Queen of This Realm - Plaidy Jean - Страница 25

If ever they should reject Mary and her Catholicism, they would look to me, so I knew that it was imperative for me not to accept the Catholic Faith. If ever I did, I should not be preferred to my sister—a young bigot would be just as bad as an old one, perhaps worse.

The first trouble came when there was a requiem mass for my brother. The idea of having mass for him was wrong in any case because it was the last thing he would have wanted. He had been almost as fanatical a supporter of the Reformed Faith as my sister was of the Catholic. I knew that whatever happened I must not attend.

Mary was very angry and I asked for an audience so that I could explain to her, but she refused to grant it.

I wondered how I could get away from Court, but to go now would seem like running away. I must face it, and as I had some faith in Mary's natural kindness of heart, which had been shown to me in the past, I was sure that if she would see me, if I could be alone with her, I could explain.

When Parliament was called, Gardiner's first act as Lord Chamberlain was to declare my father's marriage to Katharine of Aragon legal, which meant that Mary was legitimate and therefore that I was not.

I was sure that if Sir William Cecil were here he would say that in itself was not such a bad thing, as it implied that I had no right to the throne and that should, of course, make me less vulnerable to attack at the moment. However, I strongly resented it, but kept my resentment to myself.

In due course Mary said she would receive me, and when I went to her she allowed me to kiss her hand, which I did with the utmost respect, and I told her that it grieved me greatly that she was displeased with me.

“All you have to do to please me is to return to the true faith,” she said.

“I find it hard, Your Majesty, to make myself believe. I can only believe what my mind allows me to.”

“Belief will come. You must open your mind.”

I almost said she was asking me to shut my mind as tightly as hers was shut, but of course I did not. It would naturally have angered her, when what I desperately needed was to placate her, to gain her forgiveness, her leniency, and yet deny what she was trying to press on me.

Could I go to Mass? Would it be easier? I thought of those shouting crowds. “Long Live the Princess Elizabeth!” There was an affinity between those people and myself. They saw me as their Queen-to-be just as I saw myself; it was what they wanted and what I wanted.

I must tread very carefully.

“As you love me …” I began.

“You are my sister,” Mary interrupted me, “and as such I have regard for you, but I cannot love a heretic. That would go against God's Will.”

Since when, I wondered, had God taught man to hate his fellow man? I covered my face with my hands as though in great grief. “My sister,” I said, “I shall never forget your kindness to me when I was small and alone. We were both outcasts then. We were together…”

“The mistake was in your upbringing. You had teachers who cared more for scholarship than for religious teaching.”

I begged her to be patient with me.

“I have shown patience,” she said. “But if you would please me, you must go to Mass. There you will in time understand the truth. You may go now. But remember this. You shall go to Mass. It is my command.”

I was trembling when I left her. So I should have to go to Mass. The people would hear of it. They would say, “So she is not our Protestant Princess after all.”

I knew I dared not disobey the Queen's command. Gardiner was only waiting for a chance to put me in the Tower. After all, what had been Edward Courtenay's fault? Only that he had been a Plantagenet. For that accident of birth he had spent fifteen years of his short life in prison.

So I went to Mass. As usual I took refuge in illness, but still I had to go. My ladies almost carried me into the chapel. I made it seem as though I were half fainting, and as we came into the chapel I caused them to stop and rub my stomach. “I am afflicted by grievous pains,” I said.

That would be reported. It might tell the people that I had been most reluctant to go to Mass.

MARY SHELVED HER ANNOYANCE with me during the Coronation. Perhaps she knew that because of my popularity with the people I must be seen to play a prominent part in it.

It was the usual grand ceremony which the people loved and expected on such occasions and whatever king or queen was on the throne everyone was determined to have a good day's outing and enjoy the pageantry.

Three days before the event Mary left St James's for Whitehall and from there took a barge to the Tower accompanied by her ladies—and with me beside her.

It was thrilling to arrive at the Tower and hear the guns roar out their welcome and to see all the craft on the river with their streamers and musical instruments.

The next day we made our procession through the streets of London surrounded by a splendid array of Court officials and noblemen. I noticed my two archenemies among the party—Renaud and de Noailles. Mary was borne in a splendid litter drawn by six white horses and covered in cloth of silver. She wore a gown of blue velvet trimmed with ermine and on her head was a gold net caul covered in pearls and precious stones. She looked pale and I guessed that caul must be a great weight; and she did suffer from headaches. It was different with me; I too suffered from headaches but mine had the pleasant nature of never appearing on occasions which I could enjoy as I did this one.

I followed just behind my sister in a chariot covered with crimson velvet and with me rode my father's fourth wife—the only one now alive, Anne of Cleves, a very pleasant lady of whom I had always been fond. We were dressed in robes of cloth of silver with long hanging sleeves which fell back most becomingly when I waved to the crowds. The cheers for me were deafening, and I felt gleeful because they were greater than those for the Queen herself—although I knew this could be dangerous, for I would not be the only one who noticed this.

I loved the pageantry and all the time I was thinking: One day this will be for me.

I laughed heartily over the four giants who greeted us in Fenchurch Street and the angel perched on the arch in Gracechurch Street, who looked like a statue until she suddenly came to life and blew her trumpet. The people were already getting merry on the wine which ran in the Cornhill and Cheapside conduits as the Mayor escorted the Queen through Temple Bar to Whitehall.

On the morning of the Coronation itself we took to the barges and landed at Westminster stairs when we went to the Palace and prepared ourselves for the great occasion.

The procession from the Palace to the Abbey began at eleven o'clock. The Barons of the Cinque Ports held the canopy over the Queen and I walked immediately behind her, which was the place for the heir. She is thirty-seven years old, I kept telling myself. She will marry soon. She must. But will she get an heir? She looked so pale and tired, but she would certainly do her best to get a Catholic heir. How much did she resent me in the place I now occupied?

I might be called a bastard, but my father's will had named me as the next in succession after her and they could not go against my father's will. They had seen what had happened to Northumberland when he had tried to do that.

Gardiner was performing the ceremony. She had chosen him although it was usually the duty of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Gardiner was going to be her chief adviser. And he was my bitter enemy. I did believe that if he could have removed me without causing too much bother he would have done so by now.

I listened to the words.

“Here present is Mary, rightful and undoubted inheritrix by the laws of God and man to the Crown and royal dignity of the realm of England, France and Ireland…”