The Tutor (31 page)

He nodded gravely. “Would you care to walk a bit before the sun has left us? These December days, like too many lives, are cut short by winter. You have no gloves. Are you warm enough?”

“Yes,” she said.

He smiled. “Good.”

He turned and waited for her. She realized he had misunderstood her “Yes,” thinking that she had agreed to walk with him, when she had responded merely that she was warm enough.

“Wear these,” he said, pulling a worn pair of gloves from the leather satchel slung over his shoulder.

“No, Mr. Smythson. I’ll tuck my hands in my cloak. Thank you.”

Not knowing what else to do, she started to walk with him.

“The sun baked away much of the snow,” he said.

They stayed on the stone path that split the orchard. Not a piece of fruit or shred of leaf remained. The branches of the cherry and peach trees on one side reached out like an old woman’s fingers: the apple and pear trees on the other looked as crooked and wizened as an old man’s elbows and arms.

“How is your hand, Mr. Smythson?” she asked.

“My hand?”

“The crystal ball that shattered in the library.”

“Ah, yes, of course.” He opened his large hand and examined his finger, as if he had not done so since they had last met. Then he showed it to her. “Healed. That mark has now taken its place amongst the scars that map my skin.”

Katharine thought of the other meaning of
scar
, a rocky cliff, and how the craggy nature of Mr. Smythson’s face was interesting and even quite beautiful: it reminded her of the steep limestone scars she had seen years ago at the Yorkshire Dales up north when visiting Grace.

They stopped at the crest of the orchard before descending the stone steps to the outer garden. They stood, without speaking, in the quiet of the evening. Mr. Smythson was a curious fellow. She recalled his son and thought how fortunate this lad was to have a father who knew stillness,
for with stillness came an inward peace. Her own father, or what she remembered of him, was always in motion, and the house that she was raised in was always in motion, too. He had never felt comfortable in his own skin, had to talk or to move or to drink. But her years at Lufanwal had taught her differently, had made her understand solitary life and learn from it.

To the west, between the hills, the sun was setting the sky on fire. Indeed, the clouds were ablaze with the spectrum of a flame, yet other colors, too: garden tints, those found in rose petals and fields of violets. The sky was so extraordinary that Katharine sighed deeply.

“We must not forget nature,” said Mr. Smythson. “It replenishes the soul.”

She nodded. They stood a few minutes longer, not speaking, and then they turned and started to stroll back to the hall.

“I brought you some verse. Did your maid deliver it to you?” he said. “I heard you read much,” he added.

“I do. But I have not yet read what you kindly gave to me.” She had been so caught up with Will’s poem that she had completely forgotten about the packet from Mr. Smythson, yet she thought it sweet that he had acted upon what he had heard about her. “Do you write, Mr. Symthson? Are you a poet?”

“No,” he said. He laughed—the sound deep and rich.

What was he, this man beside her? Perhaps the primeval rock with which he worked had influenced his matter.

“I met a young woman, and she has taken to writing and gave me pages of her verse, and I quite admire it and thought you might, too. She has nothing whole yet, she told me, but bits and pieces of poems and prose. She is with Lord Hunsdon, is his . . .”

“Daughter?” Katharine offered.

“No.” Mr. Smythson laughed again. “His . . . concubine.” He
continued, “Henry Carey is a very old man, for her. She is just twenty-one. He is forty-five years her senior. She is the daughter of a court musician originally from Venice.”

“Verily!” Katharine was surprised Mr. Smythson spoke so forthrightly.
Concubine
seemed an awkward word. “Is not Lord Hunsdon the Lord Chamberlain?”

“Yes, the queen’s bastard half-brother and her cousin, too. ’Tis a fraught heritage, but he is a sympathetic soul, and treats this young woman very well.”

“And she writes?”

“She does, and is a lively lady whose parents died early. She lived at the house of the Dowager Countess of Kent, was given lessons along with the countess’s daughters and later became attached to the household of the Countess of Cumberland. She has been much at court and has a most musical mind. I thought it might interest you. She is a woman, and she writes poetry.”

Again, she was startled by his manner. She was not used to such directness.

“Zounds!” she exclaimed.

“I crave your pardon. If I said something . . .”

“No, Mr. Smythson. ’Tis nothing you said. In truth, I have completely forgotten the children!”

“The children?”

“I gave my word I would read to the children this afternoon, and now the sun is all but down and I have missed the hour. Oh, how could I have been so blind as to the time at a moment when their earth does quake? Mr. Smythson, I must take my leave. Perchance the children are still in the library. I will read this lady’s verses with interest. Fare thee well.”

“Fare thee well, my lady.” He bowed.

This time she did not give him her hand. She nodded to him, and
before they had even passed through the orchard, she dashed toward the house. She realized, as she raced down the path with her petticoats hiked up above her ankles, that the picture she was leaving with Mr. Smythson was far from ladylike, but there was a quality about the mason, a tolerance perhaps, that made her feel her behavior wouldn’t offend
him.

21

ill left the next day. Katharine watched him go. He sat a horse well: his back straight, his movement graceful. Katharine was intrigued that Will was so richly attired for his return home. A blue brocade arm with silver slashes peeked through his short riding cloak. She had checked the map pinned in the library; Stratford lay on the Roman road northwest of London and before Colchester and was roughly two days’ ride from Lufanwal. Maybe Will was making a stop on his way to Stratford.

What did the townsfolk in Warwickshire think of Will, the boy who had worn a smock in his father’s rank shop, returning as a dandy from places they would never see? Did his three children miss him during his long absences? Did Anne? How could his family not yearn for him, as Katharine did, the minute he was out of sight?

She picked up the packet of verse Mr. Smythson had given to her, untied the dark blue silk cord and unfolded the papers. The handwriting was tiny and elegant and not unlike her own. The name on the pages was Aemilia Bassano. Katharine wondered why this Aemilia had given her writing to Mr. Smythson, and how he had happened to meet her.
Perchance he had worked on a house where she resided. ’Twas fascinating this young woman was the paramour of such a powerful person and that everyone seemed privy to the affair—along with, Katharine assumed, Lord Hunsdon’s wife.

There were fragments of a poem on the Passion of Christ, which argued in iambic pentameter how men—not women—were responsible for the crucifixion of Christ. Bassano first contended that “Adam cannot be excus’d,” from his part in the fall. Eve’s fault was only “too much love,” which made her give the apple to her dear. As for men’s sinfulness in the crucifixion: the author pointed to the guilt of Pilate, who had failed to follow his wife’s sage counsel. Bassano then proposed that since men’s fault in Christ’s death was “greater” than women’s, women should have “Libertie againe” and be equals, “free from tyranny.”
Katharine admired the boldness of this lady’s ideas.

The next page was a farewell letter to an estate in Cookham where Aemilia had lived, describing its peace and tranquillity, and how the gardens and grounds encouraged meditation and withdrawal from earthly things. Katharine put the pages down. Lufanwal had been her cloister, yes, but it had been her foundation, too, her education, yet perhaps, as with Aemilia and Cookham, it was time for Katharine to bid farewell.
You will come with me
, Will had said. The idea of leaving the hall was both exhilarating and frightening. Aemilia, like Katharine, was an orphan with no dowry. This poetess was clearly clever, with a most educated mind. Only one and twenty years of age, she was maintained by a rich and powerful lord, and perhaps therein lay a certain freedom, the
Libertie
of which she wrote, for Lord Hunsdon had a wife and, Katharine recalled, a huge family of twelve children or more.

An hour later, Katharine emerged from her chamber dressed in an old skirt, boots, cloak and hood. She bade the boy at the stables to saddle one of the smaller mares. When she was younger and rode with Ned, Edward had given her horses of her own, but her riding in recent years had
waned. As a pastime, a sport, it did not interest Isabel or Joan, and Katharine was too old to ride with the boys—though she had heard the queen had maintained her love of horses and much to the dismay of her counselors she spurred her Spanish steeds with vigor and still rode long distances at great speeds.

The ground was hard this afternoon; patches of ice now replaced the snow. Katharine and the mare shot puffs of white breath into the cold air as they descended to the valley below. The river had never regained its volume after the drought, and once horse and rider reached the crusty stream they made it easily to the other side. They climbed through forest and wood. Katharine loosened her reins and let the horse traverse the incline, so it could gain momentum in ascending. As a girl she rode every day in the warm months, often alone as she was now. And until Matilda made her sit with her legs to the side, she had worn a pair of breeches under her skirt and ridden her horse astride like a man.

Katharine was pleased she was out in the fresh air, yet she felt out of time with the horse—her hands weak and her sinews soft and unused to the saddle. But she kept on, and once she reached level ground, she changed the gait to a gallop and let the horse run until both she and the mare were taxed and out of breath. Her hood had fallen to her shoulders; her hair was unpinned and streaming down her back. The silence calmed her, and the wind on her skin stung and invigorated. Mr. Smythson had been right when he spoke of how nature nourished the soul. God, indeed, was revealed in the harmony of nature, for God had created the world; it was His work.

The air began to fill with specks of snow. She pulled on her hood and turned the horse back to Lufanwal. After crossing the river, Katharine veered to the road because of the snow: the trodden path would make her return easier. Two storms, and Christmas not even come. The foul weather following the months of scant rain foretold a harsh winter. Through the squall, she saw three dark figures on horseback followed
by several horse-drawn carts. She wondered if this caravan had come for Harold or if Richard had been released—though the presence of the carts worried her. Was Richard in one? Had he turned sick, been tortured? Was he dead?

Her heart froze as she neared one of the carts: it was draped in black and a chest the length of a man lay within. The men on horseback, their dark cloaks dusted with white, waved her on. She passed them, then leaned into the snow and set off in haste toward the great house. When she reached the courtyard, she dismounted on her own, called for a servant to take the horse, then sent word for Matilda. Once in the door, she tore off her wet cloak and, without changing her attire, dashed up the stairs. When she burst through the door of Matilda’s sitting room, Isabel, Joan and Matilda looked up from their stitching. Grace had returned to Yorkshire with her family.

“Dear Katharine, where have you been?” cried Isabel.

“Riding in the hills.”

“In the snow?” said Joan.

“’Twas not yet falling when I went out, but I am here to tell you there is a band of men on the road. And there are horses with carts . . . and in the cart—”

Before Katharine finished, the three of them heard clamor rising from below.

Matilda rose.

“Mother, we can go,” said Isabel. “You stay.”

“Hand me my shawl,” was all Matilda said.