now?’
‘I don’t know that either. It has taken me the whole day to find you myself. I traced you from Sawston Hall because I heard of the fire and guessed you had been there. I am sorry, my l … Your Grace.’
‘And when was the king’s death announced? And Lady Jane falsely proclaimed?’
‘Not when I left.’
She took a moment to understand, and then she was angry. ‘He has died, and it has not been announced? My brother is lying dead, unwatched? Without the rites of the church? Without any honours done to him at all?’
‘His death was still a secret when I left.’
She nodded, her lips biting back anything she might have said, her eyes suddenly veiled and cautious. ‘I thank you for coming to me,’ she said. ‘Thank Sir Nicholas for his services to me which I had no cause to anticipate.’
The sarcasm in this was rather sharp, even for the man on his knees. ‘He told me you are the true queen now,’ he volunteered. ‘And that he and all his household are to serve you.’
‘I am the true queen,’ she said. ‘I always was the true princess. And I will have my kingdom. You can sleep here tonight. The porter will find you a bed. Go back to London in the morning and convey my thanks to him. He has done the right thing to inform me. I am queen, and I will have my throne.’
She turned on her heel and swept up the stair. I hesitated for only one moment.
‘Did you say the sixth?’ I asked the London man. ‘The sixth of July, that the king died?’
‘Yes.’
I dropped him a curtsey and followed Lady Mary upstairs. As soon as we got into her room she closed the door behind us, and threw aside her regal dignity. ‘Get me the clothes of a serving girl, and wake John Huddlestone’s groom,’ she said urgently. ‘Then go to the stables and get two horses ready, one with a pillion saddle for me and the groom, one for you.’
‘My lady?’
‘You call me Your Grace now,’ she said grimly. ‘I am Queen of England. Now hurry.’
‘What am I to tell the groom?’
‘Tell him that we have to get to Kenninghall today. That I will ride behind him, we will leave the rest of them here. You come with me.’
I nodded and hurried from the room. The serving maid who had waited on us last night was sleeping with half a dozen others in the attic bedrooms. I went up the stairs and peeped in the door. I found her in the half-darkness and shook her awake, put my hand over her mouth and hissed in her ear: ‘I’ve had enough of this, I’m running away. I’ll give you a silver shilling for your clothes. You can say I stole them and no-one will be the wiser.’
‘Two shillings,’ she said instantly.
‘Agreed,’ I said. ‘Give them me, and I’ll bring you the money.’
She fumbled under her pillow for her shift and her smock. ‘Just the gown and cape,’ I ordered, shrinking from the thought of putting the Queen of England in louse-ridden linen. She bundled them up for me with her cap and I went light-footed downstairs to Lady Mary’s room.
‘Here,’ I said. ‘They cost me two shillings.’
She found the coins in her purse. ‘No boots.’
‘Please wear your own boots,’ I said fervently. ‘I’ve run away before, I know what it’s like. You’ll never get anywhere in borrowed boots.’
She smiled at that. ‘Hurry,’ was all she said.
I ran back upstairs with the two shillings and then I found Tom, John Huddlestone’s groom, and sent him down to the stables to get the horses ready. I crept down to the bakery just outside the kitchen door, and found, as I had hoped, a batch of bread rolls baked in the warmth of the oven last night. I stuffed my breeches pockets and my jacket pockets with half a dozen of them so that I looked like a donkey with panniers, and then I went back to the hall.
Lady Mary was there, dressed as a serving maid, her hood pulled over her face. The porter was arguing, reluctant to open the door to the stable-yard for a maidservant. She turned with relief when she heard me approach light-footed on the stone flags.
‘Come on,’ I said reasonably to the man. ‘She is a servant of John Huddlestone, his groom is waiting. He told us to leave at first light. We’re to go back to Sawston Hall and we shall be whipped if we are late.’
He complained about visitors in the night disturbing a Christian household’s sleep, and then people leaving early; but he opened the door and Lady Mary and I slipped through. Tom was in the yard, holding one big hunter with a pillion saddle on its back and a smaller horse for me. I would have to leave my little pony behind, this was going to be a hard ride.
He got into the saddle and took the hunter to the mounting block. I helped the Lady Mary scramble up behind him, she took a tight grip around his waist and kept her hood pulled forward to hide her face. I had to take my horse to the mounting block too, the stirrup was too high for me to mount without help. When I was up on him, the ground seemed a long way away, he sidestepped nervously and I jerked on the reins too tightly and made him toss his head and sidle. I had never ridden such a big horse before, and I was frightened of him; but no smaller animal could manage the hard ride we must make today.
Tom turned his horse’s head and led the way out of the yard. I turned after him and heard my heart pounding and knew that I was on the run, once again, and afraid, once again, and that this time I was perhaps in a worse case than I had been when we had run from Spain, or when we had run from Portugal, even when we had run from France. Because this time I was running with the pretender to the throne of England, with Lord Robert Dudley and his army in pursuit, and I was his vassal sworn; her trusted servant, and a Jew; but a practising Christian, serving a Papist princess in a country sworn to be Protestant. Little wonder that my heart was in my mouth and beating louder than the clopping of the hooves of the big horses as we went down the road to the east, pushing them into a canter towards the rising sun.
When we reached Kenninghall at midday, I saw why we had ridden till the horses foundered to get here. The sun was high in the sky and it made the fortified manor house look squat and indomitable in the flat uncompromising landscape. It was a solid moated house, and as we drew closer I saw that it was no pretty play-castle; this had a drawbridge that could be raised, and a portcullis above it that could be dropped down to seal the only entrance. It was built in warm red brick, a deceptively beautiful house that could nonetheless be held in a siege.
Lady Mary was not expected, and the few servants who lived at the house to keep it in order came tumbling out of the doors in a flurry of surprise and greeting. After a nod from Lady Mary I quickly told them of the astounding news from London as they took our horses into the stable-yard. A ragged cheer went up at the news of her accession to the throne and they pulled me down from the saddle and clapped me on the back like the lad I appeared to be. I let out a yelp of pain. The inner part of my legs from my ankles to my thighs had been skinned raw from three days in the saddle, and my back and shoulders and wrists were locked tight from the jolting ride from Hunsdon to Hoddesdon, to Sawston to Thetford to here.
Lady Mary must have been near-dead with exhaustion, sitting pillion for all that long time, a woman of nearly forty years and in poor health, but only I saw the grimace of pain as they lifted her down to the ground; everyone else saw the tilt of her chin as she heard them shout for her, and the charm of the Tudor smile as she welcomed them all into the great hall and bid them good cheer. She took a moment to pray for the soul of her dead brother and then she raised her head and promised them that just as she had been a fair landlord and mistress to them, she would be a good queen.
That earned her another cheer and the hall started to fill with people, workers from the fields and woods and villagers from their homes, and the servants ran about with