Seven Will Out: A Renaissance Revel (3 page)

My groundbreaking historical treatise,
Henry VIII, Man of Constant Sorrow
, had made quite a splash in Renaissance academic circles. It had been conceived, so to speak, the night I was privileged to meet the six wives of Henry VIII on an astral plain and to learn the secret that each wife had harbored, heretofore safe from history. Developing the pursuant thesis on those secrets in
a scholarly fashion, when the primary sources were, shall we say, undocumented, had taken some doing—and some time. While accomplishing the task, I had grown personally and professionally, and now I yearned to expand my horizons even further. Academic advancement was the obvious possibility, and well within my comfort zone. But somehow, I wasn’t so sure about it.

I wasn’t the only one concerned about my professional development; Burr—my first mentor in Renaissance history and a dear friend—had mentioned it as well. We’d spoken about it on the phone several times, in fact, as recently as the week before.

“After all, Dolly,” he’d said, “you’ve had the last word when it comes to Henry VIII’s wives.”

Not having been there himself when I was among that legendary bevy, he could not have known that having the last word with those gals was pretty much impossible.

“I take your point, Burr, but where do I go from here? That is the question.”

“I thought ‘to be or not to be’ was the question,” Burr had said smugly, his own academic specialty being all things Shakespearian. “You can always come over to the dark side with me, Dolly. Some of the latter-generation Tudors coexisted with Shakespeare, as you well know.”

“I am all about my Tudors, Burr, and nothing is going to change that. I feel in my bones, though, that changes are afoot in my life; that the direction I am supposed to go will be made clear to me—and soon.”

“You can get out of that dusty little college you are working at, for a start,” Burr said, never one to pull any punches. “It may have been all right while you had to work on your six wives
treatise, but now that that task is over, I think it is time for you to move on to bigger and better things.”

“Well, I have had some interesting offers, but I just can’t seem to settle down to a decision. I am giving the commencement address at my college in a couple of days, and some of the parties who are interested in me will be present. Maybe that will shake something loose, somehow.”

“You’ve got to shake loose that death grip you’ve got on that little ‘six-wives-of-Henry VIII’ world you live in, Dolly. Let it go a little bit. You’ll never know what wonderful things could be in store for you, if you don’t!”

“I’ll ponder that advice a bit, Burr; really, I will!”

“Well, good luck, Dolly. And the same to Wally as well; tell him I asked after him and his husbandry.”

“Animal or conjugal, Burr?”

“I suppose he’d think I was some kind of pervert either way!” Burr said, sounding flustered. His inner nerd tended to come out at the oddest times; it made the scholarly genius quite human and lovable. “Best just give Wally my kindest regards, Dolly.”

“I will, Burr,” I assured him.

“And the same to young Lizzie, if you’re going to see her while she’s in England,” he added. Burr was inordinately fond of that almost-stepdaughter of mine, and not in a creepy way, either. Lizzie had been his student back in the day—in fact, a star pupil. She was likewise very fond of Burr and had recently used him as a cultural context consultant for her business, about which more later.

After I hung up the phone with Burr, I told Wally what we’d talked about.

“I have to agree with Burr that perhaps you have come to some sort of crossroad; that the game is soon going to change
for you. It might be time for you to let something go to pick up on something new. Wasn’t it Shakespeare who said, ‘When you come to a fork in the road, take it’?”

“No, dear,” I said fondly, charmed as I always was when Wally made one of his rare mistakes. “Yogi Berra, I think.”

“I should have known better,” Wally conceded. “After all, they tell me that I am smarter than the average Berra.”

Chapter Seven

Aviation and the Odd Relation

I hold to the philosophy that it is better to be three hours too soon than a minute too late, but between staff meeting and traffic, this would be one time I did not make the grade. I hoped, as I came to the end of my drive to the airport, that my kith and kin would not have been long on the ground when I arrived to meet them.

My cousins Jean, Kath, and Bella wouldn’t have dreamed of missing the commencement speech I would be giving the next day. They were flying in for it together, accompanied by darling Auntie Reine Marie. Miss Bess, an old family friend, had also strong-armed her way into the band of travelers. Based on a lifetime of experience, I knew what to expect when they all deplaned.

Miss Bess was the first off the plane, with relieved-looking flight attendants clearing the way for her.

“I’m what is known as a
badass
,” Bess said to the flight attendants in passing.

“
Hardass
is more like it,” one of the flight attendants whispered to the other.

“I didn’t think much of the attendants on this flight,” Bess confided in me as we hugged in greeting. “Short on brains, I can tell you! A couple of…of…”

“‘Knotty-pated fools’?” I ventured.

“I was going to say idiots, but have it your own way, Dolly.”

My cousin Jean, singularly unencumbered by excess baggage, greeted me next. “I love my new travel bag,” she said, showing
me a most efficient-looking multicompartmented marvel. “I was able to get nine days’ worth of outfits in here!”

“How did you manage that?” I asked.

“Careful folding,” she replied, her inner overachiever peeping through. “I’ve been complimented on my packing by airport security, you know.”

Cousin Kath, on the other hand, was sure to be bursting at the seams in every sense. Her predilection for stretch pants was a fond family joke; she had them in every conceivable style and pattern, and she was oblivious to ever outgrowing a single pair.

“What kind of leggings did Kath press into service for this trip?” I asked Jean, as we waited for the rest of the family to deplane.

“You mean what kind of leggings did she
stretch
into service, don’t you?”

“Come on, Jean, the suspense is killing me! Polka dots? Leopard spots? Forget-me-nots?”

My question was answered as Kath stepped off the plane sporting red leggings with a little black Yorkshire terrier silhouette print. Her little pet dog amplified the canine and the “bursting” themes, breaking free from his traveling restraints and leaking pee once at ground level.

Kath greeted me fondly. “I’ve got two checked bags to pick up, Dolly. You know I can’t cross the Atlantic without bringing you fashion from home!”

“What is it this time, Kath?” I asked, trying not to show my trepidation. I generally hold that wearing a particular type of garb the first time it was in style necessitates avoiding the mutton-dressed-as-lamb trap by eschewing it the second time it comes around. Kath had no such compunction, though, so I would not
have been surprised at anything that made its way into the “fashion from home.”

“It’s leggings!” she said jubilantly. “Leggings in all the latest colors and textures, Dolly, with plenty of tops to wear over them. I know you will be pleased with the assortment. I even managed to find a pair of leggings with pictures of Henry VIII’s wives on them!” Kath said. Her pup circled about in shared delight—or perhaps dread—of those Henry VIII leggings.

There was no convincing Kath that fashion of all kinds was available to me, should I want it, by means other than her kindly auspices. I waved at her as her little caravan of chaos headed off toward the baggage carousel, and cousin Bella, who had just stepped off the plane, watched them walk away.

“I don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse that cats don’t travel well,” Bella said, giving me a big hug. I was inclined to think
blessing
, as I emerged from the hug with my share of the cat hair that festooned pretty much everything my cousin wore.

“Your cats are with you in spirit, anyway,” I said, offering the little lint brush that experience had taught me to bring to any reunion involving Bella.

“No thanks,” she said, brushing her clothes off perfunctorily. Bella’s fashion preference tended toward what Barbara Pym would have called a fusty Bohemianism; cat hair counted as an accessory in her little world.

Auntie Reine Marie deplaned last, bringing up the tone as well as the rear. She was tall, lissome for a woman of her years, and flat-out stunning, rocking maturity, as they say, like a boss.

“Everyone else is off the plane,
n
’
est-ce pas
?” she asked before stepping into the airport proper. A combination of
native graciousness and knowledge of how to make an entrance informed her question.

“All clear,” I assured her. “Everyone else has already disembarked, hugged, kissed, stretched, scratched, and orienteered toward the nearest ladies’ room.”

Auntie Reine Marie descended like Venus stepping off the half shell, with a scarf trailing behind her á la Isadora Duncan. If anyone can descend from a plane that is actually on the ground, it is Auntie Reine Marie.

It probably will come as no surprise to you to learn that my family is what you would call well known at the airport.

Chapter Eight

A Ragtag Chin Wag

Once we were all safely crammed into my vehicle—actually, Wally’s Land Rover—and driving out of the airport, my visitors and I turned our attention to thoughts of our absent family and friends.

“I hope we get to see Mary and Lizzie!” Jean said. She was referring to my two would-have-been stepdaughters. “They are such international travelers these days that it is hard to keep track of where they are.”

“You just might see them, Jean. They are this side of the pond for the next few days.”

“Yes, they are here to get that award we’ve been hearing so much about. It is all over the news; you just can’t escape it,” said Miss Bess.

“It is as though Lizzie and Mary are being crowned queens of enterprise!” said Auntie Reine Marie, glowing with pride at the younger generation.

“Well, those girls come by their business acumen honestly,” said Miss Bess, doing the in-character thing by bringing the cold, hard facts of reproduction into the conversation. “They get it from their father, surely.”

“Mary and Lizzie no doubt got their executive abilities from Harry. And of course, Mary is so like her mother. She and Kay are both so intelligent, so capable, and
so
consistent,” commented Auntie Reine Marie.

“And Lizzie, of course, is so like that Anna Belinda,” Miss Bess added. “Mother and daughter both so intelligent, so capable, and so, so…”

“I think ‘mercurial’ is what you are looking for,” I offered.

“What did Harry have to say about his two daughters getting this award?”

“Nothing whatsoever, Bess, for the first full minute or two after the news broke,” I said, recalling what I’d heard about it through the grapevine.

“That doesn’t sound like Harry,” Jean said.

“Apparently he was so dumbfounded that his bickering daughters could accomplish
anything
together that the news rendered him speechless for a bit. He soon recovered, though.”

“What did he say about his progeny
then
, Dolly?” asked Miss Bess.

“I don’t remember the exact words,” I admitted. “Something to the effect that ‘the age of miracles is not past.’”

I didn’t know it then, but I’d soon be coming to that same conclusion myself.

Chapter Nine

Mary and Lizzie Go All Bizzie

Mary and Lizzie’s business model was, to say the least, a remarkable partnership. It ran on a winning combination of Mary’s solid grounding in traditional humanities and Lizzie’s hipper interest in science, technology, and style. It was nothing less than a schematic for subliminally encoding classical messages into modern-day social and entertainment media. The twist was that new art, products, services, and so on were to be promoted by leveraging well-worn, even archaic, axioms that had withstood the test of time.

Lizzie’s was the face associated with the advertisements that were inescapable pretty much anywhere you went to access news or information. She was probably not someone you would think of, at first blush, as being well equipped to do it. Slender to skinniness, fair and freckled in a tanning-bed world, and flat chested to boot, she was even further removed from traditional cover girlhood by geek-level intelligence. Clearly, though, she was better equipped than Mary to do the front work. Mary, though a lovely and intelligent girl, was the serious type; too little the geek and too much the old-school librarian to suit trendy tastes.

“I make a whisper a sell,” Lizzie would say softly, staring frankly and ingenuously from TV, computer screen, tablet, or smartphone as she delivered the company tagline. And most were inclined to believe her, if the success of the girls’ operation was any indication. There was something appealing about the fresh and intelligent young face juxtaposed against the outfits and accessories she chose for her appearances. Lizzie being
Lizzie, she could never do anything like everyone else did, and in this case, it paid off.

“Sex sells,” she had informed me once, thinking that I did not already know it. “But not,” she added, apparently thinking that I suffered a mercantile deficit as well, “if you give it away.” Not only was Lizzie not giving it away, but she was also keeping it under some very impressive wraps.

“I wonder,” Jean pondered aloud, “if Lizzie will accept her award in one of those famous outfits of hers.”

“Famous is an understatement! The world waits with bated breath for each of her new ads, and so do I,” admitted Bella. “I’m not sure what I look forward to finding out most: what kind of fashion statement she is going to make with her over-the-top outfits or which body part she will choose to expose.”

“My personal favorite of her ads thus far is the one in which she’s wrapped from head to toe in furs,” I said. In this particular ad, a truly lovely, long, slender, and elegantly jeweled hand was the only part of Lizzie’s body, other than her face, that was exposed.