We were kept inside the Tower for nearly two months to the day. During that time, I saw few people, save the ladies waiting on Elizabeth and the elderly gentleman usher with whom I was allowed to run the occasional errand inside the Tower. Anything that was needed from outside the walls—food, linens, and the like—was brought by men loyal to Mary and passed to the ladies Mary had sent.
I did my best to be guileless to find out what was happening in the outside world. I managed to pry some information from the ladies and gentlemen who were allowed to go back and forth from our prison, who were unwary enough of me to gossip.
First, they told me that Wyatt had steadfastly refused to say anything against Elizabeth, even when he was promised pardon for admitting that the entire plot had been instigated by her. Wyatt stubbornly would not speak, and neither would any of the others so questioned.
Second, the most damning evidence the council had against Elizabeth was the belief that she’d been preparing to move to her house at Donnington and fortify it. Elizabeth denied this at her preliminary questioning, feigning to forget she even had a residence at Donnington.
Of course she had not forgotten. William Cecil oversaw all her properties, and she consulted with him often, questioning him pointedly about each of her estates. She was careful of her money and properties, and we all knew it.
However, none of her accusers could come up with a scrap of evidence to prove she’d even contemplated moving to Donnington. So what if Sir James Croft and Wyatt had advised her to go? Elizabeth had stayed at Ashridge, hadn’t she?
Elizabeth stuck with that story, and the council could get no more out of her.
I began to have hope. If the interrogators could not come up with solid proof against Elizabeth, then they couldn’t risk bringing her to trial. If they stood her before a jury, as was her right, that jury might acquit her. If that happened, then by law she’d be free of all the charges.
As it turned out, the juries were plenty lenient with the conspirators. Thomas Wyatt and the Earl of Suffolk had been the obvious ringleaders, and they were condemned—Suffolk already dead. Courtenay, who’d never hidden the fact that he’d hoped to be king one way or another, remained imprisoned, but Bishop Gardiner’s friendship with him kept him from trial. After all, Gardiner argued, Courtenay had not actually done anything.
Other conspirators—such as Nicholas Throckmorton, who’d been in it up to his neck—were pardoned. James Colby had eluded capture, and no one named him, for which I was fervently thankful.
I held onto my hope through the long weeks we waited. On the dreadful April morning when Wyatt was executed, he declared on the scaffold that neither Elizabeth nor Courtenay had anything to do with the plots.
I knew this to be a lie, but Mary could do nothing about it. The condemned man’s last words did much to keep the council’s actions toward Elizabeth cautious ones.
It became clear that Elizabeth’s fortune had changed when Mary sent word that Elizabeth was to be moved to more agreeable accommodations, although the chambers were still within the Tower.
The change scarcely put Elizabeth in a better mood. She expected every day to be dragged to trial, for Mary to manufacture evidence, for a scaffold to be built for her. Elizabeth wavered between fear and anger, choosing the latter to relieve her feelings.
As we waited, the spring days lengthened and warmed, the chill dank of winter waning. Elizabeth was eventually allowed to walk in the privy garden, supervised by Mary’s ladies, of course. We strolled slowly, soaking up as much of the outdoor air as possible before we had to return to the rooms inside.
As the conspirators, one by one, were released or ignored, Elizabeth walked among the pruned hedges with a lighter step. Daffodils and crocuses burst through the soil, perhaps a promise of coming freedom?
One morning a small girl came to Elizabeth and handed her flowers. Elizabeth bent down to her and smiled sweetly, calling her a dear child. Mary’s ladies hovered behind Elizabeth in disapproval, and a guard strode over to monitor Elizabeth’s conversation with the mite.
This was an answer to a message I’d covertly sent elsewhere in the Tower. While the ladies and guards were thus distracted by the child, I strolled to the far end of the garden and out through a gate to a little walk between two walls.
On another side of this narrow passage lay a second gate, locked, behind which a dark-haired man waited.
“God grant you good health, Mistress Rousell,” Robert Dudley said to me. “And how is our princess this fine morning?”
“She is very well,” I answered. “How is your good wife?”
Robert laughed, sounding merry, as though he’d not been held prisoner here for many months. “I have not seen her, but she is often sickly, poor thing,” he answered. “Whereas our princess is robust.”
“She is, indeed.”
Robert beamed his smile at me. I recalled the passionate kiss he and Elizabeth had exchanged the night before his wedding, and wondered if he were thinking of it as well.
“The weather warms,” Robert remarked.
“Indeed.” I shifted from foot to foot, in a hurry to speak of something more interesting.
“A mutual friend praises you,” Robert said, a sly note to his voice.
Assuming he meant Colby, I kept silent. What was between Colby and me was none of his business.
Robert was far more informed than I at this time. I had directed a few messages out, but none had come in. Would there be a rescue, or another rebellion? Had Elizabeth’s followers abandoned her?
Robert read my expression. “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, Mistress Rousell.”
