“Elizabeth… most beauteous Princess….”
She flushed. Clever as she was, she was susceptible to flattery, even as was her royal father; and she lacked his experience in hiding this fact. Important as she knew herself to be in the affairs of state politics since she had been reinstated at court, and much as she enjoyed her new position, she was more pleased at hearing herself called beautiful than she would have been by any reference to her importance in the realm.
Seymour kept his advantage. “Give me this pleasure…give me this pleasure of gazing upon you.”
“I have heard the ladies of the court say that it is not wise to take too seriously the compliments of the Lord High Admiral.”
“The ladies of the court?” He shrugged his shoulders. “They are apart. You are as different from them as the sun from the moon.”
“The moon,” she retorted, “is very beautiful, but it hurts the eyes to look at the sun.”
“When I look at you I feel myself scorched with the passion within me.”
Her laughter rang out clear and loud.
“I hear talk of your marriage, my lord. May I congratulate you?”
“I would welcome congratulations, only if I might announce my coming marriage to one particular lady.”
“And can you not make the announcement? I have heard that there is no man at court more likely to sue successfully for a lady’s favor.”
“She whom I would marry is far above me.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Do I hear aright? Is the Lord High Admiral losing his belief in himself?”
“Elizabeth…my beautiful Elizabeth….”
She eluded him and ran from him; she paused to look back, artful and alluring, urging him on, yet forbidding him to come.
She was aware of the Palace windows. Much as she would have enjoyed a flirtation with this man, who fascinated her more than any person ever had, she did not wish to endanger her new position at court.
If Seymour had his dreams and ambitions, the Lady Elizabeth had hers no less. Indeed, they soared higher even than those of Seymour; and if they were more glorious, they were more dangerous.
He would have followed her, but she had suddenly become haughty.
“I wish to be alone,” she said coldly, and she walked from the garden, forcing herself to conquer her desire to stay with him, to invite his warm glances and perhaps the caresses which he longed to give and she would not have been averse to receiving.
Coquettish as she was, she longed for admiration. Flirtation was an amusing pastime, yet beyond the love of light pleasures was her abiding ambition.
As he watched her, Seymour had no doubt that she was the woman for him.
NAN CREPT SILENTLY out of the Palace of Greenwich. She was covered from head to foot in a dark cloak, under which she wore many thick petticoats which she would not be wearing when, and if, she were fortunate enough to return to the Palace that night.
It was not the first time she had made this journey, carrying food and warm clothing with her, but each time she made it she was filled with fears, for it was a dangerous journey.
Lady Herbert had said to her: “If you should be detained, on no account must it be known who sent you.”
“No, my lady.”
“And Nan…be strong… and brave.”
They both knew that if she were caught she would be recognized as a lady from the Queen’s household. But on no account, Nan assured herself, would she let them know that the Queen had played a part in this mission.
“God help me to be brave” was Nan’s continual prayer.
The faint light of a waning moon shone on the river, and in the shadow cast by the bushes she made out the barge which was waiting for her.
The boatman greeted her in that manner which had been arranged. “Hello, there! Come you from my lady?”
“Yes,” whispered Nan. “From my lady.”
She stepped into the boat which began to slip along only too slowly. Nan listened to the sound of the oars and continued to pray for courage.
The boatman sang softly to himself as he rowed. Not that he felt like singing. He must be almost as nervous as Nan; but he, like her, must wear an air of calm, for it must not be suspected that she came from the Queen, and that she was on her way to visit one who must surely be the most important prisoner in the Tower.
“Are you ready?” whispered the boatman at length.
“I am ready.”
She scrambled out on to the slippery bank; it seemed very cold under the shadow of the gray walls which loomed before her.
A man was waiting for her and she followed him without a word. He unlocked a door; Nan shivered as she stepped inside the great fortress of the Tower of London. This man held his lantern high, and she saw the damp walls and the pits at the bottom of which was the muddy water of the river; rats scuttled under her feet. She did not cry out, great as was the temptation to do so.
“Hurry,” whispered the man with the lantern. “You must be gone before the guard comes this way.”
