Cate of the Lost Colony - Lisa Klein [5]
For one accustomed to rule, she was often undecided about what to wear. One day Emme and I fetched her blue damask gown, but as soon as it was fitted and tied—which took fifteen minutes—she demanded the green sarcenet instead.
“Which green sarcenet?” Emme said in dismay as we stood looking around the wardrobe. “There are three of them here.”
I ran back to the queen’s chamber. “Does Your Majesty prefer the one that is bright green like an emerald, pale green like the grass in spring, or deep green like the fir trees?”
“What I do not want is a poem!” she said, sounding petulant.
Not wanting to anger her further, I murmured an apology.
“I’ve changed my mind,” she said. “I prefer the blue gown after all.” She peered at me. “Blue, like the sky at midday. Go and fetch it!”
Was I mistaken, or was there a trace of a smile in her eyes? I bowed and scurried away, only to have her call me back.
“Catherine! Bring also the embroidered stomacher my Eyes do love to behold me in.”
I wondered if this was a line from some poem. Was she now teasing me? I smiled, not daring to ask which of the many stomachers she meant. Surely Emme would know.
“That her eyes do love to behold her in?” Emme repeated. She frowned, then searched until she came up with a stomacher embroidered with flowers interspersed with eyes.
“What does this mean?” I asked, looking at the strange motif.
“By her ‘Eyes’ she means Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester. That is her nickname for him.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “He is her true love. She did not marry Monsieur Frenchman because she has been in love with Leicester, and he with her, since childhood. But he is married, so she will probably die a virgin.”
I blushed at Emme’s frank words. “Lord Leicester?” I said. “The one with the fat belly and the red face?”
Emme nodded, and I recalled seeing this lord popping in and out of the queen’s privy chamber—a place more public than its name implied.
“You’re a book of knowledge,” I said. “I must read you further.”
“Now is not the time. Go!” she said, thrusting the stomacher at me and following with the blue gown.
“Very good, my dear Catherine,” said the queen when I handed over the embroidered stomacher.
“I do live to serve Your Grace,” I said, hoping she heard my pun.
The queen smiled at me, and I noticed the wrinkles that spread from the corners of her eyes and her mouth. I did some figuring. Why, she was fifty years old! She could be my grandmother. I tried to imagine her kissing Lord Leicester but could not. I thought of the stomacher under her breasts, pressed against her belly, and wondered what secrets Leicester’s eyes had seen. Such thoughts made me blush again, and I quickly looked down.
Outside the chamber, Emme turned to me. “I desire to please the queen so much she will give me a nickname,” she said. “A pet name is like a jewel compared to Frances’s old petticoat!”
Chapter 2
An Outing in London
It was to be my first outing in the queen’s company, a barge ride on the Thames. I put on a new dark blue skirt and matching square-necked bodice I had sewn under the watchful eye of Lady Veronica, the most skillful needlewoman at court. I had even embroidered some ivy on the bodice, a tedious task that made my neck ache and my fingers bleed. I combed my hair so the waves fell loosely down my back. Emme placed on my head an open cap threaded with pearls.
“The queen likes her maids to wear these,” she said.
I touched the cap with pleasure. It made me feel like royalty.
“If only Father could see me!” I murmured. “He would be proud.”
“And your mother would be, too,” said Emme. “There’s not a woman in the kingdom who doesn’t wish for her daughter to be one of Her Majesty’s maids.”
I doubted that. Again I recalled how lonely my mother had been with my father away, and how she had pulled me back when all I wanted to do was touch the queen.
We hurried through the galleries to a