Secrets of the Tudor Court Boxed Set

3

My mother’s mother, Lady Bray, and her only remaining unmarried daughter, Dorothy, came to us for a visit during Lent. Kent had a better supply of fish than Bedfordshire and more variety, too. We dined on sea bass, red mullet, cod, haddock, pollack, hake, halibut, turbot, plaice, flounder, sole, salmon, sturgeon, trout, herring, and eels. Father arrived home several days later, after both houses of Parliament adjourned for the Easter holy days.

Although I was very fond of Grandmother Jane, I had mixed feelings about Dorothy’s presence at Cowling Castle. At our last meeting, nearly fourteen months earlier at court, she had been angry and unpleasant. She did not appear to have mellowed since.

On the day before Palm Sunday, the nineteenth of March, I came upon her in the garden where I walked daily for exercise. Dorothy sat on a stone bench, wrapped tightly against the cold in a bright red cloak. She was reading a letter and had about her the air of a cat that has just licked up an entire bowl of cream.

“You will have icicles hanging off the end of your nose if you do not get up and move around,” I said.

Dorothy’s glance was as sharp as a poniard. “I have memories to keep me warm and the promise of more heat to come.” She folded the single page with exaggerated care, smoothing the edges flat with gloved fingers.

“Is that from Lord Parr?” It was a logical conclusion but Dorothy’s reaction surprised me.

“I am going to marry him.” Her voice, her bearing, even the way she clasped the letter to her bosom, shouted defiance, as if she expected me to argue the point.

I reined in an unwanted pang of envy. “I am sure he will make you an excellent husband. Have you seen him since you left court?”

“We have been reduced to writing to each other.” She tucked the letter into a pocket sewn in the lining of her cloak. When she rearranged the garment’s folds, she made room for me to join her on the bench.

“It seems a most suitable match,” I said. “When will you be formally betrothed?”

“There are . . . reasons we must delay. And keep matters between us private for now.”

“What reasons? Is it Cousin John? Must your brother approve of the contract?” Cousin John was Lord Bray, and as such, I supposed, the head of Dorothy’s family.

“John is a mere boy. He cannot approve or disapprove of anything.” Contempt laced Dorothy’s words.

I bristled. The “mere boy” was my age. “Then it must be Grandmother Jane who objects. You’ll have to elope.”

“If only it were that simple.”

“Are you certain Lord Parr wants to marry you?”

Too late, I realized how Dorothy would interpret my impulsive question. Truly, I had not meant to imply that he had no need to marry her, having already sampled her favors, but she took my words that way and sprang to her feet, incensed.

“You know nothing of matters between men and women! Will Parr is besotted with me and has been since first we met. And I will be Lady Parr one day, while you, you foolish country mouse, will be fortunate if some simpleminded yeoman farmer can be found to marry you!”

After that encounter, I gave Dorothy a wide berth. When we were obliged to be in the same room—often the case, since I delighted in Grandmother Jane’s company—I was careful to keep Kate between us.

On the last day of March the weather was bleak. A constant drizzling rain and gray skies dampened spirits as well as objects. In the solar we lit candles, but it was still difficult to see our stitches.

Grandmother Jane complained that her swollen knuckles were even less flexible than usual. She clenched and unclenched her hands in the hope of working the stiffness out of her fingers. She had lived more than six decades and borne eleven children, but that was the only sign of age or infirmity I ever saw in her. Small and sprightly, my grandmother was the liveliest person I knew.

All the women of the castle except the laundresses and the girl who helped in the kitchen had gathered, with their needlework—Mother, Grandmother Jane, Aunt Elizabeth, their gentlewomen, Kate and I, and Dorothy. Dorothy sat hunched over a piece of embroidery, a sour expression on her face. In addition to the human inhabitants, the room was occupied by a linnet in a cage, three spaniels—Yip, Perky, and Sleepy—and Hunter, an old hound so devoted to my mother that he slept with his muzzle resting on her shoe. Two charcoal braziers gave off fitful heat and the fire in the hearth smoked and spat with every draft.

Warmly dressed, I’d chosen to curl up on the window seat, as far from Dorothy as possible, and thus I was the first to see three men ride in. I recognized one of them at once, even though he wore a long cloak and his rain-sodden hat drooped down over his ears.

“Lord Parr has just arrived,” I announced.

Dorothy went perfectly still. Her needle froze halfway through a stitch. As I watched, a satisfied smile curved her thin lips upward and she resumed stitching.

Grandmother Jane’s reaction was both more vocal and more volatile. “That blackguard! Anne, you must not let him into the house.”

My mother stared at Grandmother in astonishment. “Why ever not? He is high in King Henry’s favor and I have never heard any ill report of him.”

“Immured here in the country, you would not, but take my word for it, he’s a bad lot. And I hear he’s an evangelical, too, all for doing away with what’s left of the Mass and tearing down every church in the land to use for building stone.”

“Mother,” Dorothy warned, not quite under her breath.

Grandmother jabbed a misshapen finger in Dorothy’s direction. “Not a word out of you, girl. I know what I know.”

I wondered how, since she spent most of her time at Eaton Bray. Bedfordshire was even more remote from court and courtiers than our rural peninsula. News took a long time to reach us and sometimes people forgot entirely to send us word of events that took place elsewhere.

“Do you suppose Lord Parr will sup with us and stay the night?” Kate asked, oblivious to the daggers shooting back and forth between Dorothy and her mother. The linnet, equally unconcerned, began to sing. High, lilting notes filled the chamber, forcing Mother to raise her voice in order to be heard.

“It is too late in the day for him to travel elsewhere,” she said, sending Grandmother a stern look. “It is the obligation of every household to offer hospitality to travelers. If you cannot behave civilly toward him, perhaps you should sup in your chamber.”

“And miss hearing the latest scandals from court? Never think it!”

And so it was that we all went down to supper. I anticipated an entertaining evening.

The great chamber of Cowling Castle rose to a height of two stories but had few windows, making it a dark and dismal place even on sunny days. For family meals we customarily used the much smaller dining chamber and we continued that practice even though we had a guest. The younger boys ate with their tutors, but Father decided that George, who had turned ten in January, was old enough to join the rest of us. My little brother sat next to me, so excited at being treated as an adult that he could barely sit still. I knew just how he felt.

However much Grandmother might have disliked Lord Parr, she had no qualms about interrogating him. “Does Sir Anthony Browne still live?” she demanded the moment everyone was seated, “Or has that young bride of his danced him into his grave?”

Old Sir Anthony, I recalled, had married a lady more than twenty-five years his junior in late December. News of the wedding had reached us at Cowling Castle more than a month after the event but had still provided several hours of entertaining conversation. The age difference was not all that unusual, but the bride, Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald, was the same young noblewoman who’d once been the subject of a sonnet written by Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey. Surrey’s name never failed to stir comment at Cowling Castle. My cousin, Tom Wyatt, was one of Surrey’s boon companions. Because he was, and because the earl had admired the poetry written by Aunt Elizabeth’s late husband, Sir Thomas the Elder, Surrey had composed several laments to commemorate Wyatt’s death. My aunt despised both the poet and his poems and, by association, anyone else Surrey honored with his verses.

As I’d predicted on the day we learned my uncle was dead, Kate and I had soon learned the rest of the story, the part Father had tried to keep from us. It was not a pretty tale. Sir Thomas Wyatt had died deeply in debt, obliging Cousin Tom to sell most of his inheritance to the Crown in order to raise enough money to settle with his father’s creditors. Tom had instructed Master Rudstone to obtain Aunt Elizabeth’s permission to include in that sale some of the properties that comprised her widow’s third of the estate. My aunt had been willing to agree . . . until she’d discovered that, in spite of Tom’s desperate need for ready money, he intended to grant an entire manor in Kent to his father’s longtime mistress. Mother and son had not spoken to each other since.

Lord Parr could add nothing to our knowledge of the new Lady Browne. She’d retired to the country after her marriage.

“And what of your sister, Lady Latimer?” Mother asked Lord Parr. “How does she fare? We heard of her husband’s recent death.”

Lord Latimer had died at the beginning of the month. Father had brought that news home with him. Since I had never met either Lady Latimer or her late husband, I was not much interested in Will Parr’s reply, but Dorothy was acquainted with both of Lord Parr’s siblings.

“The other sister,” she whispered to Kate, “was a maid of honor until she married William Herbert, one of the King’s Spears.”

“Kathryn joined the Lady Mary’s household some months ago,” Lord Parr said, “and has resumed her duties there.”

“So soon?” My grandmother, who still wore black for Grandfather Bray, dead these four years and more, looked disapproving. Widows customarily went into seclusion, at least for a while.

“The king insisted that she return,” Lord Parr said, “and by His Grace’s decree, Kathryn has also forgone wearing mourning dress.”

The exchange of meaningful looks between my mother and grandmother assured me that they thought this as odd as I did, but no one pursued the subject.

“What else is new at court?” Dorothy asked.

“The king has acquired a new pet,” Will Parr said as he sampled the stewed pike, a favorite of mine. It was seasoned with currants, sugar, cinnamon, barberries, and prunes. “An ape. The creature is half as big as a man and wears a damask collar studded with pearls. It has its own keeper, but I fear it needs more than one man to look after it. The beast escaped last week and went on a rampage in the lodgings of an unfortunate courtier. It ripped his best bonnet to shreds.” Parr’s light brown eyes twinkled as he paused for effect. “And then it ate the feather.”

When our laughter died away, I realized that Father was frowning.

“Did they ever identify those drunken ruffians who caused so much damage in London back in January? It was one night after curfew,” he explained for the benefit of those of us unfamiliar with the incident. “They broke dozens of windows, targeting prominent citizens and churches, too. Then they crossed the Thames in boats and attacked several whorehouses in Southwark.”

“I am certain no one complained about that,” Aunt Elizabeth said with some asperity.

We all looked at Lord Parr expectantly. He toyed with his food and appeared ill at ease.

“Well,” Father demanded. “Have the brigands been caught?”

“It has become a matter of some delicacy,” Lord Parr hedged.

He took a swallow of wine, but that only delayed the inevitable. No one changed the subject. He sighed and gave in.

“It appears that the young men were in the company of the Earl of Surrey.” His glance slid to Aunt Elizabeth, then quickly away. “The last I heard, just before I left court, was that the earl had been ordered to appear before four members of the Privy Council on the first of April. Two of his boon companions have already been sent to the Tower of London. At first, they denied taking part in the rampage. Then they confessed. I regret to tell you, Lady Wyatt, that one of them is your son.”

Aunt Elizabeth’s lips compressed into a flat, disapproving line, but she did not look surprised by this news, nor unduly upset by it. After a moment, she gave a careless wave of one hand. “A few months in prison will do Tom good, but I feel sorry for his poor wife.”

“Are you certain you were not one of them, Lord Parr?” Grandmother Jane asked. She had the look of a cat toying with a mouse when she added, “I was under the impression that you were also one of Surrey’s minions.”

Lord Parr opened his mouth, then closed it again. He did not seem to know how to react to my grandmother’s rudeness. Had she been a man, I am sure he’d have made some arrogant denial, perhaps even let his anger at the insult show. But he was our guest and she was a baron’s widow. Long years of training in courtly behavior rose to the fore. He sent her a charming if insincere smile. “Alas, dear lady, I fear your information is some decades out of date. As boys, the earl and I were both members of the late Duke of Richmond’s household. We were the king’s son’s devoted servants until the day he died.”

My mother, ever the good hostess, stepped in to smooth over the awkwardness. “As I recall, Lord Parr, you are the patron of a troupe of Italian musicians and I see that one of the servants you brought with you has the look of a foreigner. Is he, by chance, a Bassano?”

“Indeed he is, Lady Cobham. Jasper Bassano. Shall I have him perform for you? He sings and plays any number of instruments with great skill and, should you have others to provide the music, dances extraordinarily well, too.”

“Your other servant is not musical?”

“Griggs?” Lord Parr chuckled. “He can gentle a horse with a whisper but his singing sets the hounds to howling and frightens small children.”

When the trestle table had been removed to leave a space in the middle of the room, Master Bassano, swarthy and black haired but handsome for all that, demonstrated each of his skills, first the dancing, then the singing, and finally the playing. When he launched into a pavane and Father’s musicians joined in, Lord Parr asked Dorothy to dance with him.

“There are enough of us for an alman,” Grandmother said in a carrying voice. The music abruptly stopped. She rose and crooked a gnarled finger at Matthew Rowlett, one of Father’s gentlemen. “You there. You’ll do for my partner.”

Rowlett’s ruddy complexion lost some of its color, but he obediently presented himself before her and managed a respectable bow. Grandmother gave a satisfied nod, but she was not through rearranging things. A shove here and a deft tug there and by the time we were lined up with the men on the left and the women on the right, Rowlett was holding hands with Dorothy and I stood face-to-face with Lord Parr.

“Mistress Bess,” he greeted me, taking my hands in his.

“Lord Parr.” My voice shook a little, affected by his touch in spite of my resolve not to show any interest in him. Dorothy was already wroth with me. I had no desire to increase her ire.

The hopping steps kept me close to him for a measure, then carried us apart. When it was time to repeat the pattern from the beginning, he leaned close to whisper in my ear, “Surely you can call me Will. We are all friends here.”

“I do not believe my grandmother would agree.”

His laughter followed me as I danced away to clasp hands, each in their turn, with George, my father, and Master Rowlett.

Lord Parr partnered me twice more that evening. The tug of physical attraction grew stronger every time our hands touched or our bodies swayed side by side in the movements of the dance. No wonder Dorothy was so determined to have him for her husband! Although I did my best to ignore these tingles of awareness, when Will Parr was close to me a thrill of excitement penetrated straight to my vitals. When his arm brushed against my breast—an accident, I am sure—my entire body tightened deliciously in response.

That night my sleep was broken by vivid and disconcerting dreams.

The next morning, when I caught sight of Lord Parr, at a distance, I followed him. It was as if I had no control over the impulse. I had no plan, should I overtake him, but I was disappointed when he entered my father’s closet, the small room Father used when he wished to be private to write letters or read his Bible.

I turned back the way I’d come and stopped short. Dorothy blocked my path.

“Is he in there?”

When I nodded, she brushed past me and applied her ear to a panel of the door.

“You will not be able to hear what they are saying that way. The wood is too thick.”

Her eyes narrowed as she considered my words. “Where, then?”

I hesitated. I had no reason to help Dorothy, but I was curious, too. “Follow me.”

Around the corner and along a narrow passage we came to a wall hanging painted with a pastoral scene of sheep and shepherdesses. It hid a peephole I’d discovered years before. I did not know if someone had deliberately bored it or if it were a knothole left by nature, but just on the other side was Father’s closet.

There was room for only one person at a time. I let Dorothy take the first peek. After a moment, she backed away. “They are talking of Parliament,” she complained.

I stepped up to take my turn at the peephole. With my eye close to the opening, I had an excellent view of both Will Parr and my father. Will’s words were clearly audible.

“As you know, George,” he said, “I have already secured a legal separation from my estranged wife on the grounds of her adultery, and a bill has been introduced to prevent her children from inheriting my estates. I would appreciate your support in this matter.”

I barely contained my gasp of surprise. Will Parr already had a wife? No wonder Grandmother Jane objected to his attentions to Dorothy. And no wonder he had not asked Dorothy to marry him. He was not free to wed.

Deceitful brute! I thought, and leaned closer. Lord Parr’s case was the one I had heard discussed during my brief sojourn at court. He was the unnamed lord all the ladies had pitied because, even with his unhappy marriage dissolved, he could not remarry until after the death of his cast-off wife.

“I wed Anne Bourchier,” Will said, “when she was ten years old and I was fifteen. I had no say in the matter, nor did she.”

Reluctant sympathy stabbed at me. The circumstances made his plight more pitiable, but they carried no weight under English law. He was still married and would be as long as this Anne Bourchier lived—just as Aunt Elizabeth had been tied to Sir Thomas Wyatt until she’d finally been set free by his death. As for the children his wife had borne, they were innocent victims, but they gave me even more reason to feel sorry for Will Parr. Under the law, they were his heirs, no matter who their father had been.

Dorothy tugged at my sleeve, demanding her turn at the peephole, but I refused to budge.

“It seems certain,” Will said, “that the king will marry my sister.”

This news was just as startling as the revelation of his marital status. Kathryn, Lady Latimer, the recent widow, was old, at least compared to King Henry’s last wife. Catherine Howard had not lived to see her twentieth year. I tried to wrap my mind around the idea of a matronly queen, all the while straining to hear more.

“His Grace visits Kathryn daily in his daughter’s household,” Will said as Dorothy seized me bodily and hauled me away from the peephole. “Sometimes three or four times a day.”

“What are they saying?” she demanded.

“That Lady Latimer is to be our next queen.”

“Truly?”

“Lord Parr just said so.”

“Oh, excellent! That means I will soon return to court. The king himself promised me that I would be one of his next queen’s maids of honor. And with Will’s sister as queen, His Grace will surely agree to unmake Will’s marriage to that wicked woman in Essex.”

“So you knew he already had a wife.”

“Everyone knows, and everyone knows he would gladly be rid of her.” She stepped up to the listening post, but Father and Lord Parr had finished their conversation and were already on their way out of Father’s closet.

Dorothy, ever the bold one, intercepted them. I crept quietly away and did not see Will Parr again before he left Cowling Castle.