The Heretic’s Wife

by Brenda Rickman Vantrease

  Tears welled in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks, large drops of water, like great jewels. He’d once seen a Flanders portrait decorated with such tears.

  He could not look at her but concentrated his gaze instead on the figure of the dying Christ hanging above her head.

  “Wherein, my lord, have I ever played false to you or failed to serve England?” Her voice was husky with the tears yet to flow. “Have you forgotten the triumph at Flodden against the Scots, how proud you said you were when from the war camps there I sent you the Scottish king’s plaid tunic stained with his own blood? Does not such a wife, such a queen, deserve better? Wherein have I ever been aught but a loving and loyal queen?”

  She was right, of course, except in one regard. He sometimes wondered if her loyalty to Spain was not greater than her loyalty to England. Ferdinand could not have a better spy in England’s court. But he did not say that. He had no proof.

  She sniffed, and he noticed how her shoulders stiffened, though her head was still bowed, as though she willed herself to courage. “The pope will never annul this marriage. He will not make a bastard of our daughter,” she said. “If my husband will not preserve my honor, God will. You have fallen under some evil spell. God will bring you back to me or you will lose your throne. It has been prophesied. Our daughter will reign within months if you take Anne Boleyn to wife.”

  “Where did you hear such treasonous talk?”

  “My ministers have told it to me. The Virgin has revealed it to the Holy Maid of Kent.”

  He sighed, trying to be patient. The woman was not reasonable. “If God had blessed our union,” he said as gently as he could, “we would have had a male child. I am a king by divine right. To deny me a male heir means God has not blessed this union. We lived in sin for eighteen years, and I told you last year: I will do it no longer, with the pope’s annulment or not.”

  She looked up at him then, her tearstained face stricken with grief, but there was another emotion there as well. In her large eyes—Spanish cow eyes, he’d called them, playfully at first when there was still some vestige of harmony between them, before he’d found comfort in other eyes—he saw a steel as hard as the metal in his sword. It was a king’s voice that decreed, “Not the pope, not you, not your father, and certainly not your Holy Roman Emperor nephew will make me persist in this sin one day longer, Katherine. You are my widowed sister-in-law. You are not my wife.”

  She stood up then to face him, her face blotched and red, but her wide intelligent gaze never wavered. “Take your pleasure where you find it, my lord, but know that I am Queen Katherine of England. I will never return to Spain. I will not flee to a nunnery. I am the true and loyal queen of Henry King of England and will be such when I die.”

  Henry had taken his leave of her then, striding away without even a good-bye.

  “When will I see you again, husband,” she’d called after him.

  “When hell freezes over,” he had muttered under his breath, all compassion melted away beneath the heat of her resolve.

  He’d mounted his horse and trotted briskly away. The master of the horse had wisely signaled for his riding companions, Neville and Brandon, to follow at a distance.

  Horse and rider paused now at a brook. Henry’s mount neighed gently and shook its golden harness.

  “Drink your fill, Dominican.” Henry patted the black stallion on its neck and held his hand to signal “stay” to the courtiers and the master of the horse.

  The horse, the issue of a Spanish mare, a gift from King Ferdinand, was one of Henry’s favorites—at least something fertile had come out of the Spanish court. He had named the horse himself after the ubiquitous black friars. He thought it a fine joke—less so the prior of Black Friars Abbey, who was as humorless as Katherine.

  Behind him, he was mildly annoyed at the whispering of the restless courtiers, the nervous whinnying of the horses, the jingling of the harness bells, echoing the restlessness in his own mind. He should have spent this day hunting boar in New Forrest listening to the call of the huntsman’s horn, the baying of hounds, instead of the whining of an unreasonable woman. What did a man, a king, have to do to be alone? He had a wild urge to spur Dominican and make a mad dash through the woods to his left, his cloak flying in the wind, his hat catching on the lowest tree branch, leaving his hair free to blow in the wind. Maybe he would take the road to Hever Castle, surprise Anne—there was a woman who could appreciate a good joke—but he knew they would only clamor after him. Too many of them disapproved of Anne. Too many of them were loyal to Katherine.

  Dominican raised his head, and waited, his haunch shivering slightly, for his master’s command. Henry gave a light flick of the reins and they waded on through the stream. He waved the court to follow. When they reached the hunting lodge he would send his page to summon Anne to Hampton Court. She would be there upon his return on the morrow.

  “Piety becomes a queen—” a familiar voice behind Anne said, “though not in excess.”

  Her heart skipped half a beat. Before standing up, she genuflected before the small makeshift altar—a simple cross, an unadorned prayer book, and a kneeling bench in the corner of her chamber. Turning around, she dropped a curtsy.

  “Your Majesty,” she said, then, “you have been to see the queen?” And before he could answer, because Cromwell had already told her he was going to see the queen, she asked, “How fares Queen Katherine?”

  “Very sad, Lady Anne. She is very sad. She was likewise at her altar, probably praying you would be stricken with the pox.” His voice was low because the double doors leading to her chamber, the same chamber Queen Katherine would have used had she come to Hampton Court, were open.

  “No, Your Majesty. The queen was always kind to me when I was in her service. I remember when—” She checked herself and would not say when Wolsey sent sweet Percy away. “Once when I was very ill, she treated me almost like a mother. It distresses me to think what part I must play in her sadness.”

  Gray light—for it had been a dismal autumn day, a herald of the coming winter—filtered through the mullioned window set above the altar and lent a cold glow to the room. A drop of wax from a lone candle flickering beneath the cross dripped, like a drop of blood, upon the white linen altar cloth. He scraped at the wax with a carefully manicured fingernail. His ruby signet cast a prism of red and purple and yellow.

  “Your altar is as plain as any Lutheran altar, Lady Anne.”

  “It is for my private devotion, sire.”

  “And privately you scorn the liturgy and trappings of the mass?”

  “I make no secret of it. Would you care to sit, Your Majesty? I will call for refreshment.” He looked unusually tired. He still wore his riding boots.

  “No. Come walk with me in the maze.”

  “The air is chilled. The king might catch an ague.”

  “The king wishes to be alone with you to talk privately.”

  He was not smiling. He had been to see the queen and now he wanted to talk privately.

  “Fetch my cloak,” she called to the maid, who hovered with the king’s footman just outside the open door, but the maid had already removed the cloak from its peg and was advancing toward her.

  He did not touch her as they walked among the tall hedges, did not even reach for her hand, though they were surely alone in the maze. There would be no idlers on such a day as this. Was this a bad sign? Had he decided after all to reconcile with Katherine? Was he giving up on the divorce? Well, she would not be his mistress. She would never be his mistress. She would be queen or nothing. She kept her hands in her pockets to keep them warm.

  “I read the book you gave me,” he said.

  “What book was that, Your Grace?”

  “The Tyndale book. The Obedience of a Christian Man.”

  “What did you think of it?”

  “I thought it a book for me and all kings to read.”

  “Exactly so, Your Highness. William Tyndale is a brilliant man. You w
ould be well served to have him at court.”

  They walked on, the only sound the occasional brushing of the boxwood leaves against their arms until he broke the silence. “I’ll cede brilliance, but there is much in his writing that is troubling.”

  “Troubling, Your Highness, how so?” She knew what he would say before he opened his mouth. It was what they all said who stood against reform.

  “Sir Thomas says he is as heretical as Luther: his emphasis on salvation by grace, denial of Purgatory, and his insistence that the individual is accountable to God and not Holy Church. Odd that More and Tyndale should be enemies, when you think on it. They seem to have much in common in all other respects: both are brilliant thinkers, both admire Erasmus, both are devoted to the new learning in many ways. Two branches of the same tree, it would seem. In the past I have known Sir Thomas to speak of the need for reform, even. I cannot understand why he can think only of Tyndale as fit for kindling.”

  “It is the Bible,” Anne said, feeling her nose run from the cold. She sniffed gently, so as not to give offense, and wished she’d brought a handkerchief. Was this what he had brought her out to talk about? She bit her tongue to keep from asking about his visit with Katherine as she said, “Sir Thomas denies the primacy of Holy Scripture over Holy Church. He would burn the Holy Scripture and its translator in a bonfire that would reach all the way to hell just so some plowman may not read the truth therein.”

  “The plowman has no need to read Scripture for himself. He is too ignorant. He would misinterpret it. We would be plagued with a thousand false doctrines. Each man his own priest. But I quite agree with Tyndale’s statement that the king gives account to God alone. That would mean, of course, that even the pope has no jurisdiction over the king. It has put me to thinking about a new tactic regarding Katherine.”

  A new tactic? Surely he did not mean that he was going to break with the pope and embrace Lutheranism. That would be a reversal indeed for “the defender of the faith.” But whatever the tactic, she thought with relief, it meant that he was not abandoning his pursuit of divorce in face of the Church’s opposition.

  “You are not giving up then?”

  “I am not. My marriage to Katherine is a sin. And I have told her again of my resolve to see it ended. If Tyndale is right, and the king gives account to God alone, then it is even more my responsibility to see the marriage dissolved and to secure the blessing of God and an heir for England. I intend to make you my rightful queen. You will be the mother of my son.”

  As her heart beat faster, she reminded herself that this was not the first time he’d made such a promise, usually followed immediately by physical advances and demands, demands increasingly hard for her to resist. She was but a woman after all. And he could be exceedingly charming—the most magnificent peacock on the lawn.

  “About Master Tyndale,” she said, trying to divert him from this usual pattern. “Do you think it would be possible to bring him back to England? It would be advantageous to have such a brilliant man on your council. And there is another. A young scholar named John Frith. Wolsey had him imprisoned unjustly, and I think he has fled England to join Tyndale. Some of your brightest minds are languishing in exile, Your Majesty. Bring them back. England needs them. You need them.” And then, knowing how he loved a challenge, “If you can find them, of course.”

  “Be assured I can find them.”

  The cold way he said it made her heart squeeze a little.

  “Not Sir Thomas, my lord. Do not seek his help in this.”

  For the first time he laughed, that quick, mercurial burst of staccato laughter that always set her on edge.

  “No. This is hardly a job for Sir Thomas. I expect if he could find William Tyndale, he’d already be in chains and facing down a charge of heresy. I have an agent on the Continent. A man named Stephen Vaughan. He’s a good man. He’ll seek out Master Tyndale and—”

  “Frith,” she said. “John Frith.”

  “Don’t trouble yourself about Sir Thomas,” he said. “I have another plan to bring him around.”

  “Another plan?”

  “I intend to make him chancellor in Wolsey’s place. That way I can woo him gently to our cause.”

  Her heart sank. In all of England there was no greater enemy to her cause and to her person than Sir Thomas More. He was Queen Katherine’s greatest supporter, and a man more devoted to the old faith than any cleric. She did not think Sir Thomas More would be so easily wooed.

  Henry paused in his striding through the frosty hedges and pulled her toward him. “Now, my lady, give your king a kiss, a chaste kiss upon the lips, for we must be patient, if we are to provide a legal heir for England.”

  Anne didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed at this change in him, she thought as she lifted her face and touched her lips to her king’s.

  SIXTEEN

  [T]he clergy maketh them not heretics nor burneth them neither . . . the clergy doth denounce them. And as they be well worthy the temporaltie [secular authorities] doth burn them. And after the fire of Smithfield, Hell doth receive them where the wretches burn for ever.

  —SIR THOMAS MORE ON THE

  PROCESS OF BURNING HERETICS

  At first Kate didn’t recognize the woman serving them at table in the captain’s quarters—hardly more than a closet beneath the quarterdeck and cluttered with various charts and instruments, none of which Kate recognized except the sextant. She’d once seen a picture of one in a book her brother printed. Though the serving woman appeared to be watching them from beneath lowered lids, she kept her head down, never saying a word as she removed the empty soup bowl and replaced it with a plate of roasted capon and a crusty loaf.

  “The leek soup was delicious, and it was hot! However did you manage that?” Kate asked.

  The woman signaled her acknowledgment with a nod but did not answer, only turning her back to them as she tidied the rest of the little chamber, leaving Kate to wonder if perhaps the woman was a foreigner.

  “She has a firebox in the bow that makes a passable oven. Kind of like a small brazier that you would warm your room with—except larger. She uses it to make miracles, which my crew and I delight in.” He gave a little half laugh, half grunt. “The crew almost mutinied when I first brought her on board. But after a few days of her cooking, they decided a woman on board brought better luck than hardtack.”

  “I can see why,” John said, as he sliced a bit of the fowl with his knife and put it on Kate’s plate. “It’s awfully generous of you, Captain, to give up your quarters like this.”

  Captain Lasser appeared to take little interest in the food. Kate wished he would take his leave of them. The long ride in the cramped little dinghy—with her perched precariously on the trunk that Lady Walsh had bullied the recalcitrant captain into bringing—wondering where they were going, wondering if they were indeed being taken to the ship or if perhaps he had betrayed them, had left her frazzled. But John seemed to take everything in stride.

  John speared another morsel and placed it on his plate. “I guess I had not thought . . . I mean I just assumed there would be a private cabin for passengers.”

  “This is a merchant ship, Master Frith,” the captain said curtly. “As to my ‘generosity,’ well really, what choice have we? You and your beautiful wife can hardly bunk with the crew.”

  He pushed back his chair, abruptly. “Endor will see that you have what you need,” he said, gesturing at the woman making up the cot—it was hardly more than a bench. “She is a mute, but she is not deaf. She will understand what you tell her.” And then with a little half-smile curving his mouth, he added, “Sorry about the size of the bed. It’s not built for two . . . but I’m sure you’ll manage.”

  Kate’s face burned with embarrassment.

  “At least it’s not a berth swinging from the rafters,” John said cheerfully as if he read no double entendre in the captain’s remark, or, if he did, did not think it at all inappropriate. “We’ll manage q
uite nicely, Captain.”

  The woman, slightly built, thin, with the saddest look in her eyes Kate had ever seen, returned to the table and, gesturing to the captain, raised her hands palms up as she shrugged her shoulders.

  “She’s asking if there will be anything else,” he said.

  “No . . . that’s quite—” Kate began.

  “If she would just light the ship’s lantern hanging on the wall . . .” John interrupted. “I’m afraid my wife will awaken in the dark in a strange place and be frightened.”

  Really, John, he’ll think me some helpless little girl, and then she reminded herself that she should be grateful her husband was so thoughtful, and what did it really matter what Tom Lasser thought of her?

  The woman’s hand removed the lamp and poured a little oil into its base then returned it to its wall clamp with thin, almost claw-like fingers. Kate’s memory flashed back to the day she stood outside Fleet Prison—the beggar woman scrambling in the dirty straw for the coin Kate had dropped into her cell had hands like that. Surely not . . .

  “Is that—”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I’m surprised you remembered. I’m afraid, being a mute woman, she did not fare as well as I did—that and the fact that she was being held on a charge of fortune-telling.”

  John sounded as close to indignation as Kate had ever heard him. “She’s a fortune-teller? But that’s—”

  “Against the law . . . ?” He flashed a wide smile, the same smile she’d first seen when he mocked her from inside Fleet Prison even as he was begging for his bread. “It’s more harmless than it sounds—not witchcraft, not something she does deliberately. She doesn’t conjure the devil or anything like that, Master Frith,” he said, his amusement growing with John’s discomfort. “It’s more a gift. I’ll show you.”

  John’s usual easy smile was pursed into a small pout. “Really, that isn’t necessary, Captain, indeed, I would prefer—”