Shadow of Persephone
Page 3
“Yes, Your Grace,” Henry and I said, bowing our heads.
“And the first thing we must do,” she said, her lip curling just as Joan’s had, “Is to get you some new clothes. It will not do for Howard children to scamper about in rags, like beggars.”
My cheeks flushed hot, and Henry’s cheekbones displayed the same humiliation.
We bobbed to pay homage again, and her eyes settled on me. “That first curtsey was inelegant,” she said. “You will practise tonight, fifty times before you sleep, and show me it again in the morning.”
My cheeks were fire. “Yes, Your Grace,” I said.
“Your father is a wastrel,” Agnes went on, ignoring the flames igniting in Henry’s eyes. “But here, you will learn how to act as nobles rather than vagabonds. Set aside your wretched past. The present begins here, today.”
Chapter Two
Chesworth House
May 1531
It is not my father’s fault he is a lord and cannot work for money, I thought, trying to appease my wounded pride as I left the chamber, racing once more behind Joan. But even as my mind tried to defend him, another part of me scoffed.
After our grandmother had insulted our father, she was done with us. She had other matters to attend to. Henry had departed with a manservant, and I was left to scurry after Joan. Through twisting, endless halls we walked until I felt dizzy and sick. Chesworth was a maze. As Joan walked and I scampered, I thought of my father.
“Ten children!” was the broken cry often heard emanating from Father’s rooms, as though all his children had appeared from nowhere simply to grant him trouble and expense. In truth, ten children was not unusual, many families had more.
He complained most about us girls, saying he had nothing to offer us as dowries and we were likely therefore to wed only scoundrels. That did not mean boys were not an encumbrance. Without good prospects, they might stay at home long past adulthood, draining our father’s purse.
And not all we children were his by blood. Born a Culpepper, my mother had become a Leigh before a Howard. She was married at twelve to her mother’s stepson, Ralph Leigh and John, Ralph, Isabella, Joyce and Margaret were my mother’s children from her first marriage. To my father she had presented another five, including me, and he had to provide for all of us, or so he complained. It was not actually true, but Father believed his woes worse than anyone’s. No one suffered more than him.
My half-brothers, John and Ralph, had left when I was very young. John to take on an estate inherited from his Leigh grandfather, and Ralph to train in the Inns of Court, financed by a trust also from the grandfather we did not share. Before Henry and I left home, Isabella had been married to Sir Edward Baynton, Joyce to John Stanney esquire, and Margaret to Henry Rice. My half-sisters left with barely a dowry to speak of, but their slim Howard connection was enough to interest merchants and lesser nobility hoping to hitch their fortunes to an ancient name.
As for full-blood, Charles had been sent to my uncle of Norfolk, and George to another uncle, Lord William of Effingham. The second Margaret of our family had married Sir Thomas Arundell some six years ago. Our younger sister, Mary, was still at our father’s house. One child was enough, Father said.
I had always tried to be proud, to love and respect him as children should their parents, but creeping thoughts came, whispering slights.
My father had been a page to King Henry VII, and a fine jouster in his day, often called upon to ride in the lists at court entertainments. Isabella had told us stories which our mother had told her. Sir Edmund Howard had been a star of the joust who rode like Saint George of old. Before pageants of castles, fountains streaming wine rather than water, and blushing damsels, our father had thundered by on his mighty charger, knocking challengers down like blades of wheat. When the old King had died, our father had ridden in jousts for the birth of Prince Henry, born to King Henry VIII and his new wife Katherine of Aragon.
“Father was then nineteen,” Isabella had said, her tone hushed with reverence. Although he was her stepfather, she had claimed Edmund Howard long ago as her true sire. “Father was a fine man, with shoulders broad and back straight, and a face so handsome all maids sighed with soft yearning. He led the defenders, aided by Sir Thomas Boleyn and the Duke of Suffolk. With the Queen and her ladies looking down upon them from a box decorated with cloth of gold on a forest of green velvet, they rode out and crowds screamed for them, wild with delight.”
Father won that day, and the next, and the next. All who jousted in that grand exhibition went on to become great men, promoted at court and loved by the King. All, that was, except our father.
“Why not Father?” I had asked, angry on his behalf.
“Because all other knights let the King win,” said Isabella. “Father did not. He beat the King, sent him crashing to the ground time after time. The King did not like that.”
Isabella had explained that other knights were dishonest flatterers who let the King win because he was the King, but Father would not do such a thing. And he had suffered for it.
The little Prince had died a month later, and two years after that, our father was not invited to go to France as the King tried to win back his ancient right to that throne by waging war. It was there Edward Howard, our father’s brother, had died in battle and Thomas Knyvet, husband to Aunt Muriel Howard had also died. Muriel had become lost to grief, dying in childbed four months after her husband’s death. Two more brothers, Henry and Charles, had died of natural causes not long after. Our father’s family had dropped, one by one, that fateful year.
“But,” Isabella said, “Whilst the King was away in France, nefarious Scotland took the opportunity to invade. Thinking England stripped of good knights, defenceless as a damsel, wicked Scots led by their King swarmed over the borders. They meant to take merry England and make her theirs.”
My eyes wide, I had listened as my sister told of how our brave father answered the desperate call of Queen Katherine. The Queen raised a great army, placing it under the command of our grandfather. They were short on supplies and had small time to muster, but still they marched to take on the Scots. At the Battle of Flodden our father had the right flank of the west side, a warlord commanding fifteen hundred men of Cheshire and Lancashire.
“Father was grievously attacked,” Isabella said. “More than eight thousand pikemen under the command of the Lord Chamberlain of Scotland came against his fifteen hundred. His standard bearer was killed…”
“What is that?” I asked, receiving a poke from Henry for my ignorance.
“The standard is the most important part of a battle,” he said. “It shows the arms and colours of the knight riding underneath. If taken, honour falls.”
“That is right, Henry,” Isabella said. ”And you should not interrupt, Catherine. It is not seemly.”
As Henry threw a triumphant glance at me, I swallowed my anger. Henry had also interrupted, and all I had wanted was to ask a question. But rules were different for boys. Boys were praised for being bold. Girls were supposed to be quiet, not draw attention to ourselves. When boys were naughty they were punished, but it was almost expected they would misbehave. In truth, if they did not it was seen as strange, leading fathers to fear they would grow up girlish. The expectations upon girls were different. Any infraction was punished severely.
“As our father’s standard fell,” Isabella continued, “so did the courage of his men. Many fled, abandoning him, but our father would not run. He was no coward. With a handful of guards, he fought on. Three times was he stricken to the ground, and each time he rose to fight on. Father was almost killed, but then cavalry arrived and told him the battle was won. On the field our father was knighted by his own father for courage.”
There was even a little song that had been created about our father:
And Edmund Howard’s lion bright,
Shall bear them bravely in the fight.
Sometimes, when things were bad, I sung it to myself.
Some said the King was annoyed. The Howards had outshone him in England as he sought glory in France. It was said he was still more irritated that after the battle English soldiers wore badges showing the white Howard lion devouring the red lion, Scotland’s emblem.
“For they knew it was by the Howards alone that England was delivered from ruin,” Isabella told us.
But the King hid his irritation. We Howards as a clan were lauded, but Father was not. Someone sent a letter to King Henry, telling him Father’s men had deserted their lord. It was the duty of each knight to control his men, and no matter the personal valour our father had shown he had failed in this. Isabella did not say anything, but I heard it from whispers in the servants’ hall. Our father’s flank had been the only one to suffer any defeat that day. All he got was a small pension, and that was suddenly cancelled after three years. He had fought with great courage, but it was results the King was looking for. At Flodden, Father risked all, and gained little.
“Although it redeemed the rest of ’em,” I had heard old Jack Cooper whisper to his friend over a pot of ale.
I had kept to the shadows as I listened to Jack telling his friend how my family had fought for the wrong king at Bosworth, the last battle of the Civil War, which had made the Tudors kings. Jack said my great-grandfather had fallen, and my grandfather had been locked away in the Tower of London for supporting King Richard III. We had fought on the wrong side, and had been punished. Our grandfather had redeemed himself at Flodden, our father had not. Grandfather Norfolk regained his father’s title after Flodden, and all Howards save my father, who did not know when to let his King win, basked in the glow of royal favour.
And favour it was, for Howards had gone on to win back the royal eye by quashing rebellions in the north and fighting for the King in France. My grandfather became Duke of Norfolk, and his son Thomas, Earl of Surrey. Thomas had married Anne of York, the sister of Queen Elizabeth. When Anne died, my uncle married Elizabeth Stafford, sister of the Duke of Buckingham. My grandmother, Elizabeth, had been godmother to the Princess Mary. Howards were rewarded with land and estates, their children sent to court to serve the royal household… but after jousting against the King, and winning, our father was favoured least.
Father had been permitted to escort Princess Mary Tudor, sister to the King, to France to marry Louis XII, but this trip had started him on the road to debt. He had been made a Justice of the Peace, and married my mother when he was forty. She was a wealthy widow from the line of King Edward I, so she was a fine match, but she brought along five children, draining our father’s resources. And that was not his only trouble.
Just after his marriage, Father had been hauled before the Star Chamber, facing accusations that when riots had erupted in his lands he had failed to put them down. He was accused of inciting riots by failing to keep order, and although no charges held, his reputation was damaged. His father had to step in to achieve a royal pardon. After that, his career stagnated and debts climbed. My mother’s properties were mortgaged, then mortgaged again, and child after child came. My mother’s father refused to loan him money, and cut my parents from his will.
By the time I was two, my father was lost in debt, mired so deep he could see no way out. He could not work for coin, so he borrowed more, sinking further every day.
I had watched as my father spiralled deeper and deeper into drink and self-pity. I had hidden with Henry when a man came to the door and our stepmother told us to hide in case he wanted money. I heard our servants talk. It was a poor thing to serve a master without sense or luck. It made them poorer, for my father could hardly afford to pay them, let alone send down treats. Maids got no cast-offs. The men got no presents, or money to save for their marriages. My father could give his children little, his household less.
Some thought the fairies had laid a curse upon him. Others believed he made ill luck on his own, through lack of sense, and too much pride. Father was arrogant, but easily wounded, for his name was his only asset and if anyone slighted him he took it for a challenge. He was not polished enough for court, not skilled enough for war. He could win trust, but not keep it, and was too obsessed with his own woes to think of others and gain friends. He wanted to be in the King’s inner circle, but had always been pushed to the fringes. He was unable to better himself for he was always thinking on what he had not. “He is a man,” old Jack said, “born with a great deal more than most, but in his own mind, never enough.”
“That’s the problem with rich folk,” Jack had continued, handing the pot of ale to his friend. “They think they are born in credit, the world owing them something. Rest of us know the world isn’t here to grant favours.”
Their anger made me bitter, their pity shamed me.
Isabella had tried to make it better, so had Dorothy. But she had only been wed to my father a year when she fell ill of a gripe in the belly and died two days later.
And then, a ray of hope. Our cousin Anne Boleyn, a woman so secure in the King’s affections that anything she wanted was granted without question, had sent word. She had a job for my father. He was to go to Calais and become Comptroller to the civic authorities.
“Old Ill-hap Howard has a new position,” I heard Jack tell his friend that afternoon, and blushed to hear the name. That was what they called my father when he could not hear them.
Eager to leave before he, or those who had guaranteed him loans, were arrested, our father had brought us to him, told us we were to leave and sent us to pack our bags.
“Your good cousin is an angel,” gushed Alice, one of our maids, as she helped me pack a small chest with three gowns, two pairs of shoes and my doll, Bess. “She came when you were first born, you know, mistress. Your mother was taken sick and your father…” she trailed off, offering me a knowing, pitying smile. “… well, he was unable to take care of the house. But Mistress Anne took charge.” She laughed. “Never saw I a woman with a more commanding air! She told us all what to do, called for a doctor and paid for him, and sat with your mother night after night until she was well.” Her face softened. “Some call her haughty and unnatural. But not me. She is a good woman. She made her father, who is not known for generosity, send money to yours, and left one of her own pieces of jewellery to pay for new clothes for you and the others.”
“And now she has found a position for my father,” I said, thinking with wonder on this generous, commanding cousin of mine. I had heard her name before, from behind doors. Some whispered with a note of scandal about her, some with respect.
“A good job, in keeping with his station,” said Alice. “Now all will be well. But I will miss you, my little mistress.”
She had taken me in her arms and told me all about my grandmother’s house and what a fine life I would have. There would be other children, perhaps not quite as young as me, but children nonetheless, who would be my friends. I would learn to be a great lady, for my grandmother was one already, and I would go to court and serve the Queen when I was older.
“And, if all they say is true,” she murmured into my hair. “It may be your cousin Anne will be the Queen you serve.”
We had left the next day.
My father, old Ill-hap, had never been a lucky man, and his poor fortune, for some reason granted by God, had fallen upon us. But no more, I thought as we rode through the countryside. We had a lucky charm. Her name was Anne Boleyn.
I wished I could remember her, this
cousin who had rescued my father and once drawn my mother from the arms of Death. I wished she could have been there when my mother had been ill the last time, for surely Anne could have saved both my mother and baby sister. But you should not be greedy! I thought. If Anne had not been able to rescue my mother, she had not forgotten my father. On the day we left, he had brought us to his chamber, where he stood washed and dressed like a gentleman for once. His cheeks, usually rough with black stubble, had been clean and pink. There had been only the faintest whiff of wine on his breath as he kissed us. He told us to be good, to make him proud, and that he loved us.
If he had ever said such a thing before, I do not remember it.
The name Anne Boleyn was sacred to me from that day onwards.
A pang of homesickness touched my heart as I thought of all this, but oddly at the same time I did not want to go home. I would miss Alice and some of the other servants, my sisters and brothers, but they were already gone. And soon our father would be gone too, to Calais and a better life.