Royal Inheritance (5 page)

“I have no choice. I must obey the king.”

The news that King Henry wanted me to return to court surprised me. It irritated Bridget. She pinched me. Twice.

Father’s voice faded as he moved away. I missed a few words. And then he was talking about a recent outbreak of violence among the courtiers. “It has been as deadly as any plague,” he complained. “I do not know what spawned it, but there have been brawls, duels, and even murders, all within the verge.”

“The verge?” Mother Anne asked.

“That is the ten-mile radius that surrounds the person of the king. As you know, the king and his courtiers move about a good deal, but wherever King Henry is, that is the court and the verge moves with it.”

Father was always being called upon to travel to different palaces. I already knew many of their names—Greenwich and Whitehall, Richmond and Woodstock and Worksop. And Windsor Castle, where I had once lived. There were many other royal houses, too, smaller ones that the king visited when he went on his annual progress.

“Audrey is
my
responsibility,” Father said.

“And you do well by her.” A little silence ensued. “Whitehall is but a short distance from London,” Mother Anne pointed out. “You need not remain for more than a few hours at a time.”

“If the court were always at Whitehall Palace, there would be no problem.”

“Surely His Grace does not expect you to bring Audrey with you to the more distant palaces. Greenwich, mayhap, but that is not so very far away, either.”

“Nor are Richmond and Hampton Court,” he admitted.

“From any of those palaces, you can bring her home again before nightfall. She will sleep safe in her own bed.”

“And what of the times when I am obliged to leave her alone in the chamber set aside for my workroom? I cannot take her with me into His Grace’s bedchamber.”

“She need not be alone,” Mother Anne said. “You always take Richard with you. Or one of the apprentices.”

“She should have a woman companion,” Father muttered. “Better yet, what the Spaniards call a
duenna
.”

Offended by the very idea that I should need a nursemaid, I
nearly gave away our presence. Bridget grabbed hold of my arm. Then Mother Anne began speaking again, so softly that I had to strain to catch her words.

“The girl is a great deal of trouble,” she said.

“That is scarce Audrey’s fault. Nor is it her doing that the king has no queen. So long as His Grace remains unwed, few women live at court. I cannot ignore the king’s wishes, but I dislike exposing an impressionable young girl to unsavory influences.”

“I suppose I can spare Lucy,” Mother Anne said.

“Lucy would be no help at all.” The tiring maid Elizabeth, Bridget, Muriel, and I shared was a great lump of a girl and slow-witted besides. “Nor would any of our other maidservants. They are either too young or too inexperienced, even your Nell.”

Nell had been with Mother Anne since her own girlhood and was getting on in years. Her fingers were gnarled with age and her knees pained her when she walked.

“Perhaps one of the other girls might accompany Audrey as a companion,” Mother Anne suggested. “Elizabeth is old enough to take on such a responsibility.”

Beside me, Bridget began to mutter softly. She’d hated it when I had gone to court and she had not. That Elizabeth might go, too, infuriated her.

“She also lacks the necessary experience. Bad enough,” father grumbled, “to let
one
of my innocent daughters stray so near to the dangerous undercurrents at court.”

That image put me in mind of the roiling waters of the Thames, but I knew that was not what Father meant. Although he’d moved off again, I caught a little of what he said next, enough to understand that he was speaking of certain crimes committed against women.

Father and Mother Anne did not say much more of interest.
Mother Anne suggested hiring a respectable London matron to accompany me to court and to this Father agreed. Then they left the hall for their bedchamber.

Bridget and I waited until we heard their door close before we slipped quietly back to our own bedchamber and into the bed we shared. Pocket had not moved, nor had Muriel or Elizabeth, although the latter was snoring softly. Bridget was not speaking to me, but she managed another pinch or two before she settled down to sleep.

I lay awake, for I had much to ponder. It seemed I was to return to court and that it was the king himself who wanted me there. At first, I could not imagine why he should be interested in my doings but, after mulling over this question for a time, I settled on the only possible explanation. The answer was obvious once I thought of it. His Grace wished to ask me how Pocket was faring in his new home.

F
ather need not have worried. It was some time before King Henry summoned him to court again. Soon after our encounter in the garden at Whitehall, the king departed for his hunting lodge at Royston. His Grace fell ill while there. After he recovered, in July, he embarked on his annual progress, traveling far away from London so that he might visit other parts of the realm and be seen by his subjects in those distant shires. It was November before he returned to any of the royal palaces situated near London.

In preparation for Yuletide, the king needed new clothes. With great reluctance, Father took me with him to Greenwich. I met the king at the tiltyard, where he was overseeing construction of a new seating gallery. I duly reported on Pocket’s health and well-being, but His Grace did not seem much interested. After a few minutes, he strode off to speak with two of the knights who had been practicing at the quintain.

Father said, consolingly, “King Henry has a great many very important matters on his mind.”

“I thought he would want to know that Pocket is nearly full
grown now.” He stood almost nine inches tall at the shoulder.

Father sighed, but made no further excuses for His Grace. He escorted me back to his workroom and left me there with Mistress Yerdeley, an old woman who lived near us in Watling Street. She’d been hired to accompany me to court and watch over me when Father could not. She sat on the window seat with her sewing, nodding agreeably as he repeated his instructions for what must have been the twentieth time.

“Audrey is not to leave the workroom. No one is to come into the workroom that you do not know. You are not to answer impertinent questions about your charge. And you, Audrey, are not to speak to anyone you have not already met.”

We both promised to obey him, but ten minutes after he left, Mistress Yerdeley was sound asleep, her head resting against the windowpane. I soon grew bored with staying in one place. The mending Mother Anne had sent with me held no allure. I had been taught the rudiments of reading but I had no books. Since Father’s apprentice had gone with him to the king’s fitting, I did not even have anyone to talk to.

I went to the door and opened it. No one was in sight but, in the distance, I heard singing. The music had the familiar cadence of a hymn and I reasoned that it must be coming from a chapel. How dangerous, I asked myself, could it be to listen to choristers rehearse? Certain of my logic, I followed the marvelous sound of those voices.

The Chapel Royal is not a place. It moves with the court. The singers of the Chapel Royal are of two sorts: the children of the chapel—a dozen boy choristers who lodge with the Master of the Chapel—and the gentlemen ordinary of the choir. Both groups perform sacred music for church services, but they also sing secular songs to entertain the king.

On this cold December day, the gentlemen were rehearsing. As was appropriate, they were in the chapel where the king worshipped. No one noticed me creep in. I was small enough to be almost invisible and my plain, dark garments blended nicely with the shadows.

Hidden behind a pillar, I stayed very still and listened to them practice. I was moved to tears by some of the hymns and awed by others. I do not know how long I lingered there, but I did not leave until the choristers finished their practice for the day and began to disperse. Only then did I make my way back to Father’s workroom.

I saw no one along the way except one yeoman of the guard and he ignored me. Mistress Yerdeley still slept, only waking a few minutes before Father returned to collect us and take us back to London.

I
accompanied Father to court a number of times during the months that followed. I saw the king briefly during each visit. On these occasions, His Grace would invariably ask after my welfare and that of Pocket. I took to bringing the little dog with me, since he fit easily into a carrying pouch. This amused King Henry but did not change the pattern of our meetings.

Mistress Yerdeley continued in her role as my companion and I continued, the moment she drifted off to sleep, to slip away to the chapel in the hope of finding choristers rehearsing. Although I remained hidden, I was soon able to recognize individuals, especially among the adult singers. These gentlemen took turns playing the organ to accompany their fellows. Some of them also composed music. As I watched and listened, I learned some of their names but I also began to absorb bits of the instruction that was given to the boy choristers in plainchant and harmony. I have always had a good ear for music. Without even thinking about it, I committed to memory almost every tune I heard.

There was one hymn I particularly liked, although I did not try
to reproduce the lyrics. The words were Latin and I did not understand that language. Instead I substituted nonsense syllables into the tune. On a cold early December day just a year after my first encounter with the choristers, I was tra-la-la-ing to this piece as I returned to Father’s workroom.

A bellow of rage from within stopped me dead in my tracks. I broke off singing in mid-verse. A moment later I was running toward the door, for I had recognized the king’s voice. He was berating Father for losing me.

“I am here!” I cried.

King Henry stood in the middle of the workroom. He turned a fearsome glare on me, causing me to skid to a stop, throat dry and heart pounding. The yeomen of the guard and the other minions who always accompanied His Grace had ranged themselves along the walls, as far away from the king’s wrath as they could manage to be without actually fleeing the workroom.

From the expression on old Mistress Yerdeley’s face—pure terror—as she cowered in a corner, she had been the first to feel the lash of royal anger. Father looked only slightly less shaken, but he was quick to rush to my side. Pocket, showing his mettle, stuck his head out from beneath a bench and let out one of his baying barks before retreating to safety once more.

“Here she is now, Your Grace!” Father said in a loud voice. “Safe and sound. But where have you been, Audrey? Have I not told you that you must not roam about the palace alone?”

“Leave the girl be, Malte!”

The king’s command was law. Father dropped back. Belatedly, I remembered to curtsey.

“Rise, Audrey.” His Grace no longer sounded angry and when I dared look at him again, I saw that his face wore a rueful smile. Slowly it dawned on me that the king’s fury had not been because
I was absent from the workroom when I should have been waiting obediently for Father to return, but because he, like Father, had been genuinely concerned for my safety.

“I beg your pardon, Your Majesty, for causing so much trouble.”

“It is easy to forgive a pretty girl,” the king said. “Now tell me, Audrey, what was that song you were singing?”

“I do not know its title, Your Grace.”

“Mayhap I should ask you, then,
where
you learned it.”

“In the chapel, Your Grace.” I hesitated, then decided it would be best if I confessed the full extent of my transgressions. “I go there sometimes, to listen to the choristers rehearse. They make very fine music,” I added in an earnest voice.

“And you have a very fine voice, but that particular hymn is perhaps not the best choice for a girl of your years. It is called ‘Black Sanctus, or the monk’s hymn to Satan.’ Did you know that?”

“No, Your Grace,” I whispered. “I am exceeding sorry. I will never sing it again.” I wished I could crawl into a hole and vanish. I was certain that anything to do with the devil must be very bad indeed.

The king studied me for a long moment, making me tremble inside. He had been quick to go from anger to good humor. I feared he could return to the former emotion just as fast.

“You must have lessons,” he announced, taking me by surprise. “A singing master. I will send young Harington to you, the very lad who wrote both the words and the music to that song you were singing. You have good taste in music, Audrey. I often sing that one myself, for it is a cleverly written antimonastic hymn.” He laughed at this last comment and all his minions laughed with him.

I did not understand the reason for their amusement, but I stammered my thanks. I was elated by the news that I was to have lessons. To be taught the proper way to sing seemed the most
wonderful boon anyone could grant me, even better than the king’s earlier gift, my dear companion, Pocket.

“We are most grateful, Your Grace.” Father echoed my sentiments, sounding sincere, but I could not help but notice that his brow was deeply furrowed. Something worried him about the idea.

“She shall have a dancing master, too,” the king declared. “It will do no harm for her to learn all the courtly arts. Do you know how to read, Audrey?”

“A little,” I said, bolder now. “And I can write a bit, too. And cipher.”

Father placed one hand on my shoulder and waited until the king shifted his gaze from me to him. “Those are skills customarily taught to the children of merchants, Your Grace, even the girls. A young wife must be able to keep her own accounts. How else should she know when she is being cheated by the butcher?”

Unspoken was the obvious thought that such a one had no need to learn how to tread a stately measure.

The big vein in His Grace’s neck throbbed. He expected unquestioning obedience from his subjects. While polite, Father’s defiance rankled.