The Queen's Bastard Page 9

  She had determined early on to become Robert Southern’s helpmate, take his prosperous farm, and make them wealthy. Once wealthy, she dreamed — oh, how she dreamed — they would move to London. Live the life of wealthy merchants in Londontown. Perhaps be asked to Court. Meet the Queen. Did he not once have a friend now in the Queen’s circle?

  Maud saw herself, she told Robert one winter afternoon daydreaming in front of the fire, wearing a fine blue brocaded gown with silver embroidered sleeves, curtsying to Her Majesty, and the Queen bidding her rise to compliment her sparkling eyes. And maybe, just maybe, the Queen would think: What a pretty thing to have for my waiting lady. When Robert had asked what would become of him in such a grand life, Maud had quickly added that of course Robert should go to London too. He would have a fine suit of clothes to meet the Queen. “But what would I do in London?” he persisted. “I am a man who knows and works best with animals.” Becoming cross, Maud had shaken her pretty head and blustered, “There are animals in London! Horses, chickens, pigs. There must be animals!” She’d stormed off, her dreams compromised by a bumpkin husband.

  Shortly thereafter Maud had begun having babies. A boy had been first, and despite her grandiose schemes the child, John, had brought Maud as well as Robert great joy. Two strong girls in quick succession had kept Maud busy. She always insisted, as wives of yeomen and gentry were wont to do, on hiring wet nurses to suckle her children. So Maud, between her household chores, schooling the children, teaching them their letters and numbers, and supervising the servants, had found time to establish a cheesemaking factory on the farm, producing great rounds of rich cheese which she with her clever ways contrived to sell most profitably across the Channel. She had never lost her dream at all. Simply postponed it. Enlarged it, even. Only God and Maud knew what grand London mansion on the banks of the Thames the girl had settled them in, which high lords and ladies she had invited to dinner. The dream had remained intact. Until now.

  The cattle fever had scuttled Maud’s plans as surely as a great sea wave might scuttle a small skiff, thought Robert. All profits were lost as they scurried frantically to keep from sinking altogether.

  And then the confidential letter had arrived from Kat.

  He had thanked the Lord that Maud had been elsewhere when Kat’s man Roger brought it, but as he read the missive his heart thudded thick and hard in his chest. Kat was asking him to take in Queen Elizabeth’s bastard child by Lord Robert Dudley. A child whom the Queen herself, owing to Kat’s machinations, believed to be dead.

  ’Twas folly, thought Robert Southern, treason even. But worse still than the terror of a traitor’s death, was the thought of Maud’s rage. Kat had specified that no one, not even his wife, could know the child’s lineage. Not that Robert wished to tell Maud, for if she knew the identity of the babe’s parents, ’twould only feed her unattainable dreams. But when he brought a strange child and its wet nurse into their home demanding — for he must demand it — that the boy be accepted unquestioningly, what on earth might Maud think? That he was Robert’s own bastard child, of course. No good amount of explanation, no talk of a distant family member in trouble — for Maud knew all of his meager family — would suffice. Lord, now of all times!

  Robert groaned aloud, and Betsy turned to him with a look of concern. “Are you unwell, Mister Southern, sir?”

  “No, no, I’m fine.”

  “Are we almost there, then?” she asked, shading her eyes to look down the narrow highway that cut through flat marshlands dotted with sheep and cattle.

  “See up ahead, Betsy, where the road meets with another road? The sign has been pulled down, it appears, but that is the road to London.”

  “London? Is the babe come from London, then?”

  Robert cursed himself silently. Betsy had shown considerable curiosity about her position with the dairyman’s family since her clandestine hiring, and he wished her to know as little as possible. He would not even have brought her in sight of his meeting with Kat Ashley, but for the child needing a caretaker once the exchange had been made. Besides, he did reckon, Betsy could have no way of knowing who Kat was, this girl who had never once left the confines of her rural village in the sixteen years she’d been alive.

  The milk wagon clattered to a halt at the crossroads, and they waited. It should not be long. Kat had estimated the time from the previous night’s inn to the meeting spot as less than four hours.

  Perhaps, thought Robert Southern with a twinge of hope and guilt combined, the child had died, God rest his little soul, and Kat would arrive alone to say, “Thank you, my friend, for agreeing to this favor but, alas, the Queen’s bastard has met his Maker.” Then they would sit amiably, hold hands as they chatted, exchange idle gossip as friends do, and leave each other with a chaste kiss goodbye.

  His hopeful musings were shattered by the distant unmistakable rumble of a carriage approaching down the London road.

  The coach Kat Ashley came in was large and elegant, a transport that would surely incite talk. ’Twas not the coach of any local lord or gentry, and by the next day all in the village would know of the fine carriage come from London and who had met it at the crossroads. But Robert had plotted their meeting so far from his own home that, even if it were to be seen, the village abuzz with gossip would not be his village. And unless luck was dead set against him, Maud would never hear how or when he had acquired the child.

  As the coach clattered to a stop a hundred paces from the milk cart, Robert Southern took a deep breath, straightened his jacket, and climbed down. He was strangely aware that the road under his feet was hard and uneven, and he felt, with less foreboding than he imagined he might have, that he was walking toward his destiny. Perhaps this was good fortune for them all, and consequences be damned! He would deal with Maud, quiet her fears. He would take in this royal child, much as Sir Ector, centuries before, had raised the boy Arthur as his own until the day the lad had pulled Excalibur from the stone and been proclaimed king of all England. All would be well, he told himself coming abreast of the carriage, all would be well …

  Kat and Robert dared not tarry overlong. She had immediately sent Ellen out to give the child over into the girl Betsy’s keeping. Kat did not wish to be witness to the scene and hardened her heart against Ellen’s pain at losing the infant who had for many weeks soothed the ache of her own stillborn babe.

  Kat and Robert sat in the fine coach opposite each other and spoke — not unlike he had imagined — sweetly, companionably, trying to fit too many years apart into one half hour. He had not, however, reckoned how greedy he was for the sight of her, how he searched the face, now crisscrossed with fine wrinkles, as if it were a roadmap of their past and perhaps, too, his future with the boy.

  They did not, at first, talk of the child. The details had been arranged by letter. But the time to part approached and it was only fitting that some words be spoken of this strange bundle being passed into his life. Yet no words came, no questions formed in Robert Southern’s mind. He groped in agonizing silence and Kat, good old friend that she was, sensed his confusion.

  “His name …” she said finally.

  “His name?” said Robert uncomprehendingly. Did she wish to know what he would name the child? “Oh, of course. What is he called?”

  Kat looked away out the coach window, perhaps remembering that terrible stormy night, the pain, the blood, the betrayal… .

  “The Queen called him Arthur.”

  Kat grasped Robert’s hand suddenly and fiercely. He moved to sit beside her, his arms going round her. As she leaned into them and cried bitterly, Robert Southern wondered at the Fates that had once again brought two lovers together, and a new child into his life — a royal child called Arthur.

  Maud Southern could barely contain her excitement. She had finished her day’s chores — overseeing cook’s preparation of the dinner meal, sewing the sleeves into Meg’s new Sunday gown, scolding the buttery workers for their slack pace, and haggling with the merch
ants from Plainfield over the price of her best cheese. Yes, she was weary, but like a buzzing bee her marvelous idea had flitted here and there inside her head, and even seemed to make her heart beat faster at the thought of it. Oh, where was Robert! She was trembling with anticipation to lay the scheme before him, watch that always sober countenance crinkle into a surprised smile of joy.

  She envisioned herself seated across the buttery table from him detailing her plan to sell the dairy now, before more cows sickened and died and they lost any more of their holdings. She would spread before him the money she had secretly squirreled away from her buttery operation, and describe how she had contracted with local Suffolk cheesemakers, and some others from across the Channel in France and the Low Countries with whom she had negotiated to import rather than export cheeses.

  The family would move to London, to a modest address, and open a white meats shop selling eggs and butter and cheese, with cheeses shipped in from all over England and Europe. Robert’s friend in the Queen’s entourage would help them get the license they would need for business. ’Twould at first be a small operation. They would be Lesser Merchants, to be sure, but news of their fine products would spread to all parts of London and beyond, and surely come to the Queen’s attention. They would move up in the world, become Great Merchants with a better address in Milk Street and perhaps a home separate from their shop. Young John would have the finest education and the girls large dowries. The family would rise from yeoman class to gentry. John would become a man of substance, perhaps study law, perhaps hold public office. Oh, ’twould be exciting, a life in London, sociable and satisfying! How could Robert possibly say no?

  Maud bustled up the stairs and peeked in the nursery where their servant Barbara sat suckling Maud’s youngest girl, fair Alice, just two years old. Meg, who played quietly with her new kitten, was three. She resembled her mother, with dark eyes to match her hair, and was a pretty child. Meg would have no trouble finding a good husband, with her looks and a rich merchant father. She might even marry up. And what, indeed, was “up” from the gentry? Maud smiled contentedly and turned to the room she shared with Robert.

  The bedstead, the finest piece of furniture in the house, was good sized, with a canopy and even some carving in the headboard. The muslin sheets were the best they could afford for now, though she always wondered how it would feel to slip in between fine lawn sheets. Well, she would know soon enough.

  Maud moved to the small mirror to see how she looked for Robert’s return and glimpsed John, almost five, from the window. The boy was chasing chickens round the barnyard and shrieking delightedly at the ruckus he was causing. He looked the way she imagined Robert had looked as a boy, the same fair ringlets framing the same high forehead, the toothy smile, large ears he would never quite grow into. John was her first-born and Maud adored him, glad that he had inherited his high spirits from her, and not the quiet seriousness of his father.

  The boy stopped in his tracks, then streaked to the farm gate. Robert must be home. Maud peered into the mirror, tucking a flyaway bit of hair behind her ear, and bit her lips to redden them. Despite three children in a few short years, she still retained her girlish prettiness. But now she must look neat and professional — like the proud tradeswoman she would present herself to be.

  Maud sent the servants scurrying after the children, so that when Robert Southern entered the buttery door they were quite alone. She was sitting behind the wooden table, erect, her hands folded neatly in front of her. Her pert, enigmatic smile drooped slightly with the first look at her husband’s face. Always serious, he was this afternoon very somber indeed, with what appeared to be a perplexed expression. Maud decided she must proceed nonetheless.

  “Robert. I’ve been thinking a good deal of our situation here at the farm, the dairy and such, and my cheesemaking. I’ve thought, too, about the cows and their illnesses, and how we do depend so dearly on them for our feast or famine.”

  “Maud, we must talk together.”

  “I know that, Robert. But I tell you I have done a good bit of talking to myself, sometimes as if I were talking to you, so —”

  “You don’t understand, Maud.”

  “What do I not understand? Why you’ve walked in here with a face as long as a rope? More cattle have not died, have they?” she asked, suddenly alarmed.

  “No, no cattle have died, and no one we know has died.”

  “Well, that’s a relief, then. What is it, Robert? Tell me quickly, because I’m bursting to tell you my news.”

  When he did not answer, Maud followed his gaze out the buttery window and saw the girl sitting in the milk wagon holding a bundle to her breast. Maud squinted. “Who’s that out in the cart? It looks to me like … Betsy Newman.” She looked at Robert quizzically, but he had not yet found words to begin. “Is she not the slut that birthed a little bastard last week?” Maud peered more closely out the window. “But she’s holding a babe in her arms, and I heard the child died. Why is she sitting in the milk wagon in our yard, Robert?”

  “’Tis Betsy Newman indeed,” he said in a strained voice.

  Maud waited for Robert to go on. Then she asked challengingly, “Have you brought that slut for a visit to our home?”

  “’Tis a babe she holds in her arms … though ’tis not her own, for hers did die,” Robert finally said. He could see that Maud was becoming very alarmed, but he could only push the words out one by one. “’Tis not Betsy Newman so much … who has come to our home … as the child.”

  “The child? Whose child is it? And why has it been brought here? Robert, I’m beginning to feel very cross, so I pray you speak to me smartly now.”

  “’Tis the child of a friend,” he lied — the first lie he had ever spoken to his wife — “though I will not tell you what friend. And I mean for us to take this child into our household, with Betsy Newman for his wet nurse.”

  “What are you saying? We have no money for a ward in this house. We have barely enough for our children and servants. And what mean you that you will not tell me which friend!” Maud’s face had turned red and blotchy with growing anger.

  “I do not mean for the child to be a ward —”

  “I should hope not,” Maud spat.

  “I mean for us … to adopt him as our own.”

  Maud sat at the buttery table, eyes downcast, biting at her knuckles as she tried to make sense of her husband’s senseless words.

  “Have you heard me, Maud? I want Betsy to bring the boy in now. It’s cold and getting colder out there.”

  “No,” she said quietly.

  “Maud …”

  “No, I don’t want another child. And whose is it! Is it your bastard, Robert?”

  “No, Maud, I swear ’tis not my child.”

  “We are having no more children now, Robert. We are moving to London. That is what I meant to tell you this evening. We are selling the farm and —”

  “What nonsense are you talking, woman? We have no such plans.”

  “But we do. I do!” Finally Maud moved from her chair. She sprang to the cabinet, flung it open, and pulled a small chest out. Her movements were so wild by now that she knocked open the chest before setting it down, so its contents spilled out across the floor and tabletop. Robert’s eyes stared uncomprehendingly at the coin and paper. So jumbled were his own thoughts, he could make neither head nor tail of Maud’s.

  “A white meats store, Robert, in London, with cheeses imported from everyplace — and sold to the Queen herself! You’ve seen the success I’ve made of the business here. I’ll do the same in London. I’ll run the shop, trade with the wholesalers, keep the accounts. We’ll do fine, I swear to heaven we will! But we must go soon. We cannot afford more cattle dying. The dairy will never sell!”

  She was growing frenzied. Robert knew he must move, bring the babe inside against the cold, but when he went to the door, Maud leapt at him and barred it like a madwoman.

  “No, Robert!”

  He fixed her
with a stare she had never before seen, a stare that spoke of past transgressions of hers — sullen humors, fits of temper, irrational vexations — that he had chosen to meet with mildness and acquiescence. But now he was a man decided, and he would not be moved. As gently as he was able, he pushed Maud aside and opened the door.

  “Betsy,” he called, “bring him in.”

  Stock-still Maud watched the slut, her teeth chattering, and some unnamed bastard boy cross the threshold of her home. The wet nurse looked to Robert for instructions, and he pointed to a door into their great room.

  “Warm yourselves in there for now,” he said in a kindly voice.

  Betsy chanced a small smile at Maud and was rewarded with a hatred colder than the November night.

  “Yes sir,” said Betsy, and disappeared with her silent bundle.

  Maud was rigid, refusing to meet Robert’s eye, for she had been roundly chastised by him for the first time in the entire length of their married life. And she knew not why. How could he conceive of such a plan without her consultation? And who had so much power over him that he might risk the happiness of his hearth and home?

  Robert had also remained silent, collecting his thoughts.

  “Maud … I do not wish for you to be angry, and I know you are. Perhaps you will like the rest of this.”

  “There is more?” she asked with dread in her voice.

  “I know you wish to be raised to the gentry.”

  Maud listened, afraid to breathe.

  “With this adoption” Robert continued, “comes a reward. A position. We will be moving …”

  “Where?”

  “Closer to London,” he said carefully.

  “How close?”

  “Two days’ ride.”

  “’Tis still the country!”

  “I know, Maud, but I shall be the keeper of a great chase — Enfield Chase, a fine parkland. One which the Queen herself comes to visit and hunt in. We shall have no more cows, Maud, but beautiful horses instead, and wild game all round us.”