Queen's Gambit: A Novel of Katherine Parr by Elizabeth Fremantle

Author:Elizabeth Fremantle [Fremantle, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, General, Historical, Literary
ISBN: 9781476703077
Google: 0QR_AwAAQBAJ
Amazon: 1476703078
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2014-05-05T16:00:00+00:00

GREENWICH PALACE, KENT, JUNE 1545

‘What’s the racket? It’s bedlam in here,’ says Katherine, as she enters her privy chamber with Cat Brandon.

Rig is barking manically at François the monkey who is crouched just out of reach, balanced on the back of a chair and sucking on a plum stone, with his long tail carefully curled up out of danger. In his other hairy little hand he clutches Rig’s favourite toy, a wooden mouse. Katherine hasn’t warmed to the monkey, he’s a pest, but she hasn’t had the heart to get rid of him. He has tried to bite her a couple of times, and he has poor Dot running around cleaning up the chaos he causes. Cat’s dog scampers in, joining Rig with a high-pitched yapping, and the monkey teases the pair of them by waving the mouse about.

‘Gardiner, stop that!’ Cat snaps at her dog.

The two women turn to each other with a burst of laughter, adding to the hullabaloo. It is the first time Katherine has really laughed in weeks. Meg’s death has cast a long shadow.

‘I still can’t believe you called him Gardiner,’ says Sister Anne, following them into the room. ‘I’d never have dared.’

‘The Bishop has lost his sense of humour over it,’ says Cat.

‘I wasn’t aware he ever had one,’ chips in Katherine.

‘He has to force himself to find it when my husband is with me, though it looks more like some kind of convulsion than any kind of amusement,’ Cat laughs.

One of the ushers, red-faced and flustered, has Rig by his bejewelled collar and is trying, with his other hand, to catch Gardiner who’s become so excited he’s relieved himself on the matting. Dot wipes up the mess and manages to prise the mouse from the monkey’s hairy grip. The duchess scoops up her dog and the din subsides.

They settle on the cushions, in a pool of sun from the window. It’s a relief to see the sun as it has rained and rained for weeks – or so it seems. It might as well have been April, not June. In spite of the brightness, the ladies make a sombre group now the silliness is over. They are all still dressed in black for Meg. It has been the best part of three months. Their rich brocades and shot silks make Katherine think of the ravens at the Tower, whose plumage, in the right light, looks iridescent like a slick of oil on water. She offered Dot a new dress in good black fustian and a hood to go with it, which she is wearing now. She cuts a fine figure in it, though she has already lost the matching partlet and there is a new rip in the skirt where she must have caught it on something. There is something about Dot’s lack of refinement that Katherine finds endearing, especially in this place where everything is run so very seamlessly and people’s affectations come to define them. With Meg gone Dot has become all the more precious.

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