The Last Heiress (23 page)

Tables with food were set up near the palace itself. There was, as Anne had promised, peacock, roasted and then refeathered. Swans, geese, capons, and crisp ducks in a sauce of sweet Seville oranges and raisins. There were pies of rabbit, small game birds, and eel. Platters of trout and salmon with carved lemons and watercress were served.

There was a great side of beef that had been packed in salt, and was roasting slowly over a large fire pit. There was venison, country-cured hams, and mutton stew. There were silver chargers of the king’s favorite—artichokes—bowls of new peas, and lettuces braised in white wine. The breads were hot from the ovens. There were large crocks of sweet butter as well as several wheels of good cheddar cheese, and Brie from France. And when all had been eaten, and the leftovers removed to give to the poor at the king’s gates, bowls of sweet strawberries and clotted cream were brought, along with tiny sugar wafers, marzipan fruits, and spun-sugar subtleties. The wine and ale flowed endlessly from huge kegs that had been set up on the lawns near the tables.

In late afternoon the archery contests were announced: first the ladies, and then the gentlemen. Elizabeth acquitted herself quite well, but the prize was taken by her sister Philippa, and presented by the king himself. It was a gold brooch with a small ruby heart. Philippa was most pleased, and wished Crispin had been there to see her little triumph. Then it was the gentlemen’s turn, and for the first time that day Elizabeth saw Flynn Stewart. He was extremely skilled and won the contest. His prize, a small bag of gold coins, was presented by Mistress Boleyn.

The twilight was long, and now lanterns were brought and lit. Musicians appeared and began to play. The dancing had begun. Elizabeth was delighted to have Flynn Stewart claim her hand in a country dance. They danced well together.

“Is it wise to allow them to dance?” Philippa asked Thomas Bolton.

“She fancies herself taken with him, doesn’t she?” he replied. “No matter. He is a Scot, and unsuitable. She knows it, for your sister is no fool. And we will be leaving in a few days’ time to return to Friarsgate.

Will you be traveling with us?”

Philippa shook her head. “I am going to Woodstock to see the queen,” she answered him softly.

“Is that wise?” he queried her.

“Perhaps not, but I will go anyhow,” Philippa answered. “As long as my plans are not known to any they will assume I am returning home, which I will immediately afterwards. I cannot desert her, Uncle.”

“She is a foolish woman,” Lord Cambridge said, “and overweening proud. She cannot win this battle between them, and he will have his way in the end.” Then he turned his head back to watch the dancers, and Philippa joined him.

It finally grew dark. The king had taken up his lute and begun to sing a little roundelay he had written for Mistress Boleyn. Elizabeth thought the tune a pretty one, and suddenly her voice was blending with the king’s as she learned the lines of the chorus. Henry Tudor smiled, for he remembered her father’s clear voice, and was pleased to see Elizabeth had inherited it. His roundelay sounded even better for the sweet female voice joined with his. It had been a good day, and he felt quite the young man again.

“You sing well,” he told Elizabeth when his tune came to an end.

“I hope your majesty did not mind,” she returned. “I could not resist. We frequently sing at night in my hall to entertain ourselves.”

“You have a natural talent for melody, Elizabeth Meredith,” he told her.

The dancing had finally ceased, but the musicians played on, their tunes more for entertainment now.

“I thank your majesty and Mistress Anne for a wonderful day. I shall never forget it,” Elizabeth said quietly.

“Your friendship with my Annie pleases us,” the king said.

“I am honored by her kindness,” Elizabeth replied, and then with a small bow she withdrew from the king’s presence. Moving off onto the lawn, she found herself suddenly accosted by a gentleman in a wolf’s masque.

“Greetings, lambkin,” Flynn Stewart said.

Elizabeth laughed. “Have you come to eat me up?” she teased him.

“Would that I might have that right,” he answered her softly.

“But you are a loyal Scot,” she replied as softly.

“Given where you live, and your family,” he told her, “my nationality should not prevent us from remaining friends, lambkin.” He took her hand in his and tucked it into his arm. “We will never be enemies, Elizabeth Meredith, no matter the differences between our countries.”

“Nay, we will not,” she agreed, “but—”

His fingers stopped her lips, and their eyes met for a moment. “Let those words remain unspoken between us, lambkin,” he said. “I think perhaps it is better that way.”

To her surprise two tears slipped down her cheeks, but she nodded.

“First love,” he told her gently, “is rarely last love, lambkin. You must trust me in this, for I am a man of experience.” He moved his fingers from her lips.

“I never said I loved you,” Elizabeth whispered softly.

“Nay, you did not, did you?” he responded as softly.

“If you were only just a Scot instead of a king’s brother,” Elizabeth said sadly.

“But I am a king’s brother,” Flynn Stewart replied. “And now because it is best I will bid you adieu, lambkin. We will not see each other again.” He took her shoulders in his two hands and, leaning forward, placed a kiss upon her forehead. Then, turning, he disappeared into the darkness that was enveloping the palace lawns.

Elizabeth began to cry. It was not fair! It was her birthday, and she should have what she wanted, but she could not. “I want to go home,”

she whispered to the night. “I want to go back to Friarsgate!” And then she felt a comforting arm slip about her shoulders, and looked into the face of Lord Cambridge. “Ohh, Uncle!” she sobbed.

“He is wiser than you, Elizabeth, but that does not mean his heart is not breaking too,” Thomas Bolton told her.

“It is not fair!” she cried.

“Life, dear girl, seldom is,” Lord Cambridge said gently. “Your position as the mistress of a large estate has certainly taught you that. You are not one of these no-thought-for-the-morrow courtiers, and neither is he. Come, let us go home now.”

“To Friarsgate?” she asked, and he nodded in agreement.

“To Friarsgate,” he told her, and together they walked from the palace while the moonlight shimmered on the river behind them, and the lanterns began to burn low on the May-green lawns.

Chapter 8

E
lizabeth slept late the next day. She never wanted to see the court again, but Philippa’s wisdom prevailed over her emotions.

“You must remain until the end of the month. You cannot depart until the king is ready to depart,” she told her younger sister.

“I cannot bear to see him again,” Elizabeth said, and tears filled her eyes.

“What is the matter with you?” Philippa scolded. “Your acquaintance was a brief one. He is not suitable at all, and he knew his place.

God’s wounds, sister! The man is a Scot, and worse, a Stewart’s by-blow. You are behaving like a little girl with her first love. I hope you were not silly enough to be seduced.”

“Flynn is a gentleman,” Elizabeth snapped back, “and there is nothing wrong with being a Scot, Philippa. And yes, if the first man to engage my hopes can be considered a first love, then he is. And no, I am not like these little maids who come to court all aflutter, only to lose their virtue to some overweening courtier. If passion drove me as it has our mother I should have lost my innocence long since to some handsome shepherd.”

“Do not say such a thing!” Philippa cried.

Elizabeth laughed. “Oh, sister, my reputation is pure and will not harm yours, but if I remain away from the court today it will cause no gossip. My moment in the sun departed with moonset. Someone else, something else, will engage the court today.”

“You cannot leave Greenwich without bidding the king farewell. I am certain he will have a message for Mother,” Philippa said.

“Another amusing tirade about her husband, I have no doubt,”

Elizabeth murmured. “Do you think Mother was ever his lover?”

“There was a rumor to that effect years ago, but Mother always denied it. One of the queen’s Spanish women swore she saw them together, and told the queen out of spite because she was jealous of mother’s friendship with Queen Katherine. Mother said it was Charles Brandon, and it had been nothing more than a flirtation. It was before he was married to Princess Mary. The Spanish lady was sent back to Spain with her husband, for the queen believed Mother in the end.”

“Did you?” Elizabeth asked wickedly.

“Of course,” Philippa said. And then she added, “It was better that I did. How would it have appeared if I had doubted my own mother?”

“You think she did!” Elizabeth said.

“I honestly don’t know,” Philippa replied. “What I do know is that there are certain ladies of whom the king is most fond now, but not in a lecherous way. Yet they have been known or rumored to have shared his bed at one time. Bessie Blount, the mother of his eldest son. The Countess of Langford, who was briefly his mistress. They called her the Quiet Mistress because she asked nothing of the king for either herself or her family. Even Queen Katherine liked her. But the rumor about Mother was no more than a whisper on the wind, and quickly forgotten, particularly as she hasn’t been to court in years. Yet he is openly sentimental of these ladies when they are mentioned, and kind to their families. You are the daughter of Rosamund Bolton, a childhood friend. He and the queen have been very good to Banon, to me, and to my family. I believe he would even find you a husband should you ask it of him, Elizabeth. So you cannot leave the court without bidding the king a gracious farewell. And there is your friend Mistress Boleyn to consider as well.”

A small smile touched Elizabeth’s lips. “You will not be friends with her yourself,” she noted. “But if your sister is, then our connection cannot harm your sons if she becomes queen one day. But is not one of my nephews in the service of her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk?”

“Aye, thanks to the king. When Wolsey fell shortly after Owein joined his household he would have lost his place but that the king told Norfolk to take him, for, he said, a duke could always use another page. Owein might have had to come home but for the king. The Howards are a very powerful family, Elizabeth. Your nephews serve the two most powerful men in the kingdom.”

“I will not leave without making my proper farewells,” Elizabeth promised her sister, “but today I wish to be alone with my thoughts.”

“Very well,” Philippa said, rising from her sister’s bedside, where she had been seated. She shook her skirts out. “But do not dream of what cannot be, sister. Consider what you will do now, for you must have a husband. It is rare that Mother and I agree on anything, but it this matter we stand united, and Banon too.”

“Go away!” Elizabeth said, and, snuggling back down in her bed, she pulled the coverlet up over her head. She heard her older sister’s footsteps crossing the bechamber, and then the door opened and closed. Elizabeth peeked from beneath the covers. Philippa had gone.

She heard the murmur of voices in her dayroom—Philippa undoubtedly giving Nancy instructions of some sort. She lay back and considered the day ahead.

It was a beautiful late-May morn. Much too good a day to remain in bed, Elizabeth thought, sitting up and swinging her legs over the edge of her bed. But it was also much too nice a day to go to court. She wanted to go riding. “Nancy,” she called.

Her tiring woman appeared in the door between the chambers.

“Yes, mistress?”

“Has my uncle gone yet?” she asked.

“It ain’t noon, mistress,” Nancy replied. “But I think he is just up, for I saw Master Will fetching his tray.”

“Go and ask him if I may speak with him,” Elizabeth said.

Nancy hurried off, and Elizabeth slid from her bed. Going to the window, she looked out onto the garden below and saw her sister making her way towards the wall gate. Philippa would not miss a moment of the May court, which would be over in just a few more days.
Good,
Elizabeth thought.
She will make my excuses, and I am free for now. Yes!

I want to go riding. Does no one ride at Greenwich? I haven’t been on my
horse since we arrived here.

Nancy returned. “His lordship says to come along, mistress,” she said.

Elizabeth, in her long chemise, hurried from her own rooms down the hall to her uncle’s quarters. She found him sitting up in his great bed awaiting his breakfast.

“Good morning, dear girl!” he greeted her cheerfully. “Has Philippa gone yet?”

“Aye, after coming to lecture me.” Elizabeth chuckled, sitting on the edge of his bed. “Uncle, I don’t want to go to court today. I want to go riding. Can we?”

“An excellent suggestion, dear girl,” he agreed. “Aye, ’twill give us a respite from the tedium I find the court has become. Perhaps I am growing older, but I find court less amusing than I once did. I will be glad to depart it.”

“Philippa says we cannot go until the king departs. Is that so?”

“Regretfully, aye, it is,” he told her.

“But we don’t have to dance attendance every day, do we?” she asked.

“Nay,” he responded. “I know a lovely path by the river where we may ride this afternoon, dear girl. Ahh, Will, at last! I am perishing from hunger.”

Elizabeth saw the small smile flicker across William Smythe’s face as he set the tray upon Lord Cambridge’s lap and tucked a napkin into the top of his nightshirt. “Cook wanted to have the bread absolutely hot and fresh for you,” he said. “The loaf has just come from the ovens, my lord.”

“He takes such good care of me, dear girl. Does he not?” Thomas Bolton said.

“Indeed, Uncle, he does,” Elizabeth agreed, snitching a piece of bacon from her uncle’s plate. “We are going riding this afternoon, Will. Can you join us? You have worked very hard, dashing back and forth to London several times over these last few weeks while Uncle and I have enjoyed ourselves at court. We will soon be returning home. Come and ride out with us today.”