Green Darkness

  Celia did not know what to answer. The woman’s face had a calm glow, there was great certainty in her way of speaking.

  Celia looked at the silver mug of hot ale, it smelled of nutmeg and apple, it smelled delicious. “I can’t drink this,” she said, “not before Communion. Even you know that.”

  Agnes nodded. “’Twas why I brung it. There’s naught in the Bible about goin’ to Mass, or feast days, or holy water, or praying to idols made by human hands, or beads, or some man i’ a long frock lurkin’ in a cupboard can forgive your sins . . .”

  “There isn’t?” said Celia startled. She had never read the Bible, of course, but she knew that in some way all Christianity was based on it. “How would you know, Agnes?” she said impatiently, rather as to a naughty child who has been found out in a lie. She put one bare leg out of bed, and pulled her nightshirt tight around her as St. Saviour’s rang the half-hour. She’d have to hurry to get to the eight o’clock Mass.

  “Because I’ve read every word o’ the Good Book fur m’self,” said Agnes with quiet triumph, as she held out Celia’s woolen chamber robe. “I read the Scriptures, Englished by Master John Rogers. Sir John Cheke had me taught, took me a year, but I learned.”

  “Sir John Cheke . . .” Celia frowned. She had heard of him; he had been tutor to the deluded little King Edward; he had espoused the usurpation by Lady Jane Grey. “He’s in the Tower for treason, Agnes,” said Celia severely, “and you’ve been badly taught. I’ll have to ask Brother Stephen to set you right, or we can never keep you here!”

  “Oh, Mistress Celia . . .” Agnes shook her head sadly, she gave the girl a pitying smile. “Ye’re so blind . . . poor sweeting. D’ye think any scoldin’ from a skirted young man’d sway me from God’s True Word. Ye’ve but ter read it—I’ve got the Book, Sir John gave it me—it’ll comfort ye in all tribulation, an’ ye won’t need that church yonder an’ its wicked mummeries. Our Blessed Lord saith that when two or three’re gathered together in His name that was church enough.”

  The shining in Agnes’s plain freckled face, the resolution in her clear voice perturbed Celia. She knew the woman must be wrong, but found no words to refute her. Besides, she noted as Agnes went to stir up last night’s embers in the fireplace that the poor thing had a twisted limp. Celia looked down at the left leg and saw that it ended in a lumpy shape, neatly bound with leather strips.

  “Clubfoot,” said Agnes cheerfully. “I was born wi’ it. I can work as well as any wench, but lots don’t want ter hire me. They had to turn me away at the Chekes’ w’en he was put in prison.”

  “And since then?” asked Celia. Agnes shocked and puzzled her, she might well be simple-minded, which would excuse her crazy speech. Yet, there was warmth, staunchness, a quality which Celia felt as wholeheartedness.

  “Since then I’ve trusted in m’ Blessed Lord to guide me like He promised, that Our Father knoweth what things we have need of afore we ask, and that He would not leave me comfortless. Yet, I couldn’t find work, a day here, a day there, a crust or two to keep m’belly from cavin’ in, but Our Lord ne’er promised we’d have no trials, and one night i’ a dream, He told me to use the writin’ Mistress Allen give me w’en she sent me off. I had it put by, an’ I remembered she used to boast she had a kinsman worked for Sir Anthony Browne. I’d but to ask i’ the tavern to find Sir Anthony lived here.”

  “The kinsman is Brother Stephen, our chaplain,” said Celia curtly. It did not surprise Celia that Ursula had hired the cripple provisionally, since she came with a reference, and Ursula was always pitiful. But she was made uneasy by the connection with Emma Allen. Celia’s intense dislike of the Kentish squire’s wife had faded, in fact, she remembered nothing of her own peculiar behavior after the Queen’s procession, except her half dream that Emma Allen was an adder. Nonetheless, she could not imagine Mistress Allen employing this woman. And she said so.

  “Oh,” said Agnes, “she hated the sight o’ me. Many’s the clout I got, an’ no wages neither. ’Twas just that my babe’d died an’ I had milk fur Master Charles. Me husband was blacksmith at Ightham, but he died o’ the sweatin’ sickness. I was fair beset. I’d no found m’true Heavenly Friend then.”

  “She couldn’t’ve hated you if she wrote you a character,” said Celia.

  Agnes was silent while she carefully pushed twigs and straw into the smoldering sea coals. Mistress Allen’s reference had been a bribe. It was entirely due to the night Agnes had been up with little Charles who was croupy; she had gone to the kitchen for hot water and surprised her mistress, drunk and half naked, panting in the sweaty arms of a lusty young scullion.

  “Well . . . no matter why,” said Agnes slowly. “She gi’e me the writin’.”

  Celia drew breath and began to cough. As the spasms lessened she reached for the ale mug and drank it down greedily. It eased her chest. She banished all thoughts of going to Mass. Sickness was a valid excuse, yet would make a venial sin to confess next Saturday. Her confessions of late to the parish priest had been dull and arid anyway—like her life, since Anthony had stopped entertaining.

  Agnes watched the pretty downcast face and said quickly, “The Blessed Lord’ll find ye a good husband, miss—if ye ask Him right, talk to Him straight, not wi’ candles an’ grovelin’, or gabblin’ o’ Latin words.”

  Celia gave an exasperated sigh. “I don’t know what I want! Leave me be. And quit talk like that or I’ll have to tell my aunt, at least. We can’t harbor Protestants here. And don’t upset the other servants.”

  “I s’all do wot God tells me ter do,” said Agnes gently. “An’ He’s allus wi’ me—in me heart.” She said no more while she limped carefully around the room, making the bed, dusting the crannies, retrieving the chamber pot to empty in the latrine below.

  I wish there were something in my heart, Celia thought, and realized how foolish it was to be envious of a poor clubfooted serving maid. It’s the weather—the sleet drove harder against the panes—it’s my headache. It was tedium—soon she would practice her needlework with Ursula, then they would go to the stillroom where they were concocting various herbal brews, some medicinal such as balsam salve, or tincture of poppy heads—some cosmetic like cucumber facewash. Then Celia would go out to the stables and pet Juno—the horse suffered from lack of exercise as much as Celia did. Then there would be dinner, far less lavish than when Anthony was there, but still enough to sate a depressed appetite, and after dinner the short winter afternoon would fade, and Ursula might get out her Ephemeris and by candlelight painstakingly cast the horoscope for the next day. Then Celia would spin yarn while Ursula read aloud from Gesta Romanorum, an English translation of wondrous deeds in ancient times, or the ballads of Robin Hood or even from a slender volume of love sonnets written by Sir Thomas Wyatt’s father, and presented to Anthony by young Sir Thomas before the quarrel at the puppet show.

  Ursula did not much like these poems of yearning, of lost love—Celia had heretofore found in them a sour-sweet melancholy. Today she felt she could not bear to listen.

  Precisely at the moment that she finished adjusting her everyday kerchief, and peered absently into her flyspecked little mirror, she became aware of the deeper reasons for her malaise. It was not the weather, low health or tedium which made the days so drear. It was a forlorn envy at the recurrent sight of Mabel’s dithering delight in Gerald’s attentions—and the fact that Stephen had totally avoided her since his wrathful speech when he had caught her flirting with Sir Thomas.

  Celia walked slowly down to the Hall, and stopped in surprise at the doorway when she heard her aunt’s voice inside raised in excited glad greeting. Now, who could have come? Celia thought without much interest. She entered the Hall, and was smothered in a hearty embrace.

  “God’s greeting, hinny—by the Mass, ’t’s been a lang while!”

  “Maggie . . .?” said Celia wonder-struck, drawing back to stare. It was most certainly Magdalen Dacre, but a vastly different Magdalen from the hungry, anxiou
s, Border lass she had last seen in Cumberland.

  This Magdalen was dressed in green velvet over silver brocade; she had a cloak furred with the finest miniver; her wiry auburn hair was nearly covered by a fur-trimmed hood. Her long reddish neck and freckled bosom were framed by a fashionable flaring ruff. She had a golden belt from which dangled not only her rosary, but also a jeweled pomander which gave forth the scent of cloves. And she wore a pair of elaborately embroidered gloves on her large capable hands.

  “A bit o’ surprise, eh, lass?” asked Magdalen, her leaf-brown eyes twinkling. “Ye’ll niver guess what I’m doing i’ London Town. Or did Sir Anthony think to tell ye?”

  “N-no . . .” said Celia, “we’ve not seen him for days. He’s always at Court.”

  “So’m I to be!” said Magdalen chuckling. “I canna believe ma guid fortune.”

  “You’re married?” asked Celia with a constriction in her chest.

  “Na, na . . .” Magdalen laughed. “None o’ that.” She turned to include Ursula in her announcement. “The Queen’s Grace— God bless an’ keep her—has appointed me a maid o’ honor. Faither’s that pleased he bought me a’ this fine gear.”

  Magdalen accepted enthusiastic congratulations in her downright way—no trace of deprecation or false modesty. It was not only the effect of the new clothes which gave her big ungainly body a touch of magnificence, for Celia there was also shock at the difference in their stations. In Cumberland amongst the rowdy, violent, earthy Dacres, Celia had never felt inferior, now she was conscious that Magdalen was the child of nobility, of lineage through barons and earls stretching back five hundred years to the Conquest—the only historical date except Christ’s birth that Celia knew.

  “Ye luik a wee bit dozzened, lass—” said Magdalen suddenly. She examined Celia’s face. “Pale an’ peaky, ’tis the heavy London air?”

  “She’s been ill,” Ursula interjected. “We both have. Catarrh and cough. But we’re mending. ’Twas good of you to visit us, Maggie. We’ve been dull, house-bound.” She, too, found Magdalen’s transformation overpowering, and wished that Celia had not worn her old homespun kirtle, though it was fitting to the domestic duties they must perform.

  “I’ve not forgot ye,” said Magdalen, who comprehended the situation. Her fondness for Celia had perforce been submerged during the last feverish months, and she had come today on kindly impulse, as she was not on duty in the Queen’s chambers at Whitehall. Now she was shocked by Celia’s thinness, by her obvious despondency.

  “Coom, hinny,” she said, struck by a sudden idea, “no reason to mope here, ’tis Twelfth Night, we maun mak’ merry. Do ye go tonight, you an’ Lady Southwell, to the Queen’s revels at Whitehall?”

  “To Court—?” asked Ursula, astounded. “But we don’t belong there, Sir Anthony’s never mentioned such a thing.”

  “He wouldna mind, he’s mebbe heedless,” said Magdalen, “bein’ sae caught oop wi’ great matters, yet did he think on it, he’d na want ye droopin’ lak this. Forebye the palace’s open wide this neet. There’ll be a thousand or more. I’ll send a groom fur ye, at three. ’Tis settled then . . . an’ no mincing aboot.”

  She bestowed another hug on Celia, a smile on Ursula and hurried off.

  Mabel, when she finally arose—she customarily slept the morning away quite indifferent to Mass now that Brother Stephen no longer disciplined his household—was vaguely pleased, though taking Ursula and Celia to Whitehall would never have occurred to her. Mabel was out a great deal herself now, had often been to Court where Anthony had presented her to the Queen in November, under the aegis of the Countess of Arundel.

  “Fitzgerald’ll be there tonight, of course,” said Mabel smugly. “He’s asked me to sup beside him. I’ll wear my new Brussels lace ruff. Pray, Lady,” she turned to Ursula, “can you make that Agnes sew the wires more firmly? I wonder you hired her, she’s clumsy and mute as a mole. Soon I’ll have tiring women of my own, though!” Mabel’s plump face brightened, she smiled in a way that made her pretty.

  “Aye, child, ’twould seem you will.” Ursula tried to keep the tartness from her voice. For Mabel life had grown sweet. She was transformed, like all women, by a successful love affair, a suitable one, which Ursula considered that she had done nothing to deserve; except, possibly, the accident of birth when Jupiter and Venus were both ascendant. But why was she born just then? Why did her horoscope indicate a long and prosperous life, largely passed in a foreign land? And destiny was indeed unfolding such a life. It was forbidden to question God’s justice, forbidden to a devout woman—yet through Ursula’s mind there darted a memory of talks with Master Julian at Cowdray. Speaking in his ironic way, he had seemed to voice an explanation that events surrounding us in this life might be predicated on behavior in past ones. That events in this life might also influence future lives on earth. He had quoted from the ancients, from Plato and Cicero and Ovid—names she barely knew—but when she timidly objected that these men were pagans, he had laughed and said, “Da vero—so you may have Church Fathers then,” and mentioned St. Gregory and Origen, and even the Bible.

  Ursula caught herself up. She had no wish to think of Julian and the hurt he had dealt her by refusing to come to Southwark on the night of Celia’s strange illness. There was much to be done to prepare Celia’s clothes—and her spirits—for the appearance at Whitehall. Perhaps tonight, she thought with the perennial upsurge of hope, tonight will bring the change in Celia’s fortunes which Julian himself had foretold.

  The palace at Whitehall was jammed on that Twelfth Night. Queen Mary was happier than she had ever been in her life. She sat on her throne in the presence chamber, graciously nodding to each one of the indeterminate file of faces whose owners dropped to one knee as they were hurried along by the Lord Chamberlain. She glittered with jewels, and her pinched little face, sandy-browed, thin-lipped, was transfigured into comeliness by the same alchemy which had improved Mabel.

  Close beside her stood Count Egmont, the Spanish emissary who had just brought confirmation from Prince Philip of her heart’s desire—the marriage contracts. She giggled and blushed when Lord William Howard—who had replaced Clinton as Lord High Admiral—whispered daring remarks in her ear. That soon he would share her throne, and her bed—the wonderful young Spanish Prince. Soon, after years of neglect and thwarted virginity, she would have someone worthy to love. She loved him already. True, he was over ten years younger than she, but Count Egmont assured her that Philip was grave and sedate, far older than twenty-seven in his ways, and that he doted on her portrait, as she did on his.

  Mary’s rapture infected her guests. They milled through the state chambers, enjoying a courtly freedom reminiscent of King Henry’s best years. It was cold outside, the Thames was partially frozen, the sleet had turned first to snow and then to a cracking frost, but the Palace was warm from the sconces, the roaring fires and the heat of so many velvet and fur-clad bodies.

  Anthony was standing near the throne conversing warily with the haughty and immensely rich Earl of Pembroke, whose views on the Spanish marriage were known to be adverse. Pembroke had been friend to Northumberland, had signed for Queen Jane, then retracted like so many others whom Mary forgave. He was the most powerful peer after the Duke of Norfolk, he was sternly anti-Catholic, and had never been civil to Anthony until the last weeks, when Mary’s approval of Cowdray’s owner had been so marked.

  “Disgusting rabble here tonight,” Pembroke observed. “Our poor young King’d never have permitted such a throng. Some o’ these folk are commoners! I wonder at Her Majesty!”

  Anthony raised his eyebrows and said, “True, my lord, and did you mean me especially?”

  The Earl glanced at him, “Nay, nay, my good knight, I referred to”—he waved a thin veined hand—“well, to such as those near the doorway.”

  Anthony looked and saw Master Julian standing with the Allens and a young man in doctoral robes. “I know them,” he said. “All but the youngest man. They’re en
tirely respectable.”

  The Earl snorted. “So is a quarter of England, I warrant—and the youngest man is John Dee, whom I do not consider respectable, for all he calls himself a doctor, and has set up as Astrologer Royal.”

  “Oh . . .?” said Anthony, slightly amused by the Earl’s venom. “I have heard of him.”

  “Dangerous fellow,” said the Earl. “Black magic, alchemy, witchcraft, two-faced as Janus. Can’t have that sort of villain at Court!” Pembroke snapped his turtle mouth shut and walked off to greet young Courtenay, the Earl of Devonshire, who was languidly approaching.

  Cotsbody, what a coil! Anthony thought amused. The maligned John Dee had a pleasant intelligent face, and baseless slander was a frequent pastime amongst the nobility. However, as he was dedicated to the Queen and her welfare, he thought that he had better join the foursome by the doorway and inspect Dee. He was checked by the sight of Magdalen Dacre towering over the crowd and shepherding two women whom he recognized with astonishment as Lady Ursula and Celia. He rushed forward, beaming and contrite.

  “Aye,’ sir,” said Magdalen, seeing the contrition. “Since ye prove sae neglectful o’ your womenfolk, others maun recall your duties this Twelfthneet.”

  Anthony laughed, and thumped his breast. “Mea culpa, my ladies, I’m glad to see you,” and he was, though he did not know what to do with them. Lady Ursula had her own handsome dignity; Celia was always pretty, yet tonight she seemed small and uncertain next to Magdalen. Fond as he was of them, Anthony perceived that they were both of the class which Pembroke had contemptuously dismissed as “commoners”! They were not actual kin of his, and by no stretch of propriety might they be permitted to sup in the banqueting hall, much less the high table where he had been allotted a place near the Queen.

  Magdalen quickly saw his dilemma, even though she was, as yet, unused to Court. She herself must eat amongst the maids of honor, and it was all very unlike the easy ways at Naworth Castle. She exchanged a look of rueful understanding with Anthony and said cheerfully, “I could show ’em aboot the Palace, then there’ll be food i’ the back rooms. They’ll have a cake ther-re, too, hinny.” She smiled at Celia. “God-a-mercy, ye maught cut it reet an’ get the bean, then ye’d be a queen fur the neet, same lak Her Majesty . . .”