Lady in Waiting: A Novel (22 page)

In a year’s time, it seemed, everything would be different.

We had been in London for near a month, and still there had been no visit from young Edward Seymour. Jane still received letters from him, but he spoke only of the distant future and never of the worrisome present. His father continued to wage a political battle with John Dudley, now the new Duke of Northumberland, and Dudley’s many supporters. The elder Seymour’s problems were far from over; he had been arrested a second time and deposited in the Tower. It was difficult for Jane to maintain a pleasant countenance at the many parties and events her parents pulled her to, as John Dudley was often at such events.

One evening I was summoned to Jane’s chambers to help her dress for a dinner engagement. The duchess had chosen the gown for that
evening, and it was particularly elegant—nasturtium red velvet with turned-back sleeves of peacock blue, worked with a cornflower design of gold. Spanish embellishments decorated the inside of the open collar and the wrist-frills. A second collar of white gauze had been embroidered with red silk. Jane took one look at the dress and announced she wished to wear black.

“Please, my lady,” I urged. “The duchess—”

“Princess Elizabeth would never wear such a brazen garment. I should be wearing black.” She stared at the dress in my hands as if it were a loathsome snake.

“But you will look beautiful in this dress,” I said.

She turned from me. “I don’t want to be beautiful.”

“But why ever not?” I asked.

She choked back a sob. “I don’t want to be beautiful.”

“What troubles you tonight, my lady?” I asked her.

For a moment she said nothing. “I am afraid,” she finally whispered. Her gaze rested unblinking on the dress and its shouting colors.

“Afraid of what, my lady?”

But she would not answer me.

I said nothing and waited for wisdom. I did not know what to say to her. To my gratitude, a moment later, she turned back around and stretched out her arms for the bodice. I saw that Edward’s ring was on her finger, but the stones were turned inward toward her palm.

Half an hour later, the dress was on her. I walked with her, bearing her train, to the barge that would take her on the Thames to a party I was sure Edward would not be attending.

When she returned at midnight, I helped her disengage from the dress she had not wanted to wear. Mrs. Ellen was there too, fussing over her and asking who was the handsome young lord who had been after Jane’s attention all evening?

Jane shrugged. “It does not matter.”

“Handsome young lord?” I asked, directing the question to Mrs. Ellen.

“Och. Yes, ’tis all Lady Katherine spoke of on the barge coming home. That a handsome gentleman had eyes only for Jane.”

Jane moved away from us to her bed, her white chemise falling about her body like the cloak of an angel.

“But … but my lady is betrothed,” I whispered.

“Perhaps this will speed things along,” Mrs. Ellen whispered back. “’Tis not official, the agreement with Somerset. Perhaps this will speed things along.”

I learned the next morning the handsome young lord was John Dudley’s son, Guildford.

As Christmas neared, I was most anxious to be dismissed for the holidays to be with my family. Nicholas was coming to meet my parents, and I could scarce think of anything else. I knew our time of betrothal would be lengthy. Nicholas had yet another year at Oxford. But still I was oft imagining myself the lady of my own house, wife to Nicholas Staverton, sewing infant smocks instead of ball gowns.

In late November a package arrived for Jane from the Princess Mary, who was living in virtual exile in Hertfordshire. There were plans in place for Jane and her mother to spend Christmas with the Princess Mary, and the package was an early present so that Jane would have something lovely to wear when Mary of Guise came to visit London the following week. Inside the box was an exquisite gown of French design. The cone-shaped bodice included a partlet of embroidered gauze with an upstanding collar finished in tiny, bright pleats. The sleeves, with puffs at the shoulders, were embellished with ribbons of gold, tiny pearls, and jeweled buttons.
The skirt was a creamy satin and the mantle was of blue velvet embroidered with lilies. Jewels glittered everywhere, at every seam and gather. It seemed to shout, as a champion might, “At last. We are victorious!”

Lady Jane gasped when she saw it. “Whatever would I do with such a dress!” she exclaimed.

“Why, wear it, my wee lass!” Mrs. Ellen answered. “’Tis a dress finer than any queen’s!”

“I … I couldn’t.” The color in Jane’s face had drained, and she looked at the dress with something akin to fear. “No upstanding Reformed girl would wear it! Elizabeth wouldn’t. I won’t.”

“Elizabeth is not going to Princess Mary’s home for Christmas either. You are!”

“Why would she send this to me? Is she mocking me?” Jane turned to me. “Is the Princess Mary mocking me?”

Mrs. Ellen spoke before I could answer that I’d no idea why Princess Mary would send such an expensive gown. “She is fond of you, my lady!” Mrs. Ellen put her hands on her ample hips. “Does she need more reason than that?”

But Jane turned away from the gown.

“You will be writing the Princess Mary this very afternoon to thank her or the duchess will hear of it, and you don’t want that, my lady,” Mrs. Ellen said, lifting the dress from within the box.

“When do you leave, Lucy?” Jane said absently. Mrs. Ellen clucked her tongue and whispered something under her breath. She swept out of the room, carrying the glistening dress in her arms.

“Not for several weeks, my lady.”

“I wish you were coming with us to the Princess Mary’s.”

“I shall only be gone for a few days.”

“Is Mr. Staverton coming to see you?” She fingered the ring Edward had given her.

“God be willing,” I answered.

“God be willing,” she said, though not to me.

A week later, as I assisted Jane down the stairs to supper, a messenger burst into the hall with dreadful news. The Duke of Somerset, Edward Seymour’s father, had just been tried at Westminster Hall on an exaggerated charge of treason, convicted, and condemned to death.

Jane flew to her chambers, begging Mrs. Ellen over and over to tell her what this meant for her and Edward. Jane’s parents had not summoned her, nor were they even at home when the news came.

But Mrs. Ellen didn’t know.

None of us knew.

All Jane could do was sit at the window, spinning Edward’s ring on her finger as she waited for her parents to return home.

M
olly sat across from me, stroking the stem of her coffee mug. Jeff and their girls were in Central Park enjoying the April brilliance of a Sunday afternoon. I had been back in Manhattan for less than an hour, having left my parents’ house that morning a little after noon, much to their dismay. Leslie had come over early to have breakfast with us and then stayed until I left. My parents never had the long talk alone with me they’d wanted to have. I had come to Molly’s straight from the train station.

I took a sip from my water glass.

“We’re still friends, right?” Molly said.

I smiled at her. “I’m not mad at you, if that’s what you mean.”

“I felt really bad about what I said about you letting everybody make your decisions. And I didn’t like it that you were gone and I couldn’t tell you in person that I felt bad about it.”

“It’s all right, Molly. I suppose I’ve known all along what you said was true.” A breeze blew up onto her patio and fluttered the flowered tablecloth on the table between us. The flattened rose petals seemed to applaud. “I let my parents choose my college major; I let them decide Kyle wasn’t the right guy for me. I let Brad choose where we’d live. I let my mother choose the job I have now. I even let my parents choose Brad. And now I am letting Brad choose whether we’ve a marriage worth saving or not.”

Silence stretched across the table for a few moments. The breeze wafted away. Then Molly spoke.

“Did you and Brad talk at all this weekend?”

I’d kept my phone close to me all during Leslie’s party, ready to excuse myself if Brad called. When he didn’t, I reasoned that he got my voice mail too late to call back and would call me in the morning.

When he didn’t do that, I thought perhaps he wanted to wait until I was back in Manhattan, or at least on the train, away from my mother’s listening ears before he returned my call.

“I called him last night, before Leslie’s party started. Left a ridiculous message.”

“A ridiculous message?”

“I stammered and stuttered, and I told him I missed him. He didn’t call me back.”

Molly looked down at her lap, as if struggling to know what to say next. Something niggled at me.

“Why did you ask me if Brad and I had talked this weekend?” I asked.

And then suddenly I knew.

She had seen him. He had been here. In Manhattan.

Not the day before. The day before, he was at UMass with Connor. If he came, he came that day. And it’s a four-hour drive from Manchester to Manhattan.