Free The Lost Duchess by Jenny Barden Page A

used the close stool of necessity, then poured water into a bowl from the silver ewer provided, worked a block of fine white Castile soap around her hands, and used a bristle brush to scrub at her fingers. She wept as she rubbed without knowing why, perhaps because she’d reacted absurdly to Kit’s gentle touch, recoiling from the very man for whom she had some real regard. What would Kit think of her now? He must have felt she wanted nothing to do with him, probably that she was aloof and conceited and considered herself superior without any cause. Then what was she doing? She should have been treasuring the affection implicit in his gesture, not trying to wash it away as hard as she could. But she felt unclean. Kit’s contact with her had been a shock; she had not anticipated it at all. He had touched her unexpectedly and she’d connected it with Lord Hertford driving his fingers into her.
    O me, not that. She hung her head in mortification and rubbed with the brush until her fingers were raw. She felt as if she would never be clean again. In the bowl was her world: the light from a tiny window in a high stone wall and the shadow of her reflection in a greasy film of dirty suds. Her tears plopped onto the surfaceone by one. She plunged in her hands and inadvertently splashed her skirts. She felt dizzy, not helped by the heady smell of violets in the confined space together with a lingering odour from the privy drain. She longed to escape. She did not know what to do. She no longer understood her own mind. What did she hope to achieve by scouring her hands?
    A sharp rapping on the door made her look up.
    ‘Emme?’ Bess called softly. ‘Are you in there?’
    ‘Yes,’ she answered, more brightly than she felt. ‘I’ll be out in a moment.’
    She wiped her eyes and her hands on a napkin, looked out of the little window and saw the river far below. Then she picked up the bowl and threw the water outside.

4
Knowledge
    ‘Knowledge is never too dear.’
    —Favourite maxim of Sir Francis Walsingham, Secretary of State and chief intelligencer to Queen Elizabeth I
    ‘I did not order that Babington was to be tortured in execution.’ The Queen’s voice rose to a shout. ‘Defiled and butchered!’
    ‘You told my Lord Burghley that hanging was not terrible enough,’ Sir Francis Walsingham remarked quietly.
    ‘I said that the populace should see and learn from the just punishment of traitors, not that they should be left fainting and retching. This report says that the man’s privities were sliced off before his eyes and his innards were drawn out while he was still alive.’
    Bess gasped and put her hand over her mouth. Emme stopped sewing in the act of pulling a stitch tight, conscious that her needle was trembling in her hand. They both leant closer together on theircushions in the corner of the Presence Room. Through the damask of her friend’s sleeve, Emme could feel Bess shivering.
    The Queen tossed a sheet of paper on the table before Secretary Walsingham and slammed her palm down on top. ‘This sickens me.’
    ‘It is done,’ he said, clasping his hands within his sleeves. ‘The quarters of the first seven traitors are displayed at St Giles and their heads are on London Bridge as an example to all.’
    ‘Make sure the next seven are dead before they are cut open.’ The Queen picked up a late September plum from a silver plate and turned to face the magnificent view from Greenwich Palace over the Thames. ‘What does my cousin Mary say now?’
    Walsingham stood behind her. ‘She feigns unconcern and says she will answer to no one but God.’
    ‘Pah!’ The Queen brought the plum to her mouth, held it close to her lips, then took it slowly away and proffered it to Walsingham.
    He held his palm open. ‘She must stand trial,’ he said gently. ‘The evidence is overwhelming.’
    To Emme, watching from the corner, Walsingham looked ink black against the light while the Queen shimmered like a fiery ember