A Favorite of the Queen: The Story of Lo - By Jean Plaidy Page 0,4
he could not yet go to Court.
Sir Richard came home full of excitement. “See what I have done for you, John!” he cried. “Now it will be your turn.”
“Yes, now it is my turn,” said the solemn boy.
Jane watched them gravely, wondering what this was all about. But there was no need to explain such matters to Jane. She was happy because her father was happy; and she saw in John that deep brooding concentration which she respected although she could not share it.
As they went out to the stables together she said: “Something good has happened, has it not?”
He nodded but he said no more then for he did not wish the grooms to hear.
As they rode across the clover-starred meadows, he said: “I am no longer without means. My father’s fortune is to be returned to my family.”
“John … does it mean you will go away?”
He smiled at the fear in her eyes. “If I went away, I should come back. You know, do you not, Jane, that when we are old enough we are to marry?”
“Yes, John,” she answered.
“You will be happy then, Jane. So shall I!”
He was sure of her contentment—as sure as he was that one day he would be a leader of men. It did not occur to her that this might be arrogance on his part; if he was arrogant, then, in her eyes, arrogance was a virtue.
As they cantered across the fields she was thinking of their future, of their marriage and the children they would have.
He too was thinking of the future, but not of his life with Jane. Jane’s love was something he took for granted. The thunder of horses’ hoofs seemed to say to him “Dudley—Tudor!”
Those name implied ambition—the rise from obscurity to greatness.
They were married when John was nineteen and Jane had just reached her eighteenth birthday. They continued to live quietly at Sir Richard’s house—so near Court and yet not of it.
The King had changed; he was no longer a careless boy; his conscience had begun alternately to torment and soothe him, and it now assured him that Sir Edmund Dudley had been a traitor who had imposed great hardship on the people. He had deserved his fate, and what, this King could ask himself, would his subjects think of a monarch who honored the descendants of such a man!
No, the King would show no favor to a Dudley; nor could he receive at Court the son of a traitor.
Jane’s first son was born; and John, who felt that the shame and humiliation of that day on Tower Hill were branded on him so deeply that only the dazzling accoutrements of dignity and great power could distract attention from the defect, determined that if he could not win favor at Court he would seek it on the field of battle.
Jane was tearful at the prospect of his departure for France.
“Why cannot you stay here?” she asked. “What do you want of fame? We have all we need. We have our little son, your namesake, and we will have more children.”
“Aye, we will have more,” said John. Of course he would have more. Children—even girls—were useful to men of power, for through them links with the great and rich were forged. Jane had her task; he had his. She must provide him with many sons and a few daughters; but he must bring power and fame to the name of Dudley.
He distinguished himself in the service of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, who had married the King’s sister Mary. John came back from the battlefield Sir John Dudley.
An important step forward had been taken.
Quickly the years passed whilst ambition smoldered. Jane was fulfilling her task more successfully than John fulfilled his.
She had given him four sons and three daughters; and she was about to bear another child.
Jane remembered the day long afterward. She was happy enough in the garden of their Chelsea manor house with the river lapping at its edge. She was thinking of her beloved children—and wondering whether the one she now carried would be a girl or a boy.
How blessed she was in her four handsome sons!
There were many rumors about the King at this time. How he would have envied her her four if he had seen them! It was said that his eyes first lighted up, then smoldered when he looked at other men’s sons.
Such excitements there had been of late! Such rumors! Would the King really take Anne Boleyn to wife? Would