Queen Without a Crown (9 page)

‘Not for long. I must carry the queen’s answer back to Lord Sussex, though I hope to return soon, I pray with good news!’

‘Amen to that,’ I said soberly.

Mark finished his ale, bade us farewell and left. A few minutes later, we heard another set of steps coming up the stairs, slow ones this time, accompanied by a low grumbling and gasps for breath.

‘Gladys!’ I said.

I went to give her a hand up the last few stairs. I didn’t dislike touching her as I had once done. Nowadays, Gladys did at least keep my rules about cleanliness. Nothing could be done about the brown fangs which disfigured her smile (or rather, her leer) but most old people have similar teeth, and if you really looked into her eyes, which were almost black, you could see that even now they had a kind of beauty.

She still had a bad temper, however, though she had given up her former habit of cursing people. She arrived in our room, complaining.

‘Why must you have rooms up at the top of a damned old mountain, indeed to goodness?’ Gladys was Welsh in origin, had a strong Welsh accent and knew all about mountains. ‘Half kills me, it do, clambering up and down those stairs, but if I don’t do it now and then I’m just a prisoner up here in this tower, like a princess in a legend.’

‘Princess!’ said Dale with a snort.

I poured her some wine, which she preferred to ale, and handed her the glass. ‘Where did you walk?’ I asked. ‘On the terrace?’

‘Nope. Queen was on the terrace, with all the ladies and gentlemen and those giggly maidens of hers,’ Gladys said. ‘I went out the other way, to the garden. Then it turned out that her majesty didn’t have
all
her fine folk on the terrace with her.’

She let out a lewd chuckle, sipping her wine. ‘She’s missing one of her giggly girls and a young courtier. Saw the pair in the garden stealing a kiss behind an apple tree, I did. Mind you, I don’t spoil sport. Going a bit further than kissing, they were, I reckon. You’re not wanted here, Gladys, I said to myself, so I dodged back through the castle and crossed the terrace quick-like and took a walk down as far as that cottage below. And then wished I hadn’t; it was such a clamber back up, for my old legs.’

Brockley, who had been standing silently at the window for some time, frowning, made an impatient sound. ‘Never mind Gladys’ legs, madam. She can rest them now. If we truly wish to help young Master Easton, how are we to find out where this man Jonathan Bowman lives?’

‘Bowman?’ said Gladys.

We all turned to her. ‘Yes, Jonathan Bowman,’ said Hugh. ‘Do you know anything about him?’

‘Course I do,’ said Gladys, helping herself to a second glass of wine without being invited. ‘He’s the old fellow lives in that cottage just below the terrace, where I went to just now. I talk to him once in a while, when I get up the strength to go there. Been talking to him just now. He had a glover’s shop in the town, till he got old and retired. Then he moved to that cottage, but his savings weren’t enough to live on so he’s still a glover on and off and still embroiders the gloves himself. Always seems odd, seeing a man embroidering.’

I looked at Hugh. ‘I can’t really believe that we’ll learn anything worthwhile if we visit this Master Bowman, but I suppose we should.’

‘We’ll go this afternoon,’ said Hugh. ‘I’d like to take some part in this myself.’

Never Look Behind You

B
owman’s cottage, when Hugh and I walked down to it after dinner, stood like an island in the midst of its heathy hillside. It was in poor repair, with warped window frames and old thatch as tufty as though it had been clawed by a giant cat. The garden was fairly neat, but no garden is much to look at in November.

The man who opened the door to us was surprisingly old. The Easton tragedy had happened over twenty years ago, and the man Judith Easton had then married might well, by now, be past fifty, but Bowman, lined and white-haired, with a small white beard and a pair of eyeglasses perched on his nose, looked nearer to seventy. Judith must have taken a husband much older than herself.

‘And who might you be?’ he said, not very amiably.

Gladys might enjoy visiting Master Bowman, but we had no idea what Bowman thought about Gladys, who wasn’t everyone’s choice of visitor. We preferred not to mention her. ‘We’re friends of your stepson, Mark,’ said Hugh. ‘Did you know he was in Windsor – in the castle, as a matter of fact? He arrived as a courier from Lord Sussex.’

‘Did he? No, I didn’t know.’ Bowman was brusque and sounded grumpy. ‘Haven’t set eyes on Mark since he was five. Wouldn’t know him if I met him in the street. Heard he was working for Lord Sussex, up north. Thought he was still there. If Mark wants to see me, why isn’t he with you?’

We had meant to bring him but found that he had set out for the north immediately after dinner. ‘He couldn’t find you,’ said Hugh. ‘We found you today, by lucky chance, but Mark himself has already left Windsor to return to his master. We have come on his behalf.’

‘Got business of some sort with me, has he? You say you’re his friends. But
who
are you?’

‘I am Master Hugh Stannard, and this is my wife, Mistress Ursula Stannard, who is also one of the queen’s ladies.’

‘Oho! Very exalted company Mark keeps these days, it seems! Courier for Sussex; friends with a queen’s lady. You’d best come in.’

He led us into a room which seemed to be a mixture of parlour and workroom. There was a fire, though not a good one, and the place was cluttered, mainly with evidence of its occupant’s trade. There were shelves piled with spools of thread, sausage-like rolls of cloth, leather and kidskin, and stone jars of what seemed to be dyestuffs, except for one shelf, beside the hearth, which was stacked with cups and flagons, with a small but beautiful silver salt pushed in at one end and two wine casks stowed on the floor beneath. There were a few seats, but these, too, were littered with evidence of glove-making: pieces of material, more spools of thread, needle cases, pairs of shears and a strewing of snippings. A few half-finished gloves lay here and there.

There was a settle beside the casks, jutting out at right angles to catch such warmth as the fire provided. The settle offered a small amount of unoccupied space, and our host threw himself into it. He adjusted his eyeglasses, gathered up a glove in which a needle was sticking, pulled out the needle and resumed the embroidery our arrival had probably interrupted. His wrinkled hands moved slowly, but with astonishing delicacy. ‘Well, sit down,’ he said, impatiently. ‘What’s it all about?’

It is customary, when visitors come, to offer refreshments and also to point out which seats are the most comfortable and remove any obstacles from them. Master Bowman evidently wasn’t a slave to custom. He made no move to provide us with as much as a glass of ale, and we ourselves moved bits and pieces off a couple of stools. Hugh put mine by the fire, opposite Bowman, so that I could get warm, though the blaze only warmed one side of me. Watching Bowman as he stitched, I saw that he was so close to the hearth that the fire must surely be scorching the back of the hand that held the needle. Anything is better than cold fingers, though, when one is trying to do embroidery.

Coming straight to the point, Hugh said: ‘We are here on behalf of Mark, but also on behalf of two other men, long dead. One of them was Peter Hoxton, who died in the castle in September 1547. The other was Mark’s father, the first husband of your wife Judith. He would have been accused of killing Hoxton, except that he drowned himself too soon.’

Bowman paused, needle in hand, and looked sharply up at us through his eyeglasses. His eyes were pale blue, the shade which looks as though it has a layer of water over it. They had no film of age, however. Their gaze was bright and searching.

‘I know all about that. Could never stop Judith yearning backwards for that first husband of hers. She always said he didn’t do it. Nonsense, I used to tell her; ’course he did. Only a guilty man ’ud go drinking himself silly and then jumping in the river. Hated Hoxton, he did. Whole bloody castle knew that. I had customers there; used to go to the castle to call on the important ones. I met the Eastons and Hoxton there. I knew the whole story. I tried to knock the nonsense out of her, but it was no use. She’d just cry and say Gervase didn’t do it, over and over.’ He looked at his work again and drew a strand of peacock blue silk carefully through the pale kidskin, completing a complex stitch.

‘The point is,’ said Hugh, ‘that Mark doesn’t think his father was guilty. Also, his chances of marrying the girl of his choice are being spoiled by his father’s apparent crime. Mark is desperate to clear his father’s name.’

‘Oh, so that’s it.’ Bowman snorted. ‘Love! When a man goes crazy for a girl, he’ll convince himself of anything. But the world’s full of pretty girls and every family isn’t that particular. You’d have done better to tell him so.’ He added another meticulous stitch. ‘He’s young,’ he remarked. ‘Young folk in love, they lose their sense of proportion. Done it myself in my time. I always had an eye for a good-looking wench.’

He glanced up and suddenly smiled. A smile can be a very revealing thing. Just as, for a moment, I had caught sight of the pretty girl Madge had once been, now I glimpsed the handsome young man Bowman used to be. Handsome and passionate, I thought. For a brief second, when he smiled, his pale eyes had flashed, as though some bygone emotion had been reawakened. It radiated from him to me, taking me aback. This white-haired creature with the swollen finger-joints even now retained the vestiges of a powerful attraction and a capacity for deep feeling.

Hugh, however, was still talking about Mark. ‘He does have some real reasons for believing in his father’s innocence,’ he said mildly. ‘We have undertaken to talk to anyone we can find who was here at the time and may recollect the business, in case, somewhere, we discover a clue that points to someone else as the killer.’

‘Judith used to talk like that,’ said Bowman. ‘
No one’s tried hard enough to find out who did it.
I don’t believe that woman that said she saw Gervase putting the poisoned dish there. Gervase just wouldn’t
. I got tired of hearing it.’

His attraction promptly vanished. I regarded him coldly, pitying Judith.

Bowman seemed to sense it. ‘Think I’m a hard one, do you, mistress? Now let me tell
you
something. It’s no good looking back. The dead don’t return. And the truth don’t change, no matter how much you want it to. Judith didn’t want to think her Gervase was a killer; Mark don’t want to think his father was, but facts are facts.
Judith
!’ Suddenly, he dropped his work on to his knees. ‘Oh, dear God. When she used to come into my shop in Windsor, why, I thought then that she was a lovely thing and Gervase a lucky man. I hoped he’d do well or make it up with his family; raise the two of them up in the world. But no, he must needs make a fool of himself and go murdering a rival! Silly fellow!’

I said nothing. Nor did Hugh. Bowman picked up his stitchery again. ‘Hard I may seem,’ he said, ‘but I take the world as it is. Never look behind you, that’s what I say, but Judith, she just wouldn’t give over looking behind her. Thought when I got her with child that that ’ud make her turn to the future, but no; she loses it before its time and dies herself and didn’t even seem to care. I cared for her; I wanted to take care
of
her, but all she could see was Gervase. She only married me for a protector.’

Suddenly, there was bitterness in his voice, and pain, as though he hadn’t put the past behind him as well as he pretended.

I said: ‘Please, Master Bowman – for Mark’s sake, will you try to remember? Did you ever hear anything – did Judith ever say anything – that raised a doubt of Gervase’s guilt? That might suggest another name?’

‘Nothing. Gervase did it, all right.’ The bright gaze lifted from his work again and met mine. ‘More than once, when I was up at the castle, I’d seen Hoxton hanging about, hoping to catch sight of Judith, and Easton scowling at him and hurrying Judith away. And you should have seen Hoxton after Easton hammered half the life out of him that time. You know about that?’ We nodded. ‘Looked as though he’d been trampled by an ox, he did, even after he’d kept out of sight for days.’

‘Easton admitted to that,’ Hugh said. ‘But he also said, in a letter he left for his wife, that a fight was a different thing from a poisoning.’

‘With most men, I dare say. But Easton was besotted with Judith. Used to be a lot of laughter about it, in the Antelope where I did my drinking. Oh, it was all known round the town. There was never a word against Judith herself, but folk used to say Easton was a donkey and that Judith was a good woman and Hoxton ’ud tire of his nonsense, sooner or later. But Easton – no, he was crazy with jealousy. A man in that state might do anything. Damn it all, I met Gervase once in the Antelope, around that time. He’d had a fair amount of ale, and he was in a temper because Hoxton had sent Judith a nosegay or something of the kind. He was saying that he’d like to meet Hoxton in a tavern and slip something into his drink, that ’ud stop his nonsense for good and all.’

For a moment, Hugh and I were both silent. Then, however, Hugh asked curiously: ‘What were Hoxton and Easton really like?’

Bowman put his head to one side, considering. ‘Hoxton was a spry, brisk fellow. Fond of the ladies, and they were fond of him, as often as not. Can’t think why. He wasn’t tall, and he was as hairy as an ape. Funny creatures, women. Hadn’t been a Clerk Comptroller long and was mighty proud of his position.’

‘What did he have to do?’ I enquired.

‘Attend in the counting house sometimes – the Greencloth, they call it. There’s a table in the middle with a green baize cloth, so I’ve heard. He was one of those that signed the lists of dishes and ingredients for the day. He was always talking about his work. Used to travel to buy supplies, as well. Easton was thankful when Hoxton was away. So was Judith, give her due.’

‘And Easton?’

‘Easton was good-looking enough. Stocky, dark, easy-going most ways. Laughed a lot, but had a temper. Oh yes, he certainly had a temper. The mess he made of Hoxton’s face proves that!’