The Tower by Flora Carr

Author:Flora Carr [Carr, Flora]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2024-03-05T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

—

It is already well past midnight, they are closer to dawn than dusk, when Mary asks that Jane, Queen of the Bean, be her bedfellow for the night. Mary is undressed first: the misrule of Twelfth Night extends only so far, it seems. The women gather about her, Jane still in her red velvet, unlacing Mary, stifling yawns, swaying where she stands, reminded of that first day at Lochleven, when she and Cuckoo put Mary to bed, the two of them exhausted from the hard ride through the night, but unable to even sit down until Mary’s own needs were taken care of. So it is tonight, but Jane feels no resentment: she fumbles with laces and cuffs, clumsy, delaying the moment until she must relinquish the red dress.

When the candles are blown out, and they are in bed—Jane has not slept here since Seton arrived at Lochleven—the clean scent of Mary’s skin and hair, familiar and exotic, seems to overwhelm Jane, enveloping her, sticking to her like honey, so that tomorrow she will again know the alien pleasure of moving through the day in a body that does not smell like her own. Jane’s thoughts drift to Seton lying in the other room, perhaps kept awake by Cuckoo’s snores.

“You looked well tonight, in my velvet,” Mary says. “I’m sorry there was no throne for you.”

Jane leaves a pause before speaking, to ensure she will not interrupt her bedfellow. “I preferred it this way,” she says, and she speaks the truth: there was an intimacy between the women, a camaraderie, Mary’s careful hands arranging her own sleeves on another’s arms. When she celebrated Twelfth Night in her palaces, did Mary dress those other women crowned queen for a day, her own fingers positioning their hems on the ground? Jane doubts it somehow.

“It is not yet the morning; you are still a queen until we wake. Think of that, three queens on one island: myself, my cousin Elizabeth. You.” In the darkness, Mary wets her lips. “It was a strange comfort, when you masqueraded as her; when we played games during the storm. I have never met Elizabeth. Never heard her voice. For so many years I have wanted to speak with her; never more so than now. I would seek her counsel. I would put aside our past arguments and I would ask her advice, one prince to another ... I would ask her what I should do next.”

The air seems to ripple, as though a window has been opened or a sheet shaken out above their heads. Jane holds her breath; she senses that Mary is peering at her, trying to make out her expression. She is expecting her to say something, or hoping for it. Jane remembers the whispered words by the fireside. Wouldn’t it be easier if we could wed?

“Perhaps,” she says, tentatively, “perhaps Cuckoo guessed my identity too soon that night. Perhaps you would prefer to converse a little more, to confirm who I am.

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