Free To Ruin A Queen: An Ursula Blanchard Mystery at Queen Elizabeth I's Court by Fiona Buckley Page A

the northwest tower behind the kitchen, and the retainers—I mean the guard—in the gatehouse tower.”
    “What about that one?” Pausing, I pointed back toward the tower in the southwest corner, which he hadn’t mentioned. It was the only one that didn’t have another building in front of it, but it had an oddly deserted air and its door was solidly shut, with no key in its stout iron lock.
    “Oh, that.” Rafe was amused. He gave me a sidelong grin, which undid the impression of courtliness and made him look mischievous. “That’s the haunted tower. Every castle worth its salt has a haunted tower, you know.”
    Hampton Court was said to be haunted, in particular by the shade of King Henry’s fifth wife, Kate Howard, who was arrested there before she was taken to the tower and then beheaded at Henry’s orders. Elizabeth didn’t stay there often but occasionally she did and once, when I was still serving as one of her ladies, I had found myself alone, at dusk, in the gallery where Kate’s screams were still said to echo. I had heard nothing, seen nothing, but I had been uneasy, as though I were being watched from the shadows. I was not as inclined as Rafe to laugh at such things.
    “What kind of ghost is it?” I asked.
    “There are two. They’re supposed to be the phantoms of a medieval castellan’s lady and the minstrel she fell in love with. The husband caught them, and he shut them in the tower and left them to die for lack of food and drink. Not a pleasant end. Imagine it,” said Rafe, and to my surprise gave me another sidelong glance, as if to see if my efforts at imagining it would produce some tenderhearted feminine vapors.
    “Nasty,” I said coolly.
    “It’s said,” Rafe informed me, “that sometimes you can see their faces at the window and that if you go inside, even in daylight, you may hear them moaning, or hear the sound of the minstrel’s harp. The place is disused now but Sir Philip has it swept out once or twice a year and the servants who do the sweeping go in all together and look over their shoulders all the time. I went in last time it was cleaned and nothing happened, but I admit,” said Rafe more seriously, “that I wouldn’t care to spend a night there.”
    “Has anyone, ever?”
    “Not that I know of. It’s kept locked most of the time. It’s virtually empty, except for a few bits of furniture that no one wants. If you will come this way …”
    It was a polite reminder that Lady Thomasine was waiting. The way to her apparently led through the modern red-brick house. “This is called the Aragon Wing, or sometimes just Aragon,” Rafe said. “Lady Thomasine’s father, Sir Thomas Vetch, had it built. He liked modern building styles—not like the Mortimers. They prefer things to be ancient and hallowed. Lady Thomasine says that Aragon was completed on the very day when KingHenry married his first wife, Katherine of Aragon. A great party was held in the wing, as a housewarming and to celebrate the royal marriage, both at once. Careful as we go in; the entrance is rather dark and there’s a step.”
    Courteously, he offered me a hand, and steered me over the threshold with a firm grip. We passed through a shadowy little entrance lobby and then through an inner door into a pleasant parlor with windows overlooking the courtyard on one side, and the tiltyard on the other. A staircase at one side led to the floor above and an ornamental clock, with a pale blue enamel surround rimmed in turn by gilt sun-flames, hung on one wall. The wall tapestries and the cushions on the settles were all in shades of blue.
    “The blue parlor, for obvious reasons,” Rafe said, leading the way through to where the parlor abruptly narrowed, because a corner had been walled off to make another room. “That’s Sir Philip’s study. It looks out onto the courtyard, so that he can keep an eye on the life of the castle. The stairs lead up to a music room. I enjoy music. I sometimes play my lute