14
Elizabeth
I
t was past the midnight hour and we were all sound asleep, snug in our beds, except for my steward, Mr. Parry, who was burning the candles late over the account books, when the fists came pounding, incessant and demanding, upon the front door of my London house.
Mr. Parry, who had fallen asleep at his desk, grumpily descended the stairs, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and barking at them to stop that infernal pounding. It was loud enough to wake the dead as well as the occupants of this house and those on either side, he said. His wife, Blanche, her graying blond curls sleep-rumpled, followed him down, clutching a pale pink shawl over her modest white nightgown. And Kat and I straggled after, yawning, with our steps still leaden with slumber. In my sleep-befuddled state, I had forgotten to pull on my dressing gown, and Kat, her braids fuzzy beneath her ruffled nightcap, did not think to remind me, so I descended the stairs with my hair flowing loose about the shoulders of my white long-sleeved winter nightgown to confront a representative from the Council and a detachment of armed guards.
It was then that I learned that all Tom Seymour’s schemes had gone fantastically awry, their destruction as fabulous and outlandish as the schemes themselves had been. It had all ended in a comedy of errors. Tom was in the Tower now, charged with High Treason, and we—Mrs. Ashley, Mr. Parry, and I—stood accused of conspiring with him.
Despite their heated, increasingly frightened and hysterical protests of ignorance and innocence, the guards roughly seized hold of Kat and Mr. Parry, wrestling their arms behind their backs, as they hustled them out into the icy January night to where a barge waited to take them to the Tower for questioning.
In a panic, Mr. Parry broke free of them and threw off his gold chain of office from around his neck and wrenched the rings from his fingers and flung them higgledy-piggledy into the air, as he burst into frightened tears and wailed, “Would that I had never been born, for I am now undone!” before the guards again caught hold of him.
Kat and I tried to cling to each other but the guards tore us apart. And when Blanche Parry pleaded for them to tarry just long enough for her to run upstairs to fetch some proper warm clothes for Kat, shivering with cold and fear in her nightgown and cap, she was refused and soundly rebuked for trying to give comfort to one who was possibly a traitor.
“You have no right!” I heatedly exclaimed. Conjuring up the memory of my father and calling forth all my royal dignity, I stamped my foot indignantly, drew my spine up straight, thrust my shoulders back and my chin up high. “We know
nothing
of the Lord Admiral’s schemes! How
dare
you disturb the peace of
my
household in the middle of the night and manhandle my servants? My brother, the King, shall hear of this!”
With chilly eyes, and an even colder voice, Sir Robert Tyrwhitt turned to me.
“My Lady Princess,” he said with a mocking half bow, “in deference to your royal station, I offer you a choice—you may either walk out to my barge or be dragged and carried out by these guards and dumped into it like a sack of grain.”
Eyes blazing, I tossed my head defiantly, whipping my hair back over my shoulders, and turned to plant my velvet-slippered foot firmly on the bottom step. “I will walk without the
chivalrous assistance
you so kindly offer me, My Lord, but
first
, I
will
dress.”
His hand shot out to stay me.
“Mrs. Parry can pack what you need; I shall send word back of where to send it. But
you must
come
now,
My Lady Princess. We shall
not
tarry.”
Contemptuously, I jerked my arm free, shook back and smoothed down my hair and, clad in only my nightgown and slippers, walked boldly out into the frigid black night, with my head held high as if I were entering the King’s Presence Chamber in my finest array. Appearances are everything, and those who show their fear and weaknesses are most vulnerable.
Perhaps something in my demeanor impressed him, or some hint of compassion stirred him, or maybe he was trying to win my trust and, by extension, my gratitude, I really cannot say, but as I paused on the jetty before stepping into the barge, the icy wind, that seemed to burn and freeze at the same time, tugging viciously at my hair and gown, Sir Robert removed his own velvet cloak and draped it most solicitously about my shoulders. Contemptuously, I shrugged it off just as quickly and let it fall into the dirty, dark waters of the Thames as I stepped, unaided, into the barge and settled myself upon the velvet-cushioned seat.
I held my chin up high and stared straight ahead of me, biting my lips to prevent their quivering lest they think I shivered from fear as well as from the cold. Nor did I give them the satisfaction of asking where they were taking me; I would know soon enough. And if it happened to be the Tower, where my mother had gone before me, my body would not betray the truth that inside I cowered and cried like a frightened child, like the three-year-old I had been the day the French executioner’s sword ended my mother’s life. I was not only Great Harry’s daughter, I was Anne Boleyn’s as well, and, by heaven, I would show them all that that was a combination to be reckoned with! And, come what may, I would hold my head up high until the moment the executioner struck it off, if such was to be my fate!
But it was not to the Tower that they took me, but to my own house of Hatfield. But rather than let me go upstairs to resume my so rudely interrupted rest, or to dress or even don a robe, ease my bladder, or partake of a morsel of food or a warming drink, instead I was ushered immediately into the downstairs study by Sir Robert Tyrwhitt to begin the first round of questioning.
I knew what his game was; keeping me thus, he expected me to behave like what I was—a frightened and friendless fifteen-year-old girl, her nerves sorely jangled by an abrupt awakening and seeing her beloved governess dragged off to the Tower, with its numerous tortures and horrors, where the man she allegedly loved already languished. And as an added boon they hoped that my nakedness beneath my nightgown—one lone layer of white cloth without the rigid and respectable confines of tightly laced stays, stiff layered petticoats, covered by a proper gown—would make me feel even more vulnerable, and perhaps even conjure up memories of the wanton romps I was said to have indulged in with my stepfather, the Lord Admiral. Well, Sir Robert had met his match in Elizabeth Tudor. He might strip me naked, and leave me without sustenance until my belly howled like a banshee, but he would
never
take away my dignity! Stark naked I still had more backbone than the most rigorous corset either tailor or torturer could devise!
My chin shooting up as if my nose would bump the moon out of the sky to make way for the sun, I swept past him and settled myself in the most comfortable chair by the fire, flipped off my damp, cold slippers, and stretched out my toes to the toasty warmth.
“You have questions, Sir Robert? Well, let us get on with it then since they are apparently
so urgent
that you must roust me out of bed without tarrying even long enough for me to dress myself properly against the cold.” I paused and coughed meaningfully into my hand. “If I have caught cold, rest assured, I shall know
exactly
where to fix the blame.” To emphasize my point, I leveled accusing eyes straight at him.
“Urgent indeed, My Lady Princess,” he began. “Your paramour . . .”
“My what, Sir?” I instantly interrupted.
“The what is your paramour, My Lady Princess,” Sir Robert retorted sharply. “And before you interrupt me again to ask who I mean I shall tell you that it is the Lord Admiral, Sir Thomas Seymour, to whom I refer.”
“You are misinformed then, Sir Robert. I have no paramour. Furthermore, I am a princess of royal blood, the daughter of Henry VIII”—I gestured to the majestic portrait of my scowling, seemingly invincible sire hanging above the mantel, his meaty, bejeweled hands curled into fists as he glowered out at the world from the confines of the gilded frame—“and as such I may not entertain suitors without the consent of the Council, as surely you know, being a member of said Council and, unless you know more than I do, none has ever sued for my hand.”
“The Lord Admiral
did
ask for your hand, My Lady Princess,” Sir Robert informed me, “and was refused, rebuffed actually, to be quite candid. He did not take it well. He also petitioned for the hand of your sister, the Princess Mary, and was refused permission to court her as well. And was ‘laughed out on his arse,’ to use the crude expression that was bandied about when after the Council’s rebuke he went courting the Lady Anne of Cleves. I was told he was actually chased away by a barrage of onions hurled from the windows by that lady’s servants when he attempted to infiltrate her bedchamber in the guise of a footman bringing her an early morning repast of cakes and ale.”
I did not let Sir Robert see that this was news to me. Tom had never mentioned Mary or the Lady Anne of Cleves except in passing when he told me about how my brother had once suggested them as possible brides for him when he connived, with the devious assistance of his man Fowler, to secure royal approval of his marriage to Kate. Nor had Mary in her rigidly polite letters ever mentioned any such dealings. There had been, much to my regret, a coldness between us since I had chosen to remain at Chelsea with Kate and Tom after their surprisingly sudden marriage which had outraged Mary’s inflexible sense of propriety. I had meant to write to her, to try to thaw the coldness, but in my reckless passion for Tom I kept putting it off.
“The Lord Admiral was my stepfather,” I calmly explained to Sir Robert, “the husband of my late lamented stepmother the Dowager Queen Katherine, and I was never privy to what business he had with the Council. If he ever asked for my hand, he never deigned to discuss the matter with me personally, so you might add presumption to his list of alleged crimes.”
“He already stands accused of three-and-thirty counts of High Treason, Princess; do you not think that sufficient?” Sir Robert parried.
“Three-and-thirty!”
I arched my brows. “How flamboyant! One would think an Englishman would show more restraint! It shows a want of good taste, to say nothing of good judgment! Do you not agree, Sir Robert?”
“Yes, Princess, I entirely agree; a most apt assessment for one so young.” He nodded grudgingly.
“Oh my lord, how you do flatter me!” I cried, slumping back in my chair with my hand upon my heart in parody of a swoon.
He fixed me with a cold, stern, and reproachful stare. “I do not have time for flattery, Princess, or levity either.”
He then went on to enumerate Tom’s various crimes as I shook my head, clucked my tongue, and feigned surprise at his foolishness, interjecting from time to time a litany of amazed comments.
“A Lord Admiral of England consorting with pirates?”
“Allowing them free rein in exchange for a share of their spoils?”
“For shame!”
“The dread pirate Thomessin was his boon companion?”
“They actually sat at table together for a moonlit banquet on the pirate’s flagship and the Lord Admiral
sang
bawdy English tavern songs and danced for him?”
“Surely not ‘Cakes and Ale’ again, Sir Robert? Verily, the Lord Admiral seems to sing but one song!”
“This reflects badly upon England and our navy as well as upon the Lord Admiral!”
“Embezzling the Royal Mint? Coin clipping? Oh my! How brazen!”
“The keys were not pilfered but given to him by the royal locksmith? Well, apparently the Lord Admiral’s charm must extend to locksmiths as well as ladies and pirates!”
He went on to tell me that my mad, rash-brained Tom had been apprehended after sneaking into the royal apartments at Hampton Court in the dead of night to put in motion a harebrained scheme in which he planned to sneak my brother from his bed, to carry him away and marry him to the Lady Jane Grey before anyone noticed he was missing. He had intended not to return him to the palace until the marriage had been consummated so none could annul it. But his scheme had been thwarted by my brother’s spaniel, Hector, who roused the guards by barking. The faithful canine paid for his loyalty with his life when Tom discharged his pistol right between its beautiful brown eyes, thus rousing those in the palace who had not already been awakened by the dog’s barking, and causing my brother to burst into tears and fly at his once favorite uncle, pummeling him with his fists and screaming, “You killed my dog, now I will kill you!” before he collapsed on the floor cradling the lifeless body of the only one whose loyalty he never doubted, staining his white nightshirt with its faithful fast-cooling blood.
Tom was dragged away by the palace guards, shouting back over his shoulder that he would bring Edward “a new dog tomorrow! Don’t despair, Nephew, I shall bring you a whole kennel full of dogs—brown dogs, and black dogs, white dogs, and red dogs, yellow dogs, parti-colored, striped, and spotted dogs! Dogs with long hair and dogs with short, dogs with bristly hair and silky soft! Stop crying now and smile for Uncle Tom,” he cajoled, “and tomorrow I shall bring you dancing dogs and singing cats, all dressed in clothes and funny hats!”