Recovering himself, he asked, “But that fatal contract was annulled?”
Catherine remained silent.
“I will answer the question,” said Lady Rochford. “It was not.”
“Then the marriage with the King is not valid!” cried Adrian. “Why — why was this frightful risk incurred?”
“I was dazzled. But I now see the end of it — I discern the scaffold to which I shall be taken. Save me, Adrian! — save me!”
“How can I save you? I can kill this man; but his death will not obliterate the past. You may have other accusers. Who is that woman, Lassells?”
“She witnessed my betrothal.”
“I feared so. And now I remember that inquiries were made for her by Cranmer immediately after her mysterious disappearance from the palace. What has become of her?”
“Dereham alone can tell. He promised she should trouble me no more. Oh, Adrian! I have gone on step by step, till retreat has become impossible. The end cannot be far off, unless you deliver me.”
“How can I deliver you?” be cried, in accents of despair. “’Tis a task beyond my power. But your preservation shall be my sole thought. You have enemies among the Protestant leaders. None of them, I trust, have obtained any clue to this fatal secret. Yet Cranmer’s inquiries for Mary Lassells alarm me. Dereham’s presence is another, and a greater, danger. But, for the moment, we must bear with him, lest his sudden disappearance should excite suspicion, and lead to discovery.”
“You are right,” said Lady Rochford. “Such has been my counsel to the Queen.”
“He is called my private secretary,” said Catherine, with a look of scorn. “But he is only so in name. I never allow him to approach me.”
“You shall be rid of him ere long,” said Adrian. “The opportunity is sure to arrive. I would slay him now, but the fear of harming you restrains me.”
“Bide your time,” said Lady Rochford. “Yield not to any sudden impulse of anger. Above all, let him not perceive that you have recognised him.”
“I will observe due caution,” he replied.
“My fears will be lessened now you are with us, Adrian,” said Catherine. “Wear this for my sake.” As she spoke, she detached a chain from her neck. He knelt down, and she placed it over his shoulder.
“I will wear it next my heart,” he said.
As he arose, she looked earnestly at him, and murmured, in accents that he could not resist, “Ere we part, say you forgive me, Adrian,”
“I do forgive you, Catherine,” he replied.
An impulse, that neither could resist, brought them together, and he strained her to his breast.
What a world of sadness as well of bliss was there in that embrace!
“You must not remain here longer, Adrian,” said Lady Rochford, opening the door, and looking out into the corridor.
By this incautious act, she enabled the two spies to see the Queen leaning on Adrian’s shoulder, and gazing tenderly into his face.
Lady Rochford stamped her feet impatiently.
Adrian, who was lost to everything except the rapture of the moment, was compelled to obey.
With an impassioned look at the Queen, he departed, and the door was instantly closed after him.
XIV. An Encounter in the Corridor.
As Adrian disappeared in the darkness of the corridor, the two pages came forth.
They were moving slowly along, laughing, and making comments on what they had seen, when they became aware that some one was near them.
They could not clearly distinguish this person, but they felt sure it must be Adrian Culpepper, and became silent in a moment.
“What are you doing here at this time of night?” demanded the new-comer, sternly. “You shall give an account of yourselves to the guard.”
“You will rue it, if you take us to the guard, Master Adrian Culpepper,” replied Paschal, in a defiant tone.
“Ay, you had best not trouble us,” added Celestin. “We have seen — what we have seen.”
“Like enough,” rejoined the new-comer. “And pray what have you seen?”
“We have seen you enter the Queen’s chamber,” replied Paschal. “And we have waited upwards of an hour for your coming forth. What say you to that, fair sir?”
The person addressed started, but made no reply.
“Methinks it were wiser to purchase our silence, than to threaten us,” observed Celestin. “If taken to the guard, we might make unpleasant disclosures. Deal with us fairly, and we will deal fairly with you, sweet Master Adrian.”
“You are impudent and lying varlets,” cried the other, “and deserve to have your tongues plucked forth for making this false charge. Learn, to your confusion, that I am not Adrian Culpepper, as you suppose, but Hugh Tilney, the Queen’s private secretary. As to the scandalous story you have invented, I can flatly contradict it. I have been in this corridor ever since the King retired to rest, and I have seen no one within it but yourselves. Insinuate aught against the Queen’s honour, and you shall hang — ay, hang, my pretty masters; therefore, beware!”
Quite confounded by the secretary’s boldness, and repenting that they had said so much to him, the two pages slunk off.
Left alone, Hugh Tilney remained stationary for a short space — apparently irresolute.
Rage prompted him to proceed to the Queen’s apartments; but he checked himself, exclaiming, “No.
The hour of vengeance has not yet arrived. Till then, I must protect her.”
XV. The Bishop of Lincoln.
ON the morrow, Hugh Tilney repeated his admonitions to the two pages; and his menaces so terrified them, that they postponed their designs against Adrian to a more favourable juncture.
But though they continued their surveillance, they made no further discoveries. Adrian avoided the secretary, and the secretary avoided him. Both were biding their time.
Three days afterwards, Henry and his consort arrived at Lincoln, and were received by the Bishop, who was the King’s confessor.
The Episcopal Palace of that time was little inferior to a baronial castle in size and grandeur, and boasted a vast and magnificent hall, supported by a double row of pillars. In this hall, the King and his attendants banqueted daily.
At Lincoln, the royal pair were met by the Duke of Norfolk and Gardiner, who came ostensibly to congratulate the King on the success of his progress, but, in reality, to accomplish Cranmer’s overthrow, which they had so long meditated.
Catherine’s influence over her husband, as we have shown, was now greater than ever; and she was prevailed upon to second their efforts — Gardiner persuading her that it was her duty as a good Catholic to aid them in removing every obstacle to the King’s return to the Apostolic See.
Many conferences were held. Cranmer’s heresies were denounced; and the King’s anger against him being heightened by Catherine, he promised her that if the charges against the Primate could be substantiated, he should share the fate of Cromwell.
This was enough. Gardiner undertook to prefer charges against Cranmer that would ensure the Archbishop’s condemnation as a heretic and schismatic.
Unluckily for the success of the design, Cranmer had a friend in the Bishop of Lincoln, who secretly conveyed to him intelligence of the plot — representing the great peril in which he stood; and adding, that if he would preserve his life, the Queen’s pernicious influence over the King must be destroyed.
The missive communicating these alarming tidings was entrusted to Celestin, who, with his fellow-page, had made certain disclosures to the Bishop.
On receiving the letter, Cranmer took immediate measures for his own safety. He learnt much from Celestin, who had been enjoined by the Bishop of Lincoln to reveal all he knew to him.
But he desired further and corroborative evidence of the Queen’s guilt; and he succeeded in obtaining it, as we shall proceed to relate.
Meanwhile, the royal pair pursued their journey southwards, little dreaming of the impending catastroph
e.
XVI. A Consultation.
UNTIL he had obtained all the evidence he needed, Cranmer refrained from consulting with his colleagues in the Anti-Papal Council; but as soon as his investigations were completed, he summoned the Lord Chancellor and the Earl of Hertford to Lambeth Palace, and laid the matter before them.
Nothing could exceed their astonishment at the revelation made to them.
“I see you are reluctant to believe my terrible relation,” said the Archbishop; “and I do not wonder at your incredulity. ’Tis inconceivable, indeed, that one so richly graced by nature, and so seemingly virtuous, as the young Queen, could have thus erred. But I have proofs of her guilt. Truly, the King has been unfortunate in his consorts. The only one who deserved his love was your sister, Queen Jane Seymour,” he added, to the Earl of Hertford.
“And she was taken from him,” observed Hertford, gravely.
“Your Grace has proofs of the Queen’s culpability, you say?” remarked the Lord Chancellor.
“I have witnesses, my lord, whom you yourself can interrogate,” rejoined Cranmer. “But before introducing them, suffer me to describe the extraordinary manner in which the retreat of the most important of them, Mary Lassells, came to be discovered. So strange was the discovery, that, happening when it did, I cannot but discern in it the finger of God.
“Cromwell’s last words to me were, that a certain Mary Lassells, if duly questioned, would furnish me with the means of dissolving the King’s union with Catherine Howard. This woman, he said, was then in the Queen’s household. I inquired for her, but in vain. The Queen herself positively denied that there was any such person among her household, and I own I felt reluctant to proceed further in so painful a business — especially when her Highness promised to mitigate the persecution of our partisans.”
“Your Grace displayed too much forbearance,” remarked the Lord Chancellor. “If you attached any weight to Cromwell’s dying advice, you ought to have pursued the inquiry, without regard to consequences. After your talk with the Queen, it was certain Mary Lassells would be removed.”
“So, indeed, it happened,” said Cranmer. “I subsequently ascertained that Lassells had been spirited away from Greenwich Palace; and from the manner of her disappearance, I entertained very little doubt as to her fate. If my conjectures were correct, the evidence against the Queen, whatever it might be, had been destroyed.”
The Earl of Hertford slightly shrugged his shoulders, and glanced at the Chancellor.
“Now mark, my lords, I pray you, how wonderful are the ways of heaven!” pursued Cranmer. “On the very same day that the messenger brought me the letter for the Bishop of Lincoln, a man, named Ludgrave, one of the King’s bargemen at Greenwich Palace, besought a private audience of me, stating that he had matter of importance to communicate.
“He informed me that chancing to be on St. Margaret’s Hill in Southwark, he had encountered the African with whom Lassells had privily quitted the palace, and instantly recognising the dark-skinned villain, though the other knew him not, had followed him warily to a wretched tenement on the Bank Side.
“Further investigations resulted in the discovery that a woman was concealed in a vault beneath the house; and believing the captive to be Mary Lassells, he came with the intelligence to me, being aware that I had made search for her.
“On hearing this, I sent some of my officers with Ludgrave to the house, when, as he suspected, Mary Lassells was found in the vault Mourzouk, the African, was seized at the same time, though he made a stout resistance, and both he and the miserable woman were brought here.”
“This is strange, indeed!” exclaimed his auditors.
“You shall now see her,” said the Archbishop.
And striking a small silver bell placed on the table, he directed the grave usher, who answered the summons, to bring in Mary Lassells.
XVII. How Mary Lassells was interrogated.
VERY pitiable was Mary Lassells’s appearance. Her frame was emaciated, her cheeks hollow, her eyes lustreless; and though restoratives had been given her, she was still so feeble, that during the examination that ensued, she was allowed to sit down.
“My deliverance was only just in time,” she said. “For two months, or more, I have been imprisoned in the dark, dank vault from which I have been taken — my sole diet being bread and water. I was fast sinking, and a few more days would have seen me out. But heaven willed that I should not die till I had disclosed the secret that has weighed so heavily on my soul! Question me, I pray you, my lords, and I will answer truthfully.”
“By whom have you thus been held in duresse, and from what motive?” demanded Audeley.
“I have been imprisoned by the African slave, Mourzouk, by order of his master, Francis Dereham. Dereham’s motive for treating me thus cruelly, was to keep me concealed from his Grace of Canterbury.”
“Where is Dereham now?” demanded the Earl of Hertford.
“With the Queen,” replied Lassells. “He is her private secretary.”
“You are mistaken, woman,” said the Chancellor. “Her Highness’s private secretary is named Hugh Tilney.”
“Hugh Tilney and Francis Dereham are one and the same person,” returned Lassells.
Audeley uttered an exclamation of surprise.
“How comes it that the Queen thus favours him?” demanded Hertford.
“She has good reason for doing so,” replied Lassells, with a malignant smile that gave a strange expression to her haggard countenance.
Then, speaking with great deliberation, in order that not a word she uttered might he lost, she said, “When Francis Dereham was page to the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk, he was the Lady Catherine Howard’s lover — Lady Catherine being then barely sixteen.”
“Alas! so young, to be ensnared by such a villain!” ejaculated Cranmer.
“If I had said he was her husband, I should not have been much wide of the truth,” pursued Lassells.
“Her husband?” exclaimed Hertford, stupefied.
“Ay, my lord! She had plighted her troth to him.”
“We are learning something now,” remarked Hertford.
“How know you that the Lady Catherine had plighted her troth to this man?” demanded the Chancellor. “From hearsay?”
“By the evidence of my own eyes and ears, my lord. I witnessed their betrothal. It took place in a little rustic temple situated in a secluded part of the Duchess’s garden at Lambeth.”
“And you were present, you say, woman?” demanded the Chancellor.
“I was the sole witness, my lord.” —
“Was any discovery made by the Duchess of her granddaughter’s intimate relations with Dereham?” inquired Hertford.
“I think not, my lord. But she was angered by his attentions to the Lady Catherine, and dismissed him.”
“What followed?”
“I was sent away, and money and jewels were given me by the Lady Catherine never to divulge her secret.”
“You have well performed your promise,” observed Hertford, indignantly. “Hark ye, woman! Were you Dereham’s mistress?”
“I will not attempt to deny it, my lord,” she replied, hanging her head.
“And you helped to betray the Lady Catherine — then only a girl of sixteen?” said the Chancellor, sternly.
Lassells made no reply.
“You hear me, woman?” thundered Audeley.
“Alas! my lord, it is too true.”
“You richly deserve the cruel treatment you have experienced from him,” observed the Chancellor.
“Did Dereham keep up any correspondence with the Lady Catherine after Ms dismissal?” asked Hertford.
“No, my lord; he sailed for the coast of Africa, and joined Dragut, the Corsair.”
“Joined Dragut? Why, then his life is already forfeited!” cried Hertford. “On his return, did he make any attempt to claim the Lady Catherine?”
“He had a secret interview with her, but she refused to fulfil
her promise, having transferred her affections to Adrian Culpepper. What he might have done, I know not, for he was frenzied with rage and jealousy; but he found a new and far more formidable rival in the King. Since then he has nourished only schemes of vengeance, in which I have been forced to aid him.”
“And when your presence endangered his schemes, you were unhesitatingly removed?” observed Hertford.
“He would have caused me to be murdered, if he had not thought that I might still be useful to him,” said Lassells.
The examination was continued for some time longer, but as the particulars elicited are already known to the reader, it does not seem necessary to repeat them.
Lassells appeared to gain strength and spirit as the inquiry proceeded, but she nearly fainted at its close, and had to be tended by the Archbishop’s physician.
Strict injunctions were given the physician to watch carefully over her, but he appeared to entertain no apprehensions as to her recovery.
Mourzouk was then brought in. His hands were fettered, and he was guarded by two halberdiers.
Glancing fiercely at his interrogators, he refused to answer any questions. The thumbscrew was applied, but without effect. Not even an expression of pain could be wrung from him.
As his obstinacy could not be overcome, he was ordered to be taken to the Tower, and placed in one of the underground dungeons.
Celestin was next introduced.
His evidence, in the opinion of the Chancellor and Hertford, furnished conclusive proof of the Queen’s guilt. The marked favour she had shown Adrian Culpepper, which was notorious to the whole Court, convinced them that the intrigue had been of long duration.
There could be no doubt that Lady Rochford had assisted throughout the affair, as well as at the midnight meeting between the Queen and her lover, witnessed by Celestin and his fellow page.
When the examination was concluded, Cranmer informed his colleagues that he had written to the Bishop of Lincoln, instructing him not to make any communication respecting the matter for the present to the King, and in nowise to alarm Adrian Culpepper and the so-called Hugh Tilney; but to take all needful precautions to prevent their flight.
The Works of William Harrison Ainsworth Page 632