VIII (24 page)

The piece Anne’s playing is very difficult. Her
fingers move swiftly over the keyboard; her brow is furrowed in concentration.

I lean across, and play a flourish on the low notes. She slaps me away.

“You are very irritating,” she says, but her tone is teasing.

My chair is right beside hers. I put my face close to her ear. “I-love-you-I-love-you-I-love-you.”

She swats me away like a fly. Grinning, I return my attention to the astrolabe I’m holding. “My wife is so heartless.”

The astrolabe is a thing of beauty: a gilt brass disc and dial, engraved with sea monsters and signs of the zodiac. It can be used for navigating on board ship, for telling the time day or night, for casting horoscopes and for surveying land. When the new child in Anne’s belly is born, I’ll be able to calculate his natal chart with this thing – for I was right: God has brought the next child, the boy, to us swiftly: the infant
Elizabeth is only a few months old and Anne is pregnant again.

I move the astrolabe’s dial, examining the gradations marked on the rim. I say, “Have you felt him move, yet?”

“It’s too early.”

We both return to our preoccupations. Outside, the winter sun is watery and cold, weeping a trickle of light through a dank fog. Here, in my private gallery, torches in sconces on the walls throw patches of flickering orange onto the ceiling. A great fire blazes in the grate, but draughts still swirl at floor-level; my bad leg is propped up to escape them.

Anne sings a phrase or two as she plays, then breaks off. “If you love me so much… what… then…” She plays a note for each word, “would… you… give up for me?”

I laugh, still fiddling with the astrolabe. “What have I
not
given up for you?”

She turns and looks at me severely; I raise my eyebrows –
what
? Then I relent, and play the game; I put down the astrolabe. “All right. My hunting. I would give up the chase.”

She pretends to consider the offer for a moment – then turns back to playing. “Not enough.”

“What? That’s huge! All right then… I would give up gambling. Of any kind. No money will be staked by the King on anything ever again.”

She plays a little more; breaks off; shakes her head. “Uhuh.”

Reaching over, I take hold of her chin and turn her face to me. I say, “I would beg alms from door to door for the rest of my days.”

“To keep me in finery, I hope.”

“Of course. And I would lie at your feet in my stinking rags like a dog, and you could feed me scraps from your plate.” I kiss her. “Is that enough?”

I kiss her again. She wrinkles her nose and says, “Maybe.”

I kiss her repeatedly – kiss, kiss, kiss. I say, “Maybe, hm? Maybe.”

Suddenly I feel Anne tense, though she doesn’t move away. I realise that someone has come in. A bulky figure is standing in the shadows beyond the window. I let go of Anne, stretch, get up – say, “Cromwell, my diligent man, what have you brought in your ink-stained hands for me now? Come on. How many things on your list?”

The hands holding today’s documents are thick as a
black-smith’s.
Cromwell is a fighting dog, born in a back alley – a start in life so unheralded that he doesn’t even know his own age. I like his savage teeth; I like his charm. He is quick to see my purposes. God’s purposes. He gets things done.

Right now he is scanning his list. I say, “Oh, don’t depress me. Just start.” I turn to Anne. “Business is troublesome. Yours should be all happy thoughts. Take yourself to your ladies. For the child’s sake.”

She’s standing beside the virginals, queenly and authoritative. She says, “I’m fine.”

“For the child.”

She shoots me a withering look – and a concession. “I’ll sit down.”

Cromwell’s first subject is Catherine, whose title now is not Queen, of course, but – as my brother’s widow – Princess Dowager. He says, “Your Majesty. The latest report from Buckden says that the Princess Dowager hasn’t been out of her room for an entire month. Except to hear Mass in a gallery.” Anne gives a snort of exasperation; gets up again.

Cromwell refers to his notes. “She won’t eat or drink what her new servants provide. The little she does eat is prepared by her chamber-women. And her room is used as her kitchen—”

“So – what?” I slap the sideboard next to me. “What should I be doing about it? Did I order any of this? This squalid situation is—” I beat my hand on the wood for emphasis, “
entirely
of her
own making
. What does she think? That we intend to poison her?”

“Of course,” Anne says. She follows me with her eyes as I cross to one of the windows. The fog seems to press against the glass. Below, dim silhouettes appear and disappear in the near distance – the builders are doing what they can despite the weather. This palace of Hampton Court is to have entirely new queen’s lodgings; we are impatient for them to be finished.

Cromwell says, “The Princess Dowager complains that the house at Buckden is too near the river, sir, and that the damp is destroying her health.”

“Nothing will destroy her health so well as keeping to her chamber, taking no air or exercise, and thinking nothing but obstinate and vengeful thoughts.” I turn to face him. “But if she is determined to hasten to her grave, I will not stop her.”

“And she asks, again, to see the Lady Mary.”

The Lady Mary, our daughter – our illegitimate daughter, since she was born during an invalid marriage. Now no longer Princess, and now almost eighteen years old.

Anne answers quietly: “Mary can see her mother when she tames the obstinacy of her Spanish blood and recognises that she herself is a bastard.”

Cromwell’s eyes flick to me: checking.

I say, “Exactly. I expect Lady Shelton has told you – Mary is playing the same trick as her mother and keeping to her chamber, so she won’t have to encounter our daughter Elizabeth.”

“And
curtsey
to her,” Anne puts in.

“Catherine must be encouraging her. No doubt the
Emperor’s ambassador has been in touch with her, too. Are you intercepting correspondence?”

“Of course,” says Cromwell.

The Emperor’s current ambassador, Chapuys, is a mincing little twig of a man, and an inveterate gossip. “He can go to hell,” I say. “I loathe him.”

Cromwell rubs his sausagey fingers over his chin. He’s clean-shaven, but his hair is so dark that the skin there is permanently grey. He says, “But I’d suggest, sir, that you shouldn’t say anything – yet – about the advice Chapuys is giving her. It would reveal our surveillance – and bring it to an end. We’re waiting to land a bigger fish: we want to know whether the Princess Dowager is sending messages to the Emperor, asking him to invade.”

“Yes… Christ. I know.”

“There is a different matter though, sir, on which you might decide to act,” Cromwell goes on. “I have spies in Chapuys’ household. They tell me he has been heard saying something…
interesting
… lately. Saying that when Parliament is bullied into passing a law, that law is worth nothing. And that men can, with a clear conscience, disobey it as soon as a signal comes from the Pope or the Emperor to do so.”

For a moment, no one speaks. The fire spits and hisses.

My focus is all on Cromwell. I seem to see him down a tunnel. I say, “So. Let me get this straight. An Act – say, the Act of Succession you’re preparing, the Act that will confirm this boy-child as my heir…” I point, without looking, in the direction of Anne’s belly. “This Act can be passed by Parliament, signed and sealed, and then, as soon as the Emperor lands an invasion force
my own subjects
are absolved from any duty to obey it? They can fight beside the Emperor’s troops to put some usurper on the throne instead of me or my
true heir? Is that what he means?”

“I believe so, sir.”

Evil surrounds me.
Be sober and watch
, the Bible says,
for your adversary the Devil as a roaring lion walketh about, seeking whom he may devour…

My hand goes to my belt as I walk forward. “Bring Chapuys to me. Bring the nasty little shit to me. To hell with ambassadorial protection.” I have drawn my dagger; I hold the blade up, glinting, in front of Cromwell’s nose. “I will gut him myself. I will flay him.” Turning, I throw the knife at the wall. It embeds itself, juddering, in the wood panelling. I press my palms against my forehead – pushing back hard, stretching the skin. My head feels fit to explode.

I hear a cool, dogged voice: “If he is saying it, others will too.”

I whip round to face Anne. “So I will have them all killed. No one will stand in the way of my son succeeding. I will slaughter them like beasts, I will hang them from every gibbet. Let every town stink of rotting meat.”

Cromwell says, “I have a solution to propose.”

“Christ.” I cross to the windows, then back again. My leg is hurting. “Tell me. Tell me what it is. Quickly.” I keep walking; I can’t stop.

“Have an oath prepared,” says Cromwell steadily. “Make each citizen swear to maintain this Act. Swear,” he counts the points off on his fingers, “to obey your Majesties, to uphold the right of your children to inherit the crown, to accept the validity of your marriage, to deny the power of the Pope… Then it will be on each person’s conscience, before God, to obey – or risk the damnation of their soul.”

I am still walking; I mutter, “Yes. Yes.”

Anne says, “How can you possibly swear everyone?”

Out of the corner of my eye I see Cromwell grin. “Anything
can be done, Your Grace.”

I don’t need to look – I know that she doesn’t smile in return; she is waiting for more. Quickly Cromwell adds, “Appoint commissioners. Use every landowner, every justice of the peace, every bishop, abbot and friar – give each one responsibility for the swearing of every person under their charge. I will organise it.”

I stop walking in front of another window, put my arms up and lean on the mullions, glaring out at the blank, grey view.

Behind me Anne says, “And what if people refuse?”

“Simple,” says Cromwell. “Then the treason laws will take their course.”

Which means the death penalty. So the choice is this: swear complete allegiance to me or die.

“It’s not complicated, Norris. Well, not
that
complicated.” I’m coming down the stairs, slapping my riding crop on the side of my boot.

Behind me, Norris says, “I just can’t quite imagine it, sir.”

At the turn of the staircase, I stop and pull out my hunting knife. “Look, the barrel runs along the back of the blade – the blade’s single-edged and deep like this one. And the barrel’s very narrow.” I hold the knife level and show with my thumb and forefinger where the pistol’s barrel lies. “I’ll show you when we get back to London. You can have a go at firing it.”

George Boleyn, waiting further up the staircase for us to move on, says, “Give me notice, sir – he’s a terrible shot. I’d want to take cover.”

“I seem to remember he beat you at the butts a few months back,” says Edward Seymour beside him.

I’m at The More, one of Wolsey’s old houses in Hertfordshire. There’s always good hunting here, and it’s a glorious day outside; we’re ready in our boots and green
hunting coats, and Boleyn – who, amongst his other titles, is my Master of the Buckhounds – has assured me that the dogs and their handlers are ready.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, I say, “That branch of the moat that lies furthest west – should I have it filled in?”

“Sir?” Norris looks confused. He’s still troubled by the idea of a combined knife and pistol.

“The moat here.” Facing Norris, I’m walking backwards. “The branch of it nearest the river. You know? It would make a better run for the hunting if it was filled in, don’t you thi—”

I cannon straight into someone behind me. I turn to see the top of a gable headdress; it’s one of Anne’s maids of honour, curtseying now, with her head bowed.

“I – I’m so sorry, Your Majesty,” comes a small voice from under the headdress. In her hands she’s holding a pile of clean linen.

I regard her for a moment – a moment she evidently finds uncomfortable. Then I say, “You are forgiven. Go on your way.” She scurries off.

“Seymour, isn’t that one of your sisters?”

“Yes, sir.”

I watch her hurried progress down the passageway. “Which one?”

“Jane, sir.”

“Does she always shake like that?”

Seymour begins to apologise; I slap his stomach with the back of my hand. “Don’t worry, man. I like it. It makes a change from what I get from—”

I stop. In the shadows under the stairs, there is a bundle of clothes. Except it is not a bundle of clothes. It is him – again. Crouching, his bony knees drawn up. The boy.

What’s shocking this time is how much worse he looks – ravaged, emaciated, sinewy. His clothes are frayed and worn,
and hang limply from his thin frame. He is eating like an animal – in front of him on the floor are strewn pieces of a small spare carcass. He is picking at the bones with his fingers, shovelling morsels quickly to his mouth.

As I watch, he lifts his head to me. I see the wet gleam of his eyes in the gloom. He drops his food and extends his arms, his greasy clawlike fingers reaching out, scratching the air. A voice sounds in my head, insistent and demanding:

Comfort me
.

The boy’s lips have not moved, but I know the voice is his.

“Sir?” says Norris beside me. “Are you all right, sir?”

My heart is hammering; I am sweating. I hardly dare acknowledge it, but with an unsteady hand I point. “Norris, do you see anything?”

“Where, sir?”

“There – under the stairs.”

He goes over – peers into the shadows.

The boy ignores Norris, stares past him straight at me. Looking half-starved as he does, he should be weak, but I have the feeling that his power is growing; that in his physical deterioration this creature is showing more and more of his devilish nature.

Comfort me!

That voice again.

Norris shakes his head. “What kind of thing am I looking for, sir?”

“Huh? Nothing. Trick of the light,” I say, holding the boy’s gaze.

It is an effort to turn away, but I do it. Turn and walk to the door that gives out onto the courtyard. As I am about to reach it – about to escape into the sunshine outside – a clatter of footsteps brings a pageboy, running down the corridor, scrambling to a halt.

“Your Majesty, I have a message from the Queen.”

I turn back. From here I cannot see the space under the stairs. Instead I see the pageboy, straightening from his bow. He looks pale, shocked. Behind him I see women coming and going from the direction of Anne’s apartments. Holding linen, like the Seymour girl. Hurrying. Heads bowed. I realise that some of them are crying.

Around me, my men are waiting – tense for my reaction.

Disconcerted by the silence, the messenger looks to Norris for instruction – should he go on?

Norris says gently, “Will you hear it, sir?”

There’s a pane of glass between me and the world – the pageboy, my men, the whole scene is distant. Here, where I am, there is only me. And the voice:

Comfort me!

I say, “What?”

“The message, sir,” says Norris. “Will you hear it?”

But I don’t need to hear it. I have seen the crying women; the fresh linen; the shocked messenger. It is too soon for Anne to be delivered of a live child.

I feel a rising panic: I will not hear the message. I will not hear the words. I cannot. I say to Norris, “No.”

And I turn again towards the open door. For a moment I have to steady myself against the doorframe. The sunshine outside is dazzling: a bright black light.