At the House of the Magician (22 page)

The grip tightened somewhat. ‘Then you must tell them you were waylaid by a disease-ridden old beggar who threatened to harm you unless you gave him your fine goose – and a kiss.’

‘A kiss!’ I cried, horrified, thinking that I’d have given him my whole basket of goods and taken the consequences rather than kiss whatever plague-ravaged face lay beneath the filthy cowl.

‘Is’t so repugnant, Mistress?’ He stood, bent of back, his head on one side and looked up at me, but I could see very little of his features, for the porch was dark and overhung by a vast yew tree.

I strained my eyes to see what I didn’t want to see. Was that a plague sore on his cheek? Trembling, I tried to temper my reaction, for I didn’t wish to provoke him. I even tried to smile, but made little success of it.

He drew me closer to him. ‘Would you deny a kiss to a poor old man who’s near death?’

‘I … I …’

‘Or would you, mayhap, prefer to kiss the queen’s fool?’

I gasped. ‘What do you mean?’

There was sudden laughter in his voice. ‘’Tis I, Tomas,’ he said. He straightened up and his hold on my wrist became looser; one that caressed rather than gripped. ‘Forgive me, Lucy,’ he said. ‘I came here in disguise and – such is my devotion to my trade – couldn’t resist playing a jape.’

I snatched back my hand. ‘’Twas not a jape!’ I said. ‘’Twas cruel and I was frightened. Besides, ’tis too early in the day for fooling.’

‘’Tis never too early. Though the hour’s but small, my wit is like the marigold and opens with the sun.’

‘’Tis not at all sunny today,’ I said obstinately.

His hand came to rest on my shoulder. ‘Lucy, I am sorry. Truly,’ he said. ‘Being in Court, where all is bluff and artifice, I sometimes forget the ordinary sensibilities.’

I looked up, under his hood, and could see little but his grey eyes shining and his mouth curved in a smile.

‘Then … then if you are truly sorry, will you take your hood off and let me see you properly?’

‘I cannot,’ he said, ‘for I come in disguise for a reason.’

My heartbeat steadying now, I looked at him with growing interest. It must, surely, be something to do with my elevation to Court. Perhaps he was going to tell me that I must go with him now and begin my new responsibilities.

He glanced about us to see that we were not being observed. ‘I talked with Her Grace long into the night,’
he said, seeming to confirm my expectations, ‘and with Kat Ashley and Sir Thomas Walsingham also.’

‘The queen’s spymaster?’ I asked, puzzled.

‘Yes. But the talk went no further than we four, for Her Grace does not wish her loyal subjects to know how close she was to taking poison without knowing it.’ His voice dropped as he added, ‘Or how close England came to being without a ruler.’

I nodded wordlessly.

‘We talked of you and how you should be rewarded.’

I felt myself flush. ‘I seek no other reward but to serve Her Grace,’ I said again.

‘Quite so. And thus the queen has sent me here this morning to make you a proposition.’

‘Truly?’ Before I could stop myself, I burst out, ‘Tell me, then, when am I to become a lady-in-waiting?’

Much to my discomfiture, he began laughing. ‘A lady-in-waiting? No, I fear you are not to become one of those.’

‘
Not?
’ I looked at him in dismay.

‘Dear Lucy, you’d be unhappy in such a situation, for the women who surround the queen are of the type who seek preferment at every turn and can kick like a she-ass if they think anyone is usurping their position.’

‘Oh,’ was all I could say, and it was hard to stop my bottom lip from jutting out childishly.

He put his hand on my arm, ‘They are titled girls,’ he said gently, ‘highly educated and very aware of their
place in life. They use the Court as a marriage market, each vying one with another for the best catch.’

‘So just because I don’t have a title …’ I began, tears coming into my eyes.

‘And thank God you do
not
have a title, for the queen wants you to take on a more exacting role.’

I looked at him as well as I could, for his face was still concealed under his hood. ‘And what is that?’

‘Her Grace wants you to spy for her.’

‘Spy for her?’ I repeated disbelievingly.

‘To
observe
, shall we say? For that doesn’t sound so alarming.’ He squeezed my arm. ‘She knows that Dr Dee is of loyal heart, but fears that those who surround him may be of lesser mettle. Her Grace wants to know what people are saying about her in the streets and in marketplaces, in church and at hiring fairs and bear-baitings. She wants to know, in short, what is the true opinion of the people. If there is any dissent to her rule she wants to hear of it; if there is sympathy for her cousin Mary and the old religion then she wishes to be privy to that, too.’

‘And how would I discover such things?’

‘Just by going about your normal business in Dr Dee’s household and keeping your eyes and ears open. And, in addition, sometimes I may point you in a certain direction and ask you to give your observations on a particular person.’

‘And would Dr Dee know of all this?’

Tomas shook his head. ‘He would not. As few
people as possible should know. Her Grace will devise some little assignments which will make it necessary for you to come and go between Mortlake and wherever the Court may be, so that your occasional presence is not remarked upon.’

‘So … so I won’t be the queen’s lady-in-waiting?’

‘No. You’ll remain Dr Dee’s servant, a reliable but simple girl going about her duties. No one would suspect such a person and all would speak freely in front of one.’

I sighed. ‘But I so longed to be at Court.’

He squeezed my hand. ‘The Court is like the stage, Lucy. All are players and all is false. Remember that when you pass through it.’

‘But will I be seeing you sometimes?’

‘Undoubtedly.’ He laughed. ‘But whether you will recognise me is another matter.’

He raised my hand to his lips, kissed my palm and folded my fingers over the kiss, one by one. ‘Keep this safe until I see you again,’ he said. And was gone.

Thoughtfully, I continued my journey back to the magician’s house. My life was changing, although not as I’d wished. ’Twould, however, be an interesting change …

I have deliberately not given a firm date for the happenings in this book but it is set sometime during the start of the second half of Elizabeth I’s reign, when the queen was in her early forties. At this time her ministers had not given up hope that she might marry and even, perhaps, provide the
heir that England so needed. There was much public speculation about who might or might not be one of the queen’s lovers. Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, was her long-term favourite, but many a young dandy spent a fortune on clothes and fancy accessories in his attempts to be noticed by her. The queen’s courtship by the French Duke of Alencon went on for several years and they even exchanged rings, but the fact that she was Protestant and he Catholic (and also a foreigner) eventually went against him.

Many of the other people mentioned in this book were real: Walsingham, Kelly, Robert Dudley – and Dr John Dee, of course. Dee was a brilliant mathematician, map-maker, linguist and scholar – but he also appears to have been very gullible. Kelly, his ‘scryer’, purported to have had conversations with several spirits who gave information on how to turn metal into gold, but unfortunately, these instructions were in a complicated angelic language and could never
be properly deciphered. Every philosopher/scientist of the time was searching for the ‘philosopher’s stone’, which would turn base metals into gold and bring about everlasting life. Certain magical items belonging to Dr Dee are on show in the British Museum, and there is a pen and ink drawing made at the time, which purports to show Dee and Kelly in the churchyard at Mortlake, speaking to a spirit Dee has raised.

People were very superstitious in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and astrology was a legitimate science. Those families who could afford it would have had a chart cast at the birth of a child to see what fate had in store. Dr Dee was consulted about the most auspicious coronation date for Queen Elizabeth, and she visited his house in Mortlake several times.

Unfortunately, nothing now remains of Dee’s house and library (once said to be the biggest private library in the country), only a wall in the churchyard, which is said to have led into his garden. Little remains, either, of Richmond Palace, except a picturesque archway and some ancient walls.

Lucy is, of course, a fictional character, but Dr Dee and his family would have had servants and it is fascinating to speculate what they might have thought of him and his magical endeavours. Dr Dee lived a long life, had two wives and eight children, but never achieved the
great fame and riches he so desired. He died, almost penniless, in 1608 when he was eighty-one.

Queen Elizabeth had several jesters and fools over her lifetime. These lived at court mainly to make her laugh and lighten her duties, although some were
wise
fools who would, in seeming to talk nonsense, actually give good advice. One of her favourite jesters was Thomasina, a female dwarf, who accompanied Elizabeth on her many progresses throughout the country. Then there was Monarcho, an Italian fool, and the Greens: a whole family of jesters. As the queen also had a network of spies working under Sir Francis Walsingham, it doesn’t seem to be stretching credulity too far to suggest that Tomas could have been a jester
and
a spy.