In the Shadow of the Crown (56 page)

“This I swear before God and you good people,” she added.

Her women tied a handkerchief about her eyes, and pathetically she stretched out her hands, as she could not see the block.

“Where is it?” she said. “I cannot see it.”

They said it was the most piteous sight, to observe her thus, a young and beautiful girl, so innocent of blame. I was glad I did not witness it.

They helped her to the block and, before she laid her head on it, she asked the executioner to dispatch her quickly, and he promised he would.

Then she said in a firm, clear voice, “Lord, into Thy hands I commend my spirit.”

I was deeply moved when they told me, and how fervently I wished that it had not had to be.

Others followed her, including her father, the Duke of Suffolk. I did not feel the same pity for him.

On the day Jane died, Courtenay was taken to the Tower. De Noailles was under suspicion. He had certainly played a part in the rebellion, and papers had been found to prove this. But it is not easy to deal with an ambassador. One cannot clap him into prison. We might have insisted on his recall, but Renard was against this.

I do believe that de Noailles was a very uneasy man at that time.

Elizabeth was the one Renard was most interested in. He had always regarded her as the greatest menace. In a way he respected her. He thought her clever, but that only added to his desire to put her away.

“She must be questioned,” he said to me. “She has had a hand in this. She is at the very heart of the plot. She must have known that Wyatt would have set her up as Queen.”

“He insists that it was merely to stop my marriage that he rebelled.”

“He would have stopped that by seeing that you were not here to marry. Depend upon it, his plan was to set Elizabeth on the throne. I tell you this: the Prince of Spain might refuse to come here unless she is put away…and Courtenay with her.”

“Courtenay is already in the Tower.”

“And Elizabeth should be there, too. You must send for her to come to London. There will be no peace in this realm while she is free.”

Gardiner added his voice to Renard's. I knew they were right. I did not trust my sister; but I did not believe she would be party to my murder. She knew that I was not strong; I had no heirs; she could come to the throne constitutionally. She was young. Would a woman of her astuteness, her farseeing nature, not be prepared to wait until she could achieve her desires peacefully and with the people behind her?

However, Gardiner and Renard thought differently. They were sure that Elizabeth would be safe only in the Tower.

I summoned her to Court. The reply was just what I expected. She was too ill to travel. I did not believe this, although she must have suffered great anxiety when she knew that Wyatt had been captured and that he—with Courtenay, who had been paying her some attention—was in the Tower.

I sent two of my doctors to discover whether she was well enough to travel, and they were fully aware that, if they agreed she was too ill, they would be under suspicion.

Elizabeth came to London.

As was expected, she made sure of a dramatic entrance. She was dressed in white and rode in a litter, insisting, truthfully, that she was too ill to come on horseback. She had ordered that her litter should not be covered. Naturally, she wanted the people to see her so that she might win their sympathy.

The people came out to watch her retinue as it passed along the roads. Many were weeping, knowing for what purpose she was going to London, to her death, they thought.

It was only eleven days since the beautiful Jane Grey had walked to the block. Was Elizabeth's fate to be the same? That was what they must have been asking themselves.

Perhaps some recalled her mother, who had lost her head on Tower Green.

I was relieved, though, that they did not shout for her, even though they
gave themselves up to tears. The times were too dangerous to show partisanship; there could hardly have been any of them who had not seen the corpses rotting in chains.

They took her to Westminster, from whence she sent a plea to me, reminding me of my promise never to condemn her unheard.

I did not answer that plea. I wanted others to question her—not I.

I could not get her out of my thoughts. I reproached myself for refusing to see her. I could not forget that she was my sister.

It was proved that Wyatt had written to her on two occasions: once to advise her to move farther from London and secondly to tell her of his arrival at Southwark; but she was too wise to have replied to either of these communications.

De Noailles had mentioned her in his dispatches to France, and these had been intercepted by Renard, so, to a certain extent, she was implicated, if not of her own free will.

Of course, she vowed her innocence. I believed her because I did not think she would be foolish enough to embroil herself in a revolt which could easily fail, when all she had to do was wait. If I had a healthy child, then she might have reasons, but as it was, I could see none. And Elizabeth was one who would always have her reasons.

I wanted others to decide what was done with her. Renard wanted her out of the way; Gardiner wavered. He was not really in favor of the Spanish marriage, and in this he was alone in the Council. He was of the opinion that, if I married, Philip would dominate affairs. He regarded me with that mild contempt which men often bestow on women. He was loyal but he could not believe that women were capable of government.

He it was who declared that there was no actual proof of Elizabeth's participation in Wyatt's plot. There was no correspondence between them except the letters which Wyatt had written and which had apparently been unanswered. I wondered how big a part his objections to the Spanish match played in his judgements. When the Council decided that the best place for Elizabeth was in the Tower while her case was investigated, Gardiner was inclined to stand out against this; yet when he saw he was outnumbered, he gave way.

Her passage to the Tower was as dramatic as she knew how to make it. Even the elements seemed to work in her favor, for I wished her to be taken by night so that the people might not see her and express their sympathy. I was furious with Sussex, who was to conduct her to the Tower, for allowing her to delay so that she missed the tide and had to go the next morning. It was Palm Sunday, which seemed to make it all the more dramatic. I decided she must go while most people were at church.

Many have since heard of Elizabeth's journey to the Tower, how the stern of the boat struck the side of the bridge and almost overturned, how she was at length taken to the Traitor's Gate to step into the water, her words ringing out to all those about her that they might sympathize with her.

“Here lands as true a subject being prisoner as ever landed at these stairs.”

And the response from the lookers-on: “May God preserve Your Grace.” Many of them wept, and she turned to them and told them not to weep for her; and there she was, comforting them who should have been comforting her. “For you know the truth,” she said. “I am innocent of the charges brought against me, so that none of you have cause to weep for me.”

Then they took her to her prison in the Tower.

But the thought of her haunted me. I believed that, as long as we lived, she would be there to disconcert me.

SO WYATT, ELIZABETH and Courtenay were all in the Tower—Wyatt certain of death, Courtenay and Elizabeth uncertain, but living in fear of it. Life must have been very uncomfortable for de Noailles. He knew that he was watched and suspected. I had no doubt that he would have preferred to be recalled, although that could have offered him little joy, for to be recalled in such circumstances would be an indication of failure.

At about the same time as Elizabeth was being lodged in the Tower, Wyatt was brought to trial, condemned and sentenced to death. Even so, the deed was not to be performed immediately, and the 11th of April was fixed for his execution.

I was told that early that day he asked to be allowed to see Courtenay, who was lodged near him. The request was granted, and at the meeting Wyatt fell to his knees and begged Courtenay to admit that he had been the instigator of the rebellion.

This upset me a great deal, for I remembered how at one time I had thought Courtenay cared for me. How foolish I had been to think a young and handsome man would have tender feelings for an old woman. He certainly had coveted my crown. I felt hurt, but my anger was more for myself for having been so easily deluded than for this vain and arrogant young man. He had touched my feelings rather deeply, for I made excuses for him. He was but a boy, younger than his years, so many of which had been spent in unnatural captivity. It was not surprising that, when he found himself released and saw the possibility of a crown, he became reckless and behaved in such a way as to show a complete lack of judgement.

On the scaffold, when he was face to face with death, Wyatt made a
statement in which he took the entire blame for the rebellion and declared that Elizabeth and Courtenay were innocent.

He was a brave man, but brave men are often rash and foolish.

His head was hung high on a gallows near Hyde Park, and his quartered limbs were placed for display about the town.

This was a grim warning to all traitors.

THAT WAS A TRYING TIME. MY THOUGHTS WERE OF marriage. At last that blissful state, of which I had so often dreamed in the past, was about to come to pass. When I had been a little girl and betrothed to the Emperor Charles, my maids had told me with such conviction that I was in love that I had believed them. Now I told myself that I was in love with Philip, and I was in that state, with the image I made for myself, much as my women had made for me with the Emperor.

I lived in a dream: love, marriage, children. I had wanted them desperately all my life. Now I believed they were within my grasp. I did not remind myself then: I am eleven years older than he is; his father is my cousin. Did that make me his aunt? If there was a shadow in my thoughts, I dismissed it quickly. No, no. Royal brides and grooms were often related to each other.

It was a period of uneasiness. There were murmurs of discontent all over the country. Wyatt's head was stolen, presumably so that it should be snatched from the eyes of the curious and given decent burial. I should have been glad of that—those ghoulish exhibits always nauseated me—but it was a sign of sympathy with the rebels. It meant that Wyatt's followers were still to be reckoned with and were bold enough to commit an act which could result in their deaths.

This was not only a matter of religion. The main grievance was the Spanish marriage—though I supposed one was wrapped up in the other.

A hatred for Spaniards was making itself known throughout the country. Children played games in which Spaniards figured as the villains. No child wanted to be a Spaniard in the games, and it was usually the youngest who were forced to take those parts, knowing that before long they were going to be trounced by the gallant English.

There was the unpleasant affair of Elizabeth Croft. She caused quite a stir until she was caught. She was a servant in the household of some zealous Protestants who lived in Aldersgate Street. From a wall in the house a high-pitched whistle was heard. Crowds collected to hear the whistle in the wall, and then a voice came forth denouncing the Spanish marriage as well as the Roman Catholic religion. This continued for months, and there was a great deal of talk about “the bird in the wall.”

Susan told me about it. She was frowning. “People are beginning to say it is a warning.”

“How can there be a bird in the wall?” I demanded.

“And what would a bird know about these matters?”

“People say it is a heavenly spirit speaking through the bird to warn you.”

“Then why shouldn't this spirit speak to
me
?”

“This bird is supposed to be talking to the people, telling them they should never allow the Spanish marriage to take place.”

“That is what Wyatt said, and look what happened to him.”

“I suspect the voice is a human one,” said Susan.

“In whose house is it?”

“Sir Anthony Knyvett's.”

“Has he been questioned?”

“He swears he knows nothing of it.”

“It is silly nonsense.”

“Yes, Your Majesty, but the people gather to listen.”

That voice in the wall continued to be heard for a few more months before the truth was discovered. It was Elizabeth Croft, the servant girl. When she was caught at her tricks, she was sent to prison. Sir Anthony was innocent of any part in it, but the girl did confess that she had been persuaded to do what she did by one of the servants, a man named Drake who was a fierce Protestant and hated the prospect of the Spanish marriage.

Both Renard and Gardiner talked to me about the girl. It was not that she was important in herself but it was dangerous for people to believe, if only temporarily, that a voice from Heaven should denounce my marriage.

What should we do with her? She was a simple girl, I said, no doubt led astray by others—this servant Drake for one. A weaver of Redcross Street was mentioned, and there was a clergyman from St. Botolph's Church in Aldersgate also. I could see how the girl had been tempted, and I did not want her to be severely punished. It was enough that the people should know that she was a fraud.