by G Lawrence
This was my enemies’ plan. Mary was their hope for the restoration of alliance with Rome, and a traditional future for England.
Had I carried my son to term, Mary would have been relegated to the back of the stalls. Since I had failed, she was set in the front seats. This joust for the succession could be decided by Henry. Only he could safeguard my child’s fate.
And what of me? Had I borne a son, I would have been secure, but without that blessing I was left to rely on Henry’s love. I was no princess of Spain or France with powerful friends in foreign countries, or means to extract promises that might bring wealth or trade. All I had to rely on was me, and the love Henry and I shared. At the moment, as the harsh, barren hurt we had inflicted on one another in the aftermath of our loss dissipated, Henry showed love and affection, but what if he should listen to all who hated me, and set aside another wife, to take one who might grant him children?
As I pondered, Henry came to me. “France and Spain turn cold towards each other,” he said. “And both look to England for warmth.”
“You said you would play them against each other for a while,” I said. “Is this still true? The court whispers that alliance with Spain is certain.”
I sat back in my chair, relieved that that my fever had passed and I could think clearly again. Under the care of Mistress Aucher, I had recovered in body. My mind, I tried not to think upon.
Henry chuckled. “As I would have them believe,” he said. “We have been so long at odds with Spain that it will take a great effort to convince anyone that we mean to join with them. The French are, by nature, suspicious. We will make grand gestures of friendship towards Spain, and see what comes. It is about time the French had a lesson in good manners, in any case.” He paused. “We are talking of holding the meeting with François in May.”
“I would be willing to go, as long as I am recognized as Queen.”
“I shall accept nothing less.” He leaned back, pleased with himself. “And Spain will recognise you as Queen,” he said. “On that score, I will settle for nothing less than absolute submission.”
It was easy to believe him. So easy to assume that he was doing this for me and Elizabeth… So easy, when he was with me, to have faith.
But when he left, I wondered. Was this for me, or did he do this to heal his pride?
*
“I will do all I can to aid you,” I told my poor aunt.
Lady Katherine Daubeney, nee Howard was trying to secure a separation from her husband. Seeking this on grounds of cruelty, she had turned to me as I seemed to be the only member of her family who looked on her claims with a kindly eye.
“Your husband is in debt, is he not?” I asked.
“Perpetually, Majesty.”
I smiled and it was returned. Katherine was no wilting wallflower. She despised the way her husband treated her. Something I could sympathise with. She was not the only one who had petitioned me of late. Dame Anne Skeffington, widow of Sir William, the Lord Deputy of Ireland, had sent a letter asking for my aid. She felt her children had been undone in their inheritance by her husband’s faithful service in Ireland, and was sending a petition to Cromwell that she wanted me to support. Whilst I had nothing but sympathy for these women, undone by different means by their husbands, it was pleasing to know that I was valued at court, and that they recognised I was still a force of influence upon Henry.
“I will ask my father to make money available to Lord Daubeney,” I said to my Howard aunt. “In return for an amicable agreement of separation.”
As my aunt left, I spent time with Elizabeth Browne. My friend was with child, but although the fourth month had come, her child had not quickened.
“Perhaps you were mistaken in your dates,” I said soothingly.
She nodded, but her pretty face was pale. “I think, at times, that my child will not quicken for the sorrow I felt for you, Majesty,” she said.
I blinked back tears. “All I could want, would be your safe delivery and good health for your child.”
I walked to the window and saw a sight I wished I had not; Henry, walking in the gardens with his usual band of sycophants prancing about him, but there was a lady on his arm: Jane Seymour.
When Henry and I were apart, I had no way of knowing how often Jane was being thrust in his face by my enemies. What was she telling him? That God looked on his second marriage with no more liking than his first? That she, submissive, placid, dull-as-a-drain Jane would make a more pleasing wife?
Carewe and Edward Seymour were deep in conversation at Henry’s heel and behind them Lord Montague, the Dowager of Kildare, and Gertrude Courtenay wandered, contented smiles upon their faces.
Just as I went to turn away, thinking I could stand no more, I stopped. Rounding the corner was Cromwell, chatting away to Thomas Seymour and Francis Bryan. With them was Chapuys.
So, I thought. You there too, Cromwell? Where once you swore to walk my path, now you stroll one forged by papists. How long do you think they will endure your company? They like not that a peasant should stand beside them.
The wolves were at my door. Only Henry could keep them at bay. But he was too busy running with the pack to think of me.
Chapter Fifty-One
Greenwich Palace and Whitehall Palace
February 1536
Another child was in my dreams.
Three sons haunted my nights, sometimes with Elizabeth, sometimes alone. Flashes of memory resurfaced in the daylight. I saw the tiny body of my last dead son in dreams and waking moments; his large head and little body… his small hands curled up into tiny fists… I had to turn my face from him, and thought I might choke on my guilt each time. I had to pretend, had to throw grief into the deep well inside, and hope it would not crawl up to consume me.
But to the court, another miscarriage for the Queen was already old news.
Some people had evidently believed that the moment Katherine breathed her last Henry would race back to the bosom of Rome. They were horrified to find anti-papal sentiment at court did not slacken but increased in the wake of Katherine’s death. I was amazed to think anyone would nurture such a false belief, these people who thought Henry was a loose leaf, blown by whatever wind keened strongest that day. Had they forgotten our years of struggle and study to prove Henry was the Head of the Church? Had they missed that he had executed friends, monks and bishops? Were they unaware of all the laws passed, the insults brayed on both sides… all the strife, trouble, and heartbreak we had endured to make this dream reality?
Did they know their master not at all?
Perhaps not, for conservatives were shocked to find Cranmer taking to the pulpit at St Paul’s Cathedral to deliver a searing sermon in which he named Pope Paul the Antichrist, and Henry the hallowed saviour of the faith.
Cranmer was usually so mild and tactful in his sermons that many were caught off-guard. His address was powerful, evocative, patriotic and magnificent. It showed clearly that if the King’s marriage had been the starting point for this religious revolution, it had not been the sole or most important reason.
Henry was determined that everyone would understand he had been right all along; he had brought England to a greater seat of power than it had ever known.
This glittering vision was not a true representation of reality. The Emperor and François were poised to make war. Rome was only being held off by Charles of Spain, and England was a stewpot of contention. But Spain and France were both eager for friendship. Henry took this and moulded it into a sculpture of perfect desperation. He wanted his people to witness the vision of England he saw; a country in an awesome, ineffable position of power.
All who expected Henry to scurry under the Pope’s skirts, begging for mercy, were as mistaken as they were blind. Henry was not about to surrender.
But trouble was looming. Early in February, a woman called Joanna Hammulden was arrested for slandering me. Someone had said that she, an experienced midwife, was worthy of serving the Queen, t
o which she had replied, “provided it was Queen Katherine,” for she would never serve a harlot. She added, “it was never merry in England with three Queens in it,” a clear reference to me, Katherine and Jane Seymour, whose affair with my husband was known in some circles, and said she “trusted there would be fewer Queens soon.”
She was arrested and punished, but she was not alone.
Rumours were forming, calling me wicked and loose of morals. Since this had always been said of me, I thought nothing of it.
I should have.
*
“I must to Whitehall go,” Henry said one morning. I sighed and he caressed my face. “It is necessary,” he said.
“I wish I could join you.”
I was weak. My fever had fallen, but I had not yet ceased to bleed, and this was making me nauseous and feeble. I was pale and shaky. I could only sit in my bed or in a chair, trying to ignore the visions of my child. He was always there. There were many ghosts about me now.
“Soon you will,” Henry said. “When you are churched, come to Whitehall and I will acquaint you with all that has happened.”
Henry was about to oversee the final session of Parliament. The bill to dissolve lesser monastic houses was about to be put to the Lords and our five-year battle to have Henry’s rights as Head of the Church enshrined in law was about to be won. If there were any problems, Henry had to be there to solve them. He would hold Shrovetide there, without me, as I could not re-join the court until purified.
I looked up to see his eyes lingering on Jane Seymour. I stared at him, not with accusation or the burning grief that had, I was sure, led to the loss of my child, but with the blank, stark stare I had worn in the days after that loss.
Henry blinked to see my expression. It disturbed him. It was not as before, where I had accused him in heat and fire, for to that he had a response of equal ferocity. This was silent, numb, and striking. He did not like this blankness, this empty stare, my dead eyes. It laid bare my barren, empty heart, showed plain the void within me. It cut through the fiction we had both created. He knew he might lose me to the aching maw of darkness.
No matter what, Henry could not allow that to happen. He could not play the villain.
He did not look at Jane again. He paid her no special attention in my presence.
I think he had finally realised how much he had hurt me and although I was certain he would not cease to lust after her, he would not do so obviously, or in front of me again. Would this suffice? No… but perhaps it was enough to keep the darkness at bay.
We parted with affection. “When you are recovered, we will be together again,” he said, kissing my hand.
Recovered… When I ceased to bleed and became ready to bear a child again… that was what he meant. Would I ever cease to bleed? In body, yes. In my soul? I knew not. Grief is a wound that never heals.
Some people think grief comes for a spell and then departs. Perhaps with some deaths, this is true. But I do not hold with that notion of sorrow. Some sorrows never leave. They are etched in our souls, branded upon our hearts; we cannot leave them behind for they will not go. Some people become consumed. They lose themselves to sadness. Others refuse to acknowledge grief, so it festers inside them, birthing a monster.
And some of us recognise sorrow, but lock it away. We contain it, but it is always there. Like Pandora’s Box, when this secret chest is opened, chaos is unleashed. There was a room in my heart where my children lived. A chamber bound in darkness. It was where I kept everything that wanted to hurt me, everything that might have broken me. Only I had the key and I only dared to open the door a crack.
That chamber in my darkened heart was filling. One day, I would have to open the door wide and face what lay within.
Henry seemed to forget our dead children so readily. Perhaps because he had suffered similar losses with Katherine, they did not affect him as they did me. But even as I pondered this, I knew it was not so. Henry refused to acknowledge grief. It dwelled inside him, twisting and curling. Making a monster. Birthing a demon.
Recovered… would I ever be? I doubted it. There are some experiences we carry for the rest of our lives. Some events that shape us. Dark times and deeds and events linger in us, rising like oil over water.
My children were within me and about me. They were in my bed, where they were brought to life and where they died. They were in the hope of a golden morning’s dawn, and the cool darkness of dusky twilight. They were the velvet black of night, and the soft dreams that come between the realms of waking and sleeping. They were in my hopes, dreams and fantasies. In the tang of sorrow that came with each morn, and the wrenching pull of grief’s claws when a flash of memory resurfaced. How does one recover from losing children? No parent should have to bury their child, but still crueller is the fate of one who never knew her children before they were taken from her… The fate of a mother never permitted to weep beside her children’s graves.
I never found out where they lay, but sometimes, after I was churched, in the months before my arrest, I would be found in the chapel grounds at Greenwich, wandering as though simply enjoying the day, as I searched for my children. At times, as birds sang to the dusk, I would stand in the chapel grounds and murmur to my babes, telling them the soft stories and happy tales I never got to recount in life. Sometimes I stood in silence, holding back the tears, as I asked God to show mercy and take these children into His Kingdom.
“For one day will I join you there,” I murmured. “And we will get to share everything we did not have a chance to in life.”
On the day I said those words, I remember turning my head sharply to one side. For a moment, I had thought I heard a sigh, and felt a hand rest on my shoulder. When I looked, there was nothing there.
You know what I say is truth, I said to Katherine. For are you now not surrounded by your babies in Heaven?
Katherine answered me no more, but I believed she heard me. I believed she was with me. It is strange to think that one who has been an enemy in life, might, in death, become a friend.
Our souls were bonded. No more would I deny it. Her ghost was with me, and always would it be, from the time I sought to take her place, to the moment of my death, and beyond.
*
I was churched without ceremony. Cranmer spoke words of blessing over me as I carried the taper to the door of the chapel, and offered up my child’s chrisom cloth in payment for purity, and it was done.
Much as ever before, my child was not spoken of, yet my failure was all that was on anyone’s lips.
In the desperation of sadness and fear, I turned to my friends. One day in the gardens, I stood at the archery butts watching Norris compete against Weston and George.
“Will you not try your hand, Majesty?” Weston asked, smoothing his yew bow.
“I am not yet hale,” I said.
“This is good for us, Weston,” said Norris. “The Queen is unmatched in the bow.” He smiled. It was like witnessing the first golden dawn of summer. “All men should fear to compete against our Queen,” he went on. “For she can strike the hardest target, and have it fall to her power.”
“Flatterer,” I said, brushing his arm with my hand. I had meant to cuff him, to scold him… but it was more like a caress.
I moved away swiftly to talk to George. As I walked I could feel Norris’ eyes, watching me. Sometimes it felt as though every eye of the world was upon me, but when Norris watched, I knew it was not with dislike. It was, in fact, just the opposite.
In every glance between us there was the respect of love, and yet in our every action there was understanding of duty. Norris was Henry’s best friend, and I his wife. There was no question of betrayal by our bodies, but whether my heart was solely my husband’s anymore was another question.
Long had Henry held my heart, and that was a bond unlike any other. Carried with that love was pain… pain of sorrow, the agony of his betrayal, and my fears that he would set me aside. There were our years of steadfast
commitment, our shared love for Elizabeth and, when we were at peace, our love for one another.
My love for Henry was no more a simple creature. It was one of many heads and hearts. There were times I hated him, found him laughable, thought him cruel. There were times when I knew I could not live without him.
Henry was deeply burrowed in my soul. My love was not something that may one day be forgotten. There is something about sharing life with someone that digs deep into the heart and soul. No one could replace Henry, but as I looked for comfort and found it not with him but with others, a shadow of another love came to me.