In the Shadow of the Crown - Plaidy Jean (книги хорошем качестве бесплатно без регистрации .txt) 📗

He would not come to Hunsdon; nor should I go to Court …yet. He wanted to see me first and he did not want too much noise about it. He must have felt a little uncertain about meeting a daughter who had for so many years defied him and had only just signed her submission most reluctantly.

I was to be taken at an appointed time to a country house where he would receive me.

I could not eat. I could not sleep. I hovered between excitement and apprehension. I prayed for guidance. I talked to my mother, begging her, once more, to understand why I had betrayed her in words, although in my heart I would always be true to her.

I talked to Susan Clarencieux of my fears.

She reassured me. “My lady,” she said, “you need have no fears. You are royal…as royal as the King.”

I put my finger on her lips. “Hush, Susan. I do not want to lose you. Such things as you say could be construed as treason.”

“It is true.”

“Truth can sometimes be treason, Susan. There. I am worse than you. We must guard our tongues. Let's talk of other things. What am I going to wear?”

For so long I had had few clothes and what I had were mended; but recently new garments had been sent to me and now I believed I could dress so that I would not look too shabby for the occasion.

Command came that I was to leave the following morning. Margaret Bryan came to me on the night before. She sat by my bed and held my hand as she used to in those long-ago days when my trials were just beginning.

“Have no fear,” she said. “All will be well. Remember, you are his daughter.”

“He forgot that once.”

“Nay. A man does not forget his daughter. He was plagued by other matters.”

“And I would not say what he wished me to. And now, I have, Margaret. God forgive me.”

“Hush, hush,” she said. “Everything will be understood. Try to rest. Be yourself… and all will be well.”

At the door she paused and looked at me.

“Do not forget the child,” she said. “She is only a baby. Speak for her… if there is a chance.”

I said, “I will, Margaret. But I must go carefully. He is so full of hatred for her mother now … as once he was for mine.”

“They are both gone now, God rest their souls,” said Margaret. “It is the poor children who remain.”

She then left me and I tried to compose myself and prepare for the next day's ordeal.

AT DAWN WE SET out and by mid-morning had reached our destination.

There I met the father whom I had not seen for five years. With him was his new Queen.

For a few moments we stood looking at each other. I wondered what he thought of me. When he had last seen me I had been a thin, spindly-legged girl of fifteen. Now I was a woman. I knew I had gained in dignity, especially so since I had been aware of my destiny. But I was so shocked by the change in him that I could think of little else.

When I had last seen him he had been the most handsome man I had ever known. He had stood taller than most men; he had always been recognized by his height and width at all those masques where he had delighted in trying to disguise himself. His complexion had been florid, but healthily so. Now it was purplish rather than pink. His weight had increased enormously. His was no longer an athletic figure. “Corpulent” would be a more accurate way of describing it. But it was his face in which the greater change had taken place. In the past there had been an engaging aspect. Could I call it innocence? Hardly. Perhaps rather a boyish delight in the world and himself which at that time had seemed endearing. Even in those days we had dreaded to see his mood change, which it had done now and then, and the small mouth would become a thin, straight line and the little eyes points of light almost disappearing into his full face. Much of the old benignity had departed. New lines had appeared to rob him of that quality. To look at him now, so large in his surcoat with the puffed sleeves barred with strips of fur and built-up shoulders which increased his size and made him a figure of splendor, completely over-awed me. I felt very small and insignificant beside such a glittering figure and I knew that I could never do what I had thought during my journey here that I might, which was to throw myself at his feet and beg him not to ask me to deny my mother and the Church of Rome.

To see him there, powerful and formidable in the extreme, I knew that I should never do it even if I could.

And beside him was his new Queen—slender, pretty, looking frail beside his great girth, gentle, welcoming, a little hesitant, but endeavoring to tell me she was pleased to see me.

I went to him and knelt. He gave me his hand, which I kissed. Then he made a gesture for me to stand up, so I did so.

“At last,” he said. “I rejoice to see you, daughter.”

I was trying to overcome my emotion and he sensed this. It pleased him. He saw me as the repentant daughter, asking for forgiveness because of her foolish behavior which had caused him pain.

I would have knelt to the Queen but she had taken my hands. She must have been about the same age as Anne Boleyn… but she seemed younger and I felt older in experience.

There was nothing false about the greeting she gave me. She smiled tremulously. “Oh welcome…welcome,” she said. “I have so wanted this meeting.”

The King smiled at her indulgently.

“The Queen speaks for us both,” he said.

He dismissed everyone so that we should be alone together, he said, and talk as a family should.

So we were alone and he spoke of his sufferings, of how he had been mistreated, but now that he had his good Jane beside him, all that was behind us.

He sat in the chair which had been provided for him, and Jane brought up one for me so that I could sit beside him.

“Your Grace must not wait on me,” I said.

“But it is what I want,” she told me with her rather girlish smile. “I am so happy. I have always wanted you to be at Court, and now you are going to be there.”

The King was evidently enamored of her. She was so gentle and seemed to me guileless. She was as different from Anne Boleyn as one woman can be from another. Therein, I supposed, lay her attraction.

Jane sat close to the King, who from time to time patted her knee. I thought she was like a little kitten, and I could not suppress the question which rose in my mind: How long can he be content with her?

Meanwhile she was eager to show herself my friend.

“We shall arrange for you to come to Court … in time,” said the King.

“Yes,” added Jane, “and it shall be soon.”

“I shall be leaving for the hunting season shortly,” said my father. “Perhaps after that.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” I said. Recently he had given himself the title of “Majesty” which was now generally used instead of the old “Your Grace.” After all, dukes could be Graces, but only the King—and Queen— Majesties.

“You are uneasy, daughter,” he said. “Do not be so. Now that you have confessed your faults, I forgive you freely. She who did you much harm has now reaped her just deserts. Witchcraft is a fearsome cult. It must be crushed wherever we find it. And now … if you will be my good child, I will be father to you.”

“You will be welcome at Court,” said Jane. “We shall be friends…we shall be as sisters.”

The King laughed at her. I thought her charming in her rather simple way.

He asked about my household at Hunsdon. I said that of recent date it had begun to grow.

“You shall have the comforts you once enjoyed before you were misguided enough to oppose my will.”

“I thank Your Majesty.”

“Aye… and you will find there will be much for which to thank me.”

Jane laughed happily. I thought she was really a good creature and was genuinely rejoicing in my changed fortunes.

I wondered whether I could mention Elizabeth but the dark look which had come into his face when he had spoken of her mother made me hesitate. Not yet, I thought, I must tread very carefully.