by Barbara Kyle
Slash!
The whip raged over his back. Blood speckled the floor. The single candle on the altar gasped, and More’s head dropped to his sweating chest, bowed with the unbearable weight of guilt and shame.
11
Out with the Old, In with the New
Honor was still shaking snow from her hem when she entered the Queen’s suite at Greenwich and found several clerics lounging in the antechamber. Apparently part of a small delegation come to see the Queen, these assistants were taking their ease with some of her ladies-in-waiting, bantering over mulled wine and roasted chestnuts. The door to the Queen’s private chamber stood slightly ajar and male voices rumbled out. Inside, Catherine moved past the crack of the opened door. She glimpsed Honor and tensely beckoned her.
Honor went in. Catherine threw her a fleeting smile and a nod to close the door behind her. “Some wine, my lords?” Catherine suggested with obvious relief at the diversion Honor had brought.
Honor dutifully crossed to the sideboard to pour wine. In the silence, flames from the hearth leapt and crackled as if feeding on the fuel of tension between the three people she had interrupted. They formed a triangle: the Queen at the window, Cardinal Campeggio near the door, and the obese Cardinal Wolsey facing the fire. Both men were swathed from cap to shoe in the scarlet satin that blazoned the might of the Church.
“Your Grace is unkind,” Campeggio protested to the Queen as if there had been no interruption in their talk. He shifted off his gouty foot, visibly in pain. “I am completely impartial in this sad business. My one goal has been to reconcile you and the King. To restore harmony. It is always the goal of the Church in such matters.”
“Reconciliation. Bah!” Cardinal Wolsey grunted from the hearth. He kept his huge red back turned on the room, and as Honor offered him the goblet he waved it away with such vehemence that she stepped backwards too quickly and spilled some wine onto the Turkish carpet. “Can you reconcile the lion and the hyena?” Wolsey scoffed.
Catherine’s lips twitched, but she said nothing.
Campeggio closed his eyes tightly as if to regain his composure. Honor could see from his gray face that two months of this English standoff had left him drained. He waited until Honor brought him wine, then gulped it down, and gave her back the goblet. “If, however, reconciliation is impossible,” he went on doggedly, “then why, Your Grace, will you not agree to take the veil? Surely your retirement to a convent is the course that offers a blessed comfort to all. The King promises that your life in seclusion will be as rich and joyful as at any court. In whatever convent you choose, you shall keep state like a Queen.”
“But not be a Queen,” Catherine said witheringly.
Campeggio sighed. “No.”
“And such a course would leave my lord free to marry again, would it not?” she asked.
Campeggio looked down.
“Am I not correct?” Catherine insisted. “That you have discretionary power to dissolve my earthly marriage in favor of a spiritual one in a nunnery?”
“There is a pious precedent,” Campeggio urged. “The Queen of Louis XII of France took the veil—”
“Yes, my lord Cardinal,” she cut him off bitterly. “So I have been told. Several times.”
For a few moments the only sound above the fire’s hiss was the click of the Queen’s rosary beads slipping through her fingers, one by one.
Wolsey stamped his foot on a cinder. “By all that’s holy,” he growled, “you would lose nothing but the person of the King, and that you have lost already.” The remark was all the more malicious for having been delivered to the fire, not to her face.
She addressed his back. “Have the courage to answer me at least. If I take the veil, would the Church consider my lord a widower?”
The monstrous bulk of Wolsey turned. He sneered, no longer even bothering to mask his contempt. “You know it to be so.”
“As well as I know my duty!” Catherine flared. “Duty to God, who brought me to the vocation of marriage. Duty to our daughter, whom I will not desert. And duty to my lord, who, I doubt not, will presently shake off the wicked snares and vain councilors that beset him, and see where his duty lies. You spoke of lions, my lord Cardinal. Take care the royal one you serve, who seems to sleep, does not awake to maul you.”
The folds of Wolsey’s chins trembled in fury beneath his waxy face. Campeggio hobbled into the corridor of combat between the two adversaries, so ill-matched in stature, though equals in resolution. “Please, my lord. Please, my lady. We must remain calm.” Wearily, he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Your Grace speaks of the Princess Mary. Now, we understand the strain on you in not having your daughter near—”
“In being mercilessly kept from her!” Catherine cried. “Cardinal Wolsey has forbidden me to see or contact her these many months. And,” she added, her voice almost cracking, “you speak right. It goes hard, indeed.”
“But, there!” Campeggio said brightly. “It is only a matter of agreeing to take the veil and you shall be reunited with your child. In making this slight sacrifice you would honor God, and honor the scruple of your conscience, too, without loss of any of your temporal goods or possessions, or those of your daughter. Take this offer, my lady, for your sake, and for hers.”
“The scruple of my conscience do you call it?” Catherine stared at him, incredulous. “The holy state of matrimony is the state God called me to. Is that so little a thing? Shall I blaspheme against the sacrament of marriage? Shall I call myself a whore? My daughter a bastard? Call my union with one of God’s anointed kings a sin that has defiled my honor—and his—for nineteen years? Endanger my very soul? Never! I long with all my mother’s heart to see my child again, but never will I bargain for it at the cost of my immortal soul.”
“I marvel at your obstinacy, madam,” Wolsey sputtered. Campeggio, beaten, shuffled to a chair near Honor and slumped on its edge, apparently to ease the throbbing of his foot. Wolsey stalked to the center of the room with the breath wheezing out of him like wet moss squeezed underfoot. Honor instinctively backed up closer to the sideboard. She knew where Wolsey’s fury sprang from. All of Europe was watching him, England’s Chancellor, as this drama unfolded. His credibility with the King—his whole future perhaps—rested on securing the divorce. “You prate of the safety of your soul,” he said to the Queen, “but what of the safety of this realm if His Grace is thwarted in his rights? Without an heir, you abandon it to bloody civil strife. Are these such ‘little things’?”
“These things lie in God’s hands,” she said. “My soul’s safety lies in mine.” Straining for calm, she added tonelessly, in the manner of a catechism, “It is not necessary to be careful of many things, but only of the one thing needful.”
“And what of the safety of the King himself?” Wolsey cried. “Foul designs are afoot. Plots on the King’s very life. And be assured, madam, that if certain traitorous persons were to wreak their wicked plots, the blaming fingers would not fail to point your way.”
Catherine gasped, truly shocked. “My lord’s life is dearer to me than my own. I know nothing of such plots.”
“Do you not?” he said with menace in his eyes.
“If it’s murderers you seek,” she cried, “then look no further than Bishop Fisher’s door. That good man lies wracked on his bed, poisoned with soup from his own kitchen. Two of his household died of it—though, thank the Lord, the Bishop himself is out of danger now. Ask yourself, who would poison the one man of the Church who speaks up for my rights? Oh, I know his cook was blamed and boiled alive at Smithfield in his own kettle. But who forced the poor sinner’s hand to do the deed? For a murderer, look to those who would profit by destroying my only champion. Look to those who serve the house of Boleyn.”
“My lady! My lord!” Campeggio cried, his hands raised in despair at the pointless quarrel. Glowering, Wolsey held his tongue. Campeggio stood and smiled wanly at the Queen. “Your Grace, I see that your position is a lonely one. Would it n
ot soothe your heart to see your loving daughter? It is easily arranged. Tell us only that your retirement to a convent is a possibility and she shall be brought to your side as fast as horse can carry her. To retire now is no more than dutiful obedience to the Church. Speak but the word, and let the Princess Mary come.”
Catherine had to turn her face away, and Honor saw that her heart was breaking.
Wolsey appeared to sense the change: a crumbling, a chink in the Queen’s defenses. “Accept this bargain,” he rumbled as if to ram home his advantage, “or be banished from henceforth.”
Honor’s hand flew to her mouth to stifle a gasp. Campeggio groaned. But Catherine did not flinch.
“And take this thought for council,” Wolsey plowed on. “Once banished from the court you will have no need of the large train you now enjoy, nor of your sumptuous household. These can, and will, be removed. But agree now, and you shall maintain all your state and dignity.”
Catherine was looking deep into Honor’s eyes, as if searching past their pitying warmth for an answer. She seemed to find it, for a small smile played on her lips. “My lord Cardinal, your threats of poverty hold no terror for me. I have been poor before, and friendless. I can live poor again.” She gazed through the open doors of her bedchamber to the candle-gilded prie-dieu by her bed. Her eyes lingered on its carved ivory image of exquisite suffering nailed to a silver cross. “Leave me this one maid,” she said with a nod to Honor, “and Dr. de Athequa, my confessor, and I can live out my days happy in my duty to God.”
She turned to Campeggio. “My lord, I do wish to show myself an obedient daughter of the Church. I will live wherever my husband commands me. But in this one claim I shall not be shaken: I am the King’s legal wife. If I were to be torn limb from limb for saying so, and then rise again from the dead, I would die a second time in defense of this truth.”
“So be it!” Wolsey cried. “I have done!” He lumbered to the door and flung it open so that every wondering maid and cleric in the antechamber could hear him. He turned and pointed a bloated finger at the Queen.
“You have perverted many hearts,” he said, “and who knows what deeds men will stoop to perform for your desperate cause? The King’s Grace is not safe abiding near you. I am commanded by His Grace to tell you that he wishes no longer to be affronted by your presence.”
For a moment he seemed to feed on the shock in her face. His final words were cruel with softness. “You are henceforth banished from the King’s bed and board. And you are ordered to be gone this very night.”
Two days later, Honor again crossed the antechamber of the Queen’s suite and came to the open doorway of the private chamber. The room buzzed with activity. Anne Boleyn’s friends strolled, or lounged near the blazing morning fire. Servants bustled in and out, forcing Honor to step to one side. Some were carrying away the last bundles of the Queen’s books and tapestries; some were struggling in under armloads of Anne’s things: gowns, bird cages, sheet music, jewel boxes, a spaniel puppy. Anne herself sat on a chair in the center of the room looking bored. Hans Holbein was sketching her at his easel.
A snowball splatted against the window casement. Anne sprang up and ran to the window and flung the shutter wide. A second snowball struck. Shrieking with laughter, she skipped backwards to dodge the flying fragments, then instantly dashed back. She leaned over the snow-drifted ledge to shout down at the knot of horsemen below.
“You missed, Your Grace!” She scooped a wet clump of snow from the ledge, whacked it between her palms and, with a strong, practiced arm, pitched it down through the crystal air. She leaned out to watch its flight. “Winged him!” she cried, and hopped in place, clapping her hands like a child.
The King’s laughter boomed up from below, buttressed by a cheerful round of his hawking comrades’ comments. Then there was a thudding of horses’ hooves over earth, gradually diminishing to a soft shudder, and finally to silence.
Anne’s shoulders heaved in a happy sigh. She wiped her dripping hands on her skirt and turned back to the smiles of her friends. She winked at her brother, George, who was tuning the strings of his lute near a bright-cheeked young lady. Walking towards him, Anne made a small, funny pirouette in midstride that made George laugh out loud.
Holbein’s voice barked from his easel across the room. “Lady! Sit! Be still!”
The command was so brazen, so barefaced rude, that one of the gentlemen almost choked on his wine, and several ladies giggled. Anne turned to the room with an acid smile. “Master Holbein’s highly individual use of the English language has a charm all its own,” she declared.
“Ah, but his paintings speak eloquently,” said George.
“If he ever gets to the painting,” Anne grumbled. “All this sitting—and just for a sketch.” She flounced back onto the chair and presented the artist with her grumpily knitted brows. “Satisfied, Master Holbein?” she said, peering around a maidservant who was staggering by with a large mirror. Anne raised her voice and spoke with exaggerated clarity as if communicating with someone almost deaf. “Holbein see? Lady sits!”
This brought laughter from the guests, but Holbein only frowned in oblivious concentration as his hand whispered across the pink paper with his black chalk.
George Boleyn began to play a ballad, and Anne finally noticed Honor standing in the doorway. Her smile evaporated. “Yes, Mistress Larke?” she asked. “Surely the extra day has given you ample time for the removal of your mistress’s articles. What is it? Some trinket she’s forgotten?” Her hands flew up beside her face, mimicking a protestation of innocence. “Whatever it is, I swear it is unmolested! These ladies and gentlemen can vouch for me. I have not purloined any treasure of hers.”
Honor kept her face civil but her heart raged against Anne’s insolence. And all these preening camp followers too, she thought. Scavengers who’ve descended to share in the spoils. “Not something forgotten, my lady,” she said politely. “Rather, something offered. Her Grace bids me ask if there is anything of hers you would like kept behind for your pleasure.” Her eyes were fixed on Anne, but she sensed the dropping jaws and staring faces of the guests. George Boleyn’s fingers stilled on the lute strings.
“She bids me say you are welcome to anything,” Honor went on sweetly, “but she suggests, perhaps, the prie-dieu in the bedchamber? For your pious meditations? It is an exquisite work in silver and ivory crafted by a Spanish master. Though, of course, its commercial qualities will not be as important to you as its inestimable value as a channel to God.”
In the hushed room Honor gloried at the successful double thrust of the Queen’s parry; the offer not only displayed generosity, it sparkled with panache.
Anne recognized the ambush. Her eyes narrowed. “Tell your mistress,” she said, “that I have no need of her prie-dieu. I do my praying in church and chapel as most good Christians do. More praying seems excessive. It leaves one sallow-faced and peevish.” She picked irritably at gold filaments on her green brocade sleeve. “Well, don’t just stand there, Mistress Larke,” she almost spat, “come in. And take away the prie-dieu. I tell you, I have no need of it.”
Honor smiled. She signaled to two heavily booted menservants behind her with satchels of tools, and pointed them to the adjoining bedchamber. George Boleyn then broke the silence with a ballad. Soon, his clear baritone was cresting above the music of his lute. Chatter began to percolate among the guests. Wine flowed again, along with the laughter of flirtation. Anne accepted a goblet and listened to George’s song.
Everyone frostily ignored Honor, yet she knew she was caught in this hostile territory until her workmen had dismantled the prie-dieu. She looked at Holbein. He and his easel formed an island of stillness in the stream of bustle. She made her way toward the friendly ground. She had followed the moon-faced painter’s success with great pleasure ever since he had arrived on the Chelsea riverbank a year and half ago. Sir Thomas had immediately commissioned him to paint portraits of the family, then had shown them to the
King, who was enthralled by the artist’s work. “Is there really such a marvel in England,” the King had cried, “and can he be had for money?” Now, Holbein could hardly keep up with the demand for portraits from the lords and ladies of the court.
Honor touched his elbow, gently so as not to disturb his hand. He frowned up at the interruption, then instantly brightened at the sight of her face.
“How goes the work, Hans?” she asked. She leaned to whisper in his ear. “Can silk be made of a sow’s ear after all?” His eyes twinkled and his shoulders lifted to contain a chuckle.
“Master Holbein seems able to make silk from thin air,” a male voice murmured.
Honor looked up in surprise. On the other side of the easel a man was stooped, leafing through a standing portfolio of Holbein’s drawings. The easel had obscured him from her view. She flushed crimson realizing he had overheard her remark.
As he lifted out two drawings and straightened to resume his examination of them, Honor’s anxiety dissipated, for she sensed that he was somehow aloof from this gathering. For one thing, the slightly sagging cheeks and emerging double chin proclaimed that he was older than the others, perhaps in his early forties. Also, he was dressed in an ankle-length robe of black velvet with only a wide collar of sable to indicate his status, and this alone distinguished him from the bright plumage of Anne’s friends. But there was something else that separated him and made him their superior—a look of sharp intelligence in his small, brown eyes, and a quickness there that devoured the details of Holbein’s drawings, yet remained coolly detached. There was precision and resolution in his straight wide mouth.
“Remarkable,” he murmured. He turned to study Holbein as if hoping to discover a link that connected the mastery of the artwork with the face of the master. He looked again at the drawings, then shook his head in admiration. “I do love to see reality in art, not fantasy. And here is reality—made more real. One almost expects these faces to open their mouths and complain about the weather.” He replaced the sheets in the portfolio.
