Free The King’s Concubine: A Novel of Alice Perrers by Anne O'Brien

Peckham, somewhere in Kent. I read it twice, a tiny seed of a plan beginning to unfurl in my mind. Now, here was a possibility. I did not know how to achieve what I envisaged, but of course I knew someone who would.
    Where to find him? I walked slowly down the stairs, halting halfway when I saw a figure below me.
    “Is he dead?” Signora Damiata was waiting for me in the narrow hall.
    “Yes.”
    She made the sign of the cross on her bosom, a cursory acknowledgment, then flung back the outer door and gestured for me to leave. “I’ve arranged for his body to be collected. I’ll return when the pestilence has gone.”
    “What about me?”
    “I’m sure you’ll find some means of employment,” she said, barely acknowledging me. “Plague does not quench men’s appetites.”
    “And my dower?”
    “What dower?”
    “You can’t do this!” I announced. “You can’t leave me homeless and without money.”
    But she could. “Out!”
    I was pushed through the doorway onto the street. With a flourish and a rattle of the key, Signora Damiata locked the door and strode off, stepping through the waste and puddles.
    It was a lesson to me in brutal coldheartedness when dealing with matters of coin and survival. And there I was, sixteen years old to my reckoning, widowed after little more than a year of marriage, cast adrift, standing alone outside the house, and homeless. It felt as if myfeet were chained to the floor. Where would I go? Who would give me shelter? Reality was a bitter draft. London seethed around me but offered me no refuge.
    “Mistress Perrers…!”
    “Greseley!”
    For there he was—I hadn’t had to find him after all—emerging from a rank alley to slouch beside me. Never had I been so relieved to see anyone, but not without a shade of rancor. He might have lost a master too, but he would never be short of employment or a bed.
    “What did the old besom give you?” he asked without preamble.
    “Nothing,” I retorted. “The old besom has stripped the house.” And then I smiled, waving the document in front of his eyes. “Except for this. She overlooked it. It’s a manor.”
    Those eyes gleamed. “Is it, now? And what do you intend to do with it?”
    “I intend you to arrange that it becomes mine , Master Greseley. Enfeoffment for use, I think you called it.” I could be a fast learner, and I had seen my chance. “Can you do that?”
    He ran his finger down his nose. “Easy for those who know how. I can—if it suits me—have it made over to you as the widow of Master Perrers, and now femme sole .”
    A woman alone. With property. A not unpleasing thought that made my smile widen.
    “And will it suit you, Master Greseley?” I slid a persuasive glance at the clerk. “Will you do it for me?”
    His face flushed under my gaze as he considered.
    I softened my voice. “I cannot do this on my own, Master Greseley. But you have the knowledge.…”
    He grinned, a quick slash of thin lips and discolored teeth. “Why not? We have, I believe, the basis of a partnership here, Mistress Perrers. I’ll work for you, and you’ll put business my way—when you can. I’ll enfeoff the manor to the use of a local knight—and myself.”
    So that was it. Master Greseley was not entirely altruistic, but he was willing with a little female enticement. How easily men could be seducedwith a smile and outrageous flattery offered in sweet tones. He extended his hand. I looked at it: not overclean but with long, surprisingly elegant fingers that could work magic with figures far more ably than I, and I knew his mind to be just as clever. There on the doorstep of my erstwhile home, I handed over the document and we shook hands as I had seen Janyn do when confirming some deal with a customer.
    “You’ll not cheat me, will you?” I made my voice stern.
    “Certainly not!” His outrage was amusing. And then his brows twitched together suspiciously. “Where will you go?”
    “There’s only one place.” I