And it was done. Her corpse lay in a box, neatly covered over.
Mercifully I did not hear their scaffold statements until nightfall, when the children had gone. Then I heard them. Then I lay in bed (not warm, merely pretending to be) and heard them.
I die a Queen, but I would rather die the wife of Culpepper.
She had said that. She had actually said that. Was it true? I hurried past that, which was beyond understanding, since her bloodless form now lay buried. I could never ask her, could never wring from her an explanation: Why did you in"3">“No! No!”
The wood registered the vibrations. Only a few inches between us—
I flung open the chamber door, opening on the darkened Privy Chamber.
“No! No!”
The voice was behind yet another set of doors. I opened the Privy Chamber doors, leading to the Audience Chamber, but it was empty, vast, alien.
“Henry!”
It came from the gallery, the Long Gallery connecting the royal apartments with the Chapel Royal.
I fumbled at the door latch. It was carved and heavy, to impress petitioners with the gravity of majesty. The doors themselves were great panels, the height of three men. Pulling them open required considerable strength; I felt my belly muscles tighten at the strain.
The passageway outside was deserted. Then I saw it ... the white figure, being dragged backwards, receding before my eyes. Mournful cries came from it, sorrow beyond telling....
There was nothing there. It had quite vanished, and all its presence with it.
I returned to my bed. Since Culpepper, I had had no intimate of the bedchamber, and I slept quite alone and unattended. In one sense I savoured it. It was tiresome always to consider another’s needs in the night, not to dare to light a candle for fear of waking him.
The ghost—for ghost it was, and I might as well name it as such—shrieked and cried in a way no mortal ever had. Would others see it? Or was it meant only for me? I settled the covers about me. I would not sleep, that I knew. But I expected to pass the night in solitary meditation.
It was in the very darkest part of night, when the sun is gone and thinks never to return, that I first saw the monks. They were standing in the shadows of the far reaches of the chamber. I could see straightway that their habits were varied, and that they belonged to different orders. On the left was the light-coloured habit of the Cistercians. I had not dealt kindly with them, that I knew. They were a strict order, living isolated, arduous lives, and a good order, in the beginning. Well, we are all of us good in the beginning. But we must be judged on what we become.
Next to him, a dark habit. Surely a Dominican. This was a hard order to love, just as many in Jesus’ time must have found it hard to love a disciple. They were too astute, too caustic, too clever.
Standing a little to the side was a grey-habited figure. Greyfriars, the people called the Observant Franciscans: they had had a priory right outside the palace gates at Greenwich. Once they were my friends; then they became my enemies. Well, I had destroyed that obstructionist order.
Then, in the middle, a dun-coloured habit. Oh, those Carthusians! I had had to take sternest measures against them. They had proved most recalcitrant to my enlightenment. Therefore I was not surprised when the tan-habited one came toward me.
How did I see him? It was dark. His habit did not glow, as country folk would claim. Yet I saw him.
He nodded gravely toward me. I could not see his face, yet I believe it was that of John Houghton, the London abbot whom I had hanged for refusal to take the Oath.
“Henry,” he intoned—no, whispered. “You were wrong in what you did. The monks were good="3">“They were evil, did evil.” Did I speak these words or merely think them?
“No.” The sound was soft. So soft I could not quite discover whether it was true or my imagining.
The monks shimmered. Their habits waved and seemed to change colour. Then the sun—only a tiny ray—shone into the chamber. There were no monks.
There were no monks. There was no Catherine. (Yes, there was, only it was a corpse, a corpse without a head. If I bade diggers to dig her up, she would be there, two days rotted now. In winter it is slower. She might yet be beautiful. Her face, that is, printed upon the severed head.) I had fancied it all, in my sick fantasy. “Fantasy” ... what a powerful word. The King did cast a fantasy to Catherine Howard....
CXIII
Soon they would be coming into the chamber-the attendants, the doctors—having heard about my behaviour the night before. (Was it only the night before, when I had confronted the Fiend in all his degrees?) What exactly had happened? Was there any man who would dare to tell me?
The breakfast over, the shaving over, the reading of the daily dispatches over, now the day must begin.
Brandon came to me in my sunny work chamber.
“My behaviour last night,” I said straightway. “Describe it as you would if under oath.”
“Well ...” He fidgeted, shifted back and forth on his feet. He had become portly of late.
“Pray seat yourself.” I gestured toward a chair, one of two against the wall.
He brought it over, closer to me. “Your Grace.” He smiled. “Do you not think it meet that these chairs come to this use?”
I was silent. I did not remember the chairs. Collapsible U-shaped wooden things, inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Some gift from the Patriarch of Jerusalem?
“They were in the Spaniards’ tents when the Princess of Aragon first came to England. When your father was not allowed admittance.”
In that very tent? When I first saw Katherine, and loved her? I was angry, and I knew not why. Why had they survived? They should have perished, along with all those things of that world.
“That was ten thousand years ago.”
“Aye.” His grin faded.
“What did I do last night? What did I do and say? And what truly happened? I know you will tell me.”
“There was a Valentine’s banquet. All was as it should be, all dishes served in order, the colours red and white, the Valentine’s box distributed and sweet-hearts allotted, the red-coloured courses served.”
“But?”
“But it was the day after an execution. No ordinary execution. The Queen, my Lord—you executed the Queen. And so the Valentine’s feast was a funeral feast. At least, those attending felt it so. Theont size="3">“I saw Catherine. She was sitting in her seat, with a thornless rose before her golden platter.”
“No one else saw her. She was for your eyes alone.”
“Did the guests ... know I saw her?”
“They knew you saw something. ”
“So they assume I am mad.” I jerked out the words. I had paraded my obsession, my hauntings, in front of the company.
“They assume you were conscience-stricken.” His deep brown eyes, the only youthful feature in his lined face, gazed directly into mine. “How you act from today forward will determine whether they judge you as mad.”
“I am not conscience-stricken!” I muttered. “She deserved to die.”
“That—or mad,” said Brandon calmly. “Those are the only two explanations they will allow you. People are simplistic, my Lord.”
“You know I am not mad,” I began.
“Too strong a strain, for too long, can drive anyone mad.” He was cautious.
“I have never been mad, and I never shall be mad! But you are right, it was foolish to plan such a festivity following an execution. Better just to grieve, and admit one’s grieving. I should have locked myself up in my chambers and wept all day. Then I would feel clean, not more besmirched than ever.”
“Death does not cleanse. Sometimes the loved one—or the hated one—never leaves one’s side. I still miss Mary. Katherine is no comfort. I, too, was a fool.”
I embraced him. “I misjudged you.”
“As others will misjudge you,” he said. “Unless you are careful.”
At once it was important that I tell him all o
f it. “I was not alone in my chamber. I heard shriekings outside, in the Long Gallery. And then, in the back of the room, there were monks. Whispering together, huddling, pointing, judging.”
He started and looked uneasy. “Shrieks? As of a woman? In the Long Gallery, you say?” Suddenly he flung himself up out of the Spanish chair. “Do you remember when you heard Mass at Hampton Court, in the same Chapel Royal, when the first news of Catherine was coming out?”
“Yes.”
“No one would tell you, then, as they acted on their own authority and feared your anger. When you were at your prayers, Catherine escaped from her guard and sought to find you at Mass. She eluded her watchers and came down the Long Gallery at Hampton. She reached the very doors of the chapel, where she meant to throw herself on your mercy. But just as she was turning the great door-fastener, she was apprehended. Then—”
“She called for me,” I said slowly.
“Trusting that you would hear her. She was so bold she even used your first name, the one forbidden even to me. She dared all. But failed in her attempt. She was dragged away before she could open the doors and intrude on your worship.”
“Was she wearing maiden.”
So she would appear, for all eternity. The virgin-whore. I had seen true.
“She attempted to appeal to your sense of sentimentality.”
So my “sentimentality” was well known, a weakness for users to play upon. Was there nothing of a king that others did not seek to use? From my “sentimentality” to my time on the evacuation-stool after dinner?
“I will always see her as a maiden.” That was true, that was the aching of it. But what of the ghost? Had others seen it?
“I was visited by this sight last night,” I confessed. “The same shrieks, the same calling of my name. This time I opened the door, and looked down the gallery myself. I saw it.”
Brandon frowned. “Were there any other witnesses?”
“None.”
“Set a watch, then. Else you will go mad, and she’ll have done what she set out to do.”
I nodded.
“She hates you,” Brandon said. “She wishes you to come to ruin. Remember that. Thwart her.”
“But why Catherine?” I burst out. “Why not anyone else? I swear, no one else has risen to walk!” I dared not name them, lest that call them forth. Buckingham. Anne. George Boleyn. More. Fisher. Aske. Smeaton. Weston. Norris. Brereton. Dudley. Empson. Neville. Carew. Cromwell. De la Pole. Margaret Pole.
“They were not possessed of the Evil One,” he said smoothly. “Only the Evil One gives power beyond the grave.”
“Anne—”
He could not answer. “Perhaps her soul reincarnated in her cousin Catherine. ”
I shook so profoundly I could not stop. Brandon encircled me with his great, heavy arm. “Your list of regrets is no longer than that of any other man,” he said slowly. “We live with them. We do not go mad, or sink into melancholy.” Still my shaking went on, gathering force. “Regrets. No one sets out to have a list of regrets. It is a mortal condition.”
Father, amongst his bloodied handkerchiefs-how I had despised him.
“What now?” I shook my head wildly. “So I now find myself where ordinary men do. But what does a king do?”
“A king spits on the regrets,” laughed Brandon.
Then I, too, began to laugh, and the trembling stopped.
I set six unimaginative Kentish soldiers to stand guard in the Long Gallery. I especially noted how dull of wit and irreligious they were, and posted them with the simple instructions that they were to keep watch all night, relieving one another at two-hour intervals. On no account were they to sleep, and they were to report to me any noises or stirrings they even suspected.
“For it has been said that this cold winter has forced an unusual number of ra>
“Any unusual stirring,” I repeated.
They nodded. Did they truly understand?
I thought my story quite clever. No madman could be so clever. It sounded quite logical and would net me the information I sought.
On the second night I heard the ghost. Its shriekings were quite clear. I cracked open the great doors and looked ... and saw the apparition, like Catherine but not Catherine. It merely used her externals. The guardsmen were flailing at it; one stabbed at the air as if to pierce her breast. The other just leapt about like a dazed frog.
I closed the doors. Others had seen it walk. I was not alone. I was not mad.
The next morning the guards claimed they had seen nothing, heard nothing, and had passed a tranquil night.
Liars. Liars. I was surrounded by liars, cowards, enemies who painted every aspect of life false. To what end?
I thanked them and bade them remain on duty for yet another week, just to be sure.
“For if there be rats, we must exterminate them.”
They agreed. “One quiet night does not guarantee that they are not present.” I looked into their eyes. There was no reluctance there to pass another night on the gallery. Where had this generation got such hardened hearts?
Every night I heard the ghost. Every morning the guards reported an uneventful night. At the end of the eighth day I paid them, thanked them for their honesty and perseverance, and let them go.
“No poisons, then,” I said merrily.
“Nothing to poison,” they agreed.
No. One cannot poison a ghost. One can only poison others’ opinions, and my behaviour at the Valentine’s banquet had done that. Well, no matter. I would set about sweetening them. People’s minds were like wells. First they run clear, then become polluted—but one can always counteract the pollution. Just thrchoose from.” Before the meal even appeared, I was issuing disclaimers for it.
“Five loaves and two fishes?” she laughed.
“About that,” I admitted.
The bread, made from late-winter rye, was thick and heavy. The drink, made from the same, was nourishing. And yes, there was carp: universal late-winter dish.
“Who minds the carp pools now that the monasteries are abandoned?” she asked, matter-of-factly. It was the monks who had developed elaborate fish hatcheries, and made carp a standard part of the winter diet.
“Villagers. But we are not so dependent on carp any longer, now that there is less fasting.”
“A foolish Popish custom,” she said briskly. “I am happy that you abolished much of that, my Lord.”
“But I have not abolished enough?” I chose my words carefully.
She chose hers with equal prudence. “Things are progressing. True things must build on a foundation.”
“What were you reading?” I asked abruptly. “Or, rather, attempting to read?” I indicated her book.
“Private devotions,” she said, handing me the book. “Some of the meditations were—I composed some of them myself.”
I glanced at it. Key words—“faith,” “Scripture,” “blood,” “justification” —branded it Protestant. “Have a care, Kate,” I warned gently, handing it back to her.
She winced at the name. “No one has ever called me Kate,” she said stiffly.
“No? But it is a happy name, as you are happy. A young name, as you are young.” Was I the only one to have ever seen that side of her? “But if you prefer, I shall return to ‘Lady Parr.’ ”
She did not contradict me. “You invited me, Your Majesty, because you had something for me?”
The Valentine’s present: a section of Ovid, and his treatise on love. I had thought she would enjoy translating it. I saw now how utterly inappropriate it would be, how boorish.
“You are my Valentine,” I said, thinking as quickly as I could. “We should exchange tokens, and I was remiss in withholding mine.”
“You were ill, my Lord,” she quickly reminded me.
“Yes, yes. Well, I have here”—sweet Jesu, what did I have?—“a jewel. A ruby ring.” Red. Valentine’s. Yes, it would do.
“I am in mourning,” she said.
&n
bsp; “We had agreed, as Christians, you were not.” I delved into the leather pouch I kept in my private chest, my fingers searching for the ruby. “Here.”
Reluctantly she took it. “This is not from a shrine?”
“It is not Becket’s ruby, if that is what you fear! A ruby cannot be divided and retain its roundness. Surely you knew that? No, if you must know its origins—this is the girlhood ring of my dear sister Mary. Take it, and wear it in innocenceld be,ont>
“Yes. At last.”
“The sun will warm you, will heal you. I know it. You have waited a long time.”
“I have forgotten the sun. In truth, England feels like home to me. I came here briefly, so I thought. I would serve my time and then go back to the sun, the flowers, the black-and-white of Spanish noon. But I made the mistake of coming to love the Princess of Aragon. I could see her as that young girl, setting out for England—and I wanted to serve her.”
“That you did.” I released him, old bony man. “You saw her as that Princess when to everyone else she was a dowager. Well ...” I closed my eyes, bade the images go. “We all need our champions.” I had none, but no one need know that. “Your master, the Emperor ... think you he will implement the Papal bull against me? Heed the call to holy war?”
“You and I both know that if he did not rise on behalf of his aunt, he will scarce stir now. Although he has become more pious and religious of late, that is offset by the turmoil in Germany and the Low Countries. Protestantism there ... it is that which he will battle, not England’s. You are quite safe from the Emperor,” he conceded. “Only pray do not tell him I said so.”
I embraced him again. “Naturally not.”
“One thing more, Your Majesty.” Chapuys pulled back. “The Princess Mary. Is she to be married soon?”
“I cannot see how that may be. Until the French and the Emperor recognize the importance of an alliance—”
“She is distraught. She needs a husband. I speak as a friend, not as an ambassador or as her conspirator. She is twenty-six years old, Your Grace, no longer a child, and soon will pass her childbearing years. Oh, have mercy on her!”
The Autobiography of Henry 8 Page 53
