My Story: Lady Jane Grey (My Royal Story) by Sue Reid Read Free Book Online

wish me to return to his household? No one will say and Sir John has ridden away again now.
    I wish I could have left with him! I am so lonely here. My sisters are too young to be my companions and anyway, Katherine does not share my love of learning, and skips off from lessons as soon as she can. She is much happier dancing or on horseback.
    I wondered if my parents would say anything when I knelt to receive their blessing this evening, but they did not. When I dared, I raised my eyes to their faces, but they gave nothing away.

16 October 1548
Bradgate Park
    So I am wilful and lack humility, do I? If I were more gently taught, maybe I would learn these lessons more readily. I try to please, but they always find me wanting. But I will be as docile and humble as even they wish if they will only let me leave.
    I had stopped to listen when I heard their voices raised outside the door. I knew I should not but I could not help it. I felt sure it was me they were talking about.
    “She is wilful and needs a mother’s care,” I heard my mother say. There! Who else does she say such a thing of? “She has been allowed too long a rein and does not show the humility she should,” Mother carried on to my fury. How can she say such things!
    “Lady Seymour will take good care of her,” I heard Father say. I held my breath, willing Mother to agree.
    She snorted. “Lady Seymour is old. No, she will do better here.” I know what that means. I pray that Father can change Mother’s mind.

21 October 1548
Bradgate Park
    A letter arrived for me today. It was from Elizabeth Tilney and was put into my hands by the Admiral himself. Elizabeth writes that she misses me and hopes that I will rejoin their household. Is that why the Admiral has come? Will he persuade them to let me go? I am not hopeful, but merely to see him lifted my spirits. I did not know whether to laugh or cry when he told me I had grown into a fine young lady. It is only a few weeks since I last saw him, but it feels like years. He was accompanied by Sir William Sharington – a gentleman I had seen sometimes at Seymour Place. Sir William is a treasurer at the Mint. He spent most of the time talking to Mother. I do not know what he said to her, but he made her laugh.

22 October 1548
Bradgate Park
    I am almost too happy to write. I am leaving! I am returning to the Admiral’s household. Somehow Mother has been persuaded to let me go. I do not know how, nor do I care. I am leaving and soon I will be among my friends again, under the care of the kindest guardian a girl could wish for.

27 October 1548
An inn, outside the city
    I am writing at an inn – the same inn I stayed at when I travelled to London last year. It is some days now since I bid my family farewell. I tried to hide my glee. I held little Mary close, feeling the hard hump in her little crooked back. She will never grow straight and strong.
    “You have only just come home and now you are leaving us again,” Katherine said mournfully as I hugged her.
    “I will see you when you come to London,” I said. I will miss them but as soon as the great door at Bradgate had shut behind me, I felt as if a burden had lifted from me. I remember the last time I left Bradgate for London. Then I wished the journey would never end. Now I wish my horse could fly. And how tediously slow our journey has been. At Leicester important officials came to greet me and I had to listen while the Mayor made me a long and boring speech. Then the Lady Mayoress presented me with a gift of a gallon of wine. They were kind, but how I wished them all at the ends of the earth. I will be thankful when we reach the city. And so now I will put away my journal and try to sleep, the sooner to hasten the morning.

29 October 1548
Seymour Place
    I feel as if I have come home, and yet I do not. It is not the same. I am glad we cannot go to Chelsea (the house was returned to the Crown when the Queen died). It is too full of happy memories.
    Everyone