Oh Lady Fortune,
Stand you auspicious!
— William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale
“Daughter!”
Sidonie laid a ribbon in her Euclid to mark the page and gave the soup kettle another stir. “Yes, Father?”
“Did I tell you that Thomas has also abandoned us, hired away by that mountebank Fletcher?”
“That mountebank Fletcher is much in favour at court,” Sidonie reminded him.
“Only because Dr. Dee is travelling abroad, and the lords and ladies insist upon their entertainments.”
“Then shall I write out an advertisement for a scryer?” Sidonie asked. “You must dictate, I do not know what you wish to say — beyond ‘must be willing to work any hour of the day or night, for tuppence a fortnight’.”
“Nay, child,” said Quince, ignoring this piece of impudence. “I have not time for that. Every vagabond and street juggler in the city will be lined up at our door. I had another thought, just now. Leave off what you’re doing, I pray you, and come hear me out.”
Reluctantly, Sidonie put down her book. She did not like the sound of this.
As always, when her father seized upon a fresh enthusiasm, his gaunt features softened, became almost boyish. “Sidonie, we’ve always known that you possess the gift.”
“No, Father, I have told you . . . ”
Sidonie’s hasty protest was cut short.
“I know, my child, you have said that you want nothing to do with sorcery. I do not speak of sorcery, only of scrying. To look into the crystal, to see the future, to discover what is hidden, that is a kind of science, is it not?”
“Not any kind of science I want to practise,” Sidonie said. “Father, you know well enough why I will not scry. How can you ask such a thing of me?”
“Because,” Simon Quince said gently, “it seems to me wrong, to deny the talents your were born with. It saddens me to see you waste those talents in sweeping and stirring and making beds.”
“Then hire another servant,” Sidonie said.
“In truth, daughter, we can ill afford to pay a servant, let alone a scryer. And it is the scrying that keeps the wolf from our door. Things were different, when your mother was alive. And clearly you have inherited her gift.”
“Her curse, you mean,” Sidonie said bitterly.
“If you will. It became her curse. But it does not have to be so. Your mother looked into her mirror, Sidonie — that was her grave error. She looked into her mirror, and saw her own fate. That is more than any of us can bear.”
“Sidonie, child, our fortune is made.” Simon Quince came to the doorway of his workroom. There was a folded paper in his hand.
“Indeed?” said Sidonie. She set down her basket of salad herbs. “And how shall this miracle be accomplished?”
“Have I not told you the story of how Queen Elizabeth herself visited Dr. Dee at his house in Mortlake, and asked to see his magic glass?”
“Several times,” said Sidonie, only half-listening. She stirred the floor-rushes with the toe of her slipper, sending up a puff of lavender-scented dust. It was past time the rushes were replaced.
“She arrived in a grand procession,” continued Simon Quince with practised eloquence, “accompanied by all her Privy Council, and sundry other lords and nobility. But when informed that the house was in mourning, Dr. Dee’s wife having died only hours before, Her Majesty declined to enter, and asked instead that Dr. Dee bring out the glass, that she might examine it. Which she did forthwith, to her great contentment and delight.”
A dreadful thought occurred to Sidonie. “Father,” she said. “Surely you are not suggesting . . . ”
“That we invite Queen Elizabeth to come to Charing Cross? Nay, daughter, our house is far too humble to entertain royalty.”
Thank heavens for small mercies, thought Sidonie. No matter how grand her father’s aspirations, from time to time a modicum of common sense prevailed.
“No, daughter, we are invited to visit the Queen. I have here a letter from Lord Burleigh himself, instructing us to attend upon Her Majesty at Hampton Court.”
“This is marvellous strange, Father.”
“Marvellous indeed, but hardly strange. With this Spanish trouble brewing, the Queen needs must discover what the future holds — for herself, and for England.”
“But she has an astrologer — Dr. Dee.”
“Who as you know has gone abroad, leaving Her Majesty with no prognosticator in which she can place her trust. Child, have I not said that I have friends in the highest circles? Friends who will drop a word in the right ear when the time is right?”
“But you have said ‘us’.”
“I will read the stars for Her Majesty. And you will look into the scrying crystal and see what secrets may be hidden there. Just think, daughter — wax candles again, instead of tallow. A pint of claret with our supper. And you, my clever girl, shall have a velvet hat, and a new gown, with farthingales and furbelows to your heart’s content.”
“I have a hat,” said Sidonie. “And my old gown will do well enough, since I do not go out in society.”
“Ah, but you will, daughter,” said Simon Quince. “You will come with me to court, and all the young lords will dance attendance on you.”
“Aha,” said Sidonie, only half teasing. “Now I see which way the wind blows. This is how you will put claret on the table — by marrying me off to an earl. ’Struth, dear Father, you have studied metaphysics too long — you have lost touch with reality.”
She imagined how the two of them, dressed like poor artisans, would be received at court — she in her plain woollen kirtle, her father in his shabby russet gown. She had never cared a jot for fashion, never pined as other girls did for silk stockings and doeskin gloves. But neither did she wish to be laughed at. Was her father doomed, as he so often was, to disappointment?
In truth, she too was weary of the lean days when there was no bacon for their pottage, when they had to make do with pease porridge and oats instead of wheaten bread. “ And if I look into the crystal? Will I see only the fate of others, not myself?”
“In this crystal, which I have purchased from my eminent colleague Doctor Forman, you will see the fate of all of us — the future of England. And that, my daughter, is the vision that will keep us in luxury in my old age, and yours.”
“But Father — suppose the future of England is disaster and defeat? What would it benefit the Queen to hear such tidings?”
Her father had an answer for that, as indeed he had an answer for most things: “If a man knows that his house is to catch fire, he may be unable to prevent the fire, for that is preordained. But still he can try to quench the flames; or he can choose to gather up his possessions, and go with his wife and children to an inn, and so survive.”
And Sidonie argued in her turn: “But Father, suppose it is not the fire, but the man’s death, and the death of his family, that is pre-ordained?” It was a conundrum that made her head hurt, for surely it had no easy answer.
She realized that her father was no longer paying attention. Quill in hand, he was composing his reply to Lord Burleigh’s letter. With a sigh Sidonie picked up her Euclid, taking refuge in his reassuring certainties.