His Dark Lady (47 page)

She turned her mind away from the truth of that. The darkness in her heart threatened to swallow her as it was, without dwelling on how she had ruined her reputation, too.

‘If I cannot marry you, I will never be married.’

Will kissed her and held her close in the small dark antechamber in Walsingham’s house where they had been left to wait while a priest was fetched to perform the nuptials. His gaze fed on her, his kisses tormented.

‘Forgive me, Lucy,’ he begged her in a choking voice, ‘but there is
no
other way. I have admitted my guilt. I have told you why I cannot marry you.’

He had betrayed her. He had made her think he loved her and that eventually, when he had enough money to support a family, they would be wed. Will Shakespeare had lain with her and said nothing of the wife and children he had left behind in Stratford. No wonder she had caught the odd smirk on his friends’ faces as they had walked out together on the streets of London, or sat in the taverns behind the theatres and toasted each other for love. I deserved this fall from grace, she told herself grimly. This is my reward for stupidity and wantonness. Will had never had any intention of making good his promises. It had all been a dream.

She pushed him away. ‘Don’t touch me. How can you kiss me? You are a married man.’

‘I am married, yes,’ he agreed, his voice unsteady. ‘But that does not make my love for you any less true. This is my fault, so let me help you, Lucy. This marriage will save your reputation. This is what must happen. I will not see you begging on the streets with your child.’

‘That will never happen. Master Goodluck will take care of me.’

‘Master Goodluck is not here. He lies wounded in some tavern in the country. You call that taking care of you?’

‘It is not Goodluck’s fault he cannot be here, you know fever has set into his wounds,’ Lucy reminded him. ‘Besides, he has left me to Sir Francis’s care until he is well enough to return to London. His letter made that clear.’

‘And Sir Francis agrees with me that you should marry swiftly, before your condition is too widely known. Otherwise you may forfeit your place at court for ever.’ Will’s hand dropped to her belly, warm and possessive. ‘I would give the world for this not to have happened. But it has. You are with child and I cannot marry you. But my friend Jack is still unmarried and will make you a fine husband.’

‘I will never let him touch me,’ she insisted angrily.

‘He will never try to, my love.’ Will kissed her hand before she could snatch it from him. ‘As I have tried to explain, Jack is not like other men. He does not enjoy the company of women as I do.’

‘How can you be sure he is not lying?’ Lucy asked, bewildered.

‘Jack Parker has only ever lain with men, and professes a loathing for the fairer sex. So you see, you need not fear to be raped or abused at his hands. Jack will never come to your bed at night, demanding the rights of a husband, nor expect you to give him heirs once this child of ours is born.’

‘Why would he agree to such a thing, if he cannot love a woman?’

‘His family have disowned him as a wastrel,’ Will explained soothingly. ‘This way, Jack can earn their love and respect again, and be welcomed once more as their son and heir. For what mother could resist the lure of a grandchild on the way?’

Will kissed her on the mouth, and Lucy pushed him away again. Why did she have to feel such love for him still when he had betrayed her? And betrayed his wife, too. She wondered what this unknown wife looked like. Nothing like her, he had whispered when she’d pressed him, but then refused to say more.
Nothing like her
. What did that mean? Not dark, but fair? Or beautiful, not coarse-haired and plain?

‘Jack is a good friend and he has given me his word you will be safe with him. I have known him ever since I came to London. We have even been neighbours, for pity’s sake. He will not betray me. And he wants nothing else in return but a heavy purse.’ He grimaced. ‘Sir Francis is taking care of that, thank God, for I have barely a penny to spare.’

Lucy shivered and wrapped her arms about herself. So she was to be sold to a stranger to hide her shame with a married man.

Why had she not thought it might come to this when she first let Will kiss her?

Because you trusted him
, a voice mocked her inside.
Because you are a fool where Will Shakespeare is concerned, and you will continue to be a fool, for you are in love with him
.

It had been a warm day, but now that night had fallen the room was chill and no fire had been lit. The only light was from the candles on the desk. ‘I wish Master Goodluck was here,’ she muttered.

‘I know,’ Will told her, going to the door and listening to sounds from downstairs. ‘But we cannot wait for his hurts to heal. There, you hear that? The priest has arrived. You need wait no longer. Sir Francis has even procured a special licence so you can be married
without
the reading of the banns.’ He came back to her side and took her hand. His eyes were intent on her face. ‘I envy you such powerful friends, Lucy. Walsingham has the ear of the Queen.’

She said nothing but pulled her hand free from his. She did not want Will Shakespeare to hold her and kiss her, for he belonged to another woman. A woman whose marriage bed Lucy had already betrayed unwittingly. One day perhaps she would meet this wife face to face. The thought made her shiver. She felt nothing but shame now.

What a blind fool she had been! Now all that remained was to hide her shame, to marry this Jack Parker who would not touch her, and try to be a good wife to him at least. What else could she do? Not turn to her guardian for help, that was for sure. She had seen Master Goodluck’s horror when he’d discovered she was with child. That look in his eyes. No, she would deal with this herself.

She busied herself with straightening her gown, which belonged to Lady Walsingham herself and had been let out at the seams to accommodate Lucy’s expanding belly.

It was a costly and extravagant gown – though not too far above her station if Lucy had still been one of the court ladies, tasked with dancing before a visiting ambassador or foreign prince – and at any other time she would have been thrilled to wear it. But it was pitiful to borrow such a gown to be wed to a man she barely knew, and in the night, when there could be few witnesses to carry the tale to the Queen.

Someone knocked at the door and Lucy called, ‘Come in,’ without even thinking, though it was not her house and she was a person of no importance now, a foolish wanton with no dowry and no parents and no husband, but a child already growing in her belly.

It was one of Walsingham’s serving girls, Susan, a young rosy-cheeked maid with shining eyes and a candle in her hand.

‘They are ready for you downstairs,’ Susan said shyly, curtsying, and stood back with an admiring gaze as Lucy came rustling past in her wide-skirted silver gown, her black hair teased about her head with combs and white ribbons. ‘You look beautiful.’

She was surprised to find Sir Francis Walsingham himself present for the ceremony, although she knew her loose behaviour must have shocked and horrified him. The priest looked sternly in her direction
as
she entered the candlelit room where the wedding was to take place, then turned back to his Bible and holy instruments as though she was beneath any further attention.

At the front of the room stood Jack, a little more unkempt than when she had first met him in the tavern with Will, but with just as engaging a smile. He turned swaggeringly to examine her as Will led her forward.

‘So you are to be my bride?’ he said, then took her hand and kissed it. ‘Such a dark beauty. This is the closest I shall ever get to the shores of Africa.’

Lucy looked at him sadly. ‘Sir?’

‘A jest, dear wife-to-be.’ He glanced at Will over her shoulder. ‘You have the money as we agreed?’

‘When the deed is done.’

‘You drive a hard bargain, Will. But it is not often I am in the home of such a fine gentleman as Sir Francis Walsingham, so I shall mind my manners and do as I am bid. Moreover, it’s late and I would not wish to keep all these good people from their beds over the matter of a purse of gold.’ The young man turned to face the priest, clasping Lucy’s hand tightly. ‘I am ready, Father.’

‘And the lady?’ the priest asked.

‘Lady?’ Jack laughed and peered about the room, as though hunting for some other woman. ‘What lady?’

Will growled at him. ‘Enough jests, Jack. Let the man do his work.’

‘Forgive me,’ Jack bent to murmur in her ear, seeming to regret his jest. ‘Come, give me a smile. I shall strive to be a good husband to you. What more could any woman ask?’

Thoroughly humiliated, Lucy stood in a daze while the priest performed the ceremony. She knelt and prayed, and whispered her responses when instructed to, and stared at the priest’s holy candles on the table while the service continued, imagining herself as one of the flames dancing higher and then lower, swaying as someone at the back opened the door to go out, then growing fat and hot again – until the priest finished and turned to snuff them out one by one.

Walsingham came forward to embrace her, then handed a bulging purse to her new husband. ‘This should allow you to start married life without too much hardship, Master Parker.’

‘I thank you, sir,’ Jack said, suddenly solemn and respectful. He looked at Lucy. ‘Shall we go, wife?’

Lucy was bewildered. She had a vague memory of watching the maid pack a trunk for her earlier, but had not considered what that might mean. She had thought perhaps that they would return to the house in Cheapside after the ceremony, and live there at least until Goodluck returned. With a little imagination, there would be room for the three of them. Though secretly Lucy had hoped that Master Parker would take himself off home to his own lodgings, and leave her to live as she had done before, under Goodluck’s roof, a wife in name only.

‘Go where?’

‘Why, to live with my parents at Aldgate,’ Jack told her breezily, tucking the purse inside a red leather bag which he then slung over his shoulder. ‘It is a small household, but a merry one. When I am at the play, I will sleep near the theatre and you can keep company with my mother until I return.’

He turned away, apparently losing interest in his new wife, and clasped Will’s hand. ‘I shall see you in a few days, I expect. Up at the Tunn or one of the other theatre taverns.’

Will glanced at Lucy, then hurriedly looked away. She thought she saw pain in his expression but could not be sure. Did he care for her at all? ‘Forgive me, Jack, I have to go back to Stratford for a few weeks. I’m needed at home.’

‘Oh yes,’ Jack said, and smiled broadly, his gaze flicking between Lucy’s face and his friend’s. ‘Your wife and three children call, and off you trot to Stratford, all your London friends forgotten. Well, I must accustom myself to such a life. For I am a married man now. Do you not see the chains at my neck and ankles?’

When Will had disappeared into the night and Jack had gone out laughing to prepare the cart in which Lucy’s trunk and other possessions would be taken to the Parkers’ house at Aldgate, Lucy walked slowly upstairs to change. She stood in silence as the maid helped her remove Lady Walsingham’s borrowed gown and untangle the pretty combs and ribbons from her hair. So Will was to return to his wife in Stratford now that he had tidied away all evidence of their illicit affair? What a dutiful husband he was indeed! And now she had a husband of her own. A boastful,
swaggering
boy who had no need, nor any respect, for women, but lay with other men to assuage his needs instead.

Susan was kneeling on the floor, adjusting the hem of Lucy’s old gown. A good-natured girl, she glanced up in concern as Lucy made a sobbing sound behind her hand.

‘Are you unwell, Mistress Parker?’

Mistress Parker
.

The name meant nothing to her for a few horribly blank seconds. Then Lucy realized it was her own new name, and drew another sharp breath.

‘Susan, have you ever kissed a girl?’ Lucy asked.

‘Oh, thousands of times. I have five sweet sisters, thank the Lord, and we all kiss each other, and our mother, and our aunts and cousins, too.’ Susan got up from her knees, looking at Lucy in an odd way. She passed Lucy a starched linen cap with ties, bought specially for her by Sir Francis Walsingham as a wedding gift. ‘Is that what you meant, Mistress Parker?’

‘I don’t know what I meant,’ Lucy admitted, but raised her chin and fastened the ties of the sober cap beneath it. There was no glass in which to check her reflection, but it hardly mattered. ‘Well, I am as ready as I will ever be,’ she told herself, and turned to go downstairs to her new husband.

Part Three

One