Jean Plaidy - [Queens of England 04]

by The Lady in the Tower

  “I should hate to go, George. It was so dull… but now it would be more so.”

  “There is an alternative.”

  “What?”

  “Follow in our sister’s footsteps.”

  “That I should never do! And you should know better than to suggest it. I have been so ashamed of Mary. It is so humiliating… that…and what happened at the French Court.”

  “Those French gallants were not so gallant after all, I know.”

  “All talking of her in that ribald way!”

  “Henry would not do that. He does not discuss the details of his amours with anyone. It would be against his image of himself. Besides, I am sure he convinces himself that he is quite faithful to the Queen.”

  “I am very uneasy.”

  “If anyone can handle this, you can. Be prepared for whichever way the wind blows. I am. And if we are stripped of our honors, we shall have to go back to merchanting in London. At least it would be interesting.”

  “George,” I said, “you are a comfort. I knew you would be.”

  “Don’t fret. Whatever it is, we’ll face it.”

  Thomas noticed that I was preoccupied.

  I had taken to wandering off down to the river—the Court was at Greenwich—and watching the boats sail by. I hardly saw them because I was thinking deeply of all I was going to miss in this life.

  It was only a day since the King had spoken to me and I had not seen him since. At any moment I expected to be told that I was to leave. He would not tell me himself. There would be some order, vaguely suggesting that it would be better for me to return to Hever.

  Thomas had seen me and came to talk to me.

  “Why so sad? Why alone? How have you managed to escape your admirers?”

  “It seems that I have not done so entirely,” I replied.

  “This one would find you wherever you were. But tell me, Anne, what is on your mind?”

  “It is the King,” I said.

  “He has made certain suggestions?”

  “You have guessed right.”

  “I thought I saw it coming.”

  “It was so obvious to you then?”

  “Fairly. He is not one to hide his feelings. I saw his eyes following you with a certain expression. Interest is too mild a word to describe it.”

  “I am afraid.”

  He nodded.

  “You understand that I do not want to be like my sister.”

  “I do. You are proud. You would not surrender until you love. Is that so?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Dear Anne, how I wish…”

  “Life is as we make it, I suppose. It is no use wishing it were different.”

  “Where’s the harm in wishing?”

  “None, I suppose, as long as you remember that it cannot be.”

  “I often think of those days at Hever and Allington… and in Nor-folk. It seems like fate that our families should be together both in Kent and in Norfolk. We should have plighted our troth then.”

  “As children?”

  “Why not? Was there not always that special feeling between us?”

  “If I remember rightly, both you and George despised me for my youth and sex.”

  “Put that down to the folly of the young.”

  “You and George used to talk of great adventures, how you would go forth and win battles and honors. I do not remember that I had any part in them.”

  “But I always loved you, Anne.”

  “Thomas, I think that, like so many of your sex, love is something apart from the rest of your lives…a pleasant diversion to return to when the adventures begin to pall.”

  “Was that how it was with Percy?”

  I shook my head sadly. “No … that was where he was different. With him, I should always have been first.”

  “So much so that he allowed himself to be married off very quickly to Shrewsbury’s daughter.”

  “Poor Henry, he just could not stand out against the pressure. You know how fearsome Northumberland could be. Besides, the King insisted. So did Wolsey.”

  “They made quite an issue of that affair.”

  I shivered and he turned to me. “Let’s get away from Court. Let’s defy them all.”

  I laughed at him. “You have been sitting too long in the sun,” I told him, and I remembered that was what the King had said of me.

  “You know Elizabeth and I do not live together. Our marriage is a disaster.”

  “Most marriages seem to be,” I replied.

  “They are usually brought about for the convenience of the family.”

  “Is that the reason why they are so unsuccessful?”

  “Who knows? Anne, what are you going to do?”

  “I deplore the manner in which your sex treats mine. You think of us as playthings for a while, and when that particular toy no longer excites you, you reach for another. Do you think I would ever be submitted to such humiliation?”

  “No.”

  “Therefore I will be no man’s mistress.”

  “Not even the King’s?”

  I shook my head vehemently.

  “You’re playing a dangerous game, Anne.”

  “It was not of my choosing.”

  “In a way you are to blame. You have made yourself outstanding at Court.”

  “I have been myself. That is all I can be.”

  “There is always something to be done. I think you care for me a little. Just suppose they had not married me off … just suppose I were free.”

  “You are married, Thomas, so there is no point in considering the matter.”

  I touched the jeweled tablet which I wore on a chain about my waist. It was a favorite trinket and I was hardly ever without it. It had my initials engraved on it. I was thinking of what might have happened if Thomas had not been married. Perhaps it would have been a match which could have been approved by my father. The Wyatts were old friends. There would doubtless have been haggling over my dowry… but Sir Henry would not have been too hard. I was very fond of Thomas… but I was not really in love with him. I told myself I never would be in love again.

  One of the links in the chain had broken and the tablet slipped off. I turned it over in my hand; it reminded me of Hever and Allington and the old days.

  “You give up too easily, Anne,” he said, coming nearer to me. “Am I going to spend the rest of my days longing for what might have been?”

  I smiled at him. I did not believe he was as deeply involved as he made out to be. He was a practiced lover and he had always known how to use words effectively: he was the sort of man who would know how to touch the heart of a susceptible girl. But I was not susceptible. And I had no more intention of becoming Thomas Wyatt’s mistress than I had the King’s.

  “Think about it, Anne. Think about us.”

  He leaned farther toward me and took the tablet from my hand.

  “I remember this trinket well.”

  “I have had it for years.”

  He held it in his hand and looked at it lovingly.

  I stood up and held out my hand for it. He was beside me, laughing, with a mocking glint in his eyes.

  “I shall keep it.”

  “No. You will give it back.”

  “It will be a memento… something that has been near you. I shall sleep with it under my pillow in the hope that in my dreams that which you deny me will be mine.”

  “You are ridiculous, Thomas. Give me the tablet.”

  He took a few paces backward, laughing at me. He held out his hand. “Come and get it,” he said.

  As I went to get it, he snatched his hand away and ran.

  “Give it back,” I shouted.

  “It is mine,” he called over his shoulder. “I shall never let it go.”

  He ran and I went after him. He outstripped me. As he turned the corner of the palace, he held up his hand and the trinket glistened in the sun.

  Then he was gone.

  I did not see the King for sev
eral days. I thought his attitude was very strange, as it had been throughout our acquaintance. I could not understand why there should have been those great efforts to stop my marrying either James Butler or Henry Percy, and then the long silence. And now the passionate avowal and more silence. It was really very odd. I did wonder, having heard from both George and Thomas, who in their positions at Court knew something of the intimate nature of the King’s character, whether his conduct was in some way connected with his relationship with Mary.

  But it was more likely to be annoyance with me. He was probably indicating how much he resented my refusal to accept his proposal. Or it may have been that he made such declarations to any woman who might interest him momentarily.

  Weston had gathered us together. The King wished a masque to be devised which would outshine all others. It was to take place at Greenwich, where the Court would be for the occasion, and it was to honor the departing French ambassadors.

  When the King wanted to impress foreigners—and particularly the French—he liked the entertainment to be of special grandeur.

  A great deal had happened since that display at Guines and Ardres which had surpassed all with its pointless flamboyance and which had so quickly shown itself to have been of no value whatsoever. There would never, I guessed, be another Field of the Cloth of Gold.

  George was particularly interested in what was going on abroad and he often talked about it. The fate of King François was of particular interest to me. In a way I had been fond of him. I knew he was a libertine, untrustworthy, and that the only true loyalty he had was to his sister and mother, but as a lover—in spite of his numerous affairs—he was constant to only one passion in his life and that was Art. He genuinely cared for it, and I had never forgotten his reverence for great artists. Moreover, I had been very fond of Marguerite. I would always remember her as the model I had looked up to in my youth. She had taught me so much; I had wanted to be like her. She had given me an appreciation of literature which I had never lost. So I was always avid for news of what was happening at the French Court.

  I had felt quite sad when I had heard that François had been captured at Pavia and was the Emperor’s prisoner in Madrid. I tried to imagine his frustration in such circumstances. It seemed inevitable that he should become sick. There had been a pitiful attempt to escape by changing clothes with a Negro servant who delivered the coal. I could not imagine François as a servant in any circumstances and I was not surprised that the attempt failed. Emaciated, failing in health, there could have been no doubt that he would have died if Marguerite had not gone out to nurse him. She brought her zeal, her energy and her efficiency to overriding all difficulties and to her determination to save her beloved brother.

  Having lived so close to them, I could picture, far better than my brother or Thomas could, their feelings in this terrible situation in which they found themselves. When I heard that on her arrival Marguerite found her brother so near to death that he was ready for Extreme Unction and to take his last farewell of the sister who was so dear to him, I felt deeply shocked. But Marguerite would not accept what seemed to others inevitable. She had not overcome such opposition, and traveled so far, just to say farewell to him. I could imagine her discourse with him. She was an eloquent and convincing speaker and she would be practical, too. She would have forced him to keep his grip on life, for without him she would have no wish to continue. I did not doubt she had taken remedies with her, and in spite of the fact that he was on the threshold of death, she nursed him back to life.

  He was free now, but Charles’s conditions had been harsh. François had had to agree to relinquish the sovereignty of Flanders, Artois and the Duchy of Burgundy; and moreover to restore to the Constable de Bourbon, whom he considered a traitor, all he had taken from him.

  Poor Claude had died. I was very sad to hear of her death. She must have been about twenty-five years old and she had always been a weakling. Nevertheless, she had borne François seven children in spite of her infirmities. I supposed it had worn her out. Perhaps I should not have pitied her. She had never really been unhappy, which must have been because she had shut herself off from worldly matters and given herself to good works and religion, and this had brought her a peace and serenity which I found remarkable.

  François was now married to Charles’s sister Eleanora, as part of the peace terms. But although he was allowed to leave Madrid, which seemed necessary if he was to recover fully, he had to deliver his two sons, the Dauphin and the Duc d’Orléans, as hostages until the treaty was signed. So the two little boys were sent to Madrid and François had returned. Poor François! They said he had left his youth behind in a Madrid prison.

  There were other important events taking place in Europe. Pope Leo had died and Clement VII had replaced him. Wolsey’s dream of being Pope had not come true. I could not feel sorry for him. I would never forgive him for what he had done to Henry Percy and because he had regarded me as a foolish girl unworthy to mate with the great House of Northumberland. Wolsey’s conduct—although it had been instigated by the King—was unforgivable. I was glad Clement had been chosen instead of him. So he had not gained the Papal Crown and here he was in England, the servant of an unpredictable master. The King was delighted that he had failed to be elected, so George told me. He could not bear the thought of parting with Wolsey.

  I said: “Is he so important to the King then?”

  “Henry could not do without him. Wolsey has genius. One has to admit that.”

  It was true. He was involved in many diplomatic negotiations. His name was a byword on the Continent. When people thought of influencing the King, they first thought of Wolsey.

  However, as soon as François was free, he set about inducing Pope Clement to absolve him from his oath. Clement was no Leo. That he was weak, swaying toward whichever side would bring more benefits to him, became more and more obvious to us later.

  He absolved François from his oath, which, of course, meant that François would immediately plan to go to war again.

  The power of the Emperor had increased enormously. He was now the most powerful man in Europe. Young as he was, he was proving a statesman of stature, and this gave great concern to those who had previously been his allies. The King, with Wolsey behind him, sought to break the alliance with the Emperor and form a new one with France and the Italian states. This was the reason why the French ambassadors were in England.

  I supposed that satisfactory conclusion had been reached and this was to be their farewell entertainment.

  Thomas had written the masque. There was a certain amount of mime, poetic lines were to be declaimed and some singing. Several of the ladies would be dressed as nymphs and they were to be disturbed by satyrs from whom they ran in terror to be rescued by heroic knights. It was a setting which had been used many times; the difference was in the singing and the dances, which would be more exciting than anything that had been done before.

  During the day the great hall was hung with tapestries. These usually depicted some great battle but at Poitiers, Crécy, Agincourt and suchlike the French had been our enemies, so we fell back on the Field of the Cloth of Gold, which seemed one of the few occasions when there had been amity between our two nations.

  Some very artistic scenery had been erected and this never failed to win admiration.

  The King would naturally take part. He would be the leader of the knights who rescued the maidens from the satyrs.

  There was a great deal of laughter as we planned all this. I often thought the planning was more fun than the actual performance. I had given a lot of attention to what I should wear. Water nymphs should be green but I wanted to wear red and I did. My gown was red velvet but it fell open from the waist to the hem to show a green velvet petticoat. The band about my neck was green velvet, as was the lining of my hanging sleeves. It had been difficult to find a green which toned to my satisfaction, but I decided that the contrast was quite effective.

  I felt a mingling
of apprehension and excitement. If he ignored me tonight, I was sure that I was safe, for if he had intended to banish me, he would surely have done so by now. Yet suppose his ardor had remained, what then?

  My gown was becoming. Perhaps I should have made myself drab. That was something I could not do. Clothes had always been so important to me and I did not think I could be entirely happy when they were becoming—nor could I be completely happy if they lacked charm.

  I wanted to remain at Court. I wanted to be the brightest star of the evening. I wanted admiration from them all, including the King. But I must be in control of it and never allow any of them to get beyond desiring, and my instinct warned me that they must do so if their desire was satisfied.

  So in high excitement I danced and I sang; I fled in terror from the satyrs; and then out came the knights wearing masks, of course, in a ridiculous pretense of hiding their identities—their leader tall and commanding, a glittering figure.

  I made sure I did not run toward him but almost flung myself into the arms of one of the other rescuing knights. But he was thrust aside and Henry was seizing me.

  “Mine, I think,” he said, and I was immediately relinquished.

  “Thank you, good knight,” I said, rather apprehensively.

  “Have no fear, maiden. You are safe now.”

  I was one maiden who felt far from safe.

  Then there followed the unmasking of the knights and the exclamations of amazement.

  He was looking at me with a boyish expression of pleasure. I think he was expecting me to be overcome with surprise to find that the tall, glittering figure was not a humble knight but the King.

  I almost liked him then. There was something appealing in his child-like amusement, his love of a game, his boyish indifference to reality.

  But my anxiety was acute. I suffered a great many qualms because I knew that the chase was not over; it was only just beginning.

  “I trust,” he said, “that you are grateful for your rescue.”

  “Your Grace is indeed a valiant knight.”

  “I was just in the nick of time. I did not care to see you carried off by another.”