A Court Affair. Emily Purdy

relieved by only brief and hurried visits from Robert. He always came bearing gifts, as though he thought worldly goods could atone for his absence. But his preoccupied smile and distracted eyes told me that even though his body was, his mind wasn’t truly there with me. He was there like a whirlwind and then gone again, and I was left dizzy and reeling in his wake.

      He was never there for holidays. They always had such great need of him at court, he said, but he always sent gifts—lavish, costly gifts for everyone, even the servants—but he never came himself; the King, and his father, were counting on him to help organise the Yuletide revels. So in muted sorrow, trying to smile and not let my tears rain on everyone else’s pleasure, each year I celebrated the Twelve Days of Christmas and toasted in the New Year without my husband beside me.

      Father and I went back to Syderstone—a draughty ruin though it was, and becoming less habitable every year—for our traditional New Year’s ritual. Muffled in our furs and warmest woollens, and with all our servants and workers and their families gathered around us in the snow-blanketed orchard, we set a great fire blazing, and Cook brewed up a bubbling cauldron of Lambswool—a special blend of beer flavoured with roasted apples, ginger, nutmeg, and sugar, so named for the white froth that floated on top—and ladled out cups of the steaming brew to us all. And as the church bell tolled the midnight hour, we toasted the apple trees and sang carols to them, thanking them for the fruit they had given us and hoping that their winter nakedness would soon be clothed with fine green leaves and, later, beautiful, fragrant pink and white blossoms, then fat, ripe, rosy fruit. Then the musicians played, and we danced and drank Lambswool and ate gingerbread until the sun came up, and we all staggered home and fell into our beds to sleep half the day away.

      And in June, after the shearing was finished, we held a celebration with music and dancing and served our people apple cider and sweet wafers baked to a golden crisp inside special irons that imprinted upon each side a design of a sheep in full woolly coat ringed by a border of Syderstone’s famous apples. We always let them have cream, as much as they pleased, to dip the wafers in. That was a real treat for them, as most had to use the cream from their own cow for making butter and cheese, so this was a sweet luxury indeed, and it made my heart glad to see the happy smiles it brought to their faces. But in my heart I ached because Robert was never there to share the fun and joy with me. Even as I smiled and clapped my hands as we watched the morris dancers, fire-eaters, acrobats, and jugglers, I could not help feeling his absence and longing to have him there with me. And when we went out at midnight, singing and skipping and still sipping cider as we made our way to the top of the hill and there packed a cartwheel all around with straw and set it alight and rolled it down, hoping it would reach the bottom before it went out, for that foretold a bountiful harvest, I wished with all my heart that he were there and that the revelry would end in love, with me in my husband’s arms, and not with me alone, restless and yearning, in my lonely bed.

      And he was never there to take part in the Candlestick Branle we danced every year in the Great Hall on All Hallows’ Eve, sometimes slow, solemn, and stately, other times rollicking, fast-paced, and lively, passing lighted candlesticks from hand to hand as we danced in a line and, like a lady’s intricately braided coiffure, wove complicated formations, while my father, and the others who were not taking part in the dance, watched from the gallery above or standing high upon the stairs.

      But there were good times too, even though they were few and far between and grew more so with each year that passed as Robert’s absences grew more prolonged and his visits ever briefer. Eventually they dwindled to a hasty handful strewn throughout the year that seemed to be hello and goodbye all in the blink of an eye.

      Once he sent me some jewelled grapes to wear in my hair, beautiful clusters of smooth, round amethyst and emerald grapes with silver leaves set with sparkling diamond dewdrops. They were so pretty, so special, and unique! And when he sent me word that he was coming, I was ready. When he started to bound up the stairs, sweaty and smelling of horses, sweat, leather, and spice, I was there at the top waiting for him with the jewelled grapes in my hair, wearing a new gown of gooseberry green silk with a kirtle and under-sleeves of wine-coloured silk embroidered with silver vines hung with green and gold grapes. Without a word—there was no need for any—Robert swept me up in his arms and carried me to our chamber and straight to our bed. We didn’t leave it until long after the sun came up the next day.

      But the next evening, when he sat late by the fire, and I came in my shift, sheer like a clinging cobweb covering my body, with my hair unbound, to lay my head upon his knee, he just sat there, staring broodingly into the flames, as if his mind were miles and miles away. I could not help but wonder who it was he saw dancing in those entrancing flames. Was it the flame-haired Elizabeth? Did the crackling, rippling, swaying, leaping, grasping flames remind him of her, shining like the brightest bonfire, dancing in an orange and yellow gown with her hair a flaming mass about her shoulders, flying out as she leapt and spun round and round? I was certain of it, but I bit my tongue and said nothing. I didn’t want to ruin the rare and peaceful bliss and shatter it with an argument. I wanted kisses and caresses, not raised voices and quarrelsome words. So I knelt down and laid my head in his lap, but when his hand moved to absently stroke my hair, I wondered if in his mind it was red instead of golden. Does she do this with him? I wondered. And the pleasures we shared together in bed, did he give and take the same with her? Was I special in any way, was there anything he did with me that was ours alone, or did I share all with Elizabeth, or, even worse, did I only get the crumbs from her plate? I didn’t know, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to. I wasn’t sure which would hurt more—knowing for certain or the questions that clawed at my mind, like raging, hungry lions that I tried, sometimes successfully, other times not, to quiet and subdue and send retreating with a crack of my whip, but they were always there, sometimes growling low, other times roaring deafeningly, demanding to be heard, to have their curiosity fed and sated.

      When Custard had her yearly litter of kittens, even though I marvelled and caught my breath at each tiny mewling, squirming body, so small I could hold it in the palm of my hand, I felt the shadow of sorrow hanging over me. I yearned to be a mother. But how could I conceive when my husband was away and had so little time for me? There was always one excuse or another to keep him away or prevent him from sending for me. Even as the proud mother brought each kitten to me and laid it in my lap, and I petted and praised her and profusely admired her babies, I envied her, even though she was a cat. And while Custard lay in her basket by the fire and nursed her little brood, I would take Onyx, who had, like me, never conceived, onto my lap and stroke her sleek black fur and listen to her purr, and smile through my tears; the kittens were such a bittersweet sight, they did my heart good and hurt it all at the same time.

      I would stay at Stanfield Hall so long that many would forget that I was a married woman, and they, along with those who did not know about my marriage, would call me Amy Robsart, as if it had never happened at all. Even I at times thought it was all a lovely dream that had vanished upon my waking. I had to look at the ring on my left hand to remind myself that I had the right to call myself a wife at all. The name Amy Dudley, or Lady Dudley, seemed foreign to my lips and ears; when I heard it spoken, it always took a few moments for me to realise that it was me they were talking about or speaking to. Robsart felt right and natural; Dudley made me feel like I was a pretender, claiming a name that wasn’t rightly my own. A few times I even caught myself about to introduce myself as Amy Robsart instead of Dudley, and I would grow flustered and red in the face as my tongue tripped clumsily over the syllables, trying to sort them out and speak my name aright, and the whole time I felt like a fool, and sometimes, if I saw pity in the other person’s eyes, I felt angry, at myself and Robert too. Maybe I had flown in the face of Fate, and I was never meant to be Lady Dudley at all. Maybe I was never meant to have any other name or be anyone other than Amy Robsart.

      Fear began to take a fierce hold of me; I could not outrun it or shake it off. No matter how hard I tried to lose myself in my work, its fangs and claws bit deeply and left scars and wounds that never truly healed. I would feel it in my heart, in my head, keeping me awake at night, gnawing my nerves until they were bleeding raw and leaving me so sensitive that I would cry at the least little thing. There were many days when, after tossing and turning in my big and lonely bed all night, I could not rise and would