Queen of This Realm - Plaidy Jean - Страница 20

As a result of that letter, the Council replied that if I could point out these people who were spreading lies about me, they should be suitably punished.

It was at least some slight consolation.

I fretted for Kat. I wanted her with me. I missed her love and her gossip. I decided to plead with the Protector for her return. I could not bear to think of her a prisoner in the Tower.

“My Lord,” I wrote,

“I have a request to make… peradventure you and the Council will think I favor her evil doing, for whom I shall speak, which is Katharine Ashley, that it would please Your Grace and the rest of the Council to be good unto her. Which thing I do, not favor her in any evil (for which I would be sorry to do), but for these considerations that follow, the which hope doth teach me in saying that I ought not to doubt but that Your Grace and the rest of the Council will think that I do it for other considerations. First, because that she hath been with me a long time, and many years, and hath taken great labor and pain in bringing me up in learning and honesty; and therefore I ought of very duty speak for her; for Saint Gregorie sayeth, ‘that we are more bound to them that bringeth us up well than to our parents, for our parents do that which is natural for them that bringeth us into the world, but our bringers-up are a cause to make us live well in it.' The second is because I think that whatsoever she hath done in my Lord Admiral's matter, as concerning the marrying of me, she did it because, knowing him to be one of the Council, she thought he would not go about any such thing without he had the Council's consent thereunto; for I have heard her say many times that she would never have me marry in any place without Your Grace's and the Council's consent. The third cause is, because that it shall, and doth, make men think that I am not clear of the deed myself but that it is pardoned to me because of my youth, because that she I loved so well is in such a place…

“Also, if I may be so bold and not offending, I beseech Your Grace—and the rest of the Council to be good to Master Ashley, her husband, which because he is my kinsman I would be glad should do well.

“Your assured friend to my little power, Elizabeth.”

I hoped my appeal would not fall on deaf ears. I did have some faith in Somerset. He lacked all the charm and good looks of his brother, but I believed him to be a just man and honest as far as men can be when the acquisition of power is the main object of their lives.

I felt numbed when a friend whispered to me that the Admiral was condemned to death. That spy Tyrwhit would be watching me closely. I must prepare myself to show no emotion when the news was brought to me of his execution.

It arrived on a blustery March day. I had steeled myself. When Tyrwhit came to me, he was not alone. He wanted evidence of the manner in which I received the news so that he could report with corroboration to his masters.

“My lady,” he said, “this day Thomas Seymour laid his head upon the block.”

They were watching me, all of them. I clasped my hands. They did not tremble.

I said clearly, for I had rehearsed the words: “This day died a man of much wit and very little judgment.”

Calmly I took my leave of them and went into my chamber.

THREE YEARS HAD PASSED SINCE THE DEATH OF THOMAS Seymour, and I believed I had succeeded in living down the scandals which had been circulating about me at that time. I had become very ill. I do not think I realized until after the Admiral's death the strain I had endured. I had not exactly loved him—in fact I still find it difficult to analyze my feelings toward him—but death is so irrevocable and when it befalls someone whom one has known well it is a shock, particularly when one has been in fear of one's own life.

My youth, I was sure, had saved me and also the fact that I was considered of no great importance; but I knew that as my years increased, so would the danger with them.

Lady Tyrwhit was kind to me during the months following the Admiral's death and I grew fond of her, but no one could replace Kat. The Protector was, I think, a little concerned for my state of health and sent Dr Bill, a good physician, to look after me. Dr Bill realized that the cause of my debility was not entirely physical and he prescribed that my old governess, who had been released from the Tower but forbidden to return to me, should be brought back, for he was sure her presence would have a beneficial effect on my health.

To my great joy the Protector agreed, and what a glorious day that was when we were reunited. We just clung together weeping and assuring ourselves that it was really true.

Poor Kat, she had had a terrifying experience and she told me of her fears when she had been taken away. “The Tower, my lady … and we had betrayed you. Parry and I betrayed you…”

I hugged her and kissed her and told her she was a treacherous old idiot and I did not know why I loved her.

Then she said very seriously: “I would serve you with my life.” And I knew she would, and I fervently hoped she would never come within the shadow of the rack again.

I had resumed my studies with Roger Ascham and they were a source of great joy to me. Edward and I wrote to each other and he was very annoyed because we were not allowed to be together. Edward was at this time thirteen and I was seventeen. After the Admiral's death I was kept very much in the background and hardly ever asserted myself; and when Edward suggested that I ask for a meeting I refrained from doing so, having learned a lesson. A seventeen-year-old girl would appear in a very different light from one of fourteen. I must never again become embroiled in what could be construed as treason. But when Edward asked for my portrait as he could not see me in person, that was one request with which I could comply.

Soon after Thomas's execution, dark clouds began to gather about the head of the Protector. The state of the country was not good; there was trouble with the Scots in the North and they had taken several castles on the Border; war was declared by the French; but the chief cause of friction was perhaps the religious conflicts within the realm. Moreover, through miscalculations, more land was being turned from arable into pasture which created hardship and resulted in the depreciation of the currency; there were risings in Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Norfolk, and this last was developing into more than a revolt of the peasants. It was a rebellion, which was at length crushed successfully by John Dudley, Earl of Warwick, a man of immense ambition. His triumph in Norfolk was the start of his campaign against the Lord Protector. He obviously wanted to oust Somerset from his place and take it himself. I did not know John Dudley, but I did remember a son of his whom I had met during one of his visits to Court when I was about eight years old. We had danced together. He was about a year older than I, and something in our natures had attracted us to each other. I think we both had an unusually high opinion of ourselves, children though we were!

So when I heard that John Dudley was emerging as an enemy of Edward Seymour all I knew of him was that he was the son of the powerful Edmund Dudley who had been held responsible for the taxes imposed by my grandfather King Henry VII and whom my father had sacrificed to the block in order to placate the people soon after his accession. That… and he had a son named Robert.

Although I was far from the center of events, I had my own informants, careful though they were—so I was aware that two ambitious men were determined to rule the King, and through him the country. Each had his supporters, and I confess to thinking that Seymour, as the King's uncle, would prevail, for although Edward was but a boy, his word must be taken some account of, and he would always remember—even though he had rebelled against his sternness—that Edward Seymour was his uncle.