The Queen's Lady. Barbara Kyle

tossed her head complacently. “I know that the gentleman who’s to forfeit his hand wagered five pounds on a tennis match with Reginald Quince and that Quince lost the match, but would not pay. And I know that Quince got his ugly nose broken for his impudence. Which he heartily deserved, in my book. I’m sure he owes my brother five pounds and more for a night of cards last week.”

      “And who’s the unfortunate young brawler?” Honor asked, scanning the crowd, though there was no sign yet of a prisoner.

      Margery pouted her ignorance on this point. “One can’t keep up with every wild fellow that roars into court,” she said. “Although,” she winked, “I have heard that he married into money, and while he sports and sparks here to his heart’s content, his wife obligingly waits at home at Norfolk.”

      The hubbub below grew more raucous as courtier friends hailed one another and ladies swirled out of the palace in tittering knots. On men and women alike, brocades and silks and velvets in riotous shades of marigold, ladyblush, and popinjay blue set up a hum of color, as if a flock of exotic birds had fluttered down in place of the drab pigeons that regularly pecked here at the granary refuse. The scullery doors stood partway open, and the barefoot boys who scoured the cauldrons peeked out through clouds of steam and dared one another, giggling, to dart out into the throng.

      Honor shook her head with a wondering smile. Even after six months with the Queen she was still astounded and appalled by the chaos of the King’s court. As both a private household and a public organization it was a seething snarl of humanity surrounding the royal person. Bishops and peers; priests and prostitutes; astrologers, minstrels and falconers; vendors, wonder workers and sages—all were drawn to forage for the acorns of patronage under the royal oak. The place teemed with intrigue and violence, for every gentleman, nobleman, and churchman was attended by a throng of hangers-on, and this army of servants in various employs lounged and diced and quarreled through the crowded corridors, staircases, and courtyards. Up to a thousand people were fed each day at the King’s table, where grooms armed with whips and bells patrolled the great hall to fend off scrounging dogs and rascals who tried to pass as servants. All men went armed, and daggers were drawn over every slight, real or imagined.

      This tennis quarrel was no surprise to Honor; gambling was almost a religion here. Courtiers bet on everything from wrestling matches, to a lady’s virtue, to the amount of wine a banqueting ambassador would consume, and both gentlemen and ladies were expected to play coolly, and for high stakes. The King himself often lost many pounds a day at dice. Tennis, the game most threatening to a man’s purse, was not for the faint at heart.

      There was the rumble of a single drum. Honor and Margery craned over the railing at a small procession snaking out under their gallery. Seven men emerged and started to walk across to the scaffold. Honor recognized their white-bearded leader as the royal surgeon. He supervised the maiming of state prisoners. She winced, thinking of the poor, quaking victim who had yet to appear. The grim band of officials filed up the five central platform steps. Margery displayed her skill by identifying them all: “The royal surgeon. Then, the sergeant surgeon—he’ll be doing the deed. Next, the yeoman of the wood yard, with his man bringing up the block. Then the King’s master cook with his cleaver. Then the farrier with his searing iron…”

      She and Honor exchanged queasy glances at the thought of this instrument being used to cauterize a man’s bloody wrist stump.

      “I won’t watch this,” Honor declared. “No silly fool should have to suffer so.” She hoisted her bundle off the railing. “And all for a tennis ball. It’s barbaric.” She started to go.

      “Wait! They’re bringing him in!”

      Margery had caught Honor’s elbow and was pulling her back, and Honor, submitting to a jolt of curiosity, leaned over the railing as the prisoner came out directly beneath them.

      They looked down on the man’s head, whose close-cropped, lazy auburn curls absorbed the pale sun and shot back gleams of amber. The head turned from side to side with a languid ease, as if the man were passing through a crowd of well-wishers, and, indeed, the people parted for him with a hush of fascination. His stride was long and loose and self-assured, despite a distinct pigeon-toed inclination of his right foot—or perhaps because of it, as if vanity were not at stake. It was the legacy of a broken bone mended awry, Honor supposed. But though it gave his walk an unmistakable peculiarity he seemed oblivious to the defect, as if it were a trifle that had no bearing on a man’s power, just as a seasoned soldier ignores a battle scar.

      He reached the base of the scaffold and stood for a moment with his back to the crowd. He wore a long-sleeved tunic of fine wool, of a green so dark it was nearer black, trimmed at the collar with marten but otherwise plain. Its skirt skimmed his knees where it met the tops of lived-in riding boots. A scratched leather belt as wide as a girl’s wrist drew in the tunic just above his lean hips. A second belt sloped diagonally to an empty scabbard—he had been disarmed for his ordeal—and his left hand rested on the scabbard with a controlled tension as if to give warning that, though impotent of sword, this hand could yet do battle.

      He started up the steps where the officials faced him in a line. When he reached the top, his broad shoulders eclipsed the shallow-chested old surgeon. He came to a halt, a head taller than every other man on the platform.

      He turned slowly, deliberately, like a noble about to receive tribute. He scanned the faces before him, beginning with those at his feet, so that the bone ridge of his eyebrows obscured his eyes from the gallery. Between the red-brown hair and dark clothing, his clean-shaven face was bronzed as if by years of sun and wind, and the effect, in contrast to the gaiety of colour all around, was of a gilded antique carving in weathered wood. But when he tilted up his face, cobalt blue eyes snapped the carving into instant, vivid life.

      He looked up to the gallery where Honor and Margery stood alone. His gaze traveled slowly over both of them, pausing for a moment on Honor. She felt warm blood stain her face and prick the roots of her hair. Then he looked away.

      Margery, smitten, let out a puff of breath. “If I had a man like that about I’d want both his hands left on him,” she purred. “Two hands, ready and able.”

      Honor studied the man warily. There was a mockery in those defiant blue eyes that shook loose from her heart all the pity she had wrought, in her fancy, for a contrite young hothead. This man was not contrite. And, apparently about thirty, he was not so young either.

      The drum rumbled again. The officials shuffled to the sides of the scaffold. The sergeant put a hand on the prisoner’s shoulder. “Richard Thornleigh,” he intoned, “do you stand prepared?”

      Thornleigh hesitated for a moment. He blinked at the sergeant like someone who had not fully heard, or had not understood, the question. Then, in reply, he slowly raised his arm above his head and brought it down in a flourish of a bow that was absurdly wide, absurdly dashing. The exaggerated gesture unbalanced him, and he stumbled forward. The sergeant had to snatch him by his collar to keep him from careening into the onlookers.

      “He’s drunk,” Honor said, dismayed.

      “So he is,” Margery giggled.

      The crowd shared Margery’s outlook and laughter erupted.

      Thornleigh righted himself and brushed the sergeant’s hands away. He raised his arms to ask for quiet, and looked out over the faces until the laughter subsided.

      “Gentlemen, ladies, forgive me.” He spoke with grave deliberation, but in a tone that was a clear mockery of a famous, and pompous, preacher of the city. His hand flattened over his heart. “In contemplation of this moment, I have today drunk deep of sorrow. I only pray God that before the day is out He will not let my sorrow drown me. But,” he added, listing dangerously to the left, and shuffling to a much wider stance to correct the imbalance, “I have also drunk deep of a bottle of sack.” He smiled crookedly. “And a very good bottle it was, too. Perhaps God sent it me for a raft.”

      Another wave of laughter rocked the courtyard.

      “Oh, Honor,” Margery chuckled, poking her rib, “don’t look so shocked.