The Boleyn Inheritance Part 4

I say nothing.

"Should we say anything to the king? Shall I speak to my husband? " Lady Browne asks me, her voice very low. "Should we not tell Secretary Cromwell that we have reservations? Will you say anything to the duke? "

I think quickly. I swear that I am not going to be the first to speak against this queen. "Perhaps you should speak to Sir Anthony, " I say. "Privately, as his wife. "

"Shall I tell him that we are agreed? Surely my lord Southampton realizes that she is not fit to be queen. She is so graceless! And all but mute! "

"I have no opinion, myself, " I say rapidly.

She laughs at once. "Oh, Jane Boleyn, you always have an opinion; not much ever escapes you. "

"Perhaps. But if the king has chosen her because she brings with her the Protestant alliance, if my lord Cromwell has chosen her because it makes us safe against Spain and France, then perhaps the fact that her hood is the size of a house will not matter to him. She can always change her hood. And I would not want to be the one to suggest to the king that the woman he has solemnly and unbreakably betrothed is not fit to be queen. "

That stops her in her tracks. "You think I would be mistaken to criticize her? "

I think of the white-faced girl who peeped out of the closet in Calais, too shy and too frightened to sit in a room with her own court, and I find that I want to defend her against this unkindness. "Well, I have no criticism to make of her, " I say. "I am her lady-in-waiting. I may advise her as to her gowns or her hair if she asks me, but I would not have one word to say against her. "

"Or at any rate, not yet, " Lady Browne amends coldly. "Until you see an advantage for yourself. "

I let it pa.s.s, for just as I am about to answer, the door opens and the guard announces: "Mistress Catherine Carey, the queen's maid-in-waiting. "

It is her. My niece. I have to face the child at last. I find a smile and I hold out my hands to her. "Little Catherine! " I exclaim. "How you have grown! "

She takes my hands, but she d"s not turn up her face to kiss my cheek. She looks at me quietly, as if she is taking the measure of me. The last time I saw her was when she stood behind her aunt Anne the queen on the scaffold, and held her cloak as the queen put her head on the block. The last time she saw me was outside the courtroom when they called my name to go in to give evidence. I remember how she looked at me then: curiously. She looked at me so curiously, as if she had never seen such a woman before.

"Are you cold? How was your journey? Will you have some wine? " I am drawing her to the fire, and she comes, but she is not eager. "This is Lady Browne, " I say. Her curtsy is good; she is graceful. She has been well taught.

"And how is your mother? And your father? "

"They are well. " Her voice is clear with just a hint of the country in her speech. "My mother sent you a letter. "

She brings it out of her pocket and hands it to me. I take it over to the light of the large square candle that we use in the royal household and break the seal.

Jane, So starts Mary Boleyn, without a word of a t.i.tle, as if I did not hold the very name of her house in my name, as if I were not Lady Rochford while she lives at Rochford Hall. As if she did not have my inheritance and my house while I have hers, which is nothing.

Long ago I chose the love of my husband over the vanity and danger of the court, and we perhaps would all have been happier if you and my sister had done the same *G.o.d have mercy on her soul. I have no desire to return to court but I wish you and the new Queen Anne better fortune than before, and I hope that your ambitions bring you the happiness you seek, and not what some might think you deserve.

My uncle has commanded the attendance of my daughter Catherine at court, and in obedience to him, she will arrive for the New Year. It is my instruction to her that she obeys only the king and her uncle, that she is guided only by my advice and her own good conscience. I have told her that, at the end, you were no friend to my sister nor my brother and advised her to treat you with the respect you deserve.

Mary Stafford I am shaking after I have read this note and I read it again as if it might be different the second time. The respect I deserve? The respect I deserve? What did I do but lie and deceive to save the two of them till the very last moment, and then what did I do but protect the family from the disaster that they brought down on us? What could I do more? What should I have done differently? I obeyed the duke my uncle as I was bound to do, I did as he commanded me, and my deserts are these: that I am his faithful kinswoman and honored as such.

Who is she to call me a woman who might have been a good wife? I loved my husband with every inch of my soul and being, and I would have been everything to him if it were not for her and her sister and the net they made for him that he could not break, and that I could not break for him. Would he not be alive today if he had not gone down with his sister's disgrace? Would he not be my husband and the father of our son today, if he had not been named with Anne and beheaded with Anne? And what did Mary do to save him? What did she ever do but suit herself?

I could scream with sheer rage and despair that she should set these thoughts running again in my head. That she should doubt my love of George, that she should reproach me! I am lost for words at the malice of her letter, at the veiled accusation. What else could I have done? I want to shout into her face. You were there; you were hardly the savior of George and Anne. What else could any of us have done?

But she was always like this, she and her sister; they always had a way to make me feel that they saw better, understood better, considered better. From the moment that I married George I was aware that his sisters were supposed to be finer young women than I: one the king's lover and then the other. One, in the end, the king's wife and Queen of England. They were born for greatness! The Boleyn sisters! And I was only ever a sister-in-law. Well, so be it. I have not got where I am today, I have not borne witness and sworn oaths to be reprimanded by a woman who ran away at the first sign of danger and married a man to hide in the country and pray Protestant prayers that good times would come.

Catherine, her daughter, looks at me curiously. "Did she show you this? " I ask, my voice shaking. Lady Browne looks at me, avidly inquisitive.

"No, " Catherine says.

I put it into the fire, as if it were evidence against me. The three of us watch it burn to gray ash. "I will reply later, " I say. "It was not at all important. For now, I will go and see that they have prepared your room. "

It is an excuse to get away from the two of them and the soft ash from the notepaper in the fire. I go quickly out and I call the maids and scold them for inattention, and then I go quietly to my own room and lean my hot forehead against the cool, thick gla.s.s. I shall ignore this slander, I shall ignore this insult, I shall ignore this enmity. Whatever its cause. I live in the heart of the court. I serve my king and my family. In time they shall all acknowledge me as the finest of the family, the Boleyn girl who served king and family to the end, never shrinking, never faltering, even if the king has grown fat and dangerous, and the family are all dead but me.

Katherine, Rochester, New Year's Eve 1539 Now let me see, what do I have? What do I have now I am practically a grown-up lady at court?

I have three new gowns, which is good, but it is hardly a vast wardrobe for a girl who expects to be much observed and much commented on. I have three new hoods to match, which are very pretty, but none of them are trimmed with anything more than gold lace, and I see that many of the ladies of court have pearls and even precious stones on their hoods. I have some good gloves and a new cloak and a m.u.f.f and a couple of lace collars, but I cannot say that I am overly indulged in my choice or quant.i.ty of clothes. And what is the point of being at court if I do not have a great deal of pretty things to wear?

For all my great hopes of court life, it is not proving to be very merry. We came down by boat from Gravesend in the worst weather I have ever seen, driving rain and terrible wind so my hood was all blown about and my hair a mess, and my new velvet cape got wet and I am sure it will be water-marked. The queen-to-be greeted us with a face as blank as a fish. They may say she is tired, but she seems just amazed by everything; like some peasant come to town for the first time, she stares astounded at the commonest of sights. When people cheer for her, she smiles and waves like a child at a traveling fair, but when she is called upon to greet a lord come to her court, she forever looks around for one of her Cleves companions and mutters to them in their stupid language, puts out her hand as if she was serving a joint of meat, and says nothing in English at all.

When I was presented to her, she barely looked at me. She looked at all of us new girls as if she did not know what we were doing in her chamber, nor what she should do with us. I thought she might at least ask for music, and I have a song note-perfect and ready to sing, but, absurdly, she said that she must pray and she went off and shut herself in her closet. My cousin Jane Boleyn says that she d"s that when she wants to be alone, and that it is a sign not of piety, but of her shyness, and that we must be kind to her and merry with her and she will soon learn our language and be less simple.

I can't see it myself. She has a shift under her gown that comes up nearly to her chin. She has a hood that must be a ton in weight crammed on her head, she is broad in the shoulders and she could be any size in the hips under that pudding bowl of a gown. Lord Southampton seems very taken with her, but perhaps he is just relieved that the journey will soon be over and his job done. The English amba.s.sadors who were at Cleves with her chat to her in her language, and then she is all smiles and chatters back at them like a quacking duckling. Lady Lisle seems to like her. Jane Boleyn is often at her side. But I am afraid that this is not going to be a very merry court for me, and what is the point of a court at all if it is not merry with dancing and flirtation? Indeed, what is the point of anyone being a young queen at all if she is not going to be merry and vain and silly?

Jane Boleyn, Rochester, New Year's Eve 1539

There is to be a bullbaiting after dinner, and Lady Anne is shown to the window that overlooks the courtyard so that she can have the best view. As soon as she appears at the window a cheer g"s up from the men in the yard below, even though they are bringing out the dogs and it is rare for common men to break off from gambling at such a moment. She smiles and waves to them. She is always easy with the ordinary people, and they like her for it. Everywhere we have been on the road she has a smile for the people who come out to see her, and she will blow a kiss to little children who throw posies of flowers in her litter. Everyone is surprised at this. Not since Katherine of Aragon have we had a queen who is so smiling and pleasant to the common people, and not since Aragon has England relished the novelty of a foreign princess. No doubt this one will learn to be easy with the court, too, in time.

I stand beside her on one side and one of her German friends is on the other so that he can tell her what is being said. Lord Lisle is there, of course, and Archbishop Cranmer. He is devoting himself to being pleasing, of course. She may be Cromwell's candidate, and thus an a.s.set for his rival; but his worst fear must have been that the king would bring in a Papist princess, and this reforming archbishop would see his church turned back to the old ways once more.

Some of the court are at the windows to see the baiting; some are gossiping quietly at the back of the room. I cannot hear exactly what is being said, but I think there are more than Lady Browne who think that the Lady Anne is not well suited to the great position that she has been called on to fill. They judge her harshly for her shyness and her lack of speech. They blame her for her clothes, and they laugh at her for not being able to dance or sing or play a lute. This is a cruel court, devoted to frivolity, and she is a girl easy to use as a b.u.t.t for sarcasm. If this g"s on, what will happen? She and the king are all but married. Nothing can stop the wedding. He can hardly send her home in disgrace, can he? For the crime of wearing a heavy hood? Not even the king can do that, surely? Not even this king can do it? It would bring Cromwell's treaty down about his ears, it would bring down Cromwell himself, it would leave England friendless facing France and Spain without any Protestant alliance at our back. The king will never risk it, I am sure. But I cannot imagine what will happen.

Down in the yard below they are getting ready to release the bull; his handler unclips the rope from the ring in his nose, skips out of the way, vaults over the boards, and the men who have been sitting on the wooden benches rise to their feet and start to shout bets. The bull is a great animal with heavy shoulders and a thick, ugly head. He turns this way and that, spotting the dogs from one little eye and then the other. The dogs are none too eager to be the first to run in; they are afraid of him in his power and his strength.

I feel a little breathless. I have not seen a bullbaiting since I was last at court; I had forgotten what a savage excitement it is to see the yapping dogs and the great beast that they will pull down. It is rare to see a bull as big as this one, his muzzle scarred from earlier fights, his horns barely blunted. The dogs hang back and bark, sharp, persistent barks with the thrilling sound of fear behind them. He turns from one to another, threatening them with the sweep of his horns, and they fall back into a circle around him.

One rushes in, and at once the bull spins; you would not think such a great animal could move so quickly. His head plows low, and there is a scream like a human cry from the dog as the horns buffet his body; his bones are broken for sure. He is down and cannot crawl away, he is yelping like a baby; the bull stands over him, his head down, and grinds the side of his great horn into the screaming dog.

I find I am crying out, though whether for the dog or for the bull I couldn't say. There is blood on the cobbles, but the bull's attack has left him unguarded to the other dogs, and another darts in and takes a bite at his ear. He turns, but at once another fastens on his throat and hangs there for a moment, his white teeth bared and gleaming in the torchlight, while the bull bellows for the first time and the roar of it makes all the maids scream and me among them, and everyone is now crowding to the windows to see as the bull rakes his head round and the dogs fall back and one of them howls with rage.

I find I am trembling, crying out for the dogs to go on! Go on! I want to see more, I want to see all of it, and Lady Anne beside me is laughing, she is excited, too, she points to the bull where his ear is bleeding, and I nod and say, "He will be so angry! He will kill them for sure! " And then suddenly, a bulky man I don't know, a stranger smelling of sweat and wine and horses, pushes in front of us, into the window bay where we are standing, pushes rudely by me, and says to the Lady Anne, "I bring you greetings from the King of England, " and he kisses her, full on the mouth.

At once I turn to shout for the guards. This is an old man of nearly fifty, a fat man, old enough to be her father. She thinks at once that he is some drunk fool who has managed to push his way into her chamber. She has greeted a hundred men, a thousand men, with a smile and an extended hand and now this man, wearing a marbled cape and a hood pulled over his head, comes up to her and pushes his face into hers and puts his s...o...b..ry mouth on hers.

Then I bite off my shout of alarm; I see his height, and I see the men who have come in with him in matching capes, and I know him at once for the king. At the same moment, like a miracle, at once he d"s not seem old and fat and distasteful. As soon as I know he is the king I see the prince that I have always seen, the one they called the handsomest prince in Christendom, the one whom I was in love with myself. This is Henry, King of England, one of the most powerful men in the entire world, the dancer, the musician, the sportsman, the courtly knight, the lover. This is the idol of the English court, as big as the bull in the yard below us, as dangerous as a bull when wounded, as likely to turn on any challenger and kill.

I don't curtsy because he is in disguise. I learned from Katherine of Aragon herself that one should never see through his disguises; he loves to unmask and wait for everyone to exclaim that they had no idea who the handsome stranger was, that they admired him for himself, without knowing that he was our wonderful young king.

And so, because I cannot warn Lady Anne, the scene in our gallery becomes a baiting to equal what is going on, bloodily, in the courtyard below us. She pushes him away, two firm hands against his fat chest, and her face, sometimes so dull and stolid, is burning with color. She is a modest woman, an untouched girl, and she is horrified that this man should come and insult her. She rubs the back of her hand over her face to erase the taste of his lips. Then, terribly, she turns her head and spits his saliva from her mouth. She says something in German that needs no translation, clearly it is a curse against this commoner who has presumed to touch her, to breathe his wine-scented breath into her face.

He stumbles back, he, the great king, almost falls back before her contempt. Never in his life has a woman pushed him away; never in his life has he ever seen any expression in any woman's face but desire and welcome. He is stunned. In her flushed face and bright, offended gaze he sees the first honest opinion of himself that he has ever known. In a terrible, blinding flash he sees himself as he really is: an old man, long past his prime, no longer handsome, no longer desirable, a man that a young woman would push roughly away from her because she could not stand his smell, because she could not bear his touch.

He reels back as if he has taken a mortal blow to the face, to his heart. I have never seen him like this before. I can almost see the thoughts running behind his stunned, flabby face. The sudden realization that he is not handsome, the realization that he is not desirable, the terrible realization that he is old and ill and one day he will die. He is no longer the handsomest prince in Christendom; he is a foolish old man who thought that he could put on a cape and a hood and ride out to meet a girl of twenty-four, and she would admire the handsome stranger, and fall in love with the king.

He is shocked to his soul, and now he looks foolish and confused like a muddled grandfather. Lady Anne is magnificent. She is drawn up to her full height, and she is angry, powerful; she is standing on her dignity, and she shoots a look at him that dismisses him from her court as a man that no one would want to know. "Leave me, " she says in heavy-accented English, and she turns her shoulder on him as if she would push him away again.

She looks around the room for a guard to arrest this intruder, and she notices for the first time that no one is springing to save her. We are all appalled; no one knows what to say or do to recover this moment: Lady Anne outraged, the king humbled in his own eyes, thrown down before us all. The truth of the king's age and decay is suddenly, painfully, unforgiveably apparent. Lord Southampton steps forward but is lost for words; Lady Lisle looks at me, and I see my shock mirrored in her face. It is a moment of such intense embarra.s.sment that all of us *we skilled flatterers, courtiers, liars *are lost for words. The world we have been building for thirty years, around our prince who is ageless, eternally handsome, irresistibly desirable, has been shattered about our ears *and by a woman we none of us respect.

He turns wordlessly, he almost stumbles as he g"s, his stinking leg giving way beneath him, and Katherine Howard, that clever, clever little girl, catches her breath in a gasp of absolute admiration and says to him: "Ooh! Forgive me, sir! But I am new to court myself, a stranger like you. May I ask *who are you? What is your name? "

Katherine, Rochester, New Year's Eve 1539

I am the only person to see him come in. I don't like bullbaiting, or bears, or c.o.c.kfighting, or anything like that, I think it's just downright nasty *and so I am standing a little back from the windows. And I am looking around, actually, I am looking at a young man whom I had seen earlier, such a handsome young man with a cheeky smile, when I see the six of them come in, old men, they must all be thirty at the least, and the big old king at the front, and they are all wearing the same sort of cape, like a masquing costume, so I guess at once that it is him, and that he has come in disguise like a knight errant, silly old fool, and that he will greet her and she will pretend not to know him, and then there will be dancing. Really, I am delighted to see him because this makes it a certainty that there will be dancing, and so I am wondering how I can encourage the handsome young man to be near me in the dance.

When he kisses her, it all g"s terribly wrong. I can see at once that she has no idea who he is; someone should have warned her. She thinks he is just some drunk old man who has staggered in to kiss her for a wager, and of course she is shocked, and of course quite repelled, because when he is in a cheap cloak and not surrounded by the greatest court in the world, he d"s not look at all like a king. In truth, when he is in a cheap cloak and with his companions, also dressed poorly, he looks like some common merchant, with a waddling walk and a red nose, who likes a gla.s.s of wine, and hopes to go to court and see his betters. He looks like the sort of man my uncle would not acknowledge if he called out in the street. A fat old man, a vulgar old man, like a drunk sheep farmer on market day. His face is terribly bloated, like a great round dish of dripping; his hair is thinning and gray; he is monstrously fat; and he has an old injury in his leg that makes him so lame that he rolls in his walk like a sailor. Without his crown he is not handsome; he looks like anybody's fat old grandfather.

He falls back, she stands on her dignity, rubbing her mouth to take the smell of his breath away, and then *it is so awful I could almost scream with shock *she turns her head and spits out the taste of him. "Leave me, " she says, and turns her back on him.

There is utter, dreadful silence, n.o.body says a word, and suddenly I know, as if my own cousin Anne Boleyn is at my side telling me, what I should do. I am not even thinking of the dancing and the young man; for once I am not even thinking of myself, and that almost never happens. I just think, in a flash, that if I pretend not to know him, then he can go on not knowing himself, and the whole sorry masque of this silly old man and his gross vanity will not tumble about our ears. I just feel sorry for him, to tell the truth. I just think that I can spare him this awful embarra.s.sment of bouncing up to a woman and having her slap him down like a smelly old hound. If anyone else had said anything then, I would have stayed silent. But n.o.body says anything, and the silence g"s on and on, unbearably, and he stumbles back, he almost falls back into me, and his face is all crumpled and confused and I am so sorry for him, poor humbled old fool, that I say, I coo: "Ooh! Forgive me, sir! But I am new to court myself, a stranger like you. May I ask *who are you? "

Jane Boleyn, Rochester, New Year's Eve 1539

Lady Browne is ordering the maids to their beds in a bellow as if she were a Yeoman of the Guard. They are overexcited, and Katherine Howard among them is the center of it all, as wild as any of them, a true Queen of the May. How she spoke to the king, how she peeped up at him from under her eyelashes, how she begged him, as a handsome stranger, new to court, to ask the Lady Anne for dancing, is being mimicked and reenacted till they are drunk with their own laughter.

Lady Browne is not laughing; her face is like thunder, so I hustle the girls into bed and tell them that they are all very foolish and that they would do better to copy their lady, the Lady Anne, and show proper dignity, than mimic Katherine Howard's free and forward ways. They slip into their beds two by two like pretty angels, and we blow out the candle and leave them in the darkness and lock the door. We have hardly turned away before we hear them whispering, but no power on earth can make girls behave well; and we do not even try.

"Are you troubled, Lady Browne? " I ask considerately.

She hesitates; she is longing to confide in someone, and I am here at her side, and known to be discreet.

"This is a bad business, " she says heavily. "Oh, it all pa.s.sed off pleasantly enough in the end, with the dancing and the singing, and Lady Anne recovered quickly enough as soon as you had explained to her; but this is a bad, bad business. "

"The king? " I suggest.

She nods and folds her lips over as if she would stop herself saying more.

"I am weary, " I say. "Shall we take a gla.s.s of warm ale together before we go to our beds? Sir Anthony is staying here tonight, is he not? "

"G.o.d knows he won't join me in my rooms for hours, " she says unguardedly. "I doubt if any of the king's circle will sleep tonight. "

"Oh? " I say. I lead the way into the presence chamber. The other ladies have gone to bed, the fire is burning low, but there is a jug of ale set at the fireside and half a dozen tankards. I pour us both a drink. "Trouble? "

She sits in her chair and leans forward to whisper. "My lord husband tells me that the king swears that he will not marry her. "

"No! "

"He d"s. He d"s. He swears it. He says that he cannot like her. "

She takes a long draw on the ale and looks at me over the top of the mug.

"Lady Browne, you must have this wrong . "

"I have it from my husband this very night. The king seized him by the collar, almost by the throat, as soon as we retired, and said that the moment he saw Lady Anne, he had been struck with consternation, and that he saw nothing in her that he had been told. "

"He said that? "

"Those very words. "

"But he seemed so happy as we left? "

"He was as truly happy just as Katherine Howard was truly ignorant of his ident.i.ty. He is as much a happy bridegroom as she is an innocent child. We are all actors here, but the king will not play the part of eager bridegroom. "

"He has to; they are betrothed and the contract signed. "

"He d"s not like her, he says. He cannot like her, he says; and he is blaming the men who made this marriage for him. "

I have to get this news to the duke; he has to be warned before the king gets back to London.

"Blaming the men who made the marriage? "

"And those who brought her to him. He is furious. "

"He will blame Thomas Cromwell, " I predict quietly.

"Indeed. "

"But what of the Lady Anne? Surely, he cannot refuse her? "

"There is some talk of an impediment, " she says. "And that is why Sir Anthony and none of the others will have any sleep tonight. The Cleves lords should have brought a copy of an agreement to say that some old previous contract to marry has been withdrawn. Since they don't have it, perhaps there may be grounds to argue that the marriage cannot go ahead, it is not valid. "

"Not again, " I say, unguarded for a moment. "Not the same objection that he put against Queen Katherine! We will all look like fools! "

She nods. "Yes, the same. But better for her that an impediment is declared now and she is sent safely home, than she stays and marries an enemy. You know the king; he will never forgive her for spitting out his kiss. "

I say nothing. These are dangerous speculations.

"Her brother must be a fool, " I say. "She has come a long way if he has not secured her safety. "

"I would not be in her sh"s tonight, " Lady Browne says. "You know I never thought she would please the king, and I told my husband so. But he knew best; the alliance with Cleves is vital, he tells me, we have to be protected from France and Spain, we have to be protected against the Papist powers. There are Papists who would march against us from every corner of Europe; there are Papists who would kill the king in his own bed, here in England. We have to strengthen the reformers. Her brother is a leader of the Protestant dukes and princes, that is where our future lies. I say: Yes, my lord; but the king will not like her. Mark my words: he will not like her.' And then the king comes in, all ready for courtship, and she pushes him away from her as if he was a drunk tradesman. "

"He did not look kingly at that moment. " I will not say more than this cautious judgment.

"He was not at his best, " she says, as careful as I. Between us is the unsayable fact that our handsome prince has grown into a gross, ugly man, an old, ugly man; and for the first time we have all seen it.

"I must go to my bed, " she says, putting down her cup. She cannot bear even to think of the decay of the prince we have adored.