Wolf Hall & Bring Up the Bodies - the RSC Stage Adaptation

by Mike Poulton

  KING HENRY. I must read it. Though I don’t want him near me. No one would want Bishop Gardiner in his house – not for long anyway.

  THOMAS. Sir, if I am to ride north at first light –

  KING HENRY. Go then… Godspeed.

  THOMAS leaves the chamber. WOLSEY’S GHOST is waiting for him.

  WOLSEY’S GHOST. If he wants a new wife, fix him one. I didn’t, and I’m dead.

  THOMAS. Are you? How can one tell?

  ACT TWO

  Scene Six

  Kimbolton. Outside KATHERINE OF ARAGON’s chamber.

  THOMAS. Wait here, Christophe.

  CHRISTOPHE. Be careful, master, the city wives say this Katherine put a curse on Anne Boleyn so she won’t have a boy – or if she does it won’t be the King’s.

  THOMAS. Whose will it be then?

  CHRISTOPHE. Anne cuckolds the King to pay him back – she means to put a bastard on his throne just to spite him – because he has other women. She chases him with a pair of shears shouting she’ll geld him –

  THOMAS. Londoners say anything –

  CHRISTOPHE. The gentlemen of the Privy Chamber do her one after another – they stand in line frigging their members till she shouts ‘Next!’

  THOMAS. Then things must have slipped a bit since Queen Katherine’s day.

  THOMAS goes in to KATHERINE, who is sick, sitting by a good fire, swaddled in an ermine cape.

  KATHERINE. Well, Cromwell – how am I looking? I’ve not seen myself in the mirror these many months. (Laughs.) The King once thought me beautiful – like an angel… How is his concubine? I hear she’s always on her knees… Praying to her reformed God?

  THOMAS. She’s much admired by her scholars and bishops.

  KATHERINE. They are using her. True churchmen would shrink from her in horror. She prays for a son. She lost the last child – I know how that is… I pity her.

  THOMAS. She has hopes of another.

  KATHERINE. While Henry has hopes of another woman, I hear? The concubine will be looking at her ladies, wondering ‘Is it you, madam? Or you – or you?’ Women like her – untrustworthy themselves – are blind when placing their own trust. They say when she’s crossed she carps like a common scold. A queen – well she calls herself a queen – must learn to live and suffer under the world’s eye. No woman is above her but the Queen of Heaven – she can have no companionship in her troubles. If she suffers, she must suffer alone – and she needs a special grace to bear it. Boleyn’s daughter has not received that grace –

  THOMAS. You’re in pain –

  KATHERINE. Yes – it’s nothing… The King’s Gentlemen will swear they’ll lay down their lives for her – they once offered me the same devotion – because I was the King’s wife. It had nothing – nothing – to do with my person. But she takes devotion as a tribute to her own charms. Foolishness… (Pause.) I want to see my daughter before I die.

  THOMAS. Were it in my power, madam, I…

  KATHERINE. What harm can it do?

  THOMAS. The King is advised that if he permits Mary to make the journey, she might take shipping for the territories of her cousin the Emperor –

  KATHERINE. And come riding back with a foreign husband at her side, an Imperial army at her back, and chase him out of his kingdom? You can assure Henry, our daughter has no such intention. I will answer for her with my life.

  THOMAS. Your life?

  KATHERINE. I wish my death might do him some good. When it comes, I hope to meet it in such a way as to set Henry an example when the time comes for his own.

  THOMAS. Do you often think about the King’s death?

  KATHERINE. I think often about his afterlife. I pray for him.

  THOMAS. So you work for the good of his soul? Why then do you obstruct him? If you had entered a convent and allowed him to remarry, he would never have broken with Rome. Henry was a faithful son of the Church. You drove him to this extremity. The Defender of the Faith threatened with excommunication? You, not he, split Christendom. But I expect you often think about that too? In the darkness – silence of the night –

  KATHERINE. You are… contemptible! (A long look.) You amuse yourself at the expense of a dying woman? A state such as mine usually buys kindness.

  THOMAS. I wish to be kind but you’ll not see it. Madam, put your own will aside for the sake of your daughter – reconcile with the King. If you leave this world at odds with him, blame will be visited on her. Mary is young – she has a life to live –

  KATHERINE. I know the King. He’ll not harm Princess Mary. (Silence.)

  THOMAS. He might permit her to visit you. If you’d advise her to be conformable to his will – and recognise him – as now she does not – as Head of the Church –

  KATHERINE. No! In that matter the Princess Mary must consult her own conscience… (Studies him.) Do not pity me, Cromwell. I have been preparing for death a long time.

  THOMAS. Is Mary also ready to die?

  KATHERINE. She has meditated upon Christ’s Passion since she was an infant in the nursery. She’ll be ready when He calls.

  THOMAS. You are unnatural. What parent would risk her child’s death?

  KATHERINE. What mother would risk her daughter’s soul?

  THOMAS. For the love of God – advise Mary to obey the King!

  KATHERINE. The Princess Mary. (She is exhausted.) I have often wondered, Master Cromwell… You know many languages – fluent in so many tongues – and you lie as fleetly in all of them. In what language do you confess?

  THOMAS. God knows our hearts, madam. I may need forgiveness – I do not need absolution.

  Scene Seven

  Going to KING HENRY, EUSTACHE CHAPUYS intercepts

  THOMAS.

  THOMAS. Ambassador Chapuys?

  CHAPUYS. The King won’t see me.

  THOMAS. Well, if he’s with the Queen –

  CHAPUYS. Queen! Ha! I understand nothing of your benighted country. Is Cranmer Pope here? Or is the King? Perhaps the Pope is you? One thing I know – I hear few voices raised in prayer for the concubine, and plenty calling upon God to bless Katherine, the rightful Queen. (Confidentially.) They say she’s sick.

  THOMAS. Ambassador. (Strides off, leaving CHAPUYS standing.)

  CHAPUYS. Cremuel! Come back! Come to supper.

  THOMAS (calling). No – you come to me. The food’s better.

  He goes in. KING HENRY and ANNE are at a table with BUILDERS and ARTISTS, happily working together on plans for another new palace. ANNE ignores him.

  (To KING HENRY.) Majesty. Katherine is sick. Her doctors say she’ll soon be in her grave –

  ANNE. She’d come out of it – flapping in her shroud – if she saw her chance to thwart me!

  KING HENRY. Sweetheart –

  ANNE. We should bring her bastard Mary here – make her, on her knees, beg pardon for her treasonous obstinacy, and acknowledge my daughter – my daughter – England’s only heir!

  THOMAS. Building again, are we, sir?

  KING HENRY (guiltily). See for yourself. (Pushing plans across the table.) I’m thinking of a new palace in the French manner –

  ANNE. A deer park – fountains –

  THOMAS. It would cost a great deal –

  ANNE. Cost, expense – that’s all Cromwell ever thinks about.

  THOMAS. I need money for –

  ANNE. For what?

  THOMAS. Gunpowder – fortifications along the south coast – for when the Emperor comes over.

  ANNE. Pah! He won’t come here if we make allies of the French.

  THOMAS. Or if he hears we’re fortifying our seaports, and laying in great supplies of gunpowder.

  ANNE sulks.

  KING HENRY. Sweetheart… (Raises his eyes at THOMAS.) Can Katherine die? What use is life to her now? Sure – she must be tired of contention. God knows I am! Better to join the saints and holy martyrs –

  ANNE. She’s kept them waiting long enough. (False laugh.)

  KING HENRY. She’s forever forgiving m
e. It is she who needs forgiveness. For her blighted womb.

  THOMAS bows out. JANE ROCHFORD, MARY SHELTON, and ELIZABETH, LADY WORCESTER are in playful mood and waiting for him.

  JANE ROCHFORD. Bishop Gardiner is furious?

  THOMAS. Oh, that’s old news –

  JANE ROCHFORD. What have you done to him this time?

  THOMAS. The King is sending him back to Paris as ambassador. Stephen will be away from Court for many months. Now tell me about Anne. Is she or isn’t she?

  JANE ROCHFORD. Ah! Has she said nothing?

  THOMAS. I must know! Tell me plainly – is she with child? Lady Worcester – I’m sure you know?

  LADY WORCESTER. Some people would give a great deal for the information.

  THOMAS. I’ll give you…

  LADY WORCESTER. What? What will you give me?

  THOMAS. An almond tart.

  LADY WORCESTER. Not enough.

  THOMAS. Oh, very well… Two almond tarts. Will you tell me?

  LADY WORCESTER (takes his hand and whispers in his ear). No.

  THOMAS. Mary Shelton, then – be kind to me?

  JANE ROCHFORD. Shelton knows. She’s had to let out her bodices.

  MARY SHELTON dissolves in giggles.

  THOMAS. She’s pregnant then?

  MARY SHELTON. Mmmm.

  THOMAS. Sure?

  MARY SHELTON. That much. (Holding her finger and thumb an inch apart.)

  LADY WORCESTER. Hardly unexpected – she was with the King most of the summer.

  JANE ROCHFORD. And when she wasn’t with the King she was with Harry Norris.

  LADY WORCESTER. Shhhh! (Laughs – gives her a dig to shut her up.)

  JANE ROCHFORD. What did I say? Only that when the King wasn’t with her, Norris was. Carrying Henry’s love letters. Where’s the harm in that?

  THOMAS (laughing). Lady Rochford, if somebody said to you, ‘It’s going to rain,’ you’d turn it into a conspiracy.

  He hurries away. RAFE falls in with him.

  Scene Eight

  THOMAS. We need Edward Seymour, Rafe – and his father. There’s not a moment to be lost.

  RAFE. Something’s happening? (Exit.)

  THOMAS. Something’s happening.

  KING HENRY crosses the stage in conversation with JANE SEYMOUR. EDWARD and SIR JOHN materialise around THOMAS.

  SIR JOHN. Where’s my daughter – where’s Jane?

  THOMAS. Walking in the garden with the King.

  SIR JOHN. But there’s nothing to see in the garden? It’s winter.

  THOMAS. How shall I put this, Sir John? (Hesitates.) The King wants a new woman in his bed. He’ll not touch Anne until she’s given birth – he dare not.

  EDWARD. This is Jane’s chance, Father.

  SIR JOHN. But why Jane? What can he see in her? Though if she’s to start earning her keep at last… Good!

  EDWARD. How best may this be managed?

  THOMAS. Henry has made his choice. Now Jane must keep her distance. If Anne catches Henry looking at Jane I’m afraid her sufferings will increase. The Queen won’t sit idly by while her husband makes a… a companion of another woman.

  SIR JOHN. Oh, it will be nothing – only a pinch or a slap – Jane knows how to bear herself patiently. Look what those two chits Mary and Anne did for the Boleyns! They were in trade, you know – look at them now – the father’s Earl of Wiltshire – and all the jewels young George wears – he jangles as he walks. His Majesty had to make Anne Boleyn a Marquise before she let him have her.

  EDWARD. And you know what he made her next, Father.

  SIR JOHN. What? What did he make her?

  EDWARD. He made her Queen.

  SIR JOHN. Oh… yes.

  JANE SEYMOUR enters suddenly.

  EDWARD. What has the King said to you, sister?

  JANE SEYMOUR. He asked me to be his good mistress.

  THOMAS. He said ‘good mistress’ not ‘mistress’? You’re sure?

  SIR JOHN. Is there a difference?

  THOMAS. ‘Mistress’ would have been a summons to his bed. ‘Good mistress’ means he’s offering a chaste and prolonged courtship –

  SIR JOHN. Not too prolonged or Anne will farrow and Jane will have missed her chance.

  JANE SEYMOUR. He asked me if I would look kindly on him.

  EDWARD. ‘Kindly’?

  JANE SEYMOUR. For instance, if he wrote poems – praising my beauty – I said I wouldn’t laugh at them – even behind my hand.

  SIR JOHN. I don’t understand –

  JANE SEYMOUR. Nor find fault – even if he exaggerates. In poems it’s usual to exaggerate.

  EDWARD. But if he attempts anything on your person, you must scream.

  JANE SEYMOUR. What if nobody comes?

  THOMAS. Don’t scream, Jane. Pray aloud to the Blessed Virgin – something that will appeal to His Majesty’s piety – his sense of honour.

  JANE SEYMOUR. Have you a prayer book on your person, Master Secretary? Father? No – I thought not.

  EDWARD (grimly). Here’s mine.

  JANE SEYMOUR. I’m sure I’ll find something to put the fear of God in him. I thought, when you sent for me, Master Cromwell, I was to be married at last to your sweet son Gregory. Or to you.

  THOMAS. I’m too old for you, Jane – I could be your father.

  JANE SEYMOUR. Could you? I’d no idea. My mother’s never mentioned it. Well, stranger things happen at Wolf Hall…

  She goes.

  EDWARD. I’ll never understand why the King would want Jane in his bed.

  SIR JOHN. Why would anybody? It would be like kissing a stone – the very thought numbs my parts with cold.

  EDWARD. No one who calls himself a Christian should imagine his daughter or his sister in a man’s embrace.

  SIR JOHN. No indeed… Oho! Though they say that George Boleyn –

  EDWARD. Father!

  THOMAS. Let us be clear. Presents – the rule is simple – jewellery ‘yes’, money ‘no’. And till the deal is done she mustn’t take off any item of clothing in Henry’s presence. (Pause.) Not even her gloves.

  Scene Nine

  Westminster.

  Christmas. Snow. THOMAS listening to the children and choristers of the chapel rehearse. The choir begins a joyful anthem. KING HENRY creeps up.

  KING HENRY. Cromwell. (Wretched.) What day is this?

  THOMAS. St Lucy’s day, Majesty – the shortest of the year.

  KING HENRY. My spirits are low.

  THOMAS. Well, Christmas is almost upon us.

  KING HENRY. Market price of Berkshire wool?

  THOMAS. Seven shilling the sack, and rising, sir.

  KING HENRY. Who founded the monastery at Hexham?

  THOMAS. St Wilfred… Majesty?

  KING HENRY. Something terrible has occurred. Anne’s little dog is dead. Her ladies could not face telling her – I had to do it myself. I think it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.

  ANNE’s chamber. JANE ROCHFORD comes out.

  JANE ROCHFORD. She’s a sorry sight – blubbing – she’s cried her eyes to mean little slits. When she miscarried her child, she never shed a tear.

  He goes in to ANNE.

  ANNE. Cremuel? Out! Out! (Dismisses her LADIES with angry, crow-scaring gestures.) They found him… down there in the courtyard. The window was open above. (Sobs.) Who would do such a thing?

  THOMAS. It was an accident. Surely.

  ANNE. No! It was done to frighten me. (Wipes away tears with her knuckles.) There’s bad news from Kimbolton.

  THOMAS offers a handkerchief.

  Katherine could linger on another six months. And the French never meant to make a marriage with Elizabeth. No! They offer a match for their Dauphin with Henry’s Spanish bastard. It’s as if I don’t exist – as if my daughter had never been born – as if Katherine were still Queen. Well, I shall be revenged on Lady Mary.

  THOMAS. What will you do?

  ANNE. Marry her off – to someone of no consequence. Or disgrace h
er. You’ve handsome boys in your household, Cromwell. Loose them to her. Flatter her. The sad little wretch has never had a compliment in her life. She’s eighteen now. She wants boys – to write her verses – to flutter their eyes at her – to sigh when she enters a room. (Illustrates the sigh.) How do I know this? Because I was once as foolish as any other girl. (A hard, dry laugh.)

  THOMAS. The King will kill any man who goes near her.

  ANNE. They’ve no need to bed her. Just make a fool of her – in public. I wish to destroy her pious reputation.

  THOMAS. No. That is not my aim.

  ANNE. Your aim?

  THOMAS. Those are not my methods.

  ANNE. You refuse me? You think you’re grown so great you no longer need me? I know you’re talking to the Seymours – Ha! You thought it a secret? I’ll make you sorry. Nothing is secret from me – nothing! What does Jane Seymour have but her maidenhead? What use is a maidenhead the morning after? Queen of his Heart – then just another drab who can’t keep her skirt down. She has neither looks nor wit – she won’t hold Henry a week! (Laughs.)

  THOMAS (gentle and genuine). Let me advise you. Keep yourself in quietness until your son is born. Strife and contention can mark a child even before it sees the light. You say Jane won’t hold your husband a week? Then pretend you don’t see her. Turn your head from sights that are not for you.

  ANNE. And I advise you, Cremuel. Make terms with me before my son is born.

  THOMAS (wanting reconciliation). Things were once happier between us, madam –

  ANNE. Henry will never abandon me. He will not turn his back on the great and marvellous work I have done in this realm – my work for the Gospel. And he’ll never again bend his knee to Rome. Since I was crowned I have made a new England – an England that cannot subsist without me.

  THOMAS. If there is anything I can do for you, tell me, and I will do it. (Studies her for a moment.) But do not threaten me, madam. Do not threaten me.