Carolyn Meyer - Beware, Princess Elizabeth

“You have waited three days to tell us of our father’s death,” I retorted. “Now, if you please, have the kindness to allow me a little time to console my brother, the king.” Without waiting for a reply, I knelt beside the sobbing, quivering boy. Only when he was somewhat soothed and my own feelings calmed did I call for Kat Ashley to prepare for our journey.

“LORD HAVE MERCY!” Kat cried out when I told her the news. She put on a great show of wailing and blubbering that I only half believed. Kat had been my governess and dearest confidante since I was three years old. We knew each other very well, and I sensed that although she deemed it proper to grieve for the death of the monarch, she could not forgive my father for his treatment of my mother and for the many times he seemed to have forgotten me. While Kat continued her lamentations, I summoned the maids of the chamber to begin laying out the black mourning garments I would need.

Eventually – not quickly enough for Seymour, but in good time – our belongings were packed into panniers carried by horses, and our mounts prepared. Frost crunched beneath the horses’ hooves as we plodded along rutted roadways. For once Kat was mostly silent, and I was finally able to give myself over to my grief.

I hadn’t seen my father for two years, since last he called me to court to celebrate the dawning of the new year. That was how he was – sometimes I was in the king’s favour, sometimes not. It had been this way all my life. For a time he hadn’t even acknowledged me as his daughter, long ago declaring both my sister, Mary, and me bastards. (Mary is the child of his first wife, I of his second, and Edward of his third.) Yet, only weeks before his death, I learned that he had restored us to the succession, putting us in line for the throne after Edward and whatever children my father’s only son would produce. My sister and I were still bastards, but we were the king’s heirs. I stood a long way from the throne, however, and it did not once occur to me that day as I rode towards London that I might one day become queen.

IT WAS LATE afternoon, and the torches were already lit when we reached London. We were chilled to the bone and aching with weariness. But we could not rest. We had to hasten at once to Whitehall Palace, where my father’s body lay in state in the chapel. His enormous coffin was surrounded by dozens of mourners and as many flickering candles. As I entered the chapel, I gave a start and nearly cried out, for beside the coffin stood a wax effigy of the king, dressed in magnificent jewelled robes. The extremely lifelike figure didn’t resemble my pain-wracked father as I last saw him. It was made to portray the king in his vigorous youth. I had never seen him like this. My earliest memories were of a man who was already turned fat and ungainly. I was unprepared for the feelings of loss and yearning that swept through me for the awesomely powerful man I had never known.

Near the coffin sat Queen Catherine, my father’s sixth wife, pale but composed. It would be wrong to describe her as beautiful, for Catherine, at thirty-four, was past her bloom. But she had a kindness in her eyes and a generous mouth that, on less sombre occasions, smiled easily. I thought how lonely she would now be without my father. She had been so attentive to him in his last months, when he was feeble and in pain. He had been a demanding husband, yet she was sure to feel his absence keenly.

By her side sat one of our cousins, Lady Jane Grey, gently stroking the queen’s hand. As we entered, Jane jumped to her feet, and she and Edward rushed weeping into each other’s arms. I stood silently by, observing the scene. I, too, felt like weeping, but I would never reveal my feelings so easily.

After Edward received Queen Catherine’s embrace, it was my turn. I stepped forward and knelt before her, and when she raised me up I kissed her with true affection. As I did so I noticed the man who hovered near her chair with an air of solicitude. He gazed at me, and I couldn’t help gazing back frankly. Two years previously, when I was last at court, I had met Tom Seymour, brother of Edward Seymour and another of my little brother’s uncles. I’d paid little attention to him then – I was but a child of eleven. But now thirteen and aware of such things, I was quite conscious of his eyes lingering upon me.

Tom Seymour was tall, at least six feet, although not so tall as my father, with a slender, athletic build. His dark hair fell over his brow, and his beard was red and abundant. His brown eyes generally glowed with merriment, although at times they seemed to smoulder with less pleasant emotions. I thought him very handsome.

After gazing at me for a long moment, he bowed and greeted me cordially, expressing his deep sympathy. But almost immediately he turned to my brother with an outpouring of affection. Edward had been weeping more or less steadily since Seymour brought us the news. Now he suddenly brightened and fairly leaped into Tom’s arms. Tom swept up the frail boy in an embrace that nearly engulfed him.

At that moment Edward Seymour stepped forward. “Set him down at once,” he ordered Tom in a tone that brooked no refusal. “This is the king of England, you fool! Not some idle toy for your pleasure!”

The two Seymours stared at each other while my brother clung to Tom like a cub to its dam. Then, very gently, Tom set the young king on his feet again and knelt before him. “Your Majesty,” Tom said reverently. Edward Seymour cast his brother a scornful look and turned away.

What interested me even more than the anger that flashed between the two men was something in the eyes of Queen Catherine. She gazed at Tom Seymour with an expression that could mean only one thing: she loves him.

At once I wondered, How long has she loved him? My father has been dead for less than a week! This realisation troubled me; I cared for Queen Catherine, and I could not bear to think of her as a disloyal wife. My mind raced on: And what of Tom Seymour? Does he love the queen?

I WAS KNEELING in prayer by my father’s coffin when my sister, Mary, arrived. Her entrance created a considerable stir. Unless we were called to court, we rarely saw each other, although we lived only half a day’s journey apart and often exchanged politely formal letters.

I was surprised at how she looked. She would be thirty-one in a few days, but she appeared much older. Her skin was blanched, her face pinched, her once red-gold hair now faded and thin. She seemed shrunken inside her mourning clothes, and yet she glittered from head to foot with diamonds and pearls. In her love of jewels, at least, she resembled our father! We greeted each other as daughters of the king, as the occasion demanded, and wept in each other’s arms. Yet there was no warmth in our embrace. We were not enemies then, but neither were we friends. For my part I felt no more than if I had been embracing a near stranger.

As Mary and I stood by our father’s bier, I recalled the summer our father had wed Catherine. After the marriage ceremony at Hampton Court in July of 1543, Mary and I, and Edward, had accompanied the bridal couple on a honeymoon progress through the countryside. Each summer my father made a royal progress to let himself be seen by his subjects, stopping for a week or a fortnight with noble families along the way and amusing himself each day with hunting. The purpose of this progress was to display his new wife as well as to hunt for deer.

No one paid me much attention that summer except Catherine, who was quite gracious to me. I was grateful for her kindness, for as a nine-year-old girl I did not like to be ignored. Wherever we went, little Edward, curly haired and adorable heir to the throne, was of course the object of much cooing and petting. But it was my sister, Mary, who received enthusiastic greetings from the crowds that turned out to hail us as we rode through hamlets and villages. This seemed to annoy my father, who took to teasing Mary about finding her a husband.