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