“Have a care!” said Surrey’s cautious father often enough. But, pondered the young poet, idly playing a few notes on his lute, there comes a time in the life of a man when he no longer wishes to take care, but rather to be reckless, to stake everything…to win, or pay the price of failure with his head.

Wild plans were forming in his mind. This had begun to happen when the King had told him that he had decided to send Edward Seymour, Lord Hertford, to Calais as Governor in place of himself.

These accursed Seymours! Who were they? Surrey asked himself rhetorically. An upstart family! And because young Jane had married the King, the Seymour brothers were fast becoming the most important pair in the country.

Surrey called one of his men to him and cried: “Go to the apartments of my sister, the Duchess of Richmond, and tell her I would have speech with her. Tell her it is of the utmost importance.”

The man went while Surrey sat playing with the strings of his lute.

He was thinking of his sister, Mary; she was beautiful with that striking beauty of the Howards, the mingling of dignity with personal charms. Mary had been married some years ago to the King’s illegitimate son, the Duke of Richmond, and she was now a widow, ripe for a second marriage.

The Howard women had always pleased the King, though briefly. Surrey’s father, the old Duke of Norfolk, Lord Treasurer of England, was not in favor with the King just now and had not been since the unhappiness caused Henry by Catharine Howard. Surrey smiled. But the King was old now, and his fancy would not stray so easily, and he, Surrey, did not see why a Howard woman should not retrieve the family’s fortunes.

He was madly impatient. He played with the idea of quartering the arms of Edward the Confessor on his escutcheon. Why not? He was entitled to do this by the grant of Richard the Second, because of his descent from Edward the First. Flaunting those arms would proclaim to the court that Surrey and his family considered that they had more right to the throne than the Tudors.

Imagine the royal ire at such daring! And what then? wondered Surrey. “To the Tower, my lord Earl. Off with his head. He has committed the mortal sin. He is more royal than the King!”

Surrey burst into laughter. His maternal grandfather, the Duke of Buckingham, had lost his head in 1521 because he had a claim to the throne.

I believe I will do it, he thought, for I am tired of living at the command of the King, tired of seeking the royal favor, tired of placating the angry frown. Is this how men become when they live perpetually on the edge of danger?

His father would call him a fool. The old Duke had been a doughty warrior, a cautious man. He had been less cautious in his hot youth when he had fallen in love with his wife’s laundress and raised Bess Holland to the position she enjoyed as mistress of one of the most important men of the time.

Surrey thought of the endless strife Bess had caused between his parents. Was life worth the trouble it brought? he wondered.

He doubted it.

His sister came into the room and, throwing aside his lute, he rose to greet her.

“You have something to say to me, brother?”

“You grow more beautiful every day. Sit beside me, sister, and I will sing you my latest verses which I have set to music.”

Mary Howard, Duchess of Richmond, looked at him with sly amusement. She knew he had not asked her to visit him merely to hear his verses.

“I have a new poem,” he said. “Even the King has not heard it yet.”

She listened, but she was paying little attention to the words.

She could think of nothing but a certain handsome gentleman who dominated her thoughts and desires. It was long since Richmond had died that lingering death, and she wanted a husband. She had been fond of the young Duke—such a fine, handsome man, and the image of the King—until disease had claimed him. But what was her feeling for the Duke of Richmond compared with this passion which now obsessed her?

Her father had started it. He had said to her: “These Seymours are our enemies. Who are they, these upstart gentlemen? Miserable squires, claiming kinship with the King. Daughter, we cannot fight these mighty rivals, but we could link ourselves with them.”

“By marriage?” she had asked.

And then a great excitement had been hers, for there were only two brothers and the elder was married. It was the younger, the swaggering sailor, whom her father had in mind.

Sir Thomas! The merry twinkling eyes, the jaunty beard, the charm of the man! No sooner had her father spoken those words than she could think of nothing but marriage with Sir Thomas, and he had continued to dominate her thoughts.

Surrey dismissed his attendants.

“Well?” she said. “Your news?”

He smiled at her idly. “Sister, you are very beautiful.”

“So you have already said. There is no need to repeat it, though a compliment from a brother is to be cherished, as there is often plain speaking in families. What do you want of me?”

“I? Nothing. I have had thoughts.”

“And those thoughts?”

“They have taken Anne Askew to the Tower.”

“I know. She is a heretic. What has that to do with me?”

“I saw her… this very afternoon. She was sitting in the barge, her arms folded across her breast. She looked a veritable martyr, which I doubt not she will be ere long. Sister, what does this mean? Have you thought of that?”

“That another heretic is to pay the price of her folly and her treason to the King.”

“She is a great friend of the Queen’s, and yet they have dared to take her. Gardiner and the Chancellor are behind this, depend upon it. They would not dare to take the Queen’s great friend if they did not think her Majesty was out of favor with the King.”

“And what of this? We know what favor she enjoys. If he were his old self he would have had her head off by now, and doubtless that of some other lady who had been unfortunate enough to share his throne after her. But he is sick and she is a good nurse. So he keeps her beside him.”

“He is not always so sick. I have seen his eyes grow misty and his voice gruff with desire when a beautiful woman passes before him.”

“He is too old for such pleasures.”

“He will never believe he is too old. He has indulged in them too freely. There will always be his thoughts, his desires, his belief that his powers are not yet past.”

“And what would you say to me? Have you brought me here to tell me what the court knows already and has always known?”

“Nay. The Queen’s days are numbered. Poor Katharine Parr! I am sorry for her. She will go the way of others.” He smiled. “We should not be saddened. It is the fate that threatens us all. We should look on it stoically, for if it comes not today, then it may come tomorrow. The Queen’s place will be taken by another lady. Why not you, my sister?”

She was hot with anger. “You are asking me to be the seventh? To prepare myself for the ax?”

“Nay. Be not the seventh. Be the honored mistress. Smile on his Grace and do not say, ‘Your mistress I cannot be!’ as poor deluded fools have said before you. Say this: ‘Your mistress I will be.’ Thus you will keep alive his desire. You will rule him and bring our house back to the favor it once enjoyed.”

“How dare you talk to me in this manner! You shame me. You insult me. And the King…my own father-in-law!”

Surrey shrugged his shoulders. “You were the wife of his bastard son. There is no true relationship to him in that. Moreover it will not be necessary to get a dispensation from the Pope, for his Holiness no longer carries weight in this realm. The King would get dispensation from the King, and that should be an easy matter. The royal conscience would no doubt be appeased with the greatest ease, for I doubt not that though the King’s conscience is the master of the King’s desires, the King’s desires are so subtle that they will once more deceive the conscience.”

“Brother, you talk with folly. You are proud and foolish. One of these days your tongue will cut off your head.”

“I doubt it not. I doubt it not. And, Mary, dear sister, there are times when I care not. Do not think to ally yourself with lowborn Seymour. I would stand against uniting our family with that one.”

She cried: “More foolish than ever! To unite ourselves with the King’s brother-in-law would be the best thing that could happen to our family.”

“And to its daughter—who lusteth for the man?” he taunted.

“You go too far, brother.”

“Do I, fair sister? I will tell you this: Seymour looks higher. He looks to the Princess Elizabeth. Who knows—he may get her. Unless the King decides to execute him, for that may be necessary in the process of getting rid of the Queen. Seymour had his eyes on Her Majesty at one time, you remember. Master Thomas Seymour is as near the ax as any of us, even though the King may call him brother. Nay, dear sister, do not long so for one man that you cannot see the advantage of casting your glances at another. Be bold. Be clever. Love Tom Seymour if you must, but do not lose the opportunity of restoring your family to greatness through the grace of His Majesty. I tell you he is ripe… ripe for seduction. And the ladies of our family are most accomplished in that art.”

She rose and swept haughtily from the room.

Surrey watched her, plucked a few notes from his lute, and was still playing when a messenger came and told him that his presence was required in the King’s music room.

THE KING SAT on his ornate chair in that chamber which was reserved for the playing of music.

He was surrounded by his courtiers, and the Queen sat beside him. She looked fair enough, sitting there in her scarlet hood; the pearls, which made a becoming edge to it, suited her complexion. Her skirt was of cloth of gold and cut away to show a crimson velvet petticoat. Crimson suited Kate, thought the King. If she would but give me a son I should not be displeased with her.