I hold in my hands that rare and precious thing, a letter from my husband, Thomas. It has come to me in my clean linen, so someone has bribed a laundress to get this one page to me. It is good paper—he must have gone to the clerks at Sandgate Castle and bought a sheet—and he writes a clear steady hand, not a scholarly style, but one that could be easily read by anyone, good for sending a brief order to a gatekeeper beyond hailing distance.
My love, I am far beyond hailing distance. But I hear you. God knows I will always, always listen for you.
Dear Wife,
I have spoken to Archbishop Parker (who I know is a good man) about our business, and asked him if it is not true that in a marriage no man should put us asunder. He is going to be a means to the queen for mercy and ask that I be permitted to live with my wife. I would go anywhere to be with you, I would join you in any captivity and hope to make your prison a little easier for you as the thought of you did for me. I will be your faithful and constant husband in deed as in thought, TK
It has to be good news for me that Thomas Howard, the queen’s kinsman, is released from the Tower without charge, and stays in London under house arrest. If he, a second cousin, guilty of betrothing himself to an enemy queen, can be released, if she can be returned to Scotland, then there is no sense in keeping me imprisoned.
“I have asked for your release,” Sir Thomas says to me stiffly when he comes to the door of my privy chamber to pay a courtesy visit. “I am assured that you will be released next year.”
I write to Thomas:
Dear Husband, I have had so many promises of freedom that I have learned to trust nothing, but if I can come to you, I will do so. I pray for you every day and I think of you with such great love. I am so happy that you are free and my only wish is to be with you and be a good mother to your children. Your constant and loving wife MK
I sign myself “MK” for “Mary Keyes.” I do not deny my love for him nor my marriage to him, and I kiss the fold of the paper and then melt the sealing wax and drip it into the spot and imprint my family seal. He will know to lift the seal and take the kiss.