said. And after a moment, ‘Old enough, then, for Court. Sir Thomas, is she presentable? If her parents were in the Queen’s household, she cannot be too rough in her ways.’
Thomas Wharton put his velvet-shod foot firmly on top of Austin Grey’s toes, and kept it there. ‘She would do at Court very nicely,’ he said. ‘She has an uncle somewhere in London. The Queen would remember the family.’
‘Then,’ said Lady Lennox, ‘I shall get the Queen’s permission tomorrow to invite her. And you shall take the summons with you Lord Allendale, when next you go north to the Somervilles. I take it you would have no objection to showing this girl how to conduct herself in the city?’
And Austin Grey, flushing, confirmed shortly that he would be pleased to escort Mistress Philippa Somerville in any way the Countess might indicate.
Chapter
5
Philippa’s letter, stained with food and sea water, arrived in the Kremlin in September and was laid by a servant on the Voevoda’s carved desk in the palace granted to him and to his mistress by his sovereign prince, Ivan IV. It lay there, ranked with other papers and packets, neatly dated and docketed, awaiting the Voevoda’s attention. Crawford of Lymond, as demanded of his new office and title of Russian commander, was absent in the field with his officers; whether exercising or fighting, his household did not know.
Smoothly conducted by the Mistress’s small, white-fleshed hands, the business of the luxurious house continued without cease. The Mistress’s riches were unpacked; the carpets laid; the tapestries hung, the books and paintings displayed; the lute and harpsichord uncrated and placed in the new rooms designed and built to her orders so that the strict timber edifice, raised in a cleared space near the Nikólskaya Tower for some dead appanaged prince, had gathered wings and balconies and galleried gables linked with steepled porches and bridges and stairs, tooled and painted and fretted like a gingerbread mould.
Outside, Güzel’s house was pure Russian. Inside, it was Venetian and Arab and Turkish, from the Murano glass and silk hangings to the silver incense burner and the blue and yellow tiles on the floor of the hot room where the lord of the house might strip off the stiff leather and steel of two weeks’ campaigning and emerge, bathed and rested, in the fresh robes made for him from the velvets and damasks in her embroidery rooms.
Those who lived in the Kremlin, whose wives walked veiled to church and to weddings and, surrounded by slaves and by stewards, took part in public life not at all, watched the foreign princess secretly; defensively; consumed by an envious and frantic curiosity. Güzel, knowledgeable in the ways of both men and women and accustomed to ruling, steel within silk, the still greater establishment of the Stamboul harem, made no inexpedient advances but waited, allowing her visiting tradesmen and craftsmen to glimpse and be astounded by the tall Gothic splendours of her Nürnberg clock, and the fragile and unimaginable mystery of the Italian harpsichord.
On the day the Tsaritsa’s chief lady in waiting called on her, Güzel’s house was ablaze with wax lights and hung with the smells of jasmine and the almond and sugars of sweetmeats. She saw the kitchens and the serving rooms, and met Master Gorius Grossmeyer, Güzel’s German physician. Two days later, Güzel received the firstceremonial visit from Anastasia herself and was able to present her with the silk robe, re-embroidered with crystals and bullion, which her woman had made for the new son Ivan, then four months old, and to invite her to consult with her doctor.
The following day, Güzel was received by Anastasia in the Golden Rooms at the palace of Terems, bringing some lengths of deep crimson velvet and a covered basket of sweet cakes, borne by her serving woman. There she met the whole household of women, including the widowed Tartar Queen Suunbeka and her son,
Thomas Wharton put his velvet-shod foot firmly on top of Austin Grey’s toes, and kept it there. ‘She would do at Court very nicely,’ he said. ‘She has an uncle somewhere in London. The Queen would remember the family.’
‘Then,’ said Lady Lennox, ‘I shall get the Queen’s permission tomorrow to invite her. And you shall take the summons with you Lord Allendale, when next you go north to the Somervilles. I take it you would have no objection to showing this girl how to conduct herself in the city?’
And Austin Grey, flushing, confirmed shortly that he would be pleased to escort Mistress Philippa Somerville in any way the Countess might indicate.
Chapter
5
Philippa’s letter, stained with food and sea water, arrived in the Kremlin in September and was laid by a servant on the Voevoda’s carved desk in the palace granted to him and to his mistress by his sovereign prince, Ivan IV. It lay there, ranked with other papers and packets, neatly dated and docketed, awaiting the Voevoda’s attention. Crawford of Lymond, as demanded of his new office and title of Russian commander, was absent in the field with his officers; whether exercising or fighting, his household did not know.
Smoothly conducted by the Mistress’s small, white-fleshed hands, the business of the luxurious house continued without cease. The Mistress’s riches were unpacked; the carpets laid; the tapestries hung, the books and paintings displayed; the lute and harpsichord uncrated and placed in the new rooms designed and built to her orders so that the strict timber edifice, raised in a cleared space near the Nikólskaya Tower for some dead appanaged prince, had gathered wings and balconies and galleried gables linked with steepled porches and bridges and stairs, tooled and painted and fretted like a gingerbread mould.
Outside, Güzel’s house was pure Russian. Inside, it was Venetian and Arab and Turkish, from the Murano glass and silk hangings to the silver incense burner and the blue and yellow tiles on the floor of the hot room where the lord of the house might strip off the stiff leather and steel of two weeks’ campaigning and emerge, bathed and rested, in the fresh robes made for him from the velvets and damasks in her embroidery rooms.
Those who lived in the Kremlin, whose wives walked veiled to church and to weddings and, surrounded by slaves and by stewards, took part in public life not at all, watched the foreign princess secretly; defensively; consumed by an envious and frantic curiosity. Güzel, knowledgeable in the ways of both men and women and accustomed to ruling, steel within silk, the still greater establishment of the Stamboul harem, made no inexpedient advances but waited, allowing her visiting tradesmen and craftsmen to glimpse and be astounded by the tall Gothic splendours of her Nürnberg clock, and the fragile and unimaginable mystery of the Italian harpsichord.
On the day the Tsaritsa’s chief lady in waiting called on her, Güzel’s house was ablaze with wax lights and hung with the smells of jasmine and the almond and sugars of sweetmeats. She saw the kitchens and the serving rooms, and met Master Gorius Grossmeyer, Güzel’s German physician. Two days later, Güzel received the firstceremonial visit from Anastasia herself and was able to present her with the silk robe, re-embroidered with crystals and bullion, which her woman had made for the new son Ivan, then four months old, and to invite her to consult with her doctor.
The following day, Güzel was received by Anastasia in the Golden Rooms at the palace of Terems, bringing some lengths of deep crimson velvet and a covered basket of sweet cakes, borne by her serving woman. There she met the whole household of women, including the widowed Tartar Queen Suunbeka and her son,
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