Queens' Play (51 page)

But it was Matthew Stewart, Margaret’s husband, he saw first at the ceremonial meeting between Northampton and the two Scottish Queens. This Lymond attended, inhumanly grave, while Mary of Guise, mollusced like a sea wall with jewels, acknowledged the triple obeisance, and the young Queen and the Marquis touched hands. The child’s face under Moncel’s fine pearl cap was scarlet, less because of the Latin sentence she had to recite than that the tight lacing, the gartered stockings, the long sleeves and silk attires, and the floor-length soieries de luxe were throttling them all.

Nor were the gentlemen, with chemise, camisole and pourpoint, with tracé tunic and high bouffant breeches and pushed-in waists, better off. Even the Duke of Guise, godly in his calm, was leaving dark fingermarks on his scabbard and the crisped point of George Douglas’s beard sadly hung. Afterwards, when the Queens were
greeting the chosen few brought up to the dais, the Earl of Lennox strolled over to his wife’s uncle.

Matthew Stewart, Earl of Lennox, was at home here, as Douglas was at home. For eleven years he had lived and fought in France; had indeed left for richer pastures only eight years before. For his defection to England he had been anathema to the old King of France; d’Aubigny his brother had been imprisoned because of it. But that was over. England and France were about to become allies; d’Aubigny was one of the present King’s dearest friends; and if Warwick, so hastily Reformed, was not a very dear friend of Lennox at present, all might be well if Margaret were circumspect in her encounters with that shifty gentleman Crawford of Lymond; and if nothing untoward happened to the young Queen of Scotland—or at least, so ran his prayer, nothing that could be traced to Matthew Stewart of Lennox. For since that first, delicate conversation with brother John long ago, he had been horrified to notice how the sparks from the d’Aubigny activities in France kept flying towards the Lennoxes in London. Whatever was happening, he wanted nothing to do with it; as Catholics, he and Margaret found life risky enough.

In defiance of all these morbid shadows, Matthew Stewart was wearing all his portable wealth. Sir George, not patently impressed by gold lace, watched his approach, amused. When he was within earshot—’What surprising encounters one does have,’ he said. ‘Is this visit wise, Matthew? I thought the French had taken a little against you.’

The washed-out, over-relaxed eyes were angry. ‘I bow to your definition of wisdom
of course’
, but a little leavening among the dogmatists might not come amiss on this Embassy. You heard about the scene at Saumur where none of my Reformed colleagues would bow to the pix. At Orléans, they distributed consecrated bread to the populace; and at Angers the whole legation would have been massacred if the dear Marquis had not intervened.’

‘I didn’t hear,’ said Douglas, interested. ‘What did they do?’

‘Abstracted a holy image from the church,’ said Lord Lennox bluntly. ‘And carried it about the streets with a hat on its head.’

Sir George laughed.

‘It was not, at the time, very mirth-provoking,’ said Lennox. ‘At Nantes they had to hide the statues in their houses from the Commissioners who have, of course, eaten flesh regularly throughout the whole trip. It is not,’ said Lord Lennox, a red spot on either dry cheek, ‘really the best of times to try how far French patience will stretch. Jokes about the Hollow Father do not always appeal.’

‘Then you must make jokes about my lord of Warwick instead. How fortunate,’ said Sir George, not at all to be put off, ‘that Robin Stewart is no longer with us, at least. Your brother has been looking
out for you quite assiduously ever since you arrived. Have you seen him?’

‘No,’ said Matthew Stewart briefly. ‘I find John’s passions a little irksome.’

‘Do
you now?’ said Sir George, his eyes opening in delighted surprise. ‘Not drawn to our dear d’Aubigny, are you? Then what about the Queen Mother? The lady doesn’t bear grudges. After all, she turned down Bothwell’s marriage offer as well as yours. And she has a charming Officer-at-Arms. Make a point of meeting him.’

But long before that, as Sir George well knew, the faded blue eyes had made their exploration. The Earl of Lennox turned his back on the very presentable Court of Queen Mary of Scotland, in the middle of which winked the blue and red and gold tabard of Vervassal, now restored, and said thinly, ‘If you mean Lymond, I have met him already, in London. These men’s lives are very short. I should not pin my faith, Douglas, on a giddy gentleman who will carry a hod for anyone willing to pay.’

‘Usually, in my experience, to use in browbeating his would-be patron. And giddy?’ said Sir George. ‘We are all giddy, loitering here begging with a golden cup. But certainly, like Jack Straw, our friend is enflamed with presumption and pride; and I for one will applaud his first serious mistake. So, I am sure, will Margaret. I should even trust her to help him to make it.’

The wandering gaze of Margaret’s husband, like a ball from a racquet, slapped back into Sir George’s bland face. ‘—In which case,’ Sir George added, smiling more broadly still, ‘I should say, more power to her elbow.’

In this last speech, the hesitation between one word and the next was fractional. But it was enough to turn the Earl’s pale face paler, as he gazed after the retreating speaker; and to make the more informed of the bystanders wince.

Sir George, whose son was married to the heiress of Morton, was undisturbed.

After the receptions the banquet; after the banquet, the masque; after the masque, the ball, in the great courtyard where new fountains were filled with rosé wine and drowned insects, and the trellis between dancers and stars was hung with muscatel grapes.

The formal music for the branle and galliard, the charconne and allemande and pavane and the Spanish minuet blew pattering like tinfoil through the peach trees, suffocated by the drawling French of English thoraxes and the polite, beautiful French of the most highly cultured courtiers in the world. In the long arcade adjoining the Château Neuf, Queen Catherine watched with her ladies, Margaret
Lennox among them, and the pages glinted like rudd in between.

Moving in the dance, pair by pair in their worked satins and Tardif velvet and their gem-embroidered silks, in silver lace and cloth of gold, the ostrich feathers tilting the grapes; with the men with their bleached hands, long-legged, broad-shouldered, smiling and negligent; the women with their jewelled breasts and high, plucked brows, the long oversleeves glinting, the train lifted to show an inch of stocking and Venice satin pump—the high blood of three nations bowed, swayed, paused, dispersed and re-formed as time dallied past.

Cupids filled the cleared floor and danced a moresca with torches. Veiled ladies sang flattering verses and masked knights recited. There were tonight no gigantic pies, no lions, no living statues … fantasy would come another day. Instead, the pages brought garlands of flowers, and wine, and wicker baskets filled with cat masks.

They were beautiful. Oonagh O’Dwyer, her black hair cauled and jewelled, her long limbs hidden under stiff damask, was masked in the ash-grey fur of a Persian, the emerald eyes drawing fire from her own. Below, the spare, smiling lips with their thumbnail soffit underneath, drawn in silver with sweat, were holding the attention of Black Tom Butler, tenth Earl of Ormond, one of the smooth boy Irishmen who had entertained O’LiamRoe in London, and a member of the English Ambassage. Ormond had been brought up with Edward of England, knew no other nation and, so far, desired to know none.

Oonagh, watching him through her mask scrutinize her body at leisure, continued with the sly and slightly malicious story she had embarked on. As Aunt Theresa had said, he could be quickly attracted. And Cormac, his eyes sparkling with the sheer joy of planning, had said, ‘But can she keep him so? There’s the challenge, my cold, black darling from the sea. My cold, black, ageless darling, you will need a charm, and another charm, and all the spells there are to bind that soft, oiled puppy kicking from his English nest. But—’ And, lifting a lazy finger, he had drawn it round her fine jaw, where the skin was tight drawn at the edge, and under the heavy eyes, where lack of sleep had stepped like a bird. ‘But for love of me, you will do it. It will be hard, but you will do it, my heart.’

So she had hidden the marks of his disapproval under her mask, and accepted a dance with the tenth Earl of Ormond, knowing that somewhere under this awning, in the warm, scented night, was the man who had come to France solely to challenge her. She was dancing, and for a moment she had forgotten that he might be there—among the dancers, in the spangled darkness of the gardens, in the mellow lights of the château and arcade. She did not even see him, as she and her partner moved up the line, until a voice of virgin honey
spoke in her ear. Moved by the exigencies of the dance it died away, returned, shifted focus but remained always just audible through the music and talk.

Then she turned, against her training, and saw him.

He was not even masked, the man she last remembered as the drugged and bandaged prisoner at Blois. And of all the knowing eyes that looked at him, as on the ride to Angers he had foreseen, hers alone did not change. As she turned, the music stopped, the dance was stilled, and her partner, turning, came face to face with Francis Crawford, who continued speaking as if nothing had happened, his blue eyes lit with untrustworthy joy.
‘C’est Belaud, mon petit chat gris. C’est Belaud, la mort aux rats … Petit museau, petites dents.’

Butler, who had no French, said now in his high, cold English lisp, ‘Pardon me. You are a herald, sir?’

‘To the Right High and Excellent Princess, the Dowager of Scotland’s Grace. My name, my lord, is Crawford, and I seek your permission to lead this lady to my Queen.’

There was a little pause. The high voice was annoyed. ‘The Queen Dowager wishes to see Mistress O’Dwyer?’

‘If it please you—and her.’

‘Just now?’

‘As soon as I may lead her there.’

Discontentedly the Irishman who had spent most of his life a page in London said, ‘It is not an opportune moment, but naturally …’

‘Naturally,’ said Lymond with tranquillity, and offered the lady his arm.

She took it, not because she believed for a moment that the Queen Dowager wanted her, but because she could do nothing else. They moved off, the lovely woman and the fair-haired man at her side, leaving the Earl of Ormond irresolute in the middle of the floor, and Mistress Boyle starting out wildly from the distant arcade, where Margaret Lennox, blank-faced, sat and watched. Then the music struck up, the dancers linked hands, and fifty couples slowly weaving a pavane barred Aunt Theresa’s desperate way.

By the time she had stumbled through the crowded grass of the gardens, Lymond and her niece had both gone.

By whatever munificence of bribery, the unlit room to which he brought her had no guard at the door, nor had it any signs of occupation at all, although its windows gave on to the latticed ballroom below. It was a bedchamber, small, orderly and smelling of some heavy and unidentifiable scent.

Tomorrow, her arm would be bruised where he had held it, chatting, smiling, drawing her smoothly through the crowds. As they
both knew, she could not afford a scene. She was trapped, and behind the soft mask was responding like an animal to the challenge, her eyes wide and dangerous, her breathing quick and hard. In the dark room in the Château Neuf, facing him silent at last, she was able to clear her mind of all but what she had long ago primed herself to do. His face, like hers, was obscured; his skin and sparkling clothes blemished by the fountain drops strewn on the panes. As soon as they had entered the room, he dropped his hands and stood still.

She had moved instantly to the window. There, now, she looked out. Among the politely discoursing spectators, an eddy betrayed Mistress Boyle’s purposeful grey head, making for the château. She would not be permitted to enter; and even if she did, it was too big to search; and Lymond, moreover, had locked the door.

Among the dancers, the Earl of Ormond had found another escort and was smiling again, his polished English smile. Her task for Cormac had had to be abandoned too. But she could handle Cormac. In the last resort he might use his fist, but that was because he had already conceded the case with his brain. Anyhow, she was prepared for this encounter, schooled like an athlete about to take the arena, the muscles of her mind firm and hard. She turned sideways in the faint glow of the window, and lifting her hands, she took the mask from her marked face.