Certainly, they would benefit from another reform he was proposing in the jury selection process, in which he insisted that a man must now be judged by property owners of upstanding character who were respected and invested in the community and not by just any vagrant, paid lackey, or warm body brought in to stack the jury. This law, it turned out, would stand for centuries.

Later in the session, Richard was to receive approbation for a statute that had been in his mind for several years—ever since he had encountered the distraught woman in St. Alban’s on his way to London. The law had said her husband’s property could be forfeit as soon as he was taken into custody yet was not formally indicted of a crime. Richard’s new law decreed that bail be made available to someone in custody before being indicted, in the same way that a man ready to face trial might be. If a man were innocent, he could return home knowing his property was intact.

The final decision he made after all the new bills were ratified was that they be written down in English so all, from high to low, would understand.

Richard hoped God was taking notice. Am I atoning for killing a king—who was a good man but a bad ruler? It was the only way he thought might appease the Almighty now.

In the middle of March and after many assurances that she would not be punished further for her part in the rebellion and could return to Grafton, Dame Elizabeth Grey agreed to leave sanctuary with her daughters.

“I am sorry for you, Elizabeth, but you cannot deny you deserved it,” Anne said to her sister-in-law the day before Elizabeth was to finally quit sanctuary. “You gave Richard no choice. It was treason, Dame Grey. If you had been a man, you would have lost your head.”

“Pish!” Elizabeth said dismissively as she contemplated the new queen. Anne was a good match for the under-sized, misshapen Richard, she thought. Small, attractive, but not beautiful, Anne had always appeared a bit childish to the older woman—wishy-washy even. However, her new power had given Warwick’s daughter confidence; confidence enough to scoff at Elizabeth’s new loss of prestige. Elizabeth shrugged. “Believe what you want.”

“’Tis not a question of believing,” Anne insisted, “it is a question of knowing you plotted with the Beaufort woman and that odious bishop to put Henry of Richmond on the throne. You even agreed to betroth your daughter, Edward’s beloved Bess, to that Lancastrian upstart.”