Cate of the Lost Colony - Lisa Klein [1]
“The queen requires me to attend her!” I said, my voice rising with excitement. To be granted such a prize was like being invited into the firmament to shine next to the sun.
My aunt lifted her eyebrows in disbelief. Or was it relief? I knew she was thinking of her own daughters, who needed food, clothing, and dowries, while her husband did nothing but gamble and drink.
“It is an honor she does not merit,” she said in rebuke to the messenger. “It will not take long to pack her things. Go, Catherine.”
I floated from the room on a cloud, wondering if the queen was as beautiful as everyone said. Was her bed covered with cloth of gold? Did she eat from plates made of crystal? Were her shoes set with jewels? I would see these glories for myself, living in a palace and waiting on the queen daily.
My cousins, clustered in the hallway, sniffed and made sour faces.
“Uncle always did think he was better than us,” said the eldest.
I wanted to remind them that my father had died in the queen’s service, while theirs was little more than a drunkard. But I said nothing and only stuck out my tongue as I passed.
The queen had sent a litter for me, a covered chair atop a brown palfrey. A small chest with my few belongings was secured behind. We set out before dawn the next day. I felt like a grand lady riding so high, but I was a little afraid of falling off. The messenger on his horse seemed to be smiling at me, whether in pity or friendliness, I could not tell.
All the way to London I thought about my father. I had sat dry-eyed through his funeral, unable to believe he was dead. His visits home had been rare, for he lived at court as a gentleman of the queen’s privy chamber. He even spent Christmases there. I never questioned why he chose the queen over his family. It was just the way things were. After all, who would not desire to be in the queen’s presence? I had never been out of Hampshire County and I shivered with the anticipation of arriving in the greatest city in the kingdom and meeting the queen. As we passed through the villages and the golden fields and woods of russet-leaved trees, I wished my father could see me riding in the litter. I longed for him to hug me. He would smell of civet and his beard would tickle my face as he kissed me. But alas, he was dead. I would not see him at court or anywhere ever again.
A dull pain pressed behind my ribs and rose into my throat. This was more than missing him. This was grief at last, and I let it out in quiet weeping as raindrops spattered on the canopy overhead.
Why had my father gone to the Netherlands? He had written in a letter, “It is a great honor to be chosen to escort the French prince from London to Flushing. Thankfully Her Majesty, after much indecision, has declined to marry him. Rejoice, daughter, for England need no longer fear submission to a Frenchman, one who is, moreover, a papist.” Though I did not understand everything he wrote, I was proud of my father. I expected him to return once the prince was delivered overseas. He did not write that he would stay in the Netherlands and take up arms. Perhaps he did not want me to worry. My uncle explained that Elizabeth was supporting the Dutch Protestants who were trying to drive Spain out of the Netherlands. I only knew that Spain was wicked for wanting to rule England and to force its Catholic religion on the people of Britain.
So while I had imagined my father on the deck of the queen’s flagship, wearing a cloak with fur-lined sleeves, he had been fighting in a field in the Netherlands, knee-deep in mud and blood. I thought of him riding into battle, proudly wearing the queen’s livery. Did he call my mother’s name when he died, or Elizabeth’s?
He came home in a coffin, and we buried him in the churchyard beside my mother.
I drifted in and out of sleep as night fell. The smell of damp horseflesh filled my nostrils and I remembered