Philippa Gregory 3-Book Tudor Collection 1 (174 page)

‘People do this?' I ask curiously. ‘This extreme honour?'

‘You will do it yourself,' he tells me. ‘Henry will be as a god if he wishes, there is no-one who dares to deny him.'

‘The lords?' I query, thinking of the pride of the great men of the kingdom who hailed this man's father as an equal, whose loyalty gave him his throne.

‘You will see,' my lord says grimly. ‘They have changed the laws of treason so that even to think of opposition is a capital offence. Nobody dares argue against him, there would be the knock on the door at midnight and a trip to the Tower for questioning and your wife a widow without even a trial.'

I look to the high table where the king is seated, a massive spreading bulk on his throne. He is cramming food into his mouth as we watch him, both hands up to his face, he is fatter than any man I have ever seen in my life before, his shoulders gross, his neck like an ox, his features dissolving into the moon-shaped vat of his face, fingers like swollen puddings.

‘My God, he has blown up like a monster!' I exclaim. ‘What has become of him? Is he sick? I would not have known him. God knows he is not the prince he was.'

‘He is a danger,' my lord says, his voice no more than a breath. ‘To himself in his indulgences, and to others in his temper. Be warned.'

I am shaken more than I show when I go to the table for the queen's ladies. They make a space for me and greet me by name, many of them calling me cousin. I feel the king's little piggy eyes on me and I sweep him a deep curtsey before I sit down on my stool. Nobody else pays any attention to the beast that the prince has become, it is like a fairytale and we are all blinded by an enchantment not to see the ruin of the man in this pig of a king.

I settle to my dinner and serve myself from the common platter, the best wine is poured into my cup. I look around the court. This is my home. I have known most of these people for all of my life, and thanks to the duke's care in marrying all the Howard children to his own advantage, I am related to most of them. Like most of them, I have served one queen after another. Like most of them, I have followed my royal mistress in the fashion of hoods: gable hood, French hood, English hood; and in the fashion of praying: papist, reformist, English Catholic. I have stumbled in Spanish and I have chattered in French, and I have sat in thoughtful silence and sewed shirts for the poor. There is not much about the Queens of England that I have not known, that I have not seen. And soon I shall see the next one and know all about her: her secrets, her hopes, and her faults. I shall watch her and I shall make my reports to my lord duke. And perhaps, even in a court grown fearful under a king who is swelling into a tyrant, even without my husband, and even without Anne, I shall learn to be happy again.

And what shall I get for Christmas? I know I am to have an embroidered purse from my friend Agnes Restwold, a hand-copied page from a prayer book from Mary Lascelles (I'm so thrilled at the prospect of this I can hardly breathe) and two handkerchiefs from my grandmother. So far, so very dull indeed. But my dearest Francis is going to give me a shift of best embroidered linen, and I have woven him, with my own hands, and it has taken me days, an armband of my favourite colours. I am very pleased that he should love me so, and of course I love him too, but he has not bought me a ring as he promised, and he is sticking to his plan to go to Ireland to seek his fortune in the very next month, and then I shall be left all alone, and what is the point of that?

The court is at Greenwich for Christmas, I hoped it would be at Whitehall and then I might at least have gone to see the king eat his dinner. My uncle the duke is there, but he does not summon us; and although my grandmother went to dine she did not take me with her. Sometimes I think that nothing will ever happen for me. Nothing will ever happen at all and I will live and die an old spinster in my grandmother's service. I shall be fifteen next birthday and clearly no-one has given a single thought to my future. Who ever cares for me? My mother is dead and my father barely remembers my name. It is terribly sad. Mary Lumleigh is to be married next
year, they are drawing up the contract now, and she makes much of herself and queens it over me, as though I cared for her and for her pimply betrothed. I should not want such a match if it were offered to me with a fortune attached, and so I told her, and so we have quarrelled and the lace collar she was going to give me for Christmas will be given to someone else, and I do not care about that either.

The queen should be in London by now but she has been so stupidly slow that she is delayed, so all my hopes of her great entry into London and a wonderful wedding have been put off too. It is as if the very fates themselves work to make me unhappy. I am doomed. All I want is a little dancing! Anyone would think that a girl of nearly fifteen, or at any rate fifteen next year, could go dancing once before she dies!

Of course we will have dancing here for Christmas, but that is not what I mean at all. What is the pleasure in dancing when everyone who sees you has seen you every day for a year before? What's the pleasure in a feast when every boy in the room is as familiar as the tapestries on the walls? Where's the joy in having a man's eyes on you when he is your own man, your own husband, and he would come to your bed whether you dance prettily or not? I try a special turn and curtsey that I have been practising and it does me no good at all. Nobody seems to notice except my grandmother, who sees everything, and she calls me out of the line and puts her finger under my chin and says: ‘Child, there is no need to twinkle around like some slut of an Italian. We all watch you anyway.' By which I am supposed to understand that I should not dance like a lady, like an elegant young lady, with some style; but like a child.

I curtsey and say nothing. There is no point in arguing with my lady grandmother, she has such a temper she can send me from the room in a moment if I so much as open my mouth. I really do think I am very cruelly treated.

‘And what's this I hear about you and young Master Dereham?' she suddenly asks. ‘I thought I had warned you once already?'

‘I don't know what you hear, Grandmother,' I say cleverly.

Too clever for her, because she raps my hand with her fan.

‘Don't forget who you are, Katherine Howard,' she says sharply. ‘When your uncle sends for you to wait on the queen, I take it you will not want to refuse because of some greensick flirtation?'

‘Wait on the queen?' I go at once to the most important thing.

‘Perhaps,' she says maddeningly. ‘Perhaps she will have need of a maid in waiting if the girl has been gently raised and is not known to be an utter slut.'

I cannot speak, I am so desperate. ‘Grandmother … I …'

‘Never mind,' she says and waves me away back to the dancers. I clutch at her sleeve and beg to know more; but she laughs and sends me to dance. As she is watching me, I hop about like a little wooden doll, I am so correct in the steps and so polite in my deportment that you would think I had a crown on my head myself. I dance like a nun, I dance like a vestal virgin, and when I look up to see if she is impressed by my modesty she is laughing at me.

So that night, when Francis comes to the chamber door, I meet him on the threshold. ‘You can't come in,' I say bluntly. ‘My lady grandmother knows all about us. She warned me for my reputation.'

He looks shocked. ‘But my love …'

‘I can't risk it,' I insist. ‘She knows far more than we thought. God knows what she has heard or who has told her.'

‘We would not deny each other,' he says.

‘No,' I say uncertainly.

‘If she asks you, you must tell her that we are married in the eyes of God.'

‘Yes, but …'

‘And I shall come to you as your husband now.'

‘You can't.' Nothing in this world is going to prevent me from being the new queen's maid in waiting. Not even my undying love for Francis.

He puts his hand around my waist and nibbles at the nape of my neck. ‘I shall be going to Ireland within days,' he whispers softly. ‘You will not send me away with my heart breaking.'

I hesitate. It would be very sad for his heart to break, but I have to be maid in waiting to the new queen, there is nothing more important than that.

‘I don't want your heart to break,' I say. ‘But I have to take a post in the queen's household, and who knows what might happen?'

He lets me go abruptly. ‘Oh, so you think you're going to go to court?' he asks crossly. ‘And flirt with some great lord? Or one of your noble cousins or someone? A Culpepper or a Mowbray or a Neville or someone?'

‘I don't know,' I say. It is really marvellous how dignified I can be. You would think I was my grandmother. ‘I cannot discuss my plans with you now.'

‘Kitty!' he cries, he is torn between anger and lust. ‘You are my wife, you are my promised wife! You are my own beloved!'

‘I must ask you to withdraw,' I say very grandly, and I close the door in his face and run and take a flying leap into my bed.

‘What now?' asks Agnes. At the far end of the dormitory they have drawn the curtains around the bed, some boy and some loose girl are lovemaking, and I can hear his eager panting and her sighing.

‘Can't you be quiet?' I shout down the long room. ‘It's really shocking. It is offensive to a young maid such as me. It's shocking. It really shouldn't be allowed.'

In all this long journey I have started to learn how I shall be when I am queen. The English ladies that my lord the king sent to be with me have spoken English to me every day, and my lord Southampton has been at my side at every town we have entered, and has prompted me and guided me in the most helpful way. They are a most formal and dignified people, everything has to be done by rote, by rule, and I am learning to hide my excitement at the greetings, the music, and the crowds who everywhere come out to see me. I don't want to seem like the country sister of a minor duke, I want to be like a queen, a true Queen of England.

At every town I have had a welcome of people thronging in the streets, calling out my name and bringing me posies and gifts. Most towns present me with a loyal address and give me a purse of gold or some valuable jewellery. But my arrival in my first English town, the port of Calais, is dwarfing everything that went before. It is a mighty English castle with a great walled town around it, built to withstand any attack from France, the enemy, just outside the powerfully guarded gates. We enter by the south gate that looks over the road towards the kingdom of France and we are greeted by an English nobleman, Lord Lisle, and dozens of gentlemen and noblemen, dressed very fine, with a small army of men dressed in red and blue livery.

I thank God for sending me Lord Lisle to be my friend and advisor in these difficult days for he is a kind man, with something of the look of my father. Without him, I would be speechless from terror as well as from my lack of English. He is dressed as fine as a king himself, and there are so very many English noblemen with him that they are like a sea of furs and velvet. But he takes my cold hand in his big warm grip and he smiles at me and says ‘Courage'. I may not know the word till I ask my interpreter, but I know a friend when I see one, and I find a small peaky smile and then he tucks my hand into the crook of his arm and leads me down the broad street to the harbour. The bells are pealing a welcome to me, and all the merchants' wives and children are lining the streets to have a look at me and the apprentice boys and servants all shout, ‘Anna of Cleves, hurrah!' as I go by.

In the harbour there are two huge ships, the king's own, one called the
Sweepstake
, which means something about gambling, and one named the
Lion
, both flying banners and sounding the trumpets as they see me approach. They have been sent from England to bring me to the king, and with them comes a huge fleet to escort me. The gunners fire off rounds, and the cannon roar, and the whole town is drenched in smoke and noise, but this is a great compliment and so I smile and try not to flinch. We go on to the Staple Hall where the mayor of the town and the merchants give me greetings in long speeches and two purses of gold and Lady Lisle, who is here to greet me with her husband, presents my ladies in waiting to me.

They all accompany me back to the king's house, the Chequer, and I stand as one after another comes forwards and says their name and presents their compliments and makes their bow or their curtsey. I am so tired and so overwhelmed by the whole day that I feel my knees start to weaken underneath me but still they come on, one after another. My lady Lisle stands beside me and says each name in my ear and tells me a little about them, but I cannot understand
her words and, besides, there are too many strangers to take it all in. It is a dizzying crowd of people; but they are all smiling kindly at me, and they all bow so respectfully. I ought to be glad of such attention and not overwhelmed by it, I know.

As soon as the last lady, maid, servant and page has made their bow, and I can decently leave, I say that I should like to go to my privy chamber before we dine, and my interpreter tells them; but still I cannot be at peace. As soon as we walk into my private rooms there are more strange faces waiting to be presented as servants and members of my privy chamber. I am so exhausted by all these introductions that I say I should like to go to my bedchamber, but even here I cannot be alone. In comes Lady Lisle and other ladies and the maids in waiting to make sure that I have everything I need. A full dozen of them come in and pat the bed and straighten the curtains and stand about, looking at me. In absolute desperation I say that I want to pray and go into the little closet beside the bedchamber and close the door on their helpful faces.

I can hear them waiting outside, like an audience waiting for a fool to come out and juggle or play tricks: a little puzzled at the delay, but good-humoured enough. I lean back against the door and touch my forehead with the back of my hand. I am cold and yet I am sweating, as if I were ill with a fever. I must do this. I know I can do this, I know I can be Queen of England, and a good queen as well. I will learn their language; already I can understand most of what is said to me, though I stumble over speech. I will learn all these new names and their rank and the proper way to address them so that I won't always have to stand like a little doll with a puppet-master beside me, telling me what to do. As soon as I get to England I shall see about ordering some new clothes. My ladies and I, in our German dress, look like fat little ducks beside these English swans. They go about half-naked with hardly a hood on their heads at all, they flit about in their light gowns, while we are strapped into fustian as if we were lumpy parcels. I shall learn to be elegant, I shall learn
to be pleasing, I shall learn to be a queen. I shall certainly learn to meet a hundred people without sweating for fear.

It strikes me now that they will be finding my behaviour very odd. First, I say I want to dress for dinner, and then I step into a room that is little more than a cupboard, and make them wait outside. I will seem ridiculously devout or, worse, they will know I am painfully shy. As soon as this occurs to me I freeze inside the little room. I feel such a country-born dolt. I hardly know how to find the courage to come out.

I listen at the door. It has gone very quiet outside, perhaps they have become tired of waiting for me. Perhaps they have all gone off to change their clothes again. Hesitantly, I open the door a crack and look out.

There is only one lady left in the room, seated at the window, calmly looking down into the yard below, watching. As she hears the betraying creak of the door she looks up and her face is kind and interested.

‘Lady Anne?' she says, and she rises to her feet and curtseys to me.

‘I …'

‘I am Jane Boleyn,' she says, guessing rightly that I cannot remember a single name from the blur of this morning. ‘I am one of your ladies in waiting.'

As she says her name I am utterly confused. She must be some relation to Anne Boleyn; but what is she doing in my chamber? Surely she cannot be here to wait on me? Surely she should be in exile, or in disgrace?

I look around for someone to translate for us, and she smiles and shakes her head. She points to herself and says ‘Jane Boleyn,' and then she says, very slowly and steadily: ‘I will be your friend.'

And I understand her. Her smile is warm and her face honest. I realise that she means that she will be a friend to me; and the thought of having a friend I can trust in this sea of new people and new
faces brings a lump into my throat and I blink back the tears and I put out my hand to her to shake, as if I were a half-simple countrywoman in the market place.

‘Boleyn?' I stammer.

‘Yes,' she says, taking my hand in her cool grip. ‘And I know all about how fearful it is to be Queen of England. Who would know better than me how hard it can be? I will be your friend,' she says again. ‘You can trust me.' And she shakes my hand with a warm grasp, and I believe her, and we both smile.