The Boleyn Deceit (11 page)

“And that is why I am punished now,” Mary said flatly. “Kept in this house of that heretic, Northumberland. It is insulting, and now you are come to mock.”

Minuette intervened. “No, my lady, never to mock. The king’s affections will always be inclined to leniency, but you cannot allow yourself to be used by those of evil intent.”

Elizabeth sat back and watched her sister and her friend regard each other. Mary had no cause to love Minuette after what had happened at Framlingham, but there was something gentle about Minuette that could disarm the most suspicious. Today she looked like an angel in her pale blue gown and white underskirt, a bright counterpoint of hope to Mary’s dark and fading appearance.

“I might give the same advice to my brother,” Mary challenged Minuette. “He should take care to whom he listens, for heretics will never counsel honestly.”

“We are not here to debate religion.”

“And clearly you are not here for affection’s sake, so why are you here?” Mary flung this question at her sister.

Elizabeth grudgingly admired Mary’s bluntness and replied in kind. “Do you believe that Norfolk intended open rebellion against the king?”

This time Mary didn’t respond immediately. After a considered pause, she said, “If he did, I had no knowledge, and that, I think, makes it unlikely. The duke would have needed me for
such a move, and it is unlikely he could have kept it secret from me for so long. I had heard nothing of rebellion.”

“What had you heard?”

“That there might exist a document of interest to the Catholic cause.”

The Penitent’s Confession. Elizabeth would have to speak cautiously here. “And had you heard that such a document was in Norfolk’s hands?”

“No.” Mary spoke definitely. “He did not have whatever he thought this document was. He was searching for it, tracking rumours and gossip that always turned to nothing in the end.”

Until Minuette had found it in the very heart of Framlingham, hidden in the altar of the lady chapel. Elizabeth searched Mary’s face, and could not find deception there. Was this one of those things that had Rochford so worried—that he could not believe Mary would not have known if Norfolk had the inflammatory Penitent’s Confession in his hands? And if she had not known, did that mean Norfolk himself had no idea that the forged document was concealed in his house? If that were true, it indeed meant someone else had planted it to bring down the Howard family.

And that someone remained undiscovered. Elizabeth sighed.

Mary was no fool. “Was that the wrong answer?” she asked.

“Not if it is true.”

“I do not lie, sister. Say whatever else you like about me, but you know that I do not lie.”

Not even to make her own life easier. No, Mary was inflexible and fanatic and damned irritating, but she was not a liar.

Mary went on, cannily enough. “You will not be staying here at Syon House, now that Northumberland has overreached with his son’s marriage. Does that mean the king will release me from this pretense of confinement?”

“That is for the king to say,” Elizabeth said bluntly.

“I hear he will join you at Richmond shortly. Do you think …” Mary hesitated. Elizabeth knew how it pained her to plead. “Will you ask William to see me when he arrives? And if he will not see me, at least ask him if I may return to Beaulieu.”

Elizabeth said nothing for a long moment, then she nodded curtly. “I will ask.”

What else could she do? Mary, however reluctantly and acrimoniously, was her sister. Though Henry’s three children might have wildly different temperaments, they shared a certain turn of mind that was instantly recognizable—the call of blood, perhaps.

When they had bade Mary goodbye, they found John Dudley waiting for them a courteous distance down the corridor—close enough to keep an eye on the doorway, but not close enough to eavesdrop. That was a courtesy afforded because of Elizabeth’s status. If Mary were to have less exalted visitors, John Dudley would ensure he knew every word that was spoken. As he walked them out of Syon House, they were joined by another of Northumberland’s sons, Ambrose. Though Elizabeth did not usually deal privately with Robert’s family—only when their interests impinged on wider affairs—she knew that Ambrose was Robert’s favorite amongst his brothers.

It was Ambrose who spoke first. “I understand you have met my father’s newest scholar, Dr. Dee.”

“Yes, we met him at Christmas at court. He is quite … knowledgeable.” And disconcerting, Elizabeth thought.

“John and I have just had word that Dr. Dee will be coming to Syon House with Robert the day after tomorrow. It would be an honour if the two of you would join us for dinner while they are in residence.” He nodded politely to Minuette, including her.

How much of that was planned solely to tempt her? Elizabeth
wondered. She had expected Robert would find his way to her before the rest of the court caught up, but she hadn’t thought it would be quite this quick.

Still, though Northumberland was out of favour, and Elizabeth slightly out of temper with Robert because of Guildford’s stupidity, she had no wish to decline. “It would be our pleasure.”

At first Elizabeth resisted Minuette’s plan. As she said pointedly, “Alyce de Clare is dead and buried and you cannot change that. And we already know the why of it—she was a spy who got herself with child and tumbled down a staircase.”

But Minuette refused to give up, and she had learned stubbornness from Elizabeth’s own mother. “She didn’t get herself with child alone! And I’m not convinced she simply fell down that staircase. Either way, her spying on Queen Anne was done at someone else’s command. If it wasn’t on behalf of the Howard family, then whoever wanted to plaster those broadsides about your mother’s past around court has never been exposed. Wouldn’t you like to discover the man who defamed your brother’s birth?”

And so at last Elizabeth agreed to summon Dr. Dee to see them at Richmond after his arrival with Robert at Syon House. Their dinner with the Dudley sons had been somewhat stilted, to say the least. With Mary present as well, and the Dudley sons’ father still banished from court—not to mention Guildford’s continuing absence and Margaret Clifford’s confinement to the Tower—there were topics aplenty to be avoided.

Elizabeth’s permission to Minuette was conditional on her own presence at the meeting. So when Dr. Dee arrived at Richmond, Minuette stood back and waited while Elizabeth greeted their guest.

“Dr. Dee,” Elizabeth said, “thank you for coming to see us.”

“Of course, Your Highness. It is I who am flattered by your invitation.”

Minuette was impressed with his confidence; if Dee was at all
concerned about why he’d been summoned to a private audience with royalty, he didn’t show it. He just stood there looking from Elizabeth to Minuette with an inscrutable expression on that somewhat ageless face. As though he knew plenty of things that he did not care to express.

Elizabeth waved him to a chair. “Please,” she said, then indicated that Minuette should begin.

“Dr. Dee,” Minuette said, “we’re wondering what you might be able to tell us about a political plot.”

“Is that not a matter for an intelligencer?”

“The trouble with intelligencers is that they all interpret information according to who is paying them. We are looking rather for the truth.”

“The truth …” Dee smiled and looked all at once every bit the young man he was. “That is a rare commodity. What particular truth are you seeking?”

“A young woman who served the late Queen Anne died quite suddenly two years ago at court. She was with child at the time, and embroiled in a plot to discredit the king. We want to know the truth of her death. I was wondering if you could chart her stars. Perhaps the heavens might point the way to those who used her.”

Dee looked intrigued. “To chart the stars of the dead is not a usual practice. But if you can tell me what I need to know of her birth, then yes, I can give you a chart. Whether it will be useful …” He shrugged.

“More to the point,” Elizabeth intervened sharply, “I am interested in knowing who used this woman and plotted against my brother.”

“Was that not the late Duke of Norfolk, Your Highness? He was being held in the Tower at the time of his death.”

“The evidence against the duke is, shall we say, less than
compelling. Clearly Norfolk had motive, Catholic devotee that he was, but I would not condemn a man or his family based solely on motive.”

“That is wise, Your Highness. We all have motives that are less than pure. But we do not all act on them.”

Why did Minuette feel that he was speaking straight to her? What exactly had he seen in her stars at Christmas? she wondered anew. Did John Dee know she was in love with Dominic? Did he know the lies she was telling to William and Elizabeth? She had told herself the secrecy was for William’s own good … 
We all have motives that are less than pure.

But John Dee wasn’t even looking at her; he gave a thin, enigmatic smile to Elizabeth and asked, “Are you asking me to decipher your brother’s stars more fully?”

“Can you tell me if he’s still in danger?”

Minuette held her breath, for there was an almost tangible tension between Elizabeth and John Dee, as though each was attempting to divine the other’s thoughts. It was the unspoken conversation of two people who have known each other for years.

Dee broke the connection first. “Your brother will always be in danger, Your Highness. He is a young king in a divided land and he will never be free of enemies. The stars do not speak of an immediate physical danger, if that is what you seek to know. But there are plots within plots swirling around him. I do not think you have unraveled them fully just yet.”

“I don’t suppose you care to tell me what I will find when all is unraveled?”

“No.” Leaving open the question of whether he was capable of doing so, Minuette realized wryly. Though the topic had wandered rather far afield from Alyce, she held her tongue. She would
get Alyce’s star chart; Elizabeth could ask whatever else she desired.

“Any suggestions on where to begin my unraveling, Dr. Dee?”

“I do not think, Your Highness, that you need me to teach you how to unravel plots. You are your father’s daughter; trust your instincts.”

Robert did not especially like Syon House. He preferred the luxury and convenience of Ely Place in London or the home where he’d done most of his growing up, Dudley Castle in the West Midlands. His father had only started building Syon House eight years ago, after it had been Crown property for a decade. Not that it had done much good for the Crown: Henry VIII’s body had rested here one night on its way to Windsor for burial, and people claimed his coffin had burst in the night and dogs were found licking the king’s remains.

And with Mary presently confined here, like a dour black raven in her wing of Syon House, Robert wished he were elsewhere. But this was the nearest he could get to Richmond; once William and the court arrived next week, Robert would be free to take up residence there as well. Until then, his brothers were good enough company.

More or less. Ambrose flung a pair of hose at his head when Robert walked into his bedchamber. “Stop strewing your clothes around my room,” Ambrose complained. “How does your wife put up with your mess?”

“Amy,” Robert retorted sharply, “is accommodating.”

Ambrose raised a knowing eyebrow. “But not quite so accommodating as you would like, is she? Or else you would have a divorce already.”

Although he loved his brothers, there were some subjects
Robert would not discuss with them. Elizabeth was one; his wife was another.

He twisted the subject away from his own flaws. “How long is Guildford going to hide away?”

“Until Father tells him to show himself. I think he hopes the king’s temper will blow over.”

“Guildford may believe that, fool that he is, but Father should know better. He’s made the mistake of the old men at court—assuming that because William is young he is changeable. The king may have Henry’s rages, but he has Anne’s memory for slights.”

Ambrose shrugged. “I wouldn’t worry. Father knows what he’s doing.”

Robert hoped so. Because if he didn’t—if Northumberland continued to err in his relationship with the Crown—then the whole family would be dragged into the mess. Robert was not slow to advance his own ambitions, but his family would always call to his first loyalty.

A point he remembered when Lord Rochford showed up at Syon House the next day. John, as the one charged with Mary’s confinement, met with the Lord Chancellor at once, closeted alone with him for orders or reports or whatever had to be communicated between London and its royal half prisoner.