Maid of Secrets (18 page)

“It’s excessive,” Cecil said, and rolled his eyes.

Walsingham shrugged. “It’s done. Do you take issue with the subterfuge, Miss Fellowes?”

“I— No, Sir Francis. I don’t.” Too surprised to be relieved, I struggled to catch up. “So this was a . . . misdirection? You’ve chosen no husband for me?”

“Not yet, no,” Walsingham said. Wait . . . not
yet
? But he continued, oblivious to my thoughts. “We brought you here to discuss your assignment regarding the Queen and her possible paramour. What have you learned? You’ve had more than a week since the ball, and yet I see no progress.”

So here it was. Hastily I reordered my thoughts. I’d been expecting this conversation—just not layered in such deceit. “The Queen has been traveling since just last night,” I said smoothly. “When at Windsor she rarely dines alone, and when she is not in her Presence or Privy Chamber, she’s taking her exercise, riding, or spending time in contemplation. Always she is accompanied by her ladies-in-waiting unless she seeks real privacy; in which case, Kat Ashley attends her.”

They knew all this, of course. “Your point?” asked Walsingham.

“The Queen’s chambers are protected by a rotating guard, and her royal bed by another layer of protection—her ladies of the bedchamber. For her to slip away in the dark of night and tarry in another set of rooms would be difficult, but not impossible. Guards, after all, can be bought. I suggest that rather than push me upon Her Grace within her bedchamber, you add a new man to the guard outside it—a man you trust to follow your orders over the Queen’s—and have him make the reports you seek. Not me.”

I thought this had all been rather neatly done, but Walsingham seized on a portion of my speech I had not anticipated.

“If the Queen were to tarry in another set of rooms, as you state it, Miss Fellowes,” he asked with genuine interest, “where would those rooms be?”

Instantly Saint George’s Hall sprang to mind, with its moldering tapestries hanging from great stands and its dusty furniture and old rushes. It wasn’t a pleasant room, but it
would be private. And I would never suggest it to these two, that much was certain.

“There are several possibilities,” I said instead. “I am ruling them out as I go. However, it is unlikely that the Queen would journey very far afield from her own bedchamber. There is too much opportunity for her to be caught out.” I came to my second gambit. “So in addition to your bribing a guard, I also think I should simply narrow down the choices of rooms where she might visit, and then set a watch from a central vantage point.”

“I see,” Walsingham said. “And this will take some time, I suspect?”

I nodded gravely. “Indeed it will, to give the task its due. You would not want me to misstep in a matter of such vital importance.”

“You’ve a fortnight, no more,” Cecil growled from behind Walsingham. Leave it to Cecil to bring a ray of sunshine into the conversation.

“I will give you my report then.”
Or come up with another excuse to delay you, most likely.

Walsingham nodded, ready to dismiss me, but I could not let this opportunity pass me by. “Sir Francis, if I may, I have a question pursuant to my observation of the Spanish ambassador and his men.”

Walsingham’s brows went up. “Your report was successfully delivered on that subject, Miss Fellowes. You have no further assignment.”

I kept my tone even, my words light. As if I weren’t making up a wild accusation out of whole cloth. “Still, I must share this. I have reason to believe it was a Spaniard who
killed Marie Claire. If I could prove that, would it not be of service to the Crown?”

That stopped them both. Walsingham crossed his arms over his chest, and Cecil steepled his fingers on his desk, leaning forward. “Proceed,” Walsingham said.

“If my theory is for naught, I will not waste your time with it. But to determine its merit I have a question.”

Cecil growled from the darkness. “Just tell us your theory, Miss Fellowes. You waste our time already.”

I twisted my lips in not quite a sneer. “You are training me to be a skillful spy. I would learn my craft, Sir William.”

Another pause. They knew the truth of my words, especially Cecil. “Then what is your question?” he snapped.

I started first with a question I knew the answer to, to get them conditioned to divulging information. Another ploy learned at my grandfather’s knee. “The evening Marie died was that of the Saint George’s Day ball, was it not?”

“Yes.”

“And she had attended that ball throughout the evening?”

“Yes.”

I nodded. “Did you send Marie out to gather information for you that night?”

Walsingham’s eyes narrowed. “Marie moved freely throughout the court. She was our chief informant.”

“But did you send her out for something specific that night?”

He nodded. “I did. She was to follow de Feria through the eve. She was a friend of his wife’s, who still frequented the palace at that time. We suspected the Count de Feria to be passing letters through his wife and other ladies of the
court, and wanted to identify who his contacts were, and what those letters entailed. Marie felt she was close to making a discovery.”

Again with the letters!
“And did Marie report to you, before she—ah—died?”

He shook his head. “No, Miss Fellowes, she did not. We did not believe she had even a chance to learn anything new that night. De Feria and his wife were absent from the revel that evening, claiming illness. It was unusual, and poorly timed, with his negotiations with the Queen still at a premium, but there was nothing for it.”

“You did not check to see if de Feria was in truth ill?” I thought of Jane and her poisoned flasks. Had she drugged the Spanish ambassador that night as well?

“It was not
his
sickness that kept him away,” Walsingham said. “His wife was in the third month of her confinement and came down with fever. He was at her bedside. There was no reason to intrude.”

I puzzled over this. I was sure Marie had seen someone—or heard something—that had made her move with excitement that evening. I was also sure she’d known her killer. And, finally, there had been suspicious letters changing hands back then—and now we had another set of letters, circulating anew. Had the first set of letters led to Marie’s murder? Were these new letters also worth killing for?

“Thank you, Sir Francis,” I said, completely at a loss but smiling with confidence and secret knowing, as if he’d just handed me the key to solving the mystery of Marie’s death single-handedly. “That gives me everything I need to know to move forward.”

Walsingham snorted. “Indeed. And when may we expect your report on this personal investigation?”

“When I am—”

“No.” He cut me off with a soft inflection of the word, raising his hand. “If you are to ‘learn your craft,’ Miss Fellowes, you must know the value of presenting timely information. A fortnight hence is the Harvest Ball. There will be a masque and a feast. In the days that follow that event, the largest contingent of the Spanish will leave England’s shores—including de Feria, as his work as ambassador will be at an end.”

I blinked. “A fortnight?”

He grinned wolfishly at me. “It’s well-timed, is it not? You can provide us your report on the Queen’s activities, should you uncover any details, as well as your findings about Marie.”

Panic squeezed my throat. A fortnight. So little time to potentially betray my Queen. I felt the mantle of traitor settle around me like a heavy cloak, but I managed a graceful nod.

“Of course, Sir Francis, Sir William. You will have your report by then.” I lifted my chin. “And what shall I receive in return?”

Walsingham chuckled, enjoying the game. He had expected this as well. “What boon would you ask?”

“My freedom,” I said crisply. You did not know what you might receive, if you did not ask.

Cecil began to splutter, but Walsingham lifted a hand. “Your freedom?” he repeated. “Explain that.”

“You said when last we spoke that if my work saved the Queen’s throne, you would let me return to my former life—with the Crown’s word that you will not harm anyone in connection to me, nor approach me again.”

“You dare to make demands?” Cecil’s voice was rising in both volume and tone, but it was Walsingham who held this particular key for me. And Walsingham was regarding me evenly, with no expression at all on his face.

“You think so much of your former life, and so little of this, Miss Fellowes, that you would return to the squalor from which we plucked you? Surely you have wanted for nothing here.”

“The hospitality of the Queen is more than one such as me would ever need,” I countered, not rising to the bait of his “squalor” reference. “I am a simple girl, with simple needs.”
And I simply need to get out of here before I might betray my Queen.

Walsingham appeared to consider the question seriously, which was more than I had expected he would. “If the caliber of your information is sufficient, Miss Fellowes, then you have the right to negotiate the terms of your departure.”

That wasn’t clear enough. Who was to determine “sufficient”?

“If I deliver you a Spanish murderer, Sir Francis, would you consider that sufficient enough?”

He nodded to me. “If he threatened the Queen herself, yes,” he said, his mouth twisting a little around the words. “And if you deliver the villain to me no later than a fortnight hence.”

I felt excitement catch at me, swelling me up, but before I could enjoy the moment too much, Walsingham continued. “And if you do not deliver the murderer, or you deliver him too late for us to be able to capitalize on his capture before the bulk of the Spaniards leave our shores, then you may
not
bring up the subject of your departure from the Queen’s court again for a full year, on penalty of imprisonment. Agreed?”

All the breath died in my throat.
A full year?
A full rotation of seasons away from the Golden Rose. They would surely forget me then.

“Agreed,” I managed with a confident shrug. “Sir William, Sir Francis. I bid you good day.” I executed the perfect curtsy, then took my leave of them. With eyes straight ahead I breezed back out through the receiving rooms. I might have heard Rafe say my name as I passed, but I could not afford to stop. Not yet. Not now.

I had fourteen days to solve a murder. Fourteen days to prove my worth. Fourteen days to gain my freedom.

Fourteen days to fail.

As if the weather were in grim accord with the hopelessness of my cause, it rained for six solid days after that. And I don’t mean the kind of rain that resulted in what my grandfather referred to as “soft days”—light showers drifting down from glowering skies to dampen the countryside, the sun peeking out, only to be nudged back behind the clouds. No, this rain was a torrent, bitter and unseasonably cold, chasing us indoors and keeping us there, musty, sodden, and foul-tempered.

Especially the Queen.

“I did not imagine I could hate this heap of stones any more than I already did,” grumbled Jane, scowling out over the quadrangle of the Upper Ward from the archways of our training room. “Clearly, I need to work on my imagination.”

We had not had the chance to search for Lady Amelia’s letter that first night, nor any night thereafter. We had not had the chance to learn more about the Spaniards, sequestered as they were in their own section of the castle. Even our fighting classes had been temporarily halted, as it was just too oppressive in the castle for that much effort. While Windsor was one of the grandest homes in all of England,
it still proved to be too small in a torrential storm, particularly when livestock was herded into the lowest quarters, their combined reek and bleating cries adding another layer of misery to the nobility and servants trapped above.

I blew out a frustrated breath. Another unexpected downside of the storm had been the impossible press of people roaming the castle’s halls. Spying proved difficult when there was no place to hide. Even worse, the Queen had demanded that all of her ladies put forth their best efforts to entertain her. This meant endless hours of dancing, music, and acting in front of Her Grace, all of us tucked away in her Privy Chamber. These were command performances, which meant all five of her spies had to be there too, no matter that this was a colossal waste of time. My complaints to Cecil and Walsingham had gone unheeded. Indeed, I think the two advisors relished the rain, as it allowed them long days to sit and rifle through their papers and books, creating entirely theoretical conspiracies, only to devise ways to rout them out.

Finally, however, the Queen had claimed a headache, and we’d been set free to scatter as far as the rain would allow. Which, it should be noted, was not far.

“There you are!”

Jane and I turned to see Anna bustling up to us, carrying what looked to be a heavy stack of blankets, her eyes bright with excitement, her mouth stretched into a wide smile. She stumbled just as she reached us, and both Jane and I leaped for her, all of us laughing as she shoved her bundle into our arms. “I did not think I’d have a chance to try these out before the rain let up, but it looks like we still have time!”