Secrets of the Tudor Court Boxed Set (114 page)

“He’s always been a hothead. Even Kathryn found him difficult to manage and I believe he did truly love her.”

“Not enough to stop him flirting with every other woman who crossed his path. His words about remarriage to a noble or
royal
bride disturb me.”

“Just talk.” Will dismissed the idea, but I remembered the confidences Princess Elizabeth had shared with me at Chelsea and worried.

During the next few weeks we heard all manner of rumors. It was said that the lord admiral sought to marry Anna of Cleves, King Henry’s fourth wife, whose marriage to the king had been annulled so that he
could wed Catherine Howard. Then Princess Mary’s name was mentioned as a possible bride. And then it was Princess Elizabeth he was supposed to be courting. By then Her Grace had taken up residence in her own house of Hatfield, only seventeen miles from London. At first I discounted such stories, but more accusations surfaced. I heard that Lady Tyrwhitt, who had been with the queen dowager until the end, now claimed Tom had poisoned Kathryn. And that he’d promised Lady Jane Grey’s parents he would arrange a marriage for her with Jane’s cousin, King Edward.

I had no love for my lord protector’s grace, and I was certain he had already heard the same wild tales, but as the year drew to a close I became more and more uneasy. Tom maintained close ties with Will, and continued to hint that he should exploit his ownership of so many estates in the north and remove there. If Tom was plotting rebellion, it made sense that he would want someone in place to raise those counties against his brother.

I tried to warn Will, but he had a blind spot where Tom Seymour was concerned. In the end, I took matters into my own hands. I went to the Duchess of Somerset and told her everything I suspected about the feckless brother-in-law we shared, including what Princess Elizabeth had confided to me when we were both living with the queen dowager at Chelsea. If Tom had not been attempting to seduce Elizabeth then, he was certainly considering it now.

At first nothing happened. I told myself my warning had been unnecessary. I consoled myself with the thought that I had demonstrated our loyalty to the Crown. That could never be a bad thing.

Then, on a cold morning in mid-January, Will returned to our lodgings at Hampton Court only a short time after leaving them for the daily Privy Council meeting. “Tom’s under arrest,” he announced, and went straight to the cupboard for a bottle of Rhenish.

My hands flew to my mouth to stifle a gasp.

“The damned fool went armed with a pistol,” Will said between deep swallows of wine. “In the hope of speaking to His Grace in private, Tom
and two servants broke into the privy garden and reached the king’s bedchamber without passing through the watching chamber, presence chamber, or privy chamber.” Shaken, Will drained his goblet.

I refilled it in silence.

“Tom had a key to the outer door of the bedchamber, but one of the king’s spaniels attacked him before he could reach the inner door. Tom lost his head and shot the dog.”

“Worse and worse,” I whispered. He’d signed his own death warrant with that bullet.

“The sound of the pistol being fired woke the king’s bodyguards and they raised the alarm. They caught Tom standing over the spaniel’s corpse, the smoking pistol still in hand. He tried to bluff his way out of trouble. He claimed he was conducting a test to make certain that His Grace was well guarded. No one believed him.”

“Is he to go to the Tower?”

“He is likely halfway there already. And the order has been given to search Seymour Place, his house in London, for more proof of treason.”

I clutched his arm. “Will they find anything there to implicate you, Will? Do not try to spare me. If we need to prepare—”

His fingers touched my lips, stopping the spate of words and stilling my fears. “I have long been Tom’s friend, Bess, but there’s not a man who knows him who would trust his judgment.”

And women? I wondered. Had they trusted him?

The answer was not long in coming. Princess Elizabeth’s governess, Mistress Astley, was arrested five days after Tom’s attempt to kidnap the king. She was taken to the Tower and questioned about her part in Tom’s plan to marry Elizabeth. In time, she confessed to aiding and abetting the lord admiral’s courtship. She claimed she’d seen no harm in it.

My heart went out to the young princess, deprived of her beloved lady governess. Elizabeth Tyrwhitt, who had always despised Tom Seymour, was sent to Hatfield in Mistress Astley’s place.

Tom himself was executed for treason on Tower Hill on the nineteenth
day of March. Crowds gathered on that day shouted that the Duke of Somerset, who would kill his own brother, was a “bloodsucker” and a “ravenous wolf.”

A
LTHOUGH
I
WAS
aware of growing unrest throughout the land, I was preoccupied with another matter. In spite of my best efforts since the validation of my marriage to Will, I had not become pregnant. I wanted a child, and the queen dowager’s baby daughter had been orphaned by her father’s death. The child, christened Mary, was in the keeping of the Duke and Duchess of Somerset, but they did not want her. Tom’s wish had been that she be raised by the Duchess of Suffolk, but he had not bothered to ask Catherine Suffolk if she wanted the responsibility. She did not. She agreed with me that I should have little Mary.

“Are you mad?” Will demanded when I broached the subject. “We narrowly avoided being implicated in Tom Seymour’s treason and now you want to call attention to my friendship with him by taking his spawn into our house?”

“That
spawn
is your sister’s child! Your niece! How can you be so callous?”

“Political necessity, Bess. I thought you understood that. My sister Anne and her husband have not asked for custody of the baby, either. Lord Herbert is a canny fellow. I mean to follow his example.”

“An innocent child should not be made to suffer for her father’s sins. If Lady Suffolk will not take her, she’ll be raised by Anne Somerset. I can think of no worse fate.”

Exasperation made Will’s voice harsh. “You’ve never even laid eyes on the girl. She may have inherited all of Tom’s worst qualities.”

“I long for a child,” I whispered. It had been just over a year since our union was validated. By this point in her marriage, my sister Kate had already borne a son.

Will took me in his arms and kissed me tenderly. “It cannot be this one, my love. It is better to be safe than sorry, and I want you to be safe, Bess. I want that more than I want my next breath. The lord protector
will take good care of Tom’s daughter, if only to keep control of her inheritance from her mother. And for that same reason he will never yield her to us.”

“Then let us try again to make a baby of our own.”

He was happy to oblige, but although we made fervent, passionate love that night and each of the ones that followed, I did not conceive.

33

T
here was rebellion brewing in the land. The first riots were in Cornwall and Devon, protests against the new liturgy everyone was required to follow after Whit Sunday, which that year fell on the ninth of June. It did not seem a matter of such great importance to me whether the Mass was said in English instead of Latin, but to some people it mattered a great deal.

The other great cause of dissension was easier to understand. Noblemen, Will’s brother-in-law, Lord Herbert, among them, had enclosed land once used in common by all. This had caused great hardship and much bitter resentment. By early July, rebel encampments had sprung up in dozens of locations. By the middle of the month, the lord protector had declared martial law. He ordered Will to take troops into East Anglia.

My husband came home in September full of anger and resentment. The Duke of Somerset had sent him to Norwich ill equipped and ill prepared. Will had entered the city in an attempt to pacify the rebels and talk them into surrendering. Instead it had been Will who’d suffered an ignominious defeat.

Will drank deeply of his ale, glared at the dregs, and threw his cup into the empty hearth. It bounced off the tiles with a clatter so loud it made me wince. We were in our little withdrawing chamber at Norfolk House, but the sense of security this place had once provided was long gone.

“The more I consider the circumstances, the more likely it seems to me that Somerset orchestrated my humiliation from the start. He painted me as a coward and a fool for abandoning the city.”

“You recaptured Norwich.” From my chair I watched him pace, reminded of his late sister when Bishop Gardiner had plotted against her. Gardiner, at least, was no longer a threat to anyone. The lord protector had imprisoned him on some charge or other. He was languishing in the Tower along with the Duke of Norfolk, who had been there since King Henry’s time.

“Warwick defeated the rebels, not I. At the head of an army twelve thousand strong. I was with him, but no longer in command.”

“But why would Somerset wish you to fail?”

“Revenge.” Will stopped pacing to fix me with a pleading look. “Don’t you see, Bess? I bested him in the matter of our marriage. Ever since the commission reached its decision, he has been seeking a way to punish me for my presumption.”

The Duke of Somerset had never seemed that devious to me, but I could easily believe such a thing of his wife. Even back when Anne Seymour had been Countess of Hertford, she’d had an eye out for the main chance.

“Why else would Somerset relieve me of my command? He gave me no opportunity to redeem myself. If he’d had his way, Warwick would have left me behind.”

I soothed him as I always did, with praise and kisses, but he did not forget his grievances and I soon discovered that Will was not the only one who regarded the lord protector as his enemy. Most of the Privy Council had turned against King Edward’s regent by the time the rebels were put down. On the fifth day of October, they met at Ely Place, the
Earl of Warwick’s mansion in Holborn, with the intent of finding a way to remove the Duke of Somerset from power.

I had not seen a great deal of Jane Warwick in the past year and begged Will to take me with him to Ely Place. It was located outside the city gates of London and north of the Strand, the great highway that ran between Ludgate and the city of Westminster.

“Let us walk in the cloister,” Jane suggested. “It is peaceful there.” In spite of being so near the city, Holborn had many of the advantages of the country, including gardens and orchards. One of Jane’s neighbors even boasted a vineyard. I felt a pang of regret for how long it had been since I’d visited Cowling Castle or seen any of my family save Kate. Father still had not forgiven me for marrying Will against his wishes.

The cloister at Ely Place, where once monks had strolled, was far removed from the noise and bustle beyond the gatehouse. I had seen troops massing there when we arrived, but I could barely hear any sounds of men or horses. The galleries that ran around the enclosed garden contained equally quiet rooms, from bedchambers to the countess’s solar. The great hall was situated at its northwest corner. Every time we passed those windows, I strained to hear, but all I could make out was the occasional raised voice. I could not tell if it was Will speaking out in anger or some other privy councilor.

“Do you think Somerset knows what is afoot?” I asked Jane.

“He must suspect something,” she said.

I envied Jane her calm demeanor. We both understood how very dangerous our husbands’ undertaking could be. I was terrified that Will might end his life on the headsman’s block, just like Tom Seymour.

“I am certain he has heard rumors,” she continued, “and he knows there are many who think he should be removed from office for usurping power and subverting the laws of the realm.”

“Who is to replace him?” The king had just passed his twelfth birthday. He was still too young to rule for himself. I’d heard Princess Mary’s name suggested, but she was an unlikely candidate. Her Grace clung to the old religion.

“Does it matter?” Jane asked. “The important thing is to stop Somerset before he does any more harm. He has made too many bad judgments. Taken together, they very nearly brought about wholesale rebellion. He pounded the final nail into his own coffin when he ordered all soldiers who’d been mustered to leave London and proceed to their appointed commands without authorizing the rewards he’d promised them. The English troops and foreign mercenaries who put down the riots in East Anglia and elsewhere deserve better. My lord husband is furious on his men’s behalf.”

A servant in Warwick livery, emblazoned with the emblem of the bear and ragged staff, darted across the garden to whisper in Jane’s ear. For just a moment, her composure seemed shaken. “Go inside and tell the earl,” she said. “All the councilors must hear this.”

“Hear what?” I asked.

Jane sank down onto a stone bench. When I sat beside her, I saw how pale she had gone. She drew in a deep, steadying breath.

“It has begun. There is no going back now. That messenger brought word that the Duke of Somerset has moved the king into his own lodgings at Hampton Court. As if we would hurt His Grace! Somerset plans to take King Edward and move into the Tower for greater safety.”

“You have a spy at court.”

Jane looked at me as if I were mad to doubt it. “Several. Including three of my sons.”

B
Y EVENING IT
was the Privy Council, not Somerset, who had control of the Tower of London. That night Somerset fled with the king to Windsor Castle, as it was better fortified and easier to defend than Hampton Court. At once, the Earl of Warwick, with Will at his side, began negotiations for the return of His Grace. No one wanted bloodshed, but we all knew it might come to that. Even if there was no battle for possession of the king’s person, there would likely be executions after.

I remained at Ely Place with Jane Warwick while our husbands rode out of London to lay siege to Windsor Castle. We women took comfort
from each other’s company, and chafed at having to sit and wait while others decided our fate and the fate of those we loved.