I have sent you, good sister Katherine, a book, which although it be not outwardly trimmed with gold, yet inwardly it is more worth than precious stones. It is the book, dear sister, of the laws of the Lord: It is His Testament and Last Will, which He bequeathed unto us wretches, which shall lead you to the path of eternal joy, and if you, with a good mind, read it, and with an earnest desire follow it, it shall bring you to an immortal and everlasting life.
It will teach you to live and learn you to die . . . win you more than you should have gained by the possession of your woeful father’s lands . . . such riches as neither the covetous shall withdraw from you, neither the thief shall steal, neither let the moth corrupt . . .
And as touching my death, rejoice as I do and consider that I shall be delivered of this corruption and put on incorruption, for as I am assured that I shall for losing of a mortal life, find an immortal felicity.
Farewell, good sister, put only your trust in God, who only must uphold you,
Your loving sister,
Jane Duddley
I read, with growing disbelief, this sermon—the only goodbye from my older sister that I will ever get. I read it again, only this time I am furious. I really don’t know what she thinks I am going to do with this miserable letter. I don’t know what good she thinks it will do me. I have to say that if it was me about to die, I wouldn’t write such a letter to little Mary. What a thing to write! How would it ever comfort her? I read and reread it though my eyes are so sore from crying that I can’t see her careful clerkly hand. Nothing is crossed out, nothing is blotted. She did not cry over writing as I am crying over reading it. She did not desperately scrawl it in a passion to say goodbye to me, her little sister who looks up to her and loves her so much. She wasn’t anxious to tell me that she loves me, that she is thinking of me, that she is heartbroken that we won’t grow up together. We will never now be ladies at court giggling over our admirers; we will never be learned old ladies reading to our children. She thought through these elegant paragraphs and wrote them as they came to her, with refined scholarship, without hesitation. And all about God. God! As usual.
Of course, as soon as I have read it and reread it, I know exactly what I am going to do with it. Not ball it up and hurl it into the fire, in a rage of grief, which was my first impulse. I am going to do what she wanted me to do. She didn’t even have to tell me; she knew that I would know. She didn’t have to spoil her holy detachment with a practical instruction. I know what she wants without her saying. I am to send this letter, this coldhearted unsisterly letter, to her so-called important friends in Switzerland and they will print it and get it published and send it out to everyone. And everyone will read it and say what a wonderful letter of piety, what a saint the girl was, what wise advice to her little sister, how certain it is that her faith has taken her to heaven. How lucky we all are to have been blessed with her presence.
Then everyone will admire Jane and quote this damned letter forever. They will print it in England and Germany and Switzerland as part of the wonderful scholarship of Jane Grey, proof that she was an exceptional young woman whose memory will go on and on, whose life will be a sermon to the young. And if anyone thinks of me at all, they will think that I am a very stupid frivolous girl to be the recipient of the last letter of a martyr. If Mary Magdalene had arrived at the empty tomb on Easter morning and failed to notice the gardener who was the risen Christ, and so ruined the miracle of Easter for everyone forever, I would be her: the secondary player in the greatest scene, who completely fails in her part. If Mary Magdalene tripped over a rock and hopped about clutching her toe—that would be me. Everyone is going to remember Jane the saint. Nobody is going to think twice about me—the stupid sister who received her last great letter. Nobody will think that I wanted and deserved a last letter, a proper letter, a personal letter. And no one will give a second thought to our little sister Mary, who doesn’t even get a miserable sermon.
If Jane were not dead, I would be really furious with her about this. “Learn you to die”! What a thing to write to a sister who has always loved her! If she were alive, I would go to the Tower right now and knock off her black hood and pull her hair for writing such a heartless letter to her little sister, for writing to me—to me!—that I should be glad that we have lost all our money, that I should be glad that we have lost our home, that I should be glad to have a Bible rather than jewels. As if I would ever rather have an old Bible than my lovely home, a Bible instead of Bradgate! As if anyone would! As if I don’t love jewels and pretty things and prize them above everything else in the world! As if she doesn’t know this, as if she hasn’t laughed at me for my silly vanity a hundred times!
And then I remember, with a gulp of horror like ice in my belly, that her hood is off her head already, and her head is off her body, and if I pulled her plait, then her head would swing like a ball on a rope in my hand, and I find I am screaming and I put my hands over my panting mouth until I choke down my retching sobs.
I sleep out of sheer weariness in my bed in the quiet house. My husband, Henry, does not come to lie with me. I suppose that he never will. I think he is probably forbidden even to see me. Certainly we have not been left alone together since Queen Mary returned in her triumph to London. I imagine the Herberts are desperate to get the marriage set aside, and free him from the terrible disadvantage of a wife whose sister was beheaded for treason. They will be writing out confessions and swearing that they hardly knew us Greys at all. It was such a brilliant marriage only nine months ago; then I was a catch, now I am an embarrassment. I stay in my rooms and when I go to dinner, I sit at the ladies’ table and I keep my head down and hope that no one speaks to me, for I don’t even know what my name is: am I Katherine Herbert still? Or am I Katherine Grey again? I don’t know who I am supposed to be, I don’t know what I am supposed to say. I think it safer to say nothing.
I would pray for my father but I don’t know what prayers are allowed. I know we’re not to pray in English anymore, and absolutely forbidden from doing anything that is not part of the old Mass. I understand the Latin well enough—I’m not completely ignorant—it just seems odd to me to be praying in a language that most people can’t understand. The priest turns his back on his congregation and celebrates the Mass as if it were a secret, between him and God, and this is so odd to me, who has been brought up with the communion table on the chancel steps and everyone coming up for bread and wine. The people mumble the responses, uncertain of the strange words. Nobody knows what is holy, nobody knows what is right, and nobody knows who I am—not even me.
They take my father to trial and they find him guilty again. I think that since the queen pardoned him once before, surely she is certain to repeat the pardon? Since it is the same offense? Why would she not? If treason was not too bad the first time, is it that much worse being done again? I can’t see my mother to ask her if she hopes to save her husband as she did last time, because I don’t go anywhere. I don’t leave Baynard’s Castle. I don’t know if I am allowed out. I think not.