A Court Affair. Emily Purdy

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СКАЧАТЬ to give us “strength and vigour for the night’s passionate exertions”, those about us teased, and everyone applauded when we had drained it to the dregs. And then they drew the bed-curtains and left us alone. But just before the curtains closed at the foot of the bed, I caught a glimpse of the Princess Elizabeth watching us, her dark eyes narrowed and intent, her long, slender white fingers twirling a buttercup by its stem. And again I shivered as if I could feel those very fingers closing murderously around my neck, squeezing the life out of me.

      I turned to Robert to seek refuge in his warmth and found him staring straight at her, until she dropped the buttercup and, with an abrupt and angry tug, jerked the curtains shut, then slammed the door behind her in such a way that the sound must have rung throughout the manor. She was like a human cannon packed with gunpowder, and the tiniest spark would make her explode, and I was deathly afraid that somehow I was that spark. I wanted to talk to Robert about it, to ask him why it should be so—what had I done?—but some inner instinct warned me to keep silent, and I was too afraid to defy it.

      I slipped my arms about Robert’s neck and laid my head upon his shoulder, but I found his body rock-hard and tense. The silence that had so suddenly replaced the merry, good-natured ribaldry hung heavy and awkward about us, and I felt so afraid, though for the life of me I couldn’t explain why. I felt Robert’s hands upon my waist, and I started to relax and allow a smile to form upon my lips, but it died midway as he put me from him, wrenched open the curtains, and leapt from the bed. Naked, he stalked across the room and, not even bothering to pour it into a goblet first, drank long and deeply from the flagon of wine that had been left for us. I grew alarmed as I watched a ribbon of red wine dribble down his chest, like a crimson snake winding its way through black grass, yet still he drank as if his thirst could never be quenched. Then, just as suddenly, he flung the flagon into the fireplace, where it shattered, and, like a lion attacking a trembling and helpless lamb, sprang at me from the foot of the bed and pinned me flat beneath him, grabbing my wrists, leaving bruises where his fingers pressed, as he held my arms above my head.

      I cried out when I felt his savage thrust. He was rougher with me than he had ever been before and ignored me when I begged him to be gentler, as he had been when we coupled in our bed of buttercups. I knew he must be angry with me, but I didn’t know why; I also knew that asking would only make it worse.

      Later, when I lay sobbing, huddled and hugging my pillow with my back to him, he kissed my shoulders and stroked my hair and spoke softly, blaming it all upon the wine, but I knew it was something more than that, and I felt certain it had to do with Elizabeth.

      He coaxed me to sit up, saying he had a present for me. To spare me any embarrassment upon the morrow, when all would expect to see the sheet we had coupled upon hung up to proudly display the dried red rose petal stain of my vanquished maidenhood, he took his jewel-hilted dagger and made a tiny cut to his chest, right over his heart, so that it would be his heart’s blood masquerading as my maiden’s blood that stained our sheets and saved me from dishonour. For the rest of his life he would bear a little scar there, just over his heart, that would be our secret that only we two, husband and wife, would know; that tiny raised white line upon the bronzed beauty of his chest that my tongue would seek out so many times to tease and trace would be a precious remembrance of our wedding night. And then he took me in his arms again and loved me so gently that I cried. And I fell asleep after with my head upon his chest, listening to his heart beat, like a lullaby, singing me to sleep.

      The next morning while I was still asleep, my husband rose early to hunt. I lay abed for a long time, lazily savouring the fact that I was now a married woman, a wife, and, God willing, soon to be a mother, caressing my little round belly and wondering if it had already become a warm nest for our baby to grow in. When I rose, I noticed that my husband had left our chamber in some disarray; clothing lay strewn about the floor and protruding from beneath the lid of his big oak travelling chest, carved with his initials and coat-of-arms, the Dudleys’ great bear and ragged staff, and beautifully bordered with acorns and oak leaves. I instantly set about tidying it, gathering up garments from the floor, and, observing the crumpled and wadded disarray inside, I scooped everything out of the chest, thinking to do my duty as a wife and put it all right, everything perfectly placed and folded, all pristine, perfect, and neat, and later amongst the folds I would put little bags of sweet-smelling herbs tied with blue silk ribbons, as that was my husband’s favourite colour. As I lifted out the last linen shirt, something clattered against the bottom—a small rectangle-shaped portrait framed in black enamel and pearls.

      I instantly recognised the haughty and imperious young woman who stared back at me from beneath the feathered brim of her round, pearl-studded black velvet hat, with her hair caught up like a pair of plump, fresh-baked buns on each side of her head protruding from a caul of pearls. It was the Princess Elizabeth in a black velvet riding habit worked with gold embroidery all down the front and around the hems, with its tight, close-fitting sleeves studded with an elaborate lattice pattern of pearls. But what struck me most was her hand murderously clutching her gloves as if they were a neck she wished to break.

      I remembered the look that had passed between her and Robert last night as she stood at the foot of our marriage bed and began to tremble violently as tears overflowed my eyes. Feeling of a sudden ill, I dropped the portrait back into the chest as if it burned me and bunched up all the clothes my arms could hold and crammed them back inside the chest and slammed the lid shut. Perhaps I should have confronted Robert when he came back, asked or said something, but every time I tried, fear tied my tongue in knots, and the words just would not come out. I suppose I was afraid that knowing would be even worse than not knowing. But every time I glanced at that chest, knowing that portrait was hidden away inside it, I felt a surge of blind terror that made the breath catch in my throat and my vision dim and at the same time dance with jewel-coloured sparks like gems sewn on black velvet. I didn’t know then that that flame-haired princess would ignite such a blaze of passion and ambition in my husband’s soul that it would reduce all my hopes and dreams to ashes.

      6

      Amy Robsart Dudley

       Cumnor Place, Berkshire, near Oxford Sunday, September 8, 1560

      As hot tears roll down my face, I reach for the medicine bottle and take another calming sip. What a strange sensation it brings! As if I were floating above myself, above the pain, like the notes of a song hovering above just-plucked and still-vibrating lute strings. I have the most peculiar feeling of being outside myself, and behind myself, as if each time I move, I have to pause and wait a moment for my body to catch up with my soul. Or is it the other way around, and my mind that must rush to catch up with my body? What a curious notion! I am filled with the oddest fancies! I can’t help but laugh, even though it makes me feel as if Death were playing my ribs like the ivory keys of a virginal, but the medicine numbs it, and there is that strange delaying sensation; even though Death’s fingers strike the keys, the sound of the notes lags behind a moment or two. I take another sip, and the chords of pain are muted even more, as if I have run too far away to hear them as more than a distant, wind-borne melody. The pain is my fool now, and I am not the fool of my pain. I giggle and take another sip of that amber liquid, and now I don’t even mind the bitter taste that burns my throat as it courses down; I welcome it as if it were my saviour. Salvation in a bottle, the nostrum peddlers should call this magic brew! And after another sip I lie back on my bed, close my eyes, and let my mind wander where it will …

      When last I visited the crumbling, overgrown ruins of Syderstone, though they were no longer my own, I put on my wedding gown and went out, barefoot, with my hair all a-tumble down my back, and walked across the meadow, just as I had on my wedding day, picking myself a bouquet of buttercups as I went. What a strange sight the sheep must have thought me as they fled baa-ing before me, pausing oft to look back and stare before they fell to munching clover and thistles again. I know it sounds silly, but I wanted to see what it would be like, how it would СКАЧАТЬ