Betrayal (5 page)

I have just had the most terrible shock!

I was first to bed this even. Mary Shelton and Lady Sarah were yet to retire to our chamber. As I was about to climb in, I tripped on something bony. It was Ellie’s foot! She was curled up under my bed, shivering and shaking and coughing—not at all well!

She explained to me that Mrs. Fadget has taken no notice of her illness and had cruelly insisted she carry on with her duties. She had sent Ellie to bring all the smocks back from the ladies’ bedchambers. But having been washing bedlinen all day, Ellie was exhausted, and she’d fallen asleep under my bed. Poor thing! Her skin was burning up and her breath foul, and she kept saying she was wretched cold.

I decided that I would seek out my Uncle Cavendish, the Court Physician—dearly hoping that, as a favour to me, he would tend to Ellie.

Mary Shelton came in just as I was dressing to fetch my uncle.

“Who is that?” she asked. She didn’t sound haughty, as most of the other Maids of Honour might do on seeing me nursing Ellie in our chamber. She sounded kind and concerned.

“It’s my friend Ellie from the laundry,” I
explained. After all, Mary wouldn’t have noticed Ellie even if she had seen her about the palace. “She’s very sick. And she has no mother to look after her. And Mrs. Fadget, the Deputy Laundress, has been horrible to her!”

Any of the other Maids of Honour might still have fetched Mrs. Champernowne, who would probably have sent Ellie back to the laundry, and I would have been in trouble, no doubt. But Mary didn’t. Instead she came and felt Ellie’s forehead. “She certainly has a fever,” she said. “We must get her out of these wet clothes. They’re wringing with sweat. She needs to be tucked up in bed in a clean dry smock. We have to keep her warm, since she has a fever.”

I nodded. It was a relief to have someone who knew about these things. I hardly recognized giggly plump Mary Shelton. “How do you know so much?” I asked, very impressed.

Mary shrugged. “I’ve helped my mother look after our tenants since I was nine years old.”

Between us we took off Ellie’s worn old kirtle and her dank smock and I got one of my own from the chest and put it on her. Then we tucked her up in my bed, because Mary said Ellie needed a bed with
curtains around like mine, to keep her from the bad night airs.

Poor Ellie was too feverish to be quite in her right mind and she looked very worried. “I must go,” she fretted. “Mrs. Fadget says I’ve all the stockings to wring out next—”

“Mrs. Fadget can wait,” I said. Well, that isn’t quite what I said, but I’ve made it more respectable for writing down. “You rest, Ellie. We’re getting the doctor.”

“What? You can’t!” she said, trying to sit up. “I can’t pay ’im and Mrs. Fadget—”

“It’s all right,” I told her, getting her to lie down again. “I’m going to fetch my Uncle Cavendish: he won’t want paying.”

So she sighed and rested her tangled head back down on the pillow. “Never ’ad a doctor before,” she muttered. “Not even an apothecary.”

But when I got up to fetch my uncle, Ellie would not let go of my hand, so Mary offered to go instead, bless her!

When she came back she had a very disapproving look on her face—rather like Mrs. Champernowne when she catches me writing my daybooke while I’m wearing my white damask. I saw why, and my heart
sank a little. My Uncle Cavendish was swaying and staggering behind her. I love my uncle dearly, but he has such a weakness for the drink, and I fear it will be his undoing. Clearly, this even he had drunk far too much wine.

“Lady Graishe, my dear,” he said, blinking and swaying over Ellie in my bed, “I’m shorry to shee you ill.” He fumbled for her hand.

I was going to tell him it wasn’t me, but then I thought he might be embarrassed by his mistake and that might distract him from his doctoring. So I kept quiet and moved behind one of the bed curtains.

He felt Ellie’s forehead, his eyes slightly crossed, then her pulses, and then smelled her breath and looked down her throat. “She’s got a quinsy,” he said to Mary. “Quite sherious. No need to bleed, but she musht have hot drinks every hour and she musht rest and stay warm. Hic. I’ll ret—ret—come back in a day or sho.” And he staggered out.

Mary was still frowning. But she politely did not refer to my uncle’s drunken state. “Poor Ellie,” she said. “A quinsy’s horrible. My sister had one last year. She said it feels like your throat is full of rusty nails.” She patted Ellie’s hand. “What you need is a sweet wine posset. I’ll make you one.”

When it was ready, Mary and I helped Ellie to sit up and sip the hot drink. There was still no sign of Lady Sarah, for which I was grateful, as I was certain she would not take kindly to Ellie’s presence. I hoped we could have Ellie safely tucked up in bed and hidden by the curtains before Sarah’s arrival.

When Ellie had finished her posset, she gratefully sank back down on the pillows and shut her eyes. Mary went to her bed and I climbed in next to Ellie. It was like having a bread oven in bed next to me—or a furnace even!

Lady Sarah eventually came to bed, waking me up by humming some song about “hauling ’er up-ay-oh.” I was so hot then that I had to get out of bed again, so I thought I’d write all this down and cool off at the same time—maybe then I’ll be able to sleep.

I woke quite late this morning. Lady Sarah was already risen and gone—off to daydream about Captain Drake, no doubt—and Mary was putting on her white samite gown to attend the Queen. It’s a pity really, white looks terrible on her—it quite drains her of colour. She needs pinks and purples to look healthy.

“Grace! At last!” She smiled. “I have a drink here for Ellie—hot water, aqua vitae, honey, and citron. Give her spoonfuls one at a time, because it is hard for her to swallow. I shall be back soon.”

Well, of course I was very pleased to do it, so I put on my hunting kirtle and sat spooning the hot drink into Ellie and helping her up to use the close-stool.

There was a soft knock at the door and Masou crept in, just as I was tucking Ellie up in bed again. He looked very nervous—and well he might, because
no boys of any kind are supposed to come near the chambers of the Maids of Honour.

“Grace, I can’t find Ellie anywhere, and I have looked in every hiding hole in the palace,” he whispered. “I don’t—”

I moved aside to show him Ellie, softly tucked up.

He sighed with relief. “Allah be praised, I was so full of worry for her,” he said. “That hag in the laundry said she neither knew nor cared where Ellie was.”

“Ellie has a bad quinsy but Mary and I are looking after her,” I told him. “Don’t worry, she was seen by my Uncle Cavendish last night and he says she’ll be well enough if she stays warm and rests.”

Masou nodded, glanced around furtively, and then headed for the door. “I must go now,” he said. “Mr. Somers wants all of us who can swim to come to the watersteps and practise a new tumble for the next time the Queen goes to Tilbury by boat.”

“Wait a minute, Masou.” I stopped him, grabbing a piece of paper. “Will you take a note to that Fadget woman at the laundry?”

Masou bowed. “As my lady pleases.”

It always embarrasses me when he does that—which is why he does it, of course. So I wrote a very haughty note to Mrs. Foul Fadget, saying I was
unwell and would keep Ellie with me because I required her help, and that she would return soon enough.

Masou trotted off with it after another elaborate bow. Unfortunately, the cushion I threw at him missed and knocked a pot of face cream off Lady Sarah’s table.

Mary came back then, carrying some soup from one of the nearer kitchens.

Ellie had been sleeping but she woke up as Mary entered. “Oh no!” she croaked. “Look, the sun’s up! Mrs. Fadget will kill me—”

I held her shoulders. “It’s all right,” I assured her. “I wrote her a note and she can do without you for a bit.”

“But I shouldn’t ought to be in your bed!” Ellie wailed, looking frightened now. “What will Mrs. Champernowne say?”

Mary grinned cheekily. “Mrs. Champernowne has somehow got the idea that it’s Lady Grace who is ill,” she said. “And she won’t be coming in. Now, sit up and have some soup.”

So Ellie struggled up on the pillows and Mary put a napkin round her and fed her the soup. It was a special mess of chicken and dumplings, with a little
egg mixed in—Mary has friends in all the kitchens. Perhaps that is why she is so plump.

When she had finished, Mary produced another bowl. “Now this here is a very nasty willow-bark tea,” she said. “You have to sip it slowly and let it trickle down your throat to help with the pain. But then you can have a wet sucket to take the taste away,” she added.

Suddenly Ellie was crying. “You’re both so kind, I don’t—”

I put my arms round her and hugged her. “Don’t be silly, Ellie, you’re sick,” I said. “If we were in Whitehall Palace, instead of here at Greenwich with Mrs. Fadget, Mrs. Twiste would put you to bed in the laundry’s back room and do just the same as us, now wouldn’t she?”

Ellie nodded.

“So, if that foul Fadget woman won’t treat you properly, we will,” I told her. “And you shall stay right here until you are better.”

I have slept most of today, I was so exhausted. I can’t believe all that has happened since last I wrote in my daybooke! I must begin at the beginning and try and keep it all straight in my head, because if ever there was a perfect new case for Her Majesty’s Lady Pursuivant, this is it!

Shortly after I’d finished my last daybooke entry, Mrs. Champernowne caught me in the corridor.

“I heard you had a quinsy, Lady Grace. I didn’t expect to see you today,” she said. “I must say, you don’t look very ill,” she observed suspiciously.

“I’m feeling a bit better,” I said, trying to make my face go pale by concentrating.

“Well, in that case,” Mrs. Champernowne said briskly, “I’d be grateful if you would run and find Lady Sarah for me.”

So I did. Only I couldn’t find Sarah anywhere.

I went all over Greenwich Palace—even in the stables and the mews—but there was no sign of her. Not in the Withdrawing Chamber, nor the Presence nor the Wardrobe nor the gardens nor the Long Gallery. No sign of Lady Sarah, and no sign of Olwen, either. Eventually, I returned to our chamber to make sure she hadn’t skulked back to bed.

Mary was there, knitting a baby’s biggin cap, and Ellie was asleep. But no Sarah.

Mary decided to come and help me search. As Ellie was settled, with the bed curtains closed, nobody would know she was there.

As we wandered, we tried to think where else Lady Sarah might be: hidden in an attic, high up in a tree, fallen down a ditch? It made us laugh, but none of these seemed very likely.

We were passing through a courtyard, heading for the Presence Chamber, when a pageboy came over. “Er, you’re Maids of Honour, aren’t you?” he asked us.

“Yes,” I replied cautiously, because sometimes the pageboys try and get you to scream by showing you a spider or something. It doesn’t work on me, of course. “Who are you?”

“I’m Robin, my Lady. Do you know Lady Jane Coningsby?” he asked.

“Yes, I do,” I told him.

“Well, I’ve got a message for her from her friend,” the pageboy explained.

Lady Jane has a friend? That was a wonder to me. I glanced at Mary and she looked just as surprised. “Go on then, I’ll pass it on to her,” I offered, keen to know from whom the message came.

“It’s from Lady Sarah Bartelmy,” said Robin, and he screwed up his eyes in an effort to remember it properly. “She said, ‘Please tell my best friend, Lady Jane Coningsby, that I send her my love and she need not worry for me.’”

I stared at him. I’d never heard anything so unlikely in my life. “Lady Sarah said that?” I asked incredulously.

“Yes,” Robin replied politely. “Down by the Thames, when the sea captain gave me her letter to deliver.”

“The what?” asked Mary.

“The sea captain,” Robin repeated. “I don’t know his name but I know that’s what he was because Lady Sarah called him Captain. He was helping Lady Sarah into his boat, and he called me over and
gave me this letter from her, to deliver to Her Majesty.”

Mary and I looked at each other, astounded. Lady Sarah, getting into a boat with a sea captain?

“How did you know it was Lady Sarah?” I demanded.

“Everyone knows Lady Sarah Bartelmy,” Robin replied. “She’s the one with the red hair and the big … er …”

I nodded hastily. “Now tell us again what happened,” I ordered.

The pageboy began to look uncomfortable. “I wasn’t doing anything wrong,” he insisted truculently. “I’m allowed to fish off the watersteps and I—”

“Not about you, about Lady Sarah,” I interrupted impatiently.

“Oh, right,” Robin said, looking relieved. “Well, she was being helped into a boat by this sea captain, and he called me over to give me her letter to deliver to the Queen. And as I took the letter, Lady Sarah, she called to me, ‘Please tell my best friend, Lady Jane Coningsby, that I send her my love and—’”