Elizabeth remained at Ashwellthorpe, watching as her older siblings set out to court, dreaming of the day she would join them. Whenever they visited London, as they were at present, she was overawed by the sophistication and glamour her siblings had acquired.
‘I’ll be an important lady one day,’ she had announced to Anne a few nights earlier.
‘Even greater than Mama?’ Anne had asked.
‘Perhaps,’ she had replied loftily before they collapsed into giggles.
‘What’s that supposed to be?’ asked Thomas, looking at Elizabeth’s tapestry. ‘Is it a pigeon?’
‘Don’t be mean,’ Elizabeth retorted. ‘It’s a falcon, as you can very well see.’
She put her hands on her hips and pouted.
‘Very grand,’ Thomas said with a grin. ‘Why a falcon, Lizzie?’
‘It’s because ofThe Squire’s Tale,’ she sighed, returning to her chair and the small sampler she was embroidering. Sheloved the creativity of sewing and was working hard to improve her stitching, which was often uneven.
Thomas looked at Anne for clarification.
‘Geoffrey Chaucer’s story,The Canterbury Tales,’ said Anne. ‘InThe Squire’s Tale, there’s a romantic story about a falcon who has her heart broken by an unfaithful mate?—’
‘It’s more than that,’ interrupted Elizabeth. ‘The squire is the son of the knight, who tells the first tale, which is about courtly love, but the squire’s account is more exotic. It’s set in the court of Genghis Khan and there’s a princess called Canacee, who is given a magic ring that allows her to talk to and understand the language of birds. As the princess walks in the gardens of the palace, she comes across a distraught falcon who has beaten herself so badly with her own wings that her red blood pours down the white bark of the tree where she sits. The princess scoops the falcon up and comforts her, asking her to tell her what has happened so Canacee can help her.
‘The falcon explains that she had been raised gently and her life had been full of love. Near her lived a tercelet, the male of her species, who was handsome and charming. He appeared noble and after years of persuasion and wooing of the falcon, she capitulated because she believed his promises of true love. They were happy for several years; she thought their marriage was true until he told her he must leave the land where they lived.
‘She felt he must be suffering like her and as the weeks passed, she cried, thinking her heart would break, but she was sure he would return. Then word came to her that the tercelet had another lover, a kite, a scavenger bird of low rank and the falcon succumbed to the devastation of lost love.’
‘Did she die?’ asked Thomas, amused at his sister’s dramatic rendition.
‘No, Canacee had great skill as a healer and she tended the bird’s wounds, wrapping her in soft bandages and placing herin a basket draped with blue cloth – the colour of faithfulness – while on the outside they painted derogatory pictures of unfaithful birds, such as the tercelet, the lecherous sparrow and the magpie. Unfortunately, the falcon’s reunion with the tercelet is never told because the franklin interrupts the squire in order to tell his own tale.’
Thomas gave a derisive laugh. ‘Women are fools when it involves matters of the heart,’ he said. ‘They would be wise to understand men want a wife who will support and love them but never challenge them. Look at Mama, she does all she can to free Papa and when he is home, she will follow him wherever he is sent in his quest to rebuild his reputation and our family honour.’
‘A task any good wife would undertake,’ said Anne quietly.
‘Practicality is what men require,’ said Thomas, ‘not romantic nonsense. You’d be wise to remember my advice, Lizzie.’
He gave them both a pompous look, then turned on his heel and marched away along the corridor, his boots ringing on the stone floors.
‘Lizzie, where are you?’
Her feet flew down the stairs. The horses had arrived half an hour earlier, but her mother had told her to wait to be summoned.
‘Papa might be tired and prefer to rest before he greets everyone,’ she had said, but her tone had been kind and Elizabeth had understood.
She was nine years old now, it was time to behave with the manners of a courtier, a great lady in the making, rather than amewling child. Yet, upon hearing her father’s voice, her dignity deserted her and she flew down the wide staircase, flinging herself into his arms.
‘You’ve grown since I last saw you,’ he exclaimed.
‘We visited you less than a month ago, Papa,’ she said. Then with great solemnity she showed him the piece of quartz.
‘You kept it?’ he said.
‘To keep you safe,’ she replied, and he hugged her even more tightly.
The Earl of Surrey’s incarceration had changed during its long years. At first, he was held in relative comfort, but the visits of his family were rare. As time passed and he proved an exemplary prisoner, his standard of living improved.
In 1487, when the imposter Lambert Simnel had arrived with an army in Furness, claiming to be Edward Plantagenet, Earl of Warwick, a cousin of the lost princes, an opportunity had arisen for Thomas Howard to escape from the Tower of London.
