FIFTEEN
Yuletide: Year of Our Lord 1547
Winter and Spring: Year of Our Lord 1548
Hanworth
Hampton Court Palace
Shortly before the Christmas season was about to begin, Kate and I were reading in her room whilst the snow swirled outside of the lead cross-panes when she said, “After the New Year’s celebrations, I should like to hold a fine banquet and dance to which I shall invite unmarried young men of good birth and knighthood for you to meet.” She set her book down and looked at me. “I daresay it is time.”
“I should like that, Your Grace.” I pushed aside memories of Jamie. She was right. “And mayhap you can invite some widowers?”
She looked at me strangely. “Of course, but why ever for?”
“I believe that Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald finds life with her husband, Sir Anthony Browne, to be most congenial. I should consider all.”
The queen nodded, agreeing. Soon the conversation turned toward planning the gifts and clothing she would take to court for Christmas.
Although her household numbered at about one hundred, only twenty or so of us accompanied her and Thomas to court for Christmas. She was still the highest-ranking woman at court, which piqued her sister-in-law Lady Seymour. Thomas, of course, shared her exalted chambers. One night as I was unfastening her stays and handing her gown to her lady maid she seemed particularly vexed. “Quickly!” she said. “Lord Thomas will shortly arrive and he is not well disposed.”
“Why not, Your Grace?”
She hesitated afore speaking. “He has seen the king, and asked the king to copy, in His Majesty’s own hand, a letter that Thomas has written, and then sign it as if written by the king himself. His request was denied. Then Thomas argued to His Majesty that it were no ill thing he be requesting.”
I stopped what I was doing and nearly dropped her gown. “What did this document say?”
“It was a request by the king to the council for Edward Seymour to be replaced by his brother, Thomas, as his governor.”
“And the king’s response?”
“He refused. He said if it were good, the lords would already have made such a move. And if it were ill, he, the king, would not write such a thing. He warned Thomas that it was treasonous and pointedly dropped the matter.”
I knew Lord Thomas would have taken poorly to being rebuked and chided by a ten-year-old boy, king or no. Had he not considered that the council was like to inquire of the king how he came upon this line of thought, and when pressed, His Majesty should speak the truth? “This is dangerous work, madam, when the king himself calls such an action treason. Will Lord Thomas now let this madness lie?” I heard him approach and quickly finished my ministrations.
“I think not,” she said softly. “He oft acts rashly and without forethought.”
I stuck myself with a hairpin and the sharp shock of it reflected the pain in my heart over Kate’s husband.
The New Year began with mishap but followed with merriment. The Lady Elizabeth’s tutor, Master Grindal, who was beloved by all in the queen’s household and especially by the Lady Elizabeth herself, died of plague. The plague had been better behaved under the last king, but had reared its death head more regularly under the new monarch and began boldly picking off men, women, and children. Though sorrowed, we were also relieved that Master Grindal had taken his leave afore Christmas and therefore had not had time to pass the contagion.
I came upon the queen dowager and the Lady Elizabeth having a disagreement, as mothers and daughters do, about who should replace Master Grindal. Kate desired Master Goldsmith, the Lady Elizabeth, Master Ascham.
“Come now, Kate.” Thomas strode into the room middiscussion. “I believe Elizabeth is now of an age to choose her own tutor. I rather prefer Ascham myself.”
Shortly thereafter, Master Ascham was engaged, though I know Kate did not like being rebuked by her husband in front of her ward, especially as he’d sided against her.
More trouble ensued when Elisabeth Brooke and her small household arrived to stay at Hansworth. Though she was married now, the lord protector declared it was not valid, and I again shared my large chamber with her.
“William is forbidden from seeing me on pain of death,” Elisabeth said bitterly whilst her lady maid unpacked her clothing. “The lord protector has set aside our marriage.”
“What happened?” I asked, sitting in a chair nearby whilst she raged.
“William spoke with him privately to tell him that in light of the petition for annulment last spring, we had recently married. He expected the lord protector to be favorably disposed toward this news, he having been divorced from an adulterous wife himself afore taking Lady Seymour. But no! He said his power and authority had been thwarted. That no noble may marry without his permission. Never mind that till his sister shared the king’s bed he himself was no noble, only gentry.” She paused at that, she born the daughter of a noble lord, and looked at me. “Not that I intend to slight those raised to gentry.”
“Of course not,” I said.
The news only inflamed the queen and Lord Thomas more against Edward, and I felt, to my dismay, that a final point for reconciliation had been met and then quickly passed by as the road diverged.
The queen held a large masque, as promised, in early March, when all were well tired of the ill weather. Yet it was not bright enough to look toward the promise of spring. There were more than two hundred people well-crammed in the queen’s beautiful dower estate; all spoke of her homes as the second court. The king was but a boy and Lady Seymour had more talent to pretention than to true hospitality. The tables were laden with jellied eels and baked lampreys with sticky syrup, small pies with whitefish bursting from the crusts, roasted pink salmon, and all other manner of fish as ’twere Lent. My lady did not keep with a somber household for the season, as court did of old, but she did keep with forbearing the eating of meat.
I had taken my rose gown out and let it air; I had worn it but once, when I last met Jamie, and it seemed a shame and a waste not to wear it more than that. But at the last minute, I could not. I sorrowfully put it away and chose a becoming gown of bright red that I knew also showed off my dark brown hair to advantage.
I had danced with many fine young men that night but did not allow any to think that I favored them. When a gentleman about the age of Lord Thomas approached me to dance, I accepted his invitation.
“My lady?” he said. “Sir Richard Hibbart. A dance?”
“I should be glad to,” I replied.
He took my hand and graciously led me to dance, and while he allowed me to partner with another, he later came back to ask of me again. I discovered that he was a widower with three children already with tutors of their own, one placed in a noble household and the others remaining with their governess.
“Are you in constant attendance upon the queen?” he asked at the end of the evening.
“I am,” I said. “Though I may visit my mother, who resides in Marlborough, or my brother, who is placed in Cecil’s household.”
He led me to sit, called for a goblet of watered wine, and took one for himself. He broke sweat rather quickly whilst dancing, and his hair was thinning, but he still cut a fine figure in his doublet and jacket. “I shall take my leave for Scotland soon, with the fleet, to defend against the French onslaught. I am supposing that the lord high admiral will accompany us … this time.”
It was to Thomas’s great shame that when last the fleet sailed out against Scotland he had not been at the helm, but rather remained in London pressing his case with the council.
“I will pray for your safety,” I said.
“May I call upon you when I return?” he asked.