I receive one of Sir William Cecil’s rare replies. He writes that my sister Katherine is to go into the keeping of another loyal courtier dug up from obscurity, almost in the grave from old age: Sir John Wentworth who lives at Gosfield Hall. She will live in the west wing, she will be served by her ladies. Her son Thomas, who has never known life out of imprisonment, who has never seen an open sky in all his three years, will remain with her.
As for Mr. Keyes, he is to be allowed to walk in the yard and stretch out his long legs, William Cecil writes with a glimmer of his old humor. The queen is disposed to show him mercy, and there are many who urge forgiveness for you and Lady Katherine in these troubling times. I am foremost.
I am not quite sure what especially Cecil means by “troubling times,” since these are the only times we have known since his protégé came to the throne, but in June I hear that the worst thing for Elizabeth has finally happened: the Scots queen Mary has given birth. Even worse for Elizabeth, who urged Mary’s husband to fire a gun into her belly, the young woman has survived the birth. Worse still, it is a healthy baby. And worst of all for Elizabeth: it is a boy. The papist cousin, just like the Protestant cousin, has a healthy son and heir to the throne of England. Elizabeth, thirty-two years old, unmarried, unloved, now has two cousins with boys in the cradle. She cannot deny them all.
What she does, of course, is what she always does. She runs away and pretends that it is not happening. The Chequers cook is friends with a royal groom and we hear all about the fine celebrations at Kenilworth, when Robert Dudley throws his fortune at the feet of his queen and most elusive lover. Apparently, there is a whole new wing of rooms built just for her visit, and masques and hunts and a specially commissioned play and fireworks. After his disappointment of Candlemas he is throwing himself into another attempt at wooing. This year he has left court in a rage or in despair twice, and both times she has humbled herself to beg for his return. It is clear to everyone that she cannot live without him. He must be wondering if it is clear to her.
I sit in my tiny room and I think of Elizabeth my cousin watching fireworks reflected in the great lake at Kenilworth, and I try to damp down the bitterness of my rage. I am not a melancholy prisoner like my sister Katherine, I do not give myself up to grief. I cannot forgive Elizabeth for her insane treatment of us. I think of her as a malicious madwoman, and when I write one of my regular letters pleading for forgiveness, promising my undying loyalty, I am lying like all of her courtiers. She has made a court of liars, and I am the worst.
CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
AUTUMN 1566
I hear that, once again, she keeps Robert Dudley uncertain; but this is just as I predicted. I believe he will always be on the threshold of marriage with her and never be able to jump over. I believe that she will never marry anyone. I swore it years ago, I would swear it now. She will always hold him close enough to ruin his life, but never close enough to ruin hers. She returns to London from Kenilworth, and now she has to call a parliament. She needs funds. She is spending a fortune causing trouble in Scotland: spying and rebellion never come cheap. But parliament will not grant her money without a promise about the succession. They see that they have the chance to dictate to her. The Protestant parliament wants only one heir—my sister Katherine, with her Seymour son to come after her.
One day, when I am walking in the garden and admiring the blazing colors in the trees of the parkland, and the whirl of golden leaves around my feet, I see a square of white on the path before me. I pick it up in a moment and unfold it.
Your friends will speak for you and your sister. Neither of you is forgotten. England knows its heirs.
I tuck it in my pocket and when I get back to my room I burn it in the empty grate and mash the ashes with a poker. I find I am smiling. Perhaps soon I will be able to walk across a room that is wider than twelve feet. I will walk in a garden and out through the garden gate. Perhaps next spring I will hear a lucky cuckoo in Bradgate Park.
My unwilling host comes to me in my little room. He is wearing riding breeches and boots, a warm cape over his arm, a hat in his hand; he is not shamefaced, he is beaming. He bows low to me as I am seated on my single chair before the open window. At once, I am as alert as a deer scenting the wind for the smell of hunting hounds. What is happening now?
“You see, I am going away. I am going to London,” he says.
I nod, keeping my expression calm and interested while my thoughts whirl.
“I beg of you to stay quietly in my house while I am gone,” he says. “If you were to take advantage of my absence to attempt to leave, the queen’s displeasure would fall very heavily on me and on my wife. I dare not face it. You understand.”
“I have nowhere to go, and no one to meet; and I would not expose you or my sister to such trouble,” I promise him. “I don’t doubt that the queen would punish my sister and my nephews if I were to escape.”
He bows again. “Besides, I hope to return with good news for you and Lady Hertford, your royal sister,” he says.
I note that he gives Katherine her royal recognition and her married title. “Oh, really?”
He glances behind to make sure that there is no one lingering beside the open door. I close the window and turn to him. At once we are conspirators, guarding against spies.
“I am called to parliament,” he says. “We are going to insist that the queen names her heir. Only parliament can raise taxes for her, and we can stipulate the conditions. For once we are all agreed, we have not been divided by advisors from court, and we are united with the House of Lords. We will insist that she name her heir, and that her heir be Lady Hertford and her son.”
I could leap up and clap my hands; but I sit like the princess I am and I incline my head. “I am glad to hear it,” is all I say.
“When you are released”—he says “when,” he does not say “if”—“I hope you will tell your sister, Lady Hertford, that I have been as good a host to you as I was allowed to be.”
“I will tell her that,” I say fairly. “And I will tell her that you went to London when you were called and that you spared no effort to join with the others to persuade the queen to name my sister as her heir.”
He bows as low as to a member of the royal family.
“And,” I add, “I would be very obliged if you would visit Mr. Thomas Keyes in the Fleet Prison and insist that he is released.”
“I will raise it with my fellow members of parliament,” he promises. “Of course, no man should be held without charge.” He waits in case I have any other instructions. “Should I speak to anyone at court on your behalf?”
I smile at him. I am not going to name my friends or my few kinswomen. I will incriminate no one. “Let it all be done in the open,” I say. “Speak of me and of my sister to everyone.”
In my guardian’s absence I am allowed to walk and sit in the garden. I study and I write, I read my Bible and I draw. I even attempt some frescoes on the walls of my room, remembering the carvings of the Dudley boys’ in the stone chimney breast made by the Tower all that long time ago. I think that if Katherine and I are released, and she is named as heir and we are restored to our home, then this long painful story of family disloyalty and loss of love will be ended and the innocent children will be freed. I think of the little nephews and I pray that they will both grow up in their father’s beautiful house, under the care of both their parents, knowing themselves to be rightful heirs to the throne, certain to take their place. I think Katherine will be a good Queen of England: she will not usurp her powers or use spies and torture to get her way. Her boy who comes after her will be an honorable Protestant king, a Seymour Tudor king like my poor cousin King Edward.
After a week Lady Hawtrey receives a letter from her husband and brings it to me in my little room. She taps on the door and comes in when I call “Enter!”
“My husband has sent a letter from London to tell me how they go on,” she says, curtseying very low. “I thought that you would want to know the news.”