Eliza Rose by Lucy Worsley

Author:Lucy Worsley [Worsley, Lucy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781408870129
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2016-02-23T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

‘It’s a Secret We Have to Keep’

Late that night I crept into our bed and lay there silently whimpering until I could bear it no longer, and I had to let my sobs shake the bedframe.

‘Eliza! What is it? Is it Ned?’

Katherine, bleary-eyed with interrupted sleep, was up on one elbow, lighting the candle and looking at me with genuine concern.

‘Katherine,’ I said uncertainly. I hated to reveal a weakness to her, but I had a burning need to know. ‘How can you bear it when the gentlemen of the court leer at us? They don’t mean it either, when they give us those chivalrous compliments. They’re just laughing at us and talking behind our backs about which of us they’d most like to have in bed.’

‘Oh, men!’ Katherine flumped back on the pillows, rubbing the heels of her hands into her eyes. ‘It’s always men, isn’t it? They’re just children really. Whatever man’s been horrid to you, Eliza, you should imagine him as he once was, crawling round on the floor, bawling for his nurse and pooing his linen. You have to grow up, Eliza, take it in your stride.’

But I could not seem to take it in my stride. I had come to court to find a husband to whom I would be joined in legal, holy matrimony. My father had sent me here for this purpose, surely. I did not understand how Katherine could be so relaxed. And I could hardly credit that the king himself had pushed me up against a door, like any common doxy of the streets. It seemed to me to be more than just wrong; it seemed actually to be wicked.

But of this I dared not speak, and Katherine did not press me. Soon her breathing evened out once more, but I went on staring at the candle flame until it guttered out in a pool of wax.

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