The Sixth Wife: The Story of Katherine Parr

by Jean Plaidy

  The King had become confused. “Buckingham!” he shouted, but his voice immediately fell to a whisper: “To the Tower with Buckingham. To the block, I say!”

  Seymour reflected that it must be thirty years since Buckingham went to the block. Now the King remembered. Was his conscience, so long subdued concerning Buckingham, now rousing itself uneasily? The case of Buckingham had been similar to that of Surrey; both had been noble lords obsessed by their nobility.

  The King was muttering again. He had returned to the present. “Seymour…are you there? Thomas…my friend…you spoke of Surrey. He has gone, has he? What was his crime?”

  “He would have made his sister your mistress, Your Grace. Your Grace was enraged at such a suggestion.”

  A leer, which made the bloated face more horrible, now curled the King’s lips. “Howard’s girl…a comely wench… and saucy…”

  Seymour felt nauseated. He turned from the King, thinking with amazement: On his dying bed he contemplates his bedtime pleasures! And Kate… my poor Kate… she was married to this man; and this is the monster who planned to send her the way he has sent others; who was planning, if rumor be correct, but a few weeks since.

  “Thomas …” cried the King suddenly. “There are men in our chamber. Our enemies whisper and conspire against us.”

  “Nay, Sire. They are but your Councillors. They come to inquire of your health.”

  “Is Norfolk there?”

  “Nay, Your Grace, Norfolk lies in the Tower, awaiting your signature to his death warrant.”

  “We’ll give it. We’ll give it. To the block with these Howards… father and son.”

  “Your Majesty must preserve his strength.”

  “There’s strength enough… I’ll sign it. Surrey…a foolish boy. A comely wench, thy sister, Surrey. A drink…a drink…my throat is scorched by fires. Douse them, Seymour. Douse them, my friend. What whispering goes on about me? Come forth! Come forth! Ah, I see you there, you rogue. What news, eh? Why do you look so smug? Am I going to die? Is that what you would tell me? Come…. You there, Denny. What news? What news, I say?”

  Denny, braver than the rest and certain now that the King was dying, decided to tell him the truth.

  “My lord King, all human aid is vain, your doctors fear. It is therefore meet for Your Majesty to review your past life and seek God’s mercy through Christ.”

  There was a second of terrible silence while understanding showed itself on the King’s distorted face. But he was quick to recover his calm, to banish the terror which had laid hold on him. He said sternly: “Tell me, Denny, by what authority you come to pass sentence on me. What judge has sent you here?”

  “Your doctors, Sire. I will send them to you. They await an audience.”

  The King closed his eyes wearily, but when a few seconds later the doctors approached the bed with medicines for him, he opened his eyes and glared at them with the old ferocity. “What’s this?” he demanded. “You have passed sentence on me, you judges; and when a judge has passed his sentence on a criminal, he has no longer need to trouble him. Begone! Begone, I say!” As they continued to stand there watching him, he shouted: “Begone! Begone!”

  The doctors bowed and turned away.

  “Your presence can do no good here,” said Wriothesley.

  When they had gone, the Chancellor approached the bed.

  “Your Majesty, would you wish to see some of your divines?”

  “Eh?” said the King. “What’s that? Ah…so it has come to that. Divines! Nay! I’ll see none but Cranmer… and him not yet.”

  Wriothesley turned to one of the gentlemen. “Go you to Cranmer. He is at Croydon. Go with all speed. Tell him the King desires his presence at White Hall without delay.”

  “Your Majesty,” he went on, “Cranmer will come.”

  “I’ll have him when I am ready… and not before. Begone! Begone, I said. Leave me….”

  His eyes glared at them, although, to him they were like shadows at his bedside. They moved away to a far corner of the chamber, and after a while the King closed his eyes and began to speak again.

  “Begone…. Begone… I’ll have none of ye.” He moaned and cried out suddenly in a startled voice: “Anne! Anne! You’re there, you witch. I see you.” He spoke in a whisper then. “Why lookest thou at me with those great black eyes? Thy neck is small. Thou wilt not feel the sword. Ah! You would have a sword from Calais. That is like you. The ax is for ordinary mortals. Haughty to the end! Anne… Anne…’ tis for England, sweetheart. An heir for England. A King is the servant of his country. He is not the servant of his passions. Anne, thy black eyes scorn me. I’ll not have it. To the block! To the block!”

  The King opened his eyes suddenly and stared about him in a startled fashion. The candles were burning low and flickering in their sockets.

  “Review your past life and seek God’s mercy through Christ,” he murmured. “That is what they tell me. That is what they tell me now. A great reign…a great and glorious reign. Oh God, always did the eighth Henry work for Thy glory and for the good of England. No thought gave he to his own desires….”

  His voice died away; his breathing was heavy; then suddenly it stopped, and those watching in the shadows thought the end had come.

  But before they could move toward him, he had begun to speak again.

  “Is that you, Cardinal, sitting there? Why do you smile, Cardinal? I like your smile not at all. The Cardinal died of a flux. Many die of a flux…be they Cardinal or beggar. You keep good wine, Thomas… good food and wine. A subject should not keep such state. Look at me not with those great black eyes, Anne. You witch! Sorceress! Poisoner! The roses are beautiful at Hever. Red roses… red… the color of blood. Shadows… shadows move about me. Shadows in my room. There. There! Monks… monks. …Black cowls that drip red blood. Oh, dear God, they creep toward me. Closer… closer they come. Monks… monks from all corners….” He tried to lift his hands, but he could not move them; he tried to shout for help, but his voice was a whisper. “The candles are going out and the darkness is coming, and with it… monks…. To Tyburn with them! To Tyburn! I…am not at Tyburn. I lie in bed… adying…adying.”

  The sound of his stertorous breathing filled the chamber.

  “A drink!” he gasped. “A drink…a cup of wine, for the love of God.”

  “He is scorched with the death thirst,” said Wriothesley.

  As the Chancellor approached the bed and poured wine into the cup, the King said: “Kate… Kate, is that you… good wife?”

  “It is your Chancellor, my lord,” said Wriothesley. “Here is the wine you crave.”

  “Good Kate,” said the King; and his eyes were closed now. “Good wife.”

  “There, ’tis refreshing, is it not, my lord?”

  “It doth but cool the fires ere they burst to wilder fury. Kate… Kate… I’ll not see the sun rise again.”

  “Speak not thus, my lord,” said Wriothesley.

  “Kate… I loved thee. I loved thee well. I had not thought of putting you from me that I might take another wife. I would not have married… Jane…yes, Jane…an my subjects had not urged me to it.”

  Even the grim heart of the Chancellor was moved to pity, and listening to these last words of the King he wished to soothe the monstrous conscience.

  “Your subjects urged Your Grace to the marriage,” he said softly.

  “’ Twas so. Katharine… canst thou see a dark shadow there… over there by the arras at the door?”

  “There is nothing there, Your Grace.”

  “Look again,” commanded the King.

  “Nay, Sire. Your eyes deceive you.”

  “Come closer, Kate. I would whisper. It doth look to me like a fellow in a black robe. Can you not see a monk standing there?”

  “It is but the hangings, my lord.”

  “You lie!” cried the King. “I’ll have your head off your shoulders an you deceive me. Suffolk’s wife, ah! She doth please me. Her eyes are dove
’s eyes and she would be a loving wench, I vow. And not too docile. I never greatly cared for too much docility. Jane, dost remember what happened to thy predecessor? A Flander’s mare… and Howard’s niece the prettiest thing that ever graced a court. Is that you, Chancellor? Monks…. Chancellor. They come at me. They come at me. Hold them off. Hold them off from your King, I say!” The King was breathing with difficulty. “What day is this?” he asked.

  “The morning has come, for it is two of the clock,” said Wriothesley.

  “What day? What day?”

  “The twenty-eighth day of January, my lord.”

  “The twenty-eighth day of January. Remember it. It is the day your sovereign lord the King was murdered. There in the hangings. See! Take my sword. Ah, you would have a sword from Calais to sever that proud head. The huntsman’s call…do you hear it? There… look. In the hangings. I swear I saw the curtains move. Monks… monks… Hanged, drawn and quartered. So perish all who oppose the King!”

  Those who had been standing back from the bedside now drew near.

  “He dies, I fear,” said Wriothesley. “His hour is come.”

  The King seemed calmed by the sight of his ministers.

  “My lords,” he said, “my time approaches fast. What of my son—my boy Edward? His sister Mary must be a mother to him; for look, he is little yet.”

  “Be comforted, Your Majesty. Edward will be well cared for.”

  “He is your King. Supreme head of the Church. Defender of the Faith. A little boy…but ten years old.”

  “Your Majesty may safely leave these matters to your ministers, those whom you yourself have appointed to guide the affairs of your realm.”

  The King chuckled incongruously. “A motley lot. You’ll have a noisy time, fighting together. But I’ll not be there to see it… I’ll not be there. Kate…. Where is Kate? I see her not. I command you all to honor her, for she has been a good wife to me. We…we never thought to… put her from us. ’T was but for sons… for England. Wine, wine… I am a burning furnace.”

  He had not the strength to drink the wine which was offered.

  His eyes rolled piteously.

  “All is lost. All is lost,” he moaned.

  Cranmer came hastening to the chamber. Henry looked at this well-loved minister, but he could no longer speak to him.

  The Archbishop knelt by the bed and took his master’s hand.

  “My lord, my beloved lord, give me a sign. Show me that you hope to receive the saving mercy of Christ.”

  But Henry’s eyes were glazed.

  Cranmer had come too late.

  IN THE PRIVY CHAMBER, the King’s body lay encased in a massive chest; and in this chamber, for five days, the candles burned, masses were said, and obsequies held with continual services and prayers for the salvation of his soul.

  On the sixth day the great chest was laid on the hearse which was adorned with eight tapers, escutcheons, and banners bearing pictures of the saints worked in gold on a background of damask.

  Dirges were sung as the funeral cortège began its stately journey to Windsor, where the chapel was being made ready to receive the royal corpse.

  And the mourners?

  There was his wife, now strangely light of heart. How did one feel when the ax which had been poised above one’s head for nearly four years, was suddenly removed? She was a young woman in her mid-thirties, and she had never known that happy marriage which she had thought would be hers before the King had decided to make her his wife. Those four years had seemed liked forty; but she had come through them unscathed. The death of the King had saved her; and as she rode with the procession or took her place in the state barge, she could think of little but Thomas, who was waiting.

  In his cell in the Tower of London, the Duke of Norfolk felt a similar lifting of the spirits—for he too had escaped death, and in his case, it was by a few hours. The King had intended that he should die, and instead the King had died; and now, without that master of men, there was no one left who would dare destroy the great Catholic leader. The Catholics were too strong, and there must be much diplomacy if the country was to avoid a bloody civil war. None wanted that. The hideous Wars of the Roses were too close to be forgotten. So, like Katharine, Norfolk, who had narrowly escaped with his life, could not be expected to mourn sincerely the passing of the King.

  Lord and Lady Hertford could scarcely wait to take over control. They had the young King in their keeping and they were the rulers now.

  There was the little King himself, frightened by the homage which was now done to him. Men now knelt in his presence and called him Majesty, but he was wise enough to know that he was their captive as he had never been before.

  And Mary? One life was now between her and the throne. The King was sickly; and so was she; but she prayed that God would take her brother before her so that she might have the glory of leading the English back to Rome.

  There were two other important actors in England’s drama at this time—two of the most ambitious people in the kingdom—a Princess of thirteen and a man in his thirties.

  Why not? the Lord High Admiral asked himself. I verily believe the King would have given me his daughter, had he lived. But he is dead and Kate is free, and the Council will put obstacles between myself and the Princess.

  The Admiral had need of caution, and he was the most reckless man in the kingdom.

  And the Princess Elizabeth? She was impatient of her youth, impatient of her inexperience. She longed for the Admiral. She had her mother’s love of gaiety and admiration and she yearned for the man who titillated her senses and roused within her that which was delightful and wholly dangerous. And yet… she must remember. There were two lives between herself and the throne. She was sure that her brother would never have an heir. And Mary with her ills and complaints—how long would she last? And then…! The glory of it was dazzling. She wanted it so eagerly, so urgently. But she also wanted Seymour. She wanted the man and the throne. Yet something told her she could not have them both.

  Here was a problem for a girl not yet fourteen years of age to solve. What could she do? She could wait; she could watch; she could remember always to act with caution, the greatest caution she could muster. Those who were very near the throne were in great danger until they reached it. And even then… But not a Tudor. No, once a Tudor was on the throne, he—or she—would know how to stay there.

  Such were the dreams of those who had lived near the King, as the funeral procession went its solemn way.

  The body was brought to rest for a while in the chapel at Sion House; and while it was there the chest burst open and the King’s blood was spilt on the chapel floor.

  Horror ran through the land when this became known. The terrible tortures, which had been inflicted on many during this King’s lifetime, were remembered; and the names of thousands who had died at his orders were recalled.

  What has this King to answer for? it was whispered.

  And the people shuddered.

  A certain William Greville declared that a dog had appeared and licked the King’s blood; and although great efforts had been made to drive the dog away, none had been able to do so.

  It was a ghost, said the superstitious—the ghost of one whom he had murdered.

  It was then recalled that his fifth wife, Catharine Howard, had rested at Sion House on her way to the Tower, and this was the anniversary of that day when she had laid her head on the block and departed this life.

  Had not Friar Peyto, greatly daring, preached against the King when he had put Queen Katharine of Aragon away from him and married Anne Boleyn? Had not the bold man compared Henry with Ahab, and prophesied that the dogs would, in like manner, lick his blood?

  In the church of Windsor, Gardiner stood at the head of the vault, surrounded by the chief officers of the King’s household while the corpse was lowered by means of a vice and sixteen of the strongest Yeomen of the Guard. Out of favor with the late King and looking fearfully toward a new reig
n by a King indoctrinated with the new learning, he turned his eyes to the Princess Mary and prayed God that it might not be long ere she took her place on the throne.

  The Lord Chamberlain, the Lord Treasurer and all the company which stood about the grave held their rods and staves in their hands, and when the mold was cast down, each in turn broke his staff upon his head and cast it on to the coffin. De Profundis was then said and when the planks were laid over the pit, Garter, standing among the choir, proclaimed the little King’s titles.

  “Edward the Sixth, by Grace of God King of England, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith and Sovereign of the most noble order of the Garter,” repeated Garter’s officers; and three times they said this while the trumpets rang out.

  A new reign had begun. A mighty ruler was laid to rest, and in his place stood a pale-faced boy.

  It seemed to many who watched that ceremony that among them were the ghosts of murdered men and women.

  CHAPTER

  VI

  THE PRINCESS ELIZABETH WAS DEEPLY PERPLEXED.

  There had come to her that day a proposal of marriage. It was her first proposal of this nature, because it was an appeal to her direct. There had, in the course of her thirteen years, been other suggested marriages, but she had never been called to give her opinion on these. When she had been a few months old and high in her father’s favor, he had negotiated a marriage for her with the Duke of Angoulême, the third son of King François. That could not be expected to materialize after the King had called her a bastard, and it had long been forgotten. Later she had been promised to the heir of the Scottish Earl of Arran—a poor match for a royal Princess of England—and that, as perhaps had been intended from the first, had also come to nothing. Later there had been a more ambitious plan to unite her with Philip of Spain, son of the Emperor Charles, but that was also doomed to failure.

  But this proposal she had now received was different from all others. This was a declaration of love; and it had been made by the man whom Elizabeth could now admit that she herself loved. The Lord High Admiral of England, Sir Thomas Seymour, craved the hand of the Princess Elizabeth in marriage.