The Queene’s Christmas (32 page)

He tried to lift the chair, but he was hacking too hard. He had to get out of here to clear his name. Tell Meg something. Hugged hard by suffocating smoke, Ned crumpled against the heavy chair and slid to the floor.

Chapter the Seventeenth

Water for Cooking and Baking

Water is not wholesome, sole by itself, for an Englishman but is cold, slow, and slack of digestion. The best water is rain-water, so it be purely taken. Next to it is running water, the which doth swiftly run upon stones or pebbles. The third water to be praised is river or brook water, the which is clear. Standing water, the which be refreshed with a spring, is commendable; but standing water and well-water to which the sun hath no reflection be not so commendable. And let every man beware of all waters which be putrefied with froth
.

ACROSS FROM THE ISLE OF DOGS, ELIZABETH AND HER
entourage left the river and cut up into the trees surrounding Greenwich Palace, the same area where they’d begun their fox hunt over a week ago. From here they could see that flames licked inside at least one window on the second floor of the east wing.

“I know you are angry I’ve been ordering you about, Your Grace,” Robin said and reined his horse in to block hers, “but you cannot go near a burning building. We must leave a guard here with you and ride in to rouse the staff.”

“And to fetch Ned out, I promise, Your Grace!” Jenks cried and spurred his horse toward the palace before she could give him leave.

“Yes, all right. Go, Robin, but be careful. Harry can stay with me.”

They gasped as a boom filled the air. Fireworks shot skyward to sprinkle sparks into the bare-limbed forest, as if it were New Year’s Eve again. Their mounts shied or reared, and the distant dogs in the royal kennel howled. Robin wheeled back toward her.

“I must tell you,” he shouted, “that I have learned someone stole some of the fireworks I had stored for the New Year’s celebration. There weren’t half the number I’d planned. I would have told you, of course, but I didn’t want to be blamed for aught else—which,” he added, emphasizing each word, “I did not do!”

“But gunpowder is in those fireworks,” she cried, “gunpowder for firearms which could be used in an insurrection.” She thought of Sussex, her military man, but surely he would not raise arms against her, however much he hated her reliance on Robin. No, it seemed as if the gunpowder thieves were using it for fireworks— and perhaps to start the fire at Greenwich.

“Harry, take Robin’s place at the palace and help Jenks fetch out Ned Topside before I go after him myself. Robin, stay with me. If you don’t know who took the fireworks, at least, how were they stolen?” she demanded as Harry charged after the others.

“I swear I don’t know. I had men guarding them out by the gatehouse to the Strand.”

“And so not far from the back way into the kitchens,” she muttered to herself.

“My men didn’t realize some of the fireworks were missing until they went to set them up on the ice that evening. They swore they weren’t drinking or careless. Several courtiers came out to see how the powder was put in the rockets, they said, but that’s not unusual. In truth, Your Grace, some of the fireworks seem to have vanished like—like that bracelet of yours Lady Rosie’s been searching high and low for.”

“I fear we’ve found the gunpowder at least,” she said as another boom ensued and the rocket called a Pike of Pleasure hissed sky-ward. But it looked as if, she noted, it had been launched from back
in the
forest, not into it.

“Your Grace, perhaps this will bring folk from the village beyond, maybe even from London to fight the fire. Let’s move away a bit, down on the river to direct help should it come.”

Her leg brushed his as they urged their skittish mounts out of the trees to the riverbank. She realized that she could yet mistrust and suspect Robin, but she thought she now knew who the culprit was in this war he was waging against all she held dear.

His name—shouted in the distance—woke Ned. Was it his father calling him to come downstairs for Christmas or New Year’s morn? His uncle Wat would be there, full of good cheer and good food, home from the road for a few days, presenting scenes from great dramas. Uncle Wat would let him play a soldier and speak a few lines, maybe carry a wooden sword while half the village crowded in and clapped and clapped… just like the crackling sound nearby now.

“Ned! Ned, where are you? Which room?”

He’d best heed Father and get up. He’d have to go outside to milk the cow and check under the hens for eggs before festivities began. Maybe Mother would be preparing pancakes today, with rich butter and cream or honey.

“Ned! NedTopsi-i-i-de!”

He lifted his head and began to cough again. He slitted his eyes open. Why was he sleeping on the floor?

“Ned! Fi-i-ire!”

Fire! Had he nodded off in a fire?

“Here! Here!” he thought he shouted, but he was hacking so hard he wasn’t sure he’d told his father where he was at all.

A rattling sound, a scrape. A bang and a whoosh of air. He tried to lift his head again but just wanted to sleep. His stage voice, that deep instrument that had served him so well, came out a croak, a wheeze.

More noise and someone’s hands on him, lifting him. He tried to embrace his mother, shaking him to get up. Or was it Meg come to creep into his bed?

“Meg?” he whispered. “Meg, I love you.”

“Jenks,” a rough voice said, one hacking, too. “It’s Jenks.”

“Robin, you must do something for me,” Elizabeth said.

“Anything, my queen.”

“I’m certain those fireworks are coming from back in the trees and not being shot from afar into them. Can you ride back in to see who is setting them, get behind him, perhaps snare the wretch? It may be the killer—”

“My would-be killer. They told me about Bane’s death, and to think it could have been me. Yes, I’ll go, I’ll get the whoreson murderer, if you’ll swear to stay right here.”

“I will, and send others who might come.”

“I’ll be back with the culprit who took my fireworks, at least!” he vowed and spurred his horse up the bank into the trees.

Elizabeth dismounted because her horse kept shying wildly at each blast and perhaps at the smoke smell, too. It was all she could do to keep from charging in to help oversee fighting the fire or from going after the villain in the forest herself.

She tied her horse to a tree so he wouldn’t keep jerking her arm while she held the reins. It was lonely out here as darkness fell, but her anger overcame her anxiety for her own safety. Until she heard the baying of the hounds. And the nightmare of her drowning with Robin in the river came back to her.

“A pox on it!” she muttered aloud. She and Robin weren’t together, and the river was frozen solid. Those foolish nightmares were the least of her troubles.

For she was sick over worry about Ned. If he died from this, she’d blame herself. And Meg would blame her, too.

Pacing to keep warm, Elizabeth counted three more rockets in the sky and heard the dogs roused again. She tried to reckon how long it would take people to come from the village or the city— or would they just think it was more of the Twelve Days celebration and merely gaze up into the sky in awe? The smoke was not drifting toward the nearby village. Would it dissipate before it brought someone from the city? The flames had not yet been visible from the roof of the east wing.

She was certain she heard hoofbeats. Too fast for Robin returning through these thick trees. No, the sound was that of studded hooves on ice, not on snow, and coming from the direction of the city.

She stepped back into the cover of the bankside trees. Though the twilight had nearly bled to night, she saw it was the Earl of Sussex, mounted and alone. But now that she was certain she knew who the killer was, she need not fear Sussex. What if he brought word of something amiss at Whitehall? She suddenly feared all this could be a diversion, and she had fallen for it. What if the Christmas killer had struck again?

“My lord Sussex!” she called out, and he drew his horse up sharply.

He looked shocked to see her, although that might be because she was in man’s attire. His dismount was nearly a tumble as he came closer to stare at her.

“Your Majesty? I heard Leicester got out of his room and rode off in this direction with some men. I wanted to bring him back, could not summon my men in time, but I never thought to find you here—ah, like this.”

“I remember you said we must learn to fight like those we fight, my lord,” she said, coming back onto the ice. “A killer has been stalking me, so I am stalking him.”

“Pray God, he doesn’t disappear into the trees like the Irish into their infernal bogs and fens, but I’ve never seen them shoot rockets to call attention to themselves. I believe you no longer think I am to blame?” he asked, coming closer and gesturing as yet another rocket shot skyward. “Ah, those have caught something on fire at Greenwich, haven’t they?” he asked, looking now at the demonic glow in the east wing. “Are you sure it’s not Leicester behind this, then?”

“I am. I did think it might be you for a while, because the culprit so obviously hated Leicester.” She realized then why she should have eliminated Sussex from the list of possible culprits long ago: Sussex was intelligent but not clever and had no sense of humor, perverse or otherwise, and the killer did. “But,” she went on, “since you are going to vow to me now that you will not attack the Earl of Leicester anymore when we have foreign enemies we must fear, I will trust you.”

“Enemies like your Catholic cousin Queen Mary?”

“And her minions who adore her. So will you vow to me as I have said?”

“Yes, Your Grace, most heartily, and, ah, pray you’ll tell Leicester the same.”

“I shall indeed. He’s in the woods to hunt the man who has been shooting off those fireworks, and I’d like you to put aside all animosity and help him. Watch for the next rocket and try to trace its projection point As for Greenwich, I’ve sent men to rouse the staff and put the fire out”

“I cannot leave you alone, Your Grace.”

“Then I must help Robin myself.”

“No, I’ll go at once. And you have my word on, ah, peace on earth between me and Leicester.” He mounted swifitly and urged his horse off the river ice to disappear between the black bars of tree trunks into the snow-laden forest.

As the night swallowed him, she heard again the distant, eerie baying of dogs from the isle across the river, like the fabled evil omen of hounds from hell. Yet they were her own animals, well fed and fit for the hunt. Perhaps she should have them loosed on the marauders in Greenwich forest She recalled that Simon Mac-Nair had recounted the strange story of ghostly hounds when he was new to his position and in London for the first time and would have no cause to know of her kennels unless he’d been out in this very area. Or perhaps his messenger, Duncan Forbes, who was his link to Mary of Scots, had told him.

She pictured again MacNair’s brilliant sleight-of-hand tricks that could pull coins from the air or make them vanish, just the way Robin’s fireworks had disappeared, and her bracelet. Had the canny Scot smiled and snatched it somehow off her arm so cleverly she did not notice it was missing? Had Vicar Bane found a stack of parchment missing one day and had no notion when it had gone—as well as a red, unscented torch? Yes, she knew now whom she must capture and imprison when she returned to Whitehall.

She startled as she heard a horse—no, at least two—coming at her from the forest Robin and Sussex returning? Jenks with Ned? She had been about to mount and ride toward Greenwich to be certain Ned was safe.

Robin’s distinctive black stallion broke from the bankside trees first, with him sitting tall in the saddle. Her shoulders slumped in relief. Back already, he must have met with success, but had not another rocket just raked the treetops? Since the second horse was being pulled behind, he must be leading someone out, though not Sussex, for he’d been on a mount with white fetlocks.

“Robin!” she called, relieved. “You’ve brought me either Forbes or MacNair, have you not?”

“Indeed, I’ve brought you MacNair,” the man, not Robin, said with a harsh laugh. “And dare I guess I now address the Queen of England, the one who follows her head more than her heart?”

She saw that, though the man wore Robin’s hat, his shoulders were broader. MacNair! It
was
MacNair. She had guessed it earlier but far too late.

“Happy holidays, Your Grace!” he said, his voice mocking. “And for the last course at the final feast of the Twelve Days, here is your Robin, fallen off his wall with a great fall, just as you tried to dump him on Queen Mary.”

Elizabeth gasped and stepped back only to bump into a tree. Robin was slumped either unconscious or dead on MacNair’s horse, for the Scot shoved him and he toppled limply to the snowy riverbank.

Ned knew now that it was Jenks who had dragged him out of his smoky room. It was somewhat easier to breathe here in the corridor, but now they faced worse than smoke. Crackling red-orange flames barred their escape in the only direction they could flee. He realized he’d called for Meg and Jenks had heard. Now Jenks knew how he’d felt about Meg and that his dying thought was of her.