The Taming of the Queen

by Philippa Gregory

  Being addressed as a child for my work as a scholar – this too I can endure. I bow my head. ‘I am sorry if I have done anything wrong.’

  ‘Do you know what I do with naughty girls?’ he asks, roguishly.

  I can feel my thoughts whirling. I have never heard him speak like this before, diminishing me, and being a fool himself. But I must not challenge him. ‘I don’t think I have been naughty, my lord.’

  ‘Very naughty indeed! And do you know what I do to naughty girls?’ he asks again.

  I shake my head. I think he has slipped into his dotage. I have to endure this too.

  He beckons me to the side of the bed. ‘Come a little closer.’

  I rise from my chair and go to the bed. I move gracefully, like a woman. I take the few steps with my head held high, like the queen that I am. I think, surely he cannot maintain this game that I am a child for scolding, but then it seems that he can. He takes my hand and pulls me a little closer to the bed. ‘I think that you have read books that Stephen Gardiner would say are heretical, you bad child.’

  I open my eyes wide as if to assure him of my innocence. ‘I would never go against Your Majesty’s wishes. Stephen Gardiner has never accused me, and he has no evidence.’

  ‘Oh, he has accused you,’ he says, chuckling as if this is funny. ‘Be sure of that! And he accused your friends, and the girl preacher, and indeed he had all the evidence that he needed to prove to me – or even to a jury, a jury, Kate! – that you are, alas, a very naughty little girl.’

  I try to smile. ‘But I have explained . . .’

  I see the gleam of his irritation. ‘Never mind all that. I say you are a naughty girl and I think you have to be punished.’

  At once I think of the Tower and the scaffold that they can build on the green. I think of my ladies and the preachers who have spoken before me. I think of Anne, waiting in the Tower for release from her agony. ‘Punished?’

  He reaches across his huge barrel of a body and extends his left hand to me. I take it and he tugs me roughly, as if he would pull me across the bed.

  I yield. ‘Your Majesty?’

  ‘Kneel on the bed,’ he says. ‘This is your punishment.’ He sees my aghast face and he laughs so much that he coughs, and tears come into his piggy little eyes. ‘Oh! Were you thinking that I would behead you? Oh Lord! Oh Lord! What fools women are! But kneel to me.’

  I gather the skirts of my gown in my free hand and kneel up on the bed beside him. He lets go of my hand now I am positioned where he wants me, kneeling beside him, the stench from his wounded leg wafting up into my face. I put my hands together as if to swear fealty.

  ‘No, not that,’ he says impatiently. ‘I don’t want you to beg for pardon. Go on your hands and knees. Like a dog.’

  I shoot one disbelieving look into his face and I see that he is flushed and intent. He means it. As I hesitate I see his eyes harden. ‘I’ve told you once,’ he says quietly. ‘There are guards outside and my barge will take you to the Tower tonight if I say just one word.’

  ‘I know . . .’ I say quickly. ‘It’s just that I don’t know what you want me to do, my lord husband. I would do anything for you, you know that. I have promised to love. . .’

  ‘I’ve told you what to do,’ he points out, reasonably enough. ‘Go on your hands and knees like a dog.’

  My face is burning with the heat of my shame. I go on my hands and knees on the bed and I drop my head down so that I don’t have to see the bright triumph in his face.

  ‘Lift your gown.’

  This is too much. ‘I can’t,’ I say; but he is smiling.

  ‘Up over your buttocks,’ he says. ‘Lift your gown right up, your linen too, so your arse is as bare as a Smithfield whore.’

  ‘Your Majesty . . .’

  He raises his right hand as if to warn me to be completely silent. I look back at him, I wonder if I dare to defy him.

  ‘My barge. . .’ he whispers. ‘It is waiting for you.’

  Slowly, I pull my gown up to my waist, the silk cool in my fingers. It folds around my waist, leaving me naked from the waist down, on my hands and knees on the king’s bed.

  He fumbles in the bedclothes and for a horrible moment I think that he is fondling himself, aroused by my nakedness, and that there will be worse for me to do. But he brings out a whip, a short horse’s whip, and shows it to me, bringing it to my burning face.

  ‘D’you see?’ he asks quietly. ‘It is no thicker than my little finger. The laws of the land, my laws, say that a husband may beat his wife if the stick is no thicker than his finger. D’you see that this is a thin little whip that I may legally use on you? Are we agreed?’

  ‘Your Majesty would not—’

  ‘It is the law, Kateryn. Like the law of heresy, like the law of treason. Do you understand that I am the lawgiver and the law enforcer and that nothing happens in England without my will?’

  My legs and buttocks are cold. I bend my head to the stinking covers of the bed. ‘I understand,’ I say, though I can hardly speak.

  He brings the whip closer, then thrusts it in my face. ‘Look!’ he says.

  I raise my head and look at it.

  ‘Kiss it,’ he says.

  I can’t stop myself from flinching. ‘What?’

  ‘Kiss the rod. As a sign that you accept your punishment. Like a good child. Kiss the rod.’

  I look at him blankly for a moment as if I wonder if I can disobey him. He returns my gaze, completely calm. Only his scarlet colour and his rapid breathing reveal that he is aroused. He holds the whip a little closer to my lips. ‘Go on,’ he says.

  I purse my lips. He puts the leather plaited thong to my mouth. I kiss it. He puts the thicker leather stem to my face. I kiss it. He puts his clenched hand holding the handle before my mouth, and I kiss his fat fingers too. Then without changing his expression he raises the whip behind me, and brings it down hard on my buttocks.

  I cry out and flinch away, but he has tight hold of my upper arm and he strikes me again. Three times I hear the whistle and then feel the blow as it comes down and the pain is quite terrible. There are burning tears in my eyes as he brings the whip to my face again and whispers: ‘Kiss it, Kateryn, and say that you have learned wifely obedience.’

  There is blood in my mouth from where I have bitten my lip. It tastes like poison. I can feel the hot tears pouring down my cheeks and I cannot choke down a little sob. He waggles the stick in front of me and I kiss it, as he orders. ‘Say it,’ he reminds me.

  ‘I have learned wifely obedience,’ I repeat.

  ‘Say thank you, my lord husband.’

  ‘Thank you, my lord husband.’

  He is quiet. I take a choking breath. I can feel my chest heave with my sobs. I assume my punishment is finished and I pull down my gown. My buttocks are stinging raw and I am afraid they are bleeding, and my white linen shift will be stained.

  ‘One other thing,’ he says silkily, still holding me on my hands and knees. I wait.

  He pushes back the covers of his bed and I see, like a monstrous erection, he is wearing the ivory silk codpiece from the portrait strapped on his fat naked belly. It is a grotesque sight, huge on his rolling belly, pointing upwards out of the sheets, embroidered with silver thread and stitched with pearls.

  ‘Kiss this too,’ he says.

  My will is broken indeed. I rub the tears from my eyes with the back of my hand and I feel the snot from my nose spread over my face. This, too, I will do for my own safety.

  He puts his hand on it and he caresses it as if it can give him pleasure. He giggles. ‘You have to,’ he says simply.

  I nod. I know that I have to. I put my head down and I put my lips against the encrusted tip. With a single cruel gesture he takes a handful of my hair and thumps the back of my head, so my face is smacked by it and it bangs against my teeth and the pearls scrape my lips. I don’t pull back from the pain. I hold my face still as he works it in a parody of abuse against my mouth over and over aga
in till my mouth is bruised by the jewels and the embroidery and my lips are bleeding.

  He is exhausted, his face flushed and sweating. The ivory codpiece is smeared with my blood as if he had deflowered a virgin with it. He drops back on his pillows and sighs as if he is deeply satisfied. ‘You can go.’

  It is very late when I come out of the king’s bedroom and close the door quietly behind me. I walk stiffly across the privy chamber and into the presence chamber where his pages are waiting.

  ‘Go in,’ I say to them, my hand hiding my bruised mouth. ‘He wants a drink and some food.’

  Nan and Maud Lane stand up from their seats at the fireside. The double doors between the privy chamber and the bedroom muffled my cry; but Nan can tell at once that there is something wrong.

  ‘What’s he done to you?’ she asks, scanning my white face, taking in the bruising, the smear of blood at my mouth.

  ‘It’s all right,’ I say.

  We walk to the queen’s side of the palace in silence, I know that my gait is awkward, I can feel my linen gown sticking to the weals from the whip. I go through the private galleries and into my bedroom. Maud curtseys and closes the bedroom door. Nan unlaces my gown. ‘Don’t call anyone,’ I say. ‘I’ll sleep in my linen, I’ll wash tomorrow.’

  ‘The stink of his wound is on your linen,’ Nan warns me.

  ‘It’s all over me,’ I say tightly. ‘But I have to sleep. I can’t bear . . .’

  She shucks off her own gown, and gets into the bed. For once in my life I go to bed without kneeling at the bedside to pray. I have no words tonight, I feel far from God. I slide between the cool sheets. Nan blows out the candle with a quick puff and the darkness forms around us from the shadows in the room and then I can just see the outline of the wooden shutters limned with the dawn light. We lie in sleepless silence for a long time. My little silver clock chimes four. Then she speaks: ‘Did he hurt you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say.

  ‘On purpose?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But you are forgiven?’

  ‘He wanted to break my spirit and I think he has done so. Don’t ask me more, Nan.’

  We sleep fitfully, I have no dreams of the dark castle and the woman with the wrenched limbs, or the dead wives behind the bolted doors. One of the worst things that can happen to a proud woman has happened to me, I need not fear my dreams any more. When the maids come in the morning with the ewer of hot water they find me throwing off my soiled linen and ordering the bath. I want to get the smell of his suppurating leg out of my skin, out of my hair. I want to get a fetid taste out of my mouth. I feel as if I am soiled, I feel as if I am foul and I can never be washed clean. I know that I am broken.

  Shaming me has cheered the king back to health. Suddenly he is well enough to dine with the court and this afternoon he is wheeled into the garden with me at his side. Nan, Lady Tyrwhit and little Lady Jane Grey walk with me, the rest of my ladies stroll behind us, and the king holds my hand as I walk beside the chair. There is a spreading beech tree in the centre of the king’s privy garden and he stops the chair in the shade and someone fetches a stool for me to sit beside him. Gingerly I lower myself to the seat. He smiles as he sees I cannot sit without pain.

  ‘You are amused, my lord husband?’

  ‘Now we’re going to see a play.’

  ‘A play? Here?’

  ‘Indeed yes. And when it is over you can tell me the title.’

  ‘Are you speaking in riddles my lord?’ I ask. I can feel my fear rising.

  The little iron gate to the privy garden creaks slightly, opens wide, and guards come running in, a huge number of them, crowding into the small garden. There are at least forty of them in the bright livery of the king’s yeomen of the guard. I rise to my feet. For a moment I think that there is a mutiny against the king and he is in danger. I look round for the pages who wheeled him here, for the gentlemen of the court. Nobody is within calling distance. I stand before him; I will have to shield him from whatever comes. I will have to save him if I can.

  ‘Wait,’ he cautions me. ‘Remember, it is a play.’

  These are not traitors. They are followed by Lord Wriothesley with a rolled letter in his hand. His dark face is alight with triumph. He comes towards me smiling and he unfurls the letter, showing me the seal, the royal seal. It is a warrant for my arrest. ‘Queen Kateryn, known as Parr, you are under arrest for treasonous heresy,’ he says. ‘Here is the warrant. You must come with me to the Tower.’

  I have no breath. I throw one anguished look at my husband. He is beaming. I think this is the greatest joke, the greatest masque, that he has ever performed. He has broken my spirit and now he will break my neck and I cannot complain, I cannot protest my innocence. I cannot even beg him for a pardon because I cannot breathe.

  Even my sight is dim, though I see Nan running towards us across the grass, her face screwed up in fear. Behind her little Jane Grey hesitates, steps forward, shrinks back, as Lord Wriothesley brandishes his warrant and says again: ‘You must come with me to the Tower, Your Majesty. No delay, please.’ His face is bright. ‘Please don’t make me order them to take you by force.’

  He turns to the king and he kneels to him. ‘I have come. I will do as you commanded,’ Wriothesley says, his voice oozing contentment. He rises up again, and he is about to nod to the guards to surround me.

  ‘Fool!’ Henry bellows at him, full-voiced. ‘Fool! Knave! Arrant knave! Beast! Fool!’

  Wriothesley falls back before the king’s red-faced sudden rage.

  ‘What?’

  ‘How dare you?’ Henry demands. ‘How dare you come into my own garden and insult the queen? My beloved wife! Are you mad?’

  Wriothesley opens and closes his mouth like one of the fat fish in the carp ponds.

  ‘How dare you come in here and distress my wife?’

  ‘The warrant? Your Majesty! Your royal warrant?’

  ‘How dare you show her such a thing? A woman sworn to my interests who has no mind but my mind, who has no thought but mine, whose body is at my command, whose immortal soul is in my keeping? My wife? My beloved wife?’

  ‘But you said that she should be—’

  ‘Are you saying that I would order the arrest of my own wife?’

  ‘No!’ Wriothesley says hastily. ‘No, of course not, Your Majesty, no.’

  ‘Get out of my sight,’ Henry shouts at him as if he is driven to madness by such disloyalty. ‘I can’t bear you! I never want to see you again.’

  ‘But, Your Majesty?’

  ‘Go!’

  Wriothesley bows to the ground and stumbles backwards through the garden gate. The guards fumble their exit and rush after him, pushing their way out of the sunlit garden, desperate to get away from the furious king. Henry waits till they are all gone and the gate has clanged shut, the guard standing outside it with his back to us. Only when it is all still and quiet again does the king turn to me.

  He is laughing so much that he cannot speak. For a moment I fear that he is having a fit. The tears squeeze out of his puckered eyelids and run down his sweating cheeks. He is dangerously flushed, and as he holds his shaking belly he chokes for air. Long minutes pass as he hoarsely cackles before he can steady himself. He opens his little eyes and wipes his wet cheeks.

  ‘Lord,’ he says. ‘Lord.’

  He sees me standing before him, still frozen with shock, and my ladies blank-faced, waiting.

  ‘What’s the title of the play, Kate?’ he pants, still laughing.

  I shake my head.

  ‘You who are so clever? So widely read? What is the title of my play?’

  ‘Your Majesty, I cannot guess.’

  ‘The Taming of the Queen!’ he shouts. ‘The Taming of the Queen.’ I hold my slight smile. I look at his sweating scarlet face and I let the sound of his renewed laughter break over me like the hoarse cawing of the ravens at the Tower.

  ‘I am the dog-master,’ he says, abruptly abandoning his joke. ‘I watc
h you all. I set you all at each other’s throats. Poor curs. Poor little bitch.’

  The king sits in the garden till the shadows lengthen along the smooth green grass and the birds start to sing in the tops of the trees. The swallows weave along the curves of the river, swirling above their own silvery reflections and dipping into the water to drink. The courtiers come in from playing games and they walk languidly, like happy children with flushed faces. Princess Elizabeth smiles up at me and I see a scatter of freckles over her nose like dust on marble, and I think I must remind her maid to make sure that she wears a sun bonnet whenever she goes out.

  ‘It’s been a beautiful day,’ the king says contentedly. ‘God Himself knows what a wonderful country this is.’

  ‘We are blessed,’ I agree quietly, and he smiles as if the credit for the summer and for the weather and for the sun sinking over the glassy river is somehow all due to him.

  ‘I shall come to dinner,’ he says, ‘and after dinner you may come to my room and you must talk to me about your thoughts, Kate. I like to hear what you have been reading and what you think.’

  He laughs as he sees me suddenly go pale. ‘Ah, Kate. You need fear nothing. I have taught you everything you need to know, have I not? It is my translations that you read? You are my dear wife, are you not? And we are friends?’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ I say. I bow as if I am delighted at the invitation.

  ‘And you may ask anything of me. Any little gift, any little favour. Anything you like, sweetheart.’

  I hesitate, wondering if I dare speak of the broken woman in the Tower, Anne Askew, waiting to hear if she is to live or to die. He has said I can ask anything of him, he has just said I am to fear nothing. ‘Your Majesty, there is one small thing,’ I start. ‘A little thing to you, I am sure. But it would be the greatest wish of my heart.’

  He raises his hand to stop me. ‘My dear, we have learned today, have we not, that there are no things, not even the smallest things, that come between a husband and wife like us? The greatest wish of your heart could only be the greatest wish of mine. We have nothing to discuss. You need never ask anything of me. We are as one.’