The Boleyn Inheritance Read online

  We are on our knees praying for the health and safety of the royal family when to my surprise there is a new prayer inserted without warning into the familiar words. Without a flicker of shame, the priest bids my court, my ladies, and myself to give thanks for the king’s wife Katherine.

  “We render thanks to thee, oh Lord, that after so many strange accidents that have befallen the king’s marriages, that thou hast been pleased to give him a wife so entirely conformed to his inclinations as her, he now has.”

  I cannot help myself, my head bobs up from reverent submission and I meet the surprised gaze of the Richmond priest in the choir stalls. He is reading the celebration of the king’s wife from an official document, he has been ordered to read this as he might be ordered to read a new law. Henry, in his madness, has commanded every church in England to thank God that after the many “strange accidents” of his previous marriages, he now has a wife who conforms to his inclinations. I am so outraged by the language of this, by the sentiment of it, and by the fact that I have to be on my knees listening to this insult, that I half rise to my feet in protest.

  At once an insistent hand grabs the back of my gown and pulls me down; I stumble for a moment and fall back to my knees again. Lotte, my translator, gives me a small smile, puts her hands together in a portrait of devotion, and closes her eyes. Her gesture steadies me. This is indeed an insult, most gross and thoughtless; but to respond to it is to charge into danger. If the king requires me to go on my knees and describe myself to the kingdom as a strange accident, then it is not for me to point out that our marriage was no accident but a well-planned and thoughtfully considered contract that he broke for the simple and sufficient reason that he preferred someone else. It is not my place to point out that since our marriage was real and valid, he is now either an adulterer or a bigamist, living in sin with a second wife. It is not my place to point out that if little Kitty Howard, a lighthearted, light-mannered child, is the only woman he has ever found who conforms to his inclinations, then either she must be the greatest actor who ever lived, or he must be the most deluded fool who ever married a girl young enough to be his own daughter.

  Henry is a madman now, doting on a girl like a senile fool, and he has just ordered the whole of his country to thank God for his folly. In churches up and down the land people will be biting their lips to contain their smiles; honest men will be cursing the luck that puts them in Henry’s church with this nonsense included in their prayers. “Amen,” I say loudly, and when we rise to our feet for the blessing, I show the priest a serene and devout face. My only thought, as we leave the church, is that poor Princess Mary at Hunsden will be choking with indignation at the insult to her mother, at the blasphemy of having to pray for Kitty Howard, and the idiocy of her father. Please God she has the sense to say nothing. It seems whatever the king likes to do, we must all say nothing.

  On Tuesday, one of my ladies gazing out of the window remarks: “Here is the ambassador, running up the garden from a riverboat. What can have happened?”

  I rise to my feet. Dr. Harst never visits me without first sending notice that he is coming. Something must have happened at court. My first thought is for Elizabeth or Mary; my first fear is that something has happened to them. If only Mary has not been driven by her father to defy him! “Stay here,” I say shortly to my women, and I throw a shawl around my shoulders and go down to greet him.

  He is entering the hall as I come down the stairs and at once I know that something serious has happened.

  “What is it?” I ask him in German.

  He shakes his head at me, and I have to wait until the servants have come, served him with wine and biscuits, and I can send them all from the room. “What is it?”

  “I came at once, without the full story, because I want you to be forewarned,” he says.

  “Forewarned of what? It is not the Princess Mary?”

  “No. It is the queen.”

  “She is with child?”

  He shakes his head. “I don’t know exactly. But she has been confined to her chambers since yesterday. And the king will not see her.”

  “She is ill? He is terrified of taking the plague.”

  “No. There are no physicians called.”

  “She is not accused of plotting against him?” I name the greatest fear.

  “I will tell you all I know, and it is mostly gathered from the servant we have in the king’s rooms. The king and queen attended Mass on the Sunday, and the priest gave thanks for the king’s marriage, as you know.”

  “I know.”

  “Sunday evening the king was quiet and dined alone, as if he was sinking into his old illness. He didn’t go to her rooms. Monday he locked himself in his rooms, and the queen was locked in hers. Today Archbishop Cranmer went in to talk with her and came out in silence.”

  I look at him. “She was locked in? And the king locked himself away?”

  Silently he nods.

  “What d’you think it means?”

  “I think the queen has been accused. But we cannot yet know the accusation. What we must consider is whether she will implicate you.”

  “Me?”

  “If she is accused of a Papist plot or of bewitching the king into impotence, people will remember that you were accused of a Papist plot and that he was impotent with you. People will remember your friendship with her. People will remember that you danced with her at court at Christmas and he was ill by Lent, as soon as you left. People may think that the two of you have made a plot against him. They may even say the two of you have ill wished him.”

  I put out my hand as if I would stop him. “No, no.”

  “I know it is not true. But we have to consider the worst that could be said. And try to guard against it. Shall I write to your brother?”

  “He won’t help me,” I say sullenly. “I am alone.”

  “Then we must prepare,” he says. “You have good horses in your stables?”

  I nod.

  “Then give me some money, and I shall have other horses ready all the way down the road to Dover,” he says decisively. “The moment I think that it is going against you, we can leave the country.”

  “He will close the ports,” I warn. “He did the last time.”

  “We won’t be trapped again. I shall hire a fishing boat to serve us,” he says. “We know now what he can do. We know what lengths he will go to. We will get away before they have even decided to arrest you.”

  I look at the closed door. “There will be someone in my service who will know that you have come to warn me,” I say. “Just as we have a man in his service, he will have put a spy here. I am watched.”

  “I know the man,” Dr. Harst says with quiet pleasure. “And he will report my visit today, but he will say nothing more. He is my man now. I think we are safe.”

  “Safe as mice under the scaffold,” I say bitterly.

  He nods. “As long as the axe falls on others.”

  I shudder. “Who deserves it? Not me, but not little Kitty Howard either! What did she and I ever do but marry where we were bid?”

  “As long as you escape it, my job is done,” he says. “The queen must look to her own friends for help.”

  Katherine, Hampton Court,

  November 1541

  Now, let me see, what do I have now?

  Surprise, surprise! I have no friends and I thought I had dozens.

  I have no lovers, and I thought I was pestered by them.

  I don’t even have a family; as it turns out, they are all gone.

  I have no husband, for he won’t see me; and I don’t even have a confessor, for the archbishop himself has become my inquisitor. Everyone is so mean to me, and it is so unfair. I don’t know what to think or say. They came to me when I was dancing with my ladies and said that it was the king’s orders that I was not to leave my rooms.

  For a moment – I am such a fool, grandmother was right when she said that there never was a greater fool than me – I thought
it was a masque and that someone would come in costume and capture me, and then someone would come in costume and rescue me, and there would be a joust or a mock battle on the river or something amusing. The whole country had said prayers on the Sunday to thank God for me, so I was expecting some kind of celebration on the day after. So I waited in my room, behind the locked doors, looking forward to a knight errant coming, perhaps even a tower coming to my window, or a mock siege, perhaps a cavalcade riding into the garden, and I said to my ladies: “Here’s a good joke, I expect!” But we waited all day in my room, and even though I rushed and changed my dress to be ready, no one came. I called for music and to make merry, and then Archbishop Cranmer came and said that the time for dancing was over.

  Oh, he can be so unkind! He looks so serious, as if there is something very wrong. And then he asks me about Francis Dereham! Francis Dereham of all people, only in my service at the request of my own respectable grandmother! As if it is my fault! And all because some pathetic tittle-tattle talebearer has told the archbishop that there was a flirtation at Lambeth, as though anyone should care about that now! And I must say, if I were archbishop, I would try to be a better person than one who listens to such gossip.

  So I say that all this is most untrue, and if I can see the king, I will easily persuade him not to hear a word against me. And then my lord Cranmer gives me a real fright, for he says in a most awful voice: “That, Madam, is why you will not see His Grace until your name has been utterly cleared. We will inquire into every circumstance until we have utterly scotched every slur against you.”

  Well, I don’t reply because I know that my slur cannot be utterly scotched, or anything like it; but surely, all that at Lambeth was a matter between a maid and a young man, and now that I am married to the king, who should trouble themselves about what happened all that long time ago? Why, it is a lifetime ago, it is all of two years ago! Who should care one way or another now?

  Perhaps it will all blow over in the morning. The king has his funny whims sometimes; he takes against one man or another and has them beheaded, and often he is sorry afterward. He took against poor Queen Anne of Cleves, and she got away with Richmond Palace and being his best sister. So we go to bed quite cheerful, and I ask Lady Rochford what she thinks, and she looks rather queer and says that she thinks I may get through it if I keep my nerve and deny everything. This is rather cold comfort from her, who saw her own husband go to the gallows denying everything. But I don’t tell her so, for fear of making her angry.

  Katherine Tylney sleeps with me, and she laughs as she gets into bed and says that she bets I wish she were Tom Culpepper. I say nothing, for I do wish it. I wish it so much that I could cry for him. Long after she is snoring I lie awake and wish that everything had been different for me, and Tom had come to the house at Lambeth and perhaps fought with Francis and perhaps killed him, and then taken me away and married me. If he had come for me, then I would never have been queen and never had my necklace of table diamonds. But I should have slept the whole night in his arms, and sometimes that seems a better choice. It seems a better choice tonight, for sure.

  I sleep so badly that I am awake at dawn. I lie in the quiet with the gray light shining through the shutters, and I think that I would give all my jewels to see Tom Culpepper and hear his laugh. I would give my fortune to be in his arms. Please God he knows that I am kept in my rooms and does not think that I am keeping away from him. It would be too awful if, when I come out, he has taken offense at my neglect and is courting someone else. I would die if he were to take a fancy to another girl. I really think my heart would break.

  I would send him a note if I dared, but no one is to leave my rooms, and I dare not trust one of the servants with a message. They come with breakfast to my rooms; I am not even allowed to go out to eat. I am not even to go to chapel; a confessor is to come to my rooms to pray with me before the archbishop comes to talk with me again.

  I really do begin to think this is not right; I should perhaps protest against it. I am Queen of England. I cannot be kept in my rooms as if I were a naughty girl. I am fully grown, I am a lady, I am a Howard. I am wife to the king. Who do they think I am? I am Queen of England, after all. I think I shall speak to the archbishop and tell him that he cannot treat me so. I think about this until I become quite indignant and resolve that I shall insist to the archbishop that he treat me with proper respect.

  And then he doesn’t come! We spent the whole morning sitting around, trying to sew things, trying to appear seriously employed in case the door suddenly opens and my lord the archbishop walks in. But no! It is not till the end of the afternoon, and a dreary afternoon at that, that the door opens and he enters, his kindly face all grave.

  My ladies all flutter up as if they were themselves as innocent as a flock of butterflies, imprisoned with a moldy slug. I remain seated; after all, I am queen. I just wish I could look like Queen Anne did when they came for her. She really did look innocent; she really did look unjustly accused. I am sorry now that I signed a piece of paper to bear witness against her. I realize now how very unpleasant it is to be doubted. But how was I to know that one day I would be in the same case?

  The archbishop walks up to me as if he were terribly sorry for something. He has his sad face on, as if he were struggling with an argument inside his own head. For a moment I am certain that he is going to apologize for being so unkind to me yesterday, and beg my pardon and release me.

  “Your Grace,” he says very quietly. “I am so much grieved to discover that you have employed the man Francis Dereham in your household.”

  For a moment I am so amazed that I don’t say anything. Everyone knows this. Good God, Francis has caused enough trouble at court for everyone to know it. He has hardly been discreet. How should the archbishop discover it? As well as claim to discover Hull! “Well, yes,” I say, “as everyone knows.”

  Down go his eyes again, clasp go his hands together over his cassocked tummy. “We know that you had relations with Dereham when you were at your grandmother’s house,” he says. “He has confessed it.”

  Oh! The fool. Now I cannot deny it. Why would he say such a thing? Why would he be such a slack-mouthed braggart?

  “What are we to suppose, but that you put your paramour in a position close to you for a bad purpose?” he asks. “Where you could meet every day? Where he could come to you without your ladies being present? Even unannounced?”

  “Well, suppose nothing,” I say pertly enough. “And he isn’t my paramour anyway. Where is the king? I want to see him.”

  “You were Dereham’s lover at Lambeth, you were not a virgin when you married the king, and you were his lover after your marriage,” he says. “You are an adulteress.”

  “No!” I say again. The truth is all muddled up with a lie, and besides, I don’t know what they know for sure. If only Francis had been born with the sense to shut up. “Where is the king? I insist that I see him!”

  “It is the king himself who has ordered me to inquire into your conduct,” he says. “You cannot see him until you have answered my questions and your name is cleared without blemish.”

  “I shall see him!” I jump to my feet. “You shan’t keep me from my husband. It has to be against the law!”

  “Anyway, he has gone.”

  “Gone?” For a moment it feels as if the floor has rocked under my quick feet as if I were dancing on a barge. “Gone? Where has he gone? He can’t have gone. We’re staying here until we go to Whitehall for Christmas. There is nowhere else to go to; he wouldn’t just leave me here. Where has he gone?”

  “He has gone to Oatlands Palace.”

  “To Oatlands?” This is the house where we were married. He would never go there without me. “That is a lie! When did he go? This cannot be true!”

  “I had to tell him – it was the greatest sadness of my life – that you had been Dereham’s lover and that I fear you are his lover still,” Cranmer says. “God knows I would have spared him that ne
ws. I thought he would lose his mind for grief; you have broken his heart, I think. He left for Oatlands at once, taking only the smallest household. He will see no one; you have broken his heart and ruined yourself.”

  “Gracious no,” I say feebly. “Oh, gracious, no.” This is very bad, indeed, but if he has taken Thomas with him, then at least my dearest love is safe, and we are not suspected. “He will be lonely without me,” I say, hoping that the archbishop will name his companions.

  “He is like to go mad of grief,” he says flatly.

  “Oh, dear.” Well, what can I say? The king was mad as a March hare before any of this, and that, in fairness, cannot be laid at my door.

  “Has he no companions?” I ask cleverly. Pray God that Thomas is safe.

  “The Groom of the Chamber,” he replies. So thank God Thomas is in no danger. “All you can do now is confess.”

  “But I have done nothing!” I exclaim.

  “You took Dereham into your household.”

  “At my grandmother’s request. And he has not been alone with me, nor so much as touched my hand.” I draw a little strength from my true innocence. “Archbishop, you have done very wrong to upset the king. You don’t know what he’s like when he is upset.”

  “All you can do is confess. All you can do is confess.”

  This is so like being some poor soul trudging toward Smithfield with a fagot of wood to be burned to death that I stop, and giggle, from sheer terror. “Really, Archbishop, I have done nothing. And I confess every day, you know I do, and I have never done anything.”

  “You laugh?” he says, horrified.

  “Oh, only from the shock!” I say impatiently. “You must let me go to Oatlands, Archbishop. Indeed, you must. I have to see the king to explain.”

  “No, you have to explain to me, my child,” he says earnestly. “You have to tell me what you did at Lambeth, and what you did thereafter. You have to make a full and honest confession, and perhaps then I can save you from the scaffold.”