Three Maids for a Crown: A Novel of the Grey Sisters (45 page)

I imagined the risk, what such an attempt could mean were we caught. Ned being led to Tower Hill to face the ax. Me sharing Jane’s fate on the green beneath my window. Our little son an orphan, alone in an uncertain world.

Even with the two of us dead, he would be a threat to Elizabeth Tudor. One she could eliminate so easily. Children are fragile, after all. They die every day.

I thrust the note into the fire, but the words stayed branded in my mind. Would someone attempt to free Ned and me? If Elizabeth knew such a plot was afoot, would she not imprison us even longer, in dungeons harder to reach?

I am afraid, Ned
, I whispered in my head.
Oh, love, I am so afraid
.

M
ARY

Never had I been grateful when the cell door closed between Kat and me, but as the guard turned his heavy iron key, I could only feel relief that I had kept my secret locked up as tight.

Guilt nagged, calling me hypocrite. Hadn’t I felt hurt that Kat had not shared her love for Ned Seymour with me? Was I not doing the same thing by refusing to tell her I loved Thomas Keyes?

I loved Thomas Keyes. The enormity of it swept over me, flooding me with astonishment and terror. The match was as unlikely as one of the lions in the Tower menagerie uniting with one of the stable cats, but it was real. What could confessing such a passion do but worry Kat even more, when she had enough burdens of her own to bear?

I did not want to hear her words of caution, see her recoil at the idea, or gently say that Thomas was a commoner while I was of royal blood. I did not want to have to justify why a marriage between us might not anger the queen much at all. As de Quadra said, no one could imagine me on the throne. But of all the reasons I did not confide in Kat, there was one that was most pressing of all: I did not want her to ask if Thomas loved me as I did him.

Did he? His eyes lit up when he saw me. His fingers lingered whenever he could find an excuse to touch me. I touched the purse affixed to my girdle. The coins inside the leathern pouch made a metallic sound when they clunked against Thomas’s mirror.

The money was to pay for the red petticoat I hoped might unravel the mystery of what Thomas felt for me. Perhaps if I looked well enough, he might dare to ask—

“Lady Mary.” Mr. James interrupted my thoughts. I looked into his grandfatherly face. “Your visits do your sister much good.”

“I am glad of it. And of your kindness to her and her lord.”

“It is unjust to see them kept apart when they are pining for each other. They both insist they were wed. Hertford has written the queen even pleading for her to allow a second ceremony to be held before any witnesses she cared to name. Her Majesty refuses. Hertford is near sick with missing Lady Katherine and the boy. I see your sister grieving for her husband, and I am near brought to tears myself.”

“I feel the same.”

“Why can’t the queen let them watch their little son together and laugh at his antics? He is such a winsome, wee lad. My wife and I are not of their station, I know, but Lady Katherine is so tender, and Hertford craves the tiniest news of her each time I see him. It quite breaks my heart. What harm could there be in allowing them to see each other?”

I looked up at James, every nerve in my body suddenly alert. He had been kind to Kat, and his words hinted that kindness might be stretched farther with the right inducement. My fingers touched the pouch of money at my waist. “It is cruel to keep a family apart. It seems even more so since it is being done to my sister. When we were children, Lady Katherine would ever intervene when someone was cruel to one of the animals. There were so many times she could have been hurt. I remember the stable hands scolding her, even our father reprimanding her, but when some innocent, helpless creature was suffering, she would not be dissuaded. She said she did not care if the animal bit her. It was frightened and helpless and had done nothing to deserve ill treatment. She said that if she turned her back and did nothing to help it, it made her part of the wickedness.”

“I did not know Lady Katherine was wise as well as beautiful.”

I looked up at Mr. James. “Do you believe as my sister believes?”

“I do. I see enough cruelty in these walls. I do what I can to stop it.”

“Would you ease my sister’s pain if you could, Mr. James?”

Suddenly he looked worried. “I am a loyal Englishman and servant of the queen.”

“As you should be. But would England fall if you left the door to my sister’s cell unlocked? She could not escape carrying her babe and all he would need to survive. You would be on guard to make certain of that. Would it be such a terrible thing to allow Hertford to go to her for some small while?”

“I do not know.”

I unfastened my purse with trembling fingers, knowing what this gamble could cost me. If word of it reached the queen, I would likely join my sister in these dank walls.

“Mr. James, allowing my sister and her husband to have some brief hours together in their imprisonment harms no one. But it would give great joy to two people who love each other.”

“The queen’s officers would not see it that way.”

“How would they ever know? I beg you, take this purse for your kindness to my sister.”

Mr. James eyed it, tempted yet wary. “I am not a man whose conscience can be bought.”

“I would not insult you by trying. This purse is a gift freely given. I only ask that you let your conscience guide you. Think of your wife and babes, of my sister and her little son. Think what it must mean to a husband and father cut off from those he loves most. Think what is cruel and what you might do to ease the injustice.”

“It is not right to keep them apart,” he growled low. “It is not right.”

I prayed that he was as brave as Kat had been in Bradgate’s stable yard, risking her own safety to spare innocents pain.

Chapter Thirty-three

K
AT
T
OWER OF
L
ONDON
M
AY
1562

omething was troubling Mr. James. In the weeks since the arrival of the wooden ship, his kindly smile turned more often to a thoughtful frown, one that darkened those rare times my sister was able to steal away from court. He still carried letters that gave me glimpses into my lord husband’s days, but James’s nerves seemed to be drawing tighter as if he warred over something in his mind.

I could only imagine what that something might be. Did he know about the secret communication from de Quadra? That the Spanish hoped to spirit me away from English shores? True, I had burned the ambassador’s note, but if such plots were being hatched, there would be other missives, other conspirators, other people who might make mistakes that revealed the Spaniard’s plans—fearful parties like Courtenay, who had saved his own skin by turning traitor to his companions before the Wyatt rebellion.

Jane had not been involved in Wyatt’s plot, but she had lost her head all the same. Could that happen to Ned and to me? The possibility of disaster left me chill as a grave.

Even if no one had yet caught wind of the Spaniards’ plot, it was evident that some sort of trouble was brewing. Had James or Lieutenant Warner felt compelled to reveal to the queen’s secretary William Cecil or to her spymaster Francis Walsingham that Ned and I were writing to each other? Were those powerful men demanding to read the missives we sent?

I blushed at the thought of cold, calculating eyes poring over every intimate word I had written to my husband. I could only imagine Cecil’s disgust. How angry he must have been when he learned of our marriage—it rendered his political maneuverings fruitless, dashed his plans to use me to keep England safe.

It hadn’t dashed them entirely, if Mary and de Quadra were to be believed. Many supported Ned and me. But it had made them more difficult—more dangerous—indeed.

Unable to bear the suspense, I decided to address my guard forthrightly. When he entered the chamber to deliver a basket of food and candles from Ned’s poet friend Thomas Sackville, I stopped him.

“Mr. James, you seem much worried of late. I hope I have done nothing to add to your list of cares.”

He started, and I knew that whatever was disturbing him had to do with me. “You must not concern yourself, my lady. There are parts of my job that I cannot like, but it is not your fault. It is just that you remind me of my own girls. They are not as fine as you, I mean no insult, but there is sweetness in you that they share.”

So fatherly was his tone, I could imagine him with his children. It made me wistful. “I hope your daughters know how fortunate they are to have you. You have been so kind to Lord Hertford and me, made this time in the Tower bearable.”

He protested, but I held up my hand to silence him. “It is true. You must perform your duty. I know that. But you do so with honor and tender care, giving my family all the dignity you are able to. You are a great friend, and neither Lord Hertford nor I nor our son will ever forget your friendship.”

James’s face contorted. “I am a coward, or I would do far more.”

“What can you do? Can you open prison doors and set us free? Not without forfeiting your own life and crushing your family’s fortunes. Besides, you are a loyal man, one of noble spirit. You have taken an oath to the queen. My lord husband is a man of loyalty as well. Do you know how many times he has been interrogated, pressed to recant and say we are not legally wed? They have used every weapon possible against him, and he stands firm.”

“You sound surprised by that. I cannot imagine any man worth the name would forsake his wife. Especially if he loved her.”

“My first husband did so.”

“Pembroke’s son, was he not? I remember the gossip. Bad business, that.”

“I did not know it was the most fortunate day of my life, the day Pembroke saw that marriage annulled. For if I had not suffered that humiliation and heartbreak, I would never have become Lord Hertford’s wife, and we would never have been blessed with our beautiful boy. I live for the day I am able to watch the two of them together in Hanworth’s garden, where my lord and I met.” I smiled at James, teasing. “You could not arrange that for me, could you, my kind friend? An afternoon in the country? I would return to my cell quite docile afterward.”

James tugged at his doublet. “I could not arrange anything so grand,” he said. “But I have a feeling you would quite blossom if you had an hour of your husband’s company anywhere at all. Even in this very room.” Something shifted in James’s face. “It is wrong to keep a husband and wife apart from each other. It is against God and nature.”

A squawk from the corner made me jump, and I hurried over to where my pet monkey was tormenting the nightingale in its cage. The monkey’s little fist was wrapped tight about the bird’s wing feather. He had hauled the wing through the bars and was wriggling it to and fro so the sharp beak could not reach him.

“Stop that now, you great bully!” I scolded, maneuvering him closer to the cage to ease the bird’s pain while I loosened the monkey’s grasp. The frenzied bird pecked my fingers with its beak.

“My lady, you must not!” James cried, coming to my aid. But before he could, the nightingale flapped to the far side of its cage, feathers rumpled, wing dragging, but free of the monkey. Thwarted, the monkey squealed and scampered to the other side of the room.

“Hell-born beast!” James surprised me with his rage. “Look what mischief he has caused. You are bleeding, child.”

He fished a kerchchief from a pouch at his waist, dunked the coarse linen in a ewer of water, and dabbed at the wounds. After a moment James looked up to see how I fared. Tears were tracking my cheeks.

“Does it hurt terrible much, my lady? The stupid bird was but panicked. It did not mean you harm. Dry up your tears.”

“I do not weep from pain. It is just … I was remembering how angry my father would get at times like these. I would get myself kicked or scratched or bitten interfering in fights between the animals at Bradgate. Once he even struck me—there was a pup who was born without a leg. The bitch who had whelped the pup seemed to know Father meant to kill it. She fought and snapped at him until he whipped her to submission. I tried to save the poor mama and got bit for my pains. I could not understand why the pup should be destroyed. I had seen one of the villager’s dogs manage after a wolf had torn off its limb. The shepherd had nursed it through, somehow, and the dog got along quite merrily after. I begged Father to let the pup live.”

“What happened?”

“He drowned the pup anyway, right in front of my sisters and me.”

“That was a harsh thing to do. He should have sent you away.”

“Life is made up of cruel necessities, Father said. We had best develop the stomach for it.”

“I’ve no stomach for it,” James said. “Not anymore.” His grip tightened on my hand. The dabbing kerchief stilled. “My lady, what would you say if I sent up some coppers of hot water for you to bathe with?”