by Karen Harper
“Wrong? I do not understand, Sire.” Surely, she thought, he refers to his dead son and blames Anne for that.
“How does your son, Mary?” he said calmly as though he had read her thoughts of sons.
Which son of mine? she wanted to ask impudently, but she knew which one and would not risk his wrath on that. “He is a fine student at Lincoln’s Court, Your Grace. He is tall and a good athlete. He is nearly sixteen and one half, Sire.”
“I know how old the lad is, madam. They say,” he said, leaning forward to watch her face closely, “that he has red hair.”
“It is somewhat reddish, Sire, with auburn touches, much as Will Carey’s, you remember.”
“I do remember, golden Mary. I remember much, including that your father has implied off and on that the lad was not Will Carey’s child. I trust him not, so I will have it once and for all from your lovely lips, madam. Was the boy Will Carey’s son indeed? Will Carey was no fine athlete and not so clever either, and if the boy has those traits...well, I would have you tell me the truth.”
She fought to control her voice and face. This was the moment that could save or condemn Harry. Father would be forever grateful if she would only tearfully vow to her king that the child was his. Then the Boleyns might sit more secure in the dangerous saddle of the king’s volatile affections. Then a birthright to money and power would be assured, especially now that the ailing Fitzroy was so desperately ill.
“I would certainly have told Your Grace if the child was yours. I would have told you long ago, for the boy’s sake and yours, Sire.” She held her breath and stared deep into his eyes. She must convince him now, before he somehow cast the Boleyns adrift forever and kept her son to please his own vanity and passion for a live and healthy son as he had done long ago with poor Bessie Blount’s boy. If he ever guessed the lad could as easily be his as Will’s and that only Staff knew that truth, he might throw caution to the winds and keep Harry as his own.
“That is as I thought,” he said finally. “I tried once to reckon it back to see if we had bedded then, and we had. But I was much about with others then and Carey was home those months, and, too, you would have told me.”
“Yes, Sire. I was with Will and you were much about with others then.”
“I will not have your recriminations, though you were always more sweet and understanding than your sister. Her recriminations are unending.”
“I meant no recrimination, Sire.”
“And now you have another son by Stafford?”
“Yes. Andrew,” she offered in the empty silence.
“Why were you not the Boleyn who held out, Mary, instead of that sour and bitter sister of yours? Well, what is past is well past. You were well worth the bargain before all these—these complications set in.” He rose, and in one step towered over her and pulled her to her feet, trapped between him and the table and her chair.
He placed his huge hands on either side of her head and stared down at her alarmed face. “You will bear no sons for Henry Tudor, Mary, but some lovely lass shall, as sweet and fair as yourself. Take that rebel husband of yours and be gone on the morrow, for I do not want you about the queen and her people. You will thank me later for that. Go and hide your pretty head at Colchester and bear him sons, but do not forget that once you belonged to your king.” His face was almost touching hers and his hot breath smelled of cloves and mace. “Go from this room now or I shall take my first sweet revenge on the Boleyns in a way I had never dreamed. Sweet, sweet revenge. But, then, I have no quarrel with your Lord Stafford.” Still he held her head in a vise-like grip, staring down at her, his mouth poised inches from hers.
“Please, Your Grace.”
“Yes, go on before I force you to that bed and we relive our first night together here, so long ago. Do you remember?” He bent to kiss her lips, but she wrenched away and backed off in a half curtsey.
“As you ordered, Sire, I shall be going.” Her voice sounded choked and she wobbled on her legs. Still facing him, she pulled the door latch. “I shall remember you to Lord Stafford,” she heard herself say. “He will always be your loyal servant even as I shall.”
He stood staring at her, somehow suspended between anger and awe. She tried to force a smile but could not. Gripping her purse strings in her cramped fingers, she turned in the hall and saw George and Staff hurrying toward her, far down the corridor. Ignoring the anxious faces of Weston and Norris, she walked unsteadily toward Staff.
Though she and Staff had decided they could not gainsay the king to stay beyond the next day, they went with Anne and her entourage to the joust the next morning planning to leave directly from the tiltfields on their awaiting and packed horses. Norris and George were to be part of the joust, as was the king. They were settled in their seats only a moment when one of Anne’s servants elbowed through the press of people and whispered something in the queen’s ear. Anne’s face went stark white, and she motioned Weston to her side. Mary sat next to the queen and Staff was on his wife’s other side, so Mary could hear the desperate words clearly.
“It is of Smeaton, Your Grace, as you had asked,” the girl whispered, her wild eyes darting to Mary’s face behind the queen’s.
“Yes, Joan. Did they find him? Where has the rogue been?”
“He went to Master Cromwell’s to dine yesterday after Cromwell returned with your sister. Then Smeaton disappeared.”
“Mark Smeaton was asked to dine at Cromwell’s?” Anne’s hand grasped the girl’s wrist in a cruel grip. “There is more! Tell me the rest!”
The girl’s face turned pouty and she began to whimper. “Stop that and tell me, or I will have you thrown under the horses!” Anne hissed at her. “And keep your voice down.”
“Cromwell’s men took the poor boy to The Tower late at night. A guard was bribed to admit that Cromwell was questionin’ the poor boy under torture, Your Grace.”
“Torture? Sweet, gentle Smeaton? Thinking he will tell them what? Oh, go on! Be gone and hold your tongue.” Weston looked almost green with fear. Anne turned to Mary’s wide-eyed stare and saw that Staff had heard too. “Did you mark that? Cromwell is desperate indeed if he has to hurt my little lutenist to get information of my supposed spying or plotting or whatever His Grace is so desperately trying to concoct. But a desperate Cromwell is dangerous, and bears close watching.”
The king sat encased in armor on his huge destrier at the end of the field, and Anne waved bravely to him as though they were the most intimate of lovers. He merely nodded and, as they turned to watch George in the first matchup, Mary’s eye caught her father, who had just seated himself behind them. He was so much older, older than the two years that had passed since she had last seen him.
“Do not gape so, Mary,” Thomas Boleyn chided low. “I am pleased to see you back with the family where you should be.” He raised himself slightly out of his seat to watch George’s first charge. “You and your country lord are a little late to help though. There is something dangerous afoot, Your Grace,” he said quietly, turning his face to the back of Anne’s head. “The king has ordered out a triple number of yeoman guards.”
“And that two-faced Janus, Cromwell, does me a favor one day and then kidnaps and tortures my musician the next. I shall have his head for this!”
“I think not, Anne,” their father replied. “I am afraid Cromwell has shown his true colors by all this, and he will help the Boleyns no more. I have sent for your Uncle Norfolk. We need a conference and quickly. Damn, I wish George were a better jouster, and I do not know what in hell’s gates is taking Norfolk so long to arrive!”
The stands cheered the victor who had defeated George Boleyn and the tired horses trotted off the field while the battered tilt rail was realigned. “I had heard the king ordered you and Stafford to be gone today, Mary. You could hardly expect him to welcome you with a big smile.”
“We are leaving, father, but Anne wished us to accompany her here as she ends her retirement.”
“I see. Then it is back to the country to desert her here to face God knows what in this wretched atmosphere.”
“I have urged them to go, father. They have a lovely home and a young child to return to. Leave Mary be!” Anne ordered sharply without turning her head.
Anne rose at the beginning of the next match, smiled and waved to the strangely subdued gallery. On a whim, she pulled a golden ribbon off her puffy satin sleeve and threw it to her champion, Henry Norris, who doffed his heavy silver helmet in mock salute. As he and Lord Wingfield plodded away to take up their position, the queen’s stands suddenly exploded with yeoman guards in their red doublets and hose brandishing their ceremonial axe-head pikes before them. Several ladies screamed in shock, and Staff pulled Mary back tight against him on the bench. Across the jousting field, Sir Anthony Wingfield had doffed his helmet and was staring mutely at Norris’s being surrounded by guards who swarmed onto the field. Still, beyond it all, Henry Tudor sat stockstill on his horse, staring at them all.
Anne stood and took her father’s proffered arm. “By what authority do you disturb the king’s games?” her voice rang out clear and strong.
Then their Uncle Norfolk elbowed his way through the guards and Mary breathed a tiny sigh of relief before Staff’s whispered words came terrifyingly clear in her ear. “That Judas!”
“Uncle, I am pleased to see you,” the queen was saying. “May I ask the cause of all this array of force?”
“I fear you are the cause, Your Grace, and some of those with whom you conspire.”
Anne’s sharp unbelieving laughter shredded the air and her father’s words came hard at Norfolk. “Look, man, this is a terrible scene. Does the king actually demand...”
“I am sorry, Thomas, Lord Boleyn, but here is the signed writ and order of arrest for the queen to be legally questioned concerning her crimes.”
Thomas Boleyn went white and looked as though he would double over in pain. “Crimes! Crimes! What crimes? Name them!”
“Not here, please, Lord Boleyn. The masses will know soon enough. Please come with us, Your Grace.”
“Come where, Uncle?”
“To the palace today and The Tower tomorrow. For questioning.” He handed the writ to the stunned Thomas Boleyn, and the pain was etched on his face for all to see. “I act not of my own desires, Your Grace, but the king commands. No, my lord, you shall not accompany her now. Her own answers are wanted.” Norfolk blocked Thomas Boleyn’s way with his gauntleted arm.
“May I go with my sister, then?” Mary heard herself ask, and she stood on Staff’s arm, ignoring his warning look.
“No, Lady Mary. You and Stafford had best hie yourself back to Colchester and be well out of it.” Norfolk nodded to Mary’s shocked face and then to the rows of guards who closed ranks to cut off the departing queen and Weston from the rest of the crowd.
“All will be well, dear sister. This is mere trumped-up foolishness, and you may write that down, uncle.” The queen’s mouth was curved in a derisive laugh, but her eyes were wide and wild. As she turned to go, her voice floated back to them, and all Mary could see of her now was the veil of the pearl-studded red headdress which graced her raven hair. The joust field was suddenly deserted and the king had disappeared. Fervently, Mary wished she would never see him again.
“There is nothing you can do here now, Mary,” Staff said low. “You will get on your horse with me now or I shall carry you? This way. Come on, sweetheart.”
But Mary looked back at her father’s incredulous, shattered face and hesitated. He raised his blank eyes to Stafford and then to Mary. “It says here,” he read, his voice suddenly old and quavering, “that the Queen of England, Anne Boleyn, is arrested for treason and adultery with Smeaton, her musician, and Lords Norris, Weston, and Brereton, and with her brother, George Boleyn, Viscount Rochford. Smeaton has already confessed and Jane Rochford has given sworn testimony of her husband with the queen.” His voice trailed off and Mary realized that she had screamed.
Instinctively, she reached for her father’s arm, but he recoiled, crumpled the document and threw it down. “Lies! Lies!” Tears made jagged tracks down his wrinkled face and his lip trembled.
Staff loosened his firm hold on Mary as she moved like a sleepwalker toward her father. The horror of what the paper said, her mind could not encompass yet. But her father was crushed and in pain, that she could feel deep inside. She put one hand on his shoulder, but he stared into vacancy as though she were not there.
“Father,” she said gently. “Father, I know you are thinking of all your dreams and of George and Anne. Go home to Hever and mother. They will comfort you.”
His eyes fastened on her tear-streaked face. “Leave with your husband, Mary,” he said as though exhausted. She could barely discern his words. “I am staying. The king has ordered it, but something must be done to save it all. Surely something can be done. I only have to think about it now.” He turned away, stooped, and her hand fell off his shoulder as he went. She fought the urge to chase after him and throw her arms around his thin neck, but Staff’s hands were on her again and he half-pulled, half-carried her down the far side of the gallery, gaily decked with Tudor white and green. He took her, unprotesting, through the gardens to the stableblock. It was only when he lifted her on Eden’s back and she turned to glance back at the palace that her calm became hysteria, and Staff had to carry her before him on Sanctuary until they reached the outskirts of London.
In a little inn on the edge of Lambeth, he held her on his lap and let her sob. While the grooms and Stephen hovered nervously with the horses in the street, he made her drink wine and eat fruit and cheese. “Can you ride, my love? If you do not think you can, Sanctuary can handle the extra weight until we reach Banstead.”
She turned her swollen eyes slowly to him. “Banstead?”
“Yes, lass. I can fetch our son from Wivenhoe after we make it to Hever. I want us far away from here and I do not care if we never see His Grace’s fine palaces again. Your mother has need of you and you of her. We can make it from Banstead to Hever by noon tomorrow.”
Mary nodded slowly. Her head hurt terribly, and she was certain she would be sick if she had to get on a horse. “I can make it to Banstead, my Staff. If you are near.”
“I will be near every step of the way, my love,” he comforted, his mouth pressed close in her hair.
What will happen to George and Anne? she wanted to ask him, but she was afraid he would tell her the truth and not what she so desperately wanted to hear.
“We are off to Banstead and Hever, then.” He swung her into his arms and strode for the door. “And never fear that our dreams will crash about us like that, my sweetheart. Our dreams are quite a different thing.”
She looked up dazedly into his worried face. Pain etched his forehead and wrinkled his firm brow.
“I shall remember that, my lord, no matter what befalls,” she said, and he shouldered open the inn door to put her on the waiting Eden’s back.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
February 5, 1536
Hever Castle
Hever stood cold and bare against the gray Kent sky as they approached. The ivy cloak of the castle was gone for winter and only the clinging tendrils of brown vines etched the walls. The forest’s trees stood stark and straight, and the eyelike windows reflected only the flatness of the threatening sky. Mary’s tears were long gone and a steely calm held her rigid on Eden’s back. She felt on the sharp edge of jagged screaming fits, but they never came. Surely all the terror and agony would dissolve when she saw mother’s face. If only she could pull herself awake from the smothering nightmare safe in her bed at Wivenhoe!
The horses’ hoofs echoed hollowly off the inner courtyard walls, and they drew to a halt in a ragged circle to dismount. Mary’s swollen eyes scanned the upper windows for a familiar face—of mother, or Semmonet, or a well-remembered servant. Then the central door under the proud Boleyn family crest opened and her mother rushed out dressed in velv
et black.
“Mary! Staff! I prayed you would come. Thank you, my lord, for bringing my Mary home.” She darted between Sanctuary and Eden. Her slender arms were tight about Mary, and the tears came flowing free from them both.
“You know, mother, you already know of Anne’s arrest,” was all Mary could manage as she pressed her cheek into her mother’s silvery hair. It began to snow tiny, random ice flakes, and Staff urged them both inside.
Semmonet stood bent and more crooked than ever, leaning on a carved staff at the entry, her face a mask of shocked agony. Mary embraced her tenderly then desperately, and the Boleyn women helped the old governess into the solar, as though she were one of the family, while Staff gave orders to his servants. The portrait of the king stared down unblinking on them all as they passed.
“Sit here, Semmonet. I am so pleased to see you on your feet. Mother had written that you keep much to your bed,” Mary said, amazed at her own small talk when all the eyes of the room were fastened hard on her.
“I only forced myself up today after the tragic message came from Lord Boleyn that the Queen was arrested yesterday. No one else was here who knows both our George and our dear Anne so well, and my Lady Elizabeth needed to talk.”
“Yes, of course, I see.” Mary sat on the arm of her mother’s chair and leaned into her with her arm around the fragile woman’s shoulders.
“You see, my children,” Elizabeth Boleyn began, holding up her hand for quiet as both Mary and Staff began to speak, “I have been awaiting some tragedy for years and years now, ever since I saw the king myself, and the king offered to make me his mistress—he was only Prince of Wales, then, you know—and when I refused because I was new wed and in love with my lord, the king was angry. Well, I could understand that, but when my Lord Thomas was even more angry with me...indeed, something inside me died, and I knew from then on the Bullens would live in danger. The king said so quietly, ‘I do not command, I only request,’ but I could see clearly what he meant and that to serve him was danger. But I never thought it could be this terrible. No, Staff, wait. I would say more.