by Deryn Lake
‘Who are those people,’ came Rosamund’s voice, ‘that they dare gape at you so?’
‘Acquaintances from Court,’ said Zachary and rising to his feet he began smiling and waving and bowing with such wild and exaggerated gestures that the quartette was finally forced to look away.
‘But surely that was the King’s son the Duke of Richmond?’ Rosamund went on, leaning against Zachary’s shoulder.
‘Aye, aye, we’re old friends.’
‘It would please me so greatly to know all these people. I envy you Dr Zachary. Are you a married man?’
He turned to study her properly. She was a very pretty girl — round-bosomed and golden-headed — with the look of a bed romper in her eye. Zachary gave her a wink and said, ‘Aye, but my wife is in England, is she not?’
‘And I am here.’
‘Indeed you are,’ said Zachary and slipping his hand beneath the shadowy protection of the table cloth he put it round her waist, which was quite pleasing to the touch, and squeezed.
‘Ah well,’ he thought, ‘I have been faithful to Jane for two years — nay nearly three if I count the time before I married her — and it is the destiny of every man alive, lest he be plain beyond measure, to roam abroad sooner or later. Therefore I shall do it with a good grace and a pleasing smile as did my father before me.’
And he raised his goblet to Thomas Howard who was deep in conversation with his boon companion, the King’s brother-in-law, the Duke of Suffolk.
‘You drink to your father? ’Tis said openly here that you are the bastard of the Duke of Norfolk.’
‘And it is true, madam.’
His eyes were alive with light and for a moment Rosamund Banastre wondered if she had taken on more than she could readily control. Then she thought, ‘By God’s blood and body, ’tis better than rotting with idleness.’
Their hands had just joined beneath the table when a clarion of trumpets announced the entrance of the masquers. With his fingers entwined Zachary watched with the half interest of one on the first stages of desire, more aware of the pressure of Rosamund’s breast teasing against his arm than he was of the dancers. Yet the four young women dressed in crimson and green were pleasing to look at and he was just about to relax totally and let the rest of the evening swim into a daze when one of the eight masked dancers that were following the four maidens caught his attention. Her face may be hidden beneath a lacy gold and red disguise but he knew at once by the turn of her head and delicacy of tread that Anne Boleyn had finally arrived — that her self-imposed retreat was over. With her arm extended and moving in perfect time with the music, she made her way towards the table where the two Kings sat side by side. Nothing of her features or her cloud of hair could be seen beneath the mask which stopped short at her neck, resembling more a fantastic visor than anything else.
A quick look at Henry’s face — besotted and smiling — gave everything away. He was party to the plot. But Francis I obviously had no idea what was really happening as the Lady touched him on the shoulder and asked him to dance. He rose most gallantly and at this the other eleven women accompanying her all begged a partner from the top table. As Henry stood up to join in it was a signal for every man in the room. All but the very oldest turned to the woman next to him.
‘Mistress Banastre,’ said Zachary, ‘nothing would give me greater pleasure than to step forth with you though I must confess that I am not as adept a dancer as you might wish.’
‘Dr Zachary,’ she replied, ‘to partner you in any pursuit would be pleasurable.’
And dropping a curtsey she moved off nimbly to the strains of a galliard. Zachary thought that he had never seen so fair a company as, all enmities and intrigues temporarily forgotten, the Courts of the Kings of England and France joined together in the liveliest dance of the times. Henry VIII, however, did not take a partner but weaved amongst the dancers and with much laughter began systematically removing the visors from the masquers — leaving Anne and the French King till last. As her mask came off she curtsied to the ground, humbly raising Francis’s hand to her lips. The whole droop of her shoulders and curve of her back suggested the postulant. In that one gesture she put paid to any rumours Francis might have heard that she was naught but an over-bearing strumpet. With her jewel-bound tresses still draping over his hand he raised her to her feet and in that one move she transformed into a regal gold-clad figure with diamonds blazing at her throat. One look at the King of France’s face was enough to show that he was completely captivated. Anne raised her head and tilted her eyes as she and Francis laughed together.
‘So that is the famous Marquess,’ said Rosamund. ‘I have never seen her before. That was a very clever idea to go to the French King masked. Do you think she thought of it?’
‘Without a doubt,’ answered Zachary.
Amidst a great deal of panting and noise the galliard ended and the gentler strains of a pavane started up.
‘When their Graces leave then so shall I,’ said Zachary, continuing to dance. ‘I lead a quiet life — am naught but a Romany lad — and am not used to such wild rollicking.’
‘And where will you go to, poor bewildered country fellow?’
‘To my bed in the Beauchamp Tower. And what of you?’
‘My mother is at home with a quinsy and the house is full of lodging courtiers. I find it crowded. Wouldst brighten my life and read my future?’
‘Most gladly,’ he said.
He thought, looking at her, that he had never wanted anything quite so much as to go to that round tower room and fall on to the bed with her but was wise enough to know that, though he might tumble into glory with many an eager-mouthed damsel, he would never desert, nor wish to, the sweetly-mannered girl who sat at home in England, expecting his child.
But these ideas were not in his head when there came a gentle rapping at his door and Rosamund’s impudent face appeared round the opening.
‘I thought I would never get here,’ she said. ‘The streets are swarming with the homeward bound.’
‘Did Thomas Wyatt see you?’
‘No. Only Francis Weston — he was coming into the Tower to place dice.’
‘He’s quite safe. He’s more devoted to the gaming board than to women. He’ll say naught.’
‘Why do you fear Wyatt?’
‘He is my wife’s brother and has none too great a love for me at the best of times.’
‘God’s body, you’re not the type of man who talks incessantly about his wife, are you? If that be the case I shall go. There is nothing worse.’
‘Aye but there is,’ said Zachary, throwing his head back in a guffaw.
‘And what is that?’
‘One who says you remind him of his mother.’
Rosamund clapped her hands with delight and giggled. ‘Come, great astrologer,’ she said. ‘Show me all your magic arts.’
But despite her words it was she who set to, undressing him with skilful fingers and tickling him till he collapsed in a heap of loud and joyful laughter. And then what romping as his tousled head all but vanished between her breasts and they shouted teasing merriments at one another.
In the room below Francis Weston and Sir Griffith Doon paused in their game and looked up.
‘What was that?’ said Sir Griffith. ‘Did you hear a cry?’
Francis winked.
‘It’s nothing that need concern us. I believe Dr Zachary is consulting the stars on a maiden’s behalf.’
Griffith roared.
‘God’s head, is that what he calls it?’
‘It’s gone quiet now.’
‘I think we should drink to their health.’
And the two men raised their glasses in silent salute while upstairs Zachary and Rosamund ceased their funning and settled into the delightful sensations of ravishment.
As the coldness of grey dawn came at last to the fortress town all was still. Zachary slept curled like a cat round his new mistress; in the King’s bed Anne Boleyn lay open-e
yed listening to his snoring and wondering if this night she had conceived a child; King Francis smiled in his sleep as he dreamed of Diane de Poitiers; the Duke of Norfolk drank a potion for indigestion. And Francis Weston slumbered deeply and peacefully, the dice still clutched in his hand.
15
It seemed to Rose Weston cuddled next to Francis in a safe warm sleep, that the voice calling in the distance was part of the pleasurable dream she was having. In the dream the baby, which she was now certain was growing inside her, had been born and was toddling with her through the Great Hall at Sutton Place. She had just lifted him up to see the colours of the stained glass windows when Lady Weston shouted to her. At first Rose could not hear the words but they grew louder and louder and she wondered why her mother-in-law was saying, ‘Wake up, wake up. Come along, it is most urgent that you get up. Rose, please wake.’
And then the Great Hall faded away and she felt Francis’s back against hers, saw the hangings of their bed — one curtain drawn back — and Nan Saville leaning over her, shaking her anxiously by the shoulder. She realized, with a slight sense of disappointment that she was in the Palace of Whitehall and that the baby was still a tiny seed as yet unmoving within her.
Upon Francis’s return from Calais — delayed by a whole two weeks as continuing storms in the Channel made it impossible for the Court to attempt the crossing — she had written at once to the Lady saying that she was now well enough to resume service and asking permission to go back. So Rose’s first glimpse of the husband from whom she had parted on bad terms two months previously had been as he had ridden through the Gate-House arch of Sutton Place, sent to escort his wife to London. They had met in the Great Hall.
‘Well, madam,’ Francis had said, bowing to her, ‘do I find you in better spirits?’
She had answered, ignoring the question, ‘Do you remember once, before we were married, that you told me to be free with you in all things? You said to me, “Let us have a love that is never spoiled by cynicism or artifice.” I think those were the exact words you used — do you recall them?’
‘Yes.’
He was looking at her as she spoke, thinking that her eyes — abrim with earnestness — were like flowers; that he had forgotten quite how her hair could glow like the fire of evening.
‘Then I am asking you now to put aside all dislike of me. I could not help myself. I lost all good cheer when the babe aborted. Francis, love me again as you used to — please.’
Much to his shame Francis’s debonair manner was ruined by sudden tears that came gushing down his cheeks without warning.
‘Don’t, sweetheart, don’t,’ said Rose, pulling him close to her and burying her face in his doublet. ‘I would not upset thee were I to be given all the world.’
Francis rubbed an impatient hand across his eyes.
‘What a milksop idiot you must think me. It is just that I care for you so deeply that my feelings are a curse as well as a blessing. Apart from you I am miserable and when you are angry it is even worse. I would do anything then to prove that I no longer love you and yet I cannot. I believe I am tied to you by an invisible thread. I know I am a useless wastrel. But in love for you I am the thriftiest wretch living.’
And he kissed her with such desperation, wet cheek upon wet cheek and the salt of her weeping running into his mouth, that he was suddenly on fire with longing.
‘Get to your bedchamber,’ he whispered. ‘The matter is urgent.’
‘Why?’ she answered, her naughty grin beginning to spread across her face.
‘I’ve not had a woman these two months past.’
‘Nor I a man.’
He looked down at her his tears all gone, as merry as a monkey now.
‘Then, you poor lonely woman, let me show you some tricks to make you marvel.’
‘Learned in Calais?’
‘No. Taught me by a little married trollop.’
‘Oh?’
‘With hair as red as sunset and eyes like the meadows of Cumberland. Do you know her?’
‘Probably,’ said Rose and laughing they went to their bed and it was on that afternoon, even without Dr Zachary’s elixir, that Francis had once again made her pregnant.
And now she was waking into a cold January morning, the father of her child still asleep beside her and Nan Saville hissing, ‘Be quiet, let Francis sleep on. The matter at hand is most secret.’
As soon as her feet were on the floor and before she could even slip an extra robe over her night attire Nan had taken her by the hand and led her out of the room with her finger to her lips indicating that they must move in total silence. Once within the ante-chamber Nan said, ‘You must dress at once — a good stuff morning gown.’
‘But why? It is still dark. Has morning broken?’
‘Aye, it is gone four o’clock.’
‘Nan, what is happening? Where are we going?’
Rose’s bemused eyes had taken in the fact that not only was Nan already dressed but that her face was freshly painted.
‘We go to the Marquess.’
‘At this hour?’
‘Yes. We are to attend her.’
‘For what?’
‘At her marriage.’
‘Her marriage?’
Rose was aghast. As far as she knew there had been no dispensation from Rome and Queen Katharine was still His Grace’s legal wife.
‘Yes,’ repeated Nan tersely.
‘But why like this? In such secret! In the dark!’
Nan turned to look Rose squarely in the eye.
‘Because the Prince of Wales grows in her belly. The matter can be delayed no longer.’
Rose shook her head incredulously. So it was over. The final blow to the honour of Katharine, daughter of the Queen of Castile, the ultimate achievement for Anne, daughter of a Kentish knight, was to take place at the time when more souls took flight from their earthly shells than at any other span of the twenty-four hours. It would be in blackness that Anne Boleyn would finally reach her goal; the blackness that, to Rose, surrounded the whole extraordinary affair.
Standing there in her nightdress in that bleak January, in that palace of sleepers, she shivered.
‘You’re cold,’ said Nan. ‘Come, I’ll help you dress.’
But it was not that which had made her tremble. It was the presentiment that anything so sombre, so stealthy, could only end in something equally sinister. Without knowing why Rose made the sign of the cross.
‘God protect us,’ she said.
Nan gave her a strange look but echoed, ‘Amen.’
Twenty minutes later Rose was dressed and the two women, hand-in-hand, had left the apartments allotted to the Westons and were making their way through the main corridors of the recently-built Whitehall Palace towards the west turret. There they climbed a spiral staircase until they came to a room at the top that Rose had not realized even existed. So this strange attic was to be the marriage place of England’s new Queen!
A makeshift altar had been set up complete with crucifix and rich plate and Henry Norris, white as a dead man, was lighting the candles as Rose and Nan came through the door. The three of them apart from Thomas Heneage — another of the King’s long-serving and trusted gentlemen — were quite alone.
‘At what hour were you summoned?’ Heneage asked, breaking the unnerving silence in which they had all stood regarding one another.
‘The Marquess told me last night to be up and ready by four and to wake Rose Weston and bring her here. What of you?’
‘Sir Henry woke me. Until then I knew nothing of it.’ Norris, still with the same deathly expression, said, ‘His Grace gave me my instructions after supper yesterday.’
Rose said, ‘Does anyone else know of this? Did you bring the altar plate unaided, Sir Henry?’
‘Myself and Thomas — nobody helped us. We four are automatically sworn to secrecy. You realize that?’
‘But who is to perform the ceremony?’
‘Dr Lee — one of
the chaplains. Even now a guard will be waking him and sending him here.’
Rose was longing to ask if the Pope had finally found in favour of His Grace, agreed with the contention that the marriage to Queen Katharine had never been legal and issued the papal bulls pronouncing the annulment. But she dared not. One look at the straight faces round her compelled her to silence. She felt that to utter a word would be like blaspheming in church. And the same constraint seemed to have fallen on everybody else for they all four stood in the same uncomfortable quiet again, carefully avoiding each other’s gaze, as they awaited the arrival of the royal bride and bridegroom.
A heavy and purposeful tread on the stair announced the presence of the King as effectively as the trumpets which usually preceded him. And the rapid flinging open of the door told the two Gentlemen of the Chamber that he was in an impatient mood, wedding day or no wedding day. He stood for a moment looking them all over and muttering, ‘Yes, yes,’ under his breath. Then he said in a voice that sounded unnaturally hearty, ‘A bitter morning, is it not, for Harry of England to take a bride?’
Nobody answered and the King went on, ‘What, all struck dumb?’
Henry Norris gave a choking swallow and it was Thomas Heneage who said, ‘The coldness is countered by the warmth of our hearts, your Grace.’
‘Well said, Thomas, well said. But where’s the Marquess? Did you wait upon her, ladies?’
‘No, your Grace,’ answered Nan. ‘She told me to come directly here with Mistress Weston.’
The King huffed a little but made another determined effort to hide the unease that was obviously gnawing at him.
‘Madame Anne is as unpunctual as the rest of her sex,’ he said and gave a laugh so false in sound that the quartette of courtiers shifted their feet and shot sidelong looks at each other. It was a relief to hear the rustle of silk and smell the slightly heady scent that always seemed to accompany her and see Anne Boleyn standing in the doorway silently watching them.
