A Dangerous Inheritance (34 page)

“Madam my mother,” I urge, “this marriage is so precious to me that I beg it be handled carefully. I would not wish to prejudice a happy outcome. You see, I am in good hope that very soon our cherished dreams will be fulfilled, and in the happiest of ways.”

“Wherefore spring these hopes?” my lady presses.

“Ned writes that the Venetian ambassador says openly that when the time comes, I will be able to claim the crown unopposed, for Queen Mary—who distrusts and hates the Lady Elizabeth—favors my succession. My lady, will you help us?”

“Aye, Katherine. I owe it to you, after all that has happened. But now I must rest. We will speak further about this later.”

It is a frosty November morning. My lady is still abed—she sleeps in late these days—and Mary and I, warmly cloaked and pink-cheeked, are for the stables to feed titbits to our mares and see them cozily blanketed in their stalls. Beyond the courtyard wall we hear the trundling of carts making their way to the City of London, and the clip-clop of hooves. Then another sound breaks the peace of this early hour—the distant toll of church bells.

I look at Mary. “What’s that?”

She claps a hand to her mouth as the chimes ring nearer and louder, and are taken up by other bells nearby; they will have been ringing already across the City and in outlying parishes, and soon they will be tolling out their heavy news throughout the land of England.

My hour, I believe, has come.

We go back into the house and change our clothes, putting on black out of respect for Her Majesty. I kneel with my mother and all our household in the chapel, praying for the repose of the soul of our beloved Queen Mary; and I shed tears for that kind lady. Yet all the while I am bursting inside with excitement and the pressing urge to hasten to court and claim what is rightfully mine. For now I am Queen at last, and all the power and glory that were so quickly and cruelly snatched from Jane are to be mine. And Ned will be mine too! There is no one
to forbid it. And Elizabeth, and Pembroke, must bend the knee to me. I cannot wait for my reign to begin.

Yet the decent formalities must be observed, both here at Sheen and at St. James’s Palace, where Her Majesty lay at the time of her death. The council must be allowed a space to convene. The events and processes leading to my proclamation will unfold in God’s good time. I steel myself to wait patiently for the lords to attend upon me, or for a summons to court.

By midmorning I am in a frenzy of anxiety. Surely I should have been sent for by now? I cannot keep still, but keep pacing up and down my chamber, wringing my hands. I must know what is going on.

In recent weeks I have heard talk that the courtiers were abandoning the dying Queen and making for Hatfield to wait upon the Lady Elizabeth, anticipating that she would soon succeed. Well, they will soon learn that they have miscalculated; and if Elizabeth thinks to profit by their support and deny me my rightful title, she must think again. Yet I will be merciful to all, even her. My reign will begin not with accusations and ill will, but in a blaze of glory and acclaim. And I will find her some good husband to keep her under control.

In the end I can bear the waiting no more. Wrapping myself again in my cloak, I tell my mother I am for St. James’s Palace, and order the barge to be made ready for me, summoning my maids and urging the boatmaster to make haste.

When we alight at last at Westminster, I see that huge crowds of people have gathered there. Surely I should have received a summons earlier, or some word from the Privy Council? But maybe they did not know where to find me. I push my way through the press of people, desperate to get to St. James’s; and then I espy a herald stepping up on a mounting block and unraveling a scroll of parchment.

Surely it is strange to proclaim a monarch before that monarch has even been informed of her own accession?

“Hear ye, hear ye, good people!” the herald cries. “Elizabeth, by the grace of God Queen of England, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, sends greetings to her beloved subjects and bids me read you Her Majesty’s most excellent proclamation.”

Elizabeth
, by the grace of God? How can this be? It should be I, Katherine, by the grace of God—as Queen Mary intended. This is wrong, all wrong—there has been some grave mistake! Someone should tell the herald!

But no, he is reading from the scroll, crying aloud: “Because it hath pleased Almighty God to call to His mercy out of this mortal life, to our great grief, our dearest sister of noble memory, Mary, late Queen of England—on whose soul God have mercy—and to bestow upon us, as the only right heir by blood and lawful succession, the crown of the kingdom of England, we do, by this our proclamation to all our natural subjects, notify to them that they be discharged of all bonds and duties of subjection toward our sister, and be from this day in nature and law bound only to us as to their only sovereign lady and Queen; promising on our part our love and care toward their preservation, and not doubting on their part but they will observe the duty which belongs to natural, good, and true loving subjects.”

There is more, but I do not hear it. The crowd has erupted in such a roar of joy and approbation that the herald’s final words are drowned, and all around me there is cheering and praise for Elizabeth, “Great Harry’s daughter,” as at least one reveler calls her.

“God be praised, that’s an end to the burnings!” a fat goodwife next to me cries. “The dread days of Queen Mary are over, and we’ll have a world of blessings with good Queen Elizabeth!”

“There’ll be bonfires and merrymaking aplenty tonight!” someone else calls. And suddenly, above the deafening hubbub, all the church bells of London are pealing out in celebration, and everywhere around me people are hugging and kissing each other, and even weeping for gladness. I am jostled and pushed by unheeding, ignorant citizens. This is not what Queen Mary intended! Even before she is cold, she is betrayed. How did Elizabeth bring this to pass?

The fat woman turns sharply to me. “If I were you, dearie, I’d get rid of those black weeds and that miserable face. You should be giving thanks for our new Queen.”

“I feel a little faint,” I lie, desperate to be gone from here.

“Oh, sorry, love, I didn’t realize. Do you need a helping hand?”

“No, I’ll be all right,” I manage to say, and blindly retrace my steps
to the waiting barge. It is too late for me: Elizabeth has proved too clever an adversary, and she has the love of the people on her side. And I am not too stupid to realize that, given the rapturous reception that news of her accession has prompted, few are ever likely to support me as a rival for her crown.

Our horses are draped in black caparisons down to the ground. Our mourning clothes are sumptuous but somber, as are my thoughts as I ride in procession behind Queen Mary’s hearse toward Westminster Abbey, where she will be laid to her rest, and take part in the lavish obsequies ordered by Queen Elizabeth. Listening to the soaring requiem Mass—a service soon to be outlawed—and sitting beside my sister Mary as the funeral meats are served at the banquet that follows, my heart simmers with resentment.

For already Elizabeth has made plain her dislike—nay, her hatred. Barely had the ink dried on her accession proclamation than she made her position very clear, and suddenly there was a cold draft blowing in my direction from the throne.

Elizabeth is twenty-five and has never married, so has no child to succeed her; and she has already declared that she means to live and die a virgin. Most people at court think it a bluff, or just maidenly modesty asserting itself. They little know her, for she can be as coarse and foul-mouthed as any sailor. But the fact remains that she is as yet unwed, with no heir of her body. And therefore she plainly sees me as a rival.

Queen Mary never went so far as to change the Act of Succession in my favor, which is why Elizabeth was indisputably her lawful successor. Under that same Act, I, by law, am still Elizabeth’s heir—and thereby a threat.

We both know why Elizabeth does not feel secure on her throne. It is well known that Catholic Europe regards her as a bastard, a heretic, and a usurper, and wants her set aside for a Catholic queen. That in itself is enough to keep her awake at night, but she is extraordinarily sensitive on the subject of her marriage too.

She is disposed to flirt politically with this prince and that, as well as with her courtiers, and in particular Lord Robert Dudley; but she is in
no hurry to wed and give up her freedom. “I will have but one mistress here and no master!” she is fond of saying. Nor is she eager to have children. I myself watched her flare up when Mistress Astley, her Chief Lady of the Bedchamber, suggested—as none else has dared—that having a child of her body to succeed her would bring her great joy.

“God’s teeth!” Elizabeth cried. “Do you think I could love my own winding-sheet?” And in her eyes, for that one unguarded moment, I could see fear. I suspect the matter goes very deep with her.

Yes, she is reluctant to wed and bear heirs to continue her line, but she must still name a successor, for what would happen if she were to die suddenly? By law, I should succeed Elizabeth, as I am next in blood, but has she acknowledged me? Nay, she would as soon turn Catholic.

It is my right; yet for all my desire to become Queen, I would not intrigue for her throne, on my word of honor, not though many are fawning upon me and paying me flattering addresses. I have seen too much of what happens to traitors.

How do I know she hates me? It has been made plain to me in so many ways. Not being named heir is bad enough, but when Elizabeth added insult to injury, she put me in the most difficult and embarrassing position. Under Queen Mary, despite my youth and inexperience, I was a Lady of the Privy Chamber, later promoted to the bedchamber, and as such one of Her Majesty’s most honored and intimate servants, as befit my rank and royal status. And by a further act of that Queen’s kindness, my poor misshapen sister Mary was similarly elevated.

But our gracious Queen Elizabeth has now seen fit to deprive us both of that honor. It is humiliating beyond words, and of course I cannot speak of it to anyone at court, but must go about with my head held high, and my pride in the dust. For my sister, it is worse, for people do not now disdain to call her “Crouchback Mary,” even to her face.

Of course, Elizabeth cannot banish me from her presence—even
she
has to have some regard for the proprieties—so she has made me one of the ladies of her presence chamber—a lesser honor, one that does not rank me as a princess of the blood, denies me the precedence that is my due, and keeps me at a distance from her.

“Lady of the Presence Chamber, if you please! You are her heir!”
my mother exploded when she heard the news. Yet, shocked as she was, she was the voice of reason, telling me that I must not take it personally. But I did, and I still do. Elizabeth is resolved to eclipse me utterly. I have to put up with catty remarks about my lack of religious principle—which I dare not answer as I would, because she is the Queen—or about my pale, blond looks, which Elizabeth is now pleased to openly compare unfavorably with her own red curls, now done up in the most fantastical styles, and made-up face. Where my skin is fair, hers is sallow, even swarthy, so she sees fit to mask it with a paste made up especially for her, the recipe of which she will confide to barely a soul. Indeed, she likes to pretend she shows to the world her natural complexion!

She has hated me all along. She has dealt me a very public insult—and it hurts, as she fully intended. It has certainly diminished my standing at court. I know what people have been saying: they are not so eager to pay their addresses now, or so nice as to lower their voices when giving their opinion that this demotion means Elizabeth is determined to name someone else in my stead—Mary, Queen of Scots, perhaps—or marry and get a child of her own, although there’s no sign of that happening, and privately I doubt it ever will. One reason, of course, is not far to seek, in the person of that son and grandson of traitors, Guilford’s brother, Lord Robert Dudley, whom she loves inordinately. Lord Robert, who would be a king, so the gossips say. He has a wife living, so it cannot be, but that does not silence the rumors.

Yet not everyone is as demoralized as I about my prospects. Since returning to court, I have renewed my old friendship with Jane Dormer, who is now being courted by the Spanish ambassador, the Count of Feria. He assures me that his master, King Philip, is ready to put all his weight behind my claim to the succession.

“For your ladyship is the hope of Christendom,” the count effuses, “the hope of Catholics everywhere.”

This makes me feel slightly guilty. My conversion to the Catholic faith was to a degree a pragmatic one, made when I was very young to please Queen Mary and further my chances of being named her heir. Truly there are aspects of Catholicism that appeal to me—as they appeal, I feel sure, to Queen Elizabeth, who favors the high ritual and
ceremonial of her childhood, and insists on keeping jeweled crucifixes—which some Protestants regard as graven idols—on the altars in her chapels. Thus, converting was not difficult for me, and outwardly I have practiced the old religion ever since. But inwardly I remain inclined toward the Protestant beliefs instilled in me by my parents, and recently, now that it is safe to do so, I have been on the brink of recanting my Catholicism. But if King Philip, with all the might of Spain behind him, is ready to put pressure on Elizabeth to name me her heir, then I must show his ambassador that I remain staunch in the faith and am the most suitable Catholic claimant.

Playing this role is not as dangerous as it might seem, for the Queen has said she will not make windows into men’s souls, and that she will tolerate Catholics so long as they make no trouble for her. She is unlikely to object to my going to Mass and wearing a rosary on my girdle, as long as I draw no overt attention to myself.

“The French are backing the Queen of Scots, of course,” the Count of Feria tells me. “She is married to the Dauphin, and her father-in-law King Henri relishes the prospect of England coming under French rule. He has already quartered the arms of England with those of France on her armorial bearings. Thus it is unlikely that your Queen will ever countenance the Scottish Queen’s succession, and besides, Mary was not born in England, which I gather is a legal prerequisite for succeeding to the throne.”