Maid of the King's Court

by Lucy Worsley

  And, while I was reluctant to admit it, I was angry with myself too. Successful maids of honour, I told myself as I chewed viciously upon a sliver of fingernail, were supposed to be besieged by gallants. Just like Katherine was.

  I had to try harder. The only two admirers I had were a humble bastard-born page and a man who didn’t like women.

  Darkness had fallen hours ago, and the gleaming tiles of the palace cloister were icy beneath my slippers. At intervals, the glowing coals of the braziers illuminated the watchful faces of the guards. Yet the tall Yeomen of the Guard waved us through doorway after doorway. For once I was among the chosen few, expected and welcomed. It felt good.

  A few days after the marriage and the masque, I was enjoying the chance to pay a visit of my own to the very heart of all the controversy: the queen’s bedchamber.

  The Countess of Malpas had asked for my assistance in undressing our mistress. I scurried along a respectful half pace behind her. It was always a bit of a struggle to keep up with the countess. She could move her little legs so fast and yet so smoothly that it looked as if she ran on wheels.

  “I commend you, Mistress Camperdowne,” she said over her shoulder as we went along, “for your attentiveness to the queen. It has not gone unnoticed.”

  And so I glowed a little with self-satisfaction as we entered the queen’s fire-lit bedchamber and made our curtseys. I had indeed held myself apart from the courtiers who joked about the queen’s strange German headgear and her guttural voice when she tried to speak English.

  We were to prepare our mistress for bed, and the countess began to unlace the stiff carapace of the queen’s gown. She always wore black and other dark colours, despite her young age, finely made of course but oddly sombre. The unlacing took quite some time. As usual with the taciturn Queen Anne, silence fell.

  “Madam, we hope you may soon be bringing the English court a son!” said the countess brightly and with what sounded to me like rather a desperate lunge at a topic for conversation.

  “Ach, so says the king,” she replied, looking down at her hands as she sat patiently, the countess unstitching her back. It was like the shedding of the skin of a caterpillar, and fine billows of the queen’s voluminous white shift came gradually into view as the countess’s hands worked.

  “Well, he comes to you every night to do the work of a husband, does he not?” the countess said, in an encouraging tone.

  Now Anne looked up with a little smile. Only when she gave her rare and gentle smile did her face remind me of the image Master Holbein had made. There had been great scandal whispered round the court at the trick his picture had played upon us all, for truly the queen was not beautiful. Or maybe we thought this because we only ever saw her frowning or glum.

  “Indeed!” she said with a quiet air of triumph. “Every night he come, he kiss me, he say ‘Good night, sweetheart,’ and he sleep just here!” She nodded at the enormous carved bed in the centre of the room.

  “Your Majesty, there must be more done than that if you are to bring us a boy!” said the countess, in a voice that sounded slightly shocked. I looked quickly down at the linen night shift I held in my hands, hardly knowing where to direct my eyes in the face of this revelation.

  I sensed rather than saw the countess give me the sternest of warning glances, a look that clearly spelled out that she would kill me if I told anyone that our queen was obviously ignorant of the facts of life.

  “Off with you, Mistress Eliza,” she said. “I can finish alone.”

  “Good night, Your Majesty.” I bobbed my curtsey and placed the folded shift on the bed. Just outside the door, I could not resist lingering for an instant. With horrified delight, I realised that back in the royal bedchamber the countess must be explaining to the queen, a grown woman and the mistress of us all, exactly how babies were made.

  And so I was caught.

  As I lingered outside the door, my hand still touching it and my head still turning from side to side in wonder, a pair of hands suddenly grasped my waist from behind.

  I yelped. But the hands were strong and it was a man’s breath that was blowing hot, winey, and intimidating into my ear. By now I knew enough of palace life to understand that some predators are best beaten off with discretion and the minimum of noise, so I tensed myself to swing round with a vicious kick rather than a scream. But then I realised I could do neither.

  “Well, my little elf!”

  It was the king, of course, come early to the queen’s bedchamber for the night. I froze, my arms and legs completely transformed into ice. I dared not turn to face him, and he seemed quite content to press himself against my behind, in turn pressing me against the jamb of the door. In a moment my cheek was crushed against its wood.

  “My wife’s maid a-listening at the door, eh?” he whispered. “You won’t hear much to heat your blood in there,” he muttered as if to himself. “You maids of honour are a scurrilous lot, I know,” he added, breathing into my ear again more insistently and actually nudging it with his horrid wet lips. “You need to give her a lesson or two!” I felt a hot hand briefly clamp itself to my bottom, before he pushed me out of the way and opened his wife’s chamber door.

  Shaken and revolted, I slipped away with an urgent desire to return to my own room. I consoled myself with the thought that at least my royal pawing hadn’t been witnessed.

  After three months at the court, I should have known better.

  I would later learn that someone, somewhere in the shadows, had been watching. In a royal palace every wall has ears, and eyes are hidden behind each twist of the corridor. My encounter with the king had not been unobserved.

  Late that night I crept into our bed and lay there silently whimpering until I could bear it no longer, and I had to let my sobs shake the bedframe.

  “Eliza! What is it? Is it Ned?”

  Katherine, bleary-eyed with interrupted sleep, was up on one elbow, lighting the candle and looking at me with genuine concern.

  “Katherine,” I said uncertainly. I hated to reveal a weakness to her, but I had a burning need to know. “How can you bear it when the gentlemen of the court leer at us? They don’t mean it either, when they give us those chivalrous compliments. They’re just laughing at us and talking behind our backs about which of us they’d most like to have in bed.”

  “Oh, men!” Katherine flumped back on the pillows, rubbing the heels of her hands into her eyes. “It’s always men, isn’t it? They’re just children really. Whatever man’s been horrid to you, Eliza, you should imagine him as he once was, crawling round on the floor, bawling for his nurse and pooing his linen. You have to grow up, Eliza, take it in your stride.”

  But I could not seem to take it in my stride. I had come to court to find a husband to whom I would be joined in legal, holy matrimony. My father had sent me here for this purpose, surely. I did not understand how Katherine could be so relaxed. And I could hardly credit that the king himself had pushed me up against a door, like any common doxy of the streets. It seemed to me to be more than just wrong; it seemed actually to be wicked.

  But of this I dared not speak, and Katherine did not press me. Soon her breathing evened out once more, but I went on staring at the candle flame until it guttered out in a pool of wax.

  I kept my secret to myself for several dismal and lonely weeks. In March, when the roads became passable, I began to look forward to my father and my aunt arriving at Greenwich for a long-planned visit. Heavy rain and floods delayed them, though, which disappointed me, for I was quite longing to see them again.

  In fact, my father and aunt arrived quite unexpectedly one evening, when Katherine, I, and other ladies were performing the “Dance of the Nine Muses” in the Great Chamber after dinner, for the amusement of the king and his cronies.

  We were old hands at this dance now, able to dip low and reach high so easily that we had leisure to bestow Katherine’s “killing” glances upon members of the audience if we so chose. At one point I caught Ned’
s glance, and we exchanged a comic grimace, as if the whole thing was a joke. But, almost unwillingly, my body began to perform more gracefully in the knowledge that he was watching.

  It was halfway through the performance that I spotted the two new arrivals being led into the room by two gentleman ushers. I would have recognised them anywhere, and I was so glad to see my relations that I composed myself with some difficulty to see the dance through to its conclusion.

  The king, too, had noticed the newcomers. “Lord Stone!” he shouted out genially, gesturing at me with his goblet. “How do you like your daughter now that she belongs to me?” Blushing, I bowed my head to my father. I saw that he was a little bewildered at being yelled at without having even yet made his formal bow, but that he was also smiling with undisguised pleasure.

  “Your Majesty,” he said, “I see that under your care she has become a woman.”

  And indeed I had, I thought, as I straightened up to my full height then bent down to my lowest. I had grown up more than he could have possibly suspected.

  I went over to curtsey to my father, and then rose up again to receive his kiss. I had something of a shock when I raised my head and saw him close up in the light of the chamber’s many candelabra. His little beard was now almost entirely white, and he seemed very thin and rheumy around the eyes.

  “Father, how is Stoneton?” I asked. “Is everybody well? Did Mr. Nutkin survive the winter?”

  He smiled and nodded, then turned, rather childlike, to Aunt Margaret, who repeated what I’d said.

  “Speak louder, into his left ear,” she suggested. It was blissful to see their familiar faces again after so long and wonderful to introduce them to my colleagues at the court. But something of their colour seemed to have faded.

  Later, I persuaded Katherine to go and sleep with another maid of honour in order to make room in our bed for my aunt Margaret. When the curtains were closed and our little den was illuminated with just one candle, it was very cosy indeed.

  “So, Eliza,” she said, twisting her grey hair into a bunch for sleeping, “what is it really like at court? Are you having as much fun as it seems?”

  “Well …”

  I wanted Aunt Margaret to think that I was always as graceful and as poised as she had seen me in the middle of the dance. But I found it hard to meet her searching, bright, bird-like gaze. I bent to pull off my sheepskin slippers and drop them to the floor.

  “Eliza!”

  There was no getting away from it. She wanted the whole story.

  “Well …” I began again.

  “I think, Eliza,” Aunt Margaret said, looking up at the bed canopy, “you must have learned a hard lesson or two while you’ve been here. Everyone in England looks up to King Henry the Eighth, don’t they, accepting that he is appointed by God and that he can do no wrong? But the reality is a little different, isn’t it?”

  I could hardly credit that my aunt, my straitlaced, upright aunt, was verging upon treason in her conversation. Of course we had been taught exactly what she said, from our very cradles, and our early belief in the king’s virtue, kindness, justice, and mercy was reinforced by every priest and teacher and lord in the land.

  At court, though, it was immediately obvious that this was not true. We could not ignore the evidence of our eyes that the king, God’s anointed chosen monarch, was in fact a gluttonous, predatory old man.

  “It’s as if it’s a secret we have to keep from the rest of the world,” I said in a rush. I whispered, so nervous I was of putting this thought into words. I even tweaked open the bed curtains and scanned the shadows of the room beyond to make sure we were really alone. “It’s as if all of us courtiers are in on the secret, and it creates a bond between us. The king is sometimes stupid and greedy and wrong.”

  “That’s my girl.” Aunt Margaret rolled on her side to look at me. “I was at court too, you know, long ago.”

  I had forgotten this and looked at her with renewed interest. Aunt Margaret? Dressing up, dancing, performing in masques?

  “And that’s how I know it’s a poisonous swamp, the palace. Danger everywhere. You know certain things, but you have to act as if you don’t. You must remember, Eliza, that while you may not admire every single action of the king’s, he holds the power of life or death in his hands. Your life or death. You can never, never let on what you know.”

  I nodded. But I felt a whirring in my brain, like a clock being wound up. I had never thought of my aunt as a courtier like me. Come to think of it, I had never thought of her as young like me. I decided to take advantage of the hour and the atmosphere of confidence to ask what had really been happening at Stoneton.

  “Things are bad,” she admitted. “Your father has never been any good at managing the estate, of course, and we have had to sell more land.” I pursed my lips as did my aunt herself upon hearing bad tidings. Obviously, her words made me uneasy, but I also felt a glow of pride that she was now treating me to adult news and views.

  But then an awful thought struck me. Would she ask me outright if I was likely to receive any proposals of marriage soon? That was our one hope for saving the estate. How could I say that I’d made no progress at all? I tensed myself in readiness.

  “Still,” she said, surprising me with her warmth, “you are obviously prospering here. The king has not been so welcoming to us since the events of … well, before.”

  My shoulders relaxed. So I was safe! I decided to press my advantage home to learn something I’d always been curious about. “What happened to my uncle, Aunt Margaret?”

  I knew it was something dreadful — I had seen it in the reactions of certain courtiers when they heard my name for the first time. “I know that we had to pay the ‘Great Forfeit,’ but I don’t know what it was for.”

  “For treason, child,” said my aunt in a resigned voice. “My elder brother was engaged to … a certain lady. I won’t tell you her name. It’s ancient history now. The king took a fancy to the same lady and insisted that she go to his bed. My brother was furious, and, despite everything I said, he wouldn’t keep quiet. He insisted that the ancient family of Camperdowne deserved better. The king didn’t even get angry. He just waved a hand, and my brother was taken to the Tower of London. There he refused to back down, silly fool, and eventually he was executed.”

  I shuddered and twitched up the fur coverlet about my shoulders.

  “That’s why pride, my dear, is dangerous as well as sinful, as I have told you all your life,” my aunt went on. “You just can’t afford to think that you know better than the king, or that the rules don’t apply to you. The fine we had to pay nearly ruined us and depleted the Camperdowne lands… . I can’t tell you how much we grieved and lamented his foolish pride.”

  Aunt Margaret’s fist was moving up and down, almost as if it still held her cane and she were banging it on the floor to emphasise her words.

  “And that’s why you, Eliza,” she continued, “and your marriage are so important to the future of the family. But, to be completely honest, your father and I have been struggling to find a family who will ally with us since we were tainted.” She had somehow got herself into a sitting position once again during the course of her lecture.

  “There was only the Earl of Westmorland, who counted on our being so out of the swing of things at Stoneton that we would not know about the bad character of his son. So much rides on your making a success of yourself here at the court.”

  With that Aunt Margaret pinched my cheek, pinched out the candle, reached down to put the holder on the floor, and lay down to sleep. I stayed awake for a long time, looking up into the dark. My mind wanted to dwell upon Ned’s eyes, his hands, his lips.

  But I batted the thought away.

  Aunt Margaret had just reminded me that I could not afford it. I had kept my distance from Ned recently, doubly so since Katherine had warned me that spending time with him would damage my prospects. Yet I still felt his eyes upon me as we trod the same floorboards each day i
n the Great Chamber, at chapel, and at the feast.

  I forced myself to think instead about my unknown uncle. How had he managed to muddle things up so badly? I knew that my uncle was not the first to fall foul of the king, and I feared that he would not be the last.

  Just before sleep came, I looked over at my aunt’s face on the pillow, its deep lines visible even in the gentle glow of starlight that crept through a crack in the bed curtains. Could it be that she had changed, grown softer and weaker, since I had seen her last? Even her cane now seemed to be something she needed for walking rather than just a prop for bossiness. Or perhaps the change was in me.

  My father and I were shuffling slowly along the broad walk by the wide grey river, heavily wrapped in our furred cloaks. It was freezing cold, but his step was uncertain, and he would not be hurried. This was the day after his and Aunt Margaret’s arrival at Greenwich, and the first time we had been alone.

  “I understand,” he said, “you have done very well for yourself here at the court. Henny says you have become a great lady indeed.”

  I was pleased by his words, but a slender sliver of doubt pricked me in the stomach. I suspected that Henny thought I had become too fine a lady in some of my ways. I circled my arms vigorously a couple of times, and not just because of the cold. Perhaps it was babyish of me to worry about pleasing my old nurse.

  The riverbank was enlivened by the occasional cargo ship on its way up to the port of London. It was a good place to talk. The open ground meant we could see that no one was in earshot, and my father spoke rather loudly now to compensate for his loss of hearing.

  “And Aunt Margaret tells me you have been giving some further thought to the matter of my marriage?” I asked him, slipping my hand through the crook of the arm left free from his stick.

  Even as I did so, my unruly imagination insisted on reminding me how my heart would swell should Ned suddenly step into sight on the path before us. I shook my head to clear it and get back to business.