Summer 1557, pages 4 - 16 Summary

In the second section of The Virgin's Lover by Philippa Gregory, the narrative begins one year earlier, in the summer of 1557. Robert Dudley is having a dream, a nightmare. As a youth he is standing with his brothers in a gaol (the old term for jail), staring down out of the window to where his father is being dragged to a scaffold. Robert Dudley hears his father renounce their faith (Protestantism) and their principles for Queen Mary. Robert and his brothers watch as his father, who used to be one of the greatest men in the entire kingdom loses his place on the execution scaffold. As he is blindfolded he cannot find the chopping block where he must lower his head and is screaming, scrabbling around feebly. Robert Dudley awakens when he sees the axe thud down, twice, killing...