A Dangerous Inheritance

That, alas, was the last Kate heard, for her assailant had forced her back through the turret door, and he and another burly man were half pushing, half hauling her up the stairs, she struggling and screaming. Still pinioned, she was manhandled into her room and flung down on the bed before Gwenllian’s horrified eyes, her fingers smarting where they had been bent back.

‘Give me the key,’ her captor demanded. Fumbling, Kate removed it from her pocket and, shaking with shock, anger and indignation, handed it to him.

‘How dare you treat me so roughly?’ she gasped. ‘I am with child. I mean none ill. My husband shall know of this.’

‘Rest assured, lady, he will,’ the man told her, with a nasty grin. Then he locked her in.

Katherine

February 1562. The Tower of London.

Time drags. It is too cold to go out into the garden. I have been a prisoner in the Tower over-long, and yearn for my freedom. Little Edward is a delight, but a child should not be confined to these rooms. He should be taken for walks, see faces other than those that are familiar to him – and know his father.

I have not seen Ned since I was forced, near weeping, to leave him behind in the chapel on the day of the christening. Yet Sir Edward allows him to write to me regularly. Ned’s letters are mainly declarations of love, which are the breath of life to me, yet sometimes they touch on the precariousness of our situation, with which he is naturally preoccupied. In the last one, he wrote:

Do not think I regret our marriage, yet by it I destroyed my credit with the Queen, and prejudiced your chance of being named her heir. Even so, sweet wife, I will never deny our union, not though it bring me the Queen’s favour.

And, of course, being me, and always thinking the worst, I had to wonder if he had seriously considered doing that. Now, though, I believe he wrote those words to reassure me of his devotion. And I have replied in kind, assuring him of my steadfastness.

The letters are a great comfort to me, although the Lieutenant is kindness itself, and does his best for us both. I might wonder if he was a little in love with me, save for the fact that he speaks of his wife Audrey with tender affection. She spends most of her time at Polstead Hall, their home in Norfolk, yet sometimes she lodges here in the Lieutenant’s house, although I’ve never seen her. I wonder if she is a touch jealous of the attention her husband gives me – yet I’m sure she has no cause.

*

When the Lieutenant visits me one freezing February evening, looking very pleased with himself, I expect him to tell me that my hopes of freedom have come to fruition, yet he has come on another matter entirely.

‘I have something to show you, my lady,’ he says eagerly. ‘May I sit down and warm myself by the fire? It is bitter outside.’

‘By all means,’ I say, trying to stifle my disappointment, and he takes the stool opposite my chair.

‘This,’ he says, producing a book, ‘contains an account of the murder of the Princes in the Tower.’

‘ Murder?’ I have been praying, against all reason, that those poor i

‘Yes, my lady – it was murder, I fear. You may read it for yourself.’ He passes me the book, which is entitled The Union of the Two Noble and Illustrious Families of Lancaster and York, the author being Edward Hall.

‘But I have read Hall’s chronicle,’ I say. ‘We had a copy at Bradgate, and I’m sure there is nothing about the Princes in that.’

‘It is true, there is nothing in the first edition, my lady, which must be the one you had. I have read that myself. But this is a much more recent edition, and in it you will find incorporated Sir Thomas More’s history of Richard III.’

‘Sir Thomas More wrote about Richard III?’

‘Aye, and it seems he had access to sources lost to us, for his account is the most detailed of them all. I was amazed to find this book on sale in Paul’s Churchyard as I was passing by the cathedral yesterday – I had no idea they had brought out a later edition of Hall. You may keep it if you wish, and see what you make of it. I should be most interested to know your opinion.’

‘Have you formed one, Sir Edward?’

‘I must say I find this convincing. But I will leave you to make up your own mind.’

I take the book to bed with me, setting an extra candle on my bedside table in case I have need of it. I know I will not sleep until I have read to the end.

I know little of Sir Thomas More, save that he was a devout Papist who was Lord Chancellor of England, and that he was beheaded thirty years ago for refusing to take an oath acknowledging Henry VIII’s marriage to A

First, he repeats a lurid tale that Richard III was born after two years in his mother’s womb, with teeth, long hair, a crooked back and one shoulder higher than the other, although Sir Thomas does write scornfully that either men of hatred had reported the truth, or nature had changed its course!

He accuses Richard of slaying Henry VI without commandment or knowledge of Edward IV – which is going further than any other account I have read, and indeed differs from some.

More did not believe that Richard was in danger from the Wydevilles; he suspected that he had had designs on the throne even before his brother’s death. He wrote how the citizens of London do

I hold my breath as I read More’s long account of the council meeting in the Tower at which Hastings was arrested, uncomfortably aware that Caesar’s Tower, that forbidding white keep where these events took place, is just a stone’s throw from where I lie. He says Hastings was allowed no time for any long confession before he was hustled to his death, which corroborates what Katherine witnessed. There are so many details in More’s account – where did he discover them all?

He says that as soon as Richard had both the Princes in his charge, he ‘opened his mind boldly’ to the Duke of Buckingham. What to make of that? Did he tell Buckingham he meant to take the throne? Or did he, as Margaret Beaufort told Katherine, reveal a more sinister plan to him? I shall have to discuss all this with Sir Edward. He will understand it better than I.

More disapproved of Richard’s attempts to declare Edward IV and the Princes illegitimate. He states that the only fault of Rivers and Grey lay in being good men, true to Edward V. And he describes Richard as a close and secret king from the first.

Here’s an intriguing detail: More writes that when the deposed Edward V, then being in the Tower, was told that he should not reign, but that his uncle should have the crown, he was abashed and began to sigh, saying, ‘Alas, I would my uncle would let me have my life yet, though I lose my kingdom.’ More musthave had access to secret information about what was going on in the Tower, otherwise how could he have known such a thing? Did he make it up, just to tell a good story? I think not. I have the strong impression that he was a man of staunch principle, and only wrote of what he believed – or knew – to be the truth.

He has much more to say about the Princes. He tells how they were both shut up in the Tower, and all others removed from them, except for a ruffian called Black Will Slaughter, who was appointed to serve them and ‘keep them sure’. It saddens me to read that young Edward, sick in his jaw, lingered on in heaviness and wretchedness, never even bothering to tie his hose. This all fits with what Brother Dominic and Bishop Russell and others wrote, but none of them gives these details.