Six of One by JoAnn Spears

our Christian names alone is the simplest and most acceptable solution to the problem. Use our first names freely while you are here, but, in general, please choose your words carefully.”
    If the middle girl of this trio was the young Elizabeth Tudor, the eldest could only be her half-sister, Mary, Henry VIII’s firstborn daughter. Legitimated and bastardized according to their father’s vagaries, one could forgive the sisters their avoidant tendency on the title-and-precedence issue. The youngest girl was their cousin. Henry VIII’s daughters only had so many girl cousins, I knew—at least on their dad’s side. The third young woman might be one of the Grey sisters. Since Catherine Grey was drop-dead gorgeous and Mary Grey was a dwarf, the Grey sister now present was most likely Jane Grey, the Nine Days Queen. When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, has got to be the truth.
    I framed my next words very carefully. “I am in the presence, then, of Henry VIII’s daughters, Elizabeth and Mary, and Jane, his niece. Have I deduced correctly, and addressed satisfactorily?” I asked.
    “I believe you have,” said Elizabeth, looking smug.
    Mary did not agree. “I believe you have not , Dolly! In order of age, I am the king’s first daughter and should have been mentioned first when you named us.”
    I groveled accordingly. “Accept, if you will, my humblest apology.”
    “Apology accepted.” Mary spoke to me but glared at her younger sister out of the side of her eye. I supposed that sisters were the same everywhere. Harry’s daughter Mary used to glare just like that at her sister, Lizzie.
    In spite of the cold look from her big sister, young Elizabeth was determined to have the last word. “Staying among us,” she said to me, “you will find apologies needful and frequent. You’ll find yourself becoming quite adept at them.”
    I noticed at that moment that Mary’s hands were just as beautiful as her sister Elizabeth’s were, but you had to look very carefully to see it. Mary, who had been wringing her hands earlier, was now cracking her knuckles. It was unfortunate that her choice of nervous habits obscured the view of such an attractive feature. The fact that she was agitated, though, was indisputable. Elizabeth was not visibly discomfited one whit by the tension in the room. Jane Grey, on the other hand, was markedly uncomfortable with it.
    “If my cousin Elizabeth is like a firecracker, then what am I like?” Jane asked me.
    Coming as she did from an abusive home, Jane Grey would have learned early on about diversionary tactics like the one she had just pulled off so nicely. It took me a minute to determine how I would answer her. She was fragile and tremulous, her complexion fair, and just then, she was blushing. A flower, of course, was the obvious answer. It was a sad answer to give to someone whose destiny was to bloom, fade, and die, just like a flower, in a little over a week. Nine days was how long it took Jane to go from coronation to executioner’s block at the age of sixteen, declaring pathetically that she ‘washed her hands in innocency.’
    “What could you possibly be,” I said to her as kindly as I could, “but a flower?”
    “What kind of flower?”
    “Oh, one of the delicate, early-season flowers, I think; something pink and white. A bleeding heart, perhaps.”
    “A likely choice,” Jane commented. “Lovely in spring, but with summer’s heat, the entire plant goes dormant and dies away.”
    Jane did not look angry, or even sad, as she said this; she just looked wistful. I could have bitten out my tongue for ever having said it. I was beginning to see what Elizabeth meant about apologies around here, and that Mary was right about choosing words carefully.
    “I am so sorry,” I said. “I just spoke off the top of my head.”
    My companions scurried to the wooden bedpost and started knocking away. I began to wonder if I ever would learn,