Boleyn Traitor, page 5
She looks back at him intently and she rises to her feet to reply to his toast, but he does not sit down, so as everyone else subsides, the two of them are left standing as if they are alone. She raises her cup to him then throws off her drink with an upraised arm so that her sleeve slides back to give him a forbidden glimpse of the crook of her elbow and the hidden pale flesh of her rounded upper arm. She smiles at the king, a long smile, sweet as a promise, and she sits down again, among the maidens, as modest as a primrose.
The court is stunned into silence, it is the end of the dinner. I wish to God it were the end of the day, but we all have to ride home together. George and I sweep Anne into her litter and ride beside her, ahead of everyone, so she cannot see the king, lingering behind with Agnes. She draws the curtains, and we ride on either side in stony silence.
When we are nearly home, we hear the king canter up behind us with Francis Bryan and Charles Brandon on either side, and I give up my place so that he can ride beside Anne’s litter. I mutter quickly: ‘The king!’ so she knows he’s there, but she does not draw back the curtain to greet him.
‘I think the queen is sleeping,’ George volunteers to explain the silence and the drawn curtains.
The king chuckles; he is still drunk. ‘We’ll let sleeping dogs lie, shall we?’
Charles Brandon laughs out loud. ‘Sleeping bitches bite.’
Anne tears the curtain open, and Charles Brandon bows his head and turns his horse to one side.
‘Are you tired, my lady?’ the king says, with the careful politeness of a drunk husband.
She shoots him a furious look and says nothing in reply. George drops back to give them some privacy; but everyone can see Anne’s hand gripping the silk curtain against the gold-leaf frame and hear her low-voiced stream of complaints.
‘Stop her,’ George says to me.
‘You stop her,’ I reply, for we both know I cannot push my way between the king and the litter, and anyway, the grooms have pulled the mules to a halt, and the whole court can hear the king’s furious bellow.
‘Madam, I tell you this, and I will only tell you once. You will shut your eyes and endure, as your betters have done—’
I look around to see the blank horror on Anne’s mother’s face.
‘Betters,’ I repeat in a whisper.
Anne spits a venomous reply; but the king raises his voice and goes on: ‘You should know …’ He is drunk, but his speech is clear; they will hear every word even at the very back. ‘You should know that it is in my power to humble you again, in a moment – in a moment! Just as I have raised you.’
She does not meet his bulging-eyed stare. She looks straight ahead, white-faced. The king gives a harsh, wild laugh and beckons his men friends to follow him, and they take off past the litter at a gallop back to the palace. The beautiful French mules harnessed to the litter shift restlessly and rock Anne in her seat.
George tips his head to me to stay with Anne as he puts his heels on his horse and thunders after the king. Their mother, Elizabeth Boleyn, comes up on the other side of the litter but says nothing. We ride back to the palace in silence, the dust from the king’s gallop settling on the silver white curtains.
Anne gets out as soon as the litter halts before the wide front doors, and she and her mother go inside while I am dismounting from my horse. Slowly, I follow them to the queen’s rooms, the ladies-in-waiting ahead of me. For a moment, I hesitate, remembering all the times I have gone through this door to hear someone reading from the Bible or the buzz of laughing conversation and Queen Katherine presiding over a peaceful busy room. Now, I walk into a frosty privy chamber, the ladies sulking after a scold.
Elizabeth Somerset nods her head towards the bedchamber. ‘You’re to go in. We’re all in disgrace. I don’t know why. It’s not as if it’s our fault!’
In the bedchamber, George is leaning on the mantelpiece; the fire is out. Anne’s mother has made her escape to her own rooms through the king’s door. Anne is in the window seat, still in her red-velvet riding dress, glaring down into the garden below.
I close the door and wait.
‘You saw what he did,’ she says tightly. ‘You heard him rage at me.’
‘You’ll make up,’ I say. ‘You always rage and make up.’
‘We will. But that’s the last toast he’ll drink to her.’
I glance at George; his beautiful face is stony, sculpted like the limestone fireplace.
‘Tell Agnes to go,’ Anne orders. ‘Tell her that she can’t stay at court.’
I hesitate. ‘Better not today,’ I say. ‘Not after that scene. Better to leave it, when she can leave quietly?’
‘No,’ George says decisively. ‘As an example for others. You can bed the king but not advise him. You don’t put words in his mouth. We do that: only us. She’s to leave – not because she’s his flirt but because she’s told him that Katherine of Aragon was a better woman than Anne. Because he said that Anne should put up with what had been done to her betters.’
Anne spits an oath and looks out of the window.
‘The duke, our uncle, wants her gone,’ I confirm.
‘So, what are you waiting for?’ George asks me with forced cheer. ‘Go to it! Cast off, my falcon!’
‘It’s my command,’ Anne rules.
I WALK INTO THE sullen privy chamber. ‘Where’s Agnes?’ I ask one of the maids-of-honour.
‘Changing her dress,’ she says. ‘The king has sent her some beautiful sleeves. They were on her bed when she came in.’ She simpers. ‘With a poem! He’s written her a love song!’
I enter the bedroom that Agnes shares with the other maids-of-honour without knocking. Three girls, cooing over a handwritten page, drop it as they see me, and whisk out of the door. Agnes stands by her bed with the new sleeves spread before her. I pick them up and fold them over my arm; she makes a tiny movement as if to snatch them back, and then she holds herself still.
‘I warned you,’ I say kindly, for she looks like a frightened child, standing by her bed. ‘I warned you, but you have continued to behave—’
‘The king!’ she whispers.
‘The king’s behaviour is beyond comment. He is the king. You serve the queen, and it is her good opinion you should be seeking. You have lost that. So, you have lost your place. You should write to your parents to take you from court at once.’
‘The Marquess of Exeter assured my father and mother that I should have a place in the queen’s rooms.’
Fool that she is: she has revealed her patron is Henry Courtenay Marquess of Exeter, Gertrude’s husband, of the old royal family, leader of the Spanish party. A novice spy, she has confirmed that they brought her to court and placed her into the queen’s rooms in the hopes of stealing the king from Anne. They must be delighted with her progress. The king has never spoken to Anne like this before, never told her to endure as her betters had done: he never thought that there was anyone better than Anne! This is not a lovers’ tiff; it is a masterstroke against us. The Poles, the Courtenays, all the royal cousins and kin know that the king has to be surrounded by the best – the best jousters, the best dancers, the best poets, the most beautiful women. A second son himself, he cannot tolerate second place in anything. They know this, they have known him from childhood. Agnes, their mouth to his ear, has suggested Anne is second best. With them writing her lines she is a real danger to us. She has to go.
‘That was kind of the Marquess of Exeter; but the queen has a right to choose her own household. You are not suitable. So, pack your belongings and leave. Her Grace does not want to see you again.’
She opens her mouth to speak, but she has nothing to say. She hesitates, stammers; she suddenly looks much younger, as if she is about to cry.
‘I will take these,’ I say, showing her the beautifully embroidered sleeves in my arms. Her eyes linger on the luminous mother-of-pearl buttons, on the rich silk slashing. ‘They came to you by accident. The king intended them for the queen. It will be better – far better for you – if I tell her that. But I shall see that you are invited back to court within a year or two. You can come back then, and no one will know that I ordered you to go.’
‘You order!’ she finds the courage to say, with a little quaver in her voice. ‘Who are you to give orders to me?’
‘I am a Howard,’ I say simply. ‘His Grace, Thomas Howard the Duke of Norfolk is head of my house, and the queen is my sister-in-law. Who are you to question me?’
She gives a sulky little curtsey. ‘I’ll return the sleeves to the royal wardrobe myself,’ she says.
It is her surrender, and I give them to her and go out of the room, closing the door behind me. As I walk through the presence chamber, I hear the sound of her running feet and a little breathless sob. She is looking for a friend to have a good cry and rail against me, and someone to take a letter to her parents, and someone to take the sleeves back to the royal wardrobe.
We are rid of her. My work – my spiteful courtier work – is done.
HALF AN HOUR later, the king stalks into the queen’s presence chamber, ignoring all of us ladies-in-waiting, though we are dressed to perfection and waiting for him. He tells Anne he will speak with her privately.
Her face lights up; she thinks he has come for a passionate quarrel and reconciliation, as they used to do. She leads the way into her privy chamber and closes the door on us. She thinks she will fly at him and slap his face, and he will grab at her and kiss her into submission. Perhaps they will whirl from anger to lust, from privy chamber to bedchamber, and we will all be late to dinner.
But she is wrong. She is the queen now; the days of fighting and lovemaking are gone.
I stand close to the privy-chamber door to prevent anyone eavesdropping, and I hear the low heated mutter of the king’s banked-down rage and the quick staccato reply of Anne denying whatever he is saying.
Then he says one thing loudly: ‘If she is causing this much trouble between us, then she must go.’
The door jerks open, and he comes out to the presence chamber.
I think: at any rate, we have won. He has named Agnes as trouble and insisted that she must go. But at that very moment, from the gallery end of the presence chamber, the king’s friends stroll in, merry as ever, George among them, and – to my utter amazement – on George’s arm is Agnes – not tear-stained and shamed; but rosy and chattering, smiling as if she walks into court every day with my husband at her side … and she is wearing the new sleeves.
Anne Parr, one of the ladies, touches my hand and says: ‘The queen wants you.’
I cannot tear my eyes from Agnes’ triumph. ‘What?’
‘The queen. In her privy chamber.’
I curtsey to the king; but he does not see me. George does not acknowledge me. Suddenly, I am invisible; everyone is smiling at Agnes, who is spreading her arms and pirouetting to show off her new sleeves.
I go into the privy chamber, and Anne is bleached white with rage.
‘Agnes just walked in,’ I tell her. ‘On George’s arm. In the new sleeves.’
‘The king says she’s to stay at court,’ she says, through gritted teeth. ‘He says you’re not to torment her. He says that if you cause this much trouble, you are to go.’
I can hardly hear her. ‘I?’
George opens the door and closes it quickly behind him. ‘Get out there,’ he says to Anne. ‘Go quick – don’t give her another moment to show off. And smile: for God’s sake, look as if it’s nothing to you. It was a catfight between your ladies: Jane and Agnes. Nothing to do with you at all.’
‘After what he said to me at the hunt?’
‘Because of that!’ George says urgently. ‘You must be more queenly than ever. She’s nothing beside you – a passing fancy. Put her out of his head. Shine her down. You can do it! You’ve always done it before. He has to forget that he said he raised you from nothing; he has to forget that he said Katherine was your better. We make it a petty quarrel between two women. It’s not about him seeing you for real: it’s Jane. It’s Jane’s fault. It’s Jane being a scold and bullying Agnes.’
‘It’s not!’ I find my voice. ‘Agnes knows I was obeying Anne’s order, and she’ll have told the king.’
‘Anne’ll deny it,’ George says briskly. He gently pinches her cheeks to bring the colour to them, and then he kisses her swiftly on the lips to give her courage and pushes her towards the door. ‘Go on,’ he says. ‘I’ll come as soon as I’ve got Jane out of the way.’
She raises her chin and sets her shoulders back. She breathes in, like an actor preparing to walk on a stage, and she goes without another glance at me.
‘Out of the way?’ I demand. ‘What d’you mean?’
‘My love – you’ve got to take the blame for quarrelling with Agnes.’
‘There was no quarrel! How could there be a quarrel between a maid-of-honour and the senior lady-in-waiting? I dismissed her, as you told me to! The duke told me to! Anne told me to! I didn’t loosen the saddle girth and kill the girl! I’ve done far less than Anne wanted! I’m not taking the blame for this.’
‘You are,’ he says shortly. ‘Agnes stays at court, and you retire. The king says he won’t have you causing trouble.’ He throws up his hand to stop me arguing. ‘I know! We know! These are Courtenay’s words in His Majesty’s mouth. But better for us all if you just go. We’ll get you back within weeks, and Courtenay will be sorry he put up a girl against us. Of course. But you’ve got to leave tonight. I’ve got your horse saddled and a guard ready to ride with you.’
‘But I did it for Anne!’ I protest. ‘For you! For the Boleyns! For the Howards! You can’t repay me by throwing the blame on me.’
‘We don’t blame you,’ he says quickly. ‘We love you as always. It’s just a setback. The Spanish party win this round: we’ll win the king back.’
‘I want to see the duke.’
‘He’ll be at dinner.’
‘I won’t go without seeing him.’
George sighs. ‘Don’t get upset. Go and change into your travelling clothes. I’ll ask His Grace to meet you in the stable-yard.’
Thomas Howard the Duke of Norfolk will intervene for me. He will invite me to stay at his great London house at Lambeth for a few days while it all blows over. He has as much influence as the Courtenays. He is my patron; I am under the shield of his name; he loves me. He trusted my word against his own wife.
I tumble my books and my jewel case into a little box. I tell the man at the door of our chambers to carry it down to the stable-yard and put it in the cart with the rest of my things; but this is packing for show: pretend goods into a pretend box, like a play. I am not really leaving. I change into my riding gown, and I pull on my hat and cape, and then I run down the stairs and into the stable-yard, where the Boleyn guard is mounted and waiting, and my horse saddled and ready. I try to smile at my waiting maid. ‘We’re going nowhere,’ I tell her, and then Thomas Howard the Duke of Norfolk comes out of one of the doors from the king’s side of the palace, and I know I am safe.
‘You ordered Agnes Trent from court?’ he asks, with no preamble, his face more hawklike than ever.
‘As you told me.’
‘The girl went straight to Courtenay and complained of you, and he went to the king.’
‘But you will intervene for me,’ I say.
He shrugs; his black eyes are set deep, the eyelids drooping down. ‘Anne won’t defend you; your own husband doesn’t speak up for you. Why should I?’
‘Because I’ve worked for you since I was a girl!’ I exclaim. ‘You’re my patron! You’re promised to me – and I to you. Who will serve you when I’m gone? Who will be your eyes and ears in the queen’s rooms?’
He laughs with genuine amusement. ‘Oh, don’t you worry about that. There’s Mary Shelton, or my sister, or my daughter Mary; there’s half a dozen Howards in the queen’s rooms, and half a dozen more I could buy with pennies. But you – you’re too visible now – you’re of no use to me.’
‘You said you would protect me! You promised me …’ I am as shocked as a child.
‘You were my spy,’ he concedes. ‘And if you had been born in the sex of that handsome fool your husband, I would have made you into a great diplomat, an ambassador – far better than him. If you had the allure of your sister-in-law Anne, you’d have made a better queen than her – far better. But you’re just a very pretty, over-educated young woman, Jane. There’s nothing for you to do at court but quarrel with other pretty girls.’
‘You know it was not a quarrel! You know it was not pretty girls quarrelling!’
He turns away as if he is leaving. I have to make him turn back. ‘I know something about your half-brother Thom,’ I hiss. ‘He has proposed to Margaret Douglas, the king’s niece. They say they will marry in secret.’
He pauses and nods. ‘Not much of a secret – I knew that.’
‘I know more,’ I gabble. ‘Something about Anne. Something serious!’
He waits.
‘The king isn’t potent with her! He’s lost desire.’
He is silent for a moment. ‘That’s a great secret – a grave secret, and it’s a disaster for Anne – but who can tell it? Anything that detracts from the majesty of the king is treason. You’re a traitor to even say it. I did not hear it. Go to the country, Jane, and study silence.’ He turns on his heel and leaves me, as if there is nothing more to be said, as if he will never speak to me again.
I am stunned. I let him go without a word of complaint.
