Face Down Before Rebel Hooves Part 2

"Eleanor intended to remain, in the hope of discovering details of the conspirators' plans."

"She was going to spy for him."

"Yes."

"And you mean to take her place."

"Yes. Nick, they want to depose Queen Elizabeth. They must be stopped."

"What if word of the accident in Augsburg gets back to England? What if they learn that the real Lady Pendennis is dead?"

"Walter gave out that she was not badly hurt. That man, Dartnall, who is the conspirators' contact in Augsburg, can have no reason to doubt the story."

"Pendennis must have concocted the plan to subst.i.tute you for his wife within hours of her accident. While she lay dying." Cold-blooded b.a.s.t.a.r.d!

"What other choice did he have?" Susanna's expressive eyes begged him to understand not only Pendennis's actions but her own decision to go along with his plans. "I am the only one he can trust to take Eleanor's place. If I refuse, England may well be plunged into civil war. That is too great a burden to have on my conscience, not when I can do something to prevent it."

Nick felt a giant fist curl around his heart and squeeze. Pendennis had played upon Susanna's loyalty to the queen and her faith in his honesty to convince her she must undertake this hazardous mission. No argument Nick could offer would change her mind. She already knew the dangers she would face and was not swayed by them.

"Let me come with you, to keep you safe. I can pretend to be your servant."

"Oh, my dear. I would like nothing better, but I could not hide my affection for you. Everyone would think Lady Pendennis unfaithful to her husband." She tried to smile and failed. "Besides, you have obligations here."

"I can delegate my duties to others, for as long as a few months if need be."

Susanna leaned toward him, forcing him to meet her eyes, to see the pain and longing there, as well as the determination. "Nick, I would have left here soon, even if Walter had not come to Hamburg. And you would have stayed behind. Can we not pretend our parting is no more than that?"

Her words were gently spoken, but they pierced like arrows.

With exquisite care, he gathered her into his arms. "Well then," he whispered as he began to kiss her, "if this is to be our last night together, let us make it one we will both remember for a very long time."

Chapter 4.

London October 11, 1569 Only in the stable attached to her husband's London house did Catherine Glenelg find a measure of peace. She was happy grooming Vanguard, her favorite horse, in the company of two dogs, a cat, and a falcon with a broken wing. She wished she could stay with them instead of returning to young Gavin, who was teething, and Gilbert's mother, whose greatest delight was criticizing her daughter-in-law.

"Shall I come and live here with you?" she whispered into a velvet ear. Vanguard b.u.t.ted her, as if to express understanding and sympathy, and gazed at her with large, sleepy eyes. All black, except for a white blaze on his forehead, the courser was getting on in years. He had once belonged to Catherine's half-brother, Sir Robert Appleton.

Most people, Catherine thought, would say she had no cause to complain. She was the wife of a charming, handsome, t.i.tled man. Although his estate was in Scotland, he made his princ.i.p.al residence in London to please her. Moreover, Gilbert did not desert her to hang about the fringes of the royal court, presently at Windsor, as so many n.o.blemen did. Oh, he spent time there, had been there, certes, for the last week, but only on behalf of the earl of Moray, who ruled Scotland as regent in the name of the infant King James. Unlike most husbands, her Gilbert came home as often as possible. He was devoted to Catherine and faithful to their wedding vows.

But he refused to send his mother away. That formidable Scotswoman, who insisted the servants address her as Lady Russell, even though her English husband had never been knighted, was slowly driving Catherine to madness.

Vanguard nickered in protest when Catherine wielded a hedgehog skin brush with too much force. She set it aside, using a wisp and her hand to continue currying. So lost was she in her task that she did not hear Gilbert enter the stable. He was right behind her before she became aware of his presence and turned, smiling, to greet him with mock formality. "Lord Glenelg! Well met!"

"Lady Glenelg." He bowed, then swept her into his arms, banishing the last of her discontent in a most satisfactory way.

Breathless and much restored in spirit, Catherine emerged from the embrace a few minutes later. She noted that they were alone in the stable. "Did any see you come in?"

"Temptress. Would you lie with me in the straw?" Eyes the color of the sky in summer laughed at her, then darkened with sudden heat.

"Is that a question, my lord . . . or an invitation?"

Unlike so many husbands, who grew fat and complacent once they wed, Gilbert had changed little in seven years of marriage. He was straight and tall and his thick red-brown hair, which he wore a bit longer now than when she'd first met him, was as abundant as ever. When he pulled her into his arms, she combed her fingers through it, delighting in the texture . . . and in his growl of response.

In the empty stall next to Vanguard's, freshly strewn with sweet-smelling hay brought in from the country, Lord and Lady Glenelg moved a wooden-tined pitchfork out of their way and disported themselves without further speech for the best part of the next hour. Eventually, sated, wrapped in each other's arms, Catherine encouraged Gilbert to tell her about his latest visit to the English court. It helped relax him, she had discovered, to unburden himself, and from early in their marriage he had paid her the supreme compliment of trusting her not to repeat anything he told her in private.

"I scarce know where to begin."

He tucked a dark brown lock behind Catherine's ear and bent to touch his lips to the lobe. She shivered in delight and might have been persuaded to abandon talk for a repet.i.tion of other, more pleasurable activities, had he not pulled away from her.

When he sat up, his expression was grim. "The duke of Norfolk has been arrested."

Catherine was not surprised. Queen Elizabeth had little tolerance for those who thought they knew better than she did what was best for the realm. Norfolk had long been among the most vocal of her critics.

Gilbert a.s.sumed the role of tiring woman and began to reattach various pieces of Catherine's clothing. "More than a month past, the queen had a private audience with the duke at which she forbade him to pursue any match with Mary of Scotland."

"And he disregarded her wishes?"

"Aye, he did."

At second hand, Catherine knew a great deal about the struggle for power and influence among the courtiers surrounding Queen Elizabeth and about the rival claimants for England's throne. When Mary, queen of Scots, had fled her own country the previous year, seeking sanctuary in her cousin Elizabeth's kingdom, Elizabeth had wisely ordered her imprisoned. Some in the government felt Mary should be executed, as she would provide a rallying point for rebels whilst she lived.

To Catholics, Elizabeth was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d and a heretic who had no right to England's throne. For them, Scotland's deposed queen, the granddaughter of old King Henry's elder sister, was the legitimate heir. As England's only duke and highest ranking peer, Norfolk, already thrice a widower, had been put forward as a possible spouse for Mary. One faction at court argued that marrying him to the queen of Scots would a.s.sure that she caused Elizabeth no more trouble. Norfolk, these men claimed, knew how to control a woman. And should Elizabeth die childless, then Norfolk, English and a man, would rule England, making decisions on behalf of his foreign-born wife.

It gave Catherine headaches every time she attempted to sort out all the whys and wherefores of machinations at court, but she did understand two unalterable facts. One was that religious issues always got tangled up with matters political. The other was that Scotland, the country to which Gilbert owed his allegiance, had of late declared it treason for any Scot to support Queen Mary.

Catherine tried to lighten Gilbert's mood as she helped him with the points on his shirt and doublet. "I do most heartily wish someone would devise a better way to fasten sections of clothing together," she grumbled. "To be able to remove and rea.s.sume garments, all of a piece, would be a great boon to lovers everywhere."

Gilbert did not respond to her teasing. "'Tis said Queen Elizabeth told Norfolk that she reckoned she would be removed from her throne within four months of the wedding if she allowed him to wed Mary."

Catherine's hands stilled. "She was that sure there would be rebellion?"

"She fears an uprising in the North. That is why she acted against Norfolk when new rumors reached her from abroad. She had Norfolk detained for questioning. It was a loose captivity at a gentleman's house, allowing him to place a note inside a bottle and attempt to smuggle this message to the earl of Westmorland, his brother-in-law. The missive was intercepted. It revealed that Westmorland, Norfolk, and others had planned to muster their men on the sixth day of this month."

"Five days ago." Catherine felt her face pale. "What is happening in the North?"

"All seems quiet. Since Norfolk's message begged Westmorland to call off the rebellion, it was sent on to him. As a precaution, however, the queen closed all English ports and put the militia on alert. And she sent Norfolk to the Tower. There will be no more smuggled messages. As befits his rank, his grace is allowed two personal servants but he is forbidden the use of either pen or paper."

Catherine's fingers trembled as she put her hair and headdress to rights. She had lived in the North until she was fourteen. She knew well the forces at work there, and the pa.s.sions of the people. On her estates in Lancashire, many still clung to the old religion, in spite of the law against hearing Ma.s.s. They were encouraged in their disobedience by the persistent rumor that Pope Pius V planned to excommunicate Queen Elizabeth, bestowing on her subjects the blessing of mother church to rise up against the heretic queen and put a Catholic monarch on the throne in her place.

Dismayed by the brooding expression on Gilbert's face, she attempted to hide her own worries. "Well, then, it appears the crisis is past. Come, caro sposo. Let us go in to our son."

Gilbert slung an affectionate arm around her shoulders and dropped a kiss on her forehead. "A far more pleasant topic. What remarkable new feats has he accomplished since I last saw him?"

"He's acquiring teeth." Catherine grimaced.

"So that is why you hid yourself in the stable."

They walked together toward the house and a reunion with their fussy baby and an old woman determined to find fault with everything Catherine did. The blithe plotting of acts of rebellion, she thought, had a certain appeal. She indulged in a brief, satisfying fantasy in which Gilbert's mother was abducted by pirates and carried off to be sold into slavery on the Barbary Coast. A harmless pastime, she a.s.sured herself, as long as no one tried to turn a diabolical daydream into reality.

Chapter 5.

Aboard The Green Rose October 15, 1569 Walter Pendennis paused in the act of scooping watery oatmeal pottage into his mouth to study his supper companion. Lionel Hubble had grown into a lean and well-muscled young man. No longer the gangly lad Walter remembered, the gardener's boy at Leigh Abbey until he was promoted to second gardener, Lionel had for some years now been able to take on the additional duty of bodyguard when his mistress traveled.

The two men ate standing up, near a brick firebox positioned amidships in their small merchant vessel. Walter appreciated the warmth, and the savory aromas wafting upward from two large copper cooking cauldrons with wide leaded rims, but the smoke did not vent properly. For every three or four swallows of the pottage, he had to stop and cough.

They had been at sea for more than a week but were less than halfway back to England. He'd not seen Susanna since they first set foot aboard ship in Hamburg. Her face an unhealthy shade of green, she'd mumbled something about ginger and peppermint and disappeared into the master's cabin reserved for her use.

"Was she as ill as this on the voyage over?" Walter asked.

Mopping away a mushy bit of parsnip that had dribbled into the deep cleft in his chin, Lionel thought about the question before he answered. "Worse, Sir Walter. Spewing the whole way, she was."

Susanna had said that she'd suffered greatly from seasickness on the journey from England and spent the entire crossing from Gravesend to Dordrecht "wretchedly ill" but he'd thought she must be exaggerating.

"Ca.n.a.ls bothered her, too," Lionel said. "The one to Amsterdam and the rest of them."

This was a side of Susanna that Walter had not encountered before. She'd always been strong, blooming with good health. He'd seen her discouraged, and consumed by guilt and grief, but never had he imagined she could be laid low by a mere physical ailment.

Reminded by his thoughts of the last journey he'd undertaken in company with Susanna and Lionel, Walter grew curious. "Why is Fulke not with you on this trip?" He was accustomed to thinking of Susanna's two henchmen as a pair. Fulke was only a year or two older than Lionel. At one time, he'd been much taller and bulkier, but the younger man had caught up as he'd matured.

After chewing and swallowing a chunk of ship's biscuit-plain, poor food, but blessedly free of weevils-Lionel answered. "Fulke grew tired of travel. He did not want to come. He'd been to the Continent before, he said, when Sir Robert was alive. Lady Appleton did not insist he accompany us. She said there was no need when she had me to protect her. And Master Baldwin and his man."

"This Baldwin . . . what do you know about him?"

Lionel's grin showed off teeth that lapped over one another. "He's more widely traveled than Fulke and has been to far more interesting places. He tells the most wonderful stories, all of them true."

"I have traveled to a goodly number of exotic places myself. Italy and-"

"Master Baldwin has been to Muscovy. And Persia." He named the latter place in an awed whisper.

"Is Lady Appleton also impressed by travel narratives?"

Oblivious to Walter's growing irritation, Lionel nodded. "She loves to listen to him tell his tales."

Walter all but threw his empty bowl into the stack of dirty dishes and stalked toward the nearest hatch. Lionel, still talking, unaware that his praise of Baldwin affected Walter's self-control, dogged his steps.

"I'd not care to go to Persia, but I like to travel, and 'twas much more pleasant to make the journey to Hamburg than to stay at Leigh Abbey."

Arrested by an odd note in Lionel's voice, Walter gave him a sharp look. "Why do you say so?"

"There is a woman there. Hester Peac.o.c.k. Mistress Rosamond's nursery maid. She fancies me."

A great many women, Walter imagined, would fancy Lionel. He had grown into a handsome man. "Ugly, is she?"

Color seeped into Lionel's face. "She is overtall and no beauty, that much is certain. But 'twas not her appearance made me want to flee. 'Twas the way she'd look at me, all calf-eyed, as if I could do no wrong."

Several hours later, after the sun had set, Lionel's words still lingered in Walter's thoughts. Eleanor had looked at him "all calf-eyed" once upon a time.

Fabric rustled behind him. One hand on his knife, Walter turned to confront a potential attacker and instead beheld a familiar face lit by the bright beams of a moon at the half. "Susanna!"

"Good evening, Walter."

"How do you feel, my dear?"

"To mine own surprise, much steadier on my feet than I have been."

"You will forgive me, my dear, but you do not appear to be all that steady."

"By comparison to what came before, I am a rock."

"Mayhap the fresh sea air will do you some good, then." He offered her his arm.

After a slight hesitation, she took it and allowed him to lead her to the waist-high rail. She inhaled a few cautious breaths, then seemed to relax. "Perhaps I should not have stayed in the cabin so long, or relied upon mine herbs. This bracing breeze and the scent of brine do appear to be salubrious."

"I have often observed that after a few days at sea, many of those who at first cast up their accounts find their stomachs settling and their spirits restored."

"I have never seen the moon look quite so large," she murmured.

"Distances are deceiving at sea."

"Which way is England?"

He studied the sky for a moment, finding navigation a challenge at sea. He'd just oriented himself using the North Star and pointed west when the ship changed course, veering away from their destination. Walter glanced at the great squares of canvas above them. While a half-dozen barefooted seamen controlled the sails with the use of lines, others swarmed into the rigging in response to the boatswain's whistle. Their coa.r.s.e white linen trousers flapped in the wind as they climbed higher.

"Would we not get there much sooner," Susanna asked, "if we went in a straight line?"

He shook his head. "A ship must travel in a zigzag pattern because it is dependent on the wind to fill the sails. That is why it takes so long to cross only a few score miles of water, and why storms delay so many journeys by driving ships off course."

"How, then, do we manage to land at our chosen destination?"

"A well-trained crew knows how to trim the sails to match the speed and direction of the wind."

After a short silence, during which they watched the activity overhead, she changed the subject. "You said the rebels are in Yorkshire. Why that county when their leaders are the earls of Northumberland and Westmorland?"

"Both earls also have strongholds there." Walter paused to gather his thoughts. This seemed as good a time as any to part with the few additional details he meant to give Susanna. "The city of York is some seventy miles north of Wingfield Manor where, at last report, the queen of Scots was imprisoned. I believe the rebels' intent is to free her and place her on Elizabeth's throne."