Through the spring the gloom persisted. It was exactly three years since those glorious days when we were preparing for Anne’s coronation. I remembered my grandmother’s pride and joy because of our connection with the new Queen. The atmosphere had changed a great deal. It would have been better now if we were not related to the Queen. The Duke was very gloomy. He came to the house more frequently. I gathered that he was not as popular at Court as he had been, for the King no longer had the same welcome for members of the Howard family.

My grandmother was frantic with anxiety. She shut herself in her room. Lord William was often at the house, and there were earnest conversations between him and the Duke. I saw them walking in the gardens, and I believed that they did not want what they said to be overheard.

Greatly daring, I went to the Duchess and asked if she needed me, for during one of these sessions of ours I thought I might hear something important from her ramblings; but she sharply told me to be off and not bother her.

Then came that terrible day when our hopes that the storm would blow over were foundered for ever.

It was the topic of conversation everywhere. There were several versions of it, but most were hearsay. The King and Queen had been together at the May Day joust, seated side by side in the royal box. The King did not speak to the Queen, and it was clear to everyone that all was not well between them. The King was glum, while the Queen put on an air of false gaiety in an effort to maintain the pretense of harmony.

Lord Rochford, the Queen’s brother, had challenged Henry Norris; and, with their followers, they began the mock battle.

Perhaps the Queen acted unwisely, but I supposed that, if the occasion had not arisen then, it would very soon afterward, for there were many bent on her destruction—first and foremost among them being the Seymour brothers.

What happened was that, in the heat of the contest between Rochford and Norris, Norris came near to the royal balcony and at that moment the Queen dropped her handkerchief. Norris picked it up and wiped his brow with it. It was certainly an act of familiarity. Perhaps when the Queen was in favor, she might have acted so with Norris, but now such conduct gave the King an excuse for a fresh grievance.

The King rose and left his seat. The Queen was naturally nonplussed and shortly afterward followed him. As for Norris, he was arrested a little later when he was leaving the joust. Francis Weston was also arrested.

The storm which had been brewing for months had now broken in its full fury. The King was an impatient man. He would wait no longer. His passion for our poor cousin was at an end, and he was as determined to marry Jane Seymour as he had been to marry Anne Boleyn.

The tragedy of Anne, three years a Queen, was now nearing to its end. She was sent to the Tower on a charge of adultery which, of course, was treason. I was horrified to learn that my Uncle Norfolk was a member of the Council which condemned her. I never liked him after that. In truth, perhaps I had never liked him, but I had always thought of him as a great man, for he was the head of our family, and my grandmother always spoke of him with awe. How could he, I asked myself, he, who had always been so eager to stress his connection with her, desert her so cruelly when she needed his help? Perhaps it is so with those who put family pride above all else, for what was their professed affection worth?

It was not so with the Duchess, my grandmother. She was deeply grieved for her granddaughter, and it was not entirely because the once-cherished Queen had placed our family in jeopardy. She would murmur to herself: “My poor child,” and her eyes were red from weeping. Then her face would grow dark with anger, and she would murmur against that cruel monster—the King, of course. But that was only rarely and when I was alone with her.

What happened is known to all. Anne was brought to the block.

For a long time I could not pass the Tower. Nothing would induce me to, and when eventually I did, I was filled with a sudden anger against Fate which had sent my clever cousin to Tower Green and cut off her beautiful head. By Fate, I meant the King—but it was wise not even to think such thoughts. It would be treason.

Others died with her. Norris, Weston, Brereton swore to the innocence of the Queen, even under torture. Poor delicate Mark Smeaton, the musician, gave way and admitted to his and the Queen’s guilt. He was not entirely believed, even by the Queen’s enemies. Poor Mark Smeaton, who had sworn his innocence before entering that grim fortress, where he had been prevailed upon to change his mind.

Thomas Wyatt was lucky. He escaped death and went abroad. I was glad of that, but deeply shocked when my cousin George Boleyn, Lord Rochford, was accused of being his sister’s lover. That was monstrous, and I think even my Uncle Norfolk would have questioned its plausibility if he had not feared to offend the King by doing so. He should have shown more courage, but who can be courageous when one word could betray one and result in suffering to equal that of the victim?

What was particularly shocking in the case of Anne and her brother was that it was due to Lady Rochford’s evidence that the case against her husband and sister-in-law was brought.

My grandmother gave way to her grief. “The vixen,” she cried. “How could she? It is lies … lies … all lies. But that creature was very jealous of those two. They were so brilliant. George loved his sister and she loved him. But it was a pure love. I would swear that on my life … the love between a clever brother and sister. Oh, the wicked creature! She will live to regret it.”

My grandmother might be lazy, comfort-loving, greedy, obsessed by grandeur, overweeningly proud of her noble family, intent on preserving its greatness and seeking more, but beneath all that there was kindness in her. She had loved my cousin and I believed she had some regard for me. There was a softness in her that was unlike the flinty nature of my uncle, the Duke.

Everyone knows now how bravely Anne went to her death on Tower Green and how, the moment she was dead, the King set off to Wolf Hall to become betrothed to Jane Seymour.

I was growing up. I was now fifteen years old.


* * *

Sometimes I looked at the silk rose which Francis Derham had given me. I did not wear it. If I had, my grandmother would have wanted to know whence it came, and I was wise enough to know that she would not be pleased to hear it had come from a young man.

She had changed a little since the death of my cousin. It had been a great shock to her, from which I felt she would never quite recover. She had set such hopes on her and she had been so proud. Now it seemed that the Howards wanted to forget they had ever known such a person as Anne Boleyn.

The King had married almost immediately, and the Seymour brothers were now in high favor, while the Howards, though not exactly in decline, were naturally not enjoying the honors they once did. The Seymours saw to that.

It appeared that Jane Seymour was all that the King desired in a wife, for very soon after the marriage we heard that she was with child.

The King was delighted. This was divine approval. Any lingering doubts people might have had that Anne had been cruelly treated would be dismissed. Obviously the King had been right in his action. She had been an adulteress and Heaven had frowned on the union, for there was only Elizabeth, a mere girl—and out of favor now on account of her mother. One girl and a still-born boy. Proof enough! And here was Jane, his wife of a short duration, docile and sweet—who would not be, with the memory of what had happened to her predecessor hanging over her?—pregnant in the shortest possible time.

I suppose I did not give a great deal of thought to these matters then. Remember, I was only fifteen, and a giddy fifteen at that, with my head full of things like silk flowers for my gown and admiring looks from the young men of the household. I was untutored for, with all the excitement of life at this time, who could spare a thought for my education? I could read a little, write with some difficulty, and picked up knowledge where I could. I was not of a serious enough nature to seek to educate myself. I liked to sing and dance and be merry, so was not concerned with my academic shortcomings.

I think my grandmother might have noticed the deficiencies if she had been more aware of me. But how could she have been expected to, with one other granddaughter taking up so much of her thoughts?

We eagerly awaited the birth of Jane Seymour’s child. The question everyone was asking was, will it be a boy? Would there be another disappointment? People talked of little else. Some whispered, and if not, how long will it be before Queen Jane follows Queen Anne? That scene on Tower Hill was too recent to be forgotten easily.

It seemed all was well. Oh joy! Oh jubilation! The child was a boy and the King’s dearest wish had been granted. At last, he had a son—a legitimate heir to the throne!

There must be rejoicing throughout the land. Alas, the Queen was in a sorry state. The doctors shook their heads in dismay, but even so the King could not hide his delight, for it was believed that the boy would live, if not his mother.

The child must be baptized at once, even though the doctors assured the King that he would survive. No chances must be taken. Poor Jane, how ill she must have been, exhausted, craving rest, too tired to enjoy her triumph in succeeding where her predecessors had failed.

The boy was to be named Edward. I heard accounts of his baptism: how he was taken from his nursery in Hampton Court to his mother’s chamber, accompanied by the sound of trumpets, while poor Jane lay there, pale, wan, desperately trying to take part in the ceremonial ritual. It lasted for three hours and at the end of it Jane was in no condition to understand what was happening.

The King, however, insisted on her presence. They said he could not take his eyes from the baby Prince, who behaved with impeccable good manners throughout the proceedings and gave only the occasional whimper.

Poor Jane! She never recovered from the ceremony. So died the perfect wife. Not only had she produced the longed-for son, but she had had the good grace to die before the King had tired of her.

He could now ask himself where he could find a new wife.


* * *

Queen Jane was taken from Hampton Court to Windsor for her burial.

It was a day of mourning. The people were in the streets, and we must be among them. There were masses to be said and hymns to be sung in St. Paul’s Cathedral, where, a day or so before, there had been rejoicing over the birth of an heir.

There would be no revelry, of course, which was a pity, and even the rejoicing on the baby’s birth had to be subdued because of his mother’s death; but nevertheless it was an occasion for an outing.

So, with Joan, Dorothy and Mary Lassells, and some of the others from the band of Norfolk pensioners, I boarded the barge at the privy stairs and we sailed down the river to the City.

There were crowds in the streets and, after leaving the barge at Westminster stairs, we walked through the press of people to St. Paul’s.

The cathedral was overflowing and we remained among the crowds outside, and it was there that I saw him.

He was standing before me, staring in undisguised delight. Then he took off his hat and bowed low. I was tingling with excitement.

“Mistress Katherine Howard!” he cried. “Oh fie! Do you not know me?”

I was never subtle. I cried out: “Of a surety I know you. You are Francis Derham. You gave me the silk rose.”

“Well met.”

I could think of nothing to say but: “So … you are back.”

“Yesterday noon. I have been seeking you ever since.”

“You remembered. It is long.”

“Did I not say I would never forget?”

“You said you would come back.”

“That is what I meant. What do you here? Come to sing hymns of sadness for the Queen?”

I nodded.

“I am on the same mission. But chiefly to look for you.”

Joan and Dorothy were listening with some curiosity.

“You remember them?” I asked.

“Well met, Mistresses,” he said, bowing first to Joan and then to Dorothy. But I knew he had not remembered them, and I was rather pleased about that.

“You came with a party?” asked Dorothy.