To Ruin A Queen: An Ursula Blanchard Mystery at Queen Elizabeth I's Court (11 page)

I then discovered what I ought to have realized before, which is that a host at his own table is in control of it and drinks or doesn’t drink whatever he pleases. You can’t very well say such things as: “Do try this wine, Sir Philip. It’s a great favorite of ours. It comes from such and such a vineyard in such and such a province of France,” because it’s his wine in the first place and he presumably knows where it comes from and what it tastes like. You can admire the wine and hope that he will take extra to keep you company; you can perhaps push a flagon invitingly toward him; but that’s as far as you can go.

I did my best but Mortimer drank very little. In fact, he remarked as the meal progressed that he would have estate business to deal with later on and needed a clear head.

“Two of my tenants are behind with their rent and I’ve summoned them to explain why. They’d best be convincing,” he added with an ominous grin, “or I’ll have them hung in chains, in the middle of the courtyard.” He actually leaned forward to point through the window at the courtyard. “So no more wine, thank you, mistress.” He set aside the flagon of canary which I had edged encouragingly within his reach.

Well, if I couldn’t get him fuddled, I could still
carry out his mother’s suggestion about asking artless questions. “You sound,” I said, “as though you almost wish you really could hang them in chains for not paying the rent. A little drastic, surely? Do you really want such power?”

The answer was illuminating. “There was a time,” said Sir Philip, “when the Mortimer family truly had power to that extent. I am a justice of the peace now, of course. It goes with the lordship of Vetch Castle. But the Mortimers once were much much more.” Twisting in his seat, he pointed to a coat of arms on the wall nearby. It showed the vetch plant, proper, as on the servers’ tabards, its reddish-purple flowers and rounded green leaves, on a field vert.

“Those are the arms of the Vetch family. The Mortimers had a coat of arms too although my branch has never claimed it. But I intend to do so before long. One of my forebears—Roger Mortimer, his name was—was the lover of Edward II’s queen and for a while he was king in all but name.” He let out a nostalgic sigh. “In those times,” he said, “the Mortimers were mighty Marcher barons and had the power of life and death over their serfs. Those were our great days. I have read of the deeds and the eminence of my forebears and sometimes I think that as a Mortimer, it should be my duty and pleasure to rebuild the greatness of our family. I long so to do and I believe that one day I shall.”

I saw my chance. “But how?”

He gave me a challenging glance from those oddly set greenish-blue eyes. “Ah. Well, that remains to be seen.” He smiled knowingly. “But one day, you will see.”

Here it was again, the theme that had come up at yesterday’s supper, although once more he had stopped short of detail. I felt extremely disturbed and I knew that Rob, Mattie, and Lady Thomasine all felt the same. I could feel their unease. I would have pressed on in the hope that even sober, he might be coaxed into indiscretion, but Rob and Mattie were so very disconcerted that they inadvertently spoiled my plans by beginning at once to talk of something else. Lady Thomasine then turned to Rafe, and asked if he would play his lute for us after dinner. The conversation dissolved into commonplaces and escaped from me.

But I was quite certain now that Lady Thomasine’s worries were not misplaced. Beneath the surface of this pretentious household, beneath the outdated rituals and the absurdity, was a serious and alarming undercurrent. I wondered if Philip Mortimer were quite normal. At the very least, I thought, he was living in a world of daydreams in which he had begun to believe.

One way and another, that dinner was an odd, uncomfortable business. The culminating discomfort came at the end, when Rafe duly played and sang for us and managed to embarrass me yet again, more publicly than when he had shown me over to Lady Thomasine’s room.

“Rafe must sing us something he has written himself,” Lady Thomasine said. “My son is no musician,” she added regretfully. “Are you, Philip? But Rafe has the gift, and we have had him well taught by Gareth, our musician.” The gray-bearded harper, who was now
seated just below the dais, bowed at the sound of his name. “Gareth shall play for us tomorrow,” said Lady Thomasine. “But now, Rafe, if you please … ?”

Rafe obliged without any modest disclaimers and proved to be skilled. He sang a ballad about a noble knight who ventured into a dark cave full of sharp rocks and patches of mud, and there found a splendid sword with a scabbard of gold and a jeweled hilt, which shone through the darkness and the dirt.

The ruby shone amidst the mire
With pure and undiminished fire;
The gold all damascened remained
Amid the murk, unharmed, unstained …

Which was all quite harmless and charming, but that was before he reached the last verse, where, unfortunately, there was a risqué twist that likened the sword to a woman whose charms were improved after nightfall.

“Whose shining eyes, whose pearly limbs,” sang Rafe, “are beauty darkness never dims, but all the more enchant, invite, when encircled by the night …” And as he sang, he smiled boldly at his audience, and winked naughtily at me. I turned pink and saw Sir Philip eyeing me thoughtfully. Silently, I cursed Rafe. This was a complication I could do without.

For the moment, I tried to seem oblivious. Indeed, just then a new idea came to me. When at last the song was over and we had all applauded suitably and Mortimer had announced that he must be off to terrify his defaulting tenants, I cleared my throat and issued an invitation.

“Sir Philip! One moment. You are offering us such good hospitality. Please let us return it in a small way. Our guest rooms have a kitchen. If we may ask for what we need from your own stores, will you sup with us tonight? Become a guest, as it were, within your own walls? We should be so happy if you—and you too, Lady Thomasine—would honor us. I am sure we can prepare something to your taste.”

I managed to catch Lady Thomasine’s eye as I spoke. “How kind,” she said. “We should like that very much. Should we not, Philip?”

Mortimer himself looked slightly bemused but with me gazing at him pleadingly and his mother watching him expectantly, he could do little but reply: “I shall of course be delighted. At what hour?”

“You understand?” I said, as I stood with my friends in the parlor at the keep. “After we’ve supped, you must all withdraw. Meg is to be in bed before our guests arrive. Bridget, you will stay with her.”

“And we’ll take ourselves off, yawning, when we’ve finished eating,” Mattie said. “We can say that after all, we’re rising early tomorrow, to set out for Tewkesbury—to London as far as Lady Thomasine and Sir Philip are concerned.”

“I don’t like going, but you may be right to want Meg away from here,” Rob said. “I can’t make a display of the fact that you’re being guarded but I’ll leave a man—Geoffrey Barker—at Ledbury, with a fast horse at his disposal. If you need me, send to him. He’ll be at the Sign of the Feathers.”

“Thank you. I wish you were staying, but after all, Lady Thomasine invited me here. I am under her protection, if such a thing should be needed,” I said. I turned to Brockley and Dale. “After supper, you must keep out of sight as well. I want to talk to Sir Philip alone. I have had a word aside with Lady Thomasine and she understands that too. By the way, where’s Gladys?”

“Downstairs, with Joan,” said Mattie. “I sent Joan to fetch Gladys’s belongings and she brought them but her two spare gowns were so disgustingly dirty that we’ve thrown them on the midden. Joan is altering a couple of her old kirtles to fit Gladys. She’s to be off first thing in the morning too. One of our men is going with her, and one of Mortimer’s Welsh retainers, who knows the way to her home in the mountains.”

“Good,” I said. “Now, what are we to serve for supper?”

“Madam,” said Brockley.

“Yes, Brockley?”

“I shall be within earshot. On duty, as it were. I too think that it is right to send your little daughter away from here. There are things in this castle that I don’t care for.”

“What sort of things, Brockley?”

“As Fran and I were going out for our walk this morning, madam, we saw something we haven’t mentioned to you yet. Well, maybe you’d better tell it, Fran. With your leave, madam, I’ll go and ask Pugh for a good wine for this evening.”

He left the room. “Dale?” I said.

“Well, ma’am,” said Dale, flushing slightly, “what we saw was Sir Philip, ma’am, down by the big kitchen.
He was dressed to go hawking, but he didn’t have falcons on his mind just then. He was with that girl Olwen, that waits on Lady Thomasine. He’d backed her up against the wall and well—you can guess.”

“Guests shouldn’t speak slightingly of their hosts,” said Mattie. “But do you begin to see what I was hinting at, Ursula?”

“I’d already gathered that Olwen was flighty,” I said. “Lady Thomasine said as much. These things do happen. Mattie, if it was only a matter of a servant girl and the master of the house, I think you would have said so. Is there something more? Why
do
you keep hinting instead of saying outright what you mean?”

“There is more,” Mattie said. “But I’m not sure of some things. I only guess at them. Rob thinks I may be wrong.” Mattie glanced at her husband, who nodded. “You do jump to conclusions sometimes, my love,” he said.

“Perhaps. Well, Ursula will come to her own conclusions. But I’m very glad you’ve agreed that we should take Meg away,” said Mattie. “And I agree with Brockley. Be careful, Ursula.”

I had never thought of myself as seductive, and indeed, seducing Mortimer wasn’t at all what I had in mind. But I did need, as it were, to soften him. As though, I said to myself, he were a piece of clay. I gave serious thought to the preparations for supper.

There was a sideboard in the guest parlor, which I had already discovered contained silver-plated cups and dishes and some rather handsome wineglasses. The parlor
candlesticks were only pewter, but there were plenty of fresh candles, and I had also found a well-stocked linen cupboard.

Under my supervision, the dour Susanna (a puddingy woman with eyes like black raisins, who wheezed ostentatiously when asked for the slightest exertion) made the table fine with polished glass and silver and clean white napery and candles, lit in readiness. After some anxious consideration, I put on a gown of tawny velvet over a kirtle and undersleeves of cream satin, with a fresh ruff, and Dale tidied my hair into a white cap with cream embroidery. It was a pleasing ensemble but not too striking. It said
courteous hostess
but not
come hither
.

I chose simple supper food; here too I had to find the fine line between offering too much or not enough. Sir Philip’s second cook, when asked for advice, entered into the spirit of the thing. He was a plump and cheery young redhead, who was apparently called just Higg. We learned that, like Susanna and Jack, he was English but in other respects he was a delightful contrast to the Raghorns, whom neither Matthew nor I would ever have let over the Blanchepierre threshold.

At Higg’s suggestion, I settled for fricasseed chicken, rolls, a salad of radishes, primroses, and borage flowers, and a sweet cheese flan. He brought the food to the guest kitchen, and prepared it there. The all-important wine, supplied by Pugh, was the same strong canary that had been served at dinner.

I could think of nothing more that I could do, but I wondered if my efforts would work. I was trying hard, but was this the right approach? Did it have any chance
of succeeding? And if it didn’t, then what would? What could I try next? I was barren of ideas.

I was also very nervous.

“I know that we are really drinking your own canary, Sir Philip,” I said, in my sweetest voice. “But this evening you are my guest—so let me pretend that the wine is mine. I think it an excellent vintage and I hope you are enjoying it. Let me refill your glass.”

“You are an admirable hostess,” said Mortimer. I filled his glass, leaving mine as it was, nearly empty. I had drunk sparingly during supper, but I could feel the effects nonetheless, and I had to make sure that my own head survived the evening.

Mortimer raised his brimming glass to me before he drank. “If you had not a husband already,” he said, “I might be offering my heart and hand to you myself. Though it is true that I would be foolish to consider marriage until I have rebuilt my family fortunes. I would wish, when I wed, to offer my bride a choice of fine houses to enjoy—better than this ancient castle. I have a dream of one day entertaining the queen. Tell me, Mistress Blanchard, you have been at court. What does the queen require in the way of hospitality when she visits her subjects?”

So far, so good. Sir Philip and I were alone together. His mother, having shared the supper, had taken her leave, saying that she was tired. My own people had withdrawn too. Now, as Sir Philip and I sat over the last of the supper dishes, the subject of his future hopes had come up of its own accord. If only I could play my fish with sufficient skill.

“I don’t believe,” I said, “that the queen would think the house of any loving subject unfit for her. She would enter the humblest cottage without hesitation.”

“A tactful answer, mistress.” He took a long drink of his wine and then picked up the flagon, and to my annoyance, topped up both our glasses. I sipped at mine with caution.

“I was serious,” he said. “To be a Mortimer, truly a Mortimer, one must be informed of many things. What are the queen’s tastes? What kind of food does she eat? Would a host need to provide scented candles for her bedchamber?”

“The queen has a most sensitive nose,” I said. “She dislikes strong smells of any kind. She likes her candles unscented. Sir Philip …”

“Yes, Mistress Blanchard? I agree,” he added gravely, “that this wine is of a most superior vintage. From which merchant did you buy it?”

“He keeps a cellar in a place called Vetch Castle, on the Welsh border,” I said, equally grave. “Do you know it? Sir Philip, there’s something I don’t understand.”