by Deryn Lake
Carew shot him a hasty look, sure that the King was bluffing. By leaving the banquet and not succumbing to his advances — a technique used so many times by Anne Boleyn in the past — Henry had felt himself challenged. Mentally Sir Nicholas Carew rubbed his hands together and made a conscious note to contact Edward Seymour as quickly as possible.
‘That would be most kind of Your Grace,’ he said aloud, tongue firmly planted within cheek. ‘I believe she is a virtuous girl — or so her brother says — and many consider this essential in a wife.’
‘Yes,’ Henry answered thoughtfully. ‘Provided that it is not carried to excess, of course.’
The King’s thought process was crystal clear. It was said by those who knew that he had lusted after Anne Boleyn when she had first come to the English court from France at the age of fifteen. It had been ten years before that lust was finally satisfied; ten years in which Henry had put aside a Pope and a Queen in order to finally possess his idée fixe.
Nicholas Carew smiled grimly. He had been an intimate of both Henry and Katharine since the reign began. It had been he who had thrust his short muscular body into disguise to dance in the Queen’s bedchamber during the Christmas celebrations of 1514 while Henry’s partner had been Elizabeth Blount, a nubile fifteen-year-old from Shropshire. Three years later the girl was to bear Henry’s only living son, the bastard Henry Fitzroy, and Katharine had had to bear the humiliation of the King showing the baby off at Court and weeping tears of joy. Nicholas had been there, and Nicholas had suffered with the Queen, muttering into his beard as Elizabeth — now married off to Gilbert Tailboys so that the child could have a nominal father — had walked about almost purring. He wondered now if this had been the moment when an intense loyalty to Katharine had been born, or whether his feelings sprang from resentment at the Boleyn’s all-powerful hold on the King.
‘… Nick?’ Henry was speaking.
‘I’m sorry Your Grace? My thoughts were elsewhere.’
‘I asked if Mistress Mouse could sing.’
‘Mistress Mouse? Oh, Jane. Yes, I believe so. Not very well I think, but she certainly makes an effort.’
‘I must teach her one of my songs before I leave Wolff Hall,’ said Henry smiling, and Nicholas realised that the King’s extraordinary mood of joviality was returning.
With his thoughts starting to race and the fervent wish that Edward Seymour was present and not stuck away in Hampshire, Nicholas Carew, Master of Horse to Henry VIII, yet loyal supporter of Queen Katharine and her daughter Mary, bowed his head and said, ‘I am sure that Mistress Seymour would be only too delighted with that and any other favour that Your Grace might wish to bestow on her.’
And both men were smiling as they turned their horses towards Wolff Hall and cantered off through the gentle afternoon.
*
The shadows of evening lengthened the gold-dust day and crept into the great hall until the light was soft as iris flowers. Dame Margery, seeing the beauty of it, ordered that not too many candles should be lit, and so there was a mellowness about the whole room when Jane Seymour, later than she thought she would be, joined the banquet at which the King was already seated.
Though apologising greatly, this night there was a serenity about her and she was not covered in blushing confusion as her mother had feared. Nor did Jane falter as she took her place on Henry’s left hand and, looking at her closely, Dame Margery saw that her daughter had taken so much trouble with her appearance that a tremulous confidence had been born in her and was, for the moment at least, holding sway.
Jane had dressed in blue — a colour that enhanced her eyes — and wore a French hood set well back on her head so that her hair, the colour of lilac blossom in the deceptive light, draped her face. It was Anne Boleyn who had first lengthened her eyes by clever painting and now Dame Margery saw that Jane had emulated her and had both darkened and lined her lashes. She had also laboured over her face, for her cheeks had lost their normal pallor and were pink as fruit, while her lips shone as if she had just kissed a rose.
‘You look charming, Jane,’ the King murmured, his voice a trifle thick.
Carew watched and saw to his relief that instead of casting her lashes down, Jane fluttered them as she said, ‘Your Grace is kind to flatter your humble subject.’
This, then, was the pattern for the evening: the King noticeably complimentary and attentive; Jane smiling a great deal and using her eyes to such good effect that they seemed to pick up something of the sparkle of Sir John’s finest plate and reflect the brilliance of the candlelight.
And when all the eating was done and the King once again entertained the company with a song of his own composing, it seemed natural enough that Jane should join in. It was as Nicholas Carew had said: her voice was light and of little consequence, a far cry indeed from the accomplished performances of Anne Boleyn, but the sound was true and bright and Henry seemed well pleased, applauding loudly and kissing her hand for her endeavour.
It was as he was thus stooped that he said quietly, ‘I would like some air before I retire, Jane, and I have not yet seen the gardens of Wolff Hall. Would you stroll with me before you leave for Topenham Lodge?’
She looked at him closely, for a moment losing her new-found confidence and suspecting that he was mocking her again. But she could see by the expression on his broad face that he really meant what he said.
‘If that is what Your Grace wishes, then I am his to command,’ she answered demurely, thinking all the while that Meg had been right: that the King of England could be blinded into believing a woman beautiful if she was clever enough. Her old wish on Merlin’s Mound flashed through her mind: ‘To marry a King even though I am the ugliest girl in the world.’ Jane could not help a smile crossing her features and, unknown to her, the transformation that turned her from a cygnet to a swan took place.
Henry Tudor stood up. ‘Dame Margery, Sir John,’ he said. ‘I feel the need of some gentle exercise to help me sleep and your daughter has agreed to show me your gardens. Let the company remain and listen to the music but I will take my leave of you for a while.’
A sea of astonished faces stared at him and then the entire assembly lurched to its feet as he walked purposefully from the hall, Jane’s hand resting lightly on his arm.
‘Good gracious!’ said Dame Margery so loudly that her husband let out an equally audible, ‘Ssh.’
Under cover of everyone reseating themselves, Sir John continued, ‘Think little of it, my dear. It was always His Grace’s custom to stroll in the gardens before retiring for the night.’
‘Yes, but John, with Jane alone? Do you not think he has taken some sort of fancy to her?’ asked her mother frantically.
‘No I don’t,’ answered Sir John roundly. ‘She is far too plain for him.’
‘How could you!’ exclaimed Dame Margery but her husband was not listening. Looking round the assembled courtiers to gauge their reaction, he was horrified to see Sir Nicholas Carew look straight at him and slowly wink one of his eyes.
‘God a’mercy,’ said Sir John.
But knowing nothing of the sensation they had caused, Henry and Jane were already walking towards the Young Lady’s Garden and appreciatively sniffing its wafting night scents, while a thrush who had sung to welcome the day’s end now added a few notes into the dusk.
‘Paradise,’ said the King, the part of him that wrote love songs and was capable of such passion as he had once given Anne Boleyn, filling him with sentiment.
‘This garden was made for me when I was born,’ said Jane. ‘I was the first girl, you see.’
‘Where are your sisters now?’
‘Both married and gone. Though Bess will be here on the last night of your visit to pay her respects, as will my brother, Edward.’
‘How well I like your family,’ said Henry very slowly. ‘And you, Jane, are its most precious jewel.’
She turned away from him and he saw to his amazement that the girl looked near to tears.
‘What is it?’ he said. ‘What have I done to offend you?’
‘How can I speak frankly?’ she answered wretchedly. ‘You are my sovereign lord.’
‘But I am also a man, Jane. Please tell me what is wrong.’
She looked at him, then, and had a vision of Henry Tudor that would never leave her. She saw him as an eager boy in a huge man’s body; a boy who had been misled by a scheming and wicked woman, and dragged into a net which had forced him to commit ruthless deeds in an effort to extricate himself. At that moment Jane Seymour knew that it would not take a great deal to stir the passion that lay just below her apparently austere surface and make her fall in love with the colossus who towered over her in every sense.
She decided to tell the truth. ‘Because of my looks — or lack of them — I have a fear that men deride me. And I have it now about you, Your Grace.’
‘How could you?’ he said almost angrily. ‘It is not my way to trifle with women’ — that this was patently untrue did not occur to Jane, who felt more afraid than anything else — ‘and I most certainly would not do so with my host’s daughter.’
‘Forgive me, Your Grace,’ Jane answered, truly in tears now. ‘I spoke out of turn. I think perhaps I had better go indoors.’
‘As you will,’ said Henry Tudor, ‘but I would prefer that you stayed with me.’
Just for a moment Jane hesitated and in that was lost. Her future was sealed and the whole course of her life altered as she brushed at her eyes and said, ‘Then in that case I will stay, Your Grace,’ and the King of England took her hand in his and together they walked in the gardens of Wolff Hall until the moon rose.
Chapter Five
It had long been said in the Seymour household that Savernake Forest held within its acreage places so dense and dark that if a man were to injure himself and not be able to crawl to safety, he might well be dead before any search party could find him. Further, it was rumoured that in its secret heart the forest had glades in which no mortal man had ever set foot, and — though this came from Old Will and, therefore, could not be trusted — hidden right away at the place where the trees grew densest of all, was a house inhabited entirely by dwarves.
‘Have you seen it?’ the Seymour children would ask him when they were still young: and he would answer ‘Aye, just the once. And sitting on the doorstep and rocking a babby no bigger than my thumb, was a little woman scarce three feet high.’
Though forbidden by Sir John, who well knew the dangers of the woodlands of his wardenship, Edward, Henry and Thomas had gone looking for it. But though they had found nothing, they had happened on a remote clearing, completely hidden by trees, the ceiling of which was formed by interweaving branches and the carpet, lush grass. They had called it the Cave because of its mysterious green darkness, and had never taken their sisters or cousin there, so that it had remained a place for young men alone, where they could have secret meetings far away from curious eyes and eavesdroppers.
The quiet of the Cave was difficult to comprehend and to speak in loud tones while hidden in its leafy secrecy was impossible. So small wonder that the two men concealed there presently, murmured to one another, even though there was not another soul within a mile who could have overheard them.
‘You are quite sure of this?’ whispered Edward, his brilliant eyes wide with astonishment as he gazed at Nicholas Carew.
‘I am positive — and I tell you, Ned, I am not alone in this. There is not one person in the hunting party who has not noticed it.’
Edward paused, one hand stroking the neat, dark beard which grew beneath his full and sensuous mouth. ‘Tell me again, slowly,’ he said.
‘I thought at first it was a charade,’ Nicholas answered, plucking a blade of grass and squeezing its juice between his teeth. ‘Then I realised it was more than that. That the King must have been absorbing what I said about Jane’s character and consequently took a genuine fancy to her. Now it has reached the point where he walks with her alone in the garden each evening.’
‘God’s head!’ Edward’s clenched fist punched the air. ‘Is he trifling with her?’
‘Who can tell? That he is tired of the Boleyn woman we all know, but Anne could yet redeem her position by bearing a son.’
‘So he is dallying with Jane.’
‘If he is he must be stopped,’ Carew said emphatically. ‘If Jane lets him tumble her his interest will end. We saw it before with the Night-Crow. Bluntly, the moment the King had had her, he lost interest.’
‘There’s little fear of that,’ Edward answered, laughing a little. ‘My sister is prim as a nun.’
Nicholas looked noncommittal. ‘That’s as may be. But many a high-minded woman has been dazzled by power. No, Jane’s path is clear. She must prize her virtue above all else.’
‘But what for?’ asked Edward in exasperation. ‘His Grace is married and his wife is pregnant. Why should Jane bother to play politics?’
A sly expression crossed Carew’s face. ‘His Grace was married when he met Anne Boleyn. Who could have envisaged how that would end? I’ll swear it only needs the birth of another girl for him to put her aside.’
Edward frowned. ‘I cannot see it myself. I know he is hag-ridden but the King is only too aware that if he divorces the Queen he must take Katharine back.’
Nicholas nodded. ‘Very true. But he is a wily fox and a determined one. He cannot be stopped when there’s a pretty woman involved.’
‘But Jane isn’t pretty,’ said Edward, perplexed.
‘But Henry thinks she is and there’s an end to it. Before long we must get her on one side and coach her in the role of favourite.’
Her brother still looked unconvinced. ‘I cannot believe she has such a role, despite all you’ve said.’
Carew turned on him a face suddenly ruthless. ‘Then we must make sure that she gets it. Someone in sympathy with Katharine and poor Mary must obtain the King’s ear. Otherwise their future is bleak.’
‘I’ll not have my sister used as a catspaw,’ Edward said vehemently.
‘That she won’t be,’ answered Nicholas. ‘On the contrary, I think she might play for the highest stakes of all.’
Edward stared at him wide-eyed. ‘Is there a chance?’
‘If the game is played correctly,’ said Nicholas Carew slowly, ‘there’s the greatest chance in the world.’
The two men gazed at each other in silence before they threaded their horses through the labyrinth of trees and by separate paths made their way back to Wolff Hall.
*
From her place beside the King, Dame Margery stared round the Great Barn triumphantly. Tonight, before all her neighbours and family, she felt that she had earned the honour of the most successful hostess in Wiltshire for who, looking at the decorated barn glowing with candlelight and transformed by rich-hued tapestries, could think anything else?
If the first night of the visit had been memorable, it paled in comparison with this grand ending. For in honour of the hunting party, now swelled by the Darrels of Littlecote, the Dowager Lady Hungerford, Master Wroughton, Edward Seymour, Cloverella, Bess and her husband Sir Henry Oughtred, to say nothing of all their retainers, a banquet of Roman proportions had been served.
For the assembled company, numbering some hundred in all, Dame Margery had chosen a table of two freshly killed beefs, twelve muttons, to say nothing of incidentals like cygnets, a variety of capons — some good, some coarse and some fine Kentish — and a selection of pullets, chickens, quails, egrets, swans and storks, these last presented cooked and sewn back into their plumage. For those of lighter appetite she had also produced a shield of brawn, pheasants, partridges and a delicacy of peachicks, snipe, larks, brewes and fifteen stuffed gulls (some nestling on black cherries, some hidden beneath crisp dark crusts).
Beer and ale had been served and also Gascon wine, sweet wine, and spiced wine, and to freshen the palate at the end of the meal there were doucettys, spiced tarts, frittours, blancmanges and
vast glistening puddings nestling beside uncompromising pies of mammoth proportions. A repast fit for a King, and a King who nobody present could remember ever seeing in a better humour or, for those who were casting eyes on him for the first time, could fail to like and honour.
On this most important night of all, everyone present wore their finest clothes though Henry seemed to have eyes for nobody other than Jane, dressed in a gown of deepest blue, a French hood with sparkling billiments on her head. In view of the King’s attentions, Edward, whilst scarcely crediting half of what Nicholas Carew had told him, had to admit that Henry paid his sister a great deal of court, the huge face with its little eyes constantly turning in her direction, almost to the exclusion of Dame Margery.
Not that Mother cares, thought Edward with amusement. Tonight she has scored before all her women friends and neighbours. She is a credit to us all.
He looked at Dame Margery fondly, smiling at the way her plump form bulged in the square neck of her gown, making her breasts high and round as full moons.
And why not? They fed all us children, he thought, unfashionable as it had been at the time. Edward could remember her now, sitting in her garden, constantly with a suckling babe, a comforting sight somehow.
He felt a momentary sense of disappointment that his wife had chosen not to feed their children and had had her breasts bound after the recent delivery of their second daughter — a fact which had kept Anne away from this evening’s celebration and allowed a smiling Cloverella to go in her place.
Edward’s thoughts ran on to the child that the Queen was now carrying and whether it would be a boy — and her saviour — or whether she was to be as disappointed as his wife had been.
And where does Jane stand in all this? he thought. What part can she possibly play? She is no cheap whore like Madge Shelton — or Katherine Filliol.
He rarely thought of his first wife nowadays but still found himself shuddering at her memory. To think he had discovered her infidelity by seeing the very act of adultery performed through the medium of a crystal ball, just for a moment allowed a glimpse of something taking place hundreds of miles distant. He would not have believed it possible, having a hearty disrespect for the supernatural until that moment. But nowadays Edward admitted freely there were forces at work of which he knew nothing, and at that moment came to a decision to seek mystic advice regarding his sister.