Her Highness, the Traitor - By Susan Higginbotham Page 0,32
way, there’s no choice at all, is there?”
“None indeed,” I said sadly.
***
No one wanted bloodshed, but for a few frightening days in October, it seemed as if that would be exactly what we would get. Forces gathered around John and his allies in London, while others gathered around the Protector at Hampton Court. Every spare chamber at Ely Place was crammed with the council members and their entourages, to the puzzlement of both my youngest daughter, Katheryn, who could no longer play hiding games in its once vacant spaces, and of Jerome, who asked plaintively one day when all of the grim-faced strangers could be expected to leave. “Soon,” I said hopefully, while I hurried off to ensure yet more provisions were brought in for our many house guests. Civil strife, I was finding, lessened no one’s appetites.
The war over the few days, however, would be fought not with swords, but with pen and paper. From Ely Place, the council sent letters to Somerset; from Windsor Castle, where he had hastened with the reluctant king, Somerset sent letters to the council. Everybody, it seemed, was writing to everybody. The printers of London had never been happier; both sides were furiously producing handbills, which still could be found gracing the walls of sundry buildings weeks after all had ended. As the days wore on, John received a letter from the Protector himself, begging him to remember their old friendship, and I received a letter from the Duchess of Somerset, begging me to use what influence I had with my husband. But there was nothing John could do other than to assure Somerset he did not seek his blood, and nothing I could do other than to send a similar message to the duchess. Meanwhile, the men at Windsor were rapidly deserting Somerset’s cause, and on October 11, he was arrested without putting up any resistance.
Three days later, Somerset was escorted to London as a prisoner. John did not watch him enter the city, half because he felt it unseemly, half because he could not bear to see his old friend brought low. I was of a baser nature, though, and of a more curious one, so I went. I have been repaid threefold for my idle gawking that day.
The council had taken care not to humiliate the duke—no longer Protector, for that position had been abolished the day before. Somerset wore fine clothes and was mounted on a good horse, and the only thing that marked him as a prisoner was the armed guard of three hundred men that ringed him. He gazed at the men surrounding him reprovingly yet sadly, as if they were well-loved children caught in a bad act. Only when a group of poor people cheered did his austere features soften into a smile.
Not far from me, a plainly dressed woman stifled a sob as the duke passed by. I stared at her, and stared at her even harder when, the duke having ridden past us, she began weeping openly. The Duchess of Somerset might have stripped off her jewels and hidden her carefully tended face and figure underneath someone else’s drab clothes, but she could not conceal the love she plainly bore for the prisoner heading off toward an uncertain future.
I moved to her and touched her on the shoulder. She gasped then turned a ravaged face to me. “You are enjoying this, Lady Warwick?”
“No. I am very sorry for all this.”
The duchess stared after her husband. “He thinks I am at my brother’s house in Beddington. I promised him I would not come to see him brought to London as a prisoner if it came to that. I little thought that it would. But it may be the last I ever see of him alive.”
“I told you, Anne, my husband does not seek his life.”
“He cannot bear to be in the Tower long. He will be miserable and cold there. His health will suffer.”
“I have it on good authority that the council is arranging for him to be comfortably housed there. He will be treated as his rank deserves. You have nothing to fear.”
“I miss him.”
I had no response to that. Instead, I said, “I will do everything in my power to see him freed.”
“And restored to his protectorship?”
I had to smile at the duchess’s presumption even in the face of disaster. “That I cannot promise. But I will try my best to have him restored to you and your children.”