Her Highness, the Traitor - By Susan Higginbotham Page 0,94
quick breathing indicating he had been riding hard, entered the room. I recognized him from my visits to Mary as Thomas Hungate, one of her servants. Hungate did not kneel when he saw Jane, but handed Northumberland a letter. “From the lady Mary, who is at Kenninghall.”
The council appeared to have quite forgotten about Mary. Northumberland gave Hungate a killing frown, but broke the seal. “This is the main point of it,” he announced after scanning it. “‘Wherefore, my lords, we require you and charge you, for that our allegiance which you owe to God and us, that, for your honor and the surety of your persons, you employ yourselves and forthwith upon receipt hereof cause our right and title to the Crown and government of this realm to be proclaimed in our City of London and such other places as to your wisdoms shall seem good and as to this case appertaineth, not failing thereof, as our very trust is in you.’”
“Good Lord,” murmured the Duchess of Northumberland. “She intends to fight for the crown.”
Northumberland tossed the letter aside and fixed his eyes upon Hungate. “We, as Queen Jane’s loyal councilors, will compose an answer, but you will not deliver it, my lord. It was unwise for you to throw yourself away upon this embassy. For your impertinence, the council must lodge you at the Tower until your mistress is in safe custody.”
“Aye, lodge me there if you will, Your Grace, but it will not stop my mistress. The crown is rightly hers as King Henry’s eldest daughter, and the people know it. They will fight to defend my good and gracious lady.”
Northumberland beckoned to the men standing guard by the council door. “Take him away to the Tower,” he commanded.
“No matter, Your Grace. I shall see you and your fellows there soon enough when my lady is in her rightful place. Mark me well.” He turned to his guards. “You have your orders. Take me to the Tower, where I shall await the lady Mary’s coming in majesty.”
He strode out, practically dragging the guards, who were backing out of Jane’s presence as her rank demanded, in his wake. The Duchess of Northumberland stared at their departing figures and suddenly began to cry.
So did I. The man had sounded so unnervingly sure of himself…
“I think, Your Majesty, that it was a mistake to have the duchesses at the council meeting,” Harry said. He rose and offered each of us a hand. “They take these idle threats too much in earnest. Come, ladies. I believe the queen will excuse you.”
In the oversized chair that was serving as a makeshift throne, Jane nodded. “You are excused.”
***
Despite the disquiet occasioned by Mary’s letter, servants had scurried about all morning, making the Tower ready for my daughter’s arrival. At two that afternoon, the royal barge—fitted out nearly as magnificently as it had been in my uncle Henry’s time—docked at the royal stairs at the Tower.
Nothing Jane owned was splendid enough for the occasion, so some of Catherine Parr’s robes, long in storage, had been brought out for Jane and hastily altered to better fit her youthful figure. I bore my daughter’s lengthy train as we processed toward the Lion Gate, a clutch of spectators standing by. Harry, Northumberland, and the other councilors had gone to the Tower earlier that day and awaited Jane at the gate, on their knees.
A boom, made even more startling by the silence of the spectators, caused me to almost drop the train I was carrying. “Just a salute from the guns, Mother,” whispered Kate, walking close by. “Don’t be frightened.”
Yet I should have been; it was the last time my girl would ever walk beyond the walls of the Tower as a free woman.
***
That afternoon, Jane, pen in hand, sat at a desk in the Tower’s royal lodgings. Unused since King Edward had been crowned six years before, they had been hastily put in order but still looked slightly seedy. Beside her was a stack of letters ordering officials of each of England’s counties to resist the usurper, Mary. Each letter bore the signature “Jane the Quene” in upright letters with an exuberant tail to the “Q.”
As Jane added yet another letter to the pile and started on the next, the Marquis of Winchester, William Paulet, entered the room. With him was a procession of servants bearing velvet-covered caskets. “The royal jewels, Your Majesty,” Winchester said to Jane. “There are more elsewhere, but these are what came immediately