Read My Story: Lady Jane Grey (My Royal Story) for Free Online Page A

baby Mary. She is adorable and when I hold her I feel her little legs and arms try to kick inside the swaddling bands. Earlier the Queen asked me to read to her. I was so proud that she chose me! Next to the bed, her ladies sewed and talked quietly. But after only a few pages the Queen closed her eyes and one of her ladies whispered to me to stop. She took me by the hand and led me from the chamber. “The Queen needs rest,” she told me.

2 September 1548
Sudeley Castle
    The Queen recovers, but very slowly. She is almost too weary to hold her baby and when I went to see her just now she asked for her to be put back in her cradle almost as soon as she had been laid on the bed. Her voice was very weak and I saw a little puckered frown dent the midwife’s forehead. The ladies glanced at each other and I felt a little prickle of fear run up and down my spine. But I pushed it away and bent over the cradle. Baby Mary stared up at me. She looked happy and healthy. My visits to the nursery are short. The midwife guards her charge like a dragon and soon shoos me away.

3 September 1548
Sudeley Castle
    I have just seen the Queen and am trying not to cry. I could barely recognize her. Her head was tossing to and fro on the pillow. A maid was trying to dab her face with a cloth, but she pushed it away. The Admiral was by her side. Tears were running down his face. I am not surprised that he cried. She said such awful things to him. Such awful cruel things. I wish I had not heard them. Her ladies say it is the fever. “Come along, you should not be here!” one chided me, and I felt myself taken by the hand and almost pushed out of the room.
    Her physician is with her now. I heard him say the dread words “childbed fever”. Nature, he says, must take its course.

5 September 1548
Sudeley Castle
    I am sitting by the window, dry-eyed. I cannot cry. I feel numb – as if I will never feel anything ever again. I do not know what hour it is, whether it is early or late. How quickly life can change from joy to despair. My nurse says it is a lesson we must all strive to learn, but I cannot take comfort in any such thought. The Queen died early this morning. She looked so serene and at peace when I kissed her cheek farewell. It already felt cold. I can scarce believe that only a few days ago I held her baby in my arms and saw the Queen smile at us. The Admiral is distracted by grief. He looks at me as if he does not know who I am. I feel as if I have lost them both. It quite breaks my heart.
    And me, what will happen to me now? Will I be sent home, now that the Queen is dead? Nurse says I must go but I could not bear to leave. I have been so happy here. Oh, my dear kind guardian. Let me stay. Do not send me away.

7 September 1548
The Queen’s funeral, Sudeley Castle
    The Queen was buried today. The funeral was held at St Mary’s chapel. I – the chief mourner – walked behind the Queen’s coffin in a black gown, my heavy train carried by Elizabeth Tilney. We walked slowly across the grounds, the short walk to the chapel, a sad little procession. My hands clasped the Queen’s little prayer book. It is mine now. I tried not to look at the coffin. It made me want to cry. I longed for it all to be over. I could not bear to see the black cloths with which the chapel was hung, the gaping vault into which the coffin was lowered, the clatter as the household officers threw in their staves of office – broken to show that their service to her is finished. As candles were lit the preacher, Dr Coverdale, reminded us that they were not lit for the Queen’s soul – Protestants do not light candles or pray for the dead – but to honour her. All popish statues had been removed, all icons, all paintings. They are baubles and distract us from getting close to God. The service was held in English, too – it is the first time a Protestant funeral service has been conducted for a queen in England. I am proud to be part of something so important, at