The next morning, I couldn’t think of how to escape this nightmare. My only solution was to remain in bed, in retrospect a pretty cowardly choice, but I hoped each time that I awoke I’d be home where I belonged.
Several times a day someone brought me bread and broth. Perhaps to punish me they forced me to use a chamber pot, and scowled in confusion when I demanded a flush toilet. I slept and slept.
Each day I made a small mark with my thumbnail in the soft leg of the wooden table next to my bed. After seven marks it was clear the nightmare wasn’t actually a nightmare, but some sort of reality, so I arose on the eighth day to the dawning awareness that this body I inhabited, either for real or in my coma fantasy, needed a bath. My skin looked drab and my head itched as I imagined an army of lice on patrol. My ankles were red with bites. These people might have been taking the whole realism thing just a bit too far, for there had been fleas in the bed.
While “Lady Mary’s” maid, Rosemary, helped her dress, I cleared my throat. “Lady Mary, once again, I’m sorry for hurting you the other night.”
The short woman shrugged it off. “My brother and I would fight like dogs when we were small, so I am used to it.”
“Speaking of dog,” I motioned to my sleeping companion for most of the week, now sitting on my left foot. “What’s this guy’s name?”
She shook her head. “You know perfectly well his name is Vincent.” She frowned. “What is odd, however, is that he suddenly appears to like you. He has never had any love for you before.”
I scooped Vincent up into my arms and kissed the white blaze streaking down his forehead. He looked up at me with those liquid eyes, brow furrowed as if he were as confused about his feelings for me as “Lady Mary.” I bumped my nose against his, pleased his owner was also a fan of van Gogh’s. I stopped Rosemary as she turned her attention to me. “Before I dress, do you think we could find a basin of water somewhere? Clean water? I’d like to bathe.”
“Lady Mary” looked at me down her long nose, her brown eyes small and close together. “God’s teeth, you are irritating today. I am glad you are recovering from your fall, but it has only been a fortnight since your last bath. The queen will call for the tubs when she is ready for us to bathe. Until then, the wash basins are where they have always been.”
When I didn’t respond, she sighed and took me into a sort of closet in the next room. I thanked her gratefully and washed myself as well as I could without taking off my chemise and robe. The hair would have to wait.
Getting dressed left me exhausted and humiliated because I needed so much assistance. First, Rosemary helped me step into two skirts, one stiff brown taffeta, the other a brocaded orange. Then she slipped a sleeveless tawny-orange bodice on, lacing it together in back, then tying it to my skirts. What followed was a short, stiff white collar. Next was the padded, triangular corset thing, which came to a point well below my navel. This was the dreaded stomacher.
Rosemary then tied the stomacher to the bodice. Next she attached the sleeves, which were brown with long slashes lined with orange silk. Tiny beads lined the slashes, the fitted wrists, and the edges of the stomacher.
I looked down at my chest. The snug bodice and even snugger stomacher had turned my breasts—or rather, Blanche’s breasts—into rosy, rising bread dough, threatening any second to overflow their container. “Lady Mary,” I said, “let’s cover up the girls a bit.” I motioned to the fabric that covered her own décolletage.
She laughed. “I swear you have lost much of your mind. You know perfectly well your bosom remains bare until you marry.” Right. Gotta advertise the goods.
Rosemary brushed my hair back, expertly twisted and pinned it to the back of my head, then topped it off with a soft velvet cap trimmed in more beads, work detailed enough to require bifocals of even the youngest seamstress.
I thanked Rosemary, then followed “Lady Mary” to the outer chamber where food was to be served. In doing so, I banged against two tables and the doorframe. It wasn’t just the heavy skirts, it was the hips. Wearing someone else’s clothes was awkward enough; wearing someone else’s body was insane.
I helped myself to a thick slice of grainy bread and a plate of cut apples and pears for breakfast. I poured myself a mug of the brown liquid from a glazed blue jug, took a drink, then spit it back into the mug immediately. Wine, spiced with cloves. I searched the table for water. A servant refilled the blue jug. “Excuse me,” I said, “but is there anything to drink besides wine? Perhaps some water?”
The woman’s eyes bulged like a fish’s. “Water? You would die of some horrible sickness, m’lady, if you drink water from the Thames or any other river.”
“Could you boil me some water to drink?”
Now the servant looked worried, as if I might be dangerous. “M’lady, everyone drinks the mulled wine. Why would you ever want to drink water?”
I licked my dry lips and resolved to hold out for water as she hurried away, even though dehydration surely lurked in my future.
The other women bustled in and out of the room, clearly occupied waiting on the “Queen,” but I didn’t dare participate. It was as if I walked across a thawing lake, with the ice cracking and melting. No matter where I placed my foot, it would be wrong.
The sounds of musicians drifted down the corridor—a flute and some sort of stringed instrument, and a woman singing. I peeked into the room but did not enter. This must be the Queen’s presence chamber, for it was dominated by a huge carved chair raised on a dais, and decorated with dozens of flags and emblems. “Elizabeth” sat in the chair with an older man dressed in heavy robes at her side. The room was filled with men and women pretending to be courtiers in elaborate Elizabethan dress. The air was thick with perfume that couldn’t hide the musky, moist smell permeating the room.
I slid back against the wall into the hallway. It was getting harder and harder to convince myself this was all in my coma-fied imagination. But yet, it had to be. The alternative was beyond impossible. I even managed to chuckle at creating two levels of impossible: the regular impossible and the beyond impossible. But my chuckling didn’t change the fact that a high-pitched scream of terror crouched at the base of my throat, desperate for release. I breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth, which was supposed to be calming. It took many minutes of inhaling and exhaling before Terror’s little sister Anxiety arrived to take Terror’s place. I still didn’t feel calm, but I preferred a little anxiety to terror.
With one more inhale, I pushed myself off the wall and began exploring the palace, which I assumed was meant to be Whitehall Palace in my waking nightmare. Cardinal Wolsey had built Whitehall then gave it to Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn. The palace became one of the homes of Henry and Anne’s daughter, Elizabeth, when she became Queen.
Some hallways were dark and narrow, but others were wide, lit by windows and capped with beautiful arched ceilings at least three stories overhead. I walked and walked, bewildered by the maze of corridors and galleries. Some of the rooms had fresh rosemary scattered across the floor, which made them smell as good as you’d imagine.
I wandered from room to room, undisturbed by servants as they went about their business. Apparently, they either knew “Blanche Nottingham” or respected the quality of my dress. “M’lady,” someone said behind me. “Is there anything you require?”
I turned to face a tall, kind-faced man.
“No, I….I’m just a bit restless so feel the need to wander.” I considered asking him how someone got a bath around here, but I doubted he’d be in charge of cleaning the ladies-in-waiting. The man bowed and slipped away through an open door.
As he walked away I wondered—if I ignored everyone around me, refusing to respond, would that release me from this dream? Another turn of the corridor brought me up short. There, hanging on the wall, was the Coronation Portrait of Elizabeth. The colors nearly leapt off the canvas, creating an ache in me that the version hanging in the National Portrait Gallery did not. The Gallery’s painting had been copied from the original, which had gone missing centuries ago. Could this be the original, the one lost to history? Don’t be ridiculous, I scolded myself.
The next door I passed led into a small library with towering walls lined with books.
On an easel in one corner was another portrait, also of Elizabeth, revealing the same soulful, deep-set eyes as the woman I’d met yesterday, the same expressive mouth. Either this was real, or my imagination was being very thorough in creating a believable fantasy. Suddenly, creativity seemed a curse rather than a gift, and I thought of van Gogh. Poor man had some major brain issues that historians now believe had their source in some sort of epilepsy. Was I losing touch with reality as Vincent sometimes had?
I pulled a book off the shelf at random, running my fingers over the well-worn velvet binding. I flipped through the heavy parchment pages, unable to read its French contents. But the book fell open to the first page, which held a handwritten inscription:
To the most high, puissant, and redoubted prince, Henry VIII, of the name, King of England, France and Ireland, defender of the Faith.
Elizabeth, his most humble daughter.
Health and obedience.
I began running my fingers through my hair, but they caught in the tight locks. I missed my loose hair swinging gently against my cheeks. I reread the inscription. How could I have created this in my mind? I had no idea what “puissant” meant. I’d never even seen the word. Was I clever enough, in my coma, to make up words to confuse myself?
And then there were the names. My support system was Jake, Ashley, and Mary. Already I’d met “Kat Ashley” and “Lady Mary.” All I needed was a Jake or Jacob to confirm this was all in my imagination. And then there was the dog named after Vincent van Gogh.
I replaced the book, then stroked the jewel-encrusted spines of a long line of books. I would return to this room later and search for books in English.
“You do not belong here.”
I whirled around to find a woman crouched in the corner of the room, wrapping the tie of her grungy apron tighter and tighter around one hand. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ll go.”
“You are not of this world. Neither am I. We are all weary travelers looking for home.” The woman burst into tears as I approached. “Why can I not find my way home?”
My throat constricted. “Are you lost?” I managed to croak out through dry lips.
“I do not belong here. I do not belong anywhere,” the woman wailed.
I grasped the woman’s hand. “Who are you? Do you know Dr. Rajamani? Did he give you a shot of GCA?”
“The doctors cannot help me. I have no future. It is gone, all gone.”
“Are you from the future?” I choked, stunned I’d actually voiced that possibility. “Do you know what’s happened to us? Is this real?”
The woman clutched at me. “We cannot get back. We can never get back. All we have known is lost. The doctors took it all away.”
“Oh, Margaret, there you are.” A servant dressed in blue with a white cap scurried into the room, a horrified look twisting her plain features. “I am so sorry, m’lady. Please do not tell Her Majesty.” The woman gathered Margaret in her arms. “My sister is not well. We got her out of Bedlam, a wicked, wicked place, but she is still not herself. I will not let her escape her room again.”
“Bedlam?”
“The madhouse. Bethlehem Hospital. My sister lost her wits two years ago, but Bedlam only made it worse. Come, Margaret.” The woman stopped for a shallow curtsey. “Please, m’lady, if the Queen—”
“I won’t say a word,” I replied, forcing my voice to stop shaking. What had just happened? I watched the woman lead her sister away. Was the woman truly mad? Had she been driven mad by the same circumstances that now trapped me? And if I spoke to anyone about where I’d come from, asked anyone if they were from the future too, would I be bundled off to some private facility called Bedlam? I shivered in the warmth of the sun filtering through the tall library windows. On the table beside me was an elaborate clock with a man riding a rhinoceros, with another four men standing on the ground around him. The clock gently chimed nine times while the four attendants slowly bent at the waist then gracefully returned to their original positions. The last chime echoed in the room.
Desperate for air, I ran down the corridor, turning and doubling back until light ahead led me out onto a second floor balcony. I gulped the fresh air in relief, clutching the railing as I surveyed the grounds. The rosy red brick of the palace was used in most of the buildings that lined a narrow street running from this building to the edge of a forest. Rooflines dipped and climbed, with dozens of chimneys creating a ragged horizon. Courtiers entered and exited the buildings, calling to each other and talking in small groups.
The palace grounds were a maze of pebbled paths and streets, brick walls with arched gates, narrow alleys, and great swaths of green. Roughly dressed men worked in an orchard, and others tended a small rose garden. Off to my right, someone was chopping wood, and smoke arose from some sort of oven. The smell of baking bread was so strong and so familiar it brought tears to my eyes.
The garden below had two reflecting pools and a fountain. It was a knot garden, broken into four large sections, each featuring an elaborate pattern of thick green hedges. That I knew about knot gardens told me I’d recently been diving too deeply into the Tudor pool. The green hedges wove in and around themselves, forming knot-like patterns nearly as complicated as embroidery. The green hedges were set off by exploded pinks, pansies, and grape hyacinth. Scattered throughout were poles topped with carved lions, dragons, and other beasts, each holding a flag. It was a cheerful garden.
Outside the four knot squares were rows of hollyhocks and damask roses. Beyond these was a raised walkway that must allow strollers a better view of the patterned garden, then three rows of cherry trees.
I sighed softly. Chris would be so proud. When we’d purchased our 1898 home in Powderhorn Park, Chris was determined to turn our backyard into a horticultural masterpiece. I suspect she was motivated less by a love of gardening than a desire to outshine the neighbors. One couple to the east had turned their entire front and backyards into a chaotic wildflower garden, a haven for bees and butterflies. The women to the west had gone crazy with their water feature, stacking granite slabs into an elaborate set of waterfalls cascading into shallow pools. The monstrosity so dominated the backyard that the couple’s two poor labradoodles could barely find space in which to do their “business.”
I’d helped Chris move soil and create beds and rock pathways, but she had been in charge of design. For two years, our living room, kitchen counter, and bed overflowed with plant catalogs and garden design books. That I could recognize the plants in this palace garden meant some of Chris’s constant garden talk must have stuck.
In the distance, I could barely see the tips of what must be lances, then the lances disappeared and hooves pounded the ground. I scanned the entire area for the laundry building, since surely that would have a way to heat water. Perhaps I could bathe in some lukewarm wash water…that’s how desperate I was.
Directly across from the garden was a large gatehouse next to a stone wall. Beyond that was a massive arch topped with another tower. Horse-drawn carts rumbled by under the arch.
Off to the left was a bowling green, with one of three men rolling a small ball toward the pins. A huge forest rose up at the edge of the grounds. The whole thing was less a well thought out palace and more just a mishmash of buildings and narrow paths and lush plants.
As my gaze returned to the bowling green, I froze. The tallest of the men waved at me impatiently, as if he wanted me to join them. Ha. Not likely. Then one of the men ran toward the palace and disappeared. A few minutes later, that same man showed up at my elbow and proclaimed, “Lady Blanche, there you are. Lord Winston has asked me to escort you to the bowling green.” I had no choice but to let him place my hand in the crook of his elbow and follow. The man, dressed in hose and velvet coat and bloomers, rattled on about how lovely I looked this morning, and how the orange dress brought out the brilliant blue in my eyes. I rolled my brilliant blue eyes but he didn’t notice.
I was suddenly so weary I actually needed the man’s support. I wanted to close my eyes, sleep for a week and then wake up with Chris’s familiar face next to mine.
When we reached the green, the tall man, apparently “Lord Winston,” looked at me as if I were a bug he’d found in his soup. “Finally,” he snapped. “What have you learned?” He carried himself as you’d imagine a lord would, with the complete confidence he’d be obeyed.
My mind spun. “Learned about what?”
Winston jammed his fists on his velvet-coated hips. “God’s bones, woman, this is no time to play games.” His fury only emphasized how poorly I understood the situation in which I found myself. And I was also noticing that a pretty decent curse around here consisted of one of God’s body parts—bones, teeth, blood. If I hadn’t been so confused by my situation, I could have admired the clever cursing system.
The “lord” scowled. “What have you learned of Dudley’s habits?”
Dudley. Him again. Controversy had always swirled around the man, for he seemed to control and influence the Queen more than a commoner should. Dudley fully expected to marry Elizabeth and be King. Inconveniently, he was already married to Amy Dudley.
“His schedule?”
“Is this woman totally daft?” one of the other men snapped. “Winston, you said she would help our cause.”
Winston grabbed my arm and pulled me against the tall hedge to hide us from the palace windows. “We need to dispatch Dudley here, in the palace. When does he visit the Queen next?”
“I don’t know. He comes and goes as he, or as the Queen, pleases.” What else could I say? I reached for anything from The Tudors TV show that could help. “But he always sends a request through his squire that he would like to visit, so we have several hours’ notice.”
“Good.” One of the men handed me the heavy, smooth ball, which fit snugly in my palm. “Now pray take your turn so we appear naturally engaged to anyone observing us.”
I moved away from the wall, took a few steps and rolled the ball toward the pins, missing every one of them.
Winston tucked my hand into his arm. God, it was getting old being dragged around by men’s elbows. “The next time Dudley sends notice of his intent to visit the Queen, you will contact me in the usual way.”
The usual way? That would be fine, if I actually were Blanche Nottingham and knew what that was.
Winston gripped my hand too tightly. “England’s future, its safety, and its honor are all at stake, Lady Blanche. Do not fail us.”
With that, each man executed a slight bow, then disappeared down the garden path.
Winston’s words were over-the-top dramatic, but still alarming. No matter where I was, clearly, having nothing to drink but wine might be the least of my worries.