“And then I was born and you saw that I had bright red hair. That must have put an end to your doubts.”

“Ah, there’s the pity of it. The king was not the only redheaded man I let into my bed. There was another.”

“Who?”

“Let me see your money first.”

I reached through the purpose-cut placket in my skirt and into the purse suspended from my waist, feeling for the shape and weight of the angels. I extracted one. “The other when you answer me.”

“Even if you do not like the answer?”

With a sigh, I produced the second coin. I was prepared to pay even more if it would loosen her tongue.

“I do not remember his name. I am not certain I ever knew it. He was a toothsome fellow newcome to court and he was generous with his gifts. He was at Windsor, mayhap, to present a petition to the king. Then he was gone and I never saw him again. But he had a head of flaming red hair, not unlike your own.”

Her face gave nothing away. If she had invented this red-haired man out of whole cloth, I had no way to prove it. Fear of what the king might do to her if she named him as my father might have prompted her to lie, but it was equally possible that she had just told me the truth. If she had, I would never have an answer to the question of who had fathered me.

“If he was long gone before my birth, that still left King Henry,” I said slowly. “He knew nothing of my existence until he found me crying that day. Why did you not approach him when I was born? Why did he not know about me?”

“The king went away from Windsor, too. And how was I to make my way to him even when he came back again?” She spat. “I am a laundress. I’ve no business in the king’s lodgings. And once I was burdened with a squalling brat, no more courtiers came begging for my favors. I had to settle for Dobson.”

All my fault, I thought. Again.

“I regret that your life has been so hard.” I rose from the bench, resigned to the fact that I had learned all I would from her.

Unexpectedly, Joanna said, “Malte’s a good man. He looks in on me now and again. He even gave me money when Dobson left me and took all that I had saved.”

“But is he my real father? He does not have red hair.”

“Mayhap he had a red-haired grandmother.” She snorted a laugh.

I turned to leave. I was almost at the door of the hovel when she spoke again.

“You have far more already than most girls ever get. It would do you no harm to remember your poor old mother from time to time, or to share your good fortune.”

I was a fool to do so, but I detached my purse and handed it to her. Then I left her house without looking back. I did not even wait to make sure Jack and Edith were following me. I kept walking until I reached the waiting tilt boat.












35

Catherine’s Court, November 1556

Was the king your father or not?” Hester demanded.

“I was not yet certain.” They were within sight of the stable and the horses, scenting hay, perked up and moved faster.

“If he was, then Bridget Scutt is not my aunt at all.” Hester sounded delighted by that. “Instead I have two other aunts, and one of them is the queen. Will you take me to court, Mother? I would like to meet Aunt Mary.”

“Queen Mary,” Audrey corrected her, beginning to be alarmed. Hester was too young to realize that the queen might take exception to a claim of shared royal blood. “No more of this, Hester. I would not have us overheard.”

The girl had sense enough to obey, but Audrey could see she was bubbling over with excitement. Questions threatened to burst out of her at any moment, no matter who was within earshot.

Audrey dismounted too quickly and had to grasp Plodder’s mane to steady herself.

“Is aught wrong, mistress?”

She waved off the groom’s concern but reached for Hester’s hand. “Help me into the house, child. I find I am in need of rest after all that exertion.”

As soon as they reached Audrey’s bedchamber, Hester resumed begging to visit her newly discovered aunts. “If not to court, then let us go to Hatfield. Father has been there often. I am certain we would be welcome.”

Audrey was equally certain they would not. Moreover, she was suddenly beset by the conviction that it had been a terrible mistake to tell Hester anything at all about her heritage. The girl was too young to understand the danger.

She eased herself into the cushioned chair by the window and stared out at the landscape they’d just ridden through. She missed the London skyline already. How curious, she thought, since they’d be no safer in Stepney.

Hester flung herself down onto a pillow at her mother’s feet. “When, Mother? When can I meet them?”

“You do not even know for certain that those two royal ladies are your kin.” Audrey’s voice was sharper than she’d intended, making Hester wince. She moderated her tone. “Let me finish my tale, my darling girl. Then we will talk about where you can and cannot go and why.”

“But—”

“I understand your desire. Believe me, I do. But matters are never as simple as they seem. Will you allow me to tell you what happened next?”

A deep, sulky sigh answered her, but it was accompanied by a nod.

“On the way back to London, I shared with my companions what Joanna Dobson had told me. I was surprised when Edith remarked that Joanna was much to be pitied. She said that before she came to me, she had experienced for herself just how difficult it was to be young and female at the royal court. A noblewoman might not need to fear for her virtue, she said, and most gentlewomen were safe enough, but servants have no powerful relatives or position to protect them. They are considered fair game. Edith had felt safe only so long as she kept close to her mother, and her mother’s presence only served to ward off the danger because she was in service to Lady Frances, the daughter of one earl and wife to another.”

Hester frowned at this. “I remember that you said your father—John Malte—kept warning you against wandering off by yourself. And that he hired a neighbor to go with you to court, before the king sent Edith to you.”

“Even the plainest girl will have the men flocking after her if she is on her own.” Audrey smiled a little. “That day, leaving Windsor, Edith’s revelations made Jack uncomfortable. He mumbled something about how few women there were at court. Even among the servants, men outnumber women a hundred to one. But he had to admit that perhaps Edith had the right of it. And in the end, I agreed that Joanna might be more to be pitied than reviled. I realized that John Malte must feel the same. Why else would he leave her a bequest in his will? But I still had my doubts about her truthfulness. I suspected her of lying about my paternity.”

Hester lifted her head from Audrey’s knee. “There must have been a way to learn more. Surely someone among the king’s men, someone who was at court before you were born, knew the truth.”

“That occurred to me, too, and I said so to your father. My determination to go on asking questions worried him a great deal. He warned me that I must not pursue my inquiries openly, not when they concerned the king. That, I told him, left me with only the king himself to ask.”

“What did Father say to that?”

“That if His Grace had meant to claim me, he’d have done so long ago. I’d once thought the same, but now I was of a different opinion. My memory had been jostled. I found myself recalling more about the day His Grace rescued me. It was the same day upon which Anne Boleyn was created a marquess in her own right. By the time King Henry learned of my existence, he was deeply committed to marrying her. To acknowledge me then would have angered her, and Queen Anne was legendary for her temper. I think perhaps King Henry was a little afraid of her.”

“Did you convince Father of your reasoning?”

“I chose not to debate the matter with him. Besides, by then I had begun to realize that something else was bothering him. I’d sensed it throughout our journey to Windsor. I knew that furrow in his brow.”

Hester grinned. She was familiar with it, too, and with what its appearance betokened.

“When I tore myself away from my obsession with finding out who’d fathered me and considered Jack’s behavior, I realized that he’d been relieved to leave London behind for a few days. But most curiously, now that we were on our way back, he was passing anxious for the journey to end. It was as if he knew something of importance had happened while we were gone.”

Within moments of returning to the house in Watling Street, her suspicions had been confirmed. Bridget had already been by to report the latest news from court, relayed to her by Master Scutt.

“Father was on the verge of going to Sir Jerome Shelton’s house himself to fetch me home,” she told Hester. “The first words out of his mouth when I walked in were: ‘Has Lady Heveningham been questioned?’ My blank stare must have told him I had no notion what had happened. He looked relieved, but then he ordered me to stay away from Mary, and from anyone else I had ever met through the Duchess of Richmond and her brother . . . with one exception.”

“Why was he so upset?” Hester asked.

“While I was at Windsor, the Earl of Surrey had been arrested on suspicion of treason. Sir Richard Southwell had laid evidence against him before the Privy Council.”












36

December 12, 1546

That Sunday, I went with Edith and Bridget to watch the Earl of Surrey be led through London on his way to the Tower. I vow, every citizen, every apprentice, and every stranger in London turned out to witness his disgrace.

Jostled by the crowd, I soon became separated from the others. I kept one hand on the purse I’d acquired to replace the one I’d given Joanna. The pickpockets were also out in force.

It was not idle curiosity that made me want a close look at the earl. I wished to make certain he was not accompanied by other prisoners, perhaps his sister, perhaps even Mary Heveningham. And, irrational though it was, given that Jack Harington had long since shifted his allegiance to the Seymours, I worried that he might be among them. I’d not heard a word from him since returning to London.

The earl’s name was on everyone’s lips, along with ever more creative accounts of his arrest. I had heard the true story, thanks to Master Scutt. Ten days earlier, even as I was making my way to Windsor Castle and back, Surrey had dined at Whitehall Palace. The captain of the king’s halberdiers, pretending he had a private matter to discuss with the earl—that he wanted Surrey to intercede with his father, the Duke of Norfolk—lured Surrey away from the crowded hall. Once the earl was separated from his own men, other halberdiers seized him and carried him away to the river stairs. A boat was waiting there to take him to Blackfriars landing and thence to Ely Place in Holborn and the Lord Chancellor, who informed him that he was to be held there, a prisoner, by the king’s command.

Now charged with treason, Surrey was being taken from Ely Place to the Tower. He had been stripped of all the trappings of his rank. All his possessions, even his bay jennet, had been seized by the Crown. Thus, even though he was nobly born, the son of a duke, he was being made to walk the mile-and-a-half distance—straight through London itself.

There was no fanfare as he approached the spot where I stood waiting. No silk banners waved. The only entourage accompanying him consisted of a contingent of burly guards.

I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that he was the only prisoner. If anyone else had been arrested, they had at least been spared the indignity of public humiliation.

Surrey himself was almost unrecognizable. In plain garments undecorated with jewels, he stared straight ahead, his countenance stoic. Onlookers, who had been noisy and boisterous as he approached, fell silent in his wake. It was usual to pelt prisoners conveyed through the city in carts with rotten produce and stones. No one threw anything at the earl.

Here and there, men removed their caps as a mark of respect. Others looked away from the sight of the once-proud nobleman brought low. This was not a day to remember Surrey’s drunken rioting and window-breaking. Men instead recalled his role in the French war—his heroism and military prowess. Only the presence of the earl’s armed escort prevented them from attempting a rescue. As it was, some shouted out words of encouragement to the prisoner.

Beside me, an old woman began to wail. Others echoed the lamentation, until the entire city seemed to be in mourning for the Earl of Surrey. Suddenly nervous, the guards hustled their prisoner on his way. Around me, the cries died down, but they were taken up farther along the route. Inarticulate sounds close at hand were replaced by muttered words.