To Ruin A Queen: An Ursula Blanchard Mystery at Queen Elizabeth I's Court (30 page)

I doubted if I would, but the message that fetched Rob from Tewkesbury had included a request to Mattie to send me a change of clothes. A fresh gown and sleeves had arrived in Rob’s saddlebag. I was fit to be seen. I was more anxious about Dale herself, but the innkeeper’s wife, broad of face and hearty of temperament, promised to take care of her and to make sure she did, Rob handed her a sweetener of gold sovereigns—
“for yourself, goodwife; put them in your own store.” Brockley kissed his wife good-bye, and off we went.

On the way, I said to Rob: “We have to keep Mortimer’s scheme quiet, I know, even if it means that he gets off with a warning and is never actually arrested for it. Rafe, though, is a very different matter.”

“Yes, he is,” Rob said. “You say that he is supposed to have thrown himself off a tower but was actually stabbed. It would seem, though, that quite a number of people know what really happened. You, Brockley, Dale, Mortimer, and Lady Thomasine and some of their servants.”

“Yes, Harold Pugh and Simon Evans. Questioning them could produce results,” I said.

“I shall start by questioning Mortimer and Lady Thomasine,” Rob said. “I prefer to begin with the principal actors. From what you tell me, Rafe very likely was killed by his guardian, but we can hardly arrest him for it before we’re sure. The servants may not know who did it—only that it was done.”

“Mortimer needs money and Rafe’s inheritance comes to him now,” I said.

“In other words, he had a reason for killing his ward. But to have a reason for committing murder is one thing; actually doing so, is another. If everyone who had a reason for killing someone else just went and did it, the earth would soon be short of humankind,” said Rob, who for all his insouciant airs was very levelheaded. “We must be careful. We have a busy day before us.”

When we arrived at Vetch Castle, the porter looked at us with obvious surprise but he didn’t seem to have
orders to exclude us, although this was perhaps natural. If you tell your doorkeeper to deny entry to somebody, it is usually because you think the somebody in question is likely to call. Brockley and I were supposed to be dead or dying of starvation in the Black Mountains and Rob was supposed to be in London. The Mortimers certainly weren’t expecting any of us.

The porter had a lad with him who fetched someone to take our horses. When we went through to the courtyard we found that the boy must also have passed word to Pugh that visitors had arrived, because the butler was just coming to meet us. I doubt if the lad had told him our names, though. When his eyes lit on me and Brockley, I saw his whole body go rigid.

Rob had dressed for this encounter with considerable care, halfway between the soldier and the dandy. His hat had a kite’s rufous tail feather in it, his practical russet wool doublet was slashed to show a lining of gold satin, and the turndown collar he wore instead of a ruff was of a gleaming damasked silk. His boots could easily have been used as mirrors. I was arrayed in Mattie’s contribution to my wardrobe, sunny yellow for my overskirt and sleeves, pale green for kirtle and bodice, all of it amply embroidered. The clothes were a trifle loose on me, but the general effect was striking. I walked confidently as we advanced upon Pugh.

“Mistress Blanchard! I thought you’d … gone back home.”

“You mean,” I said pleasantly, “that you thought Brockley and I were still shut in that shepherd’s hut up in the Welsh hills.”

“I haven’t the least idea what you’re talking about,
Mistress Blanchard.” He was keeping his head, but from the way Pugh looked at Rob’s five soldierly men with their helmets and swords, we had inspired his soul with a satisfying amount of terror.

“We are here to see Sir Philip Mortimer,” Rob declared. “Where is he?”

“He … he is occupied at the moment,” Pugh stammered slightly. “He is in the hall, presiding over an inquiry. As a justice of the peace …”

“I really don’t care what he’s presiding over,” said Rob bluntly, “and peace is the last thing I intend to let him enjoy. We are going straight into the hall to interrupt him. Is Lady Thomasine there?”

“No, sir, but …”

“Fetch her,” said Rob brusquely. “She is to come to the hall at once. We have business which won’t wait.”

Pugh did his best to hold on to his dignity. “Master Henderson, I really can’t allow …”

“You’ve no choice,” said Rob shortly, and strode on toward the porch.

It was a thankless task, being butler at Vetch Castle. Pugh was forever being brushed aside as unnecessary. He did his best now, and actually broke into a run, black formal gown flapping and gold chain of office bouncing, in order to plunge through the porch ahead of us and gasp out our names just as we marched in on his heels. Silence fell as we did so.

The hall was set out for an official hearing. Mortimer was seated in his thronelike chair, up on the dais. People from both the castle and the village stood on either side of the long room. Two armed retainers were positioned near the foot of the dais, and in front of it
stood a small woman with a gray shawl over her head and shoulders. She turned as we entered, and at once the silence broke as she let out a cry of recognition and came toward us at a hobbling run. She seized my arms in a clutch like an eagle’s talons.

“Oh, mistress! Oh, Mistress Blanchard! Help me! Help me!”

It was Gladys.

Mortimer’s expression when he saw me and Brockley told us at once that he knew all about our expedition to the Black Mountains. His sheer disbelief was comical. He looked as if the mastiff had just addressed him in classical Latin. But he kept his nerve. “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded, and struck the right peremptory note so well that one had to admire him for it. “A judicial inquiry is in progress here. How dare you interrupt in this fashion? Guard!” He addressed the two retainers near the dais. “Fetch the accused back. We were about to hear another witness …”

“Don’t let them! Don’t let them get ahold of me!” Gladys clung to me. I put my arms around her. Within her small, wiry body, her bones were as fragile as a bird’s, and she was shaking with fear. Gladys—rude, outspoken, and deplorably smelly Gladys—was once more terrified, as she had been when Brockley had rescued her in the village.

“It’s all right,” I said. “It’s all right. Rob, this is Gladys Morgan, who saved our lives on the Mynydd Llyr.”

“She’s a witch!” yelled someone in the crowd. “She bewitched young Rafe and made him jump off the tower!”

“Oho!” I said loudly. “So that’s the ploy, is it? There was talk that maybe he was murdered and first of all we were supposed to have done it. But now you’ve fixed on Gladys as the scapegoat, have you, Sir Philip? Don’t worry, Gladys. I’ve got you.”

“And I’m here,” said Brockley. He drew Gladys out of the crook of my arm into his own. He wrinkled his nose slightly, but went on holding her, all the same. “You’re safe now,” he said to her.

Two guards had started toward Gladys at Mortimer’s order, but three of Rob’s men stepped forward to block their way. There was a silent confrontation. From the dais, Mortimer said: “The charge is that Gladys Morgan did by divers bewitchments, induce my ward, Rafe Northcote, to throw himself from a tower to his death. It is already established that she crept back to Vetch and sought speech with a maidservant by the name of Olwen, and slyly asked after Master Northcote …”

“I knew it was dangerous, you talking to Blod and Olwen,” Brockley muttered to Gladys.

“If,” said Mortimer, “at the end of this inquiry, I find there is cause, the woman Gladys will be sent for trial at Hereford, and if the accusation of procuring a death by witchcraft stands, she will burn. This is a serious matter. I must ask you to wait while I complete it.
Be good enough, Mistress Blanchard, to tell your man to hand the prisoner over and …”

“This inquiry is rubbish,” I said, “and you know it, Sir Philip. It’s all right, Gladys.”

“And our business will not wait,” said Rob, “for it is also the queen’s business. Sir Philip, we require to see you privately, at once. The matter concerns the Mortimer family as a whole and your mother has been asked to join us. Ah. Here she is.”

Lady Thomasine had come into the hall. She too reacted in gratifying fashion when she saw me for she stopped short, her eyes widening. I favored her with an ironical smile. “I suggest,” said Rob, “that we adjourn to the tower parlor forthwith.”

“We shall do nothing of the sort. This behavior is insufferable!” Mortimer exclaimed angrily.

“You find the queen’s command insufferable? Must I repeat myself?” Rob’s voice was commanding. “We are here on the queen’s confidential business and I advise you to cooperate. The tower parlor,
if
you please. Now.”

For a moment, I thought Mortimer would defy us, but Rob’s unwavering stare and resolute stance finally prevailed. With an air of one who yields gracefully to a superior authority, Mortimer observed that a private inquiry must naturally give way to royal business, and within minutes, the gathering had been dismissed and we were in the approximate privacy of the tower parlor.

I say approximate, for although Rob left his men outside, I had to tell Brockley to bring Gladys in, for her own protection, and so there were six of us in there:
Mortimer, Lady Thomasine, Gladys and Brockley, Rob and myself. Brockley, however, took Gladys tactfully to the far side of the room. The rest of us sat down together beside the empty hearth.

“There’s no point in roaming all round the forest,” Rob said. He glanced at me, and from his doublet, he drew out the letters and handed them to me. “You did the hard work, Ursula. Show him the fruits of it.”

Rising from my seat, I went to Sir Philip and handed him the two missives I had found in his strongbox. “Do you recognize these, Sir Philip?”

For a moment I thought he was going to push my hand away but then he realized what I was offering him. He snatched them from me, his face darkening. “Where did you get these?”

“From your strongbox, Sir Philip. I confiscated them. You should be grateful to me.”

“Grateful … !”

“To use them as you intended would be treason,” I told him quietly. “The gallows, Sir Philip. The knife.”

I knew then that the theory which William Haggard and I had discussed, that his brother-in-law had been dreaming a dream and making himself believe it could be real, was right. The scheme he’d laid had substance; the letters proved that. Yet I doubted, watching him, that he would ever have used them.

I think he might have gone to Cambridge and tried to meet the queen. I think that until then, he could well have gone on imagining a wonderful future as Baron Mortimer of the Welsh March. But face-to-face with the reality of Elizabeth and the mighty, relentless machine which was her court, it is my belief that his dreams
would have withered and died unspoken. He had tried to use Haggard to safeguard himself from arrest, but still, I think, he had only half-understood his danger. Now, one reference out loud, to gallows and knife, was enough. I saw the dream break; I saw him waken from it. I saw fear take hold of him. He turned green. I do mean green—the sickly kind, like mold.

It was a most agreeable moment. It almost repaid me for coming upon Rafe’s body in the dark, for being shut in a dungeon, and then left to die—and Dale and Brockley with me—in a hut on a lonely mountain called the Mynydd Llyr.

“These are not all, Sir Philip,” I said quietly. “We also have in our possession the letters which you gave to your brother-in-law, William Haggard.”

“And we know,” said Rob, “that you plotted to extract wealth from the queen as payment for not publishing them. Master Haggard has confirmed it. You are a fool. You would have been charged with treason, as Mistress Blanchard has pointed out. It is treason to suggest that Her Majesty is anything other than the lawful progeny of King Henry, eighth of that name.”

“I’d never have published them … I’d never have done it … I only thought … I only thought …”

“I don’t understand.” Lady Thomasine spoke for the first time. She was sitting with clasped hands, her eyes fixed on me, the living ghost, visibly trying to work out how I had managed to come bouncing in at the door with Henderson, dressed in sunshine yellow and sparkling with health, when I should have been lying dead and emaciated on the floor of that hut in the mountains. “What letters are these?” she asked.

“The letters,” I said to her sweetly, “which you brought me here to find. Your son’s scheme for acquiring land and money. They are forgeries, of course. They convey a very damaging lie, concerning Her Majesty …”

“They’re not forgeries!” burst out Mortimer in a high-pitched voice. “They were left me by my father. He found them in a piece of furniture he bought, when he was living here—at the end of 1536, I think! It was a desk with a little locked compartment in it. He broke the lock open and there were the letters! And it was said that it once belonged to Mark Smeaton.”

Lady Thomasine gasped and even Rob looked shaken. I laughed. “So you say! I think I know better. I did wonder if perhaps they were innocent letters between another Mark, not Smeaton, and another Anne, not Boleyn. But forgery was so much more likely. Tell me, Sir Philip, when you left court under a cloud, ten years ago, did that have nothing to do with forgery?”

“No, my Lady Cleverness, it did not! I fought a duel and killed my man. But such things are not well seen at court, not now, not in the days of Queen Mary, either. Women are so tender of heart.”

“The reason why you were called out,” I said pitilessly, “was because you owed a gambling debt to the man concerned. You could not pay. You had spent too much on good clothes and fine horses. Some of your debtor’s friends came to ask you for it, on his behalf. You showed them a receipt. They told him and he demanded to see it for himself—and then he called you out, because he had never written it. Somebody, presumably you, had forged his signature.”

“Who told you that?” shouted Mortimer.

“Owen Lewis,” I said. “I’ve seen him. I took the opportunity to ask him why you had to leave the court, Sir Philip. I thought he might be able to tell me.”