by Jane Yolen
“‘I suppose you will do,’ Uncle said grudgingly, ‘though we will have to see if we can pretty you up a bit.’ ”
“You are pretty enough,” the queen said to me. She put her head to one side as if considering.
I blushed again. Thankfully it was too dark for her to see.
“Hai letto l’Orlando Furioso?” the queen asked suddenly in Italian, then put it into English. “Have you read The Mad Orlando?”
“I cannot read at all, Majesty.”
She seemed astonished. “You can speak two languages but read not even one? How appalling. Are all peasants like that?”
“All the ones I know,” I said. “But I can count the coins we get in the hat.”
The queen laughed, but not in a mean way. “I am sorry you cannot read, Nicola. There is so much beauty in the written word.”
I waved a hand at the darkening garden. “With so much beauty all around, why waste your days staring at paper and ink?”
The queen paused for a moment as though giving this idea serious thought. “But what about writing letters to the people you care about?” she asked. “And to read the letters they send back? I who have not seen my mother since I was eight years old hear from her almost every day through letters.”
“The folk I care about I see every day. As for the others ...” I hesitated. “I do not think they deliver letters to heaven.”
The queen sighed. “Talking to you is like playing a game of riddles, Nicola. Do you know any riddles?”
I confessed that I did not, hoping that would not disappoint her. I was not even sure what a riddle was.
“Let me try one on you then,” the queen said. “My governess, Madam de Parois, taught me this. First I walk on four legs, then on two legs, and in the end I walk on three legs. What am I?”
Is a riddle some sort of test? I thought hard before answering, “You are a dog who dances badly before a king.”
The queen looked baffled and her mouth pursed. For a moment she looked like the old widowed queen. Then she smiled and any resemblance disappeared. “Oh, no, that is not the answer.”
“Then what is?”
She clapped her hands again. “The answer is a man!”
“A man?” I shook my head. “No. I do not think so.”
“You do not think so? I, the queen, tell you it is so and you, a peasant, say you do not think so?” She turned her head slightly, looking at me out of the corner of one eye. “I will explain it to you as Madam de Parois explained it to me. It is simple: A man goes about on all fours as a baby. Then he grows up and walks on two legs. Finally, as an old man, he needs a stick—his third leg.”
“That is cheating, Your Majesty!” I told her, surprised at my own boldness. “A stick is not a leg. And no amount of saying so can make it true. If I wear a hat and call it a crown, that does not make me a queen.”
She did not seem to mind my boldness. If anything, she was intrigued and amused by what I had just said. “Then why did you think the answer was a dog?”
“You were walking on four legs just as all dogs do,” I explained, “but then the king ordered you to dance on your two hind legs to entertain his court.”
“But why do I have three legs in the end?”
“Because you found walking on two legs too difficult to do. You stumbled and knocked over the king’s wine cup, so he had one of your legs cut off as a punishment.”
The queen wrinkled her nose, as if smelling something bad. “That is a very gruesome answer, but it is also very clever. I think it is much better than the one Madam de Parois gave. Though I do not think kings are quite as cruel as you make them out to be.”
“Perhaps not all kings,” I admitted, “but it is what Uncle would do if he were king. Why—he beats us with his cane if we fall or make a mistake, or talk out of turn, and we are family. Imagine what he would do to a dog!”
“I do not think my Francis would ever beat anyone, let alone cut off a leg,” the queen said reproachfully. “Perhaps you are wrong, and kings are kinder than showmen.”
“I sincerely hope so, Your Majesty, for a whole country lies at the king’s mercy, not just a few hungry children.”
We both fell silent for a long moment, though I doubt our thoughts were the same.
Just then, as if he had an uncanny knack of knowing when people talked about him, Uncle appeared. His brow was still furrowed with rage. And because I was standing, he saw only me with the moon on my face, and not the queen sitting in shadow.
“So, it is not enough that you humiliate me in front of the king,” Uncle Armand said, his voice loud and menacing. “You must also lead me a merry chase around the palace to make me look the fool.” He made a low sound in his throat, almost like a growl. “You will pay for that, you little idiot, now and for days to come.”
At that the queen stood, and she towered a full head over me. Her face was a royal fury. I do not think Uncle could have recoiled back any more fearfully if he had found a lion in his path.
He bowed and made abject apologies. “Please forgive my niece’s insolence, Majesty. If I had known she was going to trespass, I ...”
“Yes, I think you are the kind of man who would cut off a dog’s leg for stumbling,” she said. “So it is a good thing you are not a king.”
At that Uncle’s jaw hung slack, for of course he had no idea what she was talking about.
The queen’s face suddenly got a sort of sly look. “I believe you were paid money to take Nicola into your charge,” she said.
Uncle nodded dumbly.
“How much would you take, then, to give her up?”
“Give her up?” Uncle repeated, his normally deep viol voice rising almost to a squeak, like a badly-tuned pipe.
The queen reached into her sleeve and produced a purse, which she offered to him. Uncle took it hesitantly, then pulled it open. His eyes grew wide when he saw how much was inside.
“That is what we were intending to pay you tonight,” she said. “I will double it if you will release Nicola into my service.”
“Majesty,” Uncle stammered, still fingering the coins in the purse. “You ... you do me great honor.”
“I do you no honor at all, Monsieur Brufort,” the queen replied, “but I will not see you pull the petals from the prettiest flower in my garden. Does that suit you, Nicola? Will you stay with me, telling me stories and giving the king some joy? Perhaps this is what your nuns meant when they wrapped you in warm blankets—that the Lord saved you for me,”
I thought for a moment of the troupe, and especially of Pierre. I wondered briefly how Annette would perform without me. Who would keep time to Bertrand’s piping? Or help push the cart? I wondered if any of them would even miss me.
I thought of them all for a moment.
But only a moment.
“Yes,” I breathed. I was more than Marie-in-the-Ashes. I was the captive of the Queen of Elfland herself.
“Come then, Nicola,” Queen Mary said, leading the way back to the palace. Then turning she called over her shoulder, “You will have the remainder of your money before you leave, Monsieur Brufort.”
Uncle bowed to her, but it felt as if he were bowing to me, too. I straightened my shoulders and nodded majestically back at him, but he took no notice. Instead he was counting the coins.
And seeing him counting, I could not help but wonder exactly how much I was worth.
To Uncle.
To the young queen.
6
FAREWELLS
There was just enough time for me to go and collect my few belongings before Uncle took his family away. When I got to the forecourt where we had left the cart, they were all there but Uncle, who had gone back to receive his second payment from the queen’s serving woman.
As I took my little sack out of the cart and set it on the ground, I told them about the queen and the garden.
“Magic!” Annette said, her eyes wide with awe. “Ah, Nicola—you will live happily ever after, just like Marie
-in the-Ashes.”
“A fairy tale,” Nadine said with a sniff.
“But this tale is true,” I said, suddenly realizing I needed to convince myself as well.
Nadine’s mouth was pinched, and a little line I had never noticed before showed between her eyes. “The queen is toying with you, Nicola. Nobles are like that. Passionate about something one moment, forgetting it the next. Tomorrow you will be out on the streets, and this time without the family.”
Only Pierre seemed genuinely hurt that I was going. He stared up at the stone wall of the palace as though he could see through it to the royal apartments beyond.
“Not even the queen can just buy someone like that,” he protested. “You are not a slave.”
“It is my freedom she has bought,” I told him. “Freedom from hunger. And from constant travel. And from Uncle’s cane. It is what I want, Pierre.” I put a hand on his arm, pulling him from the others before adding: “You could stay here, too.”
“I do not think the queen would pay much of a price for me.”
“She said she thought you handsome and she was impressed with your skill. I could ask her. With what she has already paid, she could have us both—quite a bargain!”
He smiled but it did not go as far as his eyes. “Nicola,” he said softly, “Father cannot afford to give away the entire family.”
“Uncle did not give me away,” I reminded him.
He grunted, and stared again at the wall.
“Pierre,” I said quickly, “listen to me. It will not be long before you are old enough to start your own company.”
“I am fourteen—that is old enough already,” he said. “Father began Troupe Brufort when he was even younger than I am now. ”
“Well,” I said, more brightly than I felt, “there will be other festivals, other royal occasions. I am sure the queen will send for you. ”
“I think not,” said Pierre. “Queen Mary does not like Father.”
“We could write to one another.”
He looked at me as if I had just told him we could fly. “Do not be an idiot, Nicola. We do not know how to write.”
“I am not an idiot.”
“You are a flea brain.”
“And you are a fleabite. ”
He laughed, but it was not his ordinary bold laugh.
I put my hand on his. “The queen promised to teach me to write. How difficult can it be? A few scratches like a hen in sand.” Turning his hand over, I made pretend marks on his palm.
Pierre laughed again, his old, bold laugh. “I suppose I could find a priest to teach me some such hen-scratchings.”
Suddenly we threw our arms around one another. What had I been thinking? How could I leave the only family I knew?
“Still here, my fine lady?” Uncle’s voice interrupted us, and we sprang apart. “Shouldn’t you be upstairs with the lords and ladies, not down here consorting with the riffraff?”
I could not stop my tongue from returning a sharp answer. “Ah, Uncle—have you finished counting the queen’s gold yet?”
Uncle sneered. “She drives a very poor bargain. I would happily have let you go for far less.”
What he said hurt so much, I said what I was thinking. “She did well to be rid of you so cheaply, Uncle.”
Determined to have the last word, Uncle said angrily, “If you treat the queen to such a wicked tongue, Nicola, you will be beheaded before the week is out. And good riddance.”
Suddenly I had no answer. Giving Pierre a last goodbye glance, I seized my bundle and walked away.
When I got back into the palace, a serving woman in a deep russet gown and dark scarf took me in hand.
“Come!” she said, and nothing more.
Leading me up the stairs, she took me to a small but elegantly-appointed room where four young women, just a few years older than me, were sitting and chatting at their needlework. The language they spoke was neither French nor Italian but something filled with harsh sounds, between a cough and a growl.
The four were all in black velvet dresses with deep hanging sleeves, starched white lawn at collar and at wrist, and dark black veils descending from small dark caps.
The servant cleared her throat. All four turned to stare at us. Then the one whose striking good looks were all but overpowering waved a hand at the servant, who left at once.
For a moment there was a deep silence. The hand-waver cast her eye over me like a farmer examining a chicken at the market. There was something regal about her: the way she carried her head, the way she dismissed the servant.
“So you are the fool.” Her accent was more pronounced than Queen Mary’s.
All at once I realized that these four women must be—like the queen herself—from Scotland, for surely it was the language of the Scots they had been speaking together.
“A fool, madam? I do not think so,” I spoke slowly but with great deliberation, my eyes lowered. “Though I am a peasant, and not nearly as clever as you, madam, I am clever enough not to insult a stranger at first meeting.”
I glanced up. Her eyes were suddenly hard and shiny like pebbles on a beach. Instinctively my hand went to my mouth. Nadine had been right. I would surely be thrown out onto the streets.
“Oh, la! She does not mean that you are stupid, girl,” said the prettiest of the four, her bright daisy looks easier to take than the other’s deep rose beauty. “To be a fool is simply your title here. A fool is ... a clown or a jester.”
I knew clowns, of course. In their motley, they juggled and mimed on the streets at any market fair.
“Am I to wear a colored costume then? And a hat with bells?”
She laughed. “What a thought!”
“But ...” I gestured down at my poor dress, with its neck kerchief and long apron. It had been good enough for a street dancer. Would it do for a court fool?
She laughed again. “Do not worry. We will dress you appropriately. Of course, now you must wear mourning as we do. The dowager insists. She does not give up her power willingly, that one. But ...” She toyed with a curl of hair that had escaped from her cap, then laughed again. “Mary is queen now. She will see us restored to our former gaiety.”
“You chatter too much,” the regal one said.
“Well, I say only the truth.”
“The queen prizes the truth,” I said brightly, hoping to make amends. “She told me so.”
“See?” The pretty one made a face at the regal one, then turned to me again. “There is money in the royal accounts for clothing for all of the queen’s people despite the old dowager’s parsimony. Certainly the queen will have some costume made up for you.” She cocked her head to one side. “As for your duties—well, there are always fools at court. You will be above them all, of course, as you are to be the queen’s own fool. And won’t that be a flea in La Folle’s ear. La!”
I had thought I was to be the queen’s own friend, not her fool. I tried not to let the disappointment show. “If that is what Queen Mary wants.”
“Oh, that she does,” said the third of the young women, setting down her embroidery frame. Her face was rounded. While she did not have the fine looks of the other two, there was a vivacity to her that shone out in bright spots of color on her cheeks. She stood up and began viewing me from every angle.
“Even between the four of us, we are not foolish enough for the French court,” she said. “We are too Scottish. We say what we mean without putting pretty twists upon it. The French court prizes the quick answer that says one thing but means another. You—it seems—can do both! And you have nothing to lose.”
“Nothing but my head,” I whispered.
All of a sudden she hooked her arm through mine so briskly I half expected her to hoist me onto her shoulders.
“They say your name is Nicola.”
“They say correctly,” I replied. “Do I need to change it as I change my dress, now that I am a fool?”
This time they all laughed, even the one who had been silent
so far, she with the set of amber prayer beads hanging at her waist. Rather plain and still compared to the other three, her large, kind eyes shone in her face like great dark jewels.
“La—Nicola,” the pretty one said. “Perhaps we are the ones who should change our names, for we Scots are each called Mary.”
“Each?”
“Each! I am Mary Beaton, and this is Mary Fleming, Mary Livingstone, and Mary Seton!” she said, pointing to one after another. Then she clapped her hands together as if she had just performed a great trick and was leading the applause.
“Five. If you count Queen Mary,” added Mary Seton, the one with the prayer beads. “May she live long and rule well.” Her right hand made a quick sign of the cross. She reminded me of the nuns who had taken care of me, and I liked her at once for that.
“I am indeed too foolish to distinguish all of you so quickly,” I said. But I had already made up my mind to think of them as Regal Mary, Pretty Mary, Jolly Mary, and Pious Mary, their actions marking them out even if their clothing did not. However, I was not so foolish as to tell them this. “But you will all know me, lest they change my name to Mary as well.”
“You may keep your name, little ninny,” said Jolly Mary Livingstone, leading me away. “Four Maries is enough. But these awful clothes—pah! They will have to go. ” She tugged at the sleeve of my threadbare dress. “The dowager would have you put down like a dog for wearing such a thing.”
“Nicola seems my size,” Pious Mary observed. “I will give her my other mourning gown till the seamstress can come. But clean her up well or she will soil the good cloth.” She picked up one end of a tapestry and disappeared through a door hidden behind it.
7
THE BATH
Come,” Jolly Mary said. ”We are well prepared for you.”
They led me into a small inner chamber where there was a steaming wooden tub sitting on the stone floor. I had never seen any pot big enough to heat this much water before. I looked under it but there was no flame. How many times must someone have emptied a kettle into it! And for what purpose?
Jolly Mary let go of my arm and said, “Now take off that hideous apron and dress. The kerchief as well. And the cap. I am certain you are going to look lovely when you are clean.”