‘’Tis well,’ said the queen. ‘Whatever you think.’ Turning her head this way and that before the mirror, she saw with pleasure how the sun caught the gold highlights after recent washings with infusions of parsley and rosemary, nettle and watercress. Ginny had dressed it for her in the most becoming styles, ready for when Henry should wish to reveal it, and she had eventually agreed, laughing with embarrassment, that it was one of her loveliest features. So far, Henry had not commented on it, but had left it to others to do so. Anna caught sight of Mistress Howard’s disappointed face and knew the reason. Handing back the ruby biliment, she smiled at the girl. ‘Lend?’ she said. ‘For tonight?’
‘Borrow, Your Grace,’ Ginny corrected her, glancing at the girl’s confusion.
‘Ah, borrow. Yes. To match your hair, no?’
Katherine Howard’s hair was auburn and she did not need anyone to tell her what her best features were. ‘Thank you, Your Grace. Oh, thank you!’ she said, pulling off her tiny hood and fixing the jewelled biliment around the curve. Her eyes sparkled with excitement as she replaced the hood well back to show off her smooth, glossy hair. It was at times like this, Ginny thought, that one wondered whether the good-natured queen understood just how intense was the rivalry for Henry’s affections, whether she knew and did not care as much as she ought, or whether she had some scheme of her own in mind that none of them had given her credit for.
In the mirror, Ginny’s eyes met Anna’s on their return from watching the silly young thing whirl away with a shriek of excitement. ‘She means no harm,’ Anna said quietly. ‘She knows how to get what she wants.’ Ginny waited, knowing there was more to come. ‘I would like to have been there,’ Anna continued, ‘at your wedding. I did not know Henry was going until it was too late. Nor has he been to tell me about it. Can it really be that his matters of state are so great that he cannot spare me a moment of his time? Was he like that with...with the others?’
‘Sometimes, Your Grace. Sometimes the king’s matters are pressing and then he has time for little else. But I didn’t know of the wedding either until it was...’
‘Was what? Too late? And do you like Sir Jon any better now, Ginny?’
I don’t like having to make up excuses for the king. I don’t like what I’m caught up in. ‘We have not had time to get used to each other yet’ was what she said.
‘But you sleep together? There will be babies? I, too, shall have babies soon, God willing.’ She pressed a hand over the skirt Ginny was tying around her waist.
‘Heirs, Your Grace? Is that so? The king is...considerate?’ Ginny had tried to avoid hearing gossip, but she knew there were those of the queen’s ladies who were quietly concerned that all was not as it should be in the royal bedchamber. Perhaps they, too, had looked in vain for bloodstains, but she had not questioned them. It was not her business, yet the queen appeared to be saying something different.
‘Yes, indeed. We sleep in the same bed each night and he is always courteous. He bids me goodnight, sweetheart and good morning, darling. So gentlemanly. I cannot complain of that.’
‘And is that all, Your Grace? Simply goodnight and good morning? Just that?’ Had they moved on no further, after more than a month? Could the rumours be true, then, after all?
Anna turned to study her friend with steadfast eyes and the hint of a query. ‘Well, yes? And a kiss, just there,’ she said, placing the tip of her finger on the corner of her mouth. ‘His Grace smells of onions,’ she whispered impishly. ‘But what do you mean by is that all? Is there something more he should do?’
So it was true. The royal marriage had not been consummated, and if Ginny didn’t explain it to her, how it felt to lie naked with a man, then one of the other women would, and not so carefully, either. Years ago, she had discovered from her friends in the north what husbands and wives did to make a child, but ought she to take it upon herself to describe an act that sounded so ridiculous and unlikely it would scarcely be believed by a woman of twenty-four? Anna was sensible to a degree, but would she submit to such intimacies with a man like Henry? Some would, for power. Anna might do it for the sake of duty. ‘Your Grace,’ she whispered, glancing at the young maids huddled over the queen’s clothes chest, ‘there is more. A man cannot get a woman with child with only kisses, or even by just sharing her bed.’
The sheltered life Anna had lived in Cleves had done her no favours. She looked at Ginny with dismay. ‘More? Oh. I see. Then perhaps someone—you—should tell me or I shall not get the heir the king wants, shall I? Don’t look so, Ginny. It cannot be as bad as that. Can it?’
She had misread Ginny’s face. Memories of that single night when Ginny had expected so much more came like a wave of sweet longing to catch her breath on a shuddering sigh, closing her eyes against the intruding light and squeezing a single tear onto her lashes to shimmer there like a pearl. Unthinking, she covered her face with both hands as the ache shook her. As she had never thought it could. Wanting him, whatever it cost her in pride. She felt Anna’s arms come round her in a womanly embrace. ‘Oh, my dear. It was bad? So sorry. Poor...poor...’
Whatever Ginny said now would probably fail to convince the queen that the experience was anything but repulsive, for Anna was a sensitive woman, despite her quiet undemonstrative manner. Would her sense of duty be enough? Was it already too late? Had the king stopped trying? Had he ever...? ‘No,’ she said, ‘it isn’t bad at all, Your Grace, but I think the one to tell you ought to be Mother Lowe, your Flemish lady, who can explain it to you in your own language. It’s not my place, you see.’
Concerned for Ginny more than herself, Anna agreed. ‘You’re right. I should not distress you. I shall ask Mother Lowe. I shall tell her she must show me.’
Ginny’s concerns went further than that, however, for the queen’s revelation was disastrous. If Henry had shown so little interest in her after so many opportunities, then his need of a mistress would be greater than ever.
* * *
Ginny’s prediction that the king would visit that evening after supper was correct. Although he brought with him a crowd of courtiers to the queen’s rooms, the time he spent with his wife was noticeably less than that spent with the other young women, including herself. Sir Jon’s appearance could not be ignored this time as it had been before, but between them there was a restraint that only they knew the reason for, and only they could amend, if some privacy could be granted. It was never going to be likely. Their exchanges were politely formal and, as he left her to speak to another woman, the pain became more intense when Thomas Culpeper came to her side with a smile she would have preferred to see on her husband’s face. He was a presentable young man of noble parentage whose knowledge of court etiquette was unimpeachable. He had everything Henry liked in his companions: good looks and a way with women, a reputation for recklessness, and a natural arrogance that won him frowns from the older courtiers and simpering smiles from their older wives, who lapped up his condescending flattery like cats with cream. The maids of honour could not get enough of him, yet Ginny thought him superficial, potentially dangerous, and too smooth-tongued to be genuine. She found it difficult to respond with anything like politeness to him now, after hearing from her brother how they had both wanted her humiliation at the expense of a good laugh. She did her best, for appearances’ sake, when he swept off his hat with a flourish that made the jewelled brim sparkle.
Culpeper’s attention returned to Ginny with a sigh. ‘A pity,’ he said softly.
‘Pity, sir? Whatever for?’ said Ginny.
‘Pity she doesn’t make her husband laugh like that as he does with you. Perhaps you should tell her how it’s done. But that would be difficult, I think. It’s a special gift you have, my lady. Which is why, I suppose, he much prefers your company to the queen’s. You must have noticed. Your father certainly has, hasn’t he?’
‘Master Culpeper, this is dan
gerous talk. If His Majesty were more in the queen’s company, he would discover her many attributes. She is eager to please him, as I said. All she lacks is the chance. And you have the means to encourage him in that, too, instead of bringing other women to his attention.’
‘By which you mean yourself,’ he said, turning the full beam of his smile upon her. ‘But, my lady, I understood that to be the reason for your marriage to Sir Jon. So that Henry could have—’
‘That’s enough, Master Culpeper! Whatever you understand to be the reason for my marriage to Sir Jon is of no account. At His Majesty’s request, I am at court to give his new wife the benefit of my assistance, however small, and to be with my husband. That’s all. I have no intention of becoming your cat’s paw in whatever game you have up your sleeve.’ As she spoke, a high giggle of girlish laughter cut across the room like a knife, turning heads to confirm what most of the assembly already assumed, that young Katherine Howard had said something to amuse both herself and the king. Again. A sparkle of rubies caught the candlelight as she whirled in front of him, wantonly, like a plump little elf, while in a shadowy corner the Duke of Norfolk watched his niece’s capers with satisfaction.
Culpeper’s wide smile faded as he caught Ginny’s eyes upon him, reading his mind, seeing the flash of desire and jealousy that flitted across his face before he could wipe it away. He knew she had seen it. ‘Where did the rubies come from?’ he said, as carefree as he could manage. ‘From Henry, was it?’
‘Who else?’ Ginny said. There, Master Culpeper, now our scores are even.
But now Thomas Culpeper had given Ginny more food for thought than she was comfortable with, making it quite certain that he would prefer her to take Henry’s fancy rather than Kat Howard. Ginny had no doubts that Culpeper was in love with the Howard girl and, like any normal man, was not happy about the idea of sharing her with the king. It was a tricky situation Ginny would rather not have been a part of. Not for the first time, her feeling of insecurity was almost like a pain, for she would have liked it better if Sir Jon had shown the same kind of concern for her that Culpeper did for Kat Howard.
Making her way across to the queen, her arm was caught in a strong grasp, and before she could protest at the urgency, she was propelled towards a door cut in the poorly lit tapestried wall usually used by servants unobtrusively. By the feel of him, and the faint scent that haunted her dreams, she knew even without looking that it was Sir Jon. There had been a time only recently when she would have made a fuss, made it difficult for him to manoeuvre her into darkness and through to the deserted passageway beyond, but not now when her senses were alive and responsive and needy, after two days of wondering how to make him want her again as he’d wanted her before, once. She did not protest at his roughness either when he turned her round to face him and slammed her without ceremony against the panelling with a soft thud, at the same time holding her fiercely, more in anger than desire, she thought.
‘I was watching,’ he said, his face close enough for her to feel his warm breath on her lips. ‘He upset you. What did he say? And don’t say it was nothing.’
‘I wasn’t going to,’ she said breathlessly, wincing under the pressure of his hands. ‘He’s concerned about Kat Howard being so close to the king. He would rather I was in her place. He’s jealous. Nothing I didn’t already know. Or you.’
‘And I expect he offered you his friendship, too, did he?’
‘He would have done, if I’d given him half a chance. Why? Do you think I would have accepted it? Do I need friends like him?’
‘I don’t know what you need, lady. Perhaps one day you’ll be able to tell me.’
‘Do I have to tell you, then?’ she whispered. ‘With all your experience, do you not know? I thought perhaps we’d found something out about each other, but perhaps I’m wrong. Perhaps I dreamed it. Or was that for someone else? Was it?’ Her free hand had begun a slow ascent along his shoulder and up to his face, and now, finding his bearded cheek, held it in a soft caress with her fingertips reaching into his velvet hair. She would like to have gone on to tell him the reason behind her softness on the night of their loving, and how he had got it so wrong, but she was given no chance before his mouth, already close to hers, took what they had both wanted and could wait for no longer.
With a fierceness that matched his, Ginny’s needs were poured into her kisses as they had been that night, after which they’d had unfinished business to attend to, and that, this time, there would be no pretence about who or what it was for. She sensed that his hunger was as great as her own when he bent her in his arms and cradled her head against his shoulder to reach the silken curve of her throat, and she felt his warm lips tasting her, possessive, assertive, as if to refute her taunt of unsureness.
If he had taken the chance then to explain to her the complications that beset him and his deeply felt reasons for doubting her, even after he’d affirmed his authority at the very beginning, she might have been more able to place her own problems in context. But they had started off on the wrong foot with her anger over the previous offer, over the king’s interference, her father’s domination, and the humiliation of being rushed into a marriage against all her wishes. On his side, there was his previous marriage to haunt him, as well as Henry’s determination to use both him and Ginny for his own ends, as if they were both there only for his convenience. And now, with no time to get to know each other at all, they were in a place where explanations were well-nigh impossible, in an undignified scuffle where families wrestled each other for power, using their women to play rings round the king’s unstable emotions. And Ginny in the middle of it all like the innocent she was and not fully aware of the dangers that lay like snares around her feet, the false offers of friendship, the nasty jests that even her brother could play on her. He himself could have gone to Henry’s chamber that night to see if the message was indeed genuine, but the suggestion of a betrothal had come from Ginny and her relatives, and why would he question that, with such an early prize to be had? The delay in consummation he had understood and accepted at the time, thinking it might be a long wait, but within days, nights, she had offered herself to him, and afterwards, still unsure of her, he had taken it the wrong way, thinking that, because of what had happened to him years ago, that was what women did when they wanted something. After seeing his child, she had no doubt worked it out for herself that a pregnancy would keep her safe from the king, at least for a while. It was all her earlier angry protests and unwillingness that had made him wonder how she could suddenly want him for any other reason but that. That, and a kind of reward.
If, of course, he had known more about the heart’s waywardness in matters of love, he would have accepted it without all the painful heart-searching. But being clever at jousting and ciphering—which he did for Sir Thomas Cromwell—did not automatically make him wise in other ways, and sometimes even love charms buried in frost-covered gardens were not entirely controlled by the ones who planted them.
In the stuffy darkness of the passageway, they snatched at a physical need that neither of them dared to question. Still feeling the unfulfilment of their previous loving, they remembered both its sweetness and bitterness and now, for whatever reason, logical or not, their hunger overpowered them for the short time available.
‘I shall come to you tonight, in your room,’ he said, taking a deep breath to steady himself. ‘Wait up for me, wife. Henry will have to wait on my pleasure.’
‘You want me, then?’ she said, hoping for a softly spoken word.
‘If I don’t, I’ll try to put up a good enough pretence of it,’ he said, adjusting the tiny French hood over her hair. ‘Come, we must go before we’re missed.’
It was not the answer she would have liked, but philosophically she had to accept that it was all she could expect until they could trust each other.
He took her back to the queen’s rooms, stealing th
rough the concealed door like lovers while one of Henry’s musicians sang to his own lute accompaniment. Only moments later, Sir Jon was asked to sing, which he did in a rich, clear baritone that Ginny had heard before. This time, as a married man, he was able to sing to his wife the words of love that, so far, he had never spoken. It was a good act that brought applause from those who were convinced by it and a lump to Ginny’s throat for the feigned sentiments of the haunting ‘My Heart Awaits the Spring’ that were still frozen in her mind by doubts.
Thankfully, her elder brother came to her side as the song finished, walking her away from the others into a recess from where they could see the colourful swirl of fabrics and the soft glitter of jewels, the sheen of gold threads and the animated faces of courtiers whose task was to entertain and be entertained. ‘I saw you and Culpeper talking,’ said Elion. ‘You should beware of him, you know. Is that what Raemon has advised?’
‘After what happened at home, you mean? Yes, I am wary, I assure you.’
‘Not only that. He’s...well, perhaps I should not say.’ Looking down at his hands and then away from her, Elion conveyed his unease as clearly as if he’d written it. Like Ginny, he tended to wear his heart on his sleeve, his comely young face being a mirror of his soul, reflecting every nuance of feeling, good or bad, unable to pretend for long what he did not believe.
‘Perhaps you should,’ said Ginny. ‘No one else will, unless it’s to his credit.’
‘That’s the problem,’ he said softly. ‘He has the king’s favour, even when it comes to crime. I say this only to protect you, Ginny.’
‘From Culpeper? Elion, you have no need. I don’t like the man. But what’s this crime you speak of that the king overlooks?’
‘Rape,’ he whispered. ‘Last year, he and his friends took the wife of a park keeper by force, in the forest, for a laugh, while his cronies held her down. And when the bailiff came along to try to arrest them, they killed him. That’s the kind of man he is. I believe Paul might have been one of those involved, but I have no proof.’ Hearing Ginny gasp, he placed a hand over hers, squeezed it, then took it away. ‘And since I cannot find proof, I cannot say anything to Father. He’d banish him. You know how Father feels about misconduct of that kind.’
Betrayed, Betrothed and Bedded Page 12
