Innocent Traitor (28 page)

It is warm, even in the shade, in the garden at Hanworth. The Queen sits dozing on a bench, stomacher unlaced to accommodate her swelling belly, and sleeves rolled up indecorously. A woman may display much cleavage in a low-cut gown, yet seemliness demands that arms be covered to the wrist, whatever the season, but the Queen is too hot to care, and we are unobserved in this leafy bower.

I look up to see Katherine dreamily watching me as I sit stitching a tiny bonnet.

“There is no news yet of your marriage,” she says. “My lord remains at court, trying to win supporters for our plans, but he still awaits an audience with the King. However, he remains optimistic and has assured me that we will soon see you more well bestowed in marriage than you could ever have hoped for. It’s just a matter of being patient.”

I am about to reply when suddenly a look of wonder appears on the Queen’s comely face, and she places both hands on her belly.

“Jane,” she whispers in awe, “feel this.” And she guides my fingers to the place.

“Can you feel it too?” she breathes. “He kicks.”

I can. It’s like a fluttering beneath my hand. I smile at her and joke, “He must be a little knave, madam. Doubtless we shall see him beaten for causing his lady mother so much trouble!”

Katherine laughs. At last, it seems, she has put her sadness behind her.

Queen Katherine Parr

HANWORTH, JUNE 1548

The Marquess of Dorset has come to supper. He is alone, for his lady has a head cold and is indisposed. Despite my enjoyment of the good food—I always seem to be hungry these days, with the child due only a few weeks ahead—it is an uncomfortable meal, for his lordship plainly has something disagreeable on his mind and wastes little time on pleasantries.

“Well, my Lord Admiral,” he weighs in, as soon as the turbot has been served, “you have had my daughter for six months, and so far we have heard nothing about your plan to marry her to the King. May I ask what progress you have made?”

Tom reclines complacently in his chair and answers in honeyed tones, “My lord, I beg of you to be patient. These things take time.”

“You’ve had six months.” Dorset sets down his goblet. He is obdurate.

“I await an audience with His Majesty,” Tom tells him, unruffled.

His lordship is not impressed. “By God, man, if you’re in a position to arrange this marriage, how come the King keeps you waiting so long? You told me he was eager for this.”

“And so he is, so he is,” Tom assures him, signaling for a servant to bring more wine. “But it would not do to be too open about this matter, not just at present. His Majesty does not wish to offend the French by rejecting their princess, so matters have to proceed delicately. England needs the friendship of France, and so it is politic, just for the present, to let King Henri think that negotiations are proceeding satisfactorily. But I promise you I have been working assiduously to build up support for the marriage with my Lady Jane, and that there are many who favor it.”

Dorset looks unconvinced. He’s a hard man to please. I smile at him and offer some gooseberry sauce. He ignores me and pulls on his beard.

“And how long is this little charade for the benefit of the French to go on?” he demands.

Tom’s momentary hesitation betrays his uncertainty. “Only until a secret treaty with the Emperor is negotiated. Then England will no longer be so much in need of the friendship of France.” He is bluffing, I know, lying his way out of a corner. There is no secret treaty with the Emperor in view.

Dorset seems to know it too. “I’m surprised His Majesty is contemplating an alliance with the Empire,” he says suspiciously. “The Emperor Charles is a far greater champion of Catholicism than the King of France. All Charles does is incite the Lady Mary to stir up trouble by insisting on her right to celebrate Mass, which, as he well knows, is now illegal in this country. With the Emperor behind her, she knows she can snap her fingers at the law. My lord, do you really believe that His Majesty seeks this alliance? Or perhaps you have been duped?”

Tom’s temper flares. “I assure you, sir, that an imperial alliance is even now being discussed by my brother, the Lord Protector, and the council,” he retorts fiercely. “They are negotiating on the very point of the Lady Mary’s Mass.”

“Did the Protector himself tell you that?” Dorset is becoming similarly heated. “I have heard it said at court that you do not enjoy your brother’s confidence. And that you have no real influence with the King.”

Tom is hot with anger now, but as he opens his mouth in indignation, the Marquess interrupts him. “I think, my lord, that the time has come for me to withdraw my daughter from your household and wardship,” he says nastily.

I know I must intervene. If I leave it to Tom, all will be ruined. A display of rage will do us no good.

“Think, my lord,” I urge. “Be not too hasty in this matter. We have only your daughter’s welfare at heart, and our mutual advancement. My lord here is still confident of success—he was only saying as much before you arrived. May I crave your indulgence for a few more weeks, to give him more time to bring this matter to fruition?” I lower my tone and lean forward confidentially. “We too get to hear the court gossip, and my lord has been credibly informed that you yourself have incurred debts that would prove an embarrassment to the father of the future Queen. Debts, they say, that you have, at present, no means of paying off.”

My bolt shoots straight to the target. Dorset is taken completely unawares, and I guess that the rumors I have heard are indeed true.

“As a token of our goodwill,” I press on, sensing victory, “my lord here has said he would be happy to make your lordship a loan to cover those debts.”

Tom takes up my drift with enthusiasm. “Interest-free, of course, as between friends,” he chimes in. “The only security I ask is that the Lady Jane remains my ward.”

Dorset’s confidence in us seems to have been miraculously restored by our offer. As my lord often says, it always helps to smooth the path with a little money. I can guess that the Marquess is thinking it unlikely that we would be willing to commit ourselves to handing over such a substantial sum if we were not optimistic about securing Jane’s marriage to the King.

“I will not deny that a loan would come in useful just now,” he says, graciousness itself. “I thank Your Majesty and you, sir, for your kind offer, and I accept it.”

Lady Jane Grey

SUDELEY CASTLE, GLOUCESTERSHIRE, JUNE 1548

The great cavalcade winds its way slowly through the Cotswolds, passing through villages of mellow stone, trundling along dusty tracks that are free of mud, thanks to the warm, dry weather. I ride with the Queen and Lady Tyrwhitt in a horse litter that jolts over every bump in the road, grateful that we will not have to suffer this discomfort for much longer, since our destination will soon be in sight.

We are bound for Sudeley Castle, near Winchcombe, a house that was granted to the Admiral when he was created Baron Sudeley. It was built more than a hundred years ago, the Queen says, and was once owned by the evil, crookbacked King, Richard III, who murdered the two poor Princes in the Tower of London. King Richard extended and improved the castle, and it is still a luxurious residence. The Queen and the Admiral are to set up their court there.

“We plan to live in the grand manner!” Her Grace told me gaily. “We will entertain the local nobility and gentry, and there will be a warm welcome under our roof for scholars, musicians, and artists. I want our house to gain a reputation as a haven for hospitality and learning.”

Dreamily she lies on the cushions in the litter, embracing her great belly and her dreams. This is to be a new beginning for all of us.

The Admiral is riding alongside.

“Look!” he cries. “Sudeley!”

We poke our heads through the damask curtains. In the leafy-green distance, we can see a fine house of honey-colored stone. As we draw nearer, the details of the castle come into view: the magnificent perpendicular wing with its soaring windows, the chapel standing separate, the stately gardens. The procession enters the gates, and the servants hasten to welcome their master and mistress and to unload the baggage carts.

“What a beautiful, beautiful place!” exclaims the Queen as we walk through the arched entrance. “A fitting place for our son to be born.”

The Admiral flings his arm around her. “It is indeed, my love.” He kisses her on the cheek. I watch her look up at him. Her love for him is obvious, despite their past troubles. This
will
be a new beginning for them, a fresh start—I feel it in my bones. I pray God they will be happy here.

SUDELEY CASTLE, 30TH AUGUST 1548

“For God’s sake, can’t somebody do something?” shouts the Admiral in anguish. “It’s been two days now, and still it goes on.”

“Babies come in their own good time, my lord,” says Mary Odell, the midwife, placidly. Yet beneath her professional air of confidence—she is the best to be found and knows her worth—Mrs. Odell seems a little worried. The Queen, at thirty-six, is old for a first confinement; she has said it herself; and matters progress slowly.

Her pains started the evening before last, mild at first, then slowly increasing in intensity all through the night. In the morning, inexplicably, they had all but ceased, but by suppertime had returned with renewed vigor. By eight o’clock Her Grace was in misery, and there was nothing we could do to ease her. Lying down, sitting, even standing with support while she waited for each onslaught to pass—nothing gave her any relief. We all stayed with her, trying to help in our different ways, the older ladies rubbing her back or telling encouraging tales of their own successful confinements, while I, like a good daughter—which is what I am treated as here—flitted to and fro, fetching cooling drinks, scented cloths to mop the Queen’s brow, or herbal infusions that were meant to dull the pain, but failed woefully.

At ten o’clock the midwife insisted that Her Majesty go to bed, shooing away the Admiral, who had, to her and the ladies’ horror, tried to insist that he remain with his wife. Men, Mrs. Odell told him firmly, had no business in the birthing chamber, for shame! This was women’s work, and the women would deal with it. So the Admiral waited impatiently outside in the antechamber, whilst I was deputed to report to him from time to time on the Queen’s progress.

It was one of the longest nights I have ever spent. I had been told it was God’s will that women should bring forth children in sorrow, as punishment for the sin of Eve, but I had never realized until now what they have to go through to have a child. It is horrible, messy, embarrassing, and fraught with perils, and I shrink at the thought that I myself might have to endure this one day. Once one is married, there is really no escape from it. I know now why people speak in hushed whispers of young brides dead within a year of their wedding, or of mothers of large families cruelly taken from them. And I can see why the Lady Elizabeth says she is scared of childbirth and does not wish to marry.

“Please God,” I prayed, “send the Queen a happy hour. Keep her safe!”

By the middle of the night, Queen Katherine was showing signs of great distress, so the midwife gave her a strong dose of some physic that sent her into a deep sleep, through which her contractions continued sluggishly. As dawn broke, however, the drug wore off, and she woke to worse pains than before, so sharp that she screamed loudly each time the agony began, calling on Our Lord and begging Him to take the pain away.

“Jesus!” she cried again and again. “Help me, help me!”

The screaming went on for hours. I, weak from lack of sleep and sobbing in fear, was sent from the room and sat huddled in the Admiral’s arms outside. He was trembling too, and to my astonishment I looked up to see tears falling down his cheeks. At one time, when the torment behind the closed door became unbearable, he bade me go down on my knees with him and pray to God to aid the poor Queen, so dear to us both. Never have I prayed so hard.

But the Admiral was in a worse case.

“I have been a bad husband,” he sobbed. “I never realized till now how much she means to me. Please, dear God, spare her life. Let me make it up to her. Give me another chance.”