Philippa Gregory - The Boleyn Inheritance

“Good night, Your Grace,” I say.

“Good night, sweetheart,” he says with such easy tenderness that for a moment I want to cling to him as my only friend at this court and tell him of my fear and unhappiness. But he is already looking beyond me, away from me. His glance is idly resting on my ladies, and Katherine Howard steps forward and curtsies to him and then I lead them all away.

I say nothing during the slow taking off of my gold collar, my bracelets, my rings, net, my hood, my sleeves, my stomacher, the two skirts, the padding, the petticoats, and the shift. I say nothing when they throw my nightdress over my head and I sit before the mirror and they brush my hair and plait it and pin my nightcap on my head. I say nothing when Lady Rochford lingers and asks kindly if I need anything, if she can be of service to me, if my mind is easy tonight.

My priest comes in, and the ladies and I kneel together for the nighttime prayers, and my thoughts beat in rhythm to the familiar words while I cannot help but think that I disgust my husband and have done from the very first day.

And then I remember it again. That first moment at Rochester when he came in all puffed up in his vanity and looking so very ordinary, exceptional only in that he stepped up to me, just like a drunken tradesman might do. But this was not a drunken old man of the country town; this was the King of England playing knight errant. I humiliated him before the whole court, and I think he will never forgive me.

His dislike of me springs from that moment, I swear it. The only way that he can bear the memory of it is to say, like a hurt child: “Well, I don’t like her either.” He recalls my pushing him away and refusing to kiss him, and now he pushes me away and refuses to kiss me. He has found a way to redress the balance by naming me as the undesirable one. The King of England, especially this king, cannot be seen to be the undesirable one, especially to himself.

The priest finishes the prayers, and I rise to my feet as the maids troop from the room, their heads bowed, as sweet as little angels in their nightcaps. I let them go. I ask for no one to wake with me though I know I will not sleep this night. I have become an object of disgust, just as I was in Cleves. I have become an object of disgust to my own husband, and I cannot see how we shall reconcile and make a child while he cannot bear to touch me. I have become an object of disgust to the King of England, and he is a man of utter power and no patience.

I am not weeping for the insult to my beauty because now I have a far greater worry. If I am an object of disgust to the King of England and he is a man of utter power and no patience, what might he do to me? This is a man who killed one beloved wife with studied cruelty; the second that he adored he executed with a French sword; and the third, who had given him a son, he left to die of poor nursing. What might he do to me?

That she is not happy is a certainty, but she is a discreet young woman, wiser by far than her years, and she cannot be led into confidences. I have been as kind and as sympathetic as I can to her, but I don’t want her to feel that I am probing for my own sake; and I don’t want to make her feel any worse than she must do already. For certain she must feel very friendless and strange in a country where she is only starting to grasp the language and where her husband shows such obvious relief when he can avoid her, and such blatant attention to another girl.

Then in the morning, after Mass, she comes to me as the girls are preening themselves before going to breakfast. “Lady Rochford, when will the princesses come to court?”

I hesitate. “Princess Mary,” I remind her. “But only Lady Elizabeth.”

She gives a little “ach” noise. “Yes. So. Princess Mary and Lady Elizabeth.”

“They usually come to court for Easter,” I say helpfully. “And then they can see their brother, and they can greet you. We were surprised that they did not greet you on your entry to London.” I stop myself. I am going too fast for her. I can see her frown as she struggles to follow my speech. “I am sorry,” I say more slowly. “The princesses should come to court to meet you. They should greet their stepmother. They should have welcomed you to London. Usually they come to court for Easter.”

She nods. “So. I may invite them?”

I hesitate. Of course, she can; but the king will not like her taking the power upon herself in this way. However, my lord duke will not object to any trouble between the two of them, and it is not my job to warn her.

“You can invite them,” I say.

She nods to me. “Please write.”

I go to the table and pull the little writing box toward me. The quills are ready-sharpened, the ink in the little pot, the sand in the sifter for scattering on the wet ink, and there is a stick of sealing wax. I love the luxury of court; I love to pick up the quill and take a sheet of paper and wait for the queen’s orders.

“Write to the Princess Mary that I should be glad to see her at court for Easter and that she will be welcome as a guest in my rooms,” she says. “Is that the right way to say it?”

“Yes,” I say, writing rapidly.

“And write to the governess of the Lady Elizabeth that I shall be glad to see her at court, too.”

My heart beats a little faster, like it does at a bearbaiting. She will walk straight into trouble if she sends these letters. These are an absolute challenge to the absolute power that is Henry. Nobody issues invitations in his household but he, himself.

“Can you send these for me?” she asks.

I am almost breathless. “I can,” I say. “If you wish.”

She puts out her hand. “I shall have them,” she says. “I shall show them to the king.”

“Oh.”

She turns to hide a little smile. “Lady Rochford, I would never do anything against the king’s wishes.”

“You have the right to have what ladies you please at your court,” I remind her. “It is your right as queen. Queen Katherine always insisted that she appoint her own household. Anne Boleyn, too.”

“These are his daughters,” she says. “So I shall ask him before I invite them.”

I bow; she leaves me with nothing to say. “Will there be anything else?” I ask her.

“You may go,” she says pleasantly, and I walk from the room. I am rather conscious that she tricked me into giving her bad advice, and she knew of it all along. I must remember that she is far more astute than any of us ever credit.

A page in Norfolk livery is idling outside the queen’s rooms. He passes me a folded note, and I step into one of the window embrasures. Outside, the garden is bobbing with yellow Lenten lilies, daffodils, and in a chestnut tree that is studded with fattening sticky buds there is a blackbird singing. The spring is coming at last, the queen’s first spring in England. The summer days of picnics and jousts and hunting and pleasure trips, boating on the river and the summer progress around the great palaces will start again. Perhaps the king will learn to tolerate her; perhaps she will find a way to please him. I shall see it all. I shall be in her rooms, where I should be. I lean against the polished paneling to read my note. It is unsigned, like every note from the duke.

The king will keep company with the queen only until the moment that France quarrels with Spain. It is agreed. Her time with us can be measured in days. Watch her. Gather evidence against her. Destroy this.

I look around for the boy. He is leaning against the wall and idly tossing a coin, catching one side up and then the other. I beckon him to me. “Tell your master that she wants the princesses at court,” I say quietly in his ear. “That is all.”

The king is most angry at dinner tonight. I can tell from the way that he leads in the queen and does not glance over to me as he usually does. I am sorry about this because I have a new gown (another one!) in creamy yellow, and it is gathered under the bust so that my breasts are on display in the most ravishing and shameless way. But it is a waste of time and trouble trying to please a man. When you are at your very best, his mind is elsewhere, or when he agrees to meet you, he has to go off somewhere else, with less than half a decent excuse. Tonight, the king is so cross with the queen that he hardly looks at me, and I have wasted my new gown for nothing. On the other hand, there is a most delicious young man sitting at the Seymour table who is clearly appreciating the gown and the contents; but I have no time for young men anymore, sworn as I am to a life of self-denial starting this Lent. I see Tom Culpepper trying to catch my eye, but I don’t even look at him. I will not easily forgive him for promising to meet me and then failing me. I shall probably live and die a spinster, and it will be his fault.

Why the king is angry, and what she has done, I don’t know until after dinner when I go up to the table to take her a handkerchief that she had embroidered to give to the king. It is a new fashion and very elegant. She certainly can sew. If a man prized a wife for her sewing, she would be his very favorite. But she never even gives it to him, for as I come up he suddenly turns to her and says: “We shall have a merry court for Easter.”

She would have been better advised to say yes, and leave it at that. But she says, “I am glad. I wish for the Lady Elizabeth and the Princess Mary to come to court.”

He looks furious, and I see her hands grip together on the table before her. “Not the Lady Elizabeth,” he says gruffly. “You should not wish for her company nor she for yours.”

This is too fast for her and I see her puzzled little frown, but she understands well enough that he is saying no.

“Princess Mary,” she says quietly. “She is my stepdaughter.”

I can hardly breathe, I am so amazed at her daring to reply. Fancy having him snarl at you like that and then standing your ground!

“I cannot think why you should want to summon a determined Papist to court,” he says icily. “She is no friend of your faith.”

The queen understands the tone well enough even if she does not quite comprehend the words.

“I her stepmother am,” she says simply. “I guide her.”

He gives a sharp bark of laughter, and I am afraid of him, even if she is not. “She is all but your own age,” he says unkindly. “I don’t think she will want any mothering from the likes of you. She was mothered by one of the greatest princesses of Christendom, and when I parted them they defied me rather than huddle together for love. D’you think she will need a girl her own age to take care of her? When she and her mother let death part them rather than deny their faith? D’you think she’ll want a mother now who can’t even speak English? She can talk to you in Latin or Greek or Spanish or French or English, but not German. And what do you have? Oh, yes, only High German.”

I know I should say something to distract his temper, but he is so spiteful and so sharp that he frightens me. I can’t say anything; I stand there like a fool and wonder how she can find the strength not to faint in her chair.

She is flushed scarlet with embarrassment, from the neck of her gown to her heavy hood; I can see the blush under her muslin shift and under the collar of gold and her neck piece. It is painful to see her embarrassment before his anger, and I wait for her to burst into tears and run from the room. But she does not.

“I learn English,” she says with quiet dignity. “All the time. And I her stepmother am.”

The king gets up from the table so fast that his heavy gold chair scrapes on the floor and almost tips over. He has to steady himself on the table. His face is red, and there is a pulse beating at his temple. I am half dead of terror just looking at him, but she is still seated, her hands gripped together on the table before her. She is like a little block of wood, rigid with fear but not moving, not crumbling. He glares down at her as if to frighten her into silence, but she speaks.

“I shall do my duty. To our children, and to you. Forgive me if I offend.”

“Invite her,” he snarls, and he stamps from the high table to the door behind the throne that leads to his private rooms. He hardly ever uses this door, so there is no one there to open it for him and he has to throw it open himself, and then he is gone, and we are all left dumbstruck.

She looks at me, and I see that her stillness is not calm; she is frozen with terror. Now he has gone and the court scrambling to their feet to bow to the slammed door, and we are all alone.