Interesting Christmas or not, stalemate reigned on the way to it, with Essex still besieged in Essex House and defying his Queen, and in the affairs of the Earl of Bretford. Martin had sent his father a letter accepting his invitation to stay with him over Yuletide, as Webster persisted in calling it, but the wording of his reply was cool in the extreme.
Martin and most of his family, for such was the name of everyone who worked for him and lived at Saxon Hall, prepared to move to the Strand on December the 24th. Festivities had already begun at court: it was apparent that, on the surface, at least, the Queen was not taking Essex’s implied threat to her sovereignty very seriously.
Raleigh, who had warned her not to be too precipitate in dealing with Essex, but to allow him to destroy himself with his folly, told Martin that Sir Robert Cecil had made great, and secret, preparations in order to withstand any uprising which Essex might try to bring about.
‘Cecil’s as wily a young fox as his father was an old one,’ he ended. ‘Her Grace has had the most amazing luck in having around her such a collection of wits—and from the beginning of her reign, too. I am beginning to think that luck is the most important ingredient in success.’
‘Exactly half, if Machiavelli is to be believed,’ Martin countered with a grin. ‘The other half being the cunning of the Prince—and both ingredients are needed.’
‘That’s what Essex lacks, cunning,’ sighed Raleigh. ‘If he were half as clever as he thinks he is, he would be one of Her Grace’s chief ministers and generals by now. As it is…’ and he left the rest of his sentence unfinished. ‘I was his friend once,’ he added, ‘but no longer. He may be bent on a form of suicide but I am not. By the by, I hear that you are to spend Christmas with your father at Bretford House. Have you become reconciled with him?’
‘That I don’t know. After years of throwing me off, even when at last I became his heir, suddenly, out of the blue, as it were, he sends me this invitation. My Privy Council, such as it is, all seemed to think that I ought to accept it, so we shall be journeying to the Strand in a sennight.’
‘By your Privy Council, do you mean the motley crew whom your father deplores?’
Martin laughed. ‘Yes, joined by my wife since we married. I truly believe that in wisdom and learning she is very like our lady, the Queen, was when she was a young woman. As to that, I don’t think that Cecil has a better crew in his ship than Rafe, Webster and Jacko.’
‘Particularly Jacko,’ quipped Raleigh, laughing in his turn. ‘I was most struck by him on my last visit to you. A murderous henchman who has a rare vein of common sense is truly a remarkable fellow to have at your back.’
‘Most particularly since, by some miracle, he is a favourite of all the ladies, both gentle and simple, in Saxon Hall.’
‘Not your good lady, surely.’
‘My good lady, her aunt and all the women in the kitchens.’
Raleigh shook his head. ‘I shall never understand women if I live to be a hundred. Anyone less like the gallant chevalier whom they are all supposed to desire than Jacko is, I have yet to meet. By the by, a little bird has told me that Essex will be mounting his grand assault on the Queen early in the New Year. If so, I would advise you to be prepared to withstand an attack on your property either at the Royal Exchange or at Saxon Hall: any such rebellion is likely to get out of hand if the mob joins in.’
Martin wondered exactly who Raleigh’s little bird was—someone near to Essex, no doubt, probably spying for Cecil and anyone else whom he thought needed to be informed. Raleigh had never said anything to suggest that he knew of Bevis Frampton’s campaign against him, so Martin did not question him about it.
That same evening he told the Privy Council of Raleigh’s name for them and of his belief that it might be wise for them to make plans to resist a possible assault on Saxon Hall.
‘And your father’s home, too,’ said Webster suddenly. ‘Remember that Bevis Frampton is one of Essex’s most fervent supporters. Who knows what he might try to do to you and yours?’
He had not forgotten that Kate was unaware of Frampton’s constant attempts on Martin’s life, as well as the failed bid to kidnap her which had been the result of one of them. He had always thought this decision to be a mistake. He put his hand to his mouth as though regretting a slip of the tongue, when Kate, who had been listening intently to everything that was being said, enquired, ‘Who is Bevis Frampton, and why should we be worried about what he might be planning?’
Martin’s look for Webster, whom he believed had just made a rare mistake, was a reproachful one.
‘I will tell you later,’ he said. ‘For the moment let us begin our own planning. Rafe and Jacko will be responsible for readying us to withstand an attack, both here and at Bretford House. I shall oversee the guarding of our premises at Southwark. I would suppose that Essex’s main aim would be to reach the court and try to take possession of the Queen herself, to compel her to carry out his demands. We must, however, be prepared for a general uprising which might engulf London.’
His hearers nodded their heads in agreement. Jacko said aggressively, ‘We’ll have to find firearms as well as some pikes, and if we do I’d like to offer Essex’s head on one of them to Her Grace. He deserves that for his ingratitude for all she has done for him. Anyone else but him would already have lost it on Tower Hill.’
This earthy piece of savagery set them all laughing, even Kate.
Later, when they were alone again, she said to Martin, ‘Now, what is all this about Bevis Frampton—and who might he be?’
He answered her wearily, ‘I had hoped that you might not have to know about him, but Webster made one of his rare errors and let the cat out of the bag.’
‘It deserved to be let out if you were keeping important matters from me,’ she told him severely. ‘I am your wife, I was nearly kidnapped and I deserve to know why.’
‘I don’t know why Frampton is trying to kill me, only that he is.’ And Martin proceeded to tell her of all that had passed since the first attempt on him immediately before he returned to Bretford House, except that he did not tell her of Frampton’s attempt to suborn Webster. He tried to make as light of it as possible, but he could not deceive Kate.
She shook her head at him. ‘If the Queen could be kept informed of the many attempts on her life, then I ought to know of those which might involve me. Do not talk to me of weak women,’ she shouted at him, her usual calm composure broken for once.
Martin gave her a sad smile. ‘Well, you know now.’
‘And what sort of answer is that?’ She glared at him, still furious. ‘As for Webster making a mistake, I have the feeling that he never makes one. Perhaps he thought that I ought to know.’
‘If so, he thinks a great deal too much,’ said her harassed husband.
‘Which is why you value him so highly, so you can’t complain about that. In any case, in future, I expect to be told when your life—and possibly mine—is in danger.’
‘So noted,’ returned Martin, with such a rueful look on his face that Kate could not help laughing.
‘I meant what I said,’ she assured him when she could speak soberly again.
‘I know, and that is what troubles me.’
‘Am I mistaken, or would you have preferred to marry a fluttering creature, fit only to mouth, “It is as you wish, my lord and master”?’
This was such an accurate description of Mary’s behaviour during their short time together that Martin was silenced. What would have happened if she had not died so early in their marriage? Would he have tired of her unthinking worship of him? Whatever Kate felt for him, it was not worship. She spoke to him as though they were equals, as the Queen would have done to any man who had dared to marry her. What would be the end of such a marriage? More to the point, did he want to be worshipped? Was not this give and take with her part of the joy of being married to her?
Was that why he loved her? He could not yet tell her so, nor could he allow her to repeat words of love to him, for still, at the back of his mind, was that he had loved once, had told his wife so, many times, as she had told him—and then had lost her, as well as the proof of their love which had lived so short a life.
‘Come to bed,’ he said suddenly. ‘I think that Raleigh was a little surprised that you had joined my Privy Council, even though he thinks it fit that his Queen should rule one.’
‘Are all issues between us to be resolved in bed?’ Kate teased naughtily, twisting away from him a little.
‘What better place can there be?’ was his riposte. ‘And if you do not agree to retire to ours immediately, I shall be compelled to carry you there.’
‘Faced by such a threat, Lord Hadleigh, there is only one thing I can do. Which is to refuse, for so far no one has ever forcibly carried me to my bed and it is an experience which I should most like to enjoy.’
Martin’s answer to that was to take her in his arms, throw her over his shoulder and begin to carry her upstairs. They were met on the landing by Webster, who could not stop himself from raising his eyebrows at them.
‘Not a word, Webster,’ Martin shouted at him. ‘You have already said too much today, and this is your fault.’
Fortunately for Webster’s peace of mind as Martin raced by, Kate lifted her head and smiled happily at him. So his own naughtiness in allowing Kate to discover about Frampton’s villainy, had merely had the result of adding further spice to his master’s marriage. As though it needed any more, he thought ruefully, contemplating his own celibate life. I suppose that if I ever found a jewel like Kate Chancellor I might be tempted to marry!
Kate had not told Martin that she loved him, ever since he had asked her not to. What was strange was that he behaved towards her as she had always believed a man who loved his wife would. Why, then, was he so reluctant to put his feelings into words? The way he had treated her after he had carried her upstairs to bed was that of a man who was either deeply in love, or deeply in lust—which never considered one’s partner—with his wife, and she preferred to believe in the first explanation.
For some reason she thought that his unwillingness to admit her love for him, or his for her, had something to do with the portrait of the pretty young woman which was hidden away in the closet in his room. More than once she had tried to look at it again to see if there was anything in, or on, the painting which might give her a clue as to who she was, and why he treasured it so much, but she had always found the closet to be securely locked.
Her curiosity was further roused when one afternoon, rummaging through the library’s bookshelves, she overheard Rafe and Webster busily talking about her husband, apparently unaware that she was nearby. Webster was commenting on Martin’s unfailing good humour. Rafe gave a short laugh.
‘Only since he married this one,’ he told Webster. ‘After he lost the other one he was like a bear with a sore head for years, but I still think this one’s better for him than t’other.’
‘And good for all of us, too,’ was Webster’s answer, after which they began to talk of other things.
Kate waited until they had left the library before she returned to the withdrawing-room, and while she waited she thought of what had been said. The only conclusion which she could come to was that Martin had been married before, a marriage of which he had said nothing to her or to anyone at Bretford House, although it was plain that Rafe and Webster knew of it.
A first marriage to a wife who was now presumably dead, for she did not think that Martin would commit bigamy, might account for his determination never fully to commit himself to her, and also to his hiding away of her portrait. It also explained a number of other mysteries. The woman in the portrait she had seen in his closet must have been his first wife. Did he still grieve for her? Was that why he had told her never to love him?
What began to trouble her while she stitched busily away beside Aunt Jocasta was how she could broach the matter with him. It was wrong—if her assumption was correct—that he had not told her that he had been married before, and that that was why he had been holding himself back from making her his true wife in every sense: one to whom he could tell the truth about his feelings for her.
On the other hand, for her to accost him over a possible first marriage meant that she would have to admit that she had heard Rafe and Webster discussing his private affairs. She would need to be cunning if she were to conjure up some other reason for raising the matter with him, particularly when he was going out of his way to be kind to her. Best, perhaps, that she say nothing. It might trouble him to talk of his dead first wife to his second live one—it was always wise to let sleeping dogs lie.
Christmas was almost upon them when Martin came home early one afternoon. He burst into the withdrawing-room where she sat with Aunt Jocasta, full of Christmas spirit, or, as Rafe dryly put it later, full of the sack which they had all been drinking with their customers to celebrate Yuletide.
‘You must be up betimes tomorrow,’ he announced, ‘for I am taking us all to the Royal Exchange so that you may see it decorated with Christmas garlands as well as the holly and the ivy. After that we shall eat at one of the ordinaries. In the afternoon the Waits will be singing carols in the square in order to entertain the shoppers and those who work to serve them.
‘It will be our last excursion before we visit Bretford House early on Christmas Eve.’
Aunt Jocasta said eagerly, ‘Am I to accompany you this time?’
‘Indeed, and Rafe, Webster and Jacko, too.’
The following morning the weather proved as kind as they might have hoped. It was cold, but sunny, after a heavy frost the night before. Martin swathed Kate and Aunt Jocasta in furs before they left.
‘Your first Christmas presents,’ he said, and when the three of them climbed into their coach they found brass warming-pans already there so that the bitter December cold should not trouble them on their journey. As usual he had thought of everything. Rafe, Webster and Jacko were travelling in the other coach. Several armed grooms followed them on horseback. They had orders to guard Kate, Martin and Aunt Jocasta when they walked through the square, so that on this visit no one would have the opportunity to attack them.
Fortunately this time their trip was a great success. Aunt Jocasta bought material for a new dress from Martin’s shop, and they admired all the jeweller’s wares and enjoyed dining at the ordinary. All in all, as Aunt Jocasta said afterwards, the whole expedition was so unlike both her and Kate’s previously sheltered lives that that alone made the day worthwhile. She did not add how much she had enjoyed being carefully watched over by Jacko, but that too, was a great part of her pleasure.
Kate did have one curious experience. She was standing outside Martin’s shop, with Rafe and one of the grooms guarding her, while inside, Aunt Jocasta and Martin haggled with Peg over a length of brocade, when she suddenly became aware that she was being watched by someone whom she could not see. It was a curious sensation which she had only experienced once before. She could feel the man staring at her, before she turned to try to find him.
There he was, only a few yards away from her, on the rough road which surrounded the square. He seemed to be an insignificant little fellow, dressed in grey and silver. He had a large man in livery beside him—his guard, probably, but his stare was for Kate, and Kate alone, and did not take in any of the clusters of shoppers who came and went, carrying their Christmas trophies.
She shivered at the sight of him and turned back to say to Rafe, ‘Tell me, Rafe, do you know that little man in grey standing directly behind me? He has been staring hard at us for some time. I do not like the look of him.’
Rafe peered over her shoulder, ‘What little man in grey, Lady Kate? I can’t see anyone answering to that description.’
Kate swung round again. The man had disappeared, lost among the crowd which had begun to fill the square. The big fellow had gone, too.
Webster came out of the shop where he had been buying linen for a new shirt.
‘What is it, Lady Kate? Why the worried look?’
Before she could explain, Rafe said, ‘She is distressed because some little man in grey has been staring at her.’
To their surprise Webster, his face furious, thrust his parcel at Rafe. ‘Hold that for me. Show me where this man is. When I find him I’ll teach him a lesson in good manners.’
‘He’s disappeared,’ said Kate. ‘He was over there. Why are you so agitated, Webster?’
‘Because I think that he may be someone dangerous. Keep hold of my parcel for me, Rafe. I’ll try to track him down.’ And he ran in the direction which he thought that the man might have taken.
Rafe, astonished, said, ‘I have never seen Webster so worked up about anything. In fact, I’ve never seen him worked up before.’
‘Nor I,’ said Kate.
Martin, coming out of his shop with Aunt Jocasta and Jacko behind him, and overhearing a little of what had been said, exclaimed sharply, ‘What’s that about a little grey man, Rafe?’
Rafe explained, and was immediately surprised by Martin’s reaction, which was as powerful as Webster’s. ‘Where is he, which way did he go?’
‘We don’t know,’ explained Kate. ‘Only that Webster has run off to try to find him.’
‘And which way did Webster go?’
The moment that they told him, Martin started off in the opposite direction, calling on one of the grooms to accompany him.
‘Where’s he off to in such a hurry?’ demanded Jacko, who had arrived in time to see Martin disappear.
Rafe explained. ‘God knows,’ he ended. ‘The grey man might be anybody—or anywhere.’
‘No need to wait for God to tell us anything. I only know of only one little grey man who might be staring at m’lady, and that’s Master Bevis Frampton. You should have known that, Rafe.’
‘I’ve never seen him, only heard of him,’ was Rafe’s tart rejoinder.
‘Who is Bevis Frampton?’ exclaimed a puzzled Aunt Jocasta.
‘That, the master will have to tell you,’ said Jacko, not obliging Aunt Jocasta for once. This time it was Rafe who said, ‘He’s one of Lord Essex’s supporters.’
He did not add that because he had never actually seen Frampton—unlike Jacko, who seemed to have seen everybody while he had tried to gather information about Bevis—he had been unable to guess at the identity of the man who had been staring at Kate.
Jacko said, ‘How the devil did Webster come to know him?’
Rafe shrugged. He liked Webster, but there was something about the man which frightened him a little. He was beginning to think that devious was his middle name.
Aunt Jocasta still puzzled, asked, ‘And why should he stare at Kate?’
Before anyone had time to answer her, Webster reappeared. He took his parcel from Rafe, saying, ‘I’m sorry, but I couldn’t find him. There were a number of coaches coming and going at the end of the street. He may have left in one of them when he grasped that we had seen him watching Lady Hadleigh.’
‘Martin went after him, too. He might have had better luck,’ offered Rafe.
But he hadn’t. He returned shortly afterwards, having been unable to find his quarry. A pale-faced Aunt Jocasta immediately asked him, ‘Who is Bevis Frampton, and why should he be staring at Kate? And why should you and Webster rush off to try to catch him?’
‘I’ll explain a little later, when we get home,’ Martin said, putting his arm around her and, at the same time, assuring her that they were in no immediate danger.
‘In fact,’ he finished, ‘I think that we should all retreat to the ordinary and try to forget little grey men who stare at my wife.’
‘I wasn’t frightened,’ Kate assured him. ‘Only curious. I’m still curious.’
‘You’re always curious,’ said Martin before steering them all, including the grooms in the direction of the best ordinary in Southwark—or so he claimed.
Even the excellent meal they ate in the ordinary, and their subsequent jaunt to Cheapside, where they found more Christmas decorations and a large crowd who were loaded with Yuletide fare and provisions, could not stop Aunt Jocasta from worrying about the strange and violent way in which both Martin and Webster had reacted to the news that her niece was being watched by a little grey man.
Kate tried to forget the whole wretched incident by watching the bear being baited. She didn’t enjoy the spectacle very much because she felt sorry for the poor beast, but was amused when Aunt Jocasta threw herself into Jacko’s arms when the bear’s master, leading him on a chain, walked him into the crowd immediately in front of her. Kate whispered in Martin’s ear, ‘I don’t like to see the bear being made fun of.’
‘Because you used to call me a bear?’
She drew away from him a little. ‘You knew?’
‘Of course, I felt rather flattered, particularly since a bear is on my Martin coat of arms and my motto is Cave ursum.’
‘Which is Beware of the Bear, so you thought of yourself as a bear before I did.’
‘Exactly. And now I think that we ought to go home before your aunt seduces Jacko.’
‘And then you may tell me why, if you are all aware that we are in danger from Bevis Frampton, you don’t report him to the Sheriff and his constables on a charge of attempted murder? That would surely result in his being sent to prison—and we should be safe from his wickedness.’
‘Because I have no firm evidence of his guilt to put before a magistrate and, without it, I might be considered to be a vindictive fool. Two of his hirelings, who could have identified him, are dead.’ He did not tell her of Frampton’s attempt to control Webster in order to use him as his assassin, for he did not wish to frighten her too much.
He stopped, and then continued, his face and voice, most earnest. ‘Promise me that you will never allow him to come near you, and that if he does, you will try to leave his presence immediately.’
Kate said, ‘I will do as you ask. Not only that, I shall not tell Aunt Jocasta about any of this. She is fearful enough without having to worry about Bevis Frampton, too.’
Martin put an arm around her and kissed her gently, ‘Come my love, let us go home and try to forget Bevis and all his works—for a little time at least. As the apostle says, “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” Tonight we may celebrate Christmas and tomorrow is another day.’
Celebrate they duly did, and afterwards they slept the deep sleep of the fulfilled.