Read Online The Fyre Mirror by Karen Harper - Free Book Online Page B

I’ve learned on the Continent, Master Kendale,” Gil countered, “is that the talent of true artists knows no boundaries. Henry Heatherley and you are pure English, as you say, so perhaps your work will remain provincial. However, Titian sells paintings to King Philip in Spain, as well as—”
    “You young whelp, half schooled, thinkin’ you’ve all the answers! You’re outta your el’ment!”
    “My element, Master Kendale, is to serve Her Majesty with my hands and head and heart.”
    “Heard you were born deaf and dumb, but you’ve got a quick lip now, however dumb you still act to be so flippant with your betters!”
    “I was not born either deaf or dumb, but was scared into silence as a lad by an explosion. Aye, the queen good as plucked me off the streets to help make me what I am today. And whatever I am, that which you are so disdainful of, best you’d complain to her then!”
    “If you open that quick mouth to tell’r one thing about what I said—”
    “Good night then, Niles. And Master Kendale, buone notte ed arrivederci, lei il maiale grasso! ”
    He prayed Kendale had no idea he’d just been bidden good night as a “fat pig.” Gil turned sideways and managed to get past the man. He hoped Kendale wouldn’t take his temper out on his boy.
    “Boy! Gil Sharpe!” a tall queen’s yeoman guard called over the banister to where Gil glowered and even gestured at Kendale’s frescoes. “Her Majesty will see you now.”
    Taking two steps at a time, Gil hurried upstairs and into the first chamber past the guards. The queen sat at a table, eating figs and drinking wine. After Gil bowed, she pointed to the chair across the table and pushed the dish of figs toward him. Compared to her high mood yesterday, her spirits seemed low. She looked both weary and wary, but surely not of him.
    “I have so much to ask and you so much to tell, yes, my Gilberto Sharpino?” she said with her mouth half full.
    “Oh, yes, Your Grace, of artists, and Italy, and anything else you would know.”
    “In due time. My lord Cecil and I want to discuss your impressions of politics and papists as well as paintings. But for now, tell me about your contretemps with Master Kendale last night.”
    Gil sat up straighter, his heart pounding, though he knew by now not to be surprised that the queen seemed to know everything. “Yes, Your Grace.”
    “Then I want you to go up on the roof with Jenks to view the way we’ve laid out the things from the burned tent and see if you can add or change anything. And sketch it for us again, lest we need to store the things away.”
    As he explained to her his encounter with Master Kendale, he tried not to sugarcoat what had passed between them on the last night of the man’s life. But he intentionally muted his own anger.
    “So he was drunk,” she said. “Perhaps his besotted state is why—besides his weight and girth—he might have been slow to move when his tent began to smoke and flame. Beyond the fact, of course, that someone had laced the fat man in his tent as tightly as a fat woman is laced into a corset.”
    “What is it, Your Grace?” he asked as she jumped up and began to pace. “Murder for certain, you mean?”
    “We’ve already established that. But I hadn’t thought of something before, that those ties were laced the way a woman would close a corset with a single, flat bow at the bottom.”
    “A woman did it?”
    “I don’t know! Never mind for now. Gil, I must ask you something else. Although Master Kendale insulted you last night, you did nothing to retaliate, did you? I know you will ever answer me truthfully.”
    Her dark eyes burned into his. He silently thanked God she had not asked another question, for it was nearly impossible to lie to her. “I tried to insult him back—circumspectly, Your Grace—and did manage to get him doubly vexed. And one more thing.”
    “Which is?” she asked, still looking worried. He realized again how blessed he was that,