Behind the men come the women, embracing great armfuls of stooks and tying them with one practiced movement, their gowns hitched up so that they can stride, their sleeves rolled up high over their brawny arms. Many of them have a baby strapped to their back, most of them have a couple of children trailing behind with the old people gleaning the fallen heads of wheat so that nothing is wasted.
I feel all the wild joy of a miser watching gold come into the treasury. I would rather have a good crop than all the plate I could steal from an abbey. I sit on my horse and watch the tenants work, and I smile when they call out to me and tell me that it is a good year, a good year for us all.
I ride back to the house and notice a strange horse in the stables and a man taking a drink of ale at the kitchen door. He looks up as I ride into the yard and pulls his hat from his head—it’s an odd cap, Italian-made I should guess. I dismount and wait for him to come towards me.
“I have a message from your son, Countess,” he says. “He is well, and sends you good wishes.”
“I am glad to hear from him,” I say, hiding my anxiety. We are all waiting, we have been waiting for months, for Reginald to complete his report on the king’s claim to be supreme head of the English Church. Reginald has promised that the work will be finished soon and that it will support the king’s views. How he will walk through the maze that lost Thomas More, how he will avoid the trap that snapped shut on John Fisher, I don’t know. But there is no one in Christendom better read than my son Reginald. If there is a precedent for a king like ours in the long history of the Church, he will find it, and perhaps he can find a way to restore Princess Mary too.
“I will read this, and write a reply,” I tell him.
He bows. “I will be ready to take it tomorrow,” he says.
“The steward will find you bed and board for tonight.”
I walk through the door to the inner garden and sit on the seat beneath the roses and break the seal of Reginald’s letter to me.
He is in Venice. I rest the letter on my knee, close my eyes, and try to imagine my son in a fabulous city of wealth and beauty, where the houses’ doors open on the lapping water, and he has to take a boat to go to the great library where he is an honored scholar.
He writes to me that he is ill and thinking about death. He does not feel sorrow but a sense of peace.
I have completed my report and sent it as a long letter to the king. It is not for publication. It is the opinion that he asked for. It is sharp and loving. The scholar in him will recognize the strength of the logic, the theologian will understand the history. The fool and the sensualist will be shocked that I call him both, but I do believe that the death of his concubine gives him a chance to return to the Church, which he must do to save his soul. I am his prophet, as God sent to David. If he can listen to me, he might yet be saved.
I have advised him to give it to his best scholars for them to make a précis for him. It’s a long letter and I know that he will not have the patience to read it all! But there are men in England who will read it and ignore the vehement words to hear the truth. They can reply to me and perhaps I will rewrite. This is not a statement for publication for all men to wonder at, this is a document for discussion among men of learning.
I have been ill but I will not rest. There are those who would be glad to see me dead and some days I would be glad to sleep in death. I remember, and I hope that you remember too, that when I was only a little boy you gave me entirely to God and rode away from me, and left me in the hands of God. Don’t worry about me now—I am still in His hands, where you left me.
Your loving and obedient son,
Reginald
I hold the letter against my cheek as if I could smell the incense and the candle wax of the study where he wrote it. I kiss the signature in case he kissed it before he sealed it up and sent it away. I think that I have lost him indeed, if he has turned from life and yearns for death. The one thing I would have taught him, if I had kept him at my side, is to never weary of life, but to cling to it. Life: at almost any cost. I have never prepared myself for death, not even going into childbed, and I would never put my head down on the block. I think that I should never have left him with the Carthusian monks, good men though they were, poor though I was and without any other way to feed him. I should have begged on the roadside with my son in my arms before I let him be taken from me. I should never have left him to grow into a man who sees himself in the hands of God and prays to go to heaven.
I lost him when I left him at the priory, I lost him when I sent him to Oxford. I lost him when I sent him to Padua, and now I know the full extent and the finality of my loss. Once, I was married to a good man, I had four handsome boys, and now I am an old lady, a widow with only two sons in England, and Reginald, the brightest and the one who needed me the most, is far, far away from me dreaming of his own death.
I hold his letter to my heart and I mourn for the son who is tired of life, and then I start to think. I reread the letter and I wonder what he means by “vehement words,” I wonder what he means by being a prophet to the king. I hope very much that he has not written anything that will stir the king’s ever-ready suspicion or wake his restless rage.
WESTMINSTER PALACE, LONDON, OCTOBER 1536
The court returns to London and as soon as the king is in his rooms I am summoned to his privy chamber. Of course, I hope that he is going to appoint me to the princess’s household, and I hurry from my rooms, across the courtyard, through a small door and up a stairway, through the great hall, until I come to the king’s rooms in the warren that is Westminster Palace.
I go through the crowded presence chamber with a little smile of anticipation on my face. They may have to wait but I have been summoned. Surely, he will appoint me to serve the princess and I can guide her back to her title and her true position.
There are more people than ever waiting to see the king, and most of them have a set of plans or a map in their hands. The monasteries and churches of England are being parceled out, one after another, and everyone wants their share.
But there are men who look uneasy. I recognize an old friend of my husband’s, one of the townsmen of Hull, and I nod to him as I go by.
“Will the king see you?” he asks urgently.
“I am going to him now,” I say.
“Please ask him if I can see him,” the man says. “We’re sick with fear in Hull.”
“I’ll tell him if I can,” I say. “What’s the matter?”
“The people can’t stand having their churches taken,” he says quickly, one eye on the door of the privy chamber. “They won’t tolerate it. When a monastery is pulled down, it robs the whole town. We can’t rule the towns, the citizens won’t bear it. They’re all up in the North, and they are talking of defending the monasteries and throwing out the inspectors who come to close them.”
“You must tell Lord Cromwell, it’s his work.”
“He knows. But he doesn’t warn the king. He doesn’t understand the danger that we are in. I tell you, we can’t hold the North against the people if they all join together.”
“Defending the Church?” I say slowly.
He nods. “Saying it has all been foretold. And speaking for the princess.”
One of the king’s grooms opens the privy chamber door and nods to me. I leave the townsman without another word, and go in.
It is cool and dark in the privy chamber, where the shutters are closed against the gray of an autumn afternoon, and the fire is laid in the grate but not yet lit. The king is seated behind a broad black-polished table in a big carved chair, scowling. The table before him is heaped with papers, and a secretary waits at the far end, his pen poised, as if the king had been dictating a letter and had broken off when he heard the sentries knock and swing open the door. Lord Cromwell stands to one side, and politely bows his head to me as I walk in.
I can smell danger, just like a horse can sense weak timbers underfoot on a rotten bridge. I look f
rom Cromwell’s downturned gaze to the poised secretary, and it is as if we are all posing for a portrait from the court painter, Master Holbein. The title would be Judgment.
I raise my head and I walk towards the table and the dark gaze of the most powerful man in Christendom. I am not afraid. I will not be afraid. I am a Plantagenet. The scent of danger is one that I know as well as I know the rich smell of fresh blood, the sharp smell of rat poison. I smelled it in my nursery; this is the scent of my childhood, of all of my life.
“Your Majesty.” I rise up from my curtsey and I stand before him, my hands clasped before me, my face serene.
He meets my gaze and glares at me, his eyes blank, and I let him hold the silence while I feel salty bile slowly rising in my throat. I swallow it down. Then he speaks first. “You know what this is,” he says rudely, pushing a bound manuscript towards me.
I step forward and when Lord Cromwell nods, I pick it up. My hands don’t tremble.
I see that the title is in Latin. “Is this my son’s letter?” I ask. My voice does not quaver.
Lord Cromwell bows his head.
“Do you know what he has called it?” Henry snaps.
I shake my head.
“Pro ecclesiasticae unitatis defensione,” Henry reads aloud. “Do you know what that means?”
I give him a long look. “Your Majesty, you know that I do. I used to teach you Latin.”
It is almost as if he loses his balance, as if I have recalled him to the boy that he was. For a moment only he wavers, then he swells into grandeur again. “For the defense of the unity of the Church,” he says. “But am I Defender of the Faith or not?”
I find that I can smile at him, my lips don’t tremble. “Of course you are.”
“And Supreme Head of the Church of England?”
“Of course you are.”
“Then is your son not guilty of insult, of treason, when he questions my right to rule my Church and defend it? The very title of his letter is treason, all on its own!”
“I have not seen his letter,” I say.
“He has written to her,” Lord Cromwell says quietly to the king.
“He is my son, of course he writes to me,” I reply to the king, ignoring Cromwell. “And he told me that he had written you a letter. Not a report, not a book, nothing to be published, nothing with a title. He told me that you had asked for his opinion on certain matters and he had obeyed you, studied, consulted, and written his opinion.”
“It’s a treasonous opinion,” the king says flatly. “He is worse than Thomas More, far worse. Thomas More should never have died for what he said, and he never said anything like this. More should be alive today, the best of my advisors, and your son beheaded in his place.”
I swallow. “Reginald should not have written anything that even approached treason,” I say quietly. “I must beg your pardon for him if he has done so. I had no idea what he was writing. I had no idea what he was studying. He has been your scholar for many years, working to your commands.”
“He says what you all think!” Henry rises to his feet and leans towards me. His little eyes are glaring. “Do you dare to deny it? To my face? To my face?”
“I don’t know what he says,” I repeat. “But none of my family in England speaks or thinks or even dreams a word of treason. We are loyal to you.” I turn to Cromwell. “We took the oath without delay,” I say. “You closed Bisham Priory, my own foundation, and I did not complain, not even when you appointed a prior of your choosing and turned out Prior Richard and all the canons and cleared the chapel. You took the Lady Mary’s jewels from the list that I made for you, and when you locked her up I obeyed you and never wrote to her. Montague is a loyal servant and friend, Geoffrey serves you in Parliament. We are kinsmen, loyal kinsmen, and we have never done anything against you.”
The king suddenly slaps the table with a heavy hand, which sounds like a pistol shot. “I can’t stand this!” he bellows.
I don’t jump, I hold myself very still. I turn towards him and face him full on, as the keeper at the Tower faces the wild beasts. Thomas More once told me: lion or king, never show fear or you are a dead man.
The king leans forward and shouts into my face. “Everywhere I turn there are people conspiring against me, whispering, writing . . .” He sweeps Reginald’s manuscript to the floor with another angry gesture. “Nobody thinks of what I do for the country, nobody thinks of how I suffer, leading the country onward, taking them out of darkness into light, serving God though everyone around me, everyone . . .” Suddenly, he rounds on Cromwell. “What are they doing in Lincoln? What are they doing in Yorkshire? What do they say against me? Why don’t you keep them silent? Why are they roaming the streets of Hull? And why did you allow Pole to write this?” he yells. “Why would you be such a fool?”
Cromwell shakes his head as if he is amazed at his own stupidity. And at once, since he is getting the blame for the bad news, he sets about diminishing it. A moment ago he was my prosecutor; now he is my codefendant, and the offense immediately becomes much less serious. I see him turn, like a dancer in a masque, to skip down the line in the opposite direction.
“The Duke of Norfolk will put down the uprising in the North,” he says soothingly. “A few peasants shouting for bread, it’s nothing. And this from your scholar Reginald Pole—this is nothing. It’s only a private letter,” he says. “It’s only the opinion of one man. If Your Majesty would deign to rebut it, how could it stand? Your understanding is naturally greater than his. Who would even read it if you denied it? Who cares what Reginald Pole thinks?”
Henry flings himself to the window and looks out into the soft twilight. The owls that live in the attics of this old building are hooting, and as he watches, a great white barn owl sweeps quietly by on silent snub wings. The bells are tolling all over the great city. I think for one moment what would happen to this king if the bells were to start to peal backwards and the people hear the signal to rise against him?
“You will write to your son,” Henry spits, without looking round. “And you will tell him to come to England and face me, like a man. You will disown him. You will tell him that he is no child of yours for he speaks against your king. I won’t have divided loyalties. Either you serve me, or you are his mother. You can choose.”
“You are my king,” I say simply. “You were born to be king, you always have been my king. I never deny that. You must judge what is the best for the whole kingdom and for me, as your most humble and loving servant.”
He turns and looks at me, and suddenly it is as if his temper is quite blown away. He is smiling, as if I have said something that makes complete sense to him. “I was born to be king,” he says quietly. “It is God’s will. To say anything else is to fly in the face of God. Tell your son that.”
I nod.
“God put Arthur aside to make me king,” he reminds me, almost shyly. “Didn’t he? You saw Him do it. You were a witness.”
I give no sign of what it costs me to speak of Arthur’s death to his younger brother. “God Himself put you on the throne,” I agree.
“The best choice,” he asserts.
I bow my head in assent.
The king sighs as if he has somehow got to a place where he can be at peace.
I glance at Cromwell; it seems that the audience is over. He nods, his face a little pale. I think that Cromwell must sometimes have to dig deep to find the courage to face this monster he has made.
I curtsey and I am about to turn to go to the door when a little warning gesture of the hand from the silent secretary at the end of the table reminds me that we are not allowed to turn our backs on the king anymore. His greatness is such that we have to leave his presence walking backwards.
I am of the old royal family in England. My father was brother to two kings. I think for a moment, for half a moment only, that I will look like a fool showing exaggerated respect for this fat tyrant, whose back is turned to me, who does not even see the homage that I am or
dered to give him. Then I think that the only fool is the one who fails to survive in these dangerous times, and I give Thomas Cromwell a smile which says—if he could but read it—how low shall we stoop, you and I? To keep our heads on our shoulders? And I curtsey again and walk backwards six paces, curtsey, feel blindly behind my back for the handle, and slide out of the door.
Montague comes to my room after Compline, late at night. “What did he say to you?” he demands. His hair is sticking up as if he has run his hands through it in exasperation. I stroke it down and straighten his cap. He jerks his head away from my touch. “He tore into me, this letter of Reginald’s has all but ruined us. I don’t think he’ll ever forgive it. He can’t bear to hear criticism. He screamed at me.”
“He told me that I had to disown Reginald,” I admit. “He was angrier than I have ever seen him before.”
“He frightened Cromwell,” Montague says. “I saw his hands shake. I was kneeling, I swear that my legs would have given way if I had been standing. There was no pleasing him through dinner. The queen spoke to him about a favor for someone and he said that she didn’t have enough goodwill from him to squander it on others. In front of everyone! I thought she was going to cry before all the court. Then after dinner he took me to one side and was beside himself.”
“She’s terrified of him,” I remark. “Not like Queen Katherine, not even like Anne. She can’t begin to manage him.”
“What will we do?” Montague demands. “God knows that we can’t manage him. What could possess Reginald to expose us to this?”
“He had to!” I defend him. “It was either that or write page after page of lies. The king commanded that he give his opinion. He had to say what he thought.”
“He called the king a tyrant and a ravening beast!” Montague raises his voice and then remembers that these words alone are treason, and claps his hand over his mouth.
The King's Curse Page 49