‘Nearly nine, by my calculation,’ he counters.
‘We don’t want you here. Stay away from Rafe,’ spits Melis. I give her ankle a sharp kick. It will make things worse if George is riled. But he seems more amused than annoyed and runs his eyes over Melis, who returns his look with a scowl.
As he moves to sit I nudge the door half shut with my foot to block his view of the front path. He brushes his knees with a quick flick of his fingers though his breeches are spotless. I wonder how he managed to travel all the way from Whitehall to Iffley without acquiring so much as a speck of dirt.
‘I was rather surprised to hear you’d named him Rafe.’ He says the name as if it has a bitter taste. The implication is that he’d expected our child to be named for him.
‘I called him after my father.’ Sliding a hand into my pocket, I find the soft contours of the wax figure Rafe made for me.
‘You always were a headstrong little thing.’
A memory comes to me, something I haven’t thought of in years, of an incident back at Lady Buckingham’s. One of the pages was wearing a neckerchief embroidered with rosemary sprigs, unusual enough for George to remark on it.
‘It was given me by my mother,’ the boy told him, ‘before she died.’
‘May I look?’ George had produced his most beguiling smile as the boy untied the scarf for him to inspect. ‘Silk.’ He ran it through his fingers. ‘It really is rather lovely.’
‘She was known for her skills at needlework.’ The boy swelled with pride but I remember feeling uneasy, for the kerchief was not so remarkable as George was making it seem, only a thing of sentimental value.
‘What I would give for something like this.’
‘Then it is yours.’ I saw the flicker of regret cross the boy’s face once the words had been said but it was too late. He couldn’t rescind the offer and George knew it.
‘Such generosity will surely reap great rewards.’
When the boy had gone, George threw the kerchief onto the fire. ‘Hideous thing.’
It reminds me who I am dealing with.
‘Where are you hiding him, then?’ His tone is light, teasing. ‘I caught a glimpse of him before you hustled him off.’
The air in the room thins, suspicion threading through it like spider’s silk. Beyond the sliver of open door I can see George’s man about to help Rafe onto the back of the vast hunter. Melis, seeing it too, gives my hand a squeeze and says, ‘You must both have things you need to discuss.’ She slides past George and outside towards Rafe. She has smelt the danger, too, but I fear it is too late.
Before I have had the chance to close the door behind her, George has twisted in his seat. ‘There he is. My boy.’ A shadow of disappointment passes over his face. ‘He’s rather small for his age.’
‘He takes after me.’ Defiantly I keep my eyes trained on George. Everyone says how like me Rafe is. If I like the look of him. I hope against all hope that this will mean George rejects him.
‘Why so prickly, Hessie?’ He makes a kind of amiable half-shrug, smacking of false innocence.
It is a gesture I remember, one he used to make when he wanted something. George always got what he wanted. And if he ever met with a refusal, he would simply help himself. That was how he got me. He helped himself to my virtue. He would never have considered that he hadn’t the right to take any of the girls in his mother’s household. He would never have considered that my cries of ‘No!’ meant anything at all.
My monster stirs again, yawning, stretching.
‘My people have been keeping an eye on you.’ He says it as if it is a privilege. I feel stripped bare. Everyone knows of the Duke of Buckingham’s network of informers but I’d been naive enough to hope I wasn’t of sufficient importance to merit such attentions.
The silence is astringent. I watch Melis hustling Rafe and Hope out of sight and hear the kitchen door shut at the back of the cottage.
‘His birthday is soon, isn’t it?’
‘I’m sure your people have informed you of that.’
‘Of course they have.’ George expels a short laugh and seizes my waist, pulling me down onto his lap. ‘The fourteenth day of September. Holy Cross Day. He will be nine. Hasn’t time flown? It doesn’t seem nearly a decade since …’ I try to wriggle free, but he has me fast and he is strong. His smell is horribly familiar. He still wears the same pomade – lilies. The smell of funerals.
‘Don’t you want me to see him?’
I know if I refuse him his determination will be roused, so I say nothing.
‘He needs to learn how to be a man,’ continues George. ‘Not be cosseted by women. He’ll go soft.’
‘He is tutored by Dr Cotton.’ I have a horrible certainty about the outcome of this visit.
‘I’m aware of that. I don’t approve of Ambrose Cotton.’ Red patches flush his cheeks and he tightens his clasp on my waist until I fear he will bruise my ribs. I would rather die than let him know he is hurting me.
I find my voice. ‘Dr Cotton is an upright man. He is Rafe’s godfather and very dear to us. He took us in when our father died.’ I consider that, of course, George already knows this.
‘I will not have my son raised by a coven of women.’ Anger leaks from behind his veneer.
‘We are far from a coven, my sisters and I.’ It is all I can do to prevent the alarm from sounding in my voice.
‘You keep yourselves to yourselves.’ He has tempered his tone. ‘It makes people talk.’
‘We live quietly, that is all.’ I don’t point out to him that I have to couch myself in a lie of respectability to ensure I am a welcome member of the parish. I suppose he knows this about me, too, but I will not cast my situation as anything other than ideal.
George is talking, asking if we aren’t cramped living here, but I am not listening as a sudden new panic has taken hold of me: that while George has engaged me in conversation, his manservant has stolen Rafe away. I twist my neck to gain a view through the crack of the door and, to my great relief, the man is still leaning against the gatepost, smoking.
‘Listen,’ George continues, loosening his grip with a disingenuous smile. ‘I have a proposition.’
I meet his twinkling gaze with a blunted stare, girding myself. ‘Go on.’
‘When he is nine, Rafe will take his place in my household. It is the right age for him to begin his education in the ways of court.’ I don’t point out that it is an order, not a proposition. ‘Six weeks will give you ample time to prepare him.’ He is smiling, taking pleasure in my pain.
I won’t be cowed. I have no intention of losing Rafe to the deceits of court where he will learn to hate me for my modest means. ‘You have a son with your wife. Why would you want –’
‘Ah!’ He doesn’t let me finish. ‘So, you do follow my affairs.’ His tone is triumphant.
‘The whole country knows your business, George.’
He softens his tone. ‘Don’t be like this, Hessie. You were fond of me once. Have you forgotten?’
His face is the image of sincerity and I understand something about George I had never realized before: that he has absorbed the lies he tells himself until they have become indistinguishable from the truth. There is no point in reminding him that he took me against my will or telling him that I never felt anything for him but hatred: he cannot see beyond the dense cladding of falsehood he has built.
‘I don’t think you understand.’ He begins to rub my back with the flat of his palm. I flinch beneath his touch. ‘As my son he will have all the advantages. He will take precedence over all but those of my children born to my wife.’ He looks around the house with a barely disguised sneer. ‘You wouldn’t want to deny our boy the kind of advantages I can give him, would you?’
‘If you knew me, you would understand that I find such ambitions meaningless.’ I am aware I should give him the impression at least that I intend to concede to his demands. But I can’t bring myself to do so. ‘Rafe is happy and safe here w
ith us.’
He releases a sardonic gust of laughter. ‘I’d forgotten quite how wilful you could be, Hester.’ He pushes me off his lap with a pat on my backside.
I step away from his reach, hands tightly fisted.
He shifts and I think he is going to stand but all he does is uncross his legs and re-cross them the other way. ‘I’ll make it worth your while. Set you up in decent fashion – a manor, an annuity.’
I lift my chin and stand firm. ‘My son is not for sale. Not at any price.’
‘I could simply take him. You do know that? Of course you do. But I don’t want things to be like that.’ He tilts his head to the side, his eyes widening with false sincerity. ‘Surely you don’t either.’ He is toying with me, as a cat with its prey.
I know that vanity is George’s weakness. Even when he took my virtue, he sought to believe I gave myself freely, wanted to hear me say so. How much do you want this? I see now it is the same with Rafe. He wants my agreement to satisfy his own pride. I will not give it as long as I have breath in my body. Rafe is not some silk kerchief to be thrown into the fire.
‘How do you manage here?’ He waves his arm in an arc, with undisguised disdain for the ordinary surroundings.
‘Since your people have been “keeping an eye on me”,’ I say pointedly, ‘I’m sure you already know the answer to that.’
He raises his eyebrows, making no attempt to hide his amusement, and picks up the book that is on the table, opening it to read its title: ‘The Feminine Monarchie, or a treatise concerning bees. So, Mr Butler’s book is where you learned to keep bees?’
‘My sister is a gifted apiarist. It is her book.’
He snorts derisively and reaches to pinch the fabric of my dress between his thumb and forefinger. ‘You still manage to turn yourself out well on your meagre income.’
I am sure his implication is that our industry extends to something more nefarious than beekeeping and needlework. ‘We make an honest living here.’ My voice is steady despite the rage seething beneath my surface. ‘Now that you have said what you wanted to say, I would be grateful if you would kindly take your leave.’ Stonily, I gesture towards the door.
He relaxes further into his chair. ‘So much for English hospitality. I haven’t even been offered a drink. You weren’t always so ungenerous with me.’ His leer drills deep. ‘I will leave when I’m good and ready. I have not yet had the pleasure of meeting my son.’
He has risen to his feet and is pushing open the door that leads to the kitchen.
Melis moves to put herself firmly between him and Rafe. I cast my eyes round the room, instinctively thinking of what might best serve as a weapon should I need it.
But George has benignly squatted on his haunches and beckoned Rafe over, so he can pretend to make a coin appear from behind his ear. Rafe laughs and looks in wonder at the gilded stranger. ‘Keep it,’ George says.
Six weeks, I am thinking. Six weeks.
Hope is gazing agog at George and I am reminded of when I first set eyes on him. I was more or less the same age as she is now. Sixteen is too young to see beyond the end of your nose. That was his effect, everyone falling in thrall to him, as if he’d been dipped in the Styx, like Achilles, and rendered half god. I had quickly learned the dangers of such bedazzlement.
‘What do you say, Rafe?’ I won’t have him forget his manners whatever the circumstances, and he mumbles a thank-you, pocketing the coin.
‘I saw you admiring my horse, young man. Do you like to ride?’
‘I do, but we have only a fat pony, nothing like your horse.’
I watch my son, heart bloating until I ache with love. I can’t find any resemblance, nothing at all of his father. He is all mine. It feels like my victory, rather than Nature’s, and I will do anything to prevent even the smallest part of that man from rubbing off on my sweet boy.
‘I have a stable full of animals just like him. Would you like one of your own?’
Just as I think I am going to have to defend Rafe against a barrage of persuasion, Melis steps up to George, standing inches from him. ‘Leave us alone.’ Her face is painted with loathing, her eyes directed at his, and she points her finger a hair’s breadth from his chest. ‘I know what you are.’
I try to drag her away but she shoves me off without removing her stare from George. ‘Traitor,’ she hisses.
I am in turmoil but plaster a smile onto my face, as if it is nothing.
George laughs dismissively, but I can tell he is angry. Beads of sweat have formed on his brow and his voice cracks slightly as he looks at me to say, ‘I should have thought by now that your sister would know when to keep her mouth shut.’ I can see the menace beneath his surface, his words needle sharp. Melis has touched a nerve.
‘Come, Melis.’ I try to persuade her away but she won’t be moved.
‘We have proof. Proof of your treachery.’
‘Stop, Melis.’ My heart collapses. She seems not to realize the trouble she’s stirring for us with her outburst. ‘She doesn’t know what she’s saying.’ I try to sound light.
‘I do know what I’m saying.’ Her prodding finger makes contact with his breast.
‘ENOUGH!’ George’s façade fractures as he barks the command.
‘You’re not making sense, Melis.’ I try to sound placatory. But she is making sense. That is what has nettled George.
‘Don’t make the mistake of believing yourself immortal,’ she says, and marches out into the yard. I can see her through the window, making for the orchard and her hives.
George has regained his composure. ‘I’d advise you to keep your sister under control. Most wouldn’t tolerate such aspersions being cast.’
‘Don’t mind her,’ I say, with a gesture that implies my sister is not entirely in control of her faculties.
His expression is as hard and cool as glass. ‘No?’ He runs his knuckles slowly over my cheek and the air seems to coagulate, like beaten cream.
‘Melis imagines things.’
‘Even so, there are punishments for slanders such as that.’ He pinches my cheek hard. ‘You know that, don’t you?’
I nod. ‘She doesn’t understand what she says.’
‘I may consider letting it go.’ He is back on firm territory, his eyes boring into me before shifting to Rafe. ‘Prepare him well for the change of circumstances. Wouldn’t want it to come as too much of a shock to him … would we?’ Something sharp lodges in my breast. ‘Would you kindly tell my man to make the horses ready?’ he says to Hope, his voice velvet smooth.
Fixing his eyes on mine he says, ‘You will be hearing from me.’
‘Who was that?’ asks Rafe, when he has gone.
‘Someone you should take no notice of.’
‘He promised me a horse.’
‘He didn’t mean it, darling.’ I stroke his shiny conker hair and the soft skin of his neck, feeling his disappointment as if it were mine. I would sell my soul to save him from upset. ‘One day you shall have a horse even better than that.’
Hope is still suspended in wonder. ‘To think the duke was standing here in this kitchen.’
Hope knows George only by reputation: the great man depicted in the news-sheets as more powerful even than King Charles.
‘That man is none of our business,’ I say bluntly, then go upstairs to find my writing box.
Opening it, I pull out all of the papers and tuck my fingernail under the base, lifting up the false bottom, drawing out a bundle of correspondence, yellowed at the edges and pocked with age. I flick through it, making sure all the letters are there in George’s distinctive, forward-thrusting handwriting and the replies bearing the Spanish ambassador’s seal.
I am back in his study at Whitehall, on the floor gathering up the mess of fallen papers. He must have assumed me too ill-educated to understand what they were, probably assumed I couldn’t read. I could read and was perfectly able to deduce from the pages I skimmed over that George had been passing state secrets to
our enemy, Spain. To what ends, I still don’t understand, but it was treason, of that I had no doubt.
His carelessness in leaving such sensitive material open even to the eyes of a maid he assumed illiterate might have seemed surprising to someone who didn’t know him. But you had only to know him a little to understand the profound belief he held of being untouchable.
I’d selected a few of the more incriminating pages, which I stuffed under my dress, spending that final night at Whitehall wide awake and petrified that he would spot they were missing. I might have been young and ignorant but I was never so much of a fool to believe I might not need to protect myself. From what exactly, I didn’t know at the time. It was my orphan’s sense of self-preservation, I suppose.
Looking through the papers now, I wonder if the years that have passed have rendered obsolete their potential to damage him. But treason is treason, and in the intervening years George has accrued powerful enemies who would be glad of such potent ammunition.
I return them to their cache, and don’t mention them when I write to Ambrose, asking his advice on my predicament.
Ambrose’s reply arrives early the following morning. We must get you away from Orchard Cottage before Rafe’s birthday, he writes emphatically. I can make arrangements for you to go somewhere safe. Prepare to leave by the end of the month and don’t advertise your departure to a soul. The words Burn this, once read bring home to me the reach of my adversary, but I am relieved at least that Ambrose has a plan for us.
That afternoon, Mr Worley, George’s foppish manservant, arrives with a package for Rafe. It contains a suit of clothes, stiff and ugly with embellishment. The sight of it angers me, as does the book of etiquette that is packed with it and the letter with detailed instructions for Rafe’s preparation.
Worley hovers, with his irritating air of contempt, suggesting I might wish to reply to the duke. I snap at him, telling him to wait in the kitchen. Taking out my writing things, I am subsumed with a terrible sense of hopelessness. We can hide but George will find us eventually. I begin to write, the pen scratching deeply into the paper as my misery turns to rage.
It is only as I watch Worley leave at full-pelt for Whitehall with the reply – I would rather die than hand my son into your care – that my anger subsides, giving rise to the sickening feeling that I have made an irreversible and terrible mistake. My gut contracts, painful as colic, with the recollection of what else I wrote: I can prove you once committed treason and I am not afraid to use that knowledge, should you try to take my son from me.
The Honey and the Sting Page 4