Secrets of the Tudor Court (21 page)

Anne dismisses her charges with a cool reserve that can only come from God, for we all know this is not her nature. Each charge is listed: incest with her brother, adultery, witchcraft, plots to marry Henry Norris after the king’s demise, the poisoning of Catherine of Aragon, and the attempted poisoning of Lady Mary. Through it all, her beautiful white face is an impervious mask. Her answers are brief and eloquent. There is no hysteria in her tone, no dramatic appeals for a justice she deserves. She only tells the truth: that she is not guilty, not to even one charge.

My father leads the questioning. He is uncomfortable in his role, at least. He keeps working his jaw and clearing his throat, clenching and unclenching his fists.

I am sweating profusely as I watch. I know my chemise is soaked and I probably reek, but fortunately everyone else is in a similar state. The hall is rank with humanity.

After the questioning, Anne rises. Each noble of the Council gives his verdict.

A single tear slides down Norfolk’s cheek as he utters the word, “Guilty.” Two sets of black eyes hold each other as he continues. “You are to be burned here within the Tower of London, on the Green; or beheaded, at the king’s pleasure.”

The crowd erupts into a clamor of speculation over the unusual sentence. Never is a woman sentenced to beheading.

My brother silences the crowd with an elegant hand.

Anne is calm. She blinks several times as she addresses the crowd. “I am not afraid to die. If I am guilty as judged, then I will die as the king bids. I only regret that I have caused the death of these innocent men. I have not always borne the king the humility I owed him, but God is my witness if I have done him any other wrong.”

And that is it. She is taken away.

I weep brokenly.

George’s approach to his trial is almost tinged with humor. He mocks the fact that he is tried at all, and is quite crafty with legalities. He is so bold that when my father hands him a paper with an accusation too scandalous to read aloud, he does so anyway; it was the stomach-turning testimony of his own wife, Jane. The hall is in an ecstasy of shock in the way spectators desire to be shocked. It is a compulsion, a strange human need, I find, to seek out the grotesque and unusual, hence the freak-show venue at country fairs.

People like to see suffering.

And so they shall.

His sentence is predictable; hanging, spared the evisceration and quartering, as he is noble.

I can only imagine what it is like to be George. No, that isn’t true. I can’t imagine. I cannot begin to imagine what it is like to learn I will die, betrayed by my own uncle, and not even afforded the comfort of my spouse’s loving prayers.

It is a sorry state we are in.

George, my sweet cousin George, is dead.

I watch him and the other four brave souls swing from the gallows on Tower Green, the same place so many festivities have been held in years past. I will never view this as any place but one of needless slaughter.

I will never see my father-in-law the king as anything but a brutal sadist.

I am numb. I cannot even cry.

George is dead. One moment here, the next gone. My heart is wrought with agony. I am fortunate to be far enough from his widow so as not to strangle her myself, nor do I stand by Norfolk.

I stand with Surrey. We hold hands and watch the handsome courtiers die.

They say Anne lost her mind in the Tower, alternating between tears and laughter, making strange comments and the like. But this is nothing I do not expect; how can one keep one’s wits in her circumstances?

She puts to rest rumors of a shattered mind on her execution day, appearing a font of calm.

A French swordsman is ordered to carry out Anne’s execution. Perhaps it serves to mock her for her love of the French court and its fashions; perhaps the king is merciful, taking into consideration the swanlike throat and the accuracy needed to smite it from the body he once craved. I do not know.

It is a private execution, for the pleasure of the court. The king is not here, of course. I do not think he is very good at farewells. He did not say good-bye to Catherine or Lady Mary. He does not see the little Princess Elizabeth, God protect her.

No, there are no farewells or reprieves, even after the glimmer of hope that shone briefly when his marriage to Anne was invalidated days before. We had thought he would divorce her in the manner he had Catherine. It is not so. The end he seeks for Anne is more final.

Once the king wants you out, you’re out.

In all the years I have seen Anne, I find it strange that she appears most beautiful this dark day. She wears a deep gray damask gown trimmed with fur over a scarlet kirtle, a mantle of ermine, her black hair bound beneath her French hood.

I am glad she wears the hood; she has remained true to herself.

Today I am again beside my brother Surrey. I am grateful Norfolk is not near me, but I spy him regarding his niece with tears in his eyes. I am startled at the show of emotion and wonder if the tears are for the fall of the Howards, or the fall of this wronged lady.

My husband is here, too, but we are not able to stand together for the thickness of the crowd. He is white-faced and trembling as he watches the mother of his sister meet her fate.

She stands before the courtiers, with the ladies who attended her in the Tower. Her spine is straight, her little shoulders square as she regards the assemblage. She is Norfolk’s image of perfect posture.

“Good Christian people,” she begins in a clear, calm voice. “I am come here to die, for according to the law and by the law I am judged to die, and therefore I will speak nothing against it. I am come here to accuse no man nor to speak anything of that whereof I am accused and condemned to die, but I pray God save the king and send him long to reign over you, for a gentler nor a more merciful prince was there never, and to me he was ever a good, a gentle, and sovereign lord. And if any person will meddle of my cause, I require them to judge the best. And thus I take my leave of the world and of you all, and I heartily desire you all to pray for me. Oh, Lord, have mercy on me. To God I commend my soul.”

The executioner’s eyes sparkle with tears. Anne kneels but keeps her spine straight, her head held high. In French executions there are no blocks, so she remains thus, a perfect embodiment of dignity. Her hood is removed and replaced with a blindfold.

“Where is my sword?” the executioner asks then.

Anne turns her head, distracted, and it is then that I realize the swordsman’s strategy.

He did not want her to know when it was coming.

In one clean cut her head is severed from its beautiful body and she is gone. The executioner is required to hold it up before the crowd. Her lips almost appear as though they are moving.

I bury my head in Surrey’s shoulder. “No!” I murmur against his chest.

He rubs my arm. “Say nothing,” he orders.

I obey.

Anne’s body is placed in an arrow chest, as a coffin is not provided. She is buried in an unmarked grave in the Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula. She was twenty-nine years old.

She is gone. The vivacious, spirited, and delightfully frustrating woman is gone.

I tell myself over and over I will not see her again.

I try to believe it.

“Good-bye, Your Majesty,” I whisper as the crowd disassembles. “God keep you.”

My Harry

H
arry and I are allowed to meet in the gardens the next day when Henry VIII announces his betrothal to stupid Jane Seymour. I do not voice my thoughts to Harry; he is the king’s son after all, and it isn’t prudent for a Howard to be too vocal at this point. Instead I clutch his hands in mine and swallow tears.

“I wanted to tell you…” he says with wide blue eyes, his voice a whisper. “I wanted to tell you I’m sorry for all that’s happened.” We seat ourselves on a bench and I try not to recall all the days spent in the gardens with Anne and her merry court. Anne and Mary Carey and George…how we’d play and sing and gossip. How nothing could touch us then. No! I must not think of it. I’ll lose my mind if I do.

Harry shakes his head in despair. “Words seem empty,” he says in helplessness. He releases my hands to rub his chest. Tears light his blue eyes; they are bright as the ocean under the afternoon sun.

“Words are empty,” I tell him. “Actions give them meaning.” I dare rest my head on his upper arm. No one sees us. No one cares now. The court is consumed with the scandal of Anne and George and the others; they are obsessed with the king’s new love affair. We do not matter at all, and that is how I want it. I do not want to matter. It is too high a price to pay to matter to Henry VIII.

“We are almost seventeen, Harry. If I appeal to my father, will you appeal to the king?” I ask. “Will you ask him if we can now be together?”

Harry’s face is white with terror. “Yes. I’ll ask him soon, but, Mary…we may have to wait a bit.”

I draw in a breath of panic. I do not want to be here. I do not want to serve that wench Jane. I do not want to be near Norfolk. I want a home and babies. I want Harry. I want not to be afraid all the time, afraid of death, afraid of the king, afraid of my father, and what seems to be my worst fear of all: transience.

Harry brings a finger to my lips. “Just a bit, Mary. Till more distance is put between us and this…event. After he has settled himself with Lady Jane.”

I swallow my disappointment.

Harry and I say nothing more to each other. We sit side by side, trying to digest the tragedy, neither knowing how to bring comfort to the other.

The king and Jane Seymour are wed May 30, eleven days after the slaughter of my lady. She is proclaimed queen of England on June 4 and Parliament passes a new Act of Succession. Now only children of Queen Jane are to be acknowledged as lawful heirs to Henry VIII. My little princess, dearest Elizabeth, is as much a bastard in the king’s eyes as her half sister, Mary. The only justice that is served is that the king meets with the willful Lady Mary at last, at Queen Jane’s urging; perhaps some of their differences can be resolved now, despite the fact that Mary is a staunch Catholic and completely resolved not to acknowledge any of the king’s reforms.

I bend my knee to the new queen. I have no choice. Norfolk, his mood sullen, does the same and acknowledges his rival family’s rise to power with a grudging respect. He thrives off challenge. Even now I am certain he is devising ways to elevate himself in the king’s favor once more. He will not be long thrown down.

He does not summon me to his apartments and I do not seek him out. I have not seen him since Anne’s execution. I have not seen him alone since before her trial.

It is just as well.

I do get to see Harry more. He comes to court to pay his respects to the queen. I suppose I don’t hate her so much. If she is a tool of her brother Edward Seymour, she is no different than our Anne was to Norfolk. She is encouraged to be as opposite in trait and demeanor to her predecessor as possible; indeed, she quite resembles Catherine of Aragon with her piety and devotion.

She is not what one could describe as fun, and our court is not nearly as merry, but the king still keeps his lively retinue of musicians, and Will Somers is still commanded to be at his comedic best, which he is. But I see his sober face when he thinks no one is paying note, the sadness in his eyes, the downward turn of his lips. He has known the king a long while—he could even be called his friend, after a fashion—and the events of the past nine years have taken a toll on the witty man.

Cedric Dane has been retained as well and performs at his best when called. When I am afforded a moment with him at one of the entertainments, his face is drawn with solemnity.

“You are fortunate to be married to Richmond,” he tells me. “It is not a good time to be a Howard.”

“I’m a Howard regardless,” I respond, tears clutching my throat. “Oh, Master Dane, these days we have known…”

Cedric scans the room. “Best not to say anything here. Best not to say anything anywhere.”

“Sometimes I feel if I don’t say something I’ll die,” I tell him with sustained fervency.

“Turn it over to prayer, Lady Richmond,” he says. “And your music. Sing. Write. ’Tis the best way to handle grief.”

“Yes,” I say in feeble tones. I purse my lips, regarding the king and queen from across the room. She appears completely enamored. Her dull face is turned up to his jocular one; she hangs on his every word. Yet what are her consequences if she does not? My breathing becomes shallow. My face is tingling.

“Lady Richmond?” Cedric’s tone is solicitous. His violet eyes are tinged with concern.

“Please…” I tug at the ruff about my neck. It is strangling me like a hangman’s noose. “I must excuse myself.”

I cannot be here anymore.

The secret betrothal of Margaret Douglas and Uncle Thomas has been discovered. For two reasons the beautiful Margaret is sent to the Tower, the first being that those of royal blood must seek the king’s permission to marry, the second being her choice of husbands. Lord Thomas is a Howard, and the king is feeling none too merciful toward anyone associating with a Howard these days. My poor uncle is accused of placing himself too close to the throne and is sentenced to death.

The king is negligent in the signing of the warrant, however, making Uncle Thomas a permanent resident of the Tower. I sob in despair and, in desperation, seek out my father.

Norfolk is quick to chastise me. “If you were involved in any way, make no mistake, you will be thrown in the Tower alongside my idiot brother and will meet the same end. And if you think I will come to your rescue, you are wrong.”

“I would expect nothing less from you,” I seethe. “Why wouldn’t you betray a duchess? You did not hesitate to betray a queen—a queen who was your own niece!”

“You do not realize why?” Norfolk grips my shoulders. “Everything I do is for this family. Everything. But in the end it comes down to this: us or them. In the choice between Anne and myself, who did you think I would choose?” He shakes his head, frustrated at what I’m sure he believes is my naïveté. “If you think I revel in it you are mistaken. I did what had to be done and no less. I will preserve our name. But I will preserve myself first.”