We Speak No Treason Vol 1 Read online

  ‘I must find my lady,’ I said wildly. ‘I shall be sore beaten.’ Groaning, Agnes pulled the covers over her head.

  I ran downstairs, under the bright latticed moon. I knew my mistress. Useless to say she had dismissed me; useless to plead that she herself had vowed no need of me; I saw only her fury as I ran through the midnight house, now dark, now bright. She was not in the chapel, and her bedroom was deserted, save for the little dog snug-curled in the centre of the bed. I went next to the chamber of Jacquetta of Bedford, hoping Elizabeth might have tarried to bid good night. Only a candle burned there, slow and lonely. My hand slid like silk on the banister. Small and demented, I reached the hall. The parlour was unoccupied. More candles whispered there, softened tallow dropping like gentle tears.

  I could have crept back to my bed. Years later, with all the mists gone from my eyes, I wished I had done that very thing, knowing that a thousand beatings would have been small sacrifice and, but for my witless pursuit of a duty, my whole existence changed.

  I spun on my heel, shaking, as a sharp noise brought the blood to my face. I was unquiet, prowling the manor at this hour. Ghosts and demons rushed about me, catching at my breath, then the sound came again: a rough, grating buffet, and I knew it as the outer door swinging on its hinge. So, angry at my own dread, I went firm and resolute to make it fast. Even as I reached for the latch, it blew open again, and I saw my lady and her mother, limned clear upon the shining lawn. I opened my mouth to call to them and in that instant saw what they were about. My mouth stayed open. Unbelievingly, I watched the Duchess raising both hands to the moon’s blank face. In one of them a small object gleamed. I put my foot over the doorsill to see better. It looked like a small manikin, a baby such as cottars’ children play with, rough-cut from wood, or wrought in some fast-hardening substance. The Duchess leaned towards her daughter. Her voice came clearly through the soft white night.

  ‘Have you his hair?’

  Elizabeth scratched in the beaded pouch that never left her waist.

  ‘Yes, Madame—I took three strands last time, but it grows less easy... I pray God...’

  The Duchess hissed like a snake.

  ‘Woman! Do not invoke that Name at this late hour in our work! Know you not that all power lies close... Our task is nearly done. Be still.’

  ‘All power!’ repeated Elizabeth. She looked about fretfully. I shrank back into the dark porch.

  ‘Yea! All richness, all knowledge, all might! From the moment of your birth, all was written, and shall be. Give me the hair, then. I have his blood, mixed in the image. His blood; where his hand was torn upon your brooch.’

  ‘Madame,’ I heard Elizabeth say uneasily, ‘is there still need for this? Is not the prize gained already, I ask you?’

  Heedlessly, her mother stretched bony arms to the sky.

  ‘Mithras attend me,’ she said devoutly.

  ‘Fortune defend me,’ cried Elizabeth. Then: ‘But, all is arranged—he will be here tomorrow, and were we caught at this craft... ah, Jesu! we should lose everything!’

  I saw the Duchess’s snarling teeth, like an animal’s.

  ‘Men are fickle, daughter, fickle, fickle!’ she crooned. ‘Let’s leave naught to chance. Forget not the other! Had she slipped your mind?’

  ‘Nay,’ said Elizabeth, twisting her hands together. ‘But he’s mad for me!

  Jacquetta of Bedford was busy with the manikin, binding something about its head. From her pouch Elizabeth took another small figure, one that had breasts and was crowned with a gilded wisp.

  ‘Shall they embrace?’ she asked, bringing the thing close to the larger one. As she spoke, a black shape trotted over the lawn with a little lilting noise. The Duchess stooped and lifted it in her arms.

  ‘Ah, Gyb, my sweet!’ she cried softly. ‘See, daughter, I did not need to call him. Now he can bind the charm. Yea, place them together, so...’ and I saw my lady mould the little dolls as one... ‘And the pelt of a black beast can seal the matter.’

  She rubbed the entwined manikins swiftly over Gyb’s arched back. He let out a high hoarse cry and leapt from Jacquetta’s grasp into the shadows. The Duchess laughed, a pleased noise, and muttering, elevated both figures towards the moon.

  ‘Attend me, Mithras,’ said Elizabeth, kneeling. ‘And send me my heart’s desire.’

  A terrifying little wind arose. It swayed the dark massed yews and ruffled the pale flower-heads sleeping against the stone house wall. It passed curiously through my hiding-place, and with cold mocking fingers lifted my hair. A drum throbbed fiercely. I touched my breast with the Blessed Sign; I touched the drum; it was my heart. For a further instant I stood motionless, staring to where the Duchess held the figures high, like a priest raising the Eucharist to heaven. The wind dropped, leaving me more afraid than ever in my life. Even when Elizabeth and her mother began to cross the lawn towards me, I could not move. Then, at the last second I ran back; I slid into a little closet before they reached the door. In the passage without, a candle bloomed. I heard a man’s voice, a deep, soft chuckle. So Anthony Woodville had also left his bed.

  ‘Is it done?’

  ‘Aye, my lord. I’m drained of strength.’

  He laughed again, unquietly. ‘May our lady mother’s wiles bring fruit, sweet sister. Yet I doubt not that yours would have sufficed.’

  ‘It will be a rich harvest, my son,’ said the Duchess wearily. She said again: ‘All is written.’

  ‘It’s heresy.’ This, with a trace of fear. ‘Remember Eleanor Cobham!’

  ‘Bah!’ said the Duchess scornfully. ‘She grew careless. And this is worth any hazard. You will see, a year hence. Come, Gyb!’

  Calling him softly, she went away. I stayed in the closet. A quivering ran up and down my sides, as if I were being stroked with feathers. Then I felt a soft nudging round my legs. A roaring purr filled the chamber, and I knew it to be, not the foul fiend, but Gyb. I dared not even shove him away with my foot. The Duchess was returning.

  ‘To bed, Mother, I pray you.’ Elizabeth’s voice was alarmingly close. ‘I’ll need you in the morning, fresh and bright.’

  ‘I can’t find my sweeting,’ said the Duchess petulantly. ‘Puss? Where are you, poppet?’

  ‘I will find the creature, Madame,’ said Anthony Woodville easily. ‘Go now. I’ll bring him to your chamber.’

  Lady Elizabeth soothed her mother away. As their slow steps faded, I stood, frantically plotting escape. There was no way out other than by the door into the passage. I heard Anthony Woodville calling the cat. Fiend that he was, Gyb yelled in answer. He pressed against my legs, uttering pleased chirps and a long, wise wail. The candlelight grew brighter. Filled with terror, I closed my eyes. A drop of hot wax fell on my neck. My eyes flew open: Anthony Woodville, tall, slender, elegant, looked musingly down at me. Gyb sprang to him, rubbing and roaring. Gently, he was pushed aside.

  ‘Away, Gyb!’ be said, just as if I were not trembling there in the flickering light. ‘You are a plaguey monster. You have put hairs upon my new hose.’

  His voice did not hold the anger I dreaded.

  ‘Well, maiden?’ he said. ‘Why do you dawdle here? I was about to make fast the doors. We are late tonight.’

  I swallowed. My throat was dry as old bread.

  ‘Speak!’ he said, more sternly. ‘Are you moonstruck?’

  I found my voice; I begged his pardon. I was but looking for my lady, I said—I was passing sorry. In my sight, his features looked long and thin. Sharp.

  ‘Did you find her?’ he said. His voice was gentle again.

  ‘She was without.’ I pointed to the door. I trembled. Then I heard him whisper a quiet oath, bitten off midway.

  ‘Tell me, good maid,’ he said, in the same even tone, ‘how long were you here? You surely saw my sister and my mother in the garden—why did you not go out to them?’

  Then, he needed no answer. My chattering teeth, my face, sufficed to inform him that I had seen something not for my ey
es, bewildering and wholly bad, yet not altogether understood. I felt his long fingers on my arm. They gripped tight.

  ‘What saw you, maiden?’

  ‘They were playing with the cat.’

  ‘What more?’ His fingers bit my bones.

  Suddenly something made me wise, more than I deserved. ‘Naught else, my lord,’ I said steadily.

  He remained silent. I made a tiny flurried motion towards escape. His hand stayed firm.

  ‘Do you dream o’ nights?’ he asked..

  ‘Yes, sir, but why...’

  ‘And your dreams are passing real, I doubt not,’ he broke in. My arm was beginning to ache. ‘So real, so true, that when you wake, you vow the dream was part of life. Is’t so?’

  ‘Yea.’ My trembling stirred the candle flame. He smiled. His grasp relented. I rubbed my shoulder with an icy hand, my eyes fixed on his face.

  ‘I’ve hurt you,’ he said wonderingly. With great delicacy he drew aside the collar of my gown. ‘How easy it is to bruise young flesh!’ he murmured. ‘Last week in London I saw a wench flogged at the cart’s tail. The poor wretch had stolen a trifle of her mistress’s beauty salve. And, though this good dame was fond of the child, she had no choice but to watch her punished. Unfair, think you? I vow there’s no maid alive who does not snatch a morsel of this cream and that lotion, especially if the mistress be old and ugly, the maiden fair. Is it not fitting for hands that prepare the bath to take a little healing balm to cheer their soreness? Or perfume to lighten a weary heart?’

  In his eyes I saw myself, a tiny, wavering figure. He knew about the rose-water cream. ‘My lady is not old and ugly, sir,’ I whispered. Through my lashes I saw on his face a look that reminded me of Gyb, after devouring a bird.

  ‘Yes, whipped at the cart’s tail,’ he said, musing. ‘Jesu! how that poor damsel’s back was bloody! A pretty skin. But that was at the start of her journey.’

  My stomach began to churn and plunge, like the courtier’s horse. I began to cry. Anthony Woodville lifted my face with one finger.

  ‘Do not weep,’ he said. ‘All shall be well, if you are wise. What saw you this night?’

  ‘Naught, my lord,’ I sobbed, and this time I myself believed it.

  He smiled. ‘You had a dream,’ he said, and his eyes were large and sharp, eyes from a dream. ‘Back to your bed. Tomorrow, you shall bring in the May.’

  Agnes wondered why I wept. She held me in her arms and nursed me sleepily. But I would not tell her. I would tell no one of the dark and hateful things—then I had no wish to speak of them. And strangely, all was as my lord had said. The night faded, in the space of my drying tears, as if it had never been.

  We were waked by a merry sun, and fat Agace banging on the door, dressed already in her scarlet kirtle, with glowing face to match—through joy, for we were to go a-Maying, all of us down to the smallest scullion; all of us, without exception.

  ‘They will have to get their own dinner,’ snickered Agnes. For a league she jested, making me laugh with images of my Lady Elizabeth’s cherished hands cooking mutton, of her mother washing platters. I sat behind her astride the spavined palfrey, treading the road-ruts to Stoney Stratford. The day was merry. Great swathes of persil foamed in the ditches, the may-bloom hung low, and my heart lifted, through laced branches, to meet the blossom, its delicate cream and pale rose and its nested harvest of small birds, singing.

  My head was bare, save for a chaplet of primroses, for Agnes said it was right seemly for a feast-day maid to go thus, and bother the priests! The sun turned my hair to gold, to fire; I saw it, falling so bright and sheen below the palfrey’s dusty sides. My lady’s cast-off gown fit snugly, slashed a thigh’s length to reveal, under its gay russet, a glimpse of tender green silk. The neck was low; Agnes had pounched and padded my bosom to show it off. The sleeves were slit in twenty tiny fronds. Five years from fashion it might have been, but I was sore enamoured of it. And I had washed my face in May dew; nay, I had rolled in it naked, so that every limb had danced and tingled with the soft, gay tears of spring. Then I had made my lady Elizabeth ready for the day. Still pale, but with a hidden glow, like a may-bud, she had tossed aside the dark dress I offered her. ‘Away with the old black gowns!’ I dared not ask her reason, either for this or for her sudden disdain of the widow’s headgear; her choice was a small gold hennin with a high veil to match a dress, shimmering and dawn-rosy, that I had not seen before. I merely knelt to straighten the long skirt and attach the broad gold cincture about my lady’s weasel-waist. Before the sun was clear of the great oak’s topmost bough, she drove me from the chamber.

  ‘Lady Elizabeth gave me some money.’ I stretched my arm past Agnes’s cheek, to show the half-angel in my palm. ‘And wished me good fortune at the fair.’

  ‘The Duchess gave me a beating,’ she answered tartly. ‘Because I was not spry enough dressing her. Jesu, what masters! I must find me a great lord who will burn Grafton about their heads. There’s a love-spell I wished I’d tried now. I’m sick of being whipped, and cursed, and virgin.’

  ‘Don’t, Agnes,’ I whispered.

  ‘Don’t what?’

  ‘Talk of spells, love-craft. I would not see you damned.’

  She reined in to laugh like a woodpecker. ‘Well, Mistress Pope-Holy!’ she cried. ‘And what’s amiss? A little flower, a straw in the wind—all good customs, to hurt man nor beast. Hawthorn-wench, you’re as guilty as I!’

  Yea, my true love would come from the north. It was then that I began to hate the hawthorn, for, after what I had seen last night, which, though sunk deep in my mind’s pit still brought unease, my little wistful ruse ranked itself with the worst spells of all.

  ‘A great lord, then, Agnes?’ I asked, for diversion. The pony grazed. ‘Would you desert Master Silversmith?’

  She half-turned. ‘How should I do that?’ she demanded. ‘I’m his by troth-plight—no other marriage would be valid.’ The sunlight caught her dimples. ‘Besides, I lust for Master Jack right well. He’s a strong leg, a lickerish eye...’

  The groom escorting Dick and Thomas Grey ahead, came trotting back.

  ‘Would to God you wenches would cease chattering,’ he said discourteously. ‘We’ll not make Stoney Stratford before noon.’

  ‘Bite your tongue,’ said Agnes. ‘Why all the haste? You’re like my lady. She chivvied me out of the house an it were on fire.’

  ‘Yea, they seemed passing anxious to see our backs,’ muttered the groom, hauling the pony’s head out of the succulent ditch.

  ‘Why, here’s another in a hurry!’ cried Agnes, staring up the road. Towards us rode a horseman. A black cloak flew behind him like a dusty sail. His mount’s hide boiled with sweat. He rode without skill; as he reached us, his horse swerved blindly and struck the groom’s beast, sending horse and rider plunging towards the hedge. He stopped to ask no pardon, but spurred on hotly and galloped off the way we had come. The groom struggled out of the ditch, shaking off broken blossoms.

  ‘Pox take you!’ he yelled after the departing figure.

  Agnes said wonderingly: ‘Was that not Master Daunger?’

  Yes, ’twas Daunger. He had swivelled his chalky whey-face and hanging lip towards us for an instant. Daunger, a dangerous name. Do-this-night-as-I-have-said Daunger. I kept silent.

  ‘Is the clerk for Grafton again, then?’ Agnes murmured. ‘More pious instruction for my lady?’

  ‘Not today,’ I only whispered. She had been like a spray of may-bloom, ready to flower. Could the clerk be her lover? I did not know what it was that lovers did that was so pleasant and nice and full of sin. Yet whatever it was I knew that chaste Elizabeth did it not. Agnes stood in the stirrups and clapped her hands, and I forgot all about Master Daunger, and cried with her: ‘Look! the May Pole!’

  Stoney Stratford opened to us round a bend in the road. Every house door stood wide. More hawthorn, scattered with blossoms, stood in great branches at every porch. Garlands of meadow-sweet and cowslips hung from
window and door frame. Folk thronged the narrow street, laughing, singing, crowned with flowers, with periwinkle, wild rose and young ivy; and in the square, with a breeze lifting its twelve gaudy streamers, the great ash-pole grew upwards to the sky. Dressed from tip to ground with wreaths of marsh-marigold, primroses and may, it stood winking in the sun. On its head lay a ring of royal lilies. ‘Worship me,’ it said.

  Children ran to meet us. One pushed a nosegay into my hand, violets clustered with harebell and eglantine, still dew-damp.

  ‘Oh, Agnes,’ I said, lost in delight. ‘Look, Agnes!’

  Agnes’s eyes darted about. She flirted her lashes at an elderly merchant, pursed her lips as a band of young clerks rolled by, arms linked. Flushed with ale, they bawled a chant far from holy. ‘How wicked the world is!’ she said, with dancing eyes.

  We halted on the green, where there seemed to have congregated a host of young men. As we dismounted one fell in courtly pose upon his knee, clutched his heart and feigned a swoon. At the comical look on his face I burst out laughing. Agnes swept by with a hauteur worthy of the Duchess. I looked up at the ring of faces. A youth in a blue doublet held a buttercup under my chin and guffawed. I heard: ‘Great Jesu, that maiden’s hair!’ and ‘But maiden-hair’s a herb, Will, and she’s a flower, yea, by the Rood.’ ‘Deflower, say you?’ A great burst of mirth, and Agnes’s cross, seizing hand. ‘Stay close.’ I caught the tail of a voice, strange and yearning, like the look in John Skelton’s eyes. ‘Little and young, I grant you. But by my mother’s soul, she lights my fire!’

  So I was conscious of the hot stares of men. Their looks were like lances, to prick and delve, to consume me. I knew the object of their joy. It rippled about me, hued like autumn fire, cloth of gold, a beech-nut, taking the colour from the flowers, laughing back at the sun. I say this in no conceit, for from my hair’s lustre came more fear than pride, that day.

  Agnes whispered: ‘Come! We’ll lose the others, or we’ll be put in charge of Tom and Dick!’ and tugged me, squirming, through the crowd to the far side of the green, where men were shooting at the butts and slender wands, and the sweetmeat booths were set up cheek by jowl with the ale-wagons.