The Secret Keeper: A Novel of Kateryn Parr

TWENTY

Summer: Year of Our Lord 1550

We made our way in a litter with the drapes pulled, though it was summer and hot. We left Lincolnshire and then made our way to Rutland, whence we would then aim for Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire, and finally Wiltshire on the journey of one hundred fifty miles toward Marlborough. I made a great display of stopping at an ancient, mighty, and imposing cathedral headed by priests likewise described. I loudly asked one, “Where do you bury children who die of plague, if they are baptized? In consecrated ground? And whom shall I speak to about this if I have such a child who died on a journey?”

He indicated a lesser clergyman and could not remove himself from my presence quickly enough when I waved my perhaps contagious garments in his direction. I claimed to grow chilled and hot at the same time and asked if he could get me a drink, which he declined to do. He tripped on his robes upon his retreat. Should anyone come and ask after a child said to be buried quickly, due to plague, he would surely remember this encounter.

I headed back to the litter, in which Mary mostly slept or played with the leather straps that held down the draperies. Gerald drove the horses on, and soon enough we reached Brighton. It was nighttime, for which I was glad, as the cover of darkness allowed me to slip quietly into the house with Mary, up to my old room, and hope that no one had taken up residence there in my absence. Within minutes my brother’s steward came to greet me.

“Oh, it be you, Mistress Juliana. Does your brother know you’re here? Did any let you in?” He seemed befuddled at my quick and strange arrival.

“He does not, but will you let him know that I am here?”

“He is with his lady, Cecily,” he said. “But I shall call upon them.”

I left Lucy and Mary in my room, instructing them to be quiet. “’Tis a game,” I told Mary, and she clapped her fat hands softly, played with Lucy, and obeyed. I went down to meet my brother, who soon came to me, hastily dressed.

“Juliana! Why are you sneaking into the house like a thief in the night?” He clasped me in a great embrace and called for food and drink, and my heart lurched because he looked so like our father. I told him that Gerald would need some of the same, that he was in the stables, and that I needed to bring some to Lucy, who was upstairs too.

“I have a child upstairs as well,” I said quietly. “Though I wish that none should know of her.”

“Your child?” He looked concerned. “Not that he wouldn’t be welcome,” he hastily added. Dear Hugh. He would welcome my child even it was baseborn.

“No,” I said. “’Tis Lady Mary Seymour.”

I spent the next hour explaining the situation to him—from Edward Seymour’s likely fall, which did not surprise him, to the refusal of all of Kate’s friends and relations to help Mary, which did not surprise him, either.

“I may have been at court but for a few years,” he said. “But ’twas long enough for me to take the measure of those men who betray their brothers with pleasure and little cause. There is nothing to be gained in caring for a child with no wardship, title, or potential. So what will you do?”

“I mean to raise her myself.” I steadied myself to appear more confident on the outside than I did on the inside.

“Surely all will recognize her, if not you,” he said. “We are of no account and like as forgotten already. But Mary Seymour?”

“I mean to take her to Ireland,” I said, emboldened now. “I have friends who have told me that ’tis easy to be lost among the Irish. I plan to sail to Father Gregory and ask for his assistance. I can present myself as a widow and live on the money that would have been my dowry, if you agree. He will settle me in his village, I know, and give merit to my account.”

I did not tell him that Thomas Seymour had prospered our family’s income through his protection and trade connections, though it were true, and therefore some help toward Mary would be just. Hugh would give me the money for my own sake, I knew.

“And not marry? Nor bear children of your own? Even now, my Cecily is with child.”

“Already?” I teased him and he adjusted his shirt in embarrassment. “I am so pleased, Hugh.” I kept my voice quiet. “I was once, whilst at court, attacked by a man who harmed me in such a way that ’tis unlikely I shall bear children.”

“Who was it? I shall direct myself to him immediately!” Hugh stood up.

“He’s dead.”

“If he weren’t already, he would be shortly,” Hugh said. He grabbed me and pulled me close. I held him tight, then he brought me to arm’s length before speaking. “You are welcome here.”

“I know it, dearest.” I reached up and wiped away his spilled tears, and then wiped away some of my own. “But Mary is my child now, and I must attend to her. It cannot be safely done in Wiltshire so close to the Seymours.”

“None will miss her?”

“I shall have you send a letter from me, if you are willing, in which I tell the duchess that Mary died of plague on the way to her grandmother’s, and that will be the end of it. All will be relieved not to have to fund her keep. None will make an effort to inquire lest they be held financially accountable for her should she be found.”

He nodded. “I can arrange for passage to Ireland if you need it. On one of our ships. I shall have to tell Cecily of this matter but I shan’t have to tell anyone else—not Matthias. Nobody. And of course you may keep your dowry funds.”

I nodded. “I may need your help with the ships,” I said. “I am hoping, though, that help is coming from someone who can better assist me to navigate Ireland once there. If I do not hear from him within two weeks, you shall have to find us passage. We cannot keep this secret longer.”

We spent the days quietly, with Mary playing softly in my chambers; Hugh’s lovely wife Cecily suggested allowing the dogs into the house—something our mother would never have done—to help Mary pass the time. I spent the day in nervous prayer, wishing I had the certainty of faith that all would be well. I had near given up hope when one night I heard a commotion between the manor and the stable. Hugh’s man went down to see what it was, as ’twas past the time when visitors would politely call.

Lucy came racing up to my chamber. “’Tis him! He’s come, as I knew he would.”

I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.

I closed my eyes for a moment in rapture and then opened them with a small laugh. I knew he would come too. I hurriedly brushed my hair, but did not have time to slip from the simple gown I wore. I made my way down the stairway and as I did Jamie strode through the door.

I moved softly forward to greet him politely, but he brooked no polite compunction, and instead, he picked me up in his arms and spun me around afore kissing my forehead and then both of my cheeks. He did not kiss my lips, though I greatly wanted him to. I wondered if he were perhaps married but this was not the time nor place for such a conversation … yet.

“You came,” I said, unable to hold back my tears.

“Of course I came, love,” he said, and drew me to him, and then under his arm, whence I felt safe for the first time in years. I absorbed the feel of him, his arms tight about me, the scent of him, the spice of soap mixed with the lather of a hard ride, the look of him, a bit older but mayhap even a bit stronger. After some minutes those about us were stirring in curiosity, so Jamie took my hand and I led him to the receiving chamber, where my brother and his wife soon met us. His wife called for her servants to prepare a meal for the guest, and we all ate together.

Jamie’s eyes rarely left me, nor my eyes him. I hungrily took in the curve of his chin, the sound of his laugh, and his attention toward me. After dinner, I stopped him. “Shall we talk?”

He shook his head and took my hand. “Not tonight. I and my men are right weary, and we must leave early tomorrow. The ship we have used to come and fetch you and Mary will shortly be required for commerce, and I expect you must pack to prepare to leave early.” He must have seen my disappointment at losing his company, however temporarily. “Tomorrow we shall speak freely. I promise.”

I reluctantly agreed, and my brother had his steward show Jamie and his few men to their rooms. I remained with Cecily.

“How do you know … Sir James?” Cecily asked politely. She was sweet and interested but not rude or pressing, and I wanted to share some of the truth as I knew it might be the last time I could talk with my new sister.

“We were friends and, well, perhaps desired to be more, whilst at court,” I said. “But our lives took us in different directions. I knew that he was honorable and hoped that he would come to help me and Mary now, in our hour of need.”

“Will you marry?” she asked bluntly. ’Twas clear Hugh had not shared my predicament with her.

“I think not,” I said.

“Be he already married?”

“I do not know,” I said.

She pressed no more but kissed me softly and bade me come to her if I had any need before we left or even after.

The next day, while the rest of the realm was busily preparing for the Seymour-Dudley wedding, we prepared to make our way to the port at Liverpool.

As Hugh and I clung to one another and said our good-byes, he insisted I take the tapestry of St. George for Mary’s chamber. “I do not want her to forget that she is English,” he said.

I slipped off a rose-colored ring that had been a prized possession for many years and placed it on Cecily’s finger. “Sisters,” I whispered, and kissed her cheek. We took our leave, and I did not look behind me for fear of wanting to turn back, but I felt Hugh’s desolate gaze upon me and I shared his misery.

Jamie and Gerald rode whilst Lucy, Mary, and I shared a litter that Jamie would pay to have returned to Brighton Manor. As he was the ship’s owner, none questioned who his guests were. He showed Lucy and Gerald to a small, private room for the quick crossing and then installed Mary and me in his own stateroom.

There, over a small dinner of cold fowl and a goblet of wine, I shared Mary’s sad story with him and reminded him that I planned to ask Father Gregory to assist me as I lived as a widow with the babe somewhere deep in an Irish thicket. “Elizabeth Fitzgerald assured me that I could be lost and not found if I chose not to be,” I said.

He nodded. “She is correct. Few English bother with Ireland outside of the Pale, where most English live. We Irish help one another, and as soon as they accept you as their own they will close ranks around you.”

“So you think my asking Father Gregory for help is a good idea?” I asked a bit wistfully, wishing, I suppose, that he would help me himself. His care of and affection toward me did not seem to be that of a man already married, but mayhap he had done as he’d said he would and married a woman not of his choosing.

I cast my eyes down and resolved not to allow myself further affection with him, in case he belonged to another.

“I think it be an excellent idea,” he said. “As soon as I received your letter, I set some men to locate him and I’ll take you there presently.”

We set foot in Ireland and I was immediately charmed by the open, friendly manner of all who spoke to us, low- and highborn. Jamie had arranged for us to be taken some miles inland to the village where Father Gregory ministered.

We arrived at his small church midafternoon. Jamie held my hand as I got out of the litter and I held on to his hand longer than I needed to steady myself because I did not know when or if I would hold it again. Lucy and Gerald attended to Mary, who ran around in circles, happy to let her dimpled little legs regain their strength and her lungs fill with air to shout. I grinned and chased her for a moment, happy, too, to be carefree.

Father Gregory had heard the commotion and came rushing out of the church, taking me in his arms. His face was wrinkled with the age that the past eight years had bequeathed, but he looked happier than I’d ever seen him.

“Mistress Juliana,” he said to me. Then he saw the babe in the background. “Or … lady?”

James stood forward. “Sir James Hart, Father. We’re here to have you marry us, if you will.”

My knees nearly collapsed and Father Gregory reached out his arm on one side and Jamie on the other to steady me. “Oh, no, no, we cannot,” I said, though I could think of nothing I yearned for more.

James looked at me sternly. “And why, Juliana, can we not? Did I misunderstand you yet again?”

I looked at him quietly, begging him for patience, but I would have understood if he had none left. “Jamie, will you please let me speak with Father Gregory alone?”

Jamie excused himself and there, in the back of Father Gregory’s lovely, tiny church, I poured out the whole story to him, including the visions, Mary’s rejection by her family and friends, and John Temple’s attack.

“Now you see, Father, why I cannot marry Jamie. I do not wish him to think ill of me, and I don’t wish him to choose between having a family and having me.”

Father Gregory took my smooth hand in his spotted one. “Do you want to marry him?”

I nodded.

“If he be man enough to fetch you after you rejected him, don’t you think he be man enough to hear the truth and make his mind up for himself? You were required to be strong and independent to master the years that now lie behind you, for Mary, and for yourself. But you don’t need to make all the decisions on your own anymore. James must know the truth and then you must let him decide.”

“Tell him all?” I asked.

“The truth will set you free, daughter,” he said. “You have passed through many evil days. But now, perhaps, you have someone you can lean upon and don’t need to stand alone anymore.”

I held his gaze and knew that, though I was unwilling, I had always trusted Father Gregory and could trust him still. A tiny shoot of hope sprang up within me.

“Now, bring the child to me, and I’ll feed your man and servant, and you set about telling your knight your tale.”

I sat with Jamie in the gardens, the grasses whispering softly with a lilt of their own in the afternoon wind, and told him all. When I came to the part about my rape he stood up and marched away, running his hand through his hair.

“Who was it? Who did this? I will revenge you upon him and ensure he is unable to … harm another woman thusly.”

I let him pace for a moment and when he returned to me I told him, “He’s dead. He was run through with a sword in Scotland fleeing the enemy.”

“Glad I am of it,” he said. “The coward. I shall repay the Scots in favor somehow.”

“Jamie,” I whispered. “Do not think ill of me for bringing this upon myself. I was young and did not understand that if I spoke intemperately or wore a becoming gown I might engender such a response.”

He drew near and took my chin in his hand. “Juliana. Love. You have not been thinking that you were to blame?”

I shook my head and let my gaze drop, unable to contain my sobs. “Perhaps. Perhaps partly if not in whole.”

He came near to me and lifted my chin with his finger. “You, love, did not bring this upon yourself no matter what you said, no matter what you did, no matter what you wore. He was a knave and a criminal. You were, and are, innocent and strong. Be this why you rejected me?”

I nodded. “The midwife who attended me said I would like as not never bear a child due to the scarring. You love children, I know. I will never bear a son.”

“Mayhap never bear a son,” he said.

“Yes. I don’t want to deceive you.” I looked away.

He sat still for a moment. “It would be a sore disappointment, I admit, not to have my own sons to train and to inherit my estates. But there is no other woman I want to marry. As you see I am, these years later, still unmarried because I am besotted with you, have always been besotted with you. The topic is one I have let no one raise with me. You and me, and Mary, we can make our hearth merry. Is that not so?”

He lifted my face to his and the tears came again, spilling over my lashes, and he kissed the tears away.

“And, in my pride,” I continued, “I didn’t want you to think less of me for not being a maid. I wanted you to keep me in your heart and mind as pure and lovely.”

“You are pure and lovely. I do not want to keep you merely in my heart and mind, love, but in my arms.” He drew me close to him and as he did, I felt the truth of his words, truth that I had known, somewhere inside me, but that needed to be liberated by the affirmations of another. The hard nub of shame was replaced by the bright star of belovedness.

I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.

We stood before Father Gregory that very afternoon, Lucy and Gerald as witness, Mary napping in the nave, and were married. My heart sang with the birdsong that accompanied our simple wedding; my traveling gown was dusty with the journey, and perhaps that was apt, as man and woman were joined together for whatever life may hold.

I heard again the gentle whisper in my heart. Who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?

Yes, Lord, you have wrought all things together for good. Thank You.

Father Gregory kindly arranged for us to take over a nearby cottage inn for the night whilst Lucy, Gerald, and Mary remained at his parish house.

The servant laid out some cold ham and cheese along with fresh bread and some ale. She started the fire and turned back the finely wrought Irish linens on the soft bed. I dressed myself in a thin white gown edged with lace; I had not thought to bring anything to wear for a wedding night. And then I sat on the edge of the bed.

“I should have preferred to wear a lovelier gown,” I said.

“No gown at all is required or, indeed, desired,” Jamie teased, and when I blushed he laughed aloud. “You shall have to get used to the forthright speech of the Irish, madam, but I suspect you will fit in well. Soon you will meet my mother, and see what I mean.”

“I am a bit afraid,” I said.

“To meet my mother? You are English, so I can well understand that.”

I opened my eyes wide. “Will she not take to me because I am English?”

“Nay,” he said. “I but jest with you. What do you fear?”

“My introduction to the … intimate matters was not, as you know, pleasurable, but fearsome.”

He stroked my hair. “Do not vex yourself, Juliana. ’Twill be different with a man who loves you, who would chase across the sea for you with a day’s notice, who would forgo children of his own and love the one you bring. Who would die for you. We will take hours or weeks or months, if need be, till you are comfortable.”

He kissed my eyelids again, and then my cheekbones, and then traced his way down my face till he nuzzled and kissed my neck, which commissioned a legion of chills to race over my skin. I warmed with desire and as I leaned into him and kissed him back again and again with more eagerness than I realized I felt, I was certain that all would be well.

Later, when we lay listening to the quiet call and response of insects tangled in the marsh grasses, he said to me, “Mayhap God hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted.”

I turned on my elbow to face him. “I thought you did not read holy writ.”

“I have of late become convinced that it’s better to be familiar with that which I transport,” he teased, and then sobered. “I began reading it after you said you would not have me. For solace. I found it to offer that, and more.”

I slipped as close to him as I could go. “’Tis the truth, you alone bind my broken heart. In His goodness, He has sent you. You are right.”

“I’ll be right about my mother taking to you too,” he said. “Wait and see.”

Although Jamie had his own estate that was deeper in Ireland, we stopped, on our journey, at his mother’s home, which was nearby his brother Oliver’s. I rode pillion behind him on his horse whilst the others followed nearby.

“Will you tell her that we are just married?” I asked. I nervously patted my hair and sought to brush any dust from my gown. “And how will you explain Mary?”

“I will tell her that you are my wife, and are now free to join me in Ireland, and that Mary is our child,” he answered. “More will not be required. All knew I had set my heart upon you and might expect that we married afore I set out to sea. They can wonder and answer their own questions as they may.”

I smiled and took his hand, glad to have married a bold man. “I do not wish to deceive her.”

“We shall not,” he said. “My mother is clever and kind, a secret keeper like my love.” He slowed the horse, turned around, and kissed me afore we continued.

His mother received us in her sitting room; she was a quail of a woman bustling about her rich reception room.

Mary, exuberant, ran in first and giggled as we tried to chase her down for a more respectable entry. She bumped into Jamie’s mother, marring Lady Hart’s gown with her face, red-stained from the wild strawberries we had enjoyed along the way.

“And who is this wee beauty?” Lady Hart reached down and took Mary by the hand.

“I Mary,” she said, and curtseyed unsteadily as she’d been taught.

His mother looked up at Jamie. “Mary! She’s named for me!” She took the child in her arms and I thought how different a grandmother she was from cold Lady Seymour.

Then Lady Hart smiled at me as Jamie drew me closer.

“This is my wife, Mother. Her name is Juliana.”

She took my hand and squeezed it before enveloping me in her warm, motherly embrace. After a moment, she looked at me kindly, but quizzically. “Juliana. ’Tis not a particularly English name.”

I grinned. We would get on just fine.

Finis