“I am going to become quite plump if all I do is eat this heavenly food and sleep,” Rosamund told Annie. “I must say, however, that this is a far more pleasant place for me than the last time I visited court.”
“Maybel said there weren’t no privacy,” Annie volunteered.
“Nay, there isn’t, except for the rich and the powerful,” Rosamund told her. “You will come with me when I go, of course.”
“Doll is jealous,” Annie said, giggling.
“Perhaps we will take her with us after we have been received,” Rosamund said, “but she will find that a familiarity with the court is likely to engender an aversion to it. Her own master is not like most. His heart is a generous one.” Rosamund, having eaten her fill, finally stood up from the table. “I must dress,” she told Annie, “but we will not use one of my fine court gowns since I am not going out other than to perhaps walk about my cousin’s riverside garden. It is walled where his property touches his neighbor’s, so it is unlikely that I shall be seen by any.”
When she was dressed and her hair neatly plaited, Annie showed Rosamund downstairs to the door leading to Lord Cambridge’s garden. She instructed her servant to remain behind so she might have a bit of privacy. In a few days’ time there would be no privacy for either of them. The court was just too busy a place, and the well-meaning queen would keep Rosamund by her side, she knew. The day was neither chill nor warm. There was no wind. The sky was a pale blue, a smudge of thin white clouds showing, indicating a change in the weather to come. The sun was watery, but shone as brightly as it could under the circumstances. It would soon set, for it was December, and the days were very short now.
Thomas Bolton’s garden was an orderly one, but she suspected that in the warm months it was a beautiful one. The beds were neat, the small flowering trees and bushes as well as the roses were pruned perfectly, awaiting the winter. There was a small green maze. Rosamund entered it and easily found her way through it. There was some rather interesting marble statuary, mostly of young men, which left nothing to the imagination. Rosamund had never seen such statues before. She found them rather beautiful, especially one of a tall youth with a hound lying at his feet. The boy was covered in graceful draperies and had exquisite ringlets, his head topped with a crown of leaves.
Rosamund walked the smoothly raked gravel paths, finally finding her way down to the riverside. The barge she had seen moored there the previous day was now gone from its dock. She stood on the little stone quay, wrapped in her blue cloak, and looked out at the river. It was beautiful to her eyes, and for a time she could not bring herself to leave its side. She was glad that her cousin did not live in the midst of the city of London. Having Bolton House to retreat to when the court became overwhelming was going to be a blessing.
She wished again as she had wished before that she wasn’t here at all. The queen meant well, she understood, but Rosamund’s previous experience at court had taught her that queens do not have time for real friendship. So what was she to do? She knew no one. Had no friends. Meg was long gone, and Queen of Scotland. The Venerable Margaret was dead and buried. What in the name of heaven was Rosamund Bolton doing here when her daughters, when Friarsgate, needed her? Rosamund felt a tear begin to slip down her cheek. She swallowed hard. She must not cry, but she couldn’t help it. Leaving the dock she sat down upon a stone bench, watched the river more, and wept. She missed Friarsgate. She missed her lasses. She missed Owein! How could he have died in such a needless accident, dammit?
“I want to go home,” she whispered aloud. But she could not. She would go to court, embrace the queen, and thank her for her generosity in inviting her. She would be a diversion for Katherine for a few days, and then the queen’s interests would turn in another direction. And Rosamund would remain, an outsider, alone, until she might beg leave to return home again, where, hopefully, she would be forgotten by the queen and could live the rest of her life in peace.
It was getting dark, and a slight wind had begun to come off the river. The tide was going out, and the visible mudflats stank of rot. Arising, she walked slowly back to the house and upstairs to her apartments again. The house was quiet, and she saw no one until she entered her own rooms. Annie hurried forward to take her cloak and her gloves.
“Gracious, m’lady, I was thinking I must go and fetch you,” Annie said. “Come and sit by the fire.”
“The garden is beautiful,” Rosamund told Annie. “In summer with all its color, and I suspect that my cousin has lots of color, it must be quite striking.” She looked toward the windows. “’Tis dark already. I love all the feasts in December, but I hate the short days.”
“Go and rest,” Annie said. “I’ll have a bath set up. The hot water will take the chill of the afternoon from your bones. Then we’ll toast a bit of bread and cheese on the fire. His lordship ain’t back yet, but who knows what tomorrow will bring?”
Rosamund dozed, and the bath was brought again. While she soaked, her long hair pinned atop her head, Annie went down to the kitchens to fetch the food. The hot water felt marvelous, taking the deep chill from her body. She sighed, relaxed, even as the door to the dayroom flew open and Lord Cambridge strode into the room.
“Cousin!” he greeted her gaily.
Rosamund gave a small shriek of surprise, and wondered if any of her person was visible other than her neck and shoulders.
He waved her concern aside. “Nothing vital is showing, dear girl. Besides, the bumps and curves of womankind are of no interest to me at all. Fashionable women receive callers in their bath.”
“I shall never bethatfashionable,” Rosamund told him, “and from the statues in your garden, cousin, I would suspect that female flesh is indeed not of interest to you, particularly in light of what you have told me about yourself. Still, I have never entertained a caller not my husband in my bath.”
“So you and Sir Owein bathed together.” He chuckled. Then he grew serious. “I managed to get in to speak with her highness, the queen, late this afternoon. She will receive you tomorrow afternoon at two o’clock, dear girl. I have told her that you will make your home with me while you are here in London. She is anxious to see you, and happy that you will be here to spend the Christmas season with her. The court is moving to Richmond in a few days. Don’t fret. It’s nearby,” he smiled. “We will have Doll to help your Annie. Doll is a marvel with hair, and you cannot go to court with that charming plait you wear each day. You must have a more elegant and sophisticated style, dear Rosamund, if you don’t want to be laughed at. Well, I shall leave you to your bath. I am positively fatigued. The court is overflowing with people, for the king enjoys making most merry and is generous with his father’s wealth. I wonder if the last Henry Tudor considered that his son would spend that which he so carefully hoarded.” He chuckled, blew her a kiss, and was gone from the apartment as quickly as he had come.
“Was that his lordship?” Annie asked, shocked, as she returned with a tray.
“It was,” Rosamund said, rising from her tub and reaching for the towel on the warming rack. “He says fashionable ladies receive gentlemen in their tubs.” Rosamund laughed.
“’Tis mad, he is,” Annie said, a scandalized look on her pretty face.
“We’re going to court tomorrow afternoon,” Rosamund told her servant. She dried herself off thoroughly and slipped her smock back on as she sat down.
“Your gown is ready,” Annie said. “Doll and me sewed the pearls on it today while you was asleep, m’lady.”
“Pearls?”Rosamund looked confused. “What pearls?”
“His lordship gave me a beautiful length of ribbon, all decorated with little pearls, and said to sew ’em on the neckline of the gown. They do look lovely, m’lady, and Doll says they give the dress real style.”
Rosamund laughed. Her cousin was determined that she make a good impression at court. “Remind me to thank his lordship tomorrow,” she told Annie. “Now, let us have our bread and cheese. All that air out in the garden has given me a good appetite.”
Annie had brought not only bread and cheese but sausage, as well, and another dish of the delicious baked apples that Rosamund had had earlier. They toasted the bread over the fire, melting the cheese atop it and adding the sausage. Mistress and servant ate together before the fire. Rosamund let Annie have some watered wine, for the girl was not used to wine. She, however, drank her wine unwatered. It was ruby in color, and sweet to her taste. She shared her apples with Annie, and when the servant took the tray back to the kitchens, Rosamund sat by the fire, thinking again. She felt better than she had this afternoon at the river. Her cousin Tom always seemed to cheer her with his presence. She considered that Owein had been a wee lad of six when he joined the Tudor household. He had survived. Indeed he had thrived. She knew she would, too.What a stay-by-the-fire I am.It was time she came out of herself, and there were so many opportunities for her at court. She might even find possible matches for her girls. She didn’t want them having to choose between Uncle Henry’s family or some wild Scots borderer like Logan Hepburn.
Now how hadheslipped into her thoughts? Rosamund wondered. Yet for a minute she saw unruly black hair and those blue-blue eyes of his. What was he doing now? Was he snug in his hall at Claven’s Carn? Or was he out beneath a border moon raiding some hapless neighbor. She shook her head impatiently.Begone!she shouted silently at the mocking smile in her head, the echo of his voice. She started suddenly. She could have sworn that she had heard his voice, and yet now as she strained to listen the house was very silent.I must go to bed,Rosamund told herself. The journey had indeed been too much for her. She should not have thought it, for she had always been a strong girl. Without even waiting for Annie to return she climbed into her bed and was quickly asleep.
