A Dangerous Inheritance (29 page)

“Well, I did warn him!” my lady says when we are alone together. “Of course, the fool would not listen, and now I wouldn’t be surprised if he brings us all down with him. There’ll be no reprieve this time. The Queen is no longer so disposed to mercy.”

She speaks truth, and certainly there are no grounds for pleading for my father.

“What will happen to him?” I ask, heavyhearted.

“What happens to all traitors,” she answers gruffly, betraying no emotion but anger. “You had best face up to it. He knew what he was risking.”

The rebels are at Gravesend. The gates of London are now under heavy guard, and the drawbridge on London Bridge has been raised.

I am among the ladies waiting on the Queen when she receives a deputation of the Commons, who beg her to reconsider her decision to wed Prince Philip.

“I cannot do that,” she tells them, “for my word is given, and this alliance will bring the kingdom great benefits. I consider myself His Highness’s wife. I will never take another husband; I would rather lose my crown and my life. Yet I assure you, my loyal Commons, that this marriage will never interfere with your liberties.”

Her spirit remains firm. Ignoring the chorus of protest from her ministers and her ladies, she is resolved upon a personal appeal to the Londoners, and in the afternoon we nervously follow her to the Guildhall. Up to the last minute, she adamantly rejected all her councillors’ pleas to consider her safety and not venture forth into the City.

She is fearless. We stand behind her as she faces the Lord Mayor and a vast crowd of people. Her speech is long and masterful. I listen, marveling, as she reminds them that she is their Queen, and tells them she loves them as naturally as a mother loves her child. She assures them she would abstain from this marriage if it did not appear to be for the high benefit of the realm.

“I am minded to live and die with you!” she cries in her deep, manlike voice, reminding them that all they hold dear is under threat. “And now, good subjects, pluck up your hearts, and like true men face up to these rebels, and fear them not—for I assure you I fear them nothing at all!”

The response is tremendous. Caps are thrown into the air and tears are shed as there is a resounding ovation. We depart to the roar of
cheering, heartened by the knowledge that Queen Mary, by her courage, now has London in the palm of her hand.

The Londoners have destroyed London Bridge, so that Wyatt and his hordes may not cross the river from the Surrey shore. There are frightening reports that he has sacked the old priory of St. Mary Overie in Southwark and Winchester Palace nearby. In the City there is much noise and tumult as men shut up their shops, put on their armor, and obey the Lord Mayor’s command to guard their front doors.

In the palace, it is as if we are under siege. The Queen’s presence chamber is thronged with armed guards. In her privy chamber, we ladies huddle together, many of us weeping and lamenting our perilous position; I confess I am among the most tremulous. My mother, though, sits tight-lipped and straight-backed. She will not give way to fear.

The waiting is intolerable. When will the violence begin?

The Queen remains calm and steadfast. “You must place your trust in God,” she exhorts us. “He will deliver us from this present danger.”

She refuses to allow the Tower guns to be fired across the Thames at the rebel army.

“My innocent subjects in Southwark might be killed,” she protests. But Wyatt clearly underestimates the Queen’s compassion. To avoid being bombarded, he leads his army upriver to Kingston, and crosses the Thames. There is near panic at Whitehall. Women can be heard shrieking and wailing; doors slam as people race about trying to find hiding places for themselves and their valuables; and many of the servants have fled. I push Arthur and Guinevere under my bed and wag my finger severely, commanding them to stay there.

The Queen is urged by her advisers to escape by river, a suggestion she rejects with derision. “I will tarry to the uttermost,” she declares. “I only wish I were not a weak woman and could take to the field in person.”

Arms are hastily issued to every member of the royal household. I’ll even wield a pistol myself if necessary.

It is my father-in-law, the martial Earl of Pembroke, who checks
Wyatt’s advance. News comes that his cavalry has forced the rebels to halt at St. James’s Park, a stone’s throw from Whitehall. So close had we come to disaster! Then we hear gunfire, which sets all the courtiers panicking again. “Fall to prayer!” the Queen exhorts us. Yet soon comes the news: Wyatt has been taken at Charing Cross, and is on his way to the Tower! The rebellion is over. We are safe.

Of my father, still no word.

“God has worked a miracle,” the Queen declares. “Now I will strike terror into all who are disposed to do evil.”

The leaders of the revolt are to be executed, as an example to other would-be traitors. My father, when he is caught—and that can only be a matter of time—will surely suffer the same fate. Suddenly people are avoiding my mother and me. The prospect of the crown now seems a very distant one. But I am more distressed about my father.

“He brought it on his own head,” my lady repeats dully, as if the fight has gone out of her. She seems resigned to his death. Yet it seems a very terrible punishment to me, even though he has fully deserved it. And I find it hard to accept that the father I have known—and looked up to until these last days—is soon to die.

August 1483; Pontefract Castle, Yorkshire

Coventry. Leicester. Nottingham. Doncaster. It was a long progress, and the Queen was finding it exhausting. What kept her going was the prospect of seeing her son, and when the court at last arrived at the great stronghold of Pontefract, there was the most joyful of reunions. The fair, delicate little boy was restored to his mother’s arms, and his proud father lifted him high and announced to everyone that Edward of Middleham was to be invested as Prince of Wales as soon as the progress reached York. There were cheers from the assembled lords;
this was a much warmer reception than in most other places, for King Richard was now in the heartlands of his affinity, and many northern lords had ridden over eagerly to pay their loyal respects.

Kate became aware that someone was watching her, and among the officers of the prince’s retinue she saw him again: Ferret Face, the black-haired man who had stared at her on coronation day. She gave him a disdainful glance and then forgot about him.

A few days later Kate followed among a bevy of noble ladies as the King and Queen, holding the little prince by both hands, walked with him into York Minster for his solemn investiture. The child won all hearts, as he lisped his way through the great ceremony and sat patiently while all the great lords, one by one, paid him homage and swore oaths to him as his father’s heir; but at the feast afterward he became restive and wanted to go off and play ball, and was only with difficulty constrained to stay in his high seat. King Richard looked happier and more relaxed than he had in weeks, and Queen Anne was all smiles, doting on her son.

If there had been rumors about the princes, there was no echo of them here. There was nothing but praise for the new King, and fervent expressions of loyalty. With the realm so quiet, Kate had no doubt that her father would keep his word and release the princes very soon.

Her feelings for John were growing. They would try to slip away from the revelry at court or their respective duties and seek each other out in deserted gardens or shadowed arbors. It was in the garden at Nottingham Castle, that mighty fortress built on a rock, that he first kissed her, on a bright afternoon with a fragrant hint of autumn in the air. Without warning he’d bent forward and gently brushed her lips with his. And then they were in each other’s arms, kissing as if the world was about to end, and not caring who saw.

“Sweet lady,” John gasped, “no one has ever held such mastery over my heart as you. I am in torment!”

“Torment?” Kate echoed.

“I would serve you all the days of my life, so I were allowed,” he breathed. “I love you, Kate. Without you, all joy must be at an end. It is that which torments me, for there can be no remedy.”

He loved her! Her heart sang.

“There
can
be a remedy,” she told him. “Why do you think I would not permit you to serve me?”

“It is not what
you
would not permit,” he answered. “It is not you who can heal my malady.”

“Then who?” She felt a twinge of fear. Had her father said something to John?

“Let us not speak of it. I want nothing to sully our precious time together.”

“It is sullied already,” she said, near to tears. Something or someone was standing in the way of their love: she knew it.

“We will defy them all!” he said fiercely.

“Defy who?” Her rare temper, born of fear, was rising. John pushed his fingers through her luxuriant dark hair and took her face firmly in his hands.

“The whole world, if need be!”

“I cannot fight an unknown enemy,” she told him, her voice cold.

“Believe me, little love—let well enough alone for now. All may right itself in time. Leave it to me.”

“I am not a child!” she cried, and walked off, leaving him to keep his secrets to himself.

He sought her out again, of course. He came and sat quietly beside her in chapel when she was at her devotions, but she refused to acknowledge that he was there. It seemed more than coincidence that she kept running into him in halls, courtyards, and other public places, and had repeatedly to force herself to ignore him. Her heart was breaking, but she kept her head high.

“You will slay me unless you soften your hard heart,” he muttered, waylaying her by the door to the Queen’s lodgings.

“The remedy is in your hands!” she said, but that hard heart of hers was fluttering like a trapped bird’s wings.

“Very well, have it your way. But you will not like what I shall say to you.”

“I would prefer honesty, sir!”

“It is my father. He has chosen a bride for me, and is already negotiating the marriage contract. I have told him I would wed you
instead—and he said that if you were the King’s lawful daughter he might consider it, but that we are too near in blood anyway.”

It was the first time her bastardy had hit her like a slap in the face. She had been made to look of scant consequence in the eyes of the man she loved. Seeing her distress, John took her hand and squeezed it.

“I paid him no heed, Kate. He is a bully and a blusterer, but I am used to him. I told him I would always love you whatever your birth, and that you are a lady worthy of the highest honor. I said I could never love another.”

“And what did he reply?”

John frowned. “No matter. I will wear him down. It won’t be the first time. And if he thinks he can stop me from paying my addresses to you, he can think again.”

“He has forbidden it?”

“I will not let him come between us. It is you I want, Kate. Your beauty, your gentleness—all the wondrous things that make you what you are. If I cannot love you, I should be dead! Say I may remain your servant, I beseech you.”

She said it; of course she did.

February 7, 1554; Whitehall Palace

It is rare to be alone in a court, and in Her Majesty’s privy chamber there are always servants about. The Queen is never alone, even when sleeping or performing her most intimate functions. Thus, when my mother suddenly appears, grim-faced, and drags me into an anteroom, brusquely dismissing two grooms and saying we need some privacy, I know that the matter is serious. Yet just how serious I could not have dreamed.

“I have just come from the Queen,” she blurts out, and to my horror I see that her eyes, normally so sharp and piercing, are brimming
with tears. I have never seen my mother weep before—ever. “Katherine, there is no easy way to say this. Jane and Guilford are to be put to death.” Her voice breaks.

Words fail me. I am looking into an abyss. My world is coming to an end.

I sway on my feet, and my mother steadies me, her hands on my shoulders, tenderer than I have ever known them.

“But the Queen gave her royal word!” I wail. “We trusted in that. How can she go back on it?”

“Things are different now.” She sits me down on a stool and half collapses into a chair, trembling. “I don’t know what I can do. I feel so helpless. Your father—I can live with that. But Jane! She is a child. She has done nothing but what she was bid. Oh, God forgive me, that I ever consented to Northumberland’s stupid, stupid plans!” Suddenly we are both sobbing helplessly in each other’s arms, devastated by this tragedy that is overtaking us.

When my tears finally subside, I find myself beached on a strange shore, where nothing makes sense anymore.

“Jane is innocent,” I declare. “She
cannot
die for that.”

“The Queen knows that,” my lady says, dabbing her eyes. She is now recovering her composure and striving to be the controlled, practical mother I have always known.

“Her Majesty has capitulated, for her councillors will not hear of her exercising clemency in the wake of the rebellion,” she says, bitter. “She has signed the death warrants. She said the least she could do was to break the news to me face-to-face. She wept, and assured me that this is the last course she ever wanted to take, but that she has no choice. But she has promised to do all she can to bring about a reprieve. Tomorrow she is sending the Abbot of Westminster to the Tower, to persuade Jane to convert to the Catholic faith. If she consents, her life will be spared.”

I remember the staunchness of my sister’s faith, her scathing comments about the Pope and his cardinals, her contempt for those who compromise their religion for worldly considerations. Dear God, let her not be so dogmatic now!

“Oh, my lady, do you think she will?”

“I pray for it. But she was ever a froward, difficult girl. I just pray that God guides her to make the right decision.”

God has indeed so guided her: but it was the right decision for Jane, not for the rest of us. That she—a young woman of seventeen, young and comely, and with her life ahead of her and so much to live for—could willingly embrace death for the sake of the finer points of a creed is to me beyond comprehension. Does she care at all about us, her loved ones, who are suffering the tortures of the damned on her account? One word, one little word—and her life would be given back to her. Why can she not say it? Why?