She drew back suddenly in delighted terror.
He is coming to me! she told herself. How like him! He will climb the creeper to my room. And what shall I do? He will be seen. There will be scandal. I shall have to make them keep quiet…I…
She placed her hand on her heart and felt its mad beating under the thin stuff of her nightgown.
He must not come….
Yet she hoped, of course, that he would.
Then, as she watched, she knew that she need not fear his coming. She would not have to deal with a delicate situation, for she had no part in it—except that of lookeron. Another person had appeared. There was the small figure of a woman. She ran to Seymour, and he and the woman seemed to melt into one. The woman’s hood fell back exposing the head of the Dowager Queen.
Elizabeth watched their kissing, the hot blood in her face, the sweat in her palms.
“How dare he!” she murmured. “And how dare
She watched them, her rage increasing. He had released Katharine now. They stood looking at each other; then he put his arm about the Queen and they turned toward the Palace.
So the Queen was taking Thomas Seymour secretly to her apartments. She was behaving, Elizabeth told herself, like any kitchen slut.
She remained kneeling at the window after they had disappeared, picturing them in the silences of the Queen’s chamber.
Her women would know, and they would keep her harlot’s secrets. Katharine Parr had always won the regard of those who served her. Doubtless Kat Ashley knew, for did not Kat make it her task to discover everything that went on? And Kat would have kept it from her mistress because she feared such news would wound her pride.
If I were Queen, meditated Elizabeth, if I were Queen of England now!
She gave herself up to thoughts of the torture she would inflict on those two.
But her rage was only temporary, for she loved them both. That was what hurt so badly. Who could help loving Katharine Parr? Ingratitude was not one of Elizabeth’s failings; she could not forget how the Dowager Queen had changed the state of the neglected princesses when she had become the King’s wife. Elizabeth must love Katharine for her virtues, while she loved Seymour in spite of his sins.
These two had betrayed her; but the Queen, of course, knew nothing of the betrayal. But he knew. He was laughing at her whose hand he had asked in marriage when he was the lover of Katharine Parr.
Elizabeth went back to her bed and tried, without success, to banish thoughts of those two together. The pictures her mind conjured up for her were so vivid. They embodied all that Elizabeth wanted for herself and dared not take, all that was denied her because of her dream of Queenship.
Her mouth grew prim. This was an insult to her father, the great King Henry. They were traitors, both of them. What if she betrayed them? What would be the fate of those two if the Duke of Somerset, the Lord Protector, knew what his brother was doing with the Dowager Queen?
What if there was a child…a son! And what if they declared that son to be the late King’s! Elizabeth grew cold at the thought. She knew at that moment that her desire for the crown would always be greater than her desire for Seymour or any man.
They would not dare declare their son the King’s son. If they tried to, she would let nothing stand in her way of humiliating them … destroying them.
I could have had him, she reminded herself. Poor Katharine! She is the one who is being cheated.
She could not sleep. She lay, conjuring up more pictures of their lovemaking until the dawn came.
She was at the window, watching his hasty departure.
THE LORD HIGH ADMIRAL sought audience with the King at the palace of White Hall. This His Majesty was very willing to grant.
“A good morrow to you, my Lord Sudley,” said the King.
The Admiral bent low and kissed the little hand. Then, lifting his face which was turned away from the King’s attendants, he slowly closed one eye and almost imperceptibly jerked his head. The little King’s face flushed with pleasure. Uncle Thomas meant: Let us be alone together.
There was nothing that would please Edward more.
“I would be alone with my uncle,” he said. “Pray leave us.”
He looked fearfully at his attendants as though he suspected that they might refuse; but there were no gentlemen of great importance among them at that moment to offer that advice, proffered ingratiatingly and yet in such a manner as to imply that His Majesty—for all his titles—was but a child, and a child who was in duty bound to obey his ministers.
When they had gone, Thomas said: “And how fares the King?”
“He was not feeling well until the Lord High Admiral called to see him. That lifted his spirits mightily.”
“My dearest nephew!”
“Uncle Thomas, it is long since I have seen you.”
“You are so guarded now, continually surrounded by your counselors. There seems hardly room for poor Uncle Thomas.”
“There is always room for Uncle Thomas.”
