The Queen's Rivals Part 6

I was standing on the threshold, blinking my eyes to accustom them to the cool dimness inside Chelsea, when I heard Jane's voice. "Kate? Is that you, Kate?" she called as she appeared upon the landing, staggering weakly and flailing blindly for the banister to support her.

What a sight she was! Even in her loose white nightgown I could tell she had lost flesh. Livid, puffy pink patches and flecks of flaky white skin marred her face and hands, even the bare toes peeping out from beneath her gown, and, I suspected, all the parts I could not see were similarly afflicted. We bolted up the stairs to meet her, and I saw that her nails were gnawed ragged and raw and the fuzzy braid that snaked crookedly over her shoulder when she bent to embrace me was not as thick as it had once been, and I could see pearly patches of scalp s.h.i.+ning through in places.

"Oh, Jane!" I sobbed and hugged her tight.

But I could not give in to despair. Kate was already taking command. "Don't worry, Jane, we're here now, and we'll soon have you well. Mrs. Ellen!" she barked like a general at the black-clad figure hovering at the top of the stairs like a shadowy phantom. Kate was a married woman now, not a little girl to be cowed by years and authority, and she issued orders now as fearlessly as a queen, confident that she would be obeyed without question. "Bring me an ap.r.o.n, and one for Mary as well, and prepare a hot bath for your lady. And I want the water steaming! Henny, have my trunks brought up at once!" she ordered her own maid. "Come, Jane, come, Mary, we've much to do." And, taking each of us by the hand, she marched us upstairs as if she, and not Jane, were the lady of the manor.

Though she squirmed and squealed in our arms like a slippery wet piglet and cried for cold water, insisting that we were scalding her, Kate and I knelt beside the tub with ap.r.o.ns tied over our dresses and determinedly scrubbed every part of Jane's body with a pumice stone until all the old, dead skin had been sloughed off. Then we pulled her from the tub and ma.s.saged her all over with olive oil, even her scalp-Kate said it might help and keep more of her hair from falling out-until, at last, Jane stood before us all rosy and pink as a newborn, her tender new skin still smarting from our ministrations.

But Kate was not done yet. She bade Jane kneel with her head over the tub and rinsed the olive oil from her hair, then sat her on a stool and, after whisking the tears of regret from her eyes, took up the shears and with a sure and steady hand quickly cut Jane's hair just below her shoulders. "I've left it long enough to pin up," she said softly, gently running her fingers through the wet waves, "so when you appear in public with your hair pinned up under your hood with a veil in back, like a proper married lady, no one will ever know. And you'll see, it will soon grow back and be more beautiful than ever."

Jane nodded gloomily and murmured something about all being vanity and her head feeling "pleasingly light" as she reached for her s.h.i.+ft, but Kate s.n.a.t.c.hed it away. "No, let your skin breathe," she insisted, and, taking Jane by the hand, led her to the bed, which had been newly made, upon Kate's orders, with the silk sheets she had brought with us, and the old canopy and curtains had also been taken down and replaced with new cream and gold damask ones. Then, settling our ailing sister back against the pillows, she dosed her with the peppermint syrup she had brought to soothe Jane's stomach and instructed Mrs. Ellen to take all Jane's clothes away-"and I do mean all, Mrs. Ellen, not even a s.h.i.+ft or even a stray stocking is to remain"-and have them laundered and thoroughly rinsed so that nothing remained that might irritate Jane's sensitive skin. She then proceeded to give instructions about Jane's diet, insisting that Jane was to have nothing but a weak chicken broth for a week, though as the week progressed, if Jane was better, she might increase its strength, and after another week she could add small portions of milk and bread before progressing to a little roast chicken, "unsalted and without seasoning," she said as firmly as though she were a graduate of the Royal College of Physicians. And she was to drink fennel tea every day and have a bit of crystallized ginger to suck on after meals and whenever her stomach felt likely to rebel.

While Jane recuperated, Guildford spent his mornings reclining, indolent as an emperor on a gold and silver brocade couch, resplendent in his favorite gold brocade dressing gown, tossing grapes to his yellow-crested white parrot, and his afternoons frolicking in the meadow, raising his voice to the glory of G.o.d and to serenade the sheep-he liked to pretend he was on the stage and they were his captive audience-and having daily lessons with Maestro Cocozza. Meanwhile, Kate-a much calmer, less frenzied, and more focused Kate without her husband and father-in-law around to flirt with and her menagerie to pull her attention in a dozen different directions-decided that we should busy ourselves with "Cupid's work" now that Jane was on the mend.

"We must do what all the scoldings, threats, commands, and beatings cannot and bring these two together, Mary! We must show our sister that it is possible to make the best of an arranged marriage and mayhap even find love and pa.s.sion within it."

"How do you propose that we do that?" I asked. Jane's coldness and contempt, the rude and scathing remarks she repeatedly doled out, had hurt Guildford one too many times, and he now kept a wary distance from her. Whenever they were together I could tell he was most uneasy in her presence, and there was a nervous stiffness, a guardedness, about him, as he weighed and pondered his every word before speaking then glanced warily at her, as though steeling himself for the biting remark that would inevitably follow. For the life of me, I didn't know how we could ever make these two fall in love.

"To the stillroom, Mary!" Kate cried and, like a soldier charging into battle, she raced ahead, arm raised as though brandis.h.i.+ng a sword, flouris.h.i.+ng the paper covered with the faded, spidery handwriting of the mother-in-law she had never known detailing how to make gillyflower wine.

Unbeknownst to me, before we left Baynard's Castle, Kate had ordered the necessary ingredients and they were there in the stillroom waiting for us. While Kate stood before the long table, reading the recipe aloud to me, I poured, scooped, measured, mixed, and boiled as Kate dictated until the mixture of water, sugar, honey, yeast, syrup of betony, cloves, and gillyflowers-Kate had chosen yellow ones because they were Guildford's favorite-had cooled and was ready to be casked and left in the dark to ferment for a month.

When it was ready, we sampled our concoction, growing giggly and giddy as Kate confided her plan to me. We would, she said, set it in motion the next morning, after Guildford departed to sing in the meadow.

Curled up on the window seat, lost in the pages of her Greek Testament, Jane suddenly found herself being deprived of her book and divested of her clothes even as we dragged her down the corridor to Kate's room, leaving her dull brown gown lying on the floor like a mud puddle. I gaily flung her plain brown hood as far as I could before I slammed the door behind us.

We stripped our sister bare and plunged her into a tub of hot, rose-scented water and scrubbed her pink. Then, over her protests, after we had dried her, we tugged a loose, flowing gown of cream-colored lace and fine, pleated, unbleached linen over her head, ignoring her cries that without undergarments underneath it was most indecent.

"I won't wear this! I simply won't!" she wept and raged. "It is indecent, I tell you, indecent, no G.o.dly Christian woman would ever . . ."

But Kate only smiled and sang over her protests as she adjusted the silken ribbons and falls of lace on the bodice and sleeves, and I raised my voice to join hers as I circled Jane, carefully smoothing the long, trailing skirt, making sure the lace and pleats lay just right.

"You're so beautiful, Jane," I breathed. "This gown makes you look so womanly and soft, like a G.o.ddess of femininity."

When Jane broke free of us and ran for the door, I raced ahead of her, turned the key in the lock, and shoved it under the door to where Henny, our coconspirator, waited outside. I smiled sweetly at Jane's defeated face and took her hand and led her back to Kate, who sang of love and lads and la.s.ses wooing and stealing kisses in pretty gardens as she combed her fingers through the wet, red brown waves of Jane's hair.

Jane broke away again, and while she pounded on the door, demanding to be let out, wincing and hopping around on one foot, cradling her toes, after she lost her temper and kicked it, Kate and I sat by the sunlit window while we waited for her hair to dry and busied ourselves with weaving daisy chains to adorn her neck, wrists, and waist, and an elaborate floral crown of scarlet poppies and golden wheat, with two grandiose upper tiers of pinks, marigolds, daisies, b.u.t.tercups, bluebells, lavender, rosemary, dandelions, corn c.o.c.kles, daffodils, peonies, periwinkles, forget-me-nots, pink sweet peas, lily of the valley, Canterbury bells, meadowsweet, yellow b.u.t.tons of tansy, the feathery spikes of bright pinkish purple loosestrife, the blus.h.i.+ng and freckled pink and white bugle blossoms of foxglove-"Like Jane will be when Guildford sees her thus!" Kate teased-the perky, purple pink pompoms of chives, and heart's ease pansies, the bold and vibrant popinjays of Mother Nature's bouquet.

"Now for Guildford!" Kate cried, proudly holding up the ornate wreath of golden wheat and yellow gillyflowers, scarlet poppies, snowdrops, sunny yellow St. John's wort, foamy white meadowsweet, marigolds, forget-me-nots, and heart's ease pansies her nimble fingers had just fas.h.i.+oned for our gilt-haired brother-in-law. "As every queen must have a king, and every king must have a crown!" How this game and these words would haunt us in later years! But we were young and innocent then of Northumberland's and our parents' schemes.

"Let me out, Henny, I order you!" Jane screamed, forgetting herself and kicking the door again.

"You heard what Lady Jane said, Henny!" Kate called in the prearranged signal. "You'd best let her out before she breaks the door or her toes!"

"Very well, Miss Jane," Henny said, and soon we heard the key turning in the lock.

As soon as the door swung open, Jane rushed out, right into the trap of Henny's and Hetty's open arms.

"Let go of me! Let me go!" she howled, thras.h.i.+ng, twisting, and squirming as Hetty's arms closed like a vise beneath her bosom and Henny caught her around the ankles and lifted her feet off the floor.

"To the meadow!" Kate trilled, carefully holding the beautiful floral crowns out before her as she skipped ahead of us and led the way downstairs, and I brought up the rear with the daisy chains draped over my outstretched arms.

As soon as we stepped outside, the musicians Kate had hired struck up a lively tune and began prancing alongside us, to escort the Lady Jane to where her bridegroom awaited her in the meadow. We had invited the servants to join our little party, and they had already carried out the casks of our gillyflower wine, and even as we approached, the girls from the kitchen were busily laying out a trestle table laden with a rich bounty of golden cakes, strawberries and cream, and meat and cheese pasties.

Every day it was Guildford's custom to go out into the meadow to dance and sing, letting his high notes soar free as birds as the sheep fled baaing before him. Most people shuddered and cringed when they heard him, but not Kate. Always kindhearted, she would shrug and say that the Bible did say, "Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth: make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise." Guildford's efforts certainly seemed joyful and were undeniably loud. Nor could I bear to mock him, for in my heart I understood all too well his impossible, impractical dream; Guildford longed to be a great singer, just as I longed to be a woman normally and beautifully formed just like my sisters.

When Guildford heard our little party approaching, he paused midsong and stood there staring at us, a very pretty picture of golden-haired puzzlement.

"Don't let her go, not yet!" Kate cautioned Henny and Hetty as they set Jane on her feet. Instantly, they tightened their grip on her as the servants milled curiously around, watching us and whispering, wondering what was going on.

"Let go of me! Let go!" Jane squirmed and twisted in the vise of their strong arms. "You've dressed me like a dancing girl, a lewd, indecent dancing girl, at a pagan baccha.n.a.l, and I shall not be part of it, I tell you, I won't, I won't, I won't! I am a good Protestant maid! I am impervious to this lewdness. It shall not infect or touch me. The Lord shall protect me!"

"Calm down, Jane," Kate said as she carefully laid the floral crowns on the ground far enough away that Jane and her captors would not trample them. "You're carrying on as though this were a witches' sabbat, and we meant to roast babies on spits over a fire and make you sign your name in the Devil's black book. Look around you, feel the suns.h.i.+ne, smell the flowers, listen to the music, and see all the smiling faces that wish you well. All the evil and indecency you're imagining is all in your mind, not ours. There are no pagans, Papists, or witches hiding in the trees waiting to swoop down on you and force you into sin. Can't you see that G.o.d is in his heaven and smiling down on us on this beautiful day?" Kate paused to give Jane's cheek a pat as she walked past, nimbly evading a kick from our outraged sister, then seized my hand and rushed me over to the trestle table. "Quickly, Mary, before Jane breaks free!" She s.n.a.t.c.hed up a cup and thrust it into my hand and then, with her back turned to Jane, stealthily withdrew the red gla.s.s vial from her bodice and spilled half its contents into the cup, then bade me take it carefully to the cask and fill it. "And please, Mary, do not spill even one precious drop!"

I did as she asked, then watched as Kate approached Jane and, with the strong-armed a.s.sistance of Henny and Hetty, forced her to drink and drain it to the dregs.

"Only a little longer, love, before it begins to work its magic," she said, stroking Jane's hair and kissing her cheek before she scooped up the crown she had made for Guildford and ran back to prepare a similar cup, with the last of the mysterious potion, then ran giggling across the meadow to where Guildford stood gaping quizzically at us.

"I am Love's humble handmaiden come to crown Your Majesty and present you with this loving cup from your queen, your loving bride," she announced playfully as she set the crown on his head, then offered him the cup, though to my eyes, Jane seemed none too loving as she snarled and twisted suddenly and kicked Hetty's s.h.i.+ns quite viciously, causing my poor old nurse to cry out in pain.

Guildford's skeptically arched eyebrow conveyed that our thoughts were traveling along the same path, but he nonetheless graciously accepted, calling out, "Thank you, my queen!" as he raised the cup in a toast to her then downed its contents. "Very sweet," he p.r.o.nounced as he pa.s.sed the empty cup back to Kate.

"We used six pounds of sugar and almost as much honey," Kate proudly volunteered, and Guildford smiled and said indeed he did not doubt it.

Smiling, Kate skipped back to Jane, and together we decked her with daisy chains. It was easier now that she was standing still. Her eyes seemed larger and curiously vacant though she was staring straight at Guildford and a strange pink flush was slowly stealing over her, and I noted as I arranged a daisy chain around her neck that her bosom had begun to heave. When I glanced up and asked if she were all right, there was a strange, crooked little smile tugging at her lips, as though one side wanted to smile and the other was undecided whether to give in or continue to frown.

"Your crown, my queen!" Kate said as she set the ornate, towering floral coronet on Jane's head and I thrust a large bouquet into her hand. "Come, your king awaits!" Kate urged as she took Jane's hand and began tugging her toward Guildford. To my surprise, Jane didn't balk but nodded and began to follow, meek and docile as one of the sheep watching these curious goings-on from a distance. I, cheerfully playing the part of trainbearer, ran behind and caught up Jane's train and, with a wave of my arm, motioned for the musicians to join us. Surrounded by sprightly music, walking on a soft carpet of green gra.s.s studded with daisies, clover, and dandelions, with plump black and yellow honeybees buzzing around our ankles, we escorted our sister to her bridegroom.

There, on that glorious June day, in the lax formality of the meadow at Chelsea, far removed from the luxurious environs of Durham House where she had been married in a golden gown, Jane, with a guttural cry and a pa.s.sionate lurch, flung her bouquet high in the air and lunged fiercely into the arms of Guildford Dudley and crushed her lips against his with bruising pa.s.sion. He gripped her tightly and returned her kisses with equal fervor as we all cheered and the men tossed their caps and the women flung flowers in the air.

"Our work is done," Kate said as we exchanged a satisfied nod. We joined hands and skipped back to the wine cask to click our cups and drink a toast to the bride and groom and offer our heartiest thanks to Madame Astarte and her "pa.s.sion potion."

While we sat on the gra.s.s, sipping our wine, Kate told me of her clandestine visit to the old gypsy witch in one of London's grimy back alleys. She described the ancient crone, dirty and stinking of garlic, stale, unwashed flesh, and sweat, who painted her old, wrinkled face with bold paint like a wh.o.r.e, ringing her mouthful of blackened stumps with the most vivid scarlet, and wore her dirty, matted gray hair in rainbow plaits of silk and satin ribbon tied with jingling bells, trailing down her back nigh to the floor; and clothed herself in glittery, mismatched rags of discarded and pilfered finery wherein teal damask with tarnished gilt threads mingled with rainbow sc.r.a.ps and tatters of dingy silks and satins, brocades, damasks, and velvets, to create a haphazard patchwork gown with a long, trailing train that followed Madame Astarte as though she were a great cat and it was her tail. Rows of clanking gold and silver bangles covered her wrists and ankles, and she let the nails on her bare feet grow into curving yellow talons that sc.r.a.ped the floor when she walked just like a cat with overlong claws. Madame Astarte had so many cats Kate claimed she couldn't take a step in any direction without tripping over or treading on them.

Suppressing her fear, Kate had boldly ventured into her lair, explained Jane's situation, and asked for whatever potion the old gypsy woman deemed most beneficial to remedy the situation. She crossed the witch's palm with silver and within minutes the red gla.s.s vial was in her hand, but ere she could depart the old crone was prying Kate's fingers wide and staring intently at her palm. With a sudden blankness in her eyes and a deadness in her voice, she monotonously chanted a dire prediction: "Your love is both a blessing and a curse to you and those you love. The greater your love, the greater your loss; the greater your pa.s.sion, the greater your pain. You will die young and fair, starved for love, but his heart shall go on." Her words filled Kate with such fear that she turned and fled, gripping the precious potion tight over her heart and praying G.o.d forgive her for going against His teachings and trafficking with witches.

Once back in the safety of her bedchamber at Baynard's Castle, Kate flipped open her Bible and found the pa.s.sage in Deuteronomy that was haunting her and read it with a thudding heart and a sudden sweat akin to that which comes with a raging fever.

There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pa.s.s through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord: and because of these abominations the Lord thy G.o.d doth drive them out from before thee.

s.h.i.+vering and burning all at the same time, salty tears and sweat running down her face, Kate fell on her knees and raised her clasped hands heavenward and begged G.o.d again and again to forgive her until she collapsed on the open Bible in a dead faint. When Henny found her and put her to bed and bathed her hot flesh with a cool, wet cloth Kate was still babbling deliriously. "Please, G.o.d, don't let it be true! Please, forgive me! Please, G.o.d, don't let it be true! I had to do it! I had to do it, for Jane!"

I never knew until she told me; Kate had kept her secret well. Henny had told me that my sister was ailing with the onset of her courses and to let her, and the household, rest in peace, so I had done as she suggested and enjoyed the quiet respite without insisting on seeing my sister. After all, it was only a trifling ail that afflicted most women every month, so I did not worry. Perhaps she only meant to be kind and didn't want to alarm me. Indeed the fever soon broke. But I wish I had known the truth, and that I had known beforehand what Kate intended to do. I would have gone with her and gladly shared her guilty burden of trafficking with that dirty, flea-bitten Circe. I would not have let that old hag hurt my beautiful Kate. I would have kicked her in the s.h.i.+n before she could mutter her evil prophecy, words that once heard could never be forgotten. Now I knew why I had a sense, though I could never put my finger on it and thought perhaps I was imagining it, that since her fever, Kate's gaiety seemed somewhat forced. But now, when I ventured this, Kate a.s.sured me that it was not true.

"I don't believe a word of it!" she declared, shaking back her curls and bravely thrusting her chin in the air. "I just hope the old witch's potion isn't as false as her prophecies! Love is the most beautiful, wonderful thing in the world; how could it ever, when it is true and given freely, hurt anyone?" She went on in a light, disdainful tone, ridiculing the witch's prophecy as she refilled her cup with our sweet, potent brew. "Here, have some more wine, Mary!" She s.n.a.t.c.hed my cup and replenished it. "False love yes," she continued, "that is a sword that wounds, but true love, as I shall always love, no, never! It is only the absence of love and love denied and unrequited that hurts! Me to die starved of love?" She scoffed. "Whoever heard of such a foolish and ridiculous thing? It's absolute nonsense, I tell you! I cannot even imagine it! Speaking of starving, I'm hungry, let us have some cake!" Before I could say a word, she bounded up and jostled her way through the crowd congregated around the flower-decked trestle table.

Are you trying to convince me, or yourself? The question hovered unasked behind my closed lips as I watched my sister, laughing and exchanging pleasant banter with the common folk and servants as she piled a plate high with golden cake, ruby red strawberries, and big white clouds of cream for us.

I was sitting there half dozing, my belly contentedly full, my brain buzzing with gillyflower wine, and a silly smile plastered across my face, watching a yellow b.u.t.terfly flit and dart from flower to flower, when Kate nudged my arm, knocking my cup from my hand and spilling what little was left of my wine.

"Look!" Kate cried, pointing as Guildford scooped Jane up in his arms and began staggering determinedly in a drunken zigzag toward the house as Jane clung to him and squealed with girlish delight and wantonly kicked her bare limbs in the air. "Now our sister will discover just how wonderful love can be! You will see," she a.s.serted with a confident nod, pausing to take another very sweet sip of our golden gillyflower wine. "She shall thank me for this in the morning!"

But upon that point Kate was very much mistaken.

Late the next morning, Jane awakened with a fearsome headache, pounding like an anvil on a blacksmith's forge within her skull, stark naked and sore between her legs with Guildford sprawled blissfully beside her on his belly with one arm draped possessively across her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. She thrust him from her in disgust. Slowly, she sat up, cringing at the vile taste in her mouth and cradling her aching head. She swung her legs over the side of the bed, wincing at the pain, and startling at the blood crusted on her inner thighs, and staining the white sheet like a bouquet of rusty red blossoms. Her bare feet sank down and crushed the coronet of flowers Kate had made for her. Instantly it all came rus.h.i.+ng back. Jane saw clearly that Kate was the culprit, the person responsible for her drunken despoiling. s.n.a.t.c.hing up the crumpled lawn and lace dress and struggling into it, Jane fled her floral-bedecked bridal bower, the room Kate had ordered arranged so beautifully while we were out in the meadow, with garlands of flowers draping the bedposts and petals scattered on the clean white sheets.

She was standing on the landing, seething, breast heaving, when she spied Kate and me poised to come up.

"You!" she hissed venomously, pointing a rage-trembling finger right at Kate. "You did this to me! You made a fool of me!" She struck her brow with the heel of her palm. "There was something in the wine, there must have been, and you put it there to make me forget myself! You made me give myself to that . . . that . . . lack-witted popinjay! I will never forgive you, Kate, never, as long as I live! From this day forward, you are my enemy, not my sister!" Then, in a frenzy of uncontrollable tears, she hitched up her skirts and ran, stumbling blindly, tripping and barking her s.h.i.+ns on the stone stairs.

I saw Kate's heart break.

"Jane, wait, please!" Kate started up after her, but I, standing on a higher step so that I was of a nigh equal height with her, reached out and stayed her and shook my head, urging Kate to wait, to leave her be, and let her temper cool. But it was too late. All of a sudden we were engulfed in the voluminous, billowing folds of a pink gown and, freeing ourselves, looked up to find ourselves caught in a shower of falling finery. Jane was hurling Kate's clothes down at us and running back for more. I hugged Kate close as she clung to me and wept amidst the hail of dresses, hats, gloves, fans, jewelry, and shoes.

"Get out! Go! I don't want you here! I never want to see you again!" Jane screamed as she barked her s.h.i.+ns and bloodied the creamy flow of her skirt trying to drag Kate's heavy oak traveling chest to the top of the stairs. Kate and I quickly jumped apart as Jane gave one last hard kick to the trunk and sent it barreling down the stairs, straight at where we had been standing. "I hate you, Kate, I hate you!" she screamed so fiercely the words seemed to rake and tear her throat raw, and I feared that when I looked up at her panting, red-faced figure glaring down at us with shoulders and breast heaving, I would see blood bubbling from her mouth. I could not fathom how she could unloose such a scream without doing internal damage.

Kate sank down onto her knees in a welter of rumpled finery and wept as I had never seen before.

"Come away," I said gently, tugging her hand, while Henny and Hetty silently appeared to gather everything up and pack it away inside the trunk that had landed on its side at the foot of the stairs.

I led my sister out to sit on the seawall, where we had pa.s.sed many happy afternoons, eating cherries and vying to see who could pitch the pits farthest out into the river, contentedly swinging our feet, and watching the pink and yellow streaked orange sunsets. While we waited for Henny to collect the rest of Kate's things, I did my best to soothe her, promising that I would remain, and that when Jane's temper cooled I would do all that I could to convince her of the truth I knew-that Kate had acted out of the goodness of her heart, wanting only to see Jane find true happiness within her marriage.

"I was afraid her bitterness, contempt, and hate would destroy her," Kate wept in my arms. "She has a chance at love-I only wanted to make her see that! She can't be so cold as she pretends, so it must be fear, it must! I thought, if she could forget herself, just for a day, see what pa.s.sion is truly like, she wouldn't be so afraid of it!"

"I know, I know." I patted Kate's back as the barge that would carry her away, back to Baynard's Castle and her wild, giddy, flirtatious whirlwind of a life, glided silently up to the water stairs.

While Henny and a footman saw to Kate's trunk, I walked my sister carefully down the smooth, worn stone water stairs, giving her every comfort and rea.s.surance I could that "sisters quarrel but never stay angry for long" and that "all will soon be forgiven."

I stood and waved until she was out of sight, then I went back in to Jane with a prayer on my lips that the words I had just spoken were not just a comforting balm, that the wound truly would heal without leaving an ugly scar.

For more than a fortnight Jane kept to her chamber, maintaining a stony wall of silence, stubbornly refusing to see me or Guildford, who repeatedly banged on her door and demanded to know how she could refuse to fall in love with him. She admitted only Mrs. Ellen, but when she tried to remonstrate with her, a.s.suring her that her sisters loved her dearly and had acted only with the best of intentions, and that Guildford was trying his best to be a good husband to her, Jane would turn her back and stop her ears, and in a loud, clear voice, that grew even louder every time poor Mrs. Ellen dared utter a word, recite Scripture, quoting, in maddening, monotonous repet.i.tion, the pa.s.sage from the Book of Matthew about wolves in sheep's clothing.

I pa.s.sed many a wakeful night worrying about how I could possibly make things right between my sisters. I could understand Jane's anger, how she felt betrayed, both by Kate and her own body, the volcano of emotions forcibly buried and concealed deep within that Madame Astarte's potion had caused to erupt in a pa.s.sionate explosion that had left Jane no longer a virgin. But I knew that Kate, more than our parents, who had arranged the match, truly had Jane's best interests at heart. She could not bear to see the sister we both loved trapped in a loveless marriage, like a windowless cell so bleak and narrow one could scarcely take two steps in any direction, with barely an arrow slit in the wall to let the light in. She wanted to show Jane that she could have so much more.

Guildford, though vain and self-centered, and not the s.h.i.+ning star of brilliance that Jane was, was not without kindness; he would, if Jane let him, be her friend and try to make the best of this marriage that neither of them had any choice about. But they had a choice within it, to be friends, kind, dear, loving friends, if they would, and, perhaps more, if they deigned to let Love enter and flood the spa.r.s.e Spartan prison of Jane's soul. I wanted to tell Jane this.

Some days I stood at her door and talked myself hoa.r.s.e, and on many of those sleepless nights I felt compelled to creep out and kneel there and pour out my heart, to try to make her understand that Kate had truly meant only good and not a bit of harm. But Jane kept her door locked and would not hear me, and through the m.u.f.fling thickness of the heavy wooden door I heard her voice loudly reciting Scripture, sometimes in English, other times in Latin, Greek, or Hebrew, but I knew it was always the same verse: Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.

One unusually hot July night, when I could no longer bear tossing sleeplessly in a tangle of sweat-sodden sheets, I rose from my bed to bind the sticky curtain of my hair in a tight braid, to give some respite to my neck, and to bathe myself with a cooling cloth. As I stood poised beside the basin, ready to dip the cloth, I heard voices below my open window. I recognized them at once-my father and Guildford. I heard every word they said, but to this day I wish I had not. I wish I, like Jane, had stopped my ears and taken refuge-even if it was a cowardly refuge-in the recitation of Scripture or just jumped back into bed and hugged a pillow tight over my head.

"Must you go?" Guildford asked in a sensual, sulky voice, and I could just picture his pretty lips pouting so seductively that he was just begging to be kissed. "The night is young and I'm so beautiful . . ."

Next came a groan, torn pa.s.sionately from Father's throat and a rustle of clothing as though he were clutching another body close to his. "I can't fight it anymore! You taste as sweet as a sugared lemon!"

"Oh, Hal!" Guildford sighed.

"Don't call me Hal. My wife calls me Hal!" Father spoke the word wife so savagely, with such biting contempt it frightened me; it was as though he were stabbing my lady-mother with his words.

"Very well, I shall call you Enrico," Guildford announced. "That is Italian for Henry; I asked Maestro Cocozza and he told me," he added boastfully as though making such an inquiry of his music master was some monumental accomplishment of which he should be very proud.

Another blissful sigh and the rustle of clothing, then Father said, "And I shall call you Il mio amore, my love, my sweet, mio dolce . . ."

The silence that followed told its own tale-they were kissing pa.s.sionately. Then, with a breathless gasp of wonder, they broke apart.

"We shall be so happy together, when we are away from here, in Italy." Father sighed, dreaming their dream, their folie a deux, aloud. "My golden songbird that I keep in the gilded cage of my heart shall sing, his voice soaring like wings from the stage. You shall be showered with accolades, gold, jewels, and flowers thrown nightly at your feet by the adoring ma.s.ses as you take your final bow, and I shall be right there in front every night, leading the applause, and every day I will bake the sweetest, most decadent, rich pastries . . ."

"Name your shop Il Limone Zuccherato, The Sugared Lemon, for me!" Guildford breathed, and another silence followed as I imagined their lips locked, their bodies crushed, close together, tart and sweet.

"But what shall we do for money?" Guildford asked. "When I sing, will the people throw enough money for us to live in the style to which we are accustomed?"

"Do not worry, my love, I shall supplement our earnings, from your singing and my pastry shop, at the gambling tables!" Father said, confident and rea.s.suring.

Inwardly I groaned. Father was a terrible gambler. Some said he was the worst in London, and the higher the stakes, the better he liked it; his losses were astronomical, and we lived perpetually on the threshold of financial disaster. Dr. Haddon, our chaplain at Bradgate, had spoken to him numerous times, pleading with him, begging him, for the good of his soul and the sake of his family and to stave off ruin, to renounce this reckless and ruinous habit forever.

"What's one fortune?" Father said with what I could well imagine was a blase shrug. "I can always win us another and another after we've run through that one, and then another! You shall stand beside me and be my good luck charm! With your beauty and my brains we make a perfect match!"

"Heavenly!" Guildford sighed and surrendered to Father's embrace one more time.

Quietly, even though the heat was stifling, I closed the cas.e.m.e.nt and returned to my bed, with a sick, frightened feeling in the pit of my stomach. I didn't want to hear any more and wished with all my heart I could erase from my mind what I had already heard. It was too absurd; my father, the Duke of Suffolk, wanted to run away with his son-in-law to Italy, to live and love, in the most sinful way known to man, warmed by the sun, while one sang, on a stage he would most likely be hissed and booed from as he was pelted with rotten vegetables, and the other renounced his proud and n.o.ble heritage to run a sweetshop. It was mad, utterly mad!

No, Father, no! I sobbed into my pillow as I pounded it with my fists in pure frustration. Guildford is meant for Jane! How can they ever become a loving couple if you come between them?

The next morning there was no sign of Father, and when I discreetly inquired if perchance he had arrived during the night, I was met with blank and puzzled stares from the servants. Clearly his clandestine visit was intended for one person alone-Guildford.

5.

On the ninth day of July, 1553, the country idyll, and with it Jane's self-imposed sulking isolation, came to an abrupt end when Lady Mary Sidney arrived, her barge gliding silently up to Chelsea like a black swan darkly silhouetted against a glowing orange sunset. She had come bearing orders from her father, the mighty Northumberland, to bring Jane and Guildford to Syon House "to receive that which has been ordered for you by the King." More than that she would not say, not even when my sister stamped her foot and demanded, imperiously as a queen, that she be told for what and why she was being summoned.

Guildford did not bother to ask questions. Excited as a child over the idea of an outing, he ran back inside to change his clothes. When he returned, elegantly garbed for travel, with Fluff purring in his arms, he paused to kiss his sister's cheek and called back casually to his valet to follow directly with his things, then settled himself comfortably in the barge, languorously against the velvet cus.h.i.+ons, ready to be off. "This place begins to bore me," he declared, nonchalantly trailing his fingers through the water.

But, ever balky, endowed with a stubbornness that put every mule in Christendom to shame, Jane resisted, digging her heels in and claiming that she could not go, she was too ill to obey the Duke's summons even if the King commanded it. She tugged, slapped, and fought against the determined hand Mary Sidney clasped around Jane's delicate wrist as she endeavored to pull her across the gra.s.s to the water stairs, urgently insisting that Jane must obey. "It is necessary for you to come with me, Jane; Father said you must come even if I must give orders to have you bound and carried into the barge, you must come now!"

With an anguished cry, Jane took refuge in unconsciousness and fell fainting to the ground. Before I could reach her, Mary Sidney had already summoned four of the bargemen, clad in the Dudleys' blue velvet livery with their proud emblem of a bear clutching a ragged staff emblazoned on their chests and sleeves. They easily lifted Jane up, a featherlight burden in her flowing gray silk gown, with her arms outstretched, and her legs straight, like Christ nailed to the cross, and gently carried her to the barge. They laid her on the cus.h.i.+ons beside Guildford, who flicked some water onto her moon-pale face on which her freckles stood out like cinnamon stars, Guildford observed, adding languidly that if mathematics didn't bore him he would be tempted to attempt to count them. His sister did not dally; she clasped me beneath my armpits, despite my protests at this indignity, and nigh threw me into the barge, then climbed in herself and gave the order to "Row! Take us to Syon House!" as we crouched around Jane, rubbing her hands and fanning her, imploring her to open her eyes.

"Yes," Guildford drawled, "it is such a beautiful sunset; you really should look at it. Lying down as you are, you have the most splendid view; I almost envy you, but I don't want to take off my hat, it's so beautiful, or rumple my hair after all the hours I spent on these curls. But"-he heaved a martyr-worthy sigh-"methinks beautiful things-like me-are wasted on you; you just don't know how to appreciate the finer things in life-like me." With those words he snapped open the yellow enameled comfit box Father had given him and began nibbling daintily upon a sugared lemon.

I opened the collar of the white lawn partlet that modestly filled the low black-braid bordered square bodice of Jane's dove gray gown and pressed a damp handkerchief to her throat. She felt feverish to my touch, and I feared the nerve-induced illness that had lately plagued her was returning with a swift vengeance. Mary Sidney quickly poured a goblet of spiced red wine, and as Jane moaned and her eyelids began to flutter, lifted her head and urged her to drink.

Jane sat up, sputtering wine and demanding that we turn around and take her back to Chelsea at once. "I order you!" she screamed, hurling the goblet of wine at the bargemen, and balling her hands into fists and futilely hammering them and her heels against the floor, but they, being Northumberland's men, ignored her, and Guildford petulantly ordered her, "Do sit still, Jane. You're rocking the boat and will bring on the mal de mar-that means seasickness," he added helpfully.

"I know it means seasickness. I speak perfect French, you nitwit!" Jane spat back at him. "And it's not mal de mar. It's mal de mer!"