"Could not he intercede for her with the King?" asked Cicely.
"We are judging hastily, my children," said Sir Harry, cautiously. "Who can tell that there will be need of intercession. It may be that some idle gossip hath reached the King, and he will but clear the Queen's fame in the sight of all men. We talk as though the Queen was sure to be condemned. I would fain hope that things have not gone so far as that."
But as the days went on, and reports of the trial that was being held at the Tower came to be known, it grew plain that it was the ruin of the Queen that was intended, and not the clearing of her fair fame from idle gossip; and men began to understand better what their beloved monarch was becoming, now that he held irresponsible power over the lives and consciences of his subjects.
Sir Harry Guildford was not called upon to take any part in the infamous trial of Queen Anne, but other witnesses had been obtained, who were willing to swear away the life of this innocent woman.
Perhaps her sentence was just, in the face of what had taken place in the matter of Catherine, but of the charge made against her now she was wholly innocent, and none knew this better than Henry himself.
It struck the nation dumb when they came to understand this, for Henry himself made it clear why the unfortunate Queen was found guilty of the charges brought against her. Before the month of May came to an end, Queen Anne had been condemned and beheaded. She never left the Tower again in life; and when the firing of a gun gave notice that the Queen was dead, Henry at once had the ceremony of marriage performed between himself and the Lady Jane Seymour.
But Greenwich folk declined to have anything to do with merry-making over this marriage, and the nation was struck with affright, that their King, who held such power as no other monarch had ever possessed in England before, could thus trample under foot the laws of God and man alike. From that day Henry was dethroned from the hearts of his people, where he had reigned without question until now.
[CHAPTER XXVII.]
THE PRIOR OF ST. MARGARET'S.
LADY PATON was playing on the virginal in the pleasant summer parlour, where she and Sir Miles had so often met before she went to the convent, and where he had given her the little bit of the New Testament he himself had translated into English. Cicely was alone, thinking of all that had happened since that day, and how eventful her life had been, and how unlikely it seemed at one time that she should ever see the old home again. And yet, here she was, playing on the virginal, and likely to be here for a month or two longer at least, for she and her husband both desired to prolong their visit that they might hear the wonderful sermons that were preached in the Parish Church—both by the Archbishop, Cranmer, and also by his more uncompromising friend, Latimer. He did not hesitate to preach the truth, even to the King himself; and Cicely was hoping that Henry might yet be brought to repentance for the murder of the Queen, when the door opening into the garden was hastily pushed back, and her husband appeared looking greatly disturbed.