A Dangerous Inheritance

‘I am very sorry for you, my lady,’ the Lieutenant says.

‘They have intended this all along,’ I wail, with sudden clarity. ‘They have sought to discredit me. Oh, the very shame of it! How shall I hold my head up after this? And my little son, what is he now? What shall become of him?’

Sir Edward says nothing. He does not need to. The word bastardhangs mockingly in the air between us.

‘Tell me, Lieutenant,’ I ask in bitterness, ‘is it now the fashion for those accused of fornication to be imprisoned in the Tower? Because if so, I wonder why half the world is not in here! And if that is all Ned and I are guilty of, then why ca

‘In faith, I do not know, my lady. I understand your anger. You have suffered much.’

‘Maybe they fear that, if we are freed, we will wed in another ceremony that none can dispute! Yes, that is why they are keeping us locked up! Have you seen my lord – what does he say?’

‘He says he will appeal against the sentence. Now, Madam, I pray you, rest a little. You are overwrought, and no wonder.’ Shaking his grizzly head, Sir Edward takes his leave. He clearly wants no part in this.

My life has become a nightmare. I am eaten up by the injustice of it all. I ammarried in the sight of God, and He knows the truth of it. I will notbe labelled fornicator or anything else! And my child islawfully begotten. When I get out of this place, I will fight this ruling in the courts, and defy the highest in the land to have the truth known, and neither Queen Elizabeth nor her entire Privy Council shall stop me!

Mrs Ellen and the other women try to comfort me. The Lieutenant performs many small kindnesses to cheer me. He even refrains from upbraiding my pets for making puddles on the floor or ripping the upholstery. But I am a raging tempest, either in a storm of weeping or a storm of fury. I snap at everyone, even my angry, bawling son. I could not feel more wretched.

I am lying abed one night and looking miserably at the moon beyond my window, wondering if I will hear those disembodied voices again, when the door opens and there is Ned, alone.

‘I bribed my guards!’ he whispers. They are the first words he has uttered to me in over a year. ‘I would comfort you, my dear wife, and lie with you!’ And in two bounds he is at my bedside, gathering me in his arms and holding me as if he will never let me go. And I, for my part, am passionately kissing him back, clutching at him and ru

‘Oh, my sweet Ned!’ I cry.

For an hour, a little hour, the world belongs to us, and nothing else exists. Oh, how we love each other, naked between the sheets, tumbling over and over, hands and lips touching, caressing, pleasing, and then our bodies locking in rapture.

‘It has been so long, my love,’ Ned murmurs, as we lie stretched out across the rumpled mattress afterwards, my head on his belly, he stroking my hair.

‘I do not know how I have borne it,’ I tell him.

The babe awakens and snuffles.

‘How is my son?’ Ned asks, rising up and leaning over to the cradle. ‘Hello, Edward! You are a fine young lord!’ I watch them together for a moment, as Ned picks up the child, strokes his fine hair and tries to make him smile. I am filled with happiness to see them thus, and will not spoil it by pointing out that Edward is no longer legally a young lord.

‘Ned,’ I ask, ‘did the Queen give permission for us to be together?’

‘No, but Sir Edward said he would allow it. He said there was no reason why we should not console one another.’

My heart swells with gratitude. ‘He is a good man.’

‘He says we may meet whenever we please, so long as I pay the guards and take care to be discreet.’

‘He is a true friend, and has proved it in many ways, but this is the greatest blessing he has brought us,’ I say, and we fall to kissing again until a light tap on the door warns us that Ned must depart.

The Lieutenant comes with news for me.

‘My lady, I have just heard from the steward at the Minories. The old lady has returned; she has not been in good health, which was why he had not seen her. He told her about my interest in the tombs and the church, and she said she would gladly meet with me to tell me more about their history.’

‘That is encouraging news!’ I exclaim. ‘I never thought to hear more of her.’

‘Well, you shall. I will invite her here, and you may meet her. My orders are to allow no one but your attendants to see you, but I know I can trust you, my lady – and I myself will be present to ensure you behave yourself!’

‘Of course, Sir Edward!’ I say warmly. ‘I will speak to her only of the tombs, I promise.’

‘Her name is Elizabeth Savage. The steward was right – she was the last abbess of the Minoresses’ convent. Naturally, she does not like that to be known, so we will not mention it unless she does.’

Can this old lady help us in our quest? She thinks she is coming to discuss some old tombs, not the disappearance of the Princes. And she will surely be startled to meet me, probably one of the most notorious prisoners in the kingdom right now!

Kate

June 1487. Raglan Castle.

News came regularly to the castle, by letter or word of mouth, and the news nowadays was momentous – but, for Kate, distressing. John was in Ireland with a Flemish army. Under his auspices, Lambert Simnel, despite being branded an imposter by the King, had been crowned as Edward VI in Dublin Cathedral late the previous month. Henry Tudor had mobilised his forces against an invasion.

Rumours and speculation were rampant everywhere, and the country, which had been in a ferment of uncertainty for weeks, now erupted in panic at the imminent prospect of invasion.

Even though Kate had been careful to express no word of support for John and the rebels, and had voiced her own fears about the conflict to come, William remained cold towards her, acting almost as if it was her fault that her sometime lover was in rebellion against the King. As if she could do anything to prevent it, she thought resentfully. She had not seen John in more than a year and a half, and there had been no communication at all between them. She wondered if he still cherished her memory, as she did his; or if his marriage had jolted him into reality and caused him to put his youthful passions behind him. She wondered too if he had spoken out in her defence after her arrest. The fact that he had stayed in favour with the Tudor argued that he had not. But she could not believe he had forsaken her. He would have reasoned that pragmatism was the safest course for them both.

Why was he backing the claims of Simnel so vigorously, and at such peril to himself? He must have heard that the Tudor had exhibited the real Warwick to the people – something her father should have done with the Princes to quell the rumours that were destroying him. But perhaps her father had known what John’s actions had now proved: that producing the Princes alive wouldn’t have made much difference anyway. Because people believe what they want to believe, she concluded. Even now, there were many, their number increasing, who held that the boy in Ireland really was Warwick.

It crossed Kate’s mind that John had set up the whole charade as a pretext for claiming the throne himself. People would be more likely to rise up for Warwick, Clarence’s heir, than for himself, whose claim came only through the female line. Even Henry Tudor had not accounted John a threat in the way he accounted Warwick.

Something Kat had written suggested to Kate that there was more to this matter than appeared on the surface.

It is said that the boy Simnel first claimed to be Richard, Duke of York, the younger of the Princes in the Tower, but the word is that Margaret of Burgundy refused to recognise him as York, so it was given out that he was Warwick.