Queen of Ambition Read Free Page A

felt like an intrusion, I also wondered
why
it had come so soon.
    It was my first intimation that something out of the ordinary was afoot.
    When the time came for me to go to France, I intended to leave Brockley and Dale to run Withysham for me. I would have plenty of servants at Blanchepierre. But in England, I only had Brockley and Dale as personal attendants, so they would have to come to Cambridge with me. Therefore, I recalled the old steward, Malton, from his retirement cottage and put him back in charge with a lengthy list of instructions, which included taking the utmost care of Gladys. “I won’t be here and Brockley won’t be here, but if anyone harms Gladys while we’re gone, you’ll answer for it. I’ll slash your pension.”
    “I’ll do my best, Mistress Blanchard,” said Malton bleakly. He had never known what to make of me but he was more than a little afraid of me, which just now was all to the good.
    “You’ll do more than your best,” I said. “Call on the vicar for help if necessary.” The vicar’s living was in the gift of Withysham and he was afraid of me, too. I was young to be a husbandless lady of the manor and sometimes I had to put on fierce airs in order to get my authority respected. I sometimes feared that I was turning into a fair facsimile of a battle-ax.
    Meg, along with her nurse, Bridget, would have to return to her foster mother, Mattie Henderson. Rob and Mattie were the owners of a big house near Hampton and Rob was a courtier, and a friend of Sir William Cecil, the Secretary of State. Rob was to join the Progress and Mattie had written to me that he was already at court. Mattie herself, however, was expecting a child and was to stay behind at their home, Thames-bank. Meg was well used to both Mattie and Thames-bank and would be contented enough there until I came back.
    “Though I don’t envy Mistress Henderson, having to stay at home while her husband goes off gallivanting among all the court ladies,” Fran Dale said in sour tones. “And her nearly forty, at that. If I was her, I couldn’t abide to see Roger going off like that and leaving me behind.”
    “No one’s asking you to,” I pointed out, somewhat brusquely, since I was extremely busy just then with the choice of gowns to pack and a further list of last-minute instructions for the harassed Master Malton.
    The day before I set out, I had an unexpected visitor. Five miles from Withysham was Faldene, the house where I had been brought up, mainly by my uncle Herbert and my aunt Tabitha. My mother had been a court lady who was sent home in disgrace, with child by a man she would not name. I had been that child. Her parents and later on her brother Herbert and sister-in-law Tabitha had sheltered us, had clothed and fed us, and had even educated me, but they had not been kind. We had disgraced them, and they let us know it.
    Later on, when my mother was dead and I was a young woman confronted with a life as Aunt Tabitha’s unpaid maidservant and Uncle Herbert’s unpaid clerk, I succeeded in stealing the affections of their daughter Mary’s betrothed. I ran off with Gerald and married him. Finally, when Uncle Herbert became involved in treason, I was the one who got him sent to the Tower. He had been released long since, as an act of mercy, because he was a heavily built man who suffered from shortness of breath and attacks of gout, but understandably, he didn’t feel inclined to forgive me.
    In fact, for excellent reasons, I didn’t like my uncle and aunt and they didn’t like me and although I lived so near them, we had not seen each other during my sojourn at Withysham. I was very surprised when Brockley came to my chamber, where Dale and I were folding clothes into hampers, and announced that Mistress Tabitha Faldene was below, and wished to speak to me.
    “Aunt Tabitha? Here?”
    “Yes, madam.” Brockley knew the situation and hiscalm high forehead with its dusting of pale gold freckles was faintly