Philippa Gregory 3-Book Tudor Collection 1 (37 page)

‘I will leave you now,’ he said. ‘I will come again tomorrow.’

She nodded, and walked with him to the door of her privy chamber. There she hesitated. ‘You mean it?’ she asked him, her blue eyes suddenly anxious. ‘You mean this as a proposal of marriage,
not as a feint in a negotiation? You truly want to marry me? I will be queen?’

He nodded. ‘I mean it.’ The depth of her ambition began to dawn on him and he smiled as he slowly saw the way to her. ‘Do you want to be queen so very much?’

Catalina nodded. ‘I was brought up to it,’ she said. ‘I want nothing more.’ She hesitated, for a moment she almost thought to tell him that it had been the last thought of his son, but then her passion for Arthur was too great for her to share him with anyone, even his father. And besides, Arthur had planned that she should marry Harry.

The king was smiling. ‘So you don’t have desire, but you do have ambition,’ he observed a little coldly.

‘It is nothing more than my due,’ she said flatly. ‘I was born to be a queen.’

He took her hand and bent over it. He kissed her fingers; and he stopped himself from licking them. ‘Take it slowly,’ he warned himself. ‘This is a girl and possibly a virgin; certainly not a whore.’ He straightened up. ‘I shall make you Katherine of Aragon, Queen of England,’ he promised her, and saw her blue eyes darken with desire at the title. ‘We can marry as soon as we have the dispensation from the Pope.’

Think! Think! I urgently command myself. You were not raised by a fool to be a fool, you were raised by a queen to be a queen. If this is a feint you ought to be able to see it. If it is a true offer you ought to be able to turn it to your advantage.

It is not a true fulfilment of the promise I made to my beloved but it is close. He wanted me to be Queen of England and to have the children that he would have given me. So what if they will be his half-brother and half-sister rather than his niece and nephew? That makes no difference.

I shrink from the thought of marrying this old man, old enough to be my father. The skin at his neck is fine and loose, like that of a turtle. I cannot imagine being in bed with him. His breath is sour, an old man’s breath; and he is thin, and he will feel bony at the hips and shoulders. But I shrink from the thought of being in bed with that child Harry. His face is as smooth and as rounded as a little girl’s. In truth, I cannot bear the thought of being anyone’s wife but Arthur’s; and that part of my life has gone.

Think! Think! This might be the very right thing to do.

Oh God, beloved, I wish you were here to tell me. I wish I could just visit you in the garden for you to tell me what I should do. I am only seventeen, I cannot outwit a man old enough to be my father, a king with a nose for pretenders.

Think!

I will have no help from anyone. I have to think alone.

Dona Elvira waited until the princess’s bedtime and until all the maids-in-waiting, the ladies and the grooms of the bedchamber had withdrawn. She closed the door on them all and then turned to the princess, who was seated in her bed, her hair in a neat plait, her pillows plumped behind her.

‘What did the king want?’ she demanded without ceremony.

‘He proposed marriage to me,’ Catalina said bluntly in reply. ‘For himself.’

For a moment the duenna was too stunned to speak then she crossed herself, as a woman seeing something unclean. ‘God save us,’ was all she said. Then: ‘God forgive him for even thinking it.’

‘God forgive you,’ Catalina replied smartly. ‘I am considering it.’

‘He is your father-in-law, and old enough to be your father.’

‘His age doesn’t matter,’ Catalina said truly. ‘If I go back to Spain they won’t seek a young husband for me but an advantageous one.’

‘But he is the father of your husband.’

Catalina nipped her lips together. ‘My late husband,’ she said bleakly. ‘And the marriage was not consummated.’

Dona Elvira swallowed the lie; but her eyes flicked away, just once.

‘As you remember,’ Catalina said smoothly.

‘Even so! It is against nature!’

‘It is not against nature,’ Catalina asserted. ‘There was no consummation of the betrothal, there was no child. So there can be no sin against nature. And anyway, we can get a dispensation.’

Dona Elvira hesitated. ‘You can?’

‘He says so.’

‘Princess, you cannot want this?’

The princess’s little face was bleak. ‘He will not betroth me to Prince Harry,’ she said. ‘He says the boy is too young. I cannot wait four years until he is grown. So what can I do but marry the king? I was born to be Queen of England and mother of the next King of England. I have to fulfil my destiny, it is my God-given destiny. I thought I would have to force myself to take Prince Harry. Now it seems I shall have to force myself to take the king. Perhaps this is God testing me. But my will is strong. I will be Queen of England, and the mother of the king. I shall make this country a fortress against the Moors, as I promised my mother, I shall make it a country of justice and fairness defended against the Scots, as I promised Arthur.’

‘I don’t know what your mother will think,’ the duenna said. ‘I should not have left you alone with him, if I had known.’

Catalina nodded. ‘Don’t leave us alone again.’ She paused. ‘Unless I nod to you,’ she said. ‘I may nod for you to leave, and then you must go.’

The duenna was shocked. ‘He should not even see you before your wedding day. I shall tell the ambassador that he must tell the king that he cannot visit you at all now.’

Catalina shook her head. ‘We are not in Spain now,’ she said fiercely. ‘D’you still not see it? We cannot leave this to the ambas
sador, not even my mother can say what shall happen. I shall have to make this happen. I alone have brought it so far, and I alone will make it happen.’

I hoped to dream of you, but I dreamed of nothing. I feel as if you have gone far, far away. I have no letter from my mother so I don’t know what she will make of the king’s wish. I pray, but I hear nothing from God. I speak very bravely of my destiny and God’s will but they feel now quite intertwined. If God does not make me Queen of England then I do not know how I can believe in Him. If I am not Queen of England then I do not know what I am.

Catalina waited for the king to visit her as he had promised. He did not come the next day but Catalina was sure he would come the day after. When three days had elapsed she walked on her own by the river, chafing her hands in the shelter of her cloak. She had been so sure that he would come again that she had prepared herself to keep him interested, but under her control. She planned to lead him on, to keep him dancing at arm’s length. When he did not come she realised that she was anxious to see him. Not for desire – she thought she would never feel desire again – but because he was her only way to the throne of England. When he did not come, she was mortally afraid that he had had second thoughts, and he would not come at all.

‘Why is he not coming?’ I demand of the little waves on the river, washing against the bank as a boatman rows by. ‘Why would he come so passionate and earnest one day, and then not come at all?’

I am so fearful of his mother, she has never liked me and if she turns her face from me, I don’t know that he will go ahead. But then I remember that he said that his mother had given her permission. Then I am afraid that the Spanish ambassador might have said something against the match – but I cannot believe that de Puebla would ever say anything to inconvenience the king, even if he failed to serve me.

‘Then why is he not coming?’ I ask myself. ‘If he was courting in the English way, all rush and informality, then surely he would come every day?’

Another day went past, and then another. Finally, Catalina gave way to her anxiety and sent the king a message at his court, hoping that he was well.

Dona Elvira said nothing, but her stiff back as she supervised the brushing and powdering of Catalina’s gown that night spoke volumes.

‘I know what you are thinking,’ Catalina said, as the duenna waved the maid of the wardrobe from the room and turned to brush Catalina’s hair. ‘But I cannot risk losing this chance.’

‘I am thinking nothing,’ the older woman said coldly. ‘These are English ways. As you tell me, we cannot now abide by decent Spanish ways. And so, I am not qualified to speak. Clearly, my advice is not taken. I am an empty vessel.’