The Nymph from Heaven, page 78
part #1 of The Tudor Chronicles Series
“For pity’s sake, Henry, François almost raped me in France, and me his queen and a royal princess! Why not just take the girl and have done? Must you set the whole world on its ear to get from her that which you could easily get from any tavern wench? And I marvel much that you expect me to sanction a court wherein a mistress reigns, a royal princess is thrust aside and a bastard takes precedence of all your nobles! The people will not have it, Henry! Already they revile her! Have you not heard the shouts against her in the streets? Katharine is my most intimate friend, Henry, and my equal in rank. Yet you would ask me to set her aside, as you do, for the company of a woman descended from merchants! If I, who love you, cannot stomach this, how can you expect that others will?”
“They will because if they do not I shall have their heads!”
“How many, Henry? How many heads will you have? You cannot execute the entire court and country! I am not of the same religious bent of mind as you, Henry, and I honestly do not know if Leviticus is the cause of your troubles. I am also not blind to the possible turmoil presented by a female succession. I understand what drives you. I see all of these things, but more than that I see the wanton cruelty and bitter injustice that you do by your actions, not just to a queen of England, or to a princess of Spain, but to a simple woman, your wife, who loves you! Are you mad, Brother?”
“I cannot in good conscience stay with her! We are living in sin!” Henry glared hotly at her; Mary glared back.
“Conscience, you say! There has been overmuch talk of consciences these many days, I fear me! I, in good conscience, cannot stand by and watch while you break Katharine’s heart and insult her before the eyes of Europe!” Mary’s chest was heaving with emotion; her anger spent, she collapsed onto the nearest chair.
Suddenly the anger left Henry’s eyes and his expression turned cold, colder than she had ever seen it do when he looked at her. “If you cannot, then you have my leave to withdraw from the court.” With that pronouncement he turned on his heel and strode from the room.
Chapter 26
“She has the most gracious and elegant carriage in conversation and dancing or anything else that is possible…she is not a bit melancholy, but lively.” - Gerard de Pleine, Margaret of Austria’s emissary to the English Court
Richmond Palace, September 1527
“Ride ahead, Cavendish,” said Wolsey wearily, “and prepare the king for my arrival. I must speak with His Majesty immediately I reach the palace.”
“Yes, Your Eminence,” Cavendish replied. He put his hand to his hat, touched his spurs, and sped away into the gloaming towards Richmond.
George Cavendish had served Wolsey as gentleman usher for only a few months, but already he had developed a deep respect for the great cardinal’s astuteness, shrewdness and abilities. The post of gentleman usher to the cardinal had come open just before Wolsey left for France in July; but because the cardinal was known to be difficult to serve, and the rumors that he might soon be out of favor with the king, there had been surprisingly few applicants for the situation. But George would always remember his elation on the day his father came home to their house in Wood Street from his job as Clerk of the Pipe in the Exchequer with the news that the cardinal was seeking, due to the death of his previous servant, a young man of intelligence and diligence to fill the void.
George knew he was up to the task, and hoped he was worthy of it; after all, he was the great-grandson of Sir John Cavendish, from whom the dukes of Devonshire and Newcastle were descended. He had a keen sense of adventure, and a desire to see and be acquainted with men of honour and authority. What better way to accomplish this than to serve the cardinal?
And now, here he was, just returned from the court of France, where he had made the acquaintance of King François himself, to present to his own king the news that the cardinal was returned from the continent and requesting an audience with His Majesty. Heady brew indeed for a young man who a mere three months earlier had been clerking for the king’s counting house!
Wolsey, perched astride his mule, fatigued as he had never been before from his long hours in the saddle, coughed at the dry dust in which Cavendish’s abrupt departure had left him. As the sound of the galloping hooves died away, he became aware once more of the small sounds of horses nickering, the jingling of the small bells some placed on their harnesses, and wagons creaking. He looked up into the steely gray sky, darkening now, and saw a crow wheeling overhead. Suddenly the bird let out a jagged cry, piercing the quiet stillness of the gathering dusk. Wolsey smiled wryly to himself. The circling crow was a bad omen, some would say. But omens, bad or good, could not change the fact that he had failed in his mission, and was returning to his king, for the first time in his life, empty-handed. What would Henry say? What would he do?
Wolsey went over again in his wretched mind the events of a summer wasted, spent in vain, at his own expense and to his great discomfort, trying to gain for his king his heart’s desire. With what high hopes had he departed in July for France! But his cavalcade had not even left the streets of Westminster before angry crowds of shouting hecklers had descended upon him. “We want no Nan Bullen!” they had cried. “God save Good Queen Katharine!” What did they think, the imbeciles? That he wanted Anne Boleyn and her pernicious relatives slithering into place beside the king, poisoning Henry’s mind against him while he was away on the king’s business? And what in God’s name could he do about it if Henry decided to take a new mistress, except be as displeased himself as the very folk who were railing at him?
It was not until he reached the continent that reports of Henry’s true intentions reached him. At first he simply could not believe it. But dispatch after dispatch from his network of informants arrived with the same disquieting news. It seemed that if he, Wolsey, should be successful in freeing the king from his matrimonial bonds, it would not be in order to marry the Princess Renée, but to marry Tom Boleyn’s daughter. It was incredible!
At first, and fairly enough, the people had blamed Wolsey for the king’s decision to set the queen aside. All knew his Francophile tendencies; such made him a natural enemy of a Spanish queen. But a French marriage, they reasoned, would not be good for trade with the Netherlands, so vital to England’s wool trade. Were the Netherlands not ruled by the Emperor Charles, Queen Katharine’s own nephew? The people desired that English policy maintain a good rapport with the emperor to prevent their profitable trade from being disturbed. But soon even the thickest skulls had absorbed the fact that the fault for this calamity could not lie with Wolsey. If the king intended to marry not a French princess but the daughter of a common upstart, it must be of his own accord. But this was cold comfort to Wolsey, who realized that he must now work to place on the throne a girl whose engagement he had once ruined, and who must surely harbor some resentment against him.
Salt was rubbed into Wolsey’s wounded heart when he realized that François already knew about Henry’s plan to marry Anne Boleyn. So much for the king’s “Secret Matter”! It was a good thing that he had been disabused of his notion that Henry still meant to marry the Princess Renée before he had had his first interview with the French king, or what a fool he would have seemed!
And was it so surprising that François had taken with equanimity the news of the transfer of Henry’s affections to a common English maid from François’ own royal sister-in-law? Wolsey knew what was in the French king’s mind; if his brother of England wanted to foment disquiet throughout his own realm in order to set his royal queen aside to marry a commoner, François was nothing loath. Let Henry go to the devil his own way, as long as he went!
Still, François had politely refused, as he would have done in any case, to support Wolsey’s idea of sending French troops into Rome to free the pope from the clutches of the Imperial army, in order to further Henry’s cause. The French king had his little sons to think of after all, who were still held hostage in Madrid by the Emperor Charles. François had, however, agreed to allow Wolsey to create, with his French cardinals, a papal regency in Avignon, as long as Pope Clement agreed. But that was as far as he was willing to go, regardless of whom the king of England decided to marry.
Wolsey had tried valiantly to effect his plan to make himself regent for the captive pope, which would have left him free to give Henry his annulment without the possibility of appeal on the queen’s part. But suddenly, all his grandiose plans had fallen apart. Few of the other cardinals were supportive of his venture, and Clement refused to sign the document Wolsey had drafted, turning papal power over to the English cardinal during his captivity.
The final blow came when Wolsey was informed that Henry had deliberately gone around him and appealed directly to the pope for his freedom. Again and again he asked himself, how could Henry have treated him thus? With that act, the king had pulled the rug out from under Wolsey’s feet and undermined his power and reputation immeasurably. And such an amateurish move! Henry had asked the pope to annul his marriage to Katharine, grant him a dispensation to marry Anne Boleyn, to whom he was related in the first degree of affinity by virtue of having slept with her sister Mary, and if Clement was not willing to grant Henry his annulment, would the pope please give him a dispensation allowing him to commit bigamy? It was ludicrous! And all done without so much as a by-your-leave from his own English Cardinal! What in God’s name could Henry be thinking?
But it was not so much an issue of what Henry was thinking as where the thoughts were coming from. Henry was not thinking with his head, but with his heart. Wolsey grunted his disgust; perhaps the king’s thoughts came forth from even lower down. And all the while he had been gone from the court on the king’s business, Thomas Boleyn, now Viscount Rochford, and Thomas Howard, the powerful Duke of Norfolk, had been crouched behind Henry’s shoulders whispering poison into his ears; poison against Wolsey! He was convinced that this dirty trick of appealing straight to the pope smacked of their influence.
And what of the influence on the king of the lady herself? Wolsey had been a churchman most of his life, but he had once loved a woman and fathered children by her. He knew that when a man was hot for a wench, and he was denied her, that he would go to almost any lengths to gain her bed. And so it was with Anne Boleyn. What witchery, he wondered, did that woman possess to so enthrall the king? To his eye she was not even comely, let alone beautiful. She was swarthy and sallow, with raven-black hair. Preferring fair, plump females himself, Wolsey found Anne’s face and body too angular for prettiness; and her bosom was not much raised. So what was it the king saw in her that had him in such a frenzy?
His musings were interrupted by their arrival at the palace. It was full dark when Wolsey rode into the palace grounds, exhausted and caked with dust. Cavendish was waiting to escort him to his audience with the king. As he stepped into the well-lighted alcove, he noticed that Cavendish looked exceedingly pale, but that small red patches burned high on each of his cheeks. He was twisting his cap in his hands as if he sought to strangle it.
“What ails you?” asked Wolsey.
“I…” Cavendish already thought of himself as one diplomat serving another; how he handled his anger was a true test of that assumption. He must inform Wolsey of what had transpired. But how to do it gently, and prepare his master for what was to come? For it was his duty to do so. “Your Eminence,” he said softly, “I was admitted to the king’s presence only after a lengthy delay. When I enquired of His Grace where Your Eminence was to meet him upon your arrival, Mistress Boleyn answered for him.”
Wolsey, taken aback, replied, “M-Mistress Boleyn? Answered for the king?”
“Yes, Your Eminence. The lady was at his side when the king received me, and she said to me, before the king could answer my question, that where else should you come, except to where the king is?”
Wolsey blanched. It was an insufferable insolence for anyone to answer for the king unless specifically directed to do so. Queen Katharine would never have taken such a liberty. “And the king’s reaction?”
“He…he laughed, Your Eminence, and chucked the lady under the chin.”
So Henry had allowed Anne to take rude liberties in front of a stranger, and by appearing to condone her behavior had insulted Wolsey’s servant. The implication was clear; an insult to Wolsey’s servant was tantamount to an insult to Wolsey himself. And Henry had let her do that!
This was dark news indeed. Wolsey thought back to the black crow that had circled over his head on the road to Richmond. It had indeed been a bad omen. Already the night crow was perched on the king’s shoulder, whispering against him. For how long would she be able to retain her hold on him? Could he himself hold out that long? Suddenly he felt drained, worn out, wearier than he had felt yet.
Greenwich Palace, December 1527
As Katharine looked into Henry’s eyes, she thought that she had never seen such a look of implacable hatred in them. That the look should be directed at her was doubly disturbing.
Suddenly a memory flashed through her mind of her sister Joanna, whom she had last seen so many years ago. She remembered her sister pacing the cold room at Windsor Castle on the night before her departure to Spain with her husband Philip in 1506, her hair and eyes wild in her anger. Joanna had loved Philip with a fierce, passionate abandon; but because of his infidelities, her hatred of him was every bit as deep as her frustrated love. In the end, that love, and the untimely death of its object, had driven her sister mad.
Katharine sighed. It seemed as if there were no hatred quite as intense as one that sprang from an erstwhile passionate love. But she knew herself to be a practical woman, schooled to patience by the long years she had waited for her liberation, either by Henry, by her father or by death, after Arthur died. She had learned from that experience, and from her warrior mother, Queen Isabella, that patience could defeat even the most determined foe. And so she would be patient. She must make no fuss, but simply agree, cheerfully if possible, with her husband’s wishes.
But what was so wrong with wanting to spend Christmas with one’s family? And her family consisted of her husband Henry and her daughter Mary. Why must Henry put her in a position where she must choose between them? Yet that was exactly what he was doing. He had steadfastly refused to allow Mary to come to court for the revels.
“She is to have her own Christmas court,” Henry said. “Complete with her own Lord of Misrule and Morris dancers. Mary is growing up and must learn to oversee such entertainments. She must learn to manage her own court.”
That was true enough as far as it went; but Katharine knew that there was more to it than that. His next words proved it. “If you wish to see Mary for Christmas,” he said, “I shall not prevent you. You have my leave to go to her.”
And it was with these words that she had seen the seething hatred shining from his eyes. She knew that he wanted her away, and Mary was the bait. He wished Anne, queen now in all but name, to preside over his Christmas court. But if she, Katharine, relinquished her position at court by Henry’s side, when would she be allowed to return? Would she ever be allowed to return? Henry was waiting for her answer; very well then, she thought, he should have it. But it would not be the one he wanted.
Katharine looked into the spiteful eyes of her husband, smiled and said sweetly, “You are right, of course. Mary must learn to hold court as the queen she will become, as I shall do here. I shall stay.” That had stung him; she saw the angry retort rise to his lips, and observed his struggle to hold it back. So it was to be a war of wills between them, and no doubt.
Henry regarded his wife coldly. How, he asked himself, could she remain so calm in the face of such opposition? So Anne had been right. Anne had predicted that Katharine would not leave her place as his queen by the king’s side, not even to spend Christmas with her beloved daughter. How on earth could she have known?
His hand went unconsciously to his chest, where Anne’s New Year gift was pinned to his doublet. She had given him three precious gifts before she left the court to go home to Hever, anticipating Katharine’s decision to stay at court for the holiday. His beloved was right; the two women could not both be at court for the revels. Such a situation would be intolerable for everyone. And so now he must endure yet another miserable holiday without his little love. It was so unfair! It was his yearning for Anne that had caused him to look at Katharine with such loathing; as he fingered Anne’s gift, the feeling intensified. An overwhelming desire to lash out, to wound, engulfed him.
Suddenly he shouted at Katharine, “Margaret has been granted her divorce, and soon I shall be granted mine! Do you hear? Your days as queen, Madam, are numbered, so enjoy them while you can!”
Katharine’s eyes went wide with disbelief. “M-Margaret? Divorced, you say?”
“Yes, that fool of a pope has granted my sister her heart’s desire! She is divorced on the grounds of Angus’ precontract with his mistress, whom he will now marry, I suppose! And now Margaret, slut that she is, will marry Henry Stewart, with whom she has been committing the vilest adultery all this time! Is everyone to have their own way but I?”
Katharine was too shocked to reply. Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scotland, divorced and on her way to a third husband! Unbelievable!
“Harlot! Whore! Shameless wanton!” cried Henry, stamping up and down and dashing his bejeweled cap to the floor. “She has sinned most grievously by abandoning Angus, who is her lawful husband! She can have no other husband by the law of God! Her behavior resounds openly to her extreme reproach! She has transformed into a person governed by her fleshly lusts, and has lost all sense of nobility and wisdom! She will burn in hell for her adultery, and the men in Rome who have abetted her in this wicked behavior deserve to burn with her!”
Katharine stared at her husband open-mouthed. Never had she heard him utter such a stream of vile invective against anyone. That he should do so, aiming his words at his own sister and an anointed queen, shocked and appalled her. Then a thought struck her so suddenly that she almost laughed out loud, and had to struggle to hold herself in check. If she laughed now, it would be an hysterical laugh, one that she might not be able to control.
