I closed my mouth and did not respond till I’d mastered the sharp retort I wanted to unleash. After a minute I said, “Please return the blue gown I loaned to you.”
She walked to her cupboard and took it out and handed it to me gingerly. “I am sorry,” she said. “I hope one day you will forgive me.”
I took the gown from her and let the tears rush down my face. “I loved you not a little, Dorothy, but very much. I wish you well.”
I returned to my own chamber, glad for the fact that Elisabeth would likely not return to it that night, and cried myself sick into the returned blue gown.
Tristram’s response proved that, like one of the king’s coins, I’d been clipped, debased, lost some of my worth through no fault of my own, never again to regain my full value. No matter how I pressed on, I was kicked back. I was tired of trying and didn’t know how much longer I could persevere. After a time, I read in my book of hours, prayed for comfort, and fell asleep without first undressing.
It was a cliff, and next to the cliff, a tiny patch of green upon which grew some flowers. They were bright and bold, flos solis, sunflowers, with beautiful faces that turned toward the sun as it arced across the lustrous blue sky, and I felt a sense of peace and contentment.
Toward the end of its arc, a seed dropped from one flower’s bosom and implanted itself deep within the soil. Within a moment, a tiny shoot sprang forward, steady and green.
We were in the queen’s chamber sewing, a week or so after the feast, when her brother, Sir William, arrived. He drew near to his sister.
“Kate.” He looked around the chamber. I was there, and Dorothy, though we sat far apart and spoke perfunctorily and coolly. None from the faction opposed to Kate were present. They had been keeping their distance from her.
“Speak freely,” she said to William.
“A letter has been intercepted, from Mistress Askew, which has led to her rearrest in London and another imprisonment. There is a rumor that the letter’s content may implicate you.” He looked around the room. “And others. Though that may be but an excuse to question her about you and your ladies.”
A hush traveled from one lady to the next.
“Gardiner is already attempting to poison the king’s mind against you, and he is sniffing every hedgerow to find further evidence to add to his case.”
“Should I speak with His Majesty about this?” she asked.
Sir William shook his head. “I think that would be unwise. He is in a foul mood.”
“You should speak with him,” Kate said. “He trusts you, always has. Hasn’t he nicknamed you his Integrity, for you shall always tell him the truth no matter the cost?”
William sat down next to his sister and took her hand in his own. “He has already spoken to me, Kate, and expects me to tell him the truth—no matter if the cost be my own sister! He has appointed me to the council that is to interrogate Mistress Askew. And not only I, but John Dudley.”
“He appoints you, my brother, though I be implicated in her letter?” Kate’s voice, and my pulse, rose.
“Yes,” William said. “I am sore vexed about it. It be a test, I know it. Have a care.” He turned toward Lady Tyrwhitt. “Because your husband served with Mistress Askew’s father, and they are known to be friends, I should have an especial care for your family, too, lady.”
At this Dorothy’s face lost color and I was left rather wondering if she still thought Tristram was such a marvelous match. I did not wish for the king’s wrath to spill upon either of them, though, nor anybody. Save John Temple.
The queen’s brother would not return to the queen’s chambers for many days so as not to draw attention to her whilst the investigation was under way. But Elisabeth heard the details from him, and she shared them with Kate privately, and with me in our chambers, as she knew where my sympathies lay.
“Today they asked Askew what her views are on the Eucharist,” she told me.
“What did she answer?” I asked, knowing that was the one question which, if answered wrongly, would lead to her death.
“She replied, ‘I believe that as often as I in a Christian congregation do receive the bread in remembrance of Christ’s death, and with thanksgiving, according to his holy institutions, I received therewith the fruits of his glorious passion.’”
“She did not answer,” I said.
“Exactly,” Elisabeth agreed. “Gardiner then told her that she should answer directly and stop speaking in parables. She told him that even if she did he would not accept it. He became vexed and shouted to her, ‘You are a parrot!’”
I said nothing, but admired her tenacity to her faith whilst under duress.
“She did not give up any names,” Elisabeth said. “Even when the counsel had her put on the rack, and Richard Rich himself turned it so that her bones and members were disjointed like as to never return to their abilities again. Then they dumped her on the cold floor, half blinded, for hours.” I recalled the countesses’s prophecy.
I grew ill while envisioning the racking and determined to continue praying for Mistress Askew daily. “They did not mention the queen, did they?”
“Not by name—they dared not. But all knew they were trying to strangle Her Grace by implicating a necklace of women in her household. Gardiner has well planted a thought in the king’s mind that Kate is undermining him, and His Majesty has given Gardiner permission to explore this.”
“Did His Majesty know of this whilst it was happening?” I asked, although I knew he must have. Little of consequence happened in his realm without his knowledge or approval, and he did not shy from torture. But racking a woman? It seemed beyond him even.
“He did,” Elisabeth answered bluntly. “The lord lieutenant of the Tower sped to him by the river and told him. But he did not stay their hands. This is not about religion, no matter how it’s cast, on either side,” she continued, whilst clasping a diamond bracelet about her wrist. “’Tis about power.”
Then I understood. All of the wives implicated were married to men in the rising faction in the king’s household: those who had his ear, his purse, his stamp. And then there was the queen, who was named in the king’s will as regent over the prince should something befall His Majesty. Religion might be the arena the game was played in, but the prize, no doubt, was earthly power.
As for Anne Askew, as a woman in opposition to the men at court in power, she had no recourse whatsoever. Her execution by burning was set for July 18. We were numb with apprehension on her behalf and despaired of our inability to help her.
Shortly thereafter the Countess of Sussex sent one of her lady maids to my chamber. “Mistress, the countess would like to see you, if you do not object.”
It was not every day I was summoned by a countess. I was afraid for what she might beseech of me and made my way on weak limbs with racing thoughts toward her chamber.
We made our way down the halls, still dimly lit with the declining summer sun, and near the center of court where the grander courtiers lodged. The lady maid knocked on the door first and then pushed it open. The Countess of Sussex was waiting in her receiving chamber just within. “Thank you, that will be all,” she said, dismissing her servant. She indicated that I should take a seat near her and offered me a glass of wine. I took it but I was not thirsty.
“Anne Askew is going to be martyred,” she said without polite prelude. “We cannot forestall that, but we would like to ease her journey as we might. It is known that they often cause the fire to burn slowly, building with little wood and not high up, for those that displease the council.”