The Redheaded Princess: A Novel (2 page)

From an open doorway came a shout. "Make way for the Lady Elizabeth." Richard and James Vernon escorted me inside. I was half asleep. What was I to do? Would I meet my father this night? I stumbled and near fell on a doorstep, and Richard Vernon picked me up and carried me in his arms. I remember holding tightly on to him and hiding my face in his shoulder. He carried me upstairs through arched corridors ablaze with torchlight. In the distance, in darkened rooms, I saw shapes, servants scurrying about and bowing. Then we went upstairs to the royal apartments, to my suite of rooms. They were lavishly furnished, with tapestry bed hangings, artwork on the walls, sweetened rushes on the floor, and a fire burning cheerfully in the hearth. "Put her on the bed," Cat Ashley directed. Servants brought a repast of pigeon pie and hot mulled wine and sweet wafers, but I was not hungry.

"I want to sleep," I told Cat.

“And so you shall." She hunted about in my trunks for my nightdress. "Did you see all the people come out to greet me?"

"I did."

"They called me Princess."

"And you should never repeat it.”

“Will you be here tomorrow?" I asked the Vernon brothers. They assured me they would, and left the room. In the next moment I was struggling into my nightdress, and then in my bed wondering, was this the room my mother once occupied? Was her ghost still about? What would I do if I saw it? I waited, but it never came. I went to sleep.

***CHAPTER TWO

The next morning when I awoke, I knew somehow that something was wrong. The early-morning sounds in the palace were missing. There were no maids giggling and whispering. No rustling of skirts in the corridor or barked orders from the commander of the guards. True, I had not been here since Katharine had married my father a few months back. We children had not been invited. It had been a private wedding in the Queen's closet at Hampton Court. Mayhap, I thought as I ate the breakfast Cat brought me, mayhap Katharine sleeps late and likes a quiet palace. "What's amiss?" I asked Cat. "Why is this place so quiet, and why is everybody moping about?”

“Wrong? Nothing. You should dress now to meet your father. I want you to wear your very best green." Green was my color, she said, given the red of my hair. So I dressed. And while she arranged my hair, pulling it back from my face so my profile was at its best, we talked.

"I like Katharine but I scarce know her," I said. She arranged a white cap adorned with pearls on my head. "Well, you know she's been widowed before. The first husband was sixty-three and she only fourteen. She has lived in castles and even owns one. She inherited it from her second husband along with many riches. There, this cap is lovely, isn't it?”

“What else?" I asked.

She fixed my starched white uplifted collar. "She's lovely. She's written two books. She yearns for more education, and let's see...when your father had her friend Anne Askew executed for being a heretic, she said not a word."

My eyes went wide. "I heard about that. She was supposed to be burned at the stake but died quickly because a kind executioner lighted a bag of gunpowder that hung about her neck.”

“Shh. We don't speak of such things," she admonished. "That's all gossip." Gossip was the lifeblood of a palace, as everyone knew. Just as we knew that the people who knew about gossip first were the servants.

I stood up. "Do you think my father will like me in this?" I asked. My dress was green damask banded with cloth of gold.

"Your manners are more important than clothes," Cat said. "But yes, he will like you. How can he not? You look much like him."

As I walked through the halls, past guards and maids and ambassadors, to wait outside the presence chamber, I thought about Katharine, now wed to my father. I knew him to be fifty-two and, they said, very fat. "As fat as no man needs to be," they said. And I knew about his sore leg. It was from an old wound and festered all the time now and he was in great pain. Only Katharine knew how to treat the leg. And then I thought, she has to be a good person to be able to keep my father as she is keeping him.

Outside the presence chamber I met Robin, my old friend, now a sturdy boy of nine and a whole head taller than I. He kissed my hand and bowed. "My Lady Elizabeth," he said in all somberness.

"Robin." I giggled and put my arms around him. "You've gotten so tall.”

“I'm about the business of growing up," he said. And he flashed a smile that showed even, white teeth. "And so are you, I see.”

“How does all go with you, Robin?" I asked.

"Better now that I'm in your lovely presence.”

“Ah, I see you're practicing to be a courtier," I said. "A few more years and I'll match my wits with the best of them. Will you go riding with me after meeting with your father?”

“If I'm still able to breathe."

"You're that afraid of him?"

"Wouldn't you be?”

“I see you're trembling. You must try to contain yourself. Don't let him see your fear. It'll all be fine. I'm told he loves you.

"Oh, if only I could be sure of that, Robin.”

“Be sure of it. Look, I'm off to pick the horses in the stables. Tell me, why do you look so sad, Elizabeth?”

“I don't know. It seems awfully somber around here this morning. Don't you sense it? Everybody is creeping around and nobody wants to meet my eyes. What is it, Robin? I'm frightened.”

“Nothing for you to be frightened about. It's Katharine who should be frightened."

I felt a sense of dread. "Why?”

“She's been accused by the King and his council of being a wanton.”

“A wanton?”

“Yes, and don't tell me you don't know what that means, Elizabeth. She's been accused of dallying with other men before she wed your father.”

“She was married to two other men before she met my father.”

“Nevertheless, her reputation is in shreds." That's what was missing. That's what was wrong. On my last visit to the palace, though I did not really get to know her, I couldn't help noticing how Katharine spread cheer, talking about events to come, welcoming us children to the table with my father. There had even been talk of her getting me a private tutor now that Cat Ashley had taught me all she had to teach me. Now silence echoed in the rooms. The vast hallways mocked me.

"Where is she?" I asked him.

"Confined to her chambers. The King is at mass. She wants to see him, one more time before ..."

"Before what?" My voice trembled.

"Before they take her to the Tower. But he won't see her. He knows, they say, that if he does, he'll relent; he still loves her so. And everyone is saying it's just like the other time.”

“The other time?" My voice broke. "They mean my mother, don't they? He's going to have her beheaded, like my mother?" Robin didn't answer. I pushed past him and ran up the great stairway that led to the upper chambers. I knew where Katharine's apartments were, at the end of the hall. And already, as I became aware of the situation, I heard her crying and screaming and banging the door of her apartments, yelling to be let out. Four members of the Royal Guard stood outside the door.

"Make way," one of them said, "for Lady Elizabeth." This was before they realized what I was about. I ran to the door and grabbed the gold knob. One of the guards stepped forward and tried to stop me. "Lady Elizabeth," he said, "you don't want to go in there."

I felt the pearls shaking on my hood as I confronted him. "Yes, I do. I want to see Katharine.”

“It isn't allowed, Lady." He gripped his halberd, his only weapon. He looked distraught. How could he go against the wishes of the nine-year-old daughter of the King? I knew I had my royalty in my favor.

"Stand back," I ordered him, in my best imperial voice. The poor man was so confused he stood back. So did his companions. Then with one firm grasp, I opened the door. I nearly fell into Katharine's arms.

"Elizabeth!" she shouted in surprise.

"Go," I said, "run."

She did, down the hall. The chapel was at the end and she ran screaming, "Henry, Henry, just see me this one time, my dear husband. Oh, Henry!" Her slippers flapped, her gown trailed out behind her. She was wearing an underskirt of cloth of gold beneath a sleeved overdress of brocade lined with crimson satin. Around her neck was a large gold cross, studded with diamonds. Outside the chapel doors stood four more guards with halberds raised. The guards who were behind me stood frozen, not knowing what to do. I blocked their way and they could not very well wrestle with the Lady Elizabeth, could they? Katharine reached the chapel doors and managed to pound on them. In a few moments they opened and my father, the King, stood there in all his bulky magnificence, clad in orange and russet velvet trimmed with ermine, dangling his jewelry of state. On his head was his little sideways hat with a peacock feather twirled around toward his face. His leg was bandaged. Immediately Katharine fell to her knees, begging for her life.

"By God, someone shall pay for this. Who let her out?" my father roared. Silence from everyone. "Can't I trust a living soul to do my bidding? Take her away. Take her back. Now." Then he saw me at the other end of the hall, surrounded by four guards. "By heaven, you go too far," he roared again. "Do you think to put yourself above the thinking of your King?"

Katharine was brought back, weeping, half dragged by the guards. They took her past me into her apartments and closed the door. And at the top of the stairway, where I'd just come up, stood Robin and Cat Ashley. My saviors. If ever I needed them, I needed them now.

***CHAPTER THREE

I was dismissed from the palace that very day and sent back to Hatfield. My father saw me after Mass and I had to muster all my strength not to tremble in his presence. Fortunately Cat Ashley came with me and stood to one side while I knelt at Father's feet and begged his forgiveness.

"She acted in haste and emotion," Cat Ashley said in my behalf.

"So do most women. It's their ruination. I am thinking of sending Katharine to the Tower because of just such failings. By God's teeth, I'll not have a daughter of mine behave so indiscriminately. Back to Hatfield you go to learn some common sense, child."

I thought when I heard the word child that there was some warmth in his voice, some caring. I would have done anything at that moment to be forgiven. We left soon afterward. I was in disgrace. As I was helped into my litter by Richard Vernon, he winked at me. "You did your best, Lady Elizabeth," he whispered. "Everyone thinks so."

My father never came to see me at Hatfield that summer of 1544. And he never wrote. Nor did I write to him. Cat Ashley urged me to. So did my knights. But I felt myself wronged by him, and my stubborn temper, equal to his, would not let me go a-begging to be taken back into his affections. Betimes, however, he did allow my brother, Edward, to visit, and Edward was now attended upon by my friend Robin. So my dear friend would be in the party, besides numerous members of Edward's household. And Robin would help me catch up with what went on at court.

"Your father has forgiven Katharine Parr for her indiscretions," he told me.

"Was she indeed a wanton?”

“No. She was worse. A radical. She was having her own thoughts about religion. Your father cannot tolerate that. But don't worry. They are back together again. Your father decided she is but a woman with all the imperfections natural to the weakness of her sex. And his mind is on other things. The invasion of France. He is readying his army. That and the
Act of Succession
. He is going to restore you and Mary in line for the throne."

I had heard rumors of such. "So he forgives me, then?”

“Enough to have you declared, once again, Princess Elizabeth.”

“But not enough to invite me back to court?"

"Why don't you write to him?" I can't. "You share more than his red hair, I see. He is King, Elizabeth. Before he is your father.”

“Let him decide if he wants to be a father or not.”

“Then write to Katharine. She still wants to bring the family together." As always, he helped me figure out the problem. Katharine! Of course! Word had it that since their falling out, my father had bestowed upon her the sweetest of benedictions.

"My own Robin. What would I do without you?”

“One more thing," he added. "Sir Thomas Seymour has returned from his post abroad. It is said your father knows of his feelings for Katharine. And now he's made him Lord High Admiral and sent him away again to the Kentish coast, against the French invasion."

My face flamed. Robin knew of my fascination with Sir Thomas Seymour. I tried to walk past Robin now, but he stood in my path. "Elizabeth," he said firmly. "Half the court of women are in love with Thomas Seymour. I don't care about that. I care about you and what this says of your father." I made myself look at him. "What does it say?"

"Your father can make people he doesn't like, people who offend him, disappear, Elizabeth. In one way or another. Don't be one of those people. Write to Katharine Parr and get back in his good graces. She will help you."

For all his saying that women had weaknesses, my father made Katharine regent when he left for the invasion of France the second week in July, though he also left her with four male advisers. Katharine went to Dover with him to kiss him good-bye. I wished I could be there. Robin told me that my father had assembled the largest and most powerful force since the height of the Hundred Years' War. It left on the night tide and arrived at Calais on the fourteenth of July. How I wished I were a boy so I could go with him! How I wished I were Queen and it was my powerful force! I felt cheated, left out.

On the twenty-fifth he lay siege to Boulogne, France's leading Channel port. On the eighteenth of September he entered Boulogne in triumph. I knew my father enough to understand what his mood would be. And so I sat down and wrote to Katharine, congratulating her on running the kingdom in my father's absence and begging her to invoke his forgiveness of his most unworthy daughter. Katharine had been writing to him all along. And so she made her appeal for me.

My father's mood was so ebullient that he himself wrote to me, telling me of his siege and that, in celebration thereof, he was sending me a real tutor to educate me properly, in light of my new place in line for the throne. His name was William Grindal, and he appeared at Hatfield on horseback one day with a note of recommendation in hand from a true man of letters, Roger Ascham. And so my real education began. The Latin and Greek became more difficult. And then there was the script I must learn to write, with pen and ink and swirling flourishes. I practiced it for hours. I broke silver pen after silver pen. I spilled the ink. I cried. And the only thing that kept me at it was when Mr. Grindal told me one day, "You must practice and practice, for one day you will be signing papers as the Queen of England. It can't be an ordinary signature. It must stand out on its own.