A crown in darkness : a novel about Lady Jane Grey

by Mullally, Margaret, 1954-

  'But then,' he allowed, 'she is of another world, so perhaps you don't see her.' He had forgotten his daughter. 'Oh Anne, you bitch! How like you to taunt me at the hour of my death. See how she laughs. She laughed at everyone. She is drenched in blood. It lies on her throat. It pours from her black hair. Anne, your neck was too small, too fragile to be cut. Your head was too beautiful to be struck from your shoulders. Anne, tell me now and let me die in peace. Did you truly deceive me, or did they lie?'

  Mary stiffened. She was bewildered, disgusted. How could he talk of that evil concubine when the daughter of his true Queen stood before him for the last time? She would listen to no more. White-faced, she backed away from the bed, trying not to listen to his tortured groans of 'Nan' and 'Sweetheart'! As she came from the room, she ran full tilt into the hurrying Archbishop.

  The next morning Jane awoke to the dismal tolling of bells. She sat up in bed, her hands clasped beneath her knees, and called for her tiring woman.

  'Angela, why are all those horrid bells ringing?' she asked.

  'His Majesty died early this morning,' said Angela quietly. 'May God rest his soul. There now, don't look so shocked, my Lady. We have all expected it for some time. Now come and have breakfast.'

  Jane slipped a fur-trimmed robe over her gown and sat down before the table. The room was candlelit, for it was still dark outside, and the flames leaped high in the fireplace.

  'So Edward is King.' Jane stared at the dish of crawfish before her. 'It seems strange, Angela. Not long ago, we were playing bowls together on the Green, and now he is King of England. Angela, I can't possibly eat all this.'

  'Try,' urged Angela, unsympathetically.

  It was like any ordinary day, and yet it wasn't. Jane had her bath, played with her puppy and read a chapter from her Bible. Then Angela dressed her, but she wasn't allowed to wear any bright colours. A plain black gown and black bordered cap had been laid on her bed.

  'For mourning,' explained Angela, pursing her lips.

  Jane did not hurry to the Queen's apartments as she usually did, for Catherine was now a widow and must observe the deepest mourning. She did not pray for Henry, as her Faith deplored this custom, and there was nobody to talk to. She spent the morning with her books and, in the afternoon, learned some Latin grammar rules.

  Towards evening, she began to feel restless. Angela, intent on a piece of mending, glanced up at her small charge with exasperation. Jane was kneeling at the window, drumming her fingers on the glass.

  'Why don't you take a turn about the garden, and get some roses in your cheeks?' she suggested irritably.

  So Jane fetched her cloak and ran downstairs into the sharp January air. The wind stirred her hair and tingled on her face. How still the grounds were! She glanced back at the red brick palace, hoping to see a friendly face at one of the many windows, but there was nobody there. She had just made up her mind to turn back, when someone gripped her elbow.

  Jane gave a startled gasp, then burst out laughing as she turned and came face to face with Sir Thomas Seymour.

  'Madam, you court trouble, walking alone in the grounds,' he chided her, a malicious sparkle in his blue eyes.

  'I was bored.'

  Then walk with me. I'd like to talk to you.'

  'What would you like to talk about?' asked Jane, allowing herself to be steered towards a bench.

  'Oh - events which concern you and me and all the fools around us.' Thomas had been drinking ale that afternoon, and his voice was a little slurred. He, like so many others, was overwhelmed by the King's death. Henry had dominated their lives for so long. Losing him was like losing a limb. 'They've told you that His Majesty is dead?' Tom asked, giving Jane a crafty look.

  'Yes,' the little girl replied flatly, wondering what was expected of her.

  'Dead, and left a lovely wife for me to devour. I mean to have her, Jane. I wanted her long before Great Harry laid eyes on her. But there will be changes now.'

  Jane wondered what sort of changes. The new King was young, he was intelligent, and he was a Reformer. Surely any changes that might be brought about under his rule could only be for the good?

  At first, the King's death was kept a secret from Edward and Elizabeth. Lord Hertford and Sir Anthony Browne escorted Edward to Enfield, where Elizabeth had set up her household, and told both the children together. To the embarrassment of both gentlemen, Edward burst into tears and his sister followed suit. Sir Anthony patted their heads awkwardly. Lord Hertford made comforting noises and promised them toys and sweetmeats. But the Royal orphans continued to weep passionately and the gentlemen, accepting defeat with none too good a grace, took their leave.

  'We'll never see him again,' sobbed Edward. 'He was the only person who really loved me. While he was alive, nobody would have dared to harm me.' The child was terrified of the burden his father had left on his frail, scholarly shoulders. He had none of Henry's great personality, none of his indomitable will.

  Elizabeth said nothing. Unlike Edward, she did not mourn her father in her heart. She had admired him vastly, but she had never loved him. Not that he had cared much for her! she thought, with a snort of disgust. He had killed her mother when she was a child of two. After Anne Boleyn's death, Elizabeth had lived in disgrace and poverty, her wardrobe desperately short of kirtles and bedgowns. Had it not been for her kind-hearted governess, Lady Margaret Bryan, Elizabeth would have had to make do with her half-sister Mary's hand-downs, altered and patched and mended. No, Elizabeth could not grieve for Henry. She cried, partly because she felt lost and bewildered, and partly to keep Edward company.

  She went off to find her governess who, by this time, had heard every detail of the King's death and could be bullied into telling the Princess.

  'Just before the end, when everyone thought he was in a coma, he sat bolt upright and cried, "Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn!" '

  Mistress Ashley gave the words their full dramatic emphasis. 'And no one knows whether it was because he saw her, or because he wanted her, or because he wanted to clear his conscience by uttering her name for the first time since her death.'

  'Possibly all three reasons,' Elizabeth said sagaciously. 'Though I must confess I always thought he hated her.'

  'And so he did, my love, but I think he loved her too — all these years. That was why he could never talk about it.'

  Elizabeth felt an odd constriction in her throat. 'If that was so,' she reasoned slowly, 'he must have banished me from Court because I was a reminder of her, and it hurt him to think of her.'

  Kat Ashley glanced at the girl's face and became brisk again. 'Come, we had better find a suitable mourning gown for you. Maybe now we'll see better days, sweetheart. The new King is fond of you.'

  'And I of him,' Elizabeth muttered automatically, but her thoughts were elsewhere.

  Two days later, Edward VI was saluted by cannons as he rode into the Tower of London, too frightened to feel any triumph. He knew that he should bow and wave and smile when the people cheered him, as his father had always done, but he felt too nervous.

  The people stared curiously at the pale, tense face of the little King, and thought him haughty. The weather was treacherous and Edward's hands and feet were numb. Every time his horse stepped into a puddle, the King's ermine-trimmed robes were spattered with muddy water. It was little wonder that he felt so miserable.

  The Archbishop of Canterbury and other Lords of the Council came forward to pay him homage. Edward managed a few watery smiles, but he failed to see why he should be gracious and regal when he didn't, as yet, possess the full power of Kingship. His father had appointed sixteen nobles as guardians to his heir, cautiously dividing the guardianship between Catholics and Protestants.

  Among these was Hertford, an able and astute statesman whom Edward feared. Temporary though the arrangement was, Edward knew he would never dare to demand supreme authority when he was old enough to do so. It also seemed unlikely that the nobles, having tasted power, would surrender
without a stormy battle and Edward was not noted for his willpower.

  The Lady Elizabeth grinned broadly and rather conceitedly as she read the Admiral's bold letter. It was the first direct marriage proposal she had received and she was more than a little flattered. There was no doubt that Tom Seymour was in love with her, and the knowledge did not surprise her. He had once told her that, in spite of her Tudor colouring, she was her mother's daughter and, like her mother, she had a generous share of fascination.

  But Elizabeth knew that it was treason to marry without the consent of the King and Council and always, always, there was her dream of becoming Queen. For the fulfilment of her wild hopes, she would sacrifice any man, even Tom.

  She thought wistfully of the happiness that might have been hers, but she stamped her foot impatiently at her own foolishness. 'Elizabeth Tudor, the Crown of England is two steps away from you,' she chided herself, 'and you stand snivelling over Tom Seymour. Marriage with him would mean death for you both.'

  And she wanted to live and be Queen. There had only been a minute's hesitation. Her mind was made up. She threw herself into a chair and began to write hastily. Her letter was a model of dignity and affronted virtue.

  'I have neither the years nor the inclination for marriage,' reproved Elizabeth, 'and I would not have thought that such a matter should have been mentioned to me at a time when I ought to be taken up in weeping for the death of my father the King ...'

  There was a wicked glint in her eyes as she continued in much the same vein. She tried not to picture his merry, twinkling eyes, tried not to think of his deep, sonorous voice. But as she read the letter through with satisfaction and began to seal it, she couldn't help sighing, 'Lord, what I am losing!'

  But Elizabeth was not the person to brood over what might have been. Her life was sunny enough at present. The Dowager Queen had been appointed guardian to the young Princess, and it was not possible for a girl to have a kinder one. Catherine was happy in her widowhood and delighted to have her stepdaughter with her in the beautiful Dormer Palace at Chelsea. She felt that she wanted nothing more from life. Even her unbecoming widow's weeds seemed ravishing. She and Elizabeth lived in amity. For the first time in her troubled girlhood, Elizabeth found herself in an unrestricted circle, and she seemed a little more relaxed, but Catherine always felt that she wore a smooth mask. For too long Elizabeth had been obliged to hide her true identity behind a shield. It was difficult to discard her shield now and, anyhow, now that her father was dead and she a little closer to the throne, the Council were watching her sharply.

  'Perhaps,' Catherine confided to her stepdaughter one morning, when they were busily working together on a tapestry, 'I would like to have my own child. Oh, I know I'm so contented and really, Elizabeth, you are as a true daughter to me, but sometimes I would give anything to hold my own baby in my arms.'

  'It would be rather tactless of you to conceive one now, Madam,' said Elizabeth.

  Catherine smiled fondly. 'Nevertheless, I shall have one,' she told herself 'Darling Thomas is sure to propose soon.'

  Elizabeth's thoughts were running along a less domestic track. Her father had left the succession first to Edward but, should Edward die childless, it was to pass on to Mary and then, under similar circumstances, to Elizabeth. Her cousin Jane was fourth in line.

  She thought of herself riding through the streets of London, draped in purple velvet robes, with the Crown set on her head and her brilliant hair flowing in the breeze. It seemed so ridiculous to give the crown to Edward when he didn't seem to know what to do with it. Why had she, Elizabeth, who craved to rule, not been placed first?

  'What are you thinking about, Elizabeth?' asked Catherine, smiling at the girl's flushed, excited face.

  Elizabeth was immediately demure. 'I was wondering what Edward is doing now, Madam. It must be dreadful to wear a crown.'

  Edward did think it was dreadful to wear a crown. He was terrified of Lord Hertford, Edward Seymour, who had instructed his little nephew to present him with the Dukedom of Somerset. In almost no time at all, the new Duke established himself as Lord Protector of the Realm, to the jealous indignation of his fellow Councillors.

  'It's a pity Old Harry isn't still alive,' growled John Dudley, Earl of Warwick. 'He would have put the lowborn knave in his place.' Others silently and heartily concurred.

  But if Edward was afraid of Somerset, he virtually cowered at the mention of that gentleman's wife, Anne Stanhope, a noisy, quarrelsome woman who left a trail of mischief behind her wherever she went. People had been inclined to snicker when she publicly henpecked her husband but now their amusement developed into horror as she cracked her whip over their heads and made her wishes known in no uncertain terms.

  She began to supervise the King's daily agenda, her time-table allowing very little time for recreation. When, in a fleeting moment of courage, he ventured to ask if he might have another hour to play with Barnaby Fitzpatrick or to practise his virginals, the Duchess fixed him with a fierce stare that would have frightened a much braver child than Edward and expostulated, 'What!'

  'I only thought,' stammered Edward, 'that if it were at all possible ...'

  'It isn't possible. It is absolutely out of the question. As King of England, you haven't time for such frivolous pastimes. You should be more concerned with affairs of State.'

  With her eyes blazing and her nostrils flaring, she was astonishingly like the dragon in the story of St George, which his tutor had told him. Edward regarded her with new respect.

  He spent long hours in the schoolroom for, as Lady Somerset kept telling him, the King of England could not be an ignoramus. This didn't displease Edward, but much of his pleasure in studying was spoiled for him when Lady Somerset adopted an annoying habit of discussing his work with his tutor, Master Cheke, and clucking over his errors.

  'This won't do. Sire. This won't do at all.'

  Edward sighed disconsolately and wished he had the courage to swear or throw an inkpot at her.

  There were tedious sessions in the Council chamber, when he had to sit quietly at the head of the table and listen to the long-winded harrying of the nobles, all of whom seemed determined to acknowledge any view other than their own.

  'Listen carefully to all that is said and you'll learn a lot,' his Uncle Somerset advised him.

  Edward listened, but he learned more about the unpleasant, selfish motives of human nature than he did about politics.

  At least, he consoled himself, he had enjoyed showering honours upon Uncle Tom, who was now created Lord Sudley and Lord High Admiral of the Fleet. Tom was sympathetic in his attitude towards the young monarch. Discovering that Edward received little pocket money, he made a point of leaving generous sums of money in various secret places about the palace. 'Our secret,' he would whisper, conspiratorially, with a devilish gleam in his eyes, and Edward would giggle and accept the money, picturing a halo on his uncle's head.

  'Were it not for Uncle Tom,' he confided to Lady Jane Grey, 'I could never bear being King.'

  'Your father would never have tolerated their arrogance,' said Jane.

  'I am not my father,' scowled Edward. Then the scowl fled, to be followed by a smile — a secretive smile. 'Jane, I know a secret.'

  'What is it?'

  Edward set aside his history book and, with a quick glance round, said in a low voice, 'Well, nobody is supposed to know yet, but Uncle Tom won't mind my telling you.'

  Jane was obviously growing a little impatient.

  'Well, Uncle Tom has asked my permission to marry the Dowager Queen.'

  'And you ...' Jane was appalled.

  'I gave my consent.' Edward looked smug. He waited for his cousin to congratulate him, but she was silent.

  'Well?' he demanded crossly.

  'The Council will never agree.'

  'As I shall not call upon the Council to voice their approval,' said Edward pompously, 'they need not concern themselves with this matter.' With a parting glance of displ
easure at Jane, he marched off, and sought the Dormer girl, with whom he would have a quick game of cards before his history lesson began.

  Jane considered the stunning news that she had just heard. Perhaps she had been a little too rash in her judgement. Catherine had thrice married elderly men. The first and second marriages had been made according to the wishes of her family. The third she had been unable to escape. She had loved Tom for years and would have married him had Henry not stepped in her path. Why should she not marry Tom now, provided a decent interval of mourning was observed?

  Puzzled, she asked Mistress Ellen when she was preparing for bed that night. 'Is it wrong? She loves him, and she has done her duty by her family three times.'

  Mistress Ellen, pressing a pale blue kirtle, was thoughtful. 'Well, my sweet, I've no doubt there'll be people to say she's showing disrespect for the late King's memory, and in a sense that's what she's doing. But she can't simulate a grief that isn't inside her for the rest of her life, and if she loves Lord Sudley, there is no earthly reason why she shouldn't marry him. Waiting will achieve nothing but frustration. Besides, there is this; if you love a person, nothing you do for him or with him can be wrong.'

  It sounded plausible but, 'I could never love another person more than myself,' announced Jane candidly. 'Mother says I'm selfish and always will be.'

  Mistress Ellen replied that, if her selfishness kept her out of trouble, it was all to the better, and stooped to kiss her forehead before retiring to the servants' quarters.

  The old Duke of Norfolk remained in the Tower, where he had been languishing since the last weeks of Henry's reign. His offence — allowing his son, the young Earl of Surrey, to brag about his noble lineage.

  Surrey himself had walked disdainfully to the block one treacherously cold morning last winter. He was haughty and satirical to the end, complaining about the injustice of leading him out to die in such cold weather, and examining the axe with the utmost interest. He made a few scathing comments which made the onlookers chuckle, whereas they had anticipated dreary tragedy. But he repented nothing.