Seven Will Out: A Renaissance Revel by JoAnn Spears Page A

without falling over. It was likely hard for her to see as well; the garments in her arms were piled up over her head.
    While the garments obscured her face, they could do nothing to hide her proportions; her hips stuck out quite a ways on either side of the garment pile. Not in this case the bumrolled or farthingaled backside; this lady’s contours could only have come from a generous Mother Nature. I remembered reading somewhere that “robes and furred gowns hide all,” but with this lady, they wouldn’t have stood a prayer.
    I got up to help the woman with her burden. As I lifted a foot or two of garment from her arms, I found myself looking into the face of an old friend.
    “Kat!”
    The lady before me was none other than Kat Ashley, the lady who acted in loco parentis for Ann Boleyn in raising Queen Elizabeth I. Some of her decision making in Elizabeth’s adolescence was more loco than parentis, but of course, nobody’s perfect.
    As Kat and I divested ourselves of the textiles and shared a hearty embrace, another lady came through the door bearing as many jewel boxes as her arms could carry. She put them down on the bed next to where we had placed the garments, turned to me, and made a slight bow.
    She was like Mutt beside Kat’s vertically challenged Jeff; tall, slender, and with posture that could go toe to toe with Bess of Hardwick’s ramrod spine any day. The black and tawny ensemble she was wearing set off her ginger coloring to perfection.
    “Here are the jewels! I’m off again for some ruffs and whatnot, now. Won’t be a moment! So happy to meet you, Dolly, having heard so much about you,” the lady said in passing as she issued out of the room.
    I wondered who this woman was. She had an accent that differed from those of the other ladies here; it was soft and lilting, with gently rolling
R
s. I concentrated hard as I watched her walk away, trying to deduce who she was.
    The attention I paid to the lady seemed to rub Kat the wrong way. “I hope she doesn’t neglect to bring the headpieces!” Kat said. “It would be,” she added, looking exasperated, “just like her.”
    As I opened the various jewel chests and peeked into them, I was surprised at Kat’s allusion to the lady’s inattention to detail. The jewel collection she had assembled indeed seemed complete. Rings, earrings, bangles, bracelets, pendants, brooches, and chains were all well represented. Gems precious and semiprecious, pearls, enamel, and finely carved cameos peeped out at me from their coffers.
    “It would be a mistake, Dolly, to start with the jewels and then assemble an outfit around them. Surely you’d want to do it theother way around. Come here and look at what I’ve brought for you! Skirts! Bodices! Sleeves!”
    “No farthingales though, I see,” I said, hopefully.
    “We will have Jane bring the correct foundations for your outfit once you have chosen it, Dolly.”
    “Jane! Is that the name of the lady who is out there acquiring ruffs for my delectation?”
    “No, Dolly, it is not!” Kat was standing with her hands on her hips, an impressive sight when one had hips like Kat’s. I’d seen the like before, whenever my dear cousin Kath was cross with me, but the familiarity did not blunt the impact. That stance and Kat’s tapping foot told me that I’d best move from the jewel trove to the garment pile and pay Kat—and my outfit-to-be—some attention.
    “You’ve gained weight, Dolly, since your last sojourn here,” she pointed out, evening things up, I supposed, for my inattentiveness to her.
    “Only a few pounds, and just lately, Kat; I must be comfort eating more than I realized. Lots of stress at work and at home these days, you know.”
    “Well, we’ll work around it,” she assured me. It was something I was sure she had plenty of personal experience with.
    “You’ve certainly outdone yourself in selecting outfit makings for me, Kat. So many colors—a veritable rainbow! I’m practically giddy