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that she was not always feminine. That quality never failed to show itself in her sternest moments, and I always believed it was, in some measure, her strength, the very reason she was able to make men work for her as for no one else. Being a woman was a part of her genius. I never saw that look, though, for anyone but Robert. He was the love of her lifeext to the crown, of course.
    is brother Guildford had married Jane,she went on. hat sly fox Northumberland had seen to that. It could have been Rob magine that. But Fate married him off so he was not available, and although it was a mesalliance, it is one for which we must be grateful. So there we were in the Beauchamp Tower. The Earl of Sussex came to me. I remember it clearly. Would not you, Cousin Lettice, if you thought that before long your body would be deprived of its head? I had made up my mind that it would be no ax for me. I would have a sword from France.Her expression was blank suddenly and I knew she was thinking of her mother. ut in fact I never intended to die. I determined that it must not come to that, and I stood firm against them all. Something within me said: ave patience. In a few years all this will have changed.Yes, I swear it. I knew this would come to pass.
    t was the prayers of Your Majesty subjects which you heard,I said.
    She never saw through flattery, or perhaps she did and liked it so much that she gobbled it up like a gourmand who knows it is bad for him but finds it irresistible.
    hat may be. But I was taken to the Traitor Gate and for a momenthough only for a momenty heart failed me. And as I alighted and stood in the water, because the fools had misjudged the tide, I cried out: ere lands as true a subject, being prisoner, as ever landed at these stairs. Before Thee, oh God, I speak it, having no other friend but Thee alone.
    know it well, Your Majesty,I told her. our brave words were recorded. They were both brave and clever, for the Lord, put thus on His mettle, must prove that He was as good an ally as all your enemies put together.
    She looked at me and laughed. ou amuse me, Cousin,she said. ou must stay with me.
    Then she went on to explain: t was all so romantic. But then anything concerned with Rob always is. He made friends with the warder boy, who adored him. Even little boys are aware of Robin charm. The boy brought him flowers and Robin sent them to me by way of the child and there was a note for me enclosed in them. Thus I knew he was in the Tower and where. He was always audacious. He might have got us straightway to the block, but then, as he said when I taunted him with this, we were both halfway there already. And he never visualized failure; that is a quality we share. When they allowed me to walk out for exercise in the precincts of the Tower I went past Robert cell. Oh, they were afraid to be too harsh with me, those jailers. Wise men! There was a chance I might remember one day. And so should I. But I found Robin and saw him through the bars of his window and that encounter sweetened our prison stay for both of us.
    Once she started talking of Robert she found it difficult to stop.
    e was the first to come to me,: Lettice,she went on. hat was right and fitting. The Queen, my sister, was sick unto death. Poor Mary, my heart went out to her. I was ever her good and faithful subject as all should be to their sovereign. But the people were sickened by what had happened during her reign. They wanted an end to religious persecution. They wanted a Protestant queen.
    Her eyes were slightly veiled. Yes, I thought, it was so, my Queen. And if they had wanted a Catholic queen would you have obliged? I had no doubt in my mind as to the answer to that. Her religion sat lightly on her; perhaps it was as well; the late Queen had been so heavily weighed down by hers that it had ruined her good name with her people and made them rejoice in her death.
    queen must rule through the will of the people,said Elizabeth. raise God, it is a truth