Mistress of Mourning (14 page)

I decided I would bide my time. Surely the man who had sought me was gone. Or if he was one of them, he would not dare to harm me after their service. If they should close or lock the door again, I would have no choice but to bang on it and tell all—without saying my pursuer had mentioned the queen and the palace. Perhaps the queen had sent him just to test me. But surely it wasn’t true that Firenze had gone ahead.

I picked out a place against the wall, one tomb away from the door. Sitting in the shadows with my back against the carved stone tomb, I put my hand out.

And touched cold flesh.

I gasped and scrambled a bit away. A person, but alive or dead? I could see little in the dim light and with my hair spilled in my eyes. Was it my pursuer still waiting for me in the chill? No, not moving, and too small to be him. I made but a little cry, though I wanted to scream my soul out. The small man’s head lay at a sharp, unnatural angle. A broken neck? And on his face a mustache, paint smears I could even feel—he was not breathing and his limbs had begun to stiffen—
Maestro
Firenze, sprawled here, dead.

Queen Elizabeth of York

“I am sure you will like Wales,” our son Arthur told his bride as the newlywed couple supped with the king and me in our withdrawing room at Westminster Palace. I saw color come to Arthur’s already rosy cheeks. “A great adventure, Catherine! The people are almost as wild as the scenery, you know.”

“I learn…all I can,” Catherine said in her halting English. “I like meet…the England people and Wales.”

“I applaud your quick learning, daughter,” I told her, and raised a goblet of Rhenish to her, and the king followed suit. “The people love you, and they will love you all the more when you learn their language and their ways.”

In Latin, Arthur repeated to her what I had said. She smiled and nodded. Arthur clearly adored her, though I had heard from my ladies who had spoken to Catherine’s Spanish ladies that the happy couple had not yet truly consummated the marriage. But, heading their own household
in Wales, there would be long winter nights for them to complete their union—and for me to miss him.

With kisses all around, Arthur and Catherine took their leave, hand in hand, heading for Baynard’s Castle, where they had lived since the wedding. We would see them off from there just four days before Christmas. I greatly disliked the timing of that, but had not argued with the king. And then the court would travel to Windsor for the holiday season.

“They are getting on exceedingly well, I’d say,” my lord observed as the yeomen guards closed the door behind them, leaving us alone. “I know the word is they have not yet sealed their union, but I spoke to Arthur about it, and I predict the word from Wales will be productive by spring or summer. Elizabeth,” he said, turning me toward him and encircling my waist with his arm, “I have decided I will look further into that matter we discussed the other night.”

“Oh, my lord, I am so grate—”

“But on the condition that you not continually inquire how it goes or what I must do to ferret out answers—or from whom. I will tell you what I know of import when I know it.”

“Yes, I understand. And I thank you, whatever means you must use.”

“We all use our own means from time to time, do we not, my dear?”

“Indeed, we do and must,” I countered, wanting to agree with him in all things for this boon he was giving me. I suppose he meant my asking him for this great favor when
we lay abed together, but I prayed he knew naught of my privy plans and necessary scheming.

Mistress Varina Westcott

Leaving Firenze’s body where it lay, I crawled closer to the door of the chapel. Should I burst in, crying, “Murder! Murder!”? Should I wait until they were greatly dispersed to send one of them—Christopher, if he was there—for the sheriff or crowner? By the saints, what if they thought that I had killed the artist? Or could he have come out here to relieve himself or look at something, then fallen and hit his head? No, I knew in my heart that the man in black had killed him as he would have me, and I knew that however stringently I was questioned, I could not say all I knew about who could have meant us harm.

As I huddled outside the door, through which I could now clearly hear the service, my mind raced over terrible possibilities. Had that tall man truly been an assassin? If so, surely he’d not been sent by the queen. Wouldn’t she need both of us alive, lest she wanted repairs on her precious effigies? The portrait Firenze had painted of me—and the effigies that I could never mention—were the two things that bound the artist and me together.

But unless I had been followed, just as Firenze said he had been, Christopher could be the only one who knew where I and
Signor
Firenze would be, and quite alone. But that man who had pursued me in the crypt—he could not have been Christopher any more than he could have been Nick Sutton.

My distracted, scattered thoughts finally settled enough to make sense of the service on the other side of the door. No doubt my six black candles burned before the angel triptych, casting light on the virgins with their lanterns that would never be finished by Firenze now. I wiped tears from my cheeks, despite knowing my filthy hands would smear my skin gray. I shook and my teeth chattered as I waited for a pause to knock on their door.

Although the lead voice and some of the singing had been in Latin, now that voice cried, “I shall light a candle of understanding in thine heart, which shall not be put out!”

All of the symbols of light within the chapel made sense now. Many of the members of the guild of the Holy Name of Jesus were chandlers and candlemongers. Of course their rites would employ light and dark, good and evil. Surely they didn’t demand sacrifices beyond time, money, and secrecy.

“Soon we shall have the painting of the ten virgins come to life on our walls,” the voice intoned.

Come to life
, I thought. And how was that? Did they intend to present living tableaux or pageants, like those for the princess Catherine or the mystery plays the guilds gave each Christmas? The outlined virgins would never come to life, not without
Maestro
Firenze. I raised my hand to knock on the door until I heard the next words.

“And now we shall hear from our brother Christopher, who has obtained the artist for us.”

Yes, the next voice was his: “Let us realize that the five foolish virgins are closer to life than the five wise ones. Womankind, unwed or not, has been weak and foolish since the days of Eve, when she tempted Adam to sin, taken in by
the Evil One. And so it has been ever since that females, though they be made from Adam’s rib, tend to evil and seduction and desperately need direction and correction from both God and man.”

I jerked my hand down and stood up straighter. Of course, he spoke Holy Church doctrine, but it suddenly rubbed me sore. I had managed my shop quite alone for months between Will’s death and Gil’s arrival. I had hired Gil and was yet in charge of major decisions. I was rearing my son without a man, though Gil and Maud certainly helped. I could carve candles and fine effigies. But yes, I had been foolish too—to adore Nick, a man above my star. And foolish certainly to ever think of wedding and trusting Christopher Gage, however much I desperately needed his support now in what must be a wrongful-death inquiry. I could bear to hear no more, to wait no longer. I must find help here.

Knowing I looked a fright, but determined to stand up to these men if need be, I knocked on the partly open door and called in, “My name is Varina Westcott. A man chased me into the crypt after I brought your candles and I hid, but the artist Firenze lies dead outside this door.”

C
haos ensued. Faces crowded the doorway, Christopher’s among them. Though he looked appalled at my appearance, he swept me into his arms, even when the others came out with lanterns and, half-blinded by their lights, I showed them where the body lay.

After that, time became as endless as the blackness in the crypt had been. Questions came at me from the guild members, then the constable, next the high sheriff of the city, finally the crowner—all who entered the crypt to examine the body through the holy guild chapel. I hoped my tale made sense, as I was forced to cobble some of it together to avoid mentioning the queen. The ruling I overheard bandied about among the city law enforcement officials was that the Italian artist had fallen and broken his neck, or had been murdered by a man unknown. Most English thought Italians or artists were not to be trusted, anyway.

Talk of women being fools, I thought. All that was
obvious. Did they not credit what I had told them enough to at least inquire about the man, talk to those above in the cathedral who might have seen him?

However protective Christopher had been this day, I would never wed him now. As for Nick, the man had deserted me without a fare-thee-well, and after that kiss and his words the day of the joust, I swore that I would swear off men! Oh, yes, that would be the clever thing to do.

At least several of the guild members said they would pay for Firenze’s funeral, and I promised a waxen shroud and votive candles. Finally, they carried his body out. I sobbed at his loss, leaning back against the last thing he had ever painted, the wise women with their lamps.

Christopher, Gil, even Maud stuck tight to me that night, until I begged exhaustion and Maud took me upstairs to bed. Insisting I bid my Arthur good night, I sat by his bed to calm him, but I could not calm myself. Again and again, as I tried to sleep, the whispering man in black approached me in the depths of my dreams. Finally, I went back into Arthur’s room and lay across the end of his bed, listening to him breathe, willing him to be safe always and have sweet rest. I had not been able to save my dear Edmund from death, but I vowed nothing bad would ever happen to Arthur.

Christopher had done just what I’d feared: insisted that this all proved I needed him to protect me. He said he’d used his influence to keep me from being questioned further. But my thoughts still raced: The mystery man had had a sword and perhaps a dagger, so if he had killed Firenze, wouldn’t he
have run him through or cut his throat? But I had overheard the crowner say there was not a drop of blood upon him, and his neck had been cleanly snapped. Cleanly? An accident? Only a fall? More like a murder. I warrant that if Roberto Firenze had not been what Londoners termed a stranger—a foreigner—they would have looked closer for a killer, unless someone with authority had told them not to. I only knew I wasn’t going out into the city soon on my own again, not to graveyards, not to chapels or crypts.

With the winter weather, I would be a voluntary prisoner in my home and shop, as if I had been locked up for doing something dire, but I would cling to my work and my family.

And I knew now for certain one thing more: As soon as the time was right, or if he asked me first, I was going to tell Christopher Gage I would not wed him. Will and I had made a good marriage, but it was a binding of hands more than hearts. Nick Sutton had stirred my now celibate body—that was all, I told myself. I warrant men were not to be trusted in general. After all, Adam in the garden had the choice not to take that apple, and look who got blamed! Oh, yes, but for business matters, I vowed I was finished with men.

How soon my solemn promise was put to the test. The next day, I was preparing to close up the shop with my son’s help, for, one way or the other, I intended never to be alone here now. To my amazement, I saw Nick Sutton dismount in the street, just as he had that first day we had met nearly two months ago. He was alone this time.

I froze where I was, my hand upraised to place a candle in the top ledge of the window for display. I snatched my hand down, so it wouldn’t look as if I were waving or beckoning him in. I retreated to the counter and leaned against it for support.

My mind raced, yet went only in circles. I had not sent word of Firenze’s death to the palace. I’d heard the court would be moving soon to Windsor for the twelve days of Christmas. On the morrow, the Prince and Princess of Wales were setting out for Ludlow Castle in Wales in a grand cavalcade. But Nick—why was he here? Why now?

“Mother, is it the bad man?” Arthur asked, tugging at my sleeve.

“No—a friend from when I was carving candles at the palace, the one who came to fetch me sometimes.”

We stood together, facing the door as Nick entered in a blast of crisp air. It had started snowing, and his black-caped broad shoulders and cap showed a dusting of it. He smiled as his gray eyes took us both in.

“A fine boy,” he said, removing his gloves and lifting off a leather satchel he wore on a strap over one shoulder. “Someday you will be taller than your mother, Arthur, but I am glad to see you are helping and protecting her even now.”

I was touched that Nick recalled Arthur’s name, but considering whom he was named for, it was not so surprising. Still not smiling at Nick in return, I bent him a slight curtsy, and Arthur bowed as he’d been taught to do when his betters came in to shop. Even after all that I’d been through, I felt my face flush at Nick’s presence, the mere sound of his voice and kind words. I made proper
introductions. Nick seemed to say all the right things, and the lad almost melted in his presence—as did I, who should know better by now.