by Lucy Worsley
Mary went on sobbing for a few minutes, before realising that she wasn’t really crying any more, only pretending to. With a final hiccup, she lifted her face from her father’s sleeve. He was ruffling her hair, and offering her his linen handkerchief. He was still looking shifty and embarrassed. Mary knew that he hated to see tears – he had often said so – and she began to feel ashamed. But mainly, she felt relief at her mother’s words.
‘Thank you, Mother,’ she coughed. ‘Thank you.’
Catherine smiled. Then she turned to face her husband, as if asking a question. The three of them were all still close together, on the chair and floor, but Mary could see that her father was straining away from them. He broke free and went to stand by the window again. Mary felt her panic coming back. He still hadn’t said anything.
‘I also came to tell you we’re leaving Hunsdon tomorrow,’ he said at last, a little distantly. ‘And we will all ride together,’ he said. He was more decisive now, as if he had made up his mind. ‘I know you ladies will be a long time getting ready …’ He sighed comically, and turned back towards them. ‘But I will wait for you. We will go together.’ Then he stepped forward, and again laid his hand on Mary’s head. He puffed out his cheeks and bulged his blue eyes at her. It was a trick he had to cheer her up, and it never failed.
Mary smiled. It was enough. It was just about enough.
Nothing else had been said about the lady her mother had mentioned. But deep down Mary knew exactly who it was. It was the woman in the violet gown, of course. It was Anne Boleyn.
Chapter 5
February 1531, Greenwich
Mary is fifteen …
The next morning, the sun was shining, and all three of them rode together and raced each other along the green lanes. Her father had even let Mary win, while her mother laughed and scolded him as a daredevil.
Mary was hugely, agreeably relieved. Her father had once again called her mother ‘Catalina’, and ‘bloody stubborn’, and laughed at her, while Catherine and Mary together insisted that he had been riding too fast, and showing off.
But Mary’s father wouldn’t allow them to remain with his household for the whole summer. It was the hunting, he said. Catherine and Mary just couldn’t keep up with the hours and speed at which he and his gentlemen rode. And accommodation was a problem too. Sometimes, his household and Mary’s household and her mother’s could just about fit into separate houses that were near to each other, but there often had to be days and nights when they were apart. Mary thought it was all silly. She didn’t need her three hundred servants. She would much rather have had fewer, so she could stay more often under the same roof as her parents.
‘No!’ her mother said, when she suggested this. ‘No! No! Your servants are your honour, Mary. You need honour, magnificence. It is all part of the battle.’
There she goes again, Mary thought sadly. Fighting talk. When her mother forgot to use her silky voice and hammered home her points like this, it made her father roll his eyes. It was much better to be peaceful and have fun, rather than to spend the days locked in deadly serious conversations with advisors and lawyers, as the queen now sometimes did.
‘We don’t need lawyers,’ Mary would say to her mother when they were reunited at the end of those long days of meetings. ‘You promised!’
‘That’s right, querida,’ her mother would say. ‘Your parents love you, don’t forget.’
If she was feeling bored, or tired, Mary would deliberately call back the memory of her mother insisting that her parents loved her, that strange day of their quarrel at Hunsdon. Then she’d recollect as well how her father had fluffed up her hair and bulged his eyes and said that she could ride with him. It always made her smile. During the long weeks, and even months, when Mary was forced to live with just her own household, she needed memories like these.
***
Now it was winter, not summer, and the main court was back at Greenwich once again. This palace, at least, was big enough to accommodate them all, king, queen and princess, and their hundreds of servants too. And if Mary’s mother wouldn’t give her the right answer to the question of their living together more of the time in future, then maybe her father would.
Mary sat up on the bed where she had been lolling, thinking over the trials of her life, and decided to trot off and see him. He would be pleased, she thought, and might even call her his Mighty Princess and let her sit under his rug by his fire, the one made from the skin of a white bear. Sometimes, when she’d been smaller, he used to get beneath it and pretend to be the bear. She loved that rug.
The day was freezing, and Mary’s own fire had died down. She’d been busy thinking, and when the pages had tried to bring more wood, she had called out that they should go away. It made her wonder, for a second, what it was like to live without three hundred servants. Was it rather lovely to make a fire for yourself? Was it rather satisfying to rely on just your own flesh and muscle? She thought that it might be.
Mary raised her cold fingers to her face and looked at them. God had given her these hands, but she never used them to do anything important. She spent so much of her life getting dressed, and sitting there while people looked at her. It seemed a waste, really.
Anyway, she could at least use her feet. To walk through the palace, she had to pass below the noses of the yeomen guards posted at each junction of the corridors and cloisters. She folded her arms across her chest and tried to scurry along unobtrusively.
But it was no good. They noticed her, inevitably, and drew themselves up and saluted.
What a palaver, Mary thought to herself. I do wish they wouldn’t.
But then a nagging little voice in her head told her she was behaving badly, sneaking through the palace like a thief. She could almost hear her mother’s voice telling her that she was on duty, was always on duty, and that she should have brought her ladies-in-waiting.
I don’t care, Mary thought. Cold and defiant, she continued to slouch along.
Arriving at her father’s rooms, she saw at once that he was out. She wilted a little with disappointment. The big chamber was deserted except for a couple of his gentlemen playing cards, and they stood silently and bowed at her arrival. These were gentlemen she knew well, but she eyed them suspiciously, as if they were keeping him from her.
‘Princess Mary,’ said one of them. ‘Your Royal Highness. What a surprise. What can we do for you?’
‘Where is the king?’ she said shortly, lowering her hands from her elbows and making an attempt to stand up straight.
‘Hunting, hunting, always hunting!’
The gentleman spoke lightly, as if he were as bored as she was with her father’s permanent absence. It almost made Mary smile back at him, although she could easily have snapped at him for disappointing her. Then she noticed a slight flinching of his face.
Mary turned to see what had caused it. A lady was coming out of the inner rooms. It must be one of the lower servants, Mary guessed, returning from a delivery of linen or beer or candles. But it wasn’t. It was that nasty French-looking lady. Anne Boleyn.
As the lady came forward into the room, the two gentlemen bowed, and silently melted away out of the door. Mary would have said they almost oozed away, with no more sound than syllabub overflowing its bowl. But she could not help but notice they bowed lower to Anne Boleyn than they had done to Mary herself, at her own entry into the room.
The lady stood looking at Mary quizzically, her hands on her hips.
‘Mary!’ she said at last. ‘What a pleasure. Come and sit with me and talk.’
Mary stood stock-still, unable to think what to do. There was nothing she wanted to do less than to sit and talk to Anne Boleyn. Everyone at court knew that the lady’s father had recently been made an earl, and that she therefore now had to be addressed as ‘Lady’ Anne.
Anne Boleyn – Mary couldn’t bear to call her Lady Anne, even within her own mind – now gestured at the stools placed near the fire.
Despite her reluctance, Mary couldn’t think how to get out of the encounter. She shuffled towards the flames, and poked her raw pink fingers out from her sleeves to warm them.
Something was nagging away inside her mind. Why had the Lady Anne not said ‘Princess Mary’? That was the way she was always addressed. But probably it was just an oversight.
‘That’s better,’ said the lady, in her curiously melodious voice, as they seated themselves in the flickering firelight. ‘When I lived in France, we never had such barbarous weather as this.’
Mary wondered briefly what Anne Boleyn thought she was doing, making herself so at home in the king’s outer chamber. They were breaking all sorts of rules by settling down and hogging the fire like this. Yet the lady appeared to be utterly at home here, stretching herself like a cat. Mary could not deny that the situation intrigued her. She knew that her father liked this woman, and that her mother hated her. But Mary’s mother could be so … definite in her likes and dislikes. What was the Lady Anne Boleyn really like? Perhaps this was the chance for Mary to form her own opinion.
‘Tell me,’ the lady purred, stroking the white fur trimmings on her black velvet sleeves as if to enjoy the delicious softness of them, ‘what is your heart’s desire?’
‘My heart’s desire …’
No one had ever asked Mary such a thing before. She was quite taken aback. But wait a moment. Mary knew exactly what it was.
‘My heart’s desire,’ she began, ‘is that my father should come and see me more often. Like he promised. But he’s never where I think he’s going to be. Like today. I’ve come all the way over here for …’
Mary broke off. She’d meant to say ‘for nothing’, but that seemed rude, as she was now talking to Anne Boleyn, which wasn’t ‘nothing’. Also, she felt, perhaps too late, that she had conceded something that she should not have done.
Information is power, her mother said, in a fight to the death.
Anne Boleyn looked a little sad. Her long neck drooped in a graceful arch.
‘I know,’ she said. ‘It’s hard to be parted from those whom one loves.’ Her eyes were big and black, like those of a doe. She turned her head towards the flames, as if to seek for those she loved among the logs.
A strange and sudden pang of pity for the elegant, regretful lady passed through Mary. It forced her own eyes away from the flames and towards her companion. Now, Mary saw, a tremulous smile was playing on the lady’s lips. She looked brave, Mary thought. Beautiful and brave. Then she quickly asked for God’s pardon in her mind. Her mother would not, and therefore God would surely not, like her to think such things.
But her mother was not here.
‘I can’t see,’ Mary said, emboldened, ‘why my father has to go hunting so much of the time. My mother doesn’t like it. I don’t like it.’
‘Why not?’ came the careless answer. ‘Your father loves the chase. It’s one of his pleasures. He has so few pleasures, you know. So many cares.’
The words came out rather like the coo of a dove, rather than the speech of a normal human being. It crossed Mary’s mind to wonder whether the cooing might not, after a while, become rather annoying.
‘Well, he might fall off and hurt himself,’ she said, feeling that this lady must be rather stupid. Everyone knew that her father was always breaking his bones doing his daredevil deeds.
‘No!’ The lady gave a tinkling laugh. ‘I didn’t mean that. How silly I am, not to express myself clearly. It’s a gift. You have it, I don’t. What I meant was, why doesn’t your mother like your father to go hunting?’
Mary tensed. Why had she not said, ‘Her Majesty, the queen’, or even ‘your mother, the queen’? Her mother had constantly cautioned her to be aware of every tiny infringement, and Mary had already let it slip once.
‘Her Majesty,’ Mary said, very quietly, knowing that she was doing her duty, but rather hating to make the correction in this intimate setting.
Although Mary had spoken softly, there was no doubt that Anne Boleyn had heard her. Of course, she must have ears like a bat. She was clearly one of those people who heard and saw everything.
‘Her Majesty,’ the lady repeated. ‘Why doesn’t Her Majesty like His Majesty to go hunting?’
By saying it in such an exaggerated way, Mary guessed that the Lady Anne was secretly laughing at her for standing upon ceremony. It wasn’t such a pleasant feeling. She stood up, feeling ready to leave. She’d had no intention of getting drawn into this conversation with one of her mother’s servants anyway. How on earth had it happened?
But there was no leaving. The Lady Anne’s eyes had a strange power. Now they were beseeching Mary, holding her in a hypnotic gaze.
‘Have you ever wondered, Mary,’ she asked slowly, ‘whether you yourself are doing the right thing? You know, coming here, asking for your father, who is busy. You are being clingy, you know, and your parents don’t like it.’
It took a few minutes for the words to sink into Mary’s mind. This lady, this servant, had just criticised her! No one criticised her, ever. That was part of the deal. She clenched her fists. But then she relaxed them, almost at once. Of course, Lady Anne would notice if she reacted with hostility, and think her smaller for it. Her mother had trained her never to feel pain.
‘Oh, and how do you know?’ Mary said, with a silky smile like Catherine’s. She imagined a snake, slithering its way through the grass. Nothing could upset a snake. She would be snake-like.
There was silence. Being snake-like didn’t seem to be having the desired effect. Mary turned to see why the Lady Anne hadn’t replied.
She was sitting there absolutely still, head bowed, neck arched. But one arm was extended, just as if she’d been absolutely certain that Mary would eventually look at her. In her lifted hand was a letter.
Mary gasped. She recognised at once the wax seal, her mother’s purple wax seal, which she always added before placing a letter in the hands of a messenger, pressing down upon the sticky, hot wax before it set with her big golden ring.
‘How did you get that letter? It’s from my mother!’
Mary felt herself as if teetering on the edge of some enormous void. This was wrong, all wrong.
But the lady still sat there mute, head bowed, eyes averted, holding out the letter.
The invitation to take the paper was overwhelmingly strong. Despite her confusion and anger, Mary was seized with an intense desire to know what it said. She tried to keep her hand by her side, but some irresistible power forced her to move it upwards, slowly, as if through thick gruel, to take the letter from the lady’s hand.
She quickly flipped it open. Yes, she knew this writing. Yes, she knew that her mother always addressed her father with these fulsome compliments and statements and restatements of all his titles and honours; that was part of the stately game that she played so well. Her mother was always respectful. Or at least, she was always respectful until she lost her temper.
Mary’s eyes moved quickly down to the meat of the letter.
You say, her mother had written, that our palaces and our income are not large enough for three households, and that we should compress into two. You think that I will choose Mary, and go to live with her away from you. Well, my love, I will not. I will always choose you, you alone above all others.
Mary read, stunned, scarcely able to believe the words.
In fact, she did not believe the words.
‘This simply isn’t true,’ she said, with what she hoped was a scornful laugh. ‘They promised that they would, well, always be happy, and live together, but with me too. They promised!’
But the lady was laughing too, faintly and falsely, a horrible sound. It sounded like a cat coughing.
‘You are in error, Your Royal Highness, my princess,’ she said, with exaggerated courtesy. ‘Do you see the date on the letter? It is very recent. And do you see now the pain you are causing? Your father offered your mother an honourable way to leave court, to go away to live with you
. But she did not do that. She did not choose you, she chose him. And this is very bad, very inconvenient, and it means that I too cannot live where and how I like, and this makes me sad. It is time to change, Princess Mary, and do as your father and betters ask.’
Mary knew that something was not right. She tried to grasp it, but her brain was working slowly, too slowly.
‘Why would my father not want my mother and me to live with him?’ Mary slowly spoke the words out loud, but her thoughts raced ahead. He loves us both! shouted a little voice inside her head. He’d said we would live all three together. Hadn’t he? Hadn’t he said that, at Hunsdon?
‘He wants his freedom,’ the Lady Anne said at once, with a kind of savage triumph. ‘He thought your mother would choose you. And then he would be rid of both of you at once.’
This frightening lady seemed to have an answer for everything.
Mary stood shaking with rage and confusion. What could this mean? What had been going on behind her back? And finally, there came into her mind the question that she should have asked at once.
How had the lady got the letter? Had she stolen it? Surely Mary’s father hadn’t given it to her to read. Or had he?
She turned back, the question ready on her lips.
But it was too late. Without a sound, almost like magic, the lady had gone.
Chapter 6
February 1531, Greenwich
Mary was left behind, all alone on the white furry hearthrug. She was gasping like a trout brought out of the moat and on to the grass. She felt that all the breath had gone out of her, and left her limp, like a rag doll. At least, she thought foolishly, no one else had witnessed her humiliation. At least the room was empty.
At that very moment, though, Mary heard a gentle cough behind her. She whisked round. There, framed in the open doorway, was the outlined silhouette of a gentleman. Was it one of the oozing card players come back again? This was intolerable! She opened her mouth to speak sharply to him.