Three Maids for a Crown: A Novel of the Grey Sisters (48 page)

Had I cast a burning brand into black powder, I could not have caused such an explosion. The queen grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me until my teeth rattled. “How dare you mock me, you grotesque little toad!”

“Majesty, I did not mean any harm.”

“I suppose your sister did not mean any harm either when she used her prison as a harlot’s lair!”

Oh, God! The queen knew of the two nights Kat and Ned had stolen together! I had caused this fresh disaster by bribing her guard.

“Soon all England will know how they defied me! Those two smug traitors! They will make me a laughingstock when this new bastard is born.”

I went limp in Elizabeth’s grasp. She released me, and I stumbled back, staring.

“Kat is with child?”

“Do not try to tell me you did not know it!”

I fought tears of shock, felt again the sting of betrayal that Kat had kept another secret from me. Why? It could only have been to protect me. “I did not know,” I said, and knew the truth must show in my eyes. “Majesty, they do not wish to harm you. They wish only to be left alone to raise their son.”

“Perhaps Beauchamp will be an orphan! Perhaps I will see to it and appoint a guardian capable of breaking that wicked Grey family pride!”

I imagined the cruelty she could inflict on a helpless child. I fell to my knees. “Majesty, I beg you to hear some small plea on their behalf. I ask for their lives in exchange for a service I have done you.”

“What could you possibly have done for me?”

“When your sister, Queen Mary, lay near to death, she had not yet named an heir.”

The queen kicked over a stool that held her work basket, spilling embroidery silks across the floor. “An heir, an heir—I am sick to death of hearing about heirs!”

“Everyone knew the queen did not wish to give the throne to you, Majesty. You must have known it also.”

“I was next in line according to my father’s will!”

“You were reformed faith and the queen knew it, and she could not forgive you for the grief caused her mother. We all heard her say most decidedly that you would never follow her onto the throne. Have you never wondered what changed her mind?”

I could see my question had pricked at the queen.

I rushed on. “Queen Mary was ready to declare my sister her heir, to name Katherine in your place. I begged her not to.”

“You expect me to believe that? You little fool!”

“My favorite sister died in the attempt to wrest the crown from the rightful heir. I could not lose another sister. I beg you, Majesty, to show mercy because I helped your cause. Do not take the life of the sister I was trying to save.”

The queen stared at me with a loathing even deeper and a rage even fiercer. “You are trying to say that I owe my crown to you? A little nothing troll? It is not true! It is not true! Damn you, Mary Grey, and all your house! And damn your sister and her brats! I will make certain of one thing, I can tell you! There will be no more Hertford bastards! Your sister does not tell you her great news? Well, I will let you carry my message to her.”

“Majesty.”

“Go to the Tower—you need not think to find the soft guards that minded her before. The lieutenant who oversaw her imprisonment thus far is in a cell of his own. As for the other workers, they are under arrest as well.”

I thought of Mr. James’s kind face. Regret stung.

“Go to your sister and give her a message from me. She had better get accustomed to being lonely, for I vow by my father’s majesty that your sister will never see her paramour again.”

T
OWER OF
L
ONDON
J
ANUARY
14, 1563

Kat clasped her son in her arms, the bump where her unborn babe grew making her look like an embattled mother in the paintings Father had seized from an abbey. At fifteen months old, Beauchamp was eager and bright and the light in my sister’s life. “Mary, what is that strange smile for?”

“You look like one of the paintings Father took from an abbey—one of the Israelite women protecting her son from Herod’s soldiers. You are quite a fierce mother, Kat, and a good one. I was wondering where you learned it.”

“It just happened when the midwife laid him in my arms. I feel as if I could fight lions to protect him. I can bear almost anything, as long as I know that he is safe. I am sorry I did not tell you about the new babe.”

“Do not waste any regret on that. I know you wanted to. You were right to fear the queen’s reaction. She is angrier than I have ever seen her.”

Kat nibbled at her bottom lip and nodded. “They have hauled Ned to the Star Chamber and interrogated him. Fined him fifteen thousand pounds for deflowering a kinswoman of the queen, for getting me pregnant this second time, and for breaking his imprisonment by visiting my chamber.”

“The fine is a grim one.”

“What else can they do to us? I have heard that people in the streets are on our side. They say it is wrong to keep a husband and wife apart. They believe we are married in God’s eyes and in the law. I have even heard John Foxe has written a Book of Martyrs that has Jane’s story in it, and that has also roused opinion in our favor. Still, the tale of Jane hurts me when I read it. Jane was not a saint, Mary. She was our sister.”

I reached out and squeezed Kat’s hand.

“I know I am not nearly as good a sister to you as she was, but I wanted to be,” Kat said.

I wanted to drive some of the sadness from Kat’s eyes, knowing how much more sorrow might be coming her way. I thought of Thomas’s way of teasing me and said: “You are my very favorite sister in the world.”

Kat shook her head. “Jane was both of our favorites, and—” But suddenly she stopped. I knew she understood why my mouth had crooked in a grin. “I am your favorite
in the world
,” she said. “Jane is in heaven. Mary, you made a jest!” She looked as if I had just achieved some great feat of magic.

“It seems Jane is always destined to be the best among us. You remember Roger Ascham, the queen’s childhood tutor? He wrote a book called
The Schoolmaster
where he recorded an account of how he once found Jane reading Boccaccio, saying she was grateful for such harsh parents because it made her love learning. And Sir Thomas Challoner wrote an elegy declaring that Jane’s learning was superior to all.” This time my smile turned fierce. “That did not sit well with the queen. But I think Her Majesty had better become accustomed to vexation. I have news of my own to share with you.”

“Please let it be something happy. I am thirsting for a drop of sunshine.”

“This is the happiest news of my life, Kat. I am to be married myself.”

Beauchamp squirmed, and this time she set him free. He toddled over to his wooden ship. “Married? To whom?”

I refused to be hurt by the surprise on her face. “Do you remember the sergeant porter at Whitehall? Thomas Keyes?”

“He is as tall as a tree. How could anyone forget him?”

“He is also the kindest, most amusing and tender man I have ever known. He loves me.” The wonder of it still astonished me.

“Mary that is—that is wonderful, of course, but I cannot believe the queen approves.”

“The queen does not know.”

“You are not planning to wed him against her wishes?” Kat asked in horror.

“As you married Ned?”

“That was different! She was not already enraged at our family as she is now.”

“She has always hated us, but then it is only fair. We were taught to despise her from the time we were in the cradle. Kat, you must not worry overmuch. The reason the queen hates you and Ned so much is that you are more worthy of the throne than she is and she knows it. The circumstance with Thomas and me is different. We cannot ascend to the throne. It would be ridiculous to think we could. Not that the queen is incapable of being ridiculous. Sometimes when she is in a rage, I think a dousing with an ewer of cold water would do Her Majesty good.”

“Mary, you must be careful. It is miserable and painful and frightening, being imprisoned at Her Majesty’s whim. Being separated from one you love.”

“A more terrible fate would be never to have the one you love at all.”

Kat stilled for a moment, then surrendered to that truth. “You are right, of course,” she confessed.

“Kat, there is one more thing the queen bade me tell you, though I hate to burden you with such a threat. She plans to keep you and Ned apart. I do not believe she can—not with so many people flocking to your side of the quarrel.”

Kat swallowed hard. “I have my little boy, and I know Ned is nearby. I can feel him, Mary, even though walls separate us. He breathes the same air, sees the sky from his window just as I do. The guards who bring me things speak to him, perhaps touch him. It is enough for now.”

I rose to leave.

“Be happy, Mary. You always had so much love to give, and most of the time I was too stupid to take it.” She rose and hugged me tight. I could feel the bulge of the coming babe against me. I did not know it was the last time I would see my pretty, loving Kat alive.

Chapter Thirty-five

K
AT
23
YEARS OLD
A
UGUST
1563

onfires smeared living flame upon the night sky. Bells rang, while people cowered in their houses, waiting for death to call. That dark summer the plague sacked London like a robber prince, its plunder near a thousand dead in a week’s time.

I did what I could to keep my boys safe—my darling Beauchamp and Thomas, who was only six months old, so small and helpless, it struck me through with dread—but what could even the most devoted mother do to protect her children from such a terrible foe?

I heard the queen herself was barricaded in Windsor, away from the contagion. She had a gallows built upon the road to prevent anyone who might carry the illness near her. As weeks passed, I began to wonder if she was hoping for the plague to breach the Tower walls, if secretly she might hope Ned, our babes, and I would die.

When news came that we were to be taken from the city, I rejoiced. But when I heard the queen’s terms, they struck, cold in my belly.

“You are to be sent to Ingatestone with Lord Thomas, Lady Katherine,” my jailer informed me. “The Earl of Hertford and Viscount Beauchamp will go to Hanworth.”

I grasped the edge of the chair, the cloth of gold tearing under my grip. “Can we not all go to Hanworth? Her Majesty cannot mean to take my little boy so far away from me.”

“There is no mistaking the queen’s orders.”

“My child and I have never been parted. He will be so afraid.”

“Would you rather he remain here in London?” the man asked coldly, always conscious of the fate of the last guards who dared to show us sympathy. “Once this transfer of custody is accomplished, you will not be allowed contact with anyone, not the Earl of Hertford or the Lady Mary Grey.”

I felt as if the queen were closing me off from light and air. My knees quaked. “Surely Her Majesty will allow me to hear how my boy fares?” I begged. “She was separated from her own mother as a child. She will let me write to him.”

“You are not in a position to question Her Majesty’s orders. We set out in an hour’s time. Do what you can to prepare the viscount and say goodbye.”

Did my wee fellow understand that something dire was coming to pass? Did he sense my heart breaking, though I tried with all my might to hide it? He twined around me like ivy, as if he were trying to melt into me, fuse with me so we could never be forced apart.

I will never forget the feel of my son’s sturdy little body being pulled from my arms. How hard I tried not to weep and frighten him even more. “You must be brave, sweeting,” I said, “and take good care of your lord father. You will play in the prettiest garden I have ever seen, and have a pony and friends to play with.”

He was so small, so much his father’s son. He did not wail, though I knew he wanted to. “You and Tom Tom come to see my pony.”

“I would like that more than anything. We shall pray for that every night. Until then, you must tell your secrets to this little fellow.” I pressed his favorite puppy into his arms. “He will help you save them up until we are together again.”

The jailer started to walk away. Beauchamp’s lip quivered. “Tomorrow, lady mother?” He asked over the man’s shoulder. “Together tomorrow?”

“Not tomorrow, but soon I hope.” Panic gripped me, a ripping away deep in my chest. “Mr. Dalton, you must tell my husband that the boy kicks his covers off. He must tuck the quilts around him tight and check them during the night. Also, his shoes are growing too small. I wanted to order larger ones, but I feared whoever made them might bring the plague.”

“They will be staying with the Duchess of Somerset. I am sure she will know what to do with the child.”
But she cannot be his mother
, I thought.
She can never be his mother
.