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

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      He was looking out of the window to the green, his desk drawn close to it to catch the light. His back was turned to me and I was across the room and beside him as he turned around. I was in his arms at once, he hugged me as a man would hug a child, a beloved little girl. But when I felt his arms come around me I longed for him as a woman desires a man.

      He sensed it at once. He had been a philanderer for too many years not to know when he had a willing woman in his arms. At once he let me go and stepped back, as if he feared his own desire rising up to meet mine.

      ‘Mistress Boy, I am shocked! You have become a woman grown.’

      ‘I didn’t know it,’ I said. ‘I have been thinking of other things.’

      He nodded, his quick mind chasing after any allusion. ‘World changing very fast,’ he observed.

      ‘Yes,’ I said. I glanced at the door which was safely closed.

      ‘New king, new laws, new head of the church. Is Elizabeth well?’

      ‘She’s been sick,’ I said. ‘But she’s better now. She’s at Hampton Court, with the queen. I just came with her from Woodstock.’

      He nodded. ‘Has she seen Dee yet?’

      ‘No. I don’t think so.’

      ‘Have you seen him?’

      ‘I thought he was in Venice.’

      ‘He was, Mistress Boy. And he has sent a package from Venice to your father in Calais, which your father will send on to the shop in London for you to deliver to him, if you please.’

      ‘A package?’ I asked anxiously.

      ‘A book merely.’

      I said nothing. We both knew that the wrong sort of book was enough to get me hanged.

      ‘Is Kat Ashley still with the princess?’

      ‘Of course.’

      ‘Tell Kat from me, in secret, that if she is offered some ribbons she should certainly buy them.’

      I recoiled at once. ‘My lord …’

      Robert Dudley stretched out a peremptory hand to me. ‘Have I ever led you into danger?’

      I hesitated, thinking of the Wyatt plot when I had carried treasonous messages that I had not understood. ‘No, my lord.’

      ‘Then take this message but take no others from anyone else, and carry none for Kat, whatever she asks you. Once you have told her to buy her ribbons and once you have given John Dee his book, it is nothing more to do with you. The book is innocent and ribbons are ribbons.’

      ‘You are weaving a plot,’ I said unhappily. ‘And weaving me into it.’

      ‘Mistress Boy, I have to do something, I cannot write poetry all day.’

      ‘The queen will forgive you in time, and then you can go home …’

      ‘She will never forgive me,’ he said flatly. ‘I have to wait until there is a change, a deep sea change; and while I wait, I shall protect my interests. Elizabeth knows that she is not to go to Hungary, or anywhere else, does she?’

      I nodded. ‘She is quite determined neither to leave nor marry.’

      ‘King Philip will keep her at court now, and make her his friend, I should think.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘One baby, as yet unborn, is not enough to secure the throne,’ he pointed out. ‘And next in line is Elizabeth. If the queen were to die in childbirth he would be in a most dangerous position: trapped in England and the new queen and all her people his enemies.’

      I nodded.

      ‘And if he were to disinherit Elizabeth then the next heir would be Mary, married to the Prince of France. D’you not think that our Spanish King Philip would rather see the devil incarnate on the English throne than the King of France’s son?’

      ‘Oh,’ I said.

      ‘Exactly,’ he said with quiet satisfaction. ‘You can remind Elizabeth that she is in a stronger position now that Philip is on the queen’s council. There’s not many of them that can think straight there; but he certainly can. Is Gardiner still trying to persuade the queen to declare Elizabeth a bastard and disinherit her?’

      I shook my head. ‘I don’t know.’

      Robert Dudley smiled. ‘I warrant he is. Actually, I know he is.’

      ‘You’re very well informed for a friendless prisoner without news or visitors,’ I observed tartly.

      He smiled his dark seductive smile. ‘No friends as dear to me as you, sweetheart.’

      I tried not to smile back but I could feel my face warming at his attention.

      ‘You have grown into a young woman indeed,’ he said. ‘Time you were out of your pageboy clothes, my bird. Time you were wed.’

      I flushed quickly at the thought of Daniel and what he would make of Lord Robert calling me ‘sweetheart’ and ‘my bird’.

      ‘And how is the swain?’ Lord Robert asked, dropping into the chair at his desk and putting his boots up on the scattered papers. ‘Pressing his suit? Passionate? Urgent?’

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