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The Lieutenant of the Tower came to me and said gently: “Madam, you sit unwholesomely.”
“It may be that I am better here than in a worse place,” I answered. One of my ushers burst into tears and seeing him thus weeping gave me strength.
“Come,” I said, “you should be comforting me, especially as you know the truth, that I am i
I stood up and allowed myself to be led to the room which had been prepared for me. It was on the first floor of the Bell Tower—a large vaulted chamber with three pointed windows and deep window-seats.
The door was bolted on us. I sat down wearily, damp, cold and desperate.
That which I had feared for so long had befallen me. I was a prisoner in the Tower of London.
WITHIN THOSE DARK stone walls there were many memories and chief of these must be of my mother. In such a way had she been brought to this grim fortress; the same despair had been hers. Her husband had been determined to destroy her; my sister felt the same about me. But did she? I could hardly believe that of Mary, and I could not help feeling that had I been able to speak to her, she would have listened to me. I remembered so vividly that terrible moment in the courtyard when my terrified mother had held me up to my glittering, all-powerful father. His cold indifference was what had made it so hard to bear. Was Mary indifferent to me? She was surrounded by men who wished to destroy me because they thought I was a threat to their ambitions. Mary believed that I was damned because I refused to accept her faith. She was not devoid of sisterly feelings, but she was a fanatic and fanatics let no human feelings stand in the way of what they believe to be right. Mary intended to bring England back to Rome and I stood in the way.
The days seemed endless; the nights even longer. Kat had not been allowed to come with me and how I missed her! But I had one or two good friends with me. Lovely Isabella Markham who had recently married Sir John Harrington was one, and Elizabeth Sand another. They did their best to make me comfortable.
Isabella said: “Did you notice how respectful the guards were, my lady? They remember you are the King's daughter. They will treat you well.”
“Being the King's wife did not save my mother from death.”
They were silent. They knew I only spoke of my mother in moments of extreme stress.
I put my hands to my throat and said: “When they send me out to Tower Green I shall ask for a sword to be sent from France. I will not have the axe.”
They all fell to weeping and I had to comfort them.
The following day Gardiner came with nine Lords of the Council and when I saw my hated enemy I feared the worst. He had come to extract a confession from me to the effect that I had been involved in Wyatt's schemes, and began by accusing me of receiving letters from the traitor.
“I received no letters from Wyatt,” I insisted.
“Letters from him to you have been intercepted,” retorted Gardiner.
“Then perhaps that is why I received none.”
“Wyatt has confessed to your involvement.”
“Then Wyatt is a liar as well as a traitor.”
I was always at my best in these verbal battles and in spite of my terrible fears I answered the questions lucidly, and Gardiner could not trap me.
One of the members of the Council, Henry Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel, looked uncomfortable while Gardiner was badgering me. Arundel was an ardent Catholic. He would see me as a danger to the plans for a Spanish marriage and the conversion to Rome, and I had thought he would be a deadly enemy; oddly enough I seemed to arouse some compassion in him. Perhaps in spite of my proud and fiery nature and my determination never to be subdued by any man, there was something essentially feminine about me. I had noticed it many times and this quality seemed to arouse a certain protective instinct in the opposite sex. Now here it was with Arundel. Because of the ever-present danger in which I stood, my awareness had intensified and I saw his attitude changing as Gardiner proceeded with the questions.
At length he held up his hand and looked at Gardiner with some distaste. “It is clear to me,” he said, “that Her Grace speaks truth and for my part I am sorry to see her troubled on such vain matters.”
Gardiner was very a
They took their leave and when they did, Arundel went on his knees and kissed my hand. That gave me new courage. I had a certain power of which people were aware but I must not allow myself to be deceived by undue optimism and must try to look clearly into the hearts and minds of my enemies. How much of the deference these men showed me was due to my own personal abilities and how much to the fact that I was young and Mary was ill and aging? How many were asking themselves: This young woman who is being persecuted could be our Queen one day. What then? She will remember me this day.
But I had begun to regain a little of my spirits and with that came hope.
One day seemed to merge into another—so alike were they. When I awoke my first thoughts were, What will happen today? I used to dream that the people rose up and came to free me. They had always loved me better than Mary. They said I was my father's daughter, that I looked like him, that I had his spirit. Would any care enough? It was significant that my room was immediately below the great alarm bell. Had they put me there to remind me that at any attempt to escape that bell would ring out, warning my captors of my flight?
In my mind I died a thousand deaths during those weeks. I would wake in the morning and put my hands to my throat. My mother had said hysterically, when she knew what her fate was to be: “I have a little neck…” I wished I could stop thinking of her.
Such mental anguish must have its effect on the body. I became ill and had to keep to my bed. This alarmed my jailers and I was quick to sense their uneasiness.
The day for Wyatt's execution came and on the scaffold he made a brave speech in which he accepted full responsibility for his actions and wholeheartedly withdrew the accusations he had made against me and Courtenay under torture.
I was greatly relieved because now there was no true case against me. Gardiner, Renaud and all my enemies would have to be very careful before they sentenced me to death. It was like a reprieve.
News drifted in from the outside world. My servants talked with the guards and so I learned something of what was going on. Wyatt's body had been barbarously treated after the execution and parts of it were exhibited over the town, while his head was attached to a gallows at Hay Hill near Hyde Park.
When I heard that after Wyatt's confession Courtenay was released but exiled, my hopes rose. Surely they could not keep me prisoner now! Wyatt had confessed that he had wrongfully incriminated me and that I had nothing to do with his insurrection, so what reason had they for keeping me in the Tower?
A very big one, they might say. I was a menace to the plans for returning England to Rome, which the greater majority of the people did not want. I would not be the first person of royal blood who had been sent to a lifetime in the Tower for no other reason than that she or he possessed a claim to royalty.
But they were very much afraid. My health was causing anxiety. They wanted my death but they did not want to be accused of causing it.
A doctor was sent to me and it was suggested that I should take a little air and exercise. There was what they called a lead—a very narrow path— which the warders used when they wanted to get from one Tower to another. This path between the battlements went from a door in the Bell Tower to one in the Beauchamp Tower. I could have no hope of escaping from this narrow path and just in case an attempt was made, two guards were to walk in front of me and one behind.