Fire & Faith

by Steven Veerapen

  ‘Aye,’ agreed Danforth. ‘It is that.’

  ‘So his Grace’s men are friends with thon serious fellow? Didn’t know young Father John had other friends than old Forrest up yonder. Hmph. Suppose he’s all about making friends. Odd ideas, that one. He’ll grow out of them, I dare say.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Danforth. ‘I shall keep an eye on him.’

  ‘You do that, son.’ He hesitated, tapping his forearm lightly on the doorframe, before adding, ‘if your friend is hoping to move for reform whilst your master is kept out of the realm’s affairs ... Ugh, like I said, a bad business. Watch your company, son.’

  The schoolmaster bowed his head before stepping backwards and closing the door. Danforth looked again down the Kirkgate, but Knox had gone. There had been something unsettling about the man’s stare. There was something even more unsettling about a ‘questioning’ man appearing in the burgh to meet his friend when that friend was in charge of security at a palace plagued by murders. If only, he thought again, he could have some quiet place to sort through matters.

  ***

  There was no avoiding the dowager’s masque. Or play, or interlude: from what Danforth could glean, the entertainment announced for the afternoon was to be some hodgepodge. Without a master of revels at her disposal, it seemed, Queen Marie would only be able to cobble together some poetry, music, and whatever the press-ganged players could recall from the entertainments staged in happier times. Danforth and Martin had picked up the news and a measure of the excitement when they washed at and drank from the fountain in the late-morning’s crisp sun.

  Again Danforth took the stairs in the northeast tower. This time the doors to the great hall were open, and already music was spilling from inside. In the short hall, men and women in Hamilton and Douglas colours were waiting to be shown to their places, Anthony Guthrie ushering them in pairs. Servants scooted out of the kitchen, ducking their way between the guests, their arms laden with silver trays of comfits.

  ‘I met your little friend earlier,’ said Martin.

  ‘Is that so? Who might that be?’

  ‘Mistress Peaceweaver.’

  ‘Dia– Mistress Beauterne? The French lass?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘What had she to say for herself?’

  ‘Nothing much. She said someone would get a great surprise at the masque. Dunno what she meant. I see what you mean about her.’

  ‘What?’ asked Danforth.

  ‘All sweetness and light. My teeth were fair aching after talking to her.’ Danforth murmured a dismissal. ‘You know,’ Martin, continued ‘I didn’t think you’d like plays.’

  ‘They have their place.’

  ‘All the larking about and that. Thought you’d hate it. You’re just full of surprises, Simon.’

  ‘I should hope so,’ said Danforth, a dryness sharpening his tone. He had no desire to be thought of as a fuddy-duddy. It was a frustrating thing to imagine oneself through the eyes of others. Less and less he liked what they seemed to see.

  ‘Aye, but I’ve never seen you at any of the cardinal’s May Day revels. Fraser was the Abbot of Unreason at one of them, God rest him.’

  ‘I prefer to read ballads and plays for the richness of their language, not for the general bawdry of the multitude.’ He and Martin stepped forward as Guthrie welcomed the men in front of them, the three disappearing. In truth, Danforth had found the May revels too social, too likely to put him amongst his colleagues as a friend. For years he avoided abjured company, preferring to dedicate his life to work. Friendship had become part of his youth.

  As they reached the front of the queue, a voice hissed behind them. ‘A fair day for a farce.’ Danforth turned to see Cam Hardie, a Douglas woman on his arm.

  ‘What – how long have you been there? Why are you here?’

  Hardie was wearing a black-and-grey suit, obviously expensive, with polished silver buttons. He eyed Martin’s livery with a smirk, focusing on the amethyst-coloured faux gems he had had sewn on. ‘Fair buttons,’ he sniffed. The woman laughed, and Danforth could sense his friend’s spine stiffen at his side. ‘They match your eye.’

  ‘I see,’ said Danforth, ‘that friend Forrest has not taken care with this palace’s safety when he allows such a one as you into the place.’

  ‘I am a Douglas,’ said Hardie, straightening his cap and bouncing his head. ‘I’ve more right to this place than some cardinal’s imps.’

  ‘Imps?’ snarled Martin. ‘If I had my dirk, I’d cut that tongue from your head.’

  ‘Is that so? I fancy I could land my fist on your other eye before you might draw blade or breath.’

  ‘How is your friend?’ asked Danforth before Martin could speak. ‘Not fallen on any more daggers?’

  ‘You shut your mouth,’ said Hardie, his voice lowered. ‘You better watch what you say about the Douglases.’

  Guthrie arrived then, preventing any further discussion. ‘Mr Danforth,’ he smiled. Then, ‘Mr Martin. You’re up and about? Splendid, you won’t miss the revels. Heh. Will you be up to a dance? Heh. There’s some ladies here special whom I reckon would take you up. One lady I know has her eye on you. Heh. She’s married, but …’ He winked.

  ‘Ladies?’ asked Danforth. ‘Dance?’ But Guthrie had turned his back and was leading them into the great hall.

  The ceiling soared above them, the voices of dozens – perhaps hundreds – of excited guests rising to meet it in a cheerful cloud. Dismal light poured in through the tall windows to their left, the biggest at the far end of the room. There sat Queen Marie, on her throne on its raised dais. The larger throne next to her was empty. She looked, thought Danforth, desperately lonely, smiling down at everyone like a graceful Madonna.

  Benches lined the long walls on either side of the chamber, three deep. Guthrie showed them to seats in the middle row on the right, giving them a good view of various Hamilton backs, caps, and headdresses. The arrangement seemed clear: the front row on each side belonged to the titled guests, the middle row to those connected with the royal household, and the back row reserved for the menials belonging to palace itself. Danforth and Martin’s view of the low stage – more an improvisation of wooden boards – was weak, but better than those behind them. It was a neat manner of doing things: it was orderly, hierarchical. Some attempt, Danforth noticed, had even been made at scenery, with painted clouds hanging from the ceiling and green splashes marking out lush fields on the stage-boards.

  ‘What’s it going to be about?’ asked Martin. Danforth shrugged. Plays were usually about good and evil, or some mummery about Robin Hood. Much of the enjoyment came from seeing friends and colleagues humiliate themselves. ‘I hope there’s no clown.’

  ‘What is that, Martin?’ Danforth was drawn to the word.

  ‘I hope there’s no clown. Can’t stick them.’

  ‘I thought if there was one fellow you’d be drawn to, it would be a clown.’

  ‘No. They’re always tricksters. Always making you laugh and falling around. But they always turn out to be devils.’

  Danforth nodded, thinking of Senat, the dowager’s fool. She had not even made him laugh. A large figure pushed in front of him, and he drew in his knees, looking up. ‘Good day to you, Danforth,’ said Forrest, glowering down. The man’s arm was stretched out behind him, leading a child. ‘This is my son. His mother insisted on me bringing him up from the town for this flummery.’ Danforth shifted to the left, causing Martin to do likewise, as Forrest lifted the boy, who could only have been about six, onto the bench.

  ‘Good day,’ he returned, ignoring the child. ‘The place is secure for this?’

  ‘Aye. As secure as it can be for this nonsense.’

  ‘I ask only because there was a fellow in here earlier. You recall, the fellow who was with me when Martin here met with his accident. The yellow-haired one?’ He spoke with one eye on the Hamilton men seated in front of him.

  ‘A guest of the clan who sit on the other side,’ said Forre
st. ‘My men are now protecting the queen in her nursery. The rest are at the gates of the palace. Both of ‘em. No one comes in or goes out whilst the play and masque are being performed.’

  ‘I wonder,’ said Danforth, standing and cracking his back, ‘if I might speak with you privately. Mr Martin here will watch your boy.’

  They left Martin showing the boy tricks, and stood off to the side, between the dowager’s dais and the benches, as the lower servants began to file in to the back row. ‘What do you want, Danforth?’

  ‘I noted your speech yesterday.’ Danforth winked, he hoped conspiratorially. ‘Your dislike of these fond capers and revels. I share it. I merely wondered if you should like to speak further on these–’

  ‘I’ll stop you there,’ snapped Forrest, hooking his thumbs into his belt. ‘Don’t shame yourself any further, Master Cardinal’s man. I’m no fool. I know what you’re driving at.’

  Danforth let his mask of friendliness slip, a wasted effort.

  ‘My beliefs are my own,’ went on Forrest. ‘And known to her Grace. If you think to make trouble for me or mine, you’ll be the worse for it. I’m no preacher, no converter. I think as my own conscience directs, with the help of Jesus Christ. Not with your Holy friends.’

  ‘I saw a crossbow on your chamber floor,’ hissed Danforth, hoping to regain the advantage. ‘I saw it.’

  ‘Is that so? So you men peep into cracks now?’

  ‘Whatever it might take to catch a murderer.’ He hoped there was an assured dignity to his tone.

  ‘Keep your damn voice down. Aye, you saw the weapon. I found it there myself at the same time.’

  ‘What? I am to believe that it was only just put there before I saw it?’

  ‘Before you and I both saw it. It was cast there when I was without – dropped.’

  ‘By whom?’

  ‘That’s what you’re supposed to be finding out, sir,’ said Forrest, his face expressionless but mirth twinkling his eyes.

  ‘Her Grace,’ said Danforth, chancing a look over at Marie, who was now watching them both. ‘Does she know that you … found … this weapon on your chamber floor?’

  ‘Naturally. I left the room almost immediately to inform her. You saw me.’

  Danforth thought back. Yes, Forrest had burst past him before he went up to the kitchen. But he might have been going anywhere. ‘Perhaps you would like to speak with the dowager,’ said Forrest, half-turning, dragging him from his thoughts.

  ‘No,’ said Danforth grudgingly. ‘I believe you. Or, at least, I shall trust in you. For the moment. And I suppose it was only the bow that was cast into your chamber? No sign yet of the missing wheellock?’

  ‘No. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to check on my boys.’

  ‘Your son?’

  ‘No, my lads at the gates. You and Martin can watch my boy. These trifles are for bairns anyway, not grown people.’

  ‘Wait, what?’ spluttered Danforth. But Forrest was already striding away, past the stage without looking at it, and out the door. He had no choice but to take his seat, next to the little boy. He looked straight ahead, into the impenetrable square back in front of him. Still he could feel the irritating child’s solemn gaze up at him. ‘Martin,’ he said, through clenched teeth. ‘Entertain that whelp, can’t you?’

  Martin’s nonsense talk filled the time until someone closed the curtains of the place, leaving only scattered wall sconce torches and some braziers lit around the stage to light the place. As his eyes accustomed to the darkness, Danforth heard the petulant voice of Guthrie fill the room from the dowager’s dais.

  ‘Good Christian people,’ he intoned, ‘lords and ladies, lairds and gentlemen, and you good serving men and women. We are come here together to laugh, to cry, to make merry, all. Yet it is meet and proper that first we remember in love our late sovereign lord, the right high and potent prince of imperial blood, King James.’ A general murmur of approval sounded through the hall, rippling like a disturbed pond. ‘And so our first reading comes from the lusty pen of our beloved makar.’ He nodded briefly, and the musicians began to play from somewhere.

  Then hastily I started out of my dream

  Half in a fray, and speedily passed home

  Lightly dined, with lust and appetite,

  Then after passed into an oratory

  And took my pen and there began to write

  All the vision that I was shown before

  But I beseech God for to send thee grace

  To rule thy realm in unity and peace

  ‘The Dream,’ said Danforth, recognising the lyrics. ‘He’s reading from The Dream.’ It was an old favourite by Sir David Lindsay, a copy of which the cardinal kept in his library. It was an allegory, crying out against misgovernment. Lindsay was a great lover of prophetic dreams and poetic visions. He wondered why Marie would have selected that – if, that was, she made her own choice of readings. Perhaps she liked to conquer her fears by confronting them. Whatever her purpose, it brought to mind the Finnart business, which Danforth had just about cast into the rubbish pile.

  ‘Good people,’ trilled Guthrie, ‘before we begin our own vision to delight you, her Grace the queen dowager bids that you dance. Gentlemen, stay your hands. For the ladies shall have their pick of you lusty gallents.’

  Danforth froze as a bevy of women emerged from some hidden passageway behind the dowager’s dais. A hidden passage, he thought, right at her back. Was it being guarded?

  Marie watched them go, one finger pressed against her lips. All were in flowing white gowns, their faces covered by silk masks. The line divided, some going towards the right-hand benches and some the left. The musicians had begun a slower tune, of the type favoured in French courtly exercises. As the women dispersed amongst the crowd, choosing partners, one came directly towards him. He felt the colour rise in his cheeks, hoping that this was the creature Guthrie had suggested had decided upon Martin. As she drew closer, though, the gait was unmistakable. Another, taller woman ambled behind her.

  ‘Mr Danforth,’ said the first lady. The flames of the torchlight sparkled yellow and orange in the depths of her eyes. ‘I choose you.’

  19

  Ghosts and ghostly visions held no terrors comparable to those brought by having to dance before a great company. Especially, thought Danforth, when that company included Queen Marie of Guise and a host of high-ranking Hamilton and Douglas retainers.

  ‘How did you get in here?’ he asked his partner as they took their opening bows.

  ‘Diane invited me,’ said Rowan. ‘Yesterday. I helped her put together some of her cloth after I left Mr Martin. She knew I fancied seeing all of this. Offered that I might take her place and dance.’ She pressed a finger over her lips. ‘Under this mask I might be anyone. Anyone in the world other than me.’

  A heady perfume hung in the air, rich and vaporous. It was, Danforth felt, not unlike the scent one found in a good church or abbey, but somehow more delicate. Queen Marie had apparently abandoned the cinnamon scent she used in her bedchamber in favour of a thick amber. ‘And why have you chosen to torture me thus?’ he hissed. It was arrant foolishness – and for her and Diane, a gentlewoman, to concoct such a hare-brained scheme without their mistress’s blessing was beyond the pale. He considered turning his back on her and storming back to his seat, but that would only invite further attention, spoiling everyone’s good time. He had no wish to be confirmed as Simon Danforth, the cardinal’s sad-eyed, miserable gentleman.

  ‘You don’t like to dance?’

  ‘I have no call to do it. I’m a secretary of the cardinal, not some … courtly creature.’

  ‘But his Grace keeps one of the greatest courts in the land,’ said Rowan, pivoting under his raised arm and bobbing low. ‘There was a muse of dance, was there not? In the nine muses?’

  ‘Terpsichore,’ said Danforth, as the music insisted he draw Rowan in close to him, his arm around her waist. Even in the gloom of torchlight, the whiteness of her dres
s contrasted starkly with the tan of her skin.

  ‘What is your life like, Mr Danforth?’ she asked.

  ‘What?’ It was an odd question.

  ‘Are you happy? Doing what you do?’

  ‘Aye, happy enough,’ he said. Was he? He did not know.

  ‘Can I tell you what I see?’ When Danforth only frowned, she continued. ‘I think you are afraid to feel. You should allow yourself.’

  There was something uncanny in her dark glare. Intense. ‘And you? Are you happy?’

  ‘No. But I will be, one day, I hope.’

  They spun together before separating to arm’s length, each dipping, as they wound their way around the little stage. It was strange, thought Danforth, how easy it seemed. Ordinarily he was horrifically uncoordinated, muddling his right and his left. But the musicians were surprisingly subtle, keeping things slow enough to follow. They might not be poisoners, he smiled to himself, but they were certainly good performers.

  As they moved with what Danforth hoped was a stately elegance, the next couple came close. Danforth saw Martin hesitantly touching his partner. Although her face was hidden, the headdress and build were familiar. It was Diane’s mistress, and Queen Marie’s chief gentlewoman, Madame LeBoeuf. She moved with surprising grace and agility, her arms stretching, like a great doyenne showing the youngsters how to do it. He felt Rowan laughing at the sight, her body vibrating. The lust-filled older woman, he thought, half-smiling. A mainstay of literature, the bawdy, ageing dame preying on young men: the wife of Bath. What others were there? The sweet virgin, pure and innocent. The duplicitous temptress, dark and beguiling. The shrew, full of vinegar. What was the woman with whom he was dancing, he wondered. As he let go, he could not be sure. She seemed to fit no script, with her hard exterior and eyes that seemed to melt from mockery to softness.

  He let the thought dangle and then brushed it away. Distraction. There would be time enough to consider the merits of women after the grisly business at hand had been resolved. If then. He was in danger of becoming a dreamy-eyed fool, like Martin. That was not how he had fashioned himself.