In Great Waters (17 page)

John was mounted on his bay mare, his face sober as he traced his way through the trees. Anne trotted her horse up to him with a little more confidence than she felt, hailing him.

John looked up and smiled politely. “My lady Princess,” he said.

“I am glad to see you back at court,” Anne said. It was a few months since the burning; John had been back several weeks now, but she had had little chance to speak to him alone. It was nice to see a friendly face. She smiled at him, hoping for some pleasant remark, some joke to soothe her anxieties about Westlake’s illness, but after a moment disappointment settled in her breast. John’s expression was distant almost to wariness.

“I am glad to be back.” Although his face was still courteous, there was some tension in his posture.

Anne swallowed, but she was determined to manage this.
I would like to meet him
, she said, resorting to the deepsmen’s tongue for safety’s sake.

“My lady Princess?” A faint frown of puzzlement creased John’s brow.

The good-to-eat plant man
. Deepsmen had no word for doctor, which strained Anne’s invention, but she didn’t like to speak nonsense to people any more than she could avoid.

John drew a breath, straightened up and turned his horse around to her. “Would you care to ride with me?” he said.

“I thank you. Do you ride alone today?” Anne got straight to the point. Her heart was beating too fast over her boldness in seeking out
the physician for her to withstand much more suspense in putting the question.

“My father is with me in the forest,” John said. “He and Master Shingleton ride together.”

“Do they look for plants to treat the poor Bishop?” Anne asked.

John shrugged. “I saw them pick nothing.”

“I would speak to Master Shingleton,” Anne said.

“My lady Princess?” John’s face did not change, but his hands lifted off the neck of his mare, as if gathering his reins up out of harm’s way.

“I wish to ask after the Bishop, how he fares,” Anne said. She kept her face and voice blank, waiting for him to close the distance between them with information. Such a tactic would not work with her mother present—Erzebet permitted no one to be more high-handed than herself—but Anne was learning, since her habit of creeping away alone to listen to people, that a request stated flatly and given no justification was not one that courtiers could easily refuse. It felt strange to assume so adult a posture, uncomfortable, but with the Bishop dying, she was not about to pass up any method that might get her answers.

“May God grant him a safe recovery,” John said, his thumbs stroking the worn leather of his reins.

Anne simply kept her eyes on him, not to be diverted. John looked at her for another moment, then, unexpectedly, he almost laughed. The corners of his mouth quirked upwards, and he ducked his head quickly in a half-bow, before sweeping back up again. “As you wish, my lady Princess,” he replied. Not waiting for her to answer, he turned his mare around. Anne followed, wondering what she had done that was so funny.

The two older men were riding together. They appeared to be deep in conversation as Anne and John approached at a canter, but she could distinguish little of what was being said over the horses’ pounding hooves before John called out a greeting.

The two men turned. Shingleton pulled off his hat immediately, waving it in a neat gesture across his stomach to indicate a bow. Claybrook, who was riding bare-headed, turned his horse and raised his
hand. “Good day, my lady Princess,” he said. For a moment, his face had been blank, but a smile quickly followed. In repose, his face was not unlike his son’s, but though both man and boy were smilers, it somehow lessened the resemblance. John’s grin made his face look young, flexible; it was a different countenance from the ageless, agreeable mask his father assumed. “How then, John. I see you have found our princess again.”

“I have, Father.” Anne looked again at John’s face. His expression was puzzling. He was smiling too, but not his usual amused twinkle. Just at that moment, he did look like his father.

“Good day, sirs,” Anne said. “I hope I find you well.” Observing Edward and Mary, she had learned something useful: the more she referred to herself and the less to her interlocutors, the harder it was for them to disoblige her. Sentences in which “I” and “me” dominated over “you” almost always got a better response.

“Thank you, my lady Princess, we are all well today,” Claybrook said.

Anne’s eyes were on Shingleton. Fair of skin, short of leg and a little stocky around the waist, he had a look of solidity to him; she could imagine him easily enough ordering soothing compresses and speaking calmly to his imprisoned idiots. His face was quite amiable in its cast; though he wasn’t smiling at her, she could see the lines curving upwards around his eyes and mouth that suggest years of sweet-faced friendliness. His look wasn’t friendly now, though. His face was pallid, colourless, and there was a tension in his attitude that reminded her of nothing so much as a Privy Sponge forced to keep bathing Philip during a tantrum.

Shingleton was sitting there, saying nothing. Discomfort rose in Anne’s chest, making it hard for her to inhale. The three men sat encircling her, each on his horse facing inwards. Little though she knew either Robert Claybrook or Shingleton, Anne could feel something was wrong. She was an intruder here.

“Master Shingleton, I am happy to see you,” Anne pressed on. “I was most glad to hear His Majesty my grandfather tell me you were to attend upon the poor Bishop. I hope his case is not too desperate?”

Shingleton’s face remained pale, but his eyes studied her, scanning her face with quick movements. “He is most gravely ill, my lady Princess,” he said.

Anne waited, but Shingleton did not go on. Was she too young to be told harsh truths? “What ails him, do you think?” she said.

“My lady Princess,” Shingleton said, “I could not say.”

There was a carefulness in his tone that set Anne’s ears tingling. “Are you uncertain of your diagnosis?” she pursued.

Shingleton swallowed. It was only a tiny sound, but she heard the little tick in his throat. “A flux may be caused by many things, my lady Princess,” he said. “So many I would not care to guess an answer to the question. My only care is to cure my patient as my lord the King has commanded, and that I strive towards. I have enough on my hands without groping after causes.”

Anne did not like to trouble an uncomfortable man, but his caution was frightening. Surely no man who set up model hospitals for treatment of the insane, no man assiduous enough in his study of medicine to rise to the position of Edward’s chosen physician, should be incurious about so deadly a disease? “Strange words, Master Shingleton. I understood you were a philosopher?”

There was a silence. Only a few seconds, then Shingleton spoke again. “A philosopher must strive to do good in the world, my lady Princess. It would be an impious man who set aside the good of God’s creatures for the good of an experiment. My care at this time is to do his Majesty’s bidding.”

Anne drew a quiet breath. There it was again: his Majesty’s command. Shingleton was not going to tell her anything except that he was answerable to Edward. Did he think she was pushing him to go behind Edward’s back? But he had spoken of the care of God’s creatures. There had been some warmth in that sentence. Perhaps he minded that the Bishop was sick after all. “Spoken like a good Christian, Master Shingleton. I shall pray for God’s blessing on your endeavour.”

Shingleton swallowed again, a little louder this time. The movement of his throat under his sandy beard was more free. “You are all
goodness, my lady Princess. I hope I will not offend you, but I have been away from my patient for long enough. By your good leave I shall return to him.”

“By all means,” Anne said. She had wanted to speak to Shingleton so much that it had not occurred to her until this moment that he should have been by the Bishop’s side. Why hadn’t she simply commanded him back to Westlake’s bedside and ridden with him on the way? Out of the side of her eye, she saw Robert Claybrook sitting very still on his horse, and John looking quickly from one man to the other.

Shingleton turned his bay to ride off.

“Master Shingleton!” Anne’s call forestalled him: she had just thought of something.

His horse shuddered as Shingleton pulled the reins and turned his head to her. “My lady Princess?”

Anne lowered her voice a little, speaking as gently as she could. “If there is any ingredient or simple you lack, perhaps I could procure it for you,” she said. “Is there anything you would wish?”

Shingleton looked at her a moment, then shook his head. “I thank you, my lady Princess, but no,” he answered. “I am well provided.”

“I thought you spoke of a unicorn’s horn.” John’s voice sounded very loud in the hushed clearing. The two older men turned to him with a start. Their faces were controlled, but Anne could see the furious glares they were trying to suppress. John looked back at them, giving stare for stare.

“Such items are not to be relied upon,” Shingleton replied. He opened his mouth to say more, but seemed to run out of words.

“I shall try my best,” Anne said. It was there, in the tension of their postures, particularly Claybrook’s: they were angry with John.

“Thank you, my lady Princess, but there is no need.”

“I would not have your offices hindered by want of ingredients,” Anne said.

Shingleton sat quietly, looking at her.

“The king, my grandfather, places faith in your treatment,” Anne said. That was the refrain Shingleton had kept returning to; perhaps he would respond if she harped on the same string. “As his Majesty
wills, so must we all do. And my heart is saddened by the Bishop’s illness. If it would help you, I would be happy to try and procure you such a thing.”

There was a pause. “Thank you, my lady Princess,” Shingleton finally said. “I can make no promises for the Bishop’s health with or without a horn, but I shall try every method. If you may procure one, I shall try my best with it.”

“I am sure the princess Anne can be trusted to search for one quietly,” John said. There was something in his tone that puzzled Anne, some quality of assertion she could not follow.

“Indeed, my lady Princess,” said Shingleton. “It is not good for a patient to have his case discussed all over court. If you were to look for a horn, it must be through your own offices, not spoken of to anyone.”

Anne sat on her horse, hands careful on the reins. “I should not break your confidence,” she said.

“You are all goodness.” Shingleton turned and rode off without another word, leaving Anne sitting watching after him.

Robert Claybrook cleared his throat. “Perhaps you might escort the princess back to the palace, John.” There was a tension in his voice, an anger in his glance, that did not bode well for his son.

“So I shall, Father.” John gave him a straight look for a moment, then turned around and led the way for Anne.

The two of them rode side by side for a while without speaking.

“I must thank you for your trust,” Anne said in the end.

“I am sure you are loyal to his Majesty’s wishes,” John said.

Anne could make nothing of that, except that Edward presumably wished the Bishop cured if he commanded so good a doctor to attend him. This was treacherous ground, and suddenly she was unhappy discussing it at all.

“I have not spoken to Master Shingleton before,” she said, changing the subject. “I was cautious of him. I heard he wished to examine my wits. I do not think he will wish to do so now.”

John looked at her and laughed. Anne rode along beside him, listening, the leather of her reins taut in her hands. A unicorn horn might be possible for her to find. She had never heard of a unicorn
being seen on land, but such creatures must exist in the sea, for sailors sometimes bought them home. If she went out for a bathe, she might find a deepsman willing to listen to her request. She could find a gift from the land to bring them, perhaps, make a purchase. Though the deepsmen seemed to have few wants.

It was how to get hold of a horn that she was thinking of. That was a problem she could address. Neither she nor John spoke of why such a thing might be wanted.

Perhaps Shingleton wanted the horn as a cure-all: many marvellous properties were attributed to them.

Among those properties was the ability to cure poisoning. But that was not all a horn was good for, and it might not be the reason after all. It might not.

T
HE TROUBLE WITH
Anne’s plan was how to get to the deepsmen. The Thames was not too far away, and if she could just make it that far, it would be easier from there: miles out to the sea, but a distance that would take hours to cross on her flimsy, aching feet could be swum in a flash. Even though it wasn’t the season for the deepsmen to be in the bay, she could call to them, from the Thames itself if she had to. The sound would travel. It might do little good, but she could ask them to bring a horn next time they came. If the Bishop lived that long. Other, wilder schemes came to mind as she brooded, that she could swim all the way north to the Atlantic waters above Scotland where the sea-unicorns were said to live, find a horn or join the deepsmen in a hunt for one, but by the time John had finished escorting her home and she was being ushered in, ready to dress for another court appearance, she’d accepted that she had to be realistic. If she got to the Thames, it was the best she could do. It was better than nothing.

Accordingly, Anne woke early the next day. Her maid, Alice Grey, usually arrived at her bedside when Anne was still sleeping, sticks in hand and legs bent in a graceful curtsey Anne admired so much that it had been years before she properly grasped that it was a gesture of respect, not a demonstration of Alice’s stronger legs. This morning, though, Anne sat up after a restless night and looked around her chamber, facing the first of her problems: the sticks were on the other side of the room, and there was no one to bring them to her.

Swung over the edge of the bed, Anne’s legs dangled loosely, grey-skinned and rough in the morning light. While she could coil them like tails, she had never tried walking on them, not without someone by to catch her.