“But why should we meddle…?”
“Dearest, there is our place at court to think of. The more power my brother builds for himself, the more he will rule us. He will be taking our houses and land ere long, to lay side by side with the royal jewelery.”
“I do not want to concern myself with our places at court now. I am happy here… I would like to stay here forever… forget everything but this.”
He smiled, tenderly sighing with her; but he was not the man to throw aside ambition because he had achieved a happy marriage.
“When we talk of these children,” she said, “I long for the children we may have.”
“I also, sweetheart.”
“And then I am afraid, Thomas. I have never had a child. I hope I may bear you one.”
He bent over her and kissed her.
“Kate, I too wish for children—sons and daughters. But I would not have you thinking of them if thinking makes you sad.”
She said: “I used to listen to the tolling of the bell. ‘Sons. Sons,’ it seemed to say to me, warning me, reminding me that if I did not give the King a son, it would toll for my death. I prayed for a child then—a royal Prince. Oh, Thomas, I used to think that if I did not have a son I should die as Anne Boleyn died.”
“I know,” he soothed her. “But that is over; that is done. That is why, much as I desire our child, I would not have you brooding on it. We have each other, Kate. If we have a child, that will be good. If we do not…we have each other.”
She took his hand and kissed it; and as they walked home, the church bells sounded a merry peal.
IT WAS SEPTEMBER, a few days after Elizabeth’s fourteenth birthday.
Lord and Lady Sudley had moved to Hanworth, and Elizabeth went with them. All through the summer days, after the newly married pair had returned from Sudley Castle, Elizabeth was becoming more and more aware of the Admiral’s watching eyes.
She was a young lady now, she believed. Fourteen seemed grownup, old enough for a girl to have a husband, if she were a Princess.
She fancied the Admiral thought so too. He had been very bold of late. It was a situation filled with danger; she was living in the household of a man and his wife, and was slightly in love with the man, and he…how much in love was he with her?
She did wish that the third person concerned was not her dear stepmother; and she wished too that the Queen was not so openly doting. Yet, thought Elizabeth, if it were not I who caught those stray glances of his, might it not be another? It would be disastrous if the wicked Admiral turned those bold glances of his on someone who did not know how to receive them in the right spirit!
She put on a gown of black velvet, and told Kat Ashley that she was going into the gardens to join the Admiral and her stepmother.
Kat Ashley protested at the dress. “My darling lady, it is too old for you. Black at your age!”
“I am grown up, Kat. Do you not realize that I am fourteen?”
“So you are, sweetheart, but you are but a girl in growth.”
“Do you not think the black suits my hair?”
“It does,” Kat admitted.
“Then it is time I began to look my age.”
Kat put her arms about her and kissed her. “Oh, my lady, I don’t want you to be grown up.”
“Why not?”
“Because I am afraid. I am afraid of when you grow up.”
“Dearest Kat, why should you be afraid?”
“Afraid for you, sweet. Now they say: ‘Oh, she is just a child …’ And they think of you as a child…of no importance.”
“But I am of importance, Mistress Ashley. I do not wish to be thought of no importance.”
“It is safer so…until…”
“Until, Kat?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Kneel and kiss my hand, then.”
She took the bracelet from her arm and put the circlet on her head.
“My lady! My lady!” cried Kat in dismay.
“There are just the two of us, so what matters it? And, Kat, you are not to gossip of it.”
“No, my lady.”
Elizabeth took Kat’s ear and pinched it hard. “You gossip too much with Master Parry.”
“Oh, my ear! It hurts. Stop, you wild cat. Stop…Your…Your Majesty!”
They began to laugh, and the bracelet fell to the floor.
