Boleyn And His Bloodline

by J P Ceark

  July 1530

  Richmond Palace

  ‘Come see, Sister.’ Anne reached out for her sister’s hand. ‘Are these not the finest rooms?’ Mary could feel Anne’s eyes on her, waiting for her reaction. Mary looked about her, avoiding her sister’s gaze. One side had an expensive tapestry hanging the length and width of the entire wall. It was embroidered with the finest silk, depicting the biblical scene of David and Goliath. The ceiling was blue and embossed with gold scrolls. Symbols were arranged for the viewer to know whose company they had arrived in. The Tudor symbol, the Falcon and their initials HA. The cushions were silk and many, the chairs were wide and long and covered with red satin and gold cloth. Mary took her place beside Anne.

  ‘I would think you Queen already,’ she commented.

  ‘If only it were true,’ Anne retorted.

  ‘You have no ladies waiting upon you?’

  ‘I have plenty of servants and as for female companionship, I have you, Jane and Mother. Who else would I need?’

  You have need of female support,’ Mary warned her sister. ‘Without your charity I would’ve been destitute.’

  ‘I have male companionship, what use are females? They wield little power and hold no enlightened talk … You being a classic example,’ she added with sting.

  ‘Hold no power? When you yourself have convinced the King to satisfy your every demand?’

  ‘That is different?’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘I have wit, beauty; a je ne sais quoi!’

  ‘Anne,’ Mary began gently. ‘Women persuade men to act in certain ways, it has always been the case; it will always remain the case. You need to have them on your side.’

  ‘Women only help women when it is too late, when the damage is done and the woman is condemned to tragedy. We are vile, competitive creatures. We do not look to educate ourselves but to beguile men, we do not look to make ourselves beautiful but to look more beautiful than other women and we do not think ever to change this. All-female criticism is not spoken with an act to improve the female plight but to further condemn them and only for their own self-interest.’

  Mary was about to speak again but Henry appeared.

  ‘Can I escort you to Mass?’ Anne smiled in reply and put her arm through his. Mary solemnly walked behind them. She was burning with resentment. She resented Anne’s burden of needed companionship, for Mary felt a duty forged from indebtedness and obligation, not love.

  Katherine and her ladies were also attending Mass. Katherine managed to avoid looking at either of them, her head held high when approaching the chapel. She walked past with controlled indignation. Her ladies, however, glared at the King without any respect shown. The final woman to brush past them was a small woman of a similar age to Anne. ‘Every Spaniard wishes you ill,’ she spat.

  ‘And I wish every Spaniard at the bottom of the ocean! We neither get what we want,’ retorted Anne.

  March 1539

  Hever Castle

  Weakness had caused Thomas to lay in silence. Cranmer had long since left. He pondered with the effort left in his spirit but the overall exhaustion was determining his sleep. He refused to consider the memory of Wolsey, though it had been plaguing him. Not because he cared for Wolsey — that would never be it. The memory was pricking at his skin, perhaps because he too was dying and thinking on his personal affairs. Wolsey was much weakened when he was arrested and forced into London. He was tied to a mule so not to keep justice waiting but died on the journey.

  Wolsey would never summon sympathy for his enemies, no matter how they died. He too had been callous. Why should Thomas consider it now?

  He challenged his own belief that his desire for Wolsey’s downfall was purely based on revenge. The concern went deeper than anyone knew. Wolsey was plotting to return to favour; it would not be the loss of status so much but the loss of life if Wolsey’s return had been successful. Ah! thought Thomas. ‘That is why it burdens me,’ he whispered. Thomas remembered his own concern when King Henry was all too willing to show his dissatisfaction to a once favoured and loyal servant. It was then, at that very time, fear crept in.

  It was him that forced Anne’s hand to complain against Wolsey. It was him that tested Anne’s hold over the King and witnessed its horrifying influence.

  Thomas smiled to himself, as if appreciating for the first time Wolsey’s incredible ability to outwit his opposition, but politics is not a skill to decipher good and evil, it is a management of events and people. But all humans are fallible — even the all-powerful.

  September 1530

  Hampton Court

  Mary viewed Anne from behind. Her sister knelt upon her prayer stool and quietly read her book of devotions. The prayer book was beautifully illustrated and bound. Her finger tips would occasionally touch the holy images and then she would shut her eyes to mutter the psalm.

  Mary tried to focus her mind on prayer but was constantly without feeling. A weight of heavy burden kept her from escape and as such from hope of salvation. She owed Anne obedience, servitude. She had adopted her son, petitioned an annuity for her, everything she had had come from Anne; she owned her now.

  Their peace was interrupted by their father. She regarded him with fear; his silhouette was impressive — broad shoulders, furs, gold and a ring of weight on each finger. Still he looked dissatisfied.

  ‘Wolsey has favour with the King again,’ he spoke with disbelief.

  ‘Not so,’ reassured Anne. ‘Only if the King have need of the Cardinal’s advice; it is beneficial to us.’ She moved away from the prayer stool, her joints stiff after many minutes kneeling.

  ‘Ageing daughter,’ Thomas spoke without volunteering his hand. ‘And still a maid,’ he mocked.

  ‘Whose fault is that?’ she answered back in a sudden strike of hatred.

  ‘Keep your temper, girl! I’m not the King … If you had pressed the King when Wolsey first failed him, the delay would not have been so great. Now you invite him back to delay the divorce once more.’

  ‘Henry is a man of sentiment, Father. He likes to be a man of forgiveness, it plays well to the public and it is how he likes to view himself.’

  ‘Wolsey plots against you,’ Thomas said bluntly. ‘I have a letter from your cousin, Francis Bryan. Wolsey is in communication with the Pope and has instructed for Charles the Fifth to threaten war against England. His letters are distributed all around the French court. Wolsey has sympathy for Katherine and believes you’re to be dismissed. Henry will return to her. Your cause is lost if Charles takes up arms.’ He held the documents, flaunting them in front of her.

  ‘What does this mean? Henry would not hear of this,’ Anne dismissed.

  ‘How long can you wait? How long shall the King wait? Answer that question in your head and whatever be the answer, that is how long Wolsey is hoping for,’ Thomas pressed. ‘He is our enemy. Take this evidence to the King and hang the Cardinal.’

  ‘And if Henry should choose the Cardinal over me?’

  ‘That is what he is counting on. We must challenge it,’ Thomas replied. ‘If you want to lose everything, you’re going the right way about it. Be cold and unforgiving and most important of all, inspire the King to be so as well.

  ‘Would that not shape him into a merciless person?’ Mary queried. ‘To encourage a man and praise him for deserting a long-held friendship and seeing him punished without any lenience for that friendship? My God, there’ll be no one safe from the King’s displeasure!’ Mary shouted.

  ‘Exactly,’ Thomas spoke. ‘Anne has the King’s heart. Any enemy of ours will retreat for fear that they too will end up like Wolsey. His downfall is the ultimate message of who is most important at court. All will bow to us … Understand, Mary? Anne, you know what must be done.’

  March 1539

  Hever Castle

  Thomas stared ahead of him. The ceiling was highly decorated, his symbol, a black bull, repeatedly carved into the grid above him. It was embellished with gold leaf
and Tudor roses. Such highly decorated and sumptuous designs were about the entire castle. How ironic that he should be confined to one room for his final days, and alone. He thought by the time he would be dying, his children would have married well, sired the next generation and he would have guided them to greater influence within the court. Never having to bow and be humble in the presence of people like Wolsey — that had been the bitterest tonic.

  Thomas reminisced about his satisfaction, his pinnacle of political manipulation and intrigue. The arrest of Thomas Wolsey was sweet. Thomas let out a weak laugh. The indignity, he thought, was truly deserved and justified.

  A knock interrupted his moment in his memories. He tutted out loud but spoke softly. ‘Enter.’

  ‘My Lord, a messenger came and brought this from Greenwich,’ Robson said and placed the letter into Thomas’s hand.

  Thomas perused the ink and recognised the writing. ‘‘Tis Mary’s hand,’ he deduced.

  ‘You wish for me to break the seal?’ suggested Robson, realising Thomas was now too weak to achieve even that.

  Thomas handed back the letter and waited for the contents to be returned to him.

  Father

  I leave for Greenwich and will be with you by late evening. Be sure to greet me with some kindness.

  Your daughter

  Mary

  ‘Be sure to greet me with some kindness,’ he read aloud. ‘I see. Throw it on the flames, Robson.’

  Robson did as he was bid but turned on his master. ‘Even in your dying hours, can you not summon some forgiveness? Soon you will be judged by God, your soul condemned for unremorseful sin.’

  Thomas grinned. ‘My Lord is my shepherd.’

  Robson shook his head but made his master comfortable by forcing him to sit up a little in bed. ‘She has come to make peace, My Lord, and to help you make peace within yourself,’ he reasoned, though Thomas showed his normal belligerence.

  ‘My peace! She betrayed Anne! My peace! Her peace! Her conscience! I consider her peace, not mine.’

  ‘Aye, My Lord, but it wasn’t Mary’s action that saw your son and daughter beheaded!’

  Thomas glared at his servant through his sunken eyes and face, made gaunter by the sudden accusation.

  ‘You sent me to witness their deaths!’ Robson explained. ‘You sent me to comfort Anne, events you should had confronted yourself. Never once did I protest, never once did I threaten you with desertion, because I saw you as a father. I respected your wish without objection but now I do object. Make your peace, for when you leave this world, I can no longer protect you. I will no longer be your servant.’

  Thomas felt his eyes sting with sadness and he shut them to soothe the pain but also to sleep.

  * * *

  A disturbance then awoke him, though he had been asleep for a time and the light had now faded. ‘Mary?’ he called out.

  ‘No Sir, Jane. I come to ask if you would take some nourishment,’ said the young washer woman.

  ‘I cannot stomach any more pottage,’ he replied gruffly.

  ‘My Lord, I can’t offer anything else, it’ll be too heavy. The food reacts badly. Anything containing heat will further unbalance the humours.’

  ‘I’ve no appetite,’ he said. ‘As it is,’ he conceded. ‘When my daughter arrives, I shall request your employment with her,’ he suggested, causing Jane to become overwhelmed with emotion.

  ‘My Lord,’ she began, but Thomas refused to be caught so near to death with tears in his eyes.

  ‘I do it so you will remain with me, to the end, Miss. No other sentiment.’

  She left the pottage beside him but turned back to him before leaving. ‘I’ll bring some sweet wafers and wine,’ she promised.

  Thomas smiled weakly and reached for the pottage. He had a small appetite and after the second mouthful he stopped. He couldn’t even take the weight of the wooden bowl.

  ‘The banquet I used to dine at,’ he whispered to himself. Now a distant memory of taste lingering on his tongue.

  December 1530

  Paris, France

  The kitchens at the Château were a confusion of people and produce. The odour of sweat and fire overpowered other aromas of sizzling meat fat and crushed sugar cone and roasting spices. Thomas avoided the heat of the fire which roasted large joints. He passed a huge bowl of cumin seeds being coated with sugar and almonds being grounded. Another kitchen servant dribbled batter onto a grill and pressed it together to make wafers, patterned to show the Boleyn bull.

  ‘René,’ he called to the chef. René looked up. He bowed when realising his boss called him. ‘Tout va bien, Monsieur!’ Thomas did not doubt it.

  ‘René,’ he called again. ‘I’ve come to see the sculpture, for the centrepiece.’

  René pointed to another room off the kitchen.

  Thomas followed where René directed. An ageing man sat quietly, dedicated to his occupation in order to speak with his master.

  ‘C’est bon, Monsieur?’ enquired the elder.

  ‘Oui, very good,’ Thomas reassured, smirking as he did so. ‘You’re a great talent, a master de sucre.’

  The elder bowed with pride in his craftsmanship.

  Thomas left the commotion of the kitchens and returned to the orderliness and quietness of the rooms within the precinct. The Grand Hall was arranged with tables, gold plates and goblets, fine chairs and cushions. The walls were hung with expensive tapestries and the ceiling boasted three chandeliers holding seventy-six candles each. The members of the French court would be greatly impressed by Thomas’s devotion to their enjoyment and pleasure for the night ahead.

  * * *

  The hall was soon filled with the dignitaries Thomas had been expecting — powerful men of the French court, many close to King Francis. It satisfied him greater when each appeared relaxed, their rosy complexions revealing their guard was down.

  ‘This is the moment our two realms have been waiting for! An alliance, a union of true friendship and enterprising endeavour!’

  More wine followed; all were in a celebratory mood. ‘To France and England; England and France!’

  King Francis’ chancellor and minister, Cardinal Antoine Duprat, sat next to Thomas and grinned at him with suspicion. ‘I have been reading reports from our ambassador in England. Your daughter impresses him daily with her sport and intellect. She is a fine example of womanhood.’

  ‘I took a care to educate her well. I had ambitions she would marry well but I never envisage this,’ he replied with false humility.

  Duprat gave a slight smile and chose not to continue the false niceties. ‘There is talk she will join the English King when they come to France next year?’

  ‘I believe so,’ said Thomas. ‘It will be a celebration of France and England’s treaty and solidarity of friendship from my daughter.’

  The food was beginning to arrive and being placed on various different tables depending on the importance of the dignitary sitting closest to Thomas. The final centrepiece, however, was placed in the middle of the room and uncovered to cheers and jeers.

  Cardinal Duprat hid his revulsion at Thomas’s crowing. Thomas eyed him, eager to see another cardinal squirm against the wishes of the Boleyns. The offending sugar sculpture was that of Cardinal Wolsey, his red robes accentuated in rounded form, his right hand raised, clutching a cross around his neck as orange flames were licking at his feet, the devil’s imps in between the flames, their pitchforks elevated in joyous condemnation at the Cardinal’s descent into hell.

  ‘A good tableau, don’t you think?’ questioned Thomas in between laughing at his own macabre jest.

  ‘The Cardinal was not much of a friend of France but nor was he an enemy,’ Duprat reminded Thomas.

  ‘Aye, the Field of Cloth of Gold is not so long in our memories nor the Treaty of London, but the Cardinal made a promise and he then reneged. Now, Wolsey is now dead and my daughter is the truest friend of France. It would be wise to remind yourself of that. King Henry ne
eds France. It is sensible to take the opportunity while it presents itself,’ explained Thomas.

  This time the Cardinal smiled. ‘We have every intention of taking the advantage,’ he assured him.

  March 1539

  Gravesend

  Mary decided not to delay her progress to her father. Instead, when coming from the barge, they walked straight to an inn, hiring out two horses. The grooms observed them with amusement. The horses snorted as they were far heavier and faster than what either rider was used to, but Mary encouraged Amy to use all her strength to control the beast. The horses felt their riders struggle and became impatient.

  As the fast-paced journey began, Mary was retracing earlier steps, going deeper into Kent upon timeworn tracks, through densely haunted woodlands and over streams of reminiscence. Mary knew this journey; she had lived it time and time again and every time it brought her home to her family and her divided emotions.

  ‘If I were to shut my eyes, I would know where I was and I would expect Anne or Mother to be with me,’ she shouted. ‘I’d be in a conflicting state of release and oppression!’

  Amy said nothing; she knew little of how to comfort. Sorrow cannot be gladdened, only endured.

  She slowed her horse, as did Mary. Both were tiring, more so than the horses, but they had had enough of a ride to trot happily along the tracks.

  ‘I was at Hever for quite some time. Anne and Mother were trying to impress the French ambassador and Father was in France arranging the treaty between the two realms, with George beside the King, influencing their cause. I was forgotten about and gratefully so. I remained at Hever with Catherine for a long while. The divorce was taking its time. They were all consumed with effort to achieve the unachievable and I remained happily forgotten … but then it changed. After years of trying, years of disappointments and setbacks, they went ahead and married without consent.’