Philippa Gregory 3-Book Tudor Collection 2: The Queen’s Fool, The Virgin’s Lover, The Other Queen. Philippa Gregory

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СКАЧАТЬ like one of his soldiers. Your job, like a puppy and not like a soldier, is to be yourself. Say the first thing that comes into your head, do whatever you wish. It will amuse him. It will amuse us, and it will set before us all the work of the Lord, which will please him. You will tell the truth in this court of liars, you will be our innocent in this wicked world. Understand?’

      ‘How am I to be?’ I was absolutely confounded. ‘What d’you want of me?’

      ‘You are to be yourself. Speak as your gift commands you. Say whatever you wish. The king has no holy fool at present and he likes an innocent at court. He has commanded you. You are now a royal fool. One of the household. You will be paid to be his fool.’

      I waited.

      ‘Do you understand, fool?’

      ‘Yes. But I don’t accept.’

      ‘You can’t accept or not accept. You’ve been begged for a fool, you have no legal standing, you have no voice. Your father has handed you over to Lord Robert here, and he has given you to the king. You are now the king’s.’

      ‘If I refuse?’ I could feel myself trembling.

      ‘You can’t refuse.’

      ‘If I run away?’

      ‘Punished according to the king’s wishes. Whipped like a puppy. You were your father’s property, now you are ours. And we have begged you for a fool to the king. He owns you. D’you understand?’

      ‘My father would not sell me,’ I said stubbornly. ‘He would not let me go.’

      ‘He cannot stand against us,’ Robert said quietly behind me. ‘And I promised him that you would be safer here than out on the street. I gave him my word and he accepted. The business was done while we ordered the books, Hannah. It is finished.’

      ‘Now,’ continued the duke. ‘Not like a puppy, and not like a fool, you have another task to do.’

      I waited.

      ‘You are to be our vassal.’

      At the strange English word I glanced at Robert Dudley.

      ‘Servant to command, servant for life,’ he explained.

      ‘Our vassal. Everything you hear, everything you see, you come and tell me. Anything the king prays for, anything that makes him weep, anything that makes him laugh, you come and tell me, or you tell Robert here. You are our eyes and our ears at his side. Understand?’

      ‘My lord, I have to go home to my father,’ I said desperately. ‘I cannot be the king’s fool nor your vassal. I have work to do at the bookshop.’

      The duke raised one eyebrow at his son. Robert leaned towards me and spoke very quietly.

      ‘Mistress Boy, your own father cannot care for you. He said that in your hearing, d’you remember?’

      ‘Yes, but, my lord, he only meant that I am a trouble to him …’

      ‘Mistress Boy, I think your father is not a good Christian from a good Christian family at all, but a Jew. I think you came from Spain because you were expelled by the Spanish for the sin of Jewishness, and if your neighbours and the good citizens of London knew that you were Jews, you would not last for very long in your new little home.’

      ‘We are Marranos, our family converted years and years ago,’ I whispered. ‘I have been baptised, I am betrothed to marry a young man of my father’s choosing, a Christian Englishman …’

      ‘I wouldn’t go in that direction,’ Robert Dudley warned bluntly. ‘Lead us to that young man and I imagine you lead us to a family of Jews living in the heart of England itself, and from thence to – where did you say? Amsterdam? And then Paris?’

      I opened my mouth to deny it, but I could not speak for fear.

      ‘All forbidden Jews, all pretending to be Christians. All lighting a candle on Friday night, all avoiding pork, all living with the noose around their necks.’

      ‘Sir!’

      ‘They all helped and guided you here, didn’t they? All Jews, all practising a forbidden religion in secret, all helping one another. A secret network, just as the most fearful of Christians claim.’

      ‘My lord!’

      ‘Do you really want to be the key that leads this most Christian king to seek you out? Don’t you know that the reformed church can light a pyre just as bright as the Papists? Do you want to pile your family on it? And all their friends? Have you ever smelled roasting human flesh?’

      I was shaking in terror, my throat so dry that I could say nothing. I just looked at him and I knew my eyes were black with fear and he would see the sheen of sweat on my forehead.

      ‘I know. You know. Your father knows he cannot keep you safe. But I can. Enough. I won’t say another word.’

      He paused. I tried to speak but all I could manage was a little croak of terror. Robert Dudley nodded at the craven depth of my fear. ‘Now, luckily for you, your Sight has won you the safest and highest place that you might dream of. Serve the king well, serve our family well and your father is safe. Fail us in any one thing and he is tossed in a blanket till his eyes fall backwards in his head, and you are married to a red-faced chapel-going Luther-reading pig herder. You can choose.’

      There was the briefest of moments. Then the Duke of Northumberland waved me away. He did not even wait for me to make my choice. He did not need the Sight to know what my choice would have to be.

      ‘And you are to live at court?’ my father confirmed.

      We were eating our dinner, a small pie brought in from the bakehouse at the end of the street. The unfamiliar taste of English pastry stuck at the back of my throat, my father forced down gravy that was flavoured with bacon rinds.

      ‘I am to sleep with the maidservants,’ I said glumly. ‘And wear the livery of the king’s pages. I am to be his companion.’

      ‘It’s better than I could have provided for you,’ my father said, trying to be cheerful. ‘We won’t make enough money to pay the rent on this house next quarter, unless Lord Robert orders some more books.’

      ‘I can send you my wages,’ I offered. ‘I am to be paid.’

      He patted my hand. ‘You’re a good girl,’ he said. ‘Never forget that. Never forget your mother, never forget that you are one of the children of Israel.’

      I nodded, saying nothing. I saw him spoon a little of the contaminated gravy and swallow it down.

      ‘I am to go to the palace tomorrow,’ I whispered. ‘I am to start at once. Father …’

      ‘I will come to the gate and see you every evening,’ he promised. ‘And if you are unhappy or they treat you badly we will run away. We can go back to Amsterdam, we can go to Turkey. We will find somewhere, querida. Have courage, daughter. You are one of the СКАЧАТЬ