Strands of My Winding Cloth

by G Lawrence

  In the evening, before the feast and dancing began, courtiers played Hoodman’s Bluff in the halls. Robin and Thomas Heneage were blinded by lengths of red velvet. They staggered and grabbed at thin air, trying to catch my giggling ladies as they danced out of their grasp. Heneage was a year younger than me, and a handsome man. He hailed from Essex. His father had been a member of my father’s Privy Council and his uncle had once been Groom of the Stool, a most important and trusted position, since it was the Groom’s job to attend to the King as he emptied his bowels in the privy… Although Heneage did not hold a position at court, he was a Member of Parliament and I had high hopes for him in the future. An affable, witty soul, he had the dark looks I admired in men, and was a fine dancer. He enjoyed riddles and jests, and when at court there was always a merry band about him. Robin and he were good friends, and Heneage was often with us when we rode out or walked in the gardens.

  “Have a care, Master Heneage!” I cried as the young man, rendered sightless by his thick blindfold, mistook me for one of the ladies in the game and grasped hold of my waist as I passed. “Unhand your Queen, sir!”

  Heneage dropped his hands and a deep flush emerged under the blindfold, but I laughed merrily. “You have a fine pair of hands there, Master Heneage,” I praised. “There are few men indeed, other than my father, who could say they have managed to hold on to me!”

  “Then I am most fortunate of all men,” Heneage announced, bowing to an empty space beside me since he could not see where I was. Mirth fluttered through the crowds. “To have known what it is to touch the most radiant of all women.”

  Did I not say he had great promise? What sweet flattery!

  “Have a care with my ladies, Heneage,” I said, tapping my lace fan on his bowed shoulder as I passed. “I want all of them returned in one piece!” Walking on, I smiled with affection at the wild antics of my courtiers. Christmas had stolen inside them, made them gay with childlike enjoyment.

  Mummers had come calling at the palace gates in the days before Christmas, and now they came to perform traditional pieces for us. In some parts of the town, women would go from house to house, visiting, offering a good-luck cup of drink to each of their neighbours. Others took the wassail cup out to the trees in their orchards, or to hives on their lands, singing to the bees and the trees to make them fruitful. I did not mind these traditions. I celebrated many of them myself. The more puritanical of my Protestant subjects disapproved, wanting to remove all the joys of life along with popish superstition, but this I did not agree with. If God created anything, He was certainly responsible for joy. Could the Devil have made such a sweet blessing? I think not. Joy and laughter, love and friendship are God’s works. To deny them is to deny God. Even Jesus was known to jest at times, using sardonic wit to make a point. Why should we not follow in his footsteps?

  We danced that night for hours. Silk and velvet whispered against the rush-covered floors, leather boots and soft slippers slipped and tripped through galliards, voltas and basse dances. Ladies were thrown into the air, and men leapt like proud stags. When the time came for the feast, we were pink of cheek and rumbling of belly, eager for food. The servers carried their wares from the kitchens. Dough balls stuffed with spiced pork and currants were served in a winter herb broth and leeks cooked in white wine dripped upon toasted slices of plump, white bread. Gourdes and cowcumber were cooked in pottage of sweet, gingered broth. Jellied soup of mutton and hens came boiled in almond milk with cubebs and mace, and tarts thick with eggs and cheese, spiced with cinnamon and cloves shone under the light of the tallow candles.

  Roasted goose, golden and sizzling arrived on beds of purple carrot glistening with oil and salt. Skinned peacocks, roasted whole and then re-dressed with their feathers were brought out to great cheers of admiration. Fish, surrounded by jelly, moulded to look like the waves of the sea, melted gently on the tables and rabbits cooked in wine syrup, heavy with ginger, sugar and pepper, stared out with sightless, brown-crisped eyes. Fat-breasted turkey, an import just beginning to be bred in England, stood proud next to whole haunches of roasted and carved venison on frumenty. Hare pie, white pudding, duck in mustard and honey, and boiled larks in verjuice and butter were dished out from the shared platters.

  To a grand cheer, the wild boar was brought in. The roasted head, cleaved from the body, was served to my table and sweet slices of his cheeks and tongue were offered to me. Boiled quail on beds of sweet cabbage, and capon with roasted, blackened slices of lemon and orange made the tables gay. Baked pheasant, crane and bustard came then, accompanied by pink-boiled shrimps and piles of muscles clicking in their shells, slathered in garlic and herbs. Sturgeon swam in sweet vinegar. Pickled mushrooms, stuffed eggs, piles of baked onions, heaps of tan-coloured, roasted garlic, and fried, shredded, turnips joined this nation of foods. Herring pies, eels, carp and trout were delivered to the already overstuffed tables. Pages took up knives to impress their lords with their carving skills, cheered on in their efforts by the hungry, waiting hordes.

  The traditional pie made of minced mutton meat and dried fruits, rich with thirteen spices, was brought out and shared; thirteen spices were used to honour the Apostles. Then there was soft, tangy, new cheese, pear pies with sugar and cloves, baked quinces, preserved oranges in syrup, apple pies and possets of cream, sugar and cinnamon. Clotted cream was smeared on dainty wafers. Newly imported sweet potatoes in rose and orange syrup, apple fritters, walnut comfits, and pottage of bright red-purple cherries on sugar-fried toast arrived to end the meal.

  The wassail bowl was filled with gallons of steaming hot ale, spices and sugar. At the bottom was a crust of bread, and, when all the ale was drunk, the crust was put upon a platter of gold and brought to me to eat. I have to say I found it delicious; sweet and spiced, soft and warm, it held a delicious sour tang from the ale.

  After the feast, as many sat looking green, clutching their over-stuffed bellies in pain, singers came forth to lull our senses. They sang of the Nativity, of God and hope and peace and charity. Some fanatical subjects wanted no singing at Christmas, but I believed that God wanted us to celebrate the birth of His son, and how better to celebrate, than to lift one’s voice to the Almighty and sing?

  That night we went to beds with bellies and hearts that were full. As the twelve days of Christmas celebrations continued, I was feeling sated, and calm, as though with the coming of the Christmas season, all was made well with my world. I wished Parry had been here to see this glorious Christmas, but the space he had left in my heart was starting to mend. I was not healed, but certainly this time of kindness and joy had done much to bring peace to me.

  I was shortly to come to regret being lulled into such calmness.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Greenwich Palace

  Winter 1560-1561

  Even as we celebrated through the twelve days of Christmas, many small and seemingly inconsequential matters occurred in my household which niggled at the edge of my consciousness. I did not pay them the attention they deserved. Although, later, I would curse myself for this, I was a busy soul at this time. News from France, and the impending arrival of my rival, Mary Stewart stole my attention. There was the organisation of festivities for Christmas, the usual everyday business of my Privy Council and country and Robin was making me wish I could twist my own ears off by endlessly pressing about his ennoblement. My head had never been as full, and my days never as busy.

  During Christmas, I had believed I had left my grief behind me. Amongst the celebrations, I had found both excitement and peace, but as the season passed, grief crept back to my side. He had been disguised for a while, but as normal life resumed, he returned.

  Grief is a cruel companion. You would think that he would come and remain at your side when a loved one dies, and for the first few weeks this is indeed the case. You grow used to him. You wake with him and go about your day in his company. You climb into bed and he is there. Then, time passes, and he seems to step away. You believe yo
urself safe. You have whole moments where you do not recall your loss and start to laugh and smile again. Life goes on… It is then that grief becomes the most unwelcome of surprise guests. He is a malicious visitor, arriving unannounced and unexpected. It can be the slightest of things which calls him to you; the scent of a particular dish, the sight of the setting sun, a familiar object which brings forth memories. Everyday things. Things to which we normally pay no heed. This is where grief hides, waiting to spring his trap. He leaps; bringing back your loss fresh, raw and new. Your heart falls again. Your sorrows crash upon your shoulders. Grief is a cruel fool; an evil jester who takes delight in stealing happiness. He is never satisfied. He always wants more.

  That was how I felt, then. Grief would allow me to forget my loss for blissful moments, only to rush at me anew. He stole my energy, and feasted on my sadness. It would have been good for me to have Robin, my old Robin, at my side. But my friend was nowhere to be seen. Someone had taken his place. A stranger who could not see his friend was slowly being eroded by sorrow. When I had the energy, I was angry. When grief stole my spirit, I merely plodded along, listening to Robin’s increasingly frequent and insistent ‘requests’ to be elevated. So when Katherine Grey was absent from her duties more often than she was present for them, I hardly noticed, until it became increasingly obvious.

  “Your friend, Katherine…” I said to Jane Seymour as she tied a silver ribbon on my new shoes of black velvet; a gift from the King of Spain. No matter how often he and I were in disagreement, it could not be denied Phillip of Spain had excellent taste in presents. The shoes were very pretty, and they made my feet look tiny and elegant. “… She was supposed to be in my chambers today, was she not?” Jane’s usually pale cheeks infused with a hint of pink. She did not lift her eyes to my face but busied herself with the ribbon. I gazed down with growing suspicion. “Where is she?” I went on, keeping my tone light.

  Jane finally looked up. “She is ill, Majesty,” she said, and then promptly flushed crimson across her chest and throat. There are many reasons a young lady might blush, but to my mind there was only one in this case. I was being lied to, by one of my own women, about one of my own women. What was Katherine up to?

  “Indeed?” I asked slowly, fixing my eyes on my new slippers, turning my foot this way and that to admire the effect. “She seems to be sick an awful lot of late. I will send my physician. Will you escort him to her, Jane?”

  The girl looked utterly mortified. “Of course, Majesty,” she agreed. “Shall… shall I go ahead and make sure she is decently dressed before he arrives?”

  “Oh, I think not… My doctors have seen many a young maid or old woman whilst in her bed, Jane. They are professionals.” I glanced backwards and waggled my fingers at Kat, bringing her to join us. “Mistress Ashley will accompany you, Jane, in case any message needs to be sent to me, for I am most concerned about the constant poor health of my kinswoman.” Jane’s red face was growing pale as Kat stepped forwards. As they were about to leave, I leant in to Kat’s ear. “Go with Jane and see what the matter with Katherine Grey is, if there is anything the matter at all,” I murmured. “And if the girl is not where she is supposed to be, then I want to know of it. Immediately.”

  When Kat arrived back perhaps an hour later, she came straight to me. “Well?” I asked.

  “Katherine Grey was in bed, Majesty, and appeared to be running a fever, so thought your doctor.”

  “So… it was true?” I drummed my fingers on the side of my chair and then stopped as I saw Kat’s dubious expression. “What is it?”

  Kat stepped closer, keeping her voice low. “The girl was flushed and hot, Majesty, and although the doctor prescribed her some salts and a potion, as well as bleeding her, I would say there are reasons why a young lady might be flushed in the face other than with fever…”

  “You think she was not ill.”

  “I think she was well enough to race from wherever it was she was not supposed to be to where she was supposed to be, and pretend she had been there all along,” Kat whispered. “I have tended many a fever, Majesty. I know the signs of sickness. Katherine’s eyes were bright, not glassy, and her cheeks were ruddy, rather than fever-flushed. I can prove nothing, but I think she was somewhere she should not have been, and someone warned her you were about to check on her.”

  “Jane?” I asked. “Did she leave your sight?”

  Kat shook her head. “Not for one moment. But Katherine has many friends amongst the maids, and a sister here in your chambers. Perhaps one of them managed to sneak out and told Katherine you were looking for her.”

  “Do you think she was meeting with Hertford?”

  Katherine had long been making eyes at Edward Seymour, Lord Hertford. She knew I did not approve. A union between Katherine and Hertford was potentially dangerous. He was a direct descendant of Edward III and had been cousin to my royal brother. If Katherine married him then her slim claim to the throne would be enhanced and I had no wish to see that happen. There were many who might think on the union of a Grey, and a Seymour as more legitimate than my own claim. Plotting minds might think to place the descendants of Edward III and Princess Mary Tudor on the throne of England, over me. I had no objection to Katherine marrying, just not to Hertford.

  Kat lifted her shoulders. “I can think of no other reason why she would play such a dangerous game, putting her position in your chambers at risk, if not for love, Majesty.”

  “Then it is time we separated them,” I said angrily. “Katherine knows well enough my feelings on the marriage once proposed between Hertford and her. It is within my power to say whom she will marry, not hers! She is a Grey rather than a Tudor, it is true, but she is still a descendant of my grandsire. Her blood is diluted, but still royal and therefore she is under my power to marry, or not marry, according to my wishes.” I glowered at nothing in particular. Had the girl been neglecting her duties for a chance to run off and meet Hertford? If so she would come to regret it!

  “I believe we need another representative in France,” I said. “Young Hertford should be tested as a dignitary. His father had great skill in the art of persuasion. I will send him to France and we will see if Lady Grey suddenly becomes more interested in her post in my household...”

  *

  That New Year’s I was given the oddest present anyone gave me when Sir Humphrey Radcliffe offered me his daughter, Mary, as a gift. Radcliffe had just been presented, and had only brought a small gift for me. Perhaps realising how insignificant his present looked in comparison to those my other nobles carried, he made a graceful bow, and offered me his daughter, when she came of age, to serve in my household. I laughed, at first thinking it a jest, but he was serious. “Do you usually go about handing out your children at New Year, my lord?” I asked. “If so, then I hope you have plenty of them, and a forgiving wife at home!”

  “You are a unique case, of course, Your Majesty,” Radcliffe said with a broad grin. “For you, there must be something special. I assure you, my daughter is a good girl. She is humble, meek but with a ready wit and a keen mind and will serve you well.”

  “And how old is she?” I asked. “How long must I wait for this gift to arrive?”

  “She is but ten, at the moment, Majesty, but will mature in good course.”

  I pursed my lips. It was a flagrant way to gain an appointment for his daughter. Everyone knew how precious the positions in my household were. I wondered if he had not brought a small gift on purpose, and had used this to engineer his offer. But I warmed to Radcliffe. He had presented his ‘gift’ in such a clever way I decided it was worth rewarding. “I accept your gift, my lord,” I said, shaking my head at his audacity even as I smiled at his cleverness. “But I must ask that you do not give out any more children as presents. I might become bombarded with gifts of daughters, as others ape you.”

  *

  After the audiences on New Year’s Day, I held a feast. It was easily as grand as the one at Christmas, and we s
upped on steaming herb pottage, boiled pink shrimp in wine sauce, oysters in lemon and oil, roasted goose, duck and venison and finished the meal with kissing comfits, almond milk with rose petals, apple sauce slathered over buttery biscuits and tarts of egg, cheese, cinnamon, and cardamom. At the end of the feast, a marchpane work was brought out; a chessboard, with all the pieces arranged ready to play, all worked in sugar paste and marzipan.

  Robin presented me with imported galingale, an aromatic root from Italy for making sweet gingerbread from, something of which I was most fond. Robin also gave me two pounds of my favourite quinces and other banqueting items, such as goblets, silver spoons and sucket knives. I was delighted with this collection of gifts, for they demonstrated attention to my personal tastes. He knew I loved sweet things. No one could find presents which pleased me as those of Robin did. He is attentive to my needs and wants, I thought with affection, wondering if my feelings towards him of late had been ungenerous. Perhaps I had been transplanting my feelings of loneliness in the wake of Parry’s death too roundly on Robin’s broad shoulders? A moment later, Robin demonstrated this was not the case.