The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers (35 page)

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Authors: Margaret George

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XXXIX
B
ut things changed from that day forward. Wolsey was at last able to badger His Holiness into granting permission for a trial to be held in England, provided another Papal legate sat alongside him. That legate was to be Cardinal Campeggio, who must travel all the way from Rome. This would take months, especially since he was old and troubled with gout, but at last I had within my grasp that which I desired above all else. My case was so clear that judgment was pre-assured, and I would be released from the bonds that grew daily more irksome.
Katherine had become ever more hovering and solicitous, acting more like a mother than a wife. Anne had continued her wayward ways, always assuring me that they were necessary dissimulations.
“If the Cardinal knew we were betrothed, he would not work so diligently on your behalf,” she said. “He intends you to take a French princess, Renée, I believe.” Her light voice skipped over the name. “He has long hated the Spanish alliance.” For some odd reason, I remember her running her slender fingers over the traced carvings of a chair as she spoke. Her touch was so graceful I watched it as I would a swan gliding on a pool. Beautiful, elegant. Like everything she did.
“So we are to deceive the Cardinal? ‘Tis not easily done,” I warned her.
She smiled. “More easily than you think.”
Her eyes had a peculiar look, and I suddenly felt uneasy. Then the look slid away and she was once again the beautiful girl I loved.
“All will be well,” I assured her. “In only a few weeks’ time it will be over. At last. And we shall be married.” I went over to her and took her hand.
She returned my touch and looked up at me. “I cannot wait, I sometimes think, to become d not wo the crest, and all else a falling off?
By this time the entire realm knew of my marital dilemma, and awaited the arrival of the Papal legate as eagerly as I. It was early spring, 1529. It had taken nearly two years and countless emissaries and missions to obtain Papal permission to hold this trial in England.
 
When Campeggio, the Papal legate, arrived in London, he was pleased to tell me that Clement himself had advised Katherine to follow the politically expedient policy of entering a convent, as had the devout Jeanne de Valois, freeing King Louis to remarry for the sake of the succession. His Holiness was bound to release anyone from his or her earthly marriage in order to make a heavenly one.
I was overjoyed. This solution would please all. Katherine was already on the border of the religious life, having taken the vows of the Third Order of St. Francis, and had a great proclivity for it, spending as much time in prayer and devotion as any nun. Clement would be spared a time-consuming and embarrassing trial. I would be spared the possible disapproval of my subjects, who loved Princess Katherine and were already muttering against Anne as a commoner.
In a few days Campeggio, accompanied by Wolsey, dragged himself off to see Katherine, and happily presented his proposal. Katherine refused, saying that she had no “vocation” for the convent life, but that she would agree if I also took monastic vows along with her and went to live as a monk.
The woman baited me! She was determined to mock and thwart me at every turn. It was then I began to hate her. Hate her for her smug Spanish feeling of superiority over me. She was a Spanish princess, I but the scion of an upstart Welsh adventurer. That was how she saw me. And she believed she could serenely command forces that I could not: the Emperor her nephew, the Pope his prisoner. Let little Henry do what he will in his little kingdom, she seemed to be saying with amusement. In the end I will snap my fingers and bring him to heel.
Very well, then. I should meet her in the arena—the arena of the Papal court.
 
It was the first time such a court had ever been held in England. A reigning King and Queen were to appear on their own soil before the agents of a foreign power, to answer certain charges.
It was to meet at Blackfriars, the Dominican convent, and Wolsey and Campeggio were seated in full array, just below my throne. Ten feet below theirs was Katherine’s. Katherine had vowed not to appear at all, as she held any ruling outside Rome to be invalid, even though the Holy Father himself had given permission for it! She was a foolish and obstinate woman!
Yet upon the opening day, she answered the summons from the crier, “Katherine, Queen of England, come into the court.”
Ah, I thought. Now she sees the justice and gravity of the case. Now at last she understands.
She came slowly into the room and proceeded to her chair. Then, instead of seating herself, she abruptly turned to her right, bypassed the astonished Cardinals, and mounted the steps toward my throne. When she was within five feet of me, she suddenly knelt.
I felt sweat break out all over my face. Was the woman mad?
“Sire,” she began, looking up at me and trying to lock our eyes in an embrace, “I beg you, for all the love that has been between us, let me ha8220;Iuspended.
As his quavering voice read this pronouncement, there was a silence, then a stirring, in the room. Clearly the case was closed, without judgment, and given back to Rome.
Then Brandon rose and banged his great hand on the table. “It has never been merry in England since Cardinals came amongst us!” he yelled. The entire gathering broke into discord. I was livid with fury.
XL
WILL:
The poor, indecisive Pope had sent many instructions to England along with Campeggio, but the most important one was: do nothing. Delay the trial as long as possible. Then advoke the case to Rome. Campeggio had merely followed advice, in this case all the more compelling because just the month before, Francis had been soundly defeated in his last desperate attempt to retake northern Italy. The Emperor had decimated his forces at Landriano, and now that all the dust had settled, the Pope and the Emperor had come to terms in the Treaty of Barcelona. The Emperor’s troops released Rome, and set the Pope free. The Curia and its Cardinals came flocking back to Rome, and soon the advocation of Katherine’s case (always Katherine’s, never Henry’s) to Rome had been decided in the Signatura and a few days later by the full Consistory. Campeggio had had no choice.
But Wolsey was stunned. This undercut all his power. The Pope, his spiritual master, had betrayed him. His other master, the King,
felt
betrayed. Between them both, he would be ground as fine as grain in a mill.
HENRY VIII:
 
So they thought they had won. They—Katherine, the Emperor, Pope Clement—thought they could chuckle and dismiss the problem of King Henry VIII and his conscience—never a weighty one for
them.
They were wrong. All wrong. But what to do?
I was finished with the Pope. He had failed me—nay, betrayed me. Never would I consult his court at Rome.
I was finished with Wolsey as well. Wolsey had failed me. Wolsey must have known of all this long ago—after all, he had seen the commissions!
Wolsey—he who was master of all facts, from the herbal remedy used to treat the Papal piles, to who was the Cardinal with the most family connections in the Curia—had proved worthless in this, my greatest concern. He had been nothing but a glorified administrator and procurer after all, not a man of vision or ideas or even insight. He had been meet enough to serve me only in my own green days.
I had outgrown him. I could do better myself.
And I
would
do better myself. I would rid myself of Wolsey and then proceed ... to wherever the road would take me.
 
Campeggio was to leave England, and sought permission to take leave of me. At that time I was staying at Grafton, a manor house in the country, and only with great difficulty could I provide lodging for Campeggio. Wolsey accompanied him and was dismayed to find no room for himself. I did not wish to speak with him at this time, but I was compellayed. Betroken an ancient law against asserting Papal jurisdiction in England without prior royal consent. The real reason was that they hated him.
In meeting me, Wolsey was deferential and shaken—a different Wolsey than I had ever seen. He lapped about my hand as a puppy, scampering about, wagging his tail to please. It sickened me and made me sad. I had no wish to witness this degradation.
“Your Majesty ... His Holiness ... I did not know ... I can undo it all....” No, such phrases I did not wish to hear from Wolsey. Not from proud Wolsey.
I gave him permission to retire. Strange it is to think that I never saw him again. When Anne and I returned from our hunt the following day, both he and Campeggio had departed. I knew in what direction Wolsey was bound, so I sent Henry Norris on horseback to overtake him and present him with a ring as token of our continuing friendship.
Evidently the scene was embarrassing. Proud Wolsey leapt off his mule and flung himself upon his knees in the mud, grasping the ring (and Norris’s hand) and kissing it wildly, all the while wallowing knee-deep in the mire. I grieved at the vision.
Yet I could not reinstate Wolsey. He had failed me in my Great Matter, and only my clemency saved him from the enemies clamouring for his head. He was of no political use to me now. It was my wish, and command, that he retire to his Archdiocese of York and perform his spiritual duties there, for the rest of his life, quietly and without molestation.
This Wolsey proved singularly unable to do. He could not bear to be disconnected from power. The wild moors of Yorkshire did not soothe his spirit or speak to him. He was a creature of civilization and artificiality; he longed for the comforts of court: for satins and silver, for golden goblets and intrigues and spies. He judged himself to be still of worth to those in high places—if not to me, then perhaps to the Emperor or the Pope, who might pay him well for what he knew.
We apprehended his letters selling himself, in precisely those terms. His Italian physician, Agnosisti, had served as message-carrier. A clumsy device, but Wolsey was desperate.
 
My heart was heavy. There was no choice. Wolsey had delivered himself into the hands of his enemies at court and in Parliament, who had long been crying for his elimination; to them, mere banishment was not enough. He had clearly committed treason. And the penalty for treason is death.
For many months thereafter I staved them off. But finally I had to sign my name to the great parchment ordering his arrest for high treason. There was no other way.

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