fear she may be in danger of falling in love with him.”
She wasn’t the first, nor surely would be the last. “If our plan works as we hope, they will likely never see each other again,” Cassandra replied.
“She seems resigned to that possibility. Now then, how is William’s play coming?”
“Excellently,” Oxford replied.
“That is wonderful to hear. Well, that is all I came to report. I must to the palace with haste.” He bowed. “Good day.”
After breakfast, both men returned to their writing and Cassandra was left with nothing to do but worry. She wandered through the house, up and down the stairs, dodging servants and trying to get some exercise since being outside was not an option. In the Great Hall was a harpsichord, and she sat down to tinker at it, but felt no inspiration. Besides, she didn’t know any Renaissance music well enough to play by heart.
After a midday meal of boiled beef and potatoes, roast chicken, leg of lamb, kidney pie, beets, and carrots, which she’d hardly worked up an appetite for, Oxford and Shakespeare both retired to their writing. Once again, but this time with a lump in her stomach from all the meat and heavy vegetables, she roamed the house restlessly.
It was a beautiful interior and there was a lot to appreciate if only she could get her mind to settle: the small, diamond-shaped panes in the leaded windows, the floor of inlaid stone in the Great Hall and adjoining rooms, thick, polished floorboards in the bedrooms; intricate tapestries lining the walls, and delicate needlework on upholstered chairs and cushions, all of which might make up a lifetime of anthropological study if one were so inclined. And wasn’t there usually a small chapel in these Tudor manor houses? That might be interesting to see. She headed in the direction of the back doors, which led to the gardens. In the small foyer there she noticed another low doorway to the left before the exit to the outside, which she hadn’t observed before. She pushed down the latch and nudged it open. In front of her a narrow, stone passageway beckoned. She tiptoed in, not wanting her footfalls to echo on the hard floor. A sound met her ears: a moan, and then a sigh. To her right was a short hallway. She peeked around the corner. The room that opened before her was cloaked in shadows, only a faint light seeping in through narrow windows. Three human shapes occupied the stone altar above which a crucifix with a mournful Christ hung, gazing in her direction, oblivious to the scene below. A woman, a maid, from what Cassandra could see of her clothing, lay on the altar, her skirts pulled up to her waist. A young man crouched between her legs, pleasuring her with his tongue. Another man knelt astride her shoulders, his erection in her mouth. Cassandra froze. They must all be servants, but it was impossible to recognize the faces in the dusky light. Was she never to chance around a corner without encountering some ribald display? The Elizabethans, for all their fascination with their “virgin” queen, were certainly a lusty bunch. She looked away, but when the woman moaned again, Cassandra couldn’t help but glance back in the direction of the writhing trio. The man being serviced moved his hips faster and faster, reaching a rapid orgasm. The woman didn’t hesitate to accept what emitted from him. A few moments later, he carefully dismounted and the woman wiped her mouth with her sleeve. Would he leave, and find Cassandra there in the passageway? She started to move away, but her foot rasped against the pavement. She stopped short. No one seemed to have heard her. The man who’d just gotten his due arranged his breeches and then sat on one of the two benches that served as pews. The woman was reaching climax too now, and she covered her mouth with her own hand to muffle her cries. Before her ecstasy subsided, the man between her legs climbed up onto the altar, freed his himself from his trousers, and entered her. The man on the bench simply watched, while the other made grunting sounds, accompanied by gasps of delight from the woman. This was the moment to make a getaway. Cassandra made for the exit and dashed through the small entry room and back into the Great Hall.
There stood an old, withered man with fierce black eyes. His back was stooped and he leaned on a cane. He sported a trimmed, white beard and was dressed all in black velvets and furs, an off-white ruff around his neck, a chain of large, gold links draped over his shoulders. She recognized him from historical portraits, one of which hung in the dining room of Oxford’s house.
“Lord Burghley,” she cried in as manly a voice as possible. She bent into a bow, right foot and arm extended.
“Who in the name of all that is holy are you?” the old man inquired in a booming voice.
“I am Ganymede.”
“Ganymede? That is no Christian name. Where is my son-in-law? What is going on here?”
“He is…he is in the library. Please, my lord, won’t you sit?” She indicated one of the large, leather chairs near the fire.
“How dare you presume to offer me a seat in mine own house?” His eyes narrowed with anger.
“Your…house?”
He scowled more deeply. “Do you think that wastrel supports this household? No, his livelihood depends on his wife’s dowry…that is to say on me and my money.” His breathing was labored. “And if you are sponging off him, you are sponging off me. Are you one of those theatre louses he
associates with?”
“No my lord,” she responded, trembling. “That is, yes, my lord. I suppose.”
Oxford came hurrying into the room, then stopped short. “My lord, to what do I owe the great honor of your visit?” He bowed low.
“Do not give me that, you sniveling mongrel, what is this riff-raff doing in my house?” He leaned more heavily on his cane.
“He is a friend of Master Shakespeare’s.”
“Shakespeare?” He spat the name. “Is he here too?”
“Yes, my lord. Surely you know that the Queen has accepted Master Shakespeare’s proposition to write a play in exchange for Master Gwynne’s freedom.”
“Yes, I am aware. Though I have been ill, very ill, I know everything that happens in the palace.”
“I am more than aware of your poor health, your lordship, which is why I tell you there was no need for you to venture out, exposing yourself to contagion and disease. There is nothing amiss here. I have simply offered Master Shakespeare a comfortable place in which to compose his masterpiece.”
“I had a feeling you might be involved in this somehow. Though you’ve promised to give up playwriting and theatre, this kind of challenge is too tempting to you. And I see I was right. If you are harboring that Shakespeare, as he writes, then you are probably dipping your quill in the ink and trying your hand at it as well.”
“No, of course not.”
Lord Burghley hobbled forward. “Do you swear to me? Do you swear?”
Oxford looked him in the eye. “Yes.”
Cassandra averted her gaze to study the floor.
“And this one―” the old man began.
She sensed a finger aimed in her direction. She glanced up. A gnarled digit pointed toward her. “This is a strange one.” He approached her and looked her up and down, his thin lips pulled downward. He squinted, cataracts clouding his eyes. “He looks like a woman.”
The Time Duchess (The Time Mistress Book 4) Page 20