Tudor Throne Read online

  Suddenly a boisterous, but I must admit very fine, baritone voice boomed out of nowhere, shattering the quietude of the countryside, startling the birds, and nearly causing me to jump out of my skin and drop my basket. My heart beat at an alarming rate, and I pressed my hand over it as the mysterious voice belted out with great gusto:

  I gave her Cakes and I gave her Ale,

  I gave her Sack and Sherry;

  I kist her once and I kist her twice,

  And we were wondrous merry!

  I gave her Beads and Bracelets fine,

  I gave her Gold down derry.

  I thought she was afear’d till she stroked my Beard

  And we were wondrous merry!

  Merry my Heart, merry my Cock,

  Merry my Spright.

  Merry my hey down derry.

  I kist her once and I kist her twice,

  And we were wondrous merry!

  Then a tall motley-clad man sprang out from behind a flowering bush, with a basket of what appeared to be little golden cakes in one hand and a large cork-stoppered green flagon in the other, or so said my ladies, Susan Clarencieux and Jane Dormer. Being extremely shortsighted, I could never discern anything not directly before my face, and this bizarre character was always a rainbow-colored blur to me; I never saw him close enough to discern his features.

  Leaping from behind the bush, with his cakes and ale in hand, he began to merrily give chase, skipping and prancing after us, loudly singing all the while, but never presuming to actually catch up with and accost us. Sometimes he would pause and break into a wild wanton jig, throwing back his head and laughing, kicking his legs up high, or taking a honey cake from his basket and throwing it at me, though I leapt back from them as though they were cakes of cow dung. I didn’t know whether to be flattered, frightened, or amused, and Susan and Jane and I quickened our pace in consequence and hurried onward on our errand of mercy, though not, I must admit, without looking back often over our shoulders to track the fool’s progress.

  When we departed after dispensing alms and aid to that poor family, enjoining them to “always trust and fear God” as we went out, he sprang from behind a tree and was there to chase us all the way back to Hunsdon in the same eccentric manner, singing, skipping, prancing, dancing, throwing cakes, and going through many loud repetitions of that ribald song until we were safely behind closed doors again.

  After that I never knew when he might appear, always trailing after me but never daring catch me, singing that increasingly irritating song and flourishing a basket of cakes and a flagon of ale. Sometimes as I sat reading or sewing, a lone honey cake would fly through the open window and land on my open book or lap. And he began to leave me gifts of cakes and ale in all manner of places. One morning I awoke and swung my feet over the side of my bed only to have my bare toes sink into a platter of warm, moist honey cakes, sticky with drizzled honey, that gave every sign of being fresh from the oven. I found them in my pew at chapel, upon my desk, on my favorite garden bench, and even in the privy as if I might wish to partake of them while I eased my body of its waste, and once as I climbed into my coach I almost sat down upon a platter. And even, most alarmingly, I awoke some mornings to find them beside my head on the pillow. Another time when I prepared to take my bath I found the tub filled with ale instead of water with light golden honey cakes bobbing in it while that voice belted out that nerve-grating song outside the window.

  Then, one night I was awakened from a sound sleep by an anguished male voice crying out, “I can’t stand it anymore—I want to taste your honey cake!” as a head thrust beneath my bedcovers and a pair of strong masculine hands closed round my ankles and tried to spread wide my legs. I struggled free and ran screaming, in my bare feet and nightgown, down the stairs to the Great Hall.

  “There is a man in my room!” I shouted as my guards and various servants swarmed around me. “He . . .” I paused suddenly, casting my eyes down and lowering my voice as I felt the heat of shame burn my face. I hugged my arms tight over my breasts, in that moment intensely aware that I was naked beneath my nightgown. “He . . . attempted indecencies upon my person!” I at last blurted out as I burst into tears and fell into Susan’s arms as Jane hastily brought a cloak to drape about my shoulders.

  My guards raced upstairs to investigate and found my bedcovers upon the floor and a number of honey cakes arranged in the shape of a heart upon the white linen sheet, the outline filled in with red rose petals. And upon the table beside my bed, lit by a pair of rose-perfumed candles tinted the most delicate shade of pink, were a flagon of ale and two golden goblets adorned with a rich, glittering pattern of garnet hearts and diamond lovers’ knots. But of the intruder there was no sign.

  Returning to my room on the heels of my guards, with Susan and Jane keeping close on either side of me, I went to the window and squinted out into the dark night. And there below me that familiar voice boomed out that annoyingly familiar bawdy tavern tune again.

  I gave her Cakes and I gave her Ale,

  I gave her Sack and Sherry;

  I kist her once and I kist her twice,

  And we were wondrous merry!

  I gave her Beads and Bracelets fine,

  I gave her Gold down derry.

  I thought she was afear’d till she stroked my Beard

  And we were wondrous merry!

  Merry my Heart, merry my Cock,

  Merry my Spright.

  Merry my hey down derry.

  I kist her once and I kist her twice,

  And we were wondrous merry!

  “Unleash the hounds!” I ordered, bristling with outrage. But he merely laughed at me, throwing back his head as he broke into a jig, kicking his legs up high and blowing kisses to me, before he had to flee with a bevy of barking dogs at his heels. After that night, I never saw him again.

  Some weeks later the Spanish Ambassador came to dine with me. He told me he had heard that the Lord Protector’s brother, the Lord Admiral, Sir Thomas Seymour, had petitioned the Council for my hand in marriage, and that he had already most presumptuously begun to woo me until he was ordered by his brother to desist as neither of them was meant to marry a king’s daughter.

  “If such is true, I know nothing about it,” I answered. “As for his courting me, I have only seen the man once or perhaps twice at court celebrations, and I have never spoken a word to him in my life.”

  Later that evening as she helped me to undress, my faithful Susan ventured to inform me, in the most deferential terms of course, that such was not exactly the case, and that I had seen Thomas Seymour several times in the guise of that mad fool stranger we had called “The Cakes and Ale Man.”

  “I naturally assumed you knew, M’am,” Susan said.

  “No, indeed I did not know,” I assured her, “and I doubt I would have even if I had seen him close enough to discern his features. But if that is his way of wooing, his technique leaves much to be desired.”

  “I quite agree, M’am,” Susan replied, “though he is said to have quite a way with the ladies, I think the rumors give him more credit than he deserves, as do the London moneylenders.”

  After “The Cakes and Ale Man” had come and gone, all lapsed back into normality, but it was only the quiet before the storm.

  6

  Elizabeth

  I could not remain at court, for the Lord Protector had decreed that during the King’s minority, while Edward was unmarried, it would not be seemly for single ladies, including the King’s sisters, to reside at court. I thought I was destined to go, yet again, back to Hatfield, and languish there for many years to come, with only occasional visits to Mary and the court at Christmastime to relieve the tedium, but Katherine Parr came to my rescue once again. I was like a daughter to her, she said, and she dreaded so to part with me, and asked me if I would like to come live with her.

  It was a dream come true to be at cheerful Chelsea, Katherine’s redbrick manor house set in a verdant green heart of woodlands, parks,
and gardens overlooking a usually placid expanse of the Thames. The mullioned windows welcomed in the sun as if to dare the gloom to intrude, and everyone, even the lowliest servant, always went about with a smile on their face; everyone was happy at Chelsea. And I settled happily into a quiet routine of study and pleasant pastimes in Kate’s company.

  And there was a mystery to spice up this bland but nonetheless pleasant existence—titillating gossip that Kate had a lover. And so soon after my father’s death! It was as unexpected as it was scandalous. Who would have believed it of Kate? I had always thought of Kate as such a practical, prim, level-headed, decorous lady, altogether lacking in passion, but apparently she had hidden depths. Even though her beliefs about religion and education were newfangled and excitingly bold, I never once thought of her as the sort of woman who would fling herself into a lover’s embrace, especially not before the official period of mourning for her husband had expired.

  My dearest, darling Kat, my plump, fussy, mother hen of a governess, Katherine Ashley, and I would crouch on the window seat in my bedchamber at night, bundled in our velvet dressing gowns, and watch by moonlight as Kate crept out cloaked and veiled amidst the night blooming jasmine to the gate at the back of the garden to let him in, a tall, dark shadow stealthy as a phantom.

  He would take her in his arms, bend her over backward, and kiss her with a scorching passion that even we, sitting there watching from the window above like a pair of giddy, giggling housemaids, could feel as we tried to guess his identity. Then she would take his hand and lead him to the house and, presumably, up the back stairs to her bed.

  And with the dawn’s first faint light, when Mrs. Ashley still slept soundly, snoring in the small room adjoining mine, I would sometimes creep from my bed, the stone floor cold beneath my naked toes, making me shiver, to watch them, arms about each other’s waists, leaning into one another, as they walked slowly back to the garden gate, pausing to steal one last, lingering kiss before he took his leave, as the jasmine closed its petals for the day.

  And then came the day when it wasn’t a secret anymore. I received a summons bidding me to come to Kate’s chamber. And there he was—the rash and reckless, hotheaded and handsome, Lord Admiral Thomas Seymour of the winning smile and ready laugh. Handsome beyond words and measure, with sun-bronzed skin, wavy auburn hair, a long luxuriant beard, twinkling cinnamon-brown eyes, and a voice like a velvet glove on bare skin, he moved with a bold, larger-than-life, confident swagger that suggested he had never in his life known a moment of self-doubt, and wielded his charm like a weapon. Every woman who crossed his path seemed to succumb to that charm. Even staid and proper matrons were reduced to giggling, giddy schoolgirls simpering and blushing in his presence, with hearts aflutter and knees like butter, hanging on his every word, and men were enraptured and enthralled by his tales of adventure and derring-do upon the high seas and his dealings with the pirates who plied the Scilly Isles. He was the complete and contrary opposite of his icy, calculating, meticulous cold fish of a brother, the Lord Protector. Tom Seymour was the man every woman wanted to wed or bed and every man wanted to be.

  When I walked in he was standing before the fire in Kate’s bedchamber, stretching his hands out to the welcoming warmth of the fragrant applewood logs as raindrops dribbled from his cinnamon velvet cloak onto the bearskin rug upon the hearth.

  The moment I saw him my heart felt a jolt as if it had been struck by lightning and unaccountably I began to blush and tremble. I could not speak; my lips could not form the words to utter even a simple greeting. I felt as if my tongue had become a useless pink ribbon all tied up in tenacious, impossible knots. For the life of me, I couldn’t understand why. Then he was crossing the room. His hands were on my waist and he was lifting me up high, my feet dangling uselessly above the floor. My long red hair swung down over my shoulders to tickle his face as I gazed down at him and he in turn fixed me with an intense, penetrating gaze. Then, very slowly, he lowered me, and pressed me close against his strong chest—I felt sure he could feel my heart pounding as if there were a wild, bucking horse trapped inside my breast—and then . . . he kissed me! Long and lingeringly upon my lips, he kissed me! I surprised myself, even as I knew I should shove him away and slap him for his impertinence, and instead I wrapped my arms around his neck and clung to him.

  “My Lord!” I gasped, blushing and befuddled, when his lips left mine.

  “Well met, My Lady Elizabeth.” He smiled at me, displaying a set of perfect pearl-white teeth, sparkling from amidst his bushy beard, as he released me and his hands reached out knowingly to catch my elbows and steady me as my knees threatened to give way beneath my black damask and velvet mourning gown.

  “I thought it only fair that since I have swept you off your feet at both our previous meetings I should continue in the same vein,” he said teasingly.

  As he spoke his eyes roved over my body and I felt as if every stitch I wore was being peeled away, leaving me stark naked before his piercing gaze.

  “Do you not remember?” An incredulous little frown creased his brow before he shook his head to chase it away and smiled again. “No, you cannot have forgotten! I am a man who always makes a lasting impression! The first time was on the occasion of my dear sister Jane’s first, and sadly last, Christmas as Queen . . .”

  “Y-Yes, M-My Lord, I . . . I . . . remember . . .” Blushing and tongue-tied, I stammered, as my mind hurtled back in time to that Christmas of 1536 when Tom Seymour, dressed in motley colored silks and ribbon streamers all trimmed with tiny bells, and a gilded tin crown, had presided over the Yuletide celebrations as the Lord of Misrule. All of a sudden he had swooped down on me and swept me up high into the air and demanded a kiss from me. Laughing, I threw my arms around his neck and complied wholeheartedly with a hearty smacking kiss that made all those about us laugh. I was but three at the time and not so mindful of my dignity, and everyone is apt to let decorum slip when the jolly, cavorting Lord of Misrule holds sway and the wine and wassail are flowing freely. Everyone looked on smilingly, observing that “Jolly Tom” had such a way with children, they naturally responded to him, and what a shame it was that he was still a bachelor and had none of his own. Then he set me down, and taking out a flute, called the other children to gather round, and bade us follow him, forming a living serpent of gaily garbed little bodies, weaving our way through the adults amassed in the Great Hall.

  “And the second time,” he prompted, “was when I carried you in the procession for . . .”

  I gulped and nodded. “. . . my brother Edward’s christening.”

  “Yes! God’s teeth, you do remember!” He smiled broadly. “I knew you could not have forgotten! My brother Ned was supposed to have the honor of carrying you, but you took an instant dislike to him—and who could blame you?—and kicked his shin and ran to me and threw yourself into my arms and said as regally as a little queen, ‘You may carry me,’ and when he tried to take you from me you bit him.”

  I blushed at the memory and hung my head; I could not meet his eyes knowing my face was all aflame, and my stomach felt as if it were aswarm with thousands of anxious bees.

  “Y-Yes, M-My Lord,” I said quietly, “I . . . I remember.”

  “And now . . .” Tom smiled, oblivious to my embarrassment. “Here I am, to sweep you off your feet every day for many years to come! What, can it be? Have you not guessed, my clever Princess?” He threw back his head and laughed at my befuddled countenance. He spread wide his arms to show off his fine manly physique and the equally fine clothing beneath his sodden cloak. “Your new stepfather stands before you!—Here I am! Come, embrace me, Bess!”

  I felt the most peculiar feeling then, a breathlessness that left me reeling, as if the breath had suddenly been knocked violently from my lungs. I couldn’t understand it then, my mind churned with confusion, but knowing that he was married made me feel as if a crushing blow had been dealt me and made me want to rage against fate, to shriek and strike out with my fists
and tear with my nails. “He can’t be married!” I kept wailing despairingly over and over in my mind, “He just can’t be married!” I cried without understanding why the news should so distress me. Tom Seymour was a grown man about to cross the threshold of forty; he had remained a bachelor long past the age when most men are many years married, and the gossips had long wondered why he tarried so long without taking a wife. Now he had only done what society had always expected of him. So why should the news leave me reeling and ready to burst into tears? God’s bones, I hardly knew the man, so why was I ready to curse and shriek at the Fates that he should have been mine?

  He took a step toward me, reaching out, as if he would draw me back into his arms again. I stepped back, even as I longed to run forward and hurl myself into them. I stumbled as my limbs tangled in my skirts, and only the quick grasp of his hand around my elbow kept me from falling.

  “Tom!” a soft, gentle voice behind me said, and I started, unaccountably feeling a hard jolt of guilt, as if I had been caught doing something illicit, as my stepmother quietly entered the room and stepped past me to lay a gentle hand on her husband’s arm.

  “For shame, Tom! You have broken the news too abruptly! Can you not see you have nearly felled her with the shock? Tut, tut, you are too impulsive, My Lord Husband! And take off that wet cloak, before you catch a chill; I want to be a wife this time, not a physician in petticoats. Sit down, please, Bess”—she turned back to me, smiling gently, encouragingly—“and I shall tell you all about it.”