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“Just some uncooked flour,” Mary said, her eyes wide.
Reginald ignored her, looking up at Walsingham and then Elizabeth. “If ’tis ratsbane, there’s more here than the size of a pea. ’Twould be a fatal dose.”
“There’s some of the powder in mine as well,” Lord Burghley proclaimed. “In the uncooked spot.”
Greer cut into one farther down. “The cake is fully cooked in this piece.”
“Here as well,” another guard called as he cut through some other cake centers, mushing the sponge with the back of his dagger.
“With so much required tasting, she would have been very careful where she put the lethal substance,” Lucy said.
A murmur rose near the door as two guards lifted the baker’s husband under his arms to bring him inside the Great Hall. “Ye have the wrong man,” he called out in a thick accent.
Catherine stood on the table, her thin legs braced wide as she pointed. “And that is Jasper Lintel.”
“Also known as Jacob O’Brien,” Walsingham said.
“The two of you killed Richard Whitby by accident when he took the tart meant for Lord Burghley,” Lucy said. “You likely added ratsbane to Cordelia’s gift for the queen. Three innocent people, Cordelia Cranfield, John Simmons, and Catolina Wakefield, are imprisoned in the Tower because of you.” She looked between Mary and her husband. “And now you try to kill the queen.”
“And me,” Lord Burghley said. “Imagine, the queen and me dead.” His eyes opened wider. “The whole of England would be in chaos.”
“And ye’d be too busy fighting your own people to worry about our isle,” Mary said, her voice full of scorn.
“Hold your tongue, woman,” Jacob O’Brien said.
“Ye incompetent fool,” she yelled at him. “We could have been done with this whole mess if ye’d let me do it my way with the tarts on Christmas.”
“Foolish woman,” Jacob muttered, glancing around, but Mary O’Brien didn’t seem to care that everyone around was witnessing her confession.
She looked at Elizabeth with disdain. “Ye royal bastard.” Gasps sounded through the hall. “Ye and your council of overly fed Protestants deciding to doom us to Hell, taking over our beautiful isle and imposing your religion on us.” She turned her glare on Lord Burghley. “We will never be a part of your Protestant England.”
“’Tis for the safety of the realm,” Lord Burghley said. “France and Spain cannot have a foothold in Ireland, or they will invade it, Wales, and England.”
“Safety of the realm?” Mary said. “And yet ye do not care if we starve or die of plague. ’Tis the safety of England ye care about.”
“You know nothing of the politics that keep this land—and your land—safe,” Lord Burghley said. But to Lucy, it sounded like Mary O’Brien had a pretty good grasp of the world she endured. Enough that she was willing to kill and die for it.
“Arrest this woman and her husband,” Elizabeth said.
Lucy’s gaze snapped back to Elizabeth. She curtseyed, her head bowed. “And release my sister, Your Majesty?”
“’Tis obvious the poison was placed in the fan by someone other than Cordelia Cranfield,” Greer said, reminding them of what he’d said before. “It makes no sense for her to poison her own gift to ye.”
Elizabeth stared at the cake with the uncooked center and then at Mary O’Brien. “It grieves my heart so,” she murmured.
“But your loyal subjects will do anything to keep you safe,” Lucy said, her hand going out to the children and Greer. “Like my sister.”
“Hm…” Elizabeth stood straighter, her gaze going to Walsingham. “If you have no proof to implicate the young Lady Cranfield, she may be allowed her freedom.”
Lucy leaned against the table, her relief so intense that she had to blink back the moisture in her eyes.
Walsingham bowed his head. “There is no evidence of her wrongdoing, except for the powder on the fan and a jar of it shoved under her bed. Her door was also left unlocked when we came to search it.”
“Very well,” Elizabeth said, waving her hand. “Let Lady Cranfield come back to Whitehall.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty.” Before the queen could turn away, Lucy murmured, “and Simmons and Mistress Wakefield?”
Elizabeth exhaled in a huff. “John Simmons and Catolina Wakefield may also go free, and if they have a business proposal, they must present it, not sneak around.”
