Queen's Gambit: A Novel of Katherine Parr Read Online Free PDF Page A

Found him …’
She can’t find the words, is too distracted by the fact that Seymour has been
tapping at the edge of her mind this last hour. ‘Oh, you know.’
    ‘This lot wouldn’t agree with
you,’ Anne says, nodding towards the group of younger maids strewn about the
hearth chatting and pretending to sew. ‘You should see how they flutter as he
passes, like butterflies in a net.’
    Katherine shrugs, telling herself that she
is not one of those butterflies. ‘Has he never been married; he must be, what,
twenty-nine?’
    ‘Thirty-four!’
    ‘He carries his age well,’ she
says, surprised. But the thought that is foremost in her mind is that Thomas Seymour is
older than she is.
    ‘He does indeed …’ Anne
pauses, then adds, ‘I seem to remember talk of him and the Duchess of Richmond
once.’
    ‘What, Mary Howard?’ asks
Katherine. ‘I thought the Howards and the Seymours were …’
    ‘Not friendly … yes,
that’s likely why it never happened. Personally I think he’s holding out for
an even more illustrious match.’
    ‘Well then, Meg wouldn’t be
suitable.’
    ‘She
is
full of Plantagenet
blood,’ says Anne.
    ‘That may be, but I’d call her a
good match, not illustrious.’
    ‘True,’ says Anne.
    Meg breaks away from the tapestries, coming
to sit beside them. The group of maids looks her up and down as she passes, a few
whispers hissing around them.
    ‘Did you see your father, Meg?’
asks Sister Anne.
    ‘I did. I’m sure it was him, on
the battlefield beside the King.’
    There is a commotion as Susan Clarencieux
slides out from Mary’s bedchamber announcing in that bossy yet quiet way
particular to her, ‘She will be dressed now.’ And turning to Katherine she
says, ‘She has asked that
you
choose her outfit.’
    Katherine, noticing her nose is put out of
joint, replies, ‘What would you suggest, Susan? Something sober?’
    Susan’s face softens. ‘Oh no, I
think something to cheer her.’
    ‘You are quite right, of course.
Something bright it is then.’
    Susan’s face stretches itself into an
uncomfortable smile. Katherine knows how to deal with these slippery courtiers and their
insecurities. She learned it from her mother.
    ‘And,’ adds Susan as Katherine
is smoothing down herdress and straightening her hood, ‘she
wants the girl presented.’
    Katherine nods. ‘Come, Meg. We
can’t keep her waiting.’
    ‘Must I come?’ whispers Meg.
    ‘You must, yes.’ She takes
Meg’s arm rather more brusquely than she means to, wishing the girl would be less
gauche, then berates herself inwardly for her unkindness and adds, ‘She may be the
King’s daughter but she is nothing to be scared of. You shall see.’ Stroking
Meg’s back she notices how thin she has become, the bones of her shoulders
protruding like the nubs of wings.
    Lady Mary sits in her bedchamber engulfed in
a silk robe. She looks frail and puffy about the face; her youth seems to have deserted
her entirely. Katherine does the mental calculation, trying to remember how much younger
Mary is than her. It is only about four years, she thinks, but Mary looks wizened and
has a feverish glaze to her eyes – the legacy of the treatment she has received at her
father’s hands, no doubt. Now at least she lives at court where she belongs and is
no longer stuck in some dank distant place, hidden away. Her position remains tenuous,
though, and since her father tore the country apart to prove he wasn’t ever truly
wed to her mother, poor Mary still has the blot of illegitimacy hanging over her. No
wonder she clings to the old faith; it is her only hope of legitimacy and a good
marriage.
    Her thin mouth twists into a smile of
greeting. ‘Katherine Parr,’ she says. ‘Oh how glad I am to have you
back.’
    ‘It is a privilege to be here indeed,
my lady,’ Katherine replies. ‘But I am only here for the baptism today. I am
told you are to stand godmother to the new Wriothesley infant.’
    ‘Only today? That