The Last Tudor Read online

  As if I have said nothing, as if they are deaf to a refusal, they crowd closer on their knees. It is nightmarish. They rise; they come one after another to bow low and kiss my hand. I would pull my hands away, but my mother supports me with an arm around my back and a grip on my armpit. Lady Dudley holds my hand outstretched so that these great strange men can press their fleshy lips on my clenched fist. I am choking on my sobs, the tears pouring down my face, but no one remarks on it. “I can’t,” I wail. “It is Princess Mary who must inherit. Not me.”

  I twist in their hold. I think they will drag me to the scaffold. I defied my cousin Mary once when I insulted her faith. I dare not do it again. To claim the throne is an act of treason, punishable by death. I dare not do it. I will not do it.

  The doors of the great hall open and my father and Guildford come in together. “Father!” I cry out, as if to my savior. “Tell them that I cannot be queen!”

  He comes to my side and I feel the intense relief of a rescued child. I think that he will save me from this misery and tell them all that it cannot be. But he too bows low to me, as he has never done before, and then he says in his sternest voice: “Jane, you were named queen by our late beloved king. It was his right to name you; it is your duty to accept the inheritance he has given you. It is your God-given duty.”

  I give a little scream. “No! No! No, Father! No!”

  My mother tightens her grip on my shoulders and gives me a little shake. “Be quiet,” she snaps in an undertone. “You were born for this. You should be glad.”

  “How can I?” I choke on my sobs. “I can’t! I can’t!”

  Wildly, I look around the stern faces for anyone who might understand and take my part. Guildford comes close to me and takes my hand. “Be brave,” he says. “This is a great opportunity for us. This is wonderful. I am so proud of you.”

  I look at him blankly, as if he were speaking Russian. What does he mean? What is he saying? He gives his pretty-child smile and then releases me and moves towards his mother. No one cares that I refuse, nobody hears that I will not take the throne. They will crown me with or without my consent. I am like a trapped hare with one foot in a snare. I can twist and turn, I can scream, but nothing will save me.

  THE TOWER, LONDON,

  JULY 1553

  I wear a new gown of gold-embroidered green velvet. They must have had it made in my size in secret, waiting for this day. When they lace the bodice round my waist, I think it is as tight as a noose around my neck. That is when I know for sure that this is no surprise bequest from a dying cousin, the act of a moment; this is a plan that has been made for some time; the dressmaker was told the measure of my waist many months ago. My father-in-law, John Dudley, the leader of the council, will have directed this gowning, this crowning, my father agreed to it, and all the lords of the council swore to it, and then my poor weary cousin Edward made it his own and commanded them to turn against his half sister Mary, the rightful heir.

  My mother consented to be passed over in my favor. She will have wrestled with her pride for weeks. All of them have had months to still their consciences—if they ever had any. But I have to take my fears to God and wrestle with my God-given duty in just a few days, and now I have to put on my new gold-embroidered green gown, get into the royal barge, sit on the throne under the golden canopy, and be rowed with the royal pennants flying, to the Tower, to prepare for my coronation.

  I have only ever been in the royal barge as a companion to my cousin, but now I sit on the central throne, and feel how the cold wind comes off the river to this exposed seat. When we come alongside the quay, there are hundreds of people, all along the riverbank and inside the Tower, staring at me, and I feel ashamed to be stepping from the barge and going to the Lion Gate under borrowed colors. I am surprised how glad I am to have Guildford at my side to accompany me in my lonely terror. He takes my hand to walk with me, and then steps back to let me go before him, as prettily as if we were dancing at our wedding. I am glad of the canopy over my head, as if it will shield me from the sight of God as I walk towards treason. My mother, walking behind me, holds my train, pulling at it left and right, like a plowman steering a reluctant horse, slapping the reins to force it to harrow the heavy earth.

  As we go into the shelter of the Tower I see that there are more crowds of people waiting to greet me. Crowded among the group of ladies is my sister Katherine. Her bewildered gaze meets mine.

  “Oh, Jane,” she says.

  “You call her ‘Your Majesty,’ ” my mother snaps, and she flips the train of my gown as if she is throwing the reins.

  Katherine bows her golden head in obedience but looks up at me, her blue eyes astounded, as I walk by. She falls into step behind me, her pale-faced husband tagging along with her. We go to the royal chambers, and I flush with embarrassment as we thrust ourselves rudely into Edward’s private rooms, into the royal chapel, into the royal bedchamber. I can’t see how I can be here; I certainly shall not sleep here—how could I sleep in the king’s bed! Everything that belonged to him has been hastily stripped out and the floor swept, and fresh rushes put down, as if he had been dead for months and not for four days. But even so, I feel as if he might walk in at any moment and I will be shamed to be caught posing in his chair.

  But these are no longer Edward’s rooms, his private rooms; they have to be mine, and as we stand there, awkwardly displaced, the door bangs open and the grooms of the royal wardrobe heave in a cavalcade of great chests of gowns and jewels from the wardrobe and treasury. All the beautiful gowns worn by Kateryn Parr are here. I remember her in them. The capes that belonged to Anne of Cleves, the Seymour pearls, the French hoods of Anne Boleyn, the Spanish goldwork of the very first queen, dead before I was born. The only gowns that fit me are the pretty little ones that belonged to Katherine Howard, beheaded for treason when she was only a few years older than me, forced into marriage like me, named as a queen before she had learned to be a woman grown.

  “Beautiful shoes,” Guildford says, showing me the embroidery and the diamonds on the toes.

  “I won’t wear a dead girl’s shoes,” I say with a shudder.

  “Then cut the diamonds off and give them to me.” Guildford laughs. He is plunging into the chests like a puppy dragging out toys. His mother smiles indulgently as he balances a jeweled hat on his fair head and swings a velvet cape around his shoulders.

  Katherine looks at me, her blue eyes wide. “Are you all right?” she asks me.

  “Leave them alone,” I say irritably to Guildford. “I’m not going to wear old furs and jewels.”

  “Why not?” he demands. “They’re the royal goods. Why wouldn’t we look our best? Who has a better right than us?”

  I turn to Katherine. “I think I’m all right,” I say unsteadily. “You?”

  “They say I’m your heir,” she says feebly. “They say I am the next queen after you.”

  I can’t help it, I let out a little scream of laughter. “You are to take the throne if I am dead?” I demand.

  Her face is like a doll’s, frozen and pretty, blank without thought. “I hope not,” she says feebly. “For both of us.”

  Her hand goes to the pocket of her cape.

  “Have you got Ribbon the kitten in there?” I ask.

  She shakes her head. “I’m not allowed.”

  William Paulet the ancient Marquess of Winchester steps forward with a leather box edged with gold at the corners and fastened with a gold hasp. I look at him as if he is bringing me an asp.

  “I thought you should try the crown,” he says with a toothless grin. “Try it!”

  “I don’t want it!” I exclaim with sudden revulsion. It is Edward’s crown; there is not a doubt in my mind that it should be Princess Mary who wears it next. “I don’t want it!”

  “I’ll wear it,” Guildford says suddenly. “Give it to me. I’ll try it.”

  “We’ll get another size for you,” the marquess says, smiling at my husband. “This is too small