Queen Without a Crown Read Free Page B

of your parents . . .?’
    ‘My father,’ said Mark miserably. ‘Or so it was said. I didn’t tell Jane or her family about it myself,’ he added in a bitter tone. ‘It isn’t the sort of thing one blithely announces across a dining table or when playing cards with one’s hosts in a parlour! But Mistress Penelope had heard the story before she met me. She was at court before her marriage, and apparently it was a scandalous tale that the maids of honour still tattle about. She recognized my name and then asked my father’s first name and said to me: was he the Gervase Easton who was accused of poisoning a man called Peter Hoxton? He was. I’d have been a fool to deny it – she and her husband could have found out easily enough whether or not I was lying.’
    ‘I didn’t hear the story when I was at court,’ I said. ‘But I suppose I was never there for all that long at a time, and I didn’t mix much with the maids of honour.’
    ‘My father was never charged with the crime,’ Mark said, ‘but that was because he took his own life first. I was only three at the time.’ He put a hand inside his doublet and drew out a miniature portrait which hung round his neck on a chain. Lifting the chain over his head, he handed it to me. ‘The man he was said to have killed had been making advances to my mother. It was supposed to be a crime of jealousy. This was my mother. Judith, her name was. Look.’
    Hugh came over to me, and we examined it together. Sybil slipped off the window seat to look as well. The miniature was exquisite. It showed the face of a young woman, dressed in the style of twenty or so years ago, with a small ruff and a round French hood. The dark hair in front of the hood and the almond-shaped brown eyes were just like Easton’s. She did not have her son’s upward swooping eyebrows, but her own slim dark brows perfectly suited her face. Her face, altogether, was . . .
    Beautiful. There was no other word for it, and the artist, whoever he was, had understood it and paid homage to it. Even in this tiny portrait, he had shown not only the shape and colour of the eyes, but also their lustrousness. He had shown the dewiness of the skin and the lovely bone structure, so clearly defined and yet so delicate, as though the bone were made of polished ivory. He had shown the generosity in the mouth and captured the little tilt of the head, which was not coquettish but enquiring; as though its owner were shyly asking a question. He had wrought a miracle of fine detail in a minuscule space.
    ‘I can’t remember my father’s face,’ Easton said. ‘But I was five when I last saw my mother, and I can remember her and she was just like that. It’s a good picture. May I tell you the story? You see, I need someone to help me. I have never believed my father was guilty. I want to prove that I’m right, because if I can, then I’ll be able to marry Jane.’
    The Brockleys came over to us as well, and after a glance at Mark for his permission, Hugh held out the miniature for them to see. ‘What a lovely face,’ Fran said, while Brockley nodded in agreement.
    Hugh handed the picture back to its owner. ‘So, tell your tale,’ he said briefly.
    ‘I said I had a house in Derbyshire,’ Mark said. ‘My father – Gervase Easton – should have inherited it; he was the eldest son. But he fell in love with my mother—’
    ‘Who could blame him?’ Brockley remarked suddenly.
    ‘Quite,’ said Mark. ‘She was the daughter of one of our smallholder tenants and that wasn’t the kind of match that his parents wanted for him. But he insisted on marrying her, so he was disinherited. His younger brother, my Uncle Robert, was to have everything; my father would have to shift for himself. So he came south, with his bride. Her family had friends in court service, apparently, and someone helped him to get a place at court. The friends weren’t very influential, though, and it wasn’t a very splendid