The de Vere Inheritance

Chapter Six - 29th June 1632

"These petitions are the way forward for all of us ladies. I know some of you are apprehensive about speaking out, but if we do not then who will? We must lead the way because the poorer women of society will not know how to act or how to get on at all if we do not lead by example! Without our support they would be beaten and trampled upon. We must lead them because our place in society affords us some liberties. We have the right to speak and be heard; particularly at court!"

Elizabeth shook her head in bemusement as she watched Blanche de la Marche, the Comtesse of Toulouse parade across a set of tables that had been haphazardly shoved together in the run down tavern. She had payed handsomely for the use of such a space and as the proprietor was extremely short of funds he had relented. Everyone knew how hard it was to find adequate meeting places for the women because strictly speaking, they shouldn't have been meeting at all. If they were found out by red guards or musketeers they would all be marched off home to their husbands to await a punishment of said man's choosing. They also wouldn't be permitted to speak to one another again. But here the Comtesse was, brandishing her pamphlets as if they were the word of God and thrusting out her expensive silk skirts with every movement of her legs. These women might be congregating for the right reasons, but Blanche's theory was all wrong. Elizabeth did not point it out of course, because they all would have shouted her down. The women were petitioning for a petition in a way. They wanted there to be a regular course of action that their peers might take when they had the need to make a grievance known to the King's privy council. Elizabeth had differing views. She knew that most of the poorer women were more likely to speak up about something they believed in. They'd likely married a man of their own choosing which was a choice that had been taken away from the wealthy women at the meeting. The poorer women had real experience of what it was like to live life on the breadline to really suffer. Most of the women surrounding Elizabeth were able to ask their husbands for whatever money they needed and some even had a weekly allowance to spend on what they wished.

Elizabeth was sure that no common women would ever listen to a woman like Blanche. Poorer women were more inclined to hate her than look up to her. No, none of it would come to any good. And yet Elizabeth found herself sitting at the back of the room during one of the meetings, unable to resist the endless prattle that stopped her mind from thinking of all else. She hadn't been able to bare listening to Eric's endless worries about her fathers killer coming after him. His debts were endless and he now considered himself as the prime target. If it were true, then Elizabeth's father had died as a means to an end. She did not want to think of it that way. She could fairly see where Eric was getting her ideas from though. Unless an Englishman or an English agent had killed her father, Elizabeth could not think of anyone else who would wish to harm him. he'd built quite the life for himself and was well respected in Paris. No, Elizabeth could readily believe it all had something to do with Eric.

They had fought of course, when she had managed to slip away from her father's lodgings the day before and return home to tell her husband the news. Elizabeth wanted companionship and a kind word but instead Eric flew into a raging panic. He was not outraged by her father's death though. He was more worried about his own precarious position in Paris now that her father was not able to speak for him. They'd argued for hours until they were both horse and then Eric had dissapeared off into the night despite his fears. The morning had brought hostility and anxiousness for the couple before Eric had voiced his wish to leave Paris. They repeated the arguements of the day before and added new ones to further refine their points of view. In the end Elizabeth had fought her way out of the apartment with harsh words and angry looks. In the end the straw that broke the camels back was her telling Eric that when he did indeed next leave the city, she wasn't going with him.

It was his lack of even civility let alone sympathy for what she was going through that made the decision for her. She could no longer in all good grace continue her life with such a man. Many times she had thought their marriage to be at an end over the course of the last four years and now that it was finally at that turning point, she felt somehow free. Elizabeth stormed from the apartment in her mourning dress and went straight to speak with her father's lawyer to see if she could discover who her father had rented her apartment from. She knew she could not hear the reading of the will for perhaps months but she could at least try to ensure that they did not cut short the lease and leave her homeless. Remarkably, Elizabeth found that her father had placed the lease in her name and as such, there was nothing the landlord could do regarding her father's death unless she did not pay the rent.