Just a Girl

by Jane Caro

  I woke with a start in the middle of that dreadful night, surprised that I had managed to close my swollen eyes at all. There was a moment when I was blissfully unconscious of my humiliation and then it flooded back over me, knowledge of all I had lost in but a few moments’ foolish indiscretion. I had lost the closest thing to a mother I had ever had, I had lost my puny hopes that I might be the dashing admiral’s one true love and, most important of all, I had lost my faith in my own good sense and rational judgement. I will never forget the words my stepmother spat at me as I struggled to right my dishevelled clothing.

  ‘Traitor!’ she hissed at me. ‘Faithless bastard, little whore!’ Names my father had also called me only a scant few months before. She even raised her hand as if to slap me, but, unable to stand a moment more, I ducked beneath her arm and fled from the room. I do not know what words she said to her guilty husband. A subdued Kat Ashley came to my chamber some time later to inform me that we were to depart for Cheshunt, the home of my father’s old friend Sir Anthony Denny, the next morning.

  Once we had left Sudeley Castle, shamed as I was, I thought the worst was over. I was to learn that the worst had not yet begun. God’s breath, the memory of my foolishness and its horrible consequences still has the power to undo me. Yet, I learnt from it, oh, aye, I learnt from it. Would that I could have learnt some of my lessons an easier way! I never suffered under Master Ascham the way I did under God.

  Queen Catherine had her child soon after my departure, a girl they called Mary. Even the name they gave her pained me. I knew that, had circumstances been different, her name would surely have been Elizabeth. But my namesake or no, she was still destined to suffer a parallel fate. Her poor mother died within a week of her birth. I wept bitter tears when I heard the news, tears of grief because Queen Catherine had been so kind and loving to me, tears of shame because I had betrayed her trust, and tears of fear, because I dreaded the approach that I was sure would come from her shameless husband, my almost-paramour. Far more basely, I also wept tears of jealousy, because her chief mourner had been a solemn, freckled eleven-year-old child, Lady Jane Grey. Once again my unimpeachable cousin had taken the place that should by rights have been mine. Even worse, I only had myself to blame for the loss of it, and that painful knowledge made me hate her all the more.

  In disgrace, in fear and trembling, I waited at Cheshunt, wondering what might happen next. I mourned the loss of the only almost happy home I could remember. I berated myself for my stupidity and my lack of control. I felt my masculine mind had been betrayed by my feminine heart and my woman’s body. Yet days, then weeks, passed and Thomas Seymour did not come. Eventually I could delay no longer. I left the guardianship of Lord and Lady Denny, much to the relief of all of us, and went with my household to Hatfield. And still he did not come. In his stead, I heard rumours, whispered to me by Kat Ashley, whispered to her by John Ashley and Thomas Parry, rumours that he had renewed his suit for mousy little Jane Grey (how that news rankled), still living with him at Sudeley.

  Master Parry swore to me that the admiral had said to him directly, ‘There hath been a tale of late, they say now I shall marry my Lady Jane–’ But Parry also told me that, after a suitably dramatic pause, the admiral had laughed his great booming laugh, leant forward, clapped my cofferer on his back, and said, ‘I tell you this but merrily, but merrily.’ Such mercurial behaviour was so like the Admiral that I could not help but believe my honest servant. My stepfather loved to keep others off balance, off kilter, confused about his true intentions. And, indeed, confused is precisely what I was, as I wondered, over and over, whether he intended to marry the Lady Jane or not.

  Daily I waited to hear the news that he had wed my rival. Part of me hoped to hear it, because I would be free of him, and part of me dreaded it, because – I would be free of him. And after a time, a rider did approach with news from court.

  It was dull and drizzly that morning, too wet to go riding. Thus I was indoors, doing my accounts with Master Parry. My life at that time seemed wholly to consist of long grey days with no one but my household to keep me company. After the drama of life at the old palace and Sudeley Castle, my exile to Hatfield was a pitiful anti-climax. Thank God for my studies. Mindful of the stern (if absent) eye of Master Ascham and the inexorable discipline of my bete noir, I filled the long hours with my Latin, my Greek and my mathematics. I read, I prayed, I practised on the harpsichord and, when the weather permitted, I rode across the countryside with my gentlemen. I loved to ride hard and fast, with the blood of the hunt in my nostrils. At such times, I was free to be just a girl, no one in particular. Few of the people we passed as we galloped through the countryside either knew or cared who I was. I could stop at market stalls and purchase apples or sweetmeats like an ordinary householder, and when we passed other travellers, wish them Godspeed. Occasionally, someone cried out, ‘Long live Princess Elizabeth!’ but usually just as we approached home. Only the local folk knew me by sight; to others, I was merely an anonymous noblewoman, and the feeling of being unknown was wonderful.

  As the days turned into weeks and then months, however, the feeling of liberation passed and I grew bored and glum. The contrast between my momentous former life and my current one was too great. I began to fuss over little details, annoying my cofferer by poring over my accounts as if I still needed to pinch my pennies. Although I was newly wealthy, thanks to my father’s will, I still could not quite believe that I had more than enough funds to buy the new dress I needed, pay my musicians, and buy the books I coveted. Schooled as I was in thrift and parsimony, I was still troubled by the amount it cost to keep up my household and I seemed unable to feel safe and prosperous. Yet even as I totted up obsessively the long columns of figures and interrogated my staff on the need for so much butter or malmsey wine, my life and my concerns seemed insignificant to me – too much of the dreaded ‘small business of life’ as Queen Catherine had called it. I yearned for something bigger, something to challenge me and put me on my mettle. I even found myself wishing for Jane Grey. I felt like a horse that has been stabled too long. I wanted to prick up my ears as such a beast does when he is fetched for saddling and senses that the tedium is about to end. I was to get my wish and, by the end of it, to wish most heartily that I had been able to stay cloistered with my cofferer and my accounts.

  It was not the admiral who invaded my torpor. It was Sir Roger Tyrwhit and his company. They brought news and they brought worse.

  ‘Princess Elizabeth,’ Sir Roger said, bowing low. My status had been resurrected somewhat as the Protestant sister of the king, second in line to the throne.

  ‘Sir Roger.’ I held out my hand to him. I was mystified as to his mission. Had the admiral actually married Lady Jane, lord protector’s brother or no, there would have been no need to send such an important man to bring me the news, or, indeed, any formal emissary at all. The messenger I had expected was one of Sir Thomas’s underlings, sent to tell me the news and then report back on my humiliation. I was nonplussed by the sudden arrival of these fine courtiers and not a little afraid. I had learnt not to like surprises.

  ‘I bring news from London, my lady,’ Tyrwhit continued and I looked at him and could not resist raising an eyebrow. It was boredom, I suspect, that caused me to be so bold.

  ‘Indeed. I assume you did not ride all this way for your health.’ But he was not to be charmed by this sally.

  ‘The Lord Admiral, Thomas Seymour, has been arrested and placed in the Tower.’ He paused, the better to gauge my reaction, I imagine, but I did not have to pretend to be astonished: I was.

  ‘The admiral is in the Tower?’ I said. ‘How so, my lord? How can this be? What crime has he committed?’

  ‘He is charged with kidnapping your brother the king, and with conspiring to marry you, my lady.’

  ‘Me? My lord? All we have heard in this backwater is that he planned to marry the Lady Jane Grey. Is that not right, Master
Parry? Did not the admiral tell you as much, from his own lips?’ Before my cofferer had a chance to answer, Tyrwhit had turned to my poor gentleman and thrust a document into his hands.

  ‘Master Thomas Parry?’ he asked him, sounding ominously official. Bereft of speech, my cofferer nodded. ‘You are under arrest, sir. I am instructed to send you forthwith to the Tower.’

  Poor Parry whimpered and fell to his knees. ‘Please, sir, please. I have done no wrong.’

  Sir Roger ignored him and handed me another document. ‘Here is a warrant for Mistress Katharine Ashley. She is also to be sent to the Tower.’ I greeted this appalling pronouncement with absolute silence. Kat, my Kat? What madness was this?

  ‘How so, Sir Roger? You must give me time to collect my thoughts. We were puzzling over a column of figures but a moment ago, my lord, and now it seems my servants are to be stripped from me. First, I need to know of the welfare of the king. Is he unharmed?’

  ‘Aye, my lady. By God’s good grace, your brother was soon released and the admiral clapped in irons.’

  ‘Thank God, indeed, sir. The king is my closest living relative and dearer to me than any. But what, Sir Roger, are my servants charged with? What crime are they accused of? How could suspicion fall on them, so quiet and far away?’

  ‘They are accused of conspiring to bring about the marriage between you, my lady, and Lord Thomas Seymour. Such plotting is high treason.’ At this my cofferer burst into loud tears. To hush him, I placed my hand on his shaking shoulder. The poor man still knelt at our feet.

  ‘Where is Mistress Ashley?’ he continued stony faced.

  ‘I will send for her, my lord.’ I did so and then turned back to face my interrogator. ‘And what, pray tell, am I to do without them?’

  ‘Do not concern yourself, my lady. I am instructed to take control of your household while I carry out the necessary investigations into your servants’ complicity in this treasonous plot and, forgive me, my lady, into your own.’

  ‘My own?’ Of course I knew that I was the person they were really after. My servants were but pawns in a bigger game. They could not quite arrest me, so they would do the next best thing and arrest them. My mind was thinking fast, trying to absorb the extraordinary change in our circumstances, from dreary day to life-or-death crisis in a matter of minutes. Damn Thomas Seymour, I thought. His foolish recklessness has dragged us all into danger. ‘I have no complicity in this plot, Lord Tyrwhit, just as I have no knowledge of it. I can also vouch for my servant’s innocence. Mistress Ashley has had no contact with the Admiral since we left Sudeley Castle and Thomas Parry has not seen him for many months.’

  ‘No, but the last time he saw the admiral, he had a conversation with him about marriage.’ This time it was another member of Tyrwhit’s party who spoke up: the Marquess of Winchester, a man, as I was to discover, who harboured little love for me.

  ‘Indeed, you are correct, my Lord Winchester, but he spoke about the admiral’s possible marriage to Lady Jane Grey, not to me.’

  ‘That is so, my lord,’ said my cofferer. ‘He never mentioned the Princess Elizabeth to me. He would not dare to do so.’

  ‘Bravely said, master cofferer, but we will see if you live up to your claims in the Tower.’ Winchester knew his business and, I believe, took pleasure in it. At his words poor Thomas Parry wept anew. As he still knelt at my feet, I put my hand back onto his curls. It was poor comfort, I knew, but it was the best I could manage.

  Kat Ashley appeared at the doorway, drained of colour. Unlike my cofferer, however, she held her composure. She curtsied, then stood there, saying nothing; hands clasped in front of her, her head modestly bowed and her eyes cast down.

  ‘This is Mistress Ashley, Sir Roger,’ I said, as if presenting her at court. I suppose, in a way, I was.

  ‘I am commanded by the lord protector to take you from this place under arrest on suspicion of treason, to the Tower.’

  Kat’s head simply hung lower. I sensed she was weeping and I wanted to take her in my arms, comfort her and assure her all would be well. But, I knew that all might not be well. We had been very foolish – not least the admiral, who had doomed himself and, through his impetuous pride, placed all the rest of us in jeopardy.

  Anger flared in my breast, like a hot spring. The admiral’s seed had killed my beloved stepmother, his bold flirtation had made sure she died hating me, he had inflamed my untried affections – and all to benefit his ambition; not because he yearned for my love. Now he had placed the people closest to me in great danger, not to mention myself, and he had tried to kidnap my brother. What manner of man was this? What manner of fool was I to fancy myself in love with him? He would die, of that there was no doubt, and with that thought my anger melted, to be replaced by pain. But I kept my face expressionless. Sir Roger was schooled in interrogation, so his eyes missed nothing. Any flicker of pity for Thomas Seymour was enough to condemn us all.

  ‘Your affection for the admiral is well known, my lady,’ Tyrwhit ventured slyly. I fought back the urge to feel shame. It was an indulgence I could not afford. ‘Forgive me for bringing this to your attention, but there are rumours abroad that you carry his child.’

  This was truly shocking, I gasped at the idea and for a moment my knees felt weak. I rallied and spread my hands wide above my narrow pelvis. ‘As you can see, Sir Roger, such rumours are base falsehoods. I would regard it as a great kindness if you took steps to ensure that the truth of my untouched virtue is widely known.’

  ‘But I am no doctor, my lady. Perhaps your state is well disguised.’

  ‘My lord, it has been almost six months since last I set eyes on the admiral, so my disguise would have to be powerful indeed to hide such a circumstance.’

  ‘And yet your fondness for Lord Seymour was well known and much remarked upon.’

  ‘Indeed, he was a kind stepfather, but it was his wife, the queen, whom I loved. I thank God that she did not live to see this day.’

  ‘Perhaps if she had, events may not have come to such a pretty pass.’

  ‘You are wise, Master Tyrwhit, as was the late queen. The admiral, I fear, is not.’ The slanders on my reputation upset me; I knew there was no one in London to defend me, no one to deny such damaging accusations. Worse, I knew that I had brought such rumours down upon my own head, thanks to my foolish behaviour at Sudeley. Hidden in my wide skirts, I balled my small fists against the memory.

  ‘May I go with my servants to London, Master Tyrwhit, to prove to all who see me that my virtue remains intact?’

  ‘No, my lady. My instructions are to remove only your servants.’

  ‘Will you take steps to restore my reputation, to refute the rumours?’

  ‘I will send a message, my lady, saying that the rumours that you carry his child appear to be untrue.’

  ‘ Are untrue, my lord; they do not merely appear to be. They are untrue.’

  I watched from the window as my servants mounted their horses for the miserable journey to London. Poor Kat had no love of horses. She sat awkwardly and clung to the pommel for dear life and one of her escorts had to slap her steed on the rump to make it move forward with the others. I watched her bounce ungainly down the avenue, her headdress askew, her skirts billowing behind her. I sensed rather than saw her fear and alarm, both at the long ride to London on a strange horse and on whatever horrors awaited them once they arrived.

  Yet I knew she had been a fool, too. Why had she not warned me when the admiral had first begun playing those foolish games? Why had she not sternly warned him off and talked to my stepmother? Why had she encouraged him in his dangerous play, why had she flirted with him herself? I was now fourteen. She was meant to be my chaperone, my guardian – not my partner in crime. I turned back to my interrogator and saw immediately that it was useless to blame others or hope for rescue. My servants’ fate as well as my own rested on my shoulders. There
was no one left to help us now. I said a silent prayer that my natural caution and my wits would stand by me, so that I would make no false step. It was at this moment, I now think, that my long dance beneath the shadow of the axe began.

  To be interrogated by an expert is an agonising experience. What helped me survive it was my innocence. I have never forgotten this. It has influenced all that I have done – and not done – since that day. I knew that I had not conspired with the admiral about marriage. The last time I had seen him, his wife was still very much alive. With an effort of will I dismissed the admiral from my mind. My major dread now was for myself and for Kat and my cofferer, who were guilty of nothing but foolishness and romantic notions.

  Sir Roger Tyrwhit asked me his questions, over and over again, all couched slightly differently, all polite, yet sinister. He was skilled, he was cold, and sometimes when he asked me a question I had not anticipated, I found myself admiring his technique. But I pride myself that I was his match. He did not trip me up. I could tell by his very persistence that he had not wrung from me the words he was looking for, and as our time together went on, I started to flatter myself that in turn he had begun to admire me. We had begun to respect one another as worthy adversaries. He was becoming convinced, if not of the truth of my answers, then of the fact that they were not going to change. And he was wary around me, conscious always of my status, that I was second in line to the throne, so I might be powerful one day and that it was better we stay on good terms. Yet still I went to bed at night and, when at last I slept, I dreamt once more of my mother and the thin line of blood running from the small depression at the base of her neck down her chest and disappearing into the cleft of her breasts. Like a chimera, the dream-mother changed her shape. Sometimes the head she bore was that of Queen Catherine Parr, or Kat Ashley, or, one horrible night, Thomas Seymour. In this dream, I followed the path of the dripping blood from the soaked neckline of the rich gown, up, up, up, until I saw the head my mother wore that night, and then I woke, sweating, panting, starting up from my sheets in fear.