We are like an army of ants trying to move a dead rabbit. We gather around her, pulling the puffs of the inner sleeves out through the ornate embroidered slashes, fastening the hooks and eyes, settling the gown over the farthingale and roll so that it rides high around her hips. When we fall back, she says, “Shoes,” and young Jennie goes down on her knees to tie the bows on Her Majesty’s best shoes.
She stands while we drape her with jewels and pin them safely. She says she will wear a cape over everything to go down the river to Durham House, and we arrange the hood over the towering red wig. She stands high above me, I see her as a created monster, half of horsehair and satin, sea pearls and white lead. I think: this is the last day that I will fear you. I will seek my own heart’s desire, as my sister did, perhaps as both my sisters did, as you never dare to do. Pray God I am indeed so small that you do not stoop to notice me. Pray God that since I am neither your rival in looks nor threat as heir, I can marry a nobody, as my mother did, as my stepgrandmother has done, and hide my name in his. Like my stepgrandmother who was Catherine Brandon but is now Catherine Bertie, I shall lose the great name of Grey and be called Mary Keyes.
Elizabeth goes towards the door to the privy chamber. We ladies are expected to follow without delaying to look at our own reflections, or straightening our own gowns. I go behind her, as my rank requires. In the absence of the disgraced Margaret Douglas I am first at court. I am going to slip away when everyone gets on the barge.
We walk through the privy garden to the pier, and there is the father of the bride in earnest argument with the new Spanish ambassador, Don Diego Guzmán de Silva. They start apart as they see Elizabeth, and then Sir Ambrose Cave explains that the French ambassador was dining with him before the wedding and is now refusing to leave. He will not give way to the Spanish ambassador. Clearly, the queen cannot walk into a diplomatic squabble—least of all when everyone knows that France and Spain are vying against each other to support the Queen of Scots against her loving cousin in England.
For a moment I think that Elizabeth will throw one of her tantrums and none of us will attend the wedding, and I will have to send to Thomas and tell him that our wedding, too, will have to be canceled. But then I see him towering head and shoulders over every other man at court, at the privy garden gate, waiting to make sure that the queen safely boards her royal barge. His warm dark gaze rests on me and then passes, expressionless, onwards. I am so relieved that he knows, that he understands, that he will not make a play out of anger and disappointment as these foolish ambassadors are doing.
William Cecil is deputed to solve the problem. He and Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, the queen’s ambassador to Scotland, go together to Durham House to clear the way for the queen. My Thomas is to walk with them. I see them go through the gate, Thomas holding the gate for the two great men, and following behind them with quiet respect.
The queen is unusually patient. From this I know that she is determined to attend Henry Knollys’ wedding. Elizabeth wishes it and will make great allowances to ensure that she is not crossed. She takes a seat, and someone fetches the musicians, who come tumbling out of the palace, thinking that they had finished work for the day, and they play for her, while the court stands around and chats to each other, alert for her attention, restless as waiting horses. In less than half an hour the garden gate opens again and my Thomas ushers in Sir William and Sir Nicholas, who are both smiling.
“Please,” William Cecil invites the queen. “Please embark in your barge. The French ambassador has left his dinner to oblige us all, and you can make your entry to the wedding.”
It could not be better for me. Everyone is so eager to go after the delay that nobody notices me at all.
I touch Mary Ratcliffe’s arm. “I cannot come. I have such an ache in my belly, I couldn’t trust myself in the chapel,” I say.
“Shall you ask permission?”
“She doesn’t care,” I say certainly. “I won’t chase after her and delay her again. If she asks for me, tell her I was sick and begged to be excused.”
The court heads down to the pier, we can hear the shout as the rowers present the oars. “Go on,” I say. “Don’t keep her waiting now!”
Mary scutters away and I am left in the empty garden. I turn and go back indoors to the palace, and on an impulse, I return through the privy chamber and into the queen’s bedroom.
I am strangely tempted to meddle with the things. There are so many beautiful things spread everywhere—the pots and paints on the table, the jewels in their boxes, the ribbons and the laces, like toys in an overstocked nursery of a spoiled child. The servants will come in soon, to clean and tidy and put everything to rights, but in the meantime I am undisturbed. I take the empty pot of ceruse and I paint a little under my eyes. I rub it off at once. It is such a bright white, it makes me look like a masquer. It does nothing for my looks; I do not have pockmarks and wrinkles to hide.
I take off my hood and let my hair down and brush it gently, smoothly, with the queen’s gold-backed hairbrush. The bristles glide through my fair hair and it tumbles to my shoulders. I put down the brush and plait it carefully, using my own hairpins to coil it closely against my head so my hood can go on top. I think, tonight Thomas Keyes will take off my hood and let down my hair, and I spray it with a little oil of roses that Elizabeth keeps on her table and I sniff at the warm sweet smell.
I make sure that I pull my fair hairs from her hairbrush, where they gleam among the thin wisps of gray, and then I put it back, exactly where her lady-in-waiting laid it down. I dab a little carmine on my lips and admire the effect; I powder a little rouge on my cheeks. I take up Elizabeth’s pencil and color my eyebrows, as she does. This is too strong, and I rub it off again with the heel of my hand. I feel wonderfully naughty, like a child playing at a wealthy mother’s dressing table.
I can tell from the silence of all the rooms that the whole court has gone to Durham House, and so I rise up from the table and smile at myself in the silvered mirror. There are jewels belonging to the queen in boxes all around the room but it does not occur to me to steal anything. I am Jane Grey’s sister, I am Katherine Grey’s sister: she is the rightful heir to all of this. All this is ours; I don’t doubt I will sit here by right one day.
I have invited three of my kinswomen to dine with me: Margaret Willoughby, my favorite cousin, and the two Stafford girls. I can trust them to keep my secret; but I will not risk their being blamed for my wedding by having them as witnesses. Instead, I send for my maidservant, who was taking the absence of the court as an excuse for her own holiday, and she comes to my rooms in an excited rush, wondering what I want from her. I tell her to wait and she will see. Then there is a tap on the door and she hurries to open it, and there, filling the doorway, his head bent under the lintel, is my love, my great love.
“It is nine o’clock,” he says, and we hear the clock strike to prove his punctuality. “Are you ready, my darling?”
I get to my feet and I put my hand out to him.
“I am ready.”
“And no second thoughts?” he asks gently. “Are you sure?”
I smile at him. I don’t need rouge to make me flush with desire. “I am sure,” I say. “I have loved you for so long, Thomas. I will be proud to become your wife.”
He bows his head and takes my hand and we lead the way, with my three friends and the little maid, Frances, following, through the deserted palace to Thomas’s rooms above the watergate.
His rooms are crowded: his brother is here and several of his friends. Thomas has hired a priest, who is waiting with his prayer book open. I turn and say to my bridesmaids: “You must all go, and wait outside. If anyone ever asks you, you can say that you were not witnesses, you were outside the door.”