She called him Robert.
He was the most handsome of all her boys. In the first few weeks of his life she knew that he would be the best beloved. He was lustier than all the others; he had been born with a thick down of hair; his eyes flashed more brightly than she believed eyes had ever flashed before; he demanded his own way from the beginning.
His father scarcely noticed him. Why should he? He was “on the road” now. He was preparing to march on to greatness.
Robert was all Jane’s in those first months of his life. No nurses should take him from her. He was her baby—her little Robin.
How sorry she was for poor Queen Katharine, living out her lonely life in the Castle of Kimbolton. A boy like Robin would have made all the difference in the world to her happiness, poor lady. As if a baby like Robin would not make all the difference to any woman! But poor Queen Katharine desperately needed a son.
And now another Queen was praying for a son.
Queen Anne was lying-in at Greenwich, and the country was waiting for the birth of a prince to be proclaimed.
When the King passed along the river, Jane watched him from the shelter of an arbor—seeing but unseen—and she held up the little boy, murmuring: “Look, Robin. There goes a king. They say he would give half his kingdom for a boy like you. But then who would not give all the world for you!”
There was a mist on the river during those September days, and the trees of the orchards were heavy with ripening fruit.
“May the Queen be fruitful,” prayed Jane; for, sorry as she was for the displaced Queen, yet she wished joy to the new one. “May the Queen give birth to a prince as bonny—nay, that were impossible—almost as bonny as my Robin.”
The bells rang out in the City. A child was born to the King and Queen.
A prince! said the people. It is sure to be a prince. Nothing but a prince would please the King.
Ah, thought Jane, the King needs a son. It will be God’s way of telling him that he was right to break from an incestuous union and set a new Queen on the throne.
John came home from the Court, sober and unsmiling.
“What news, John? What news of the prince?” asked Jane.
And he answered: “’Twas not a prince that was born this day at Greenwich. ’Twas a girl.” Then he gave that short hard laugh which, she had noticed, had developed lately. “It will not do, Queen Anne Boleyn,” he muttered. “The King married you for sons … and you give him a girl!”
“Poor lady!” murmured Jane. “Poor lady!” And she thought: Oh dear, she is gay and wicked, they say; but I would not wish to see her suffer as poor Queen Katharine did.
Suffer? How could she suffer? She was young; she was the most attractive of women; she was not the sort to despair because her first-born was a daughter. The King was deeply enamored of her; for her sake he had broken with Rome. Who was Jane Dudley to be sorry for such as Queen Anne Boleyn!
She whispered to Robert: “It is because we are both mothers, my love. But she has a daughter and she longed for a son. And I have you—the most handsome baby in the world.”
She kissed him and he wriggled away. He was nearly a year old and only wished for kisses when he was in the mood for them.
“But what does Robert Dudley care for the new Princess Elizabeth?” crooned Jane.
In the next three years Jane often thought of the little Princess. So much honor was done to her at one time. The King himself delighted to have her dressed in finery that he might carry her round and show her to the ladies of the Court, insisting that they admire his daughter, his little Elizabeth.
But the King still wished for sons; and Queen Anne, it seemed, could no more satisfy his wishes than his previous Queen had done.
Such rumors there were of quarrels between the King and Queen—and she was not humble as her predecessor had been, but fiery and haughty. “The Queen is riding for trouble,” said John.
There was talk of the lady Jane Seymour and the King’s interest in this pale, quiet girl. The King’s conscience, like a monster drugged by the sweet intoxication of Anne Boleyn, was throwing off its stupor. Was Anne really his wife? he was asking now. Had she not betrothed herself to another before she had gone through the ceremony with the King? Was she the virtuous wife he had believed her to be?
If there were no longer a Queen Anne Boleyn there might be a Queen Jane Seymour.
But Jane Dudley’s thoughts were for the little Princess—the once fêted and the honored. What would become of her? Those about the King were already wondering whether she would be designated Bastard, as her half-sister Mary had been.
“Poor little Princess!” said Jane.
But she had her own family to occupy her mind.
A new son was born to her. This son was called Guildford, after her father. Guildford Dudley. That pleased Sir Richard.
And one day on Tower Green Queen Anne lost her head, and with unbecoming haste the King made Jane Seymour his Queen.
Jane wept when she heard the news. Robert and Guildford watched her for a few seconds before four-year-old Robert asked: “Mother, why do you cry?” He was precocious beyond the others. He listened to gossip and his eyes flashed as his father’s did. “Is it because they have cut off Queen Anne’s head?”
She was silent for a while, then she said: “No, my tears are not for the Queen, for she is past her pain. It is for the little one who is left, her daughter, the little Princess Elizabeth who is but three years old and without a mother to love her.”
Robert was the center of his world; he saw everything in relation to Robert.
He said: “I am older than the Princess. She is but three and I am four.”
“Yes, my darling. And you have your mother left to you.”
Robert laughed. He was important. He was the most important person in the world. He saw that, in the eyes of his mother and young Guildford who were watching him with such admiration.
The prosperous years had set in. Jane was rich in children; she bore John thirteen—eight sons and five daughters; some of them died when pestilence struck London but her darling grew bolder and more handsome every day.
There he was, a sturdy little fellow, strutting in the Tower gardens, calling to the guards and warders. They all laughed at his swagger. “Ha,” they said, “he will get on in the world, will Master Robert Dudley.”
Meanwhile John had continued with his spectacular rise. He had come a long way now from that boy—of Robert’s age—who had stood on Tower Hill and heard the mob, shouting against his father.
Sir John Dudley was handsome, witty, and clever; he distinguished himself in the tiltyard and at all those sports and pastimes at which Henry himself had once excelled.
“I like this John Dudley,” said the King; “and it was ever my custom to reward those who pleased me.”
Others received their rewards from the King. His fifth wife lost her head on Tower Green and was buried in the church of St. Peter ad Vincula beside the King’s second Queen, who had suffered a similar fate. At this time Henry made Sir John an Admiral of his Fleet and with that honor gave him the title of Lord Lisle. John Dudley had proved himself a good servant.
They were indeed rising in the world. Lord Lisle could look at his sons and daughters and be proud of what he had done for them. He talked to them often and his talk was always of ambition. “See how a man or a woman may rise! Your grandfather, the son of a farmer, was a humble lawyer, and he became the King’s right-hand man. As a boy I saw my father beheaded on Tower Hill and knew myself a penniless orphan. And now, my sons and daughters, here you see me: Lord Lisle, Admiral of the Fleet, and for my services in the Boulogne battle I am to become a Knight of the Garter.”