The Taming of the Queen

by Philippa Gregory

  ‘Did someone write it down so that others can read it?’ I ask.

  He nods. His eyes are closing like a sleepy child after a busy day. ‘I hope so,’ he says. ‘I shall see that you get a copy. You will want to study it, I know.’

  ‘I will,’ I say.

  ‘I have pronounced,’ he says. ‘That is the end of all argument.’

  ‘Yes. Shall I leave you to sleep, husband?’

  ‘Stay,’ he says. ‘Stay. I have hardly seen you all day. Did you sit beside old Latimer’s bed?’

  ‘Hardly ever,’ I lie. ‘He was not a husband to me as you are, my lord.’

  ‘I thought not,’ he says. ‘You must have had a moment, when he was dying, when you thought you would be free of all husbands. Did you? When you thought you would be a widow, with your own little estate and your own fortune? Perhaps you even picked out a handsome young man?’ The little eyes open, twinkle with sly amusement.

  It is illegal for a woman to marry the king if she has any hidden love affairs in her past. These are dangerous words for a bedtime story.

  ‘I thought I would be a widow living only for my family, just like your grandmother, Lady Margaret Beaufort,’ I smile. ‘But a great destiny called me.’

  ‘The greatest destiny a woman can have,’ he agrees. ‘But why do you think you have not conceived, Kateryn?’

  The question is so unexpected that I give a little start. His eyes are closed; perhaps he does not see it. I think at once, guiltily, of the purse of herbs and Nan’s terror that if I do not prevent it, he will give me some monstrous miscarriage. It is not possible that someone in my rooms has told him of the herbs. I am certain that no-one would betray me. No-one knows but Nan and me. Even the maid who brings the hot water knows nothing more than that she brings a jug of hot water for a morning tisane, now and then.

  ‘I don’t know, husband,’ I say humbly. ‘Sometimes it takes time, I suppose.’

  He opens his eyes. Now he is completely wide awake, as if he was never drowsy. ‘It never took time for me before,’ he says. ‘I have three children, as you see, from three different mothers. And there were others, of course. They all conceived at once, within the first months. I am potent, royally potent.’

  ‘Indeed.’ I can feel my anxiety rising. This sounds like a trap, but I cannot see how to avoid it. ‘I see it.’

  ‘So it must be some fault in you,’ he says pleasantly enough. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘Lord Latimer was not capable, so I never expected a child from him, and when I married my first husband I was too young, and we were hardly ever together.’ Pointless to say that you, my third husband, the king, are an old man, sick as a fat dog, rarely potent, probably sterile, and that the wives that you now remember as so readily fertile were the wives of your youth, the first three, and now they are all dead: one was beheaded by you, two died of your neglect. They miscarried time after time, except the third, the one who died in her first childbed.

  ‘Do you think that God does not smile on our marriage? Since he gives you no child, you must think that.’

  The king’s God sent him one dead baby after another in his first marriage until the king realised that God was not smiling A tiny squirm of protest turns in my mind. It is such blasphemy to call in God when the truth is something that we simply don’t understand. I cannot have God in this conversation as a witness against me. God should not bear witness against yet another of Henry’s wives. I think God Himself would be unwilling to argue that Kateryn Parr should be put aside. I feel my temper silently rise.

  ‘Who can doubt His blessing?’ I assert boldly, gripping my hands on the arms of the chair, nerving myself to go on. ‘Since you are so well and so strong and so potent, and we have had so many happy months together? Two and a half years of success? Your capture of Boulogne and the defeat of the Scots? Our happiness with your children? Who can doubt that God smiles on you, a king like you? He must smile on your marriage too? A marriage of your own choice when you honoured me with your favour. Who can doubt that God smiled on me when you chose me, and when you persuaded me, against my own humility, that I might become your wife? We cannot doubt that God loves you and inspires you. We cannot doubt that you have His favour.’

  I have saved myself. I see the pleased smile spread across his face as he relaxes into sleep. ‘You are right,’ he says. ‘Of course. And a child born to you must follow. God’s blessing is on me. He knows that I have only ever done the right thing.’

  The doctor, Sir William Butts, does not come back to court as he promised. He died of his fever, far away from the court, and we don’t even hear of it until after Christmas. The king says that no-one else understands his constitution, no-one else can keep him well as Doctor Butts could do. He feels that it was wrong and selfish of the doctor to leave court so abruptly and die in such inconsiderate haste. He takes the draughts that Doctor Wendy prepares for him, he keeps him at his bedside night and day, but he complains that he will never be well now that Doctor Butts is not there to soothe his temper and diminish his fever.

  ‘And we have lost a good friend and an advisor,’ Anne Seymour remarks to me and to Catherine Brandon. ‘Doctor Butts would often ask the king to ignore a piece of gossip against a Lutheran, or to release a preacher. He never declared his own opinions, but he often asked the king to be merciful. He was a good man to have at the king’s side.’

  ‘Especially when the king was in pain and angry,’ Catherine agrees. ‘My husband used to say that Doctor Butts could soothe the king when no-one else could do it. And he was a most honest believer in reform.’ She smooths out her skirt and admires the shine on the satin. ‘But still we make progress, Anne. The king has asked Thomas Cranmer to make a list of old superstitions in the church that should be banned.’

  ‘How do you know? What has he told you?’ Anne asks. I hear the hostility in her voice and remember that she is always anxious about someone who might rise in prestige and diminish her, or her husband.

  Catherine is trying to manage a difficult relationship with the king: constantly at his side, his favourite flirt, ignored as a councillor but relished as a partner at cards. This is a path that many have trod before her: four ladies-in-waiting have become queen – I am only the most recent. Now Catherine is the most favoured lady at court, and Anne Seymour, who never ceases to measure her husband’s prestige as the uncle of the prince, is painfully jealous. Surely, the danger is to me, but Anne thinks only of herself.

  ‘He is going to establish two colleges, just as he promised Her Majesty,’ Catherine says, smiling at me. ‘One at Oxford and one at Cambridge. This is learned work, just as Her Majesty asked him to do. They will teach the new learning and they will preach in English.’

  ‘He’s planning to send my husband, Edward, to Boulogne to replace that fool young Henry Howard,’ Anne says anxiously. ‘The Howards are in disgrace for Henry’s rashness and incompetence – which is all to our good – but with my husband away from court, who is going to keep us Seymours in the king’s remembrance? How shall we stay in favour? How can we be influential?’

  ‘Ah, the Seymours,’ Catherine says sweetly. ‘The Seymours! The Seymours! Just when we thought we were talking of the friends that we could trust to bring the king and the church closer to God, I find that we are actually talking about the rise of the Seymours, once more. Again.’

  ‘We don’t need to rise,’ Anne replies irritably. ‘We are high in favour. We Seymours are kin to the only Tudor heir, and Prince Edward loves his uncles.’

  ‘But it is the queen who is named as regent,’ Catherine reminds her silkily. ‘And the king prefers her company, and even mine, to yours. And if Edward is sent to Boulogne, and Thomas is always at sea, who will keep the king in mind of the Seymours indeed? Do you have any friends at all?’

  ‘Peace,’ I say quietly. But it is not their wrangling that disturbs me. It is that I cannot bear to hear his name. I cannot bear to think that while I am trapped in a cou
rt that seems smaller and more confining every day, he is always, always far away.

  HAMPTON COURT PALACE, CHRISTMAS 1545

  We hold Christmas in the old way, with dancing and music and masquing, and sports and competitions, and huge amounts of food and wine. Every one of the twelve days of the feast the kitchen labours to bring out some new novelty, some great dish; and the king eats and eats as if to satisfy a growing insatiable hunger, as if he had a monstrous worm coiled and fat inside him.

  He commands that we invite the former queen Anne of Cleves for Christmas, and she comes to court plumply good-humoured, as greedy as the king himself, and as merry and as sweet-tempered as any woman could be who has escaped danger with her life and come out with a royal title, a fortune and her freedom.

  She is wealthy. She comes with a train of horsemen, bringing rich Christmas gifts, carefully chosen to please all of us. She is three years younger than me, fair-haired, dark-eyed, and with a calm untroubled smile. Her rounded prettiness draws admiring glances from people who have forgotten why the king rejected her. She was the Protestant princess and she fell with their leader, Cromwell, when the king turned against reform. She comes to court as if to remind me that there has been a queen before who worshipped in her own language, served God without pope or bishop, took bread and wine not body and blood – and lasted less than six months.

  She smiles warmly at me, but she keeps her distance, as if there is no advantage in friendship with a wife. She knows everything there is to know about Tudor queens, and has concluded that there is no point in becoming my friend. They tell me that she was loving with Queen Katherine Howard: she bore no grudge when their roles were reversed, and the lady-in-waiting walked before her queen; but with me she behaves as if it is hardly worth getting to know me. Her cool glance tells me that she doubts I will make three years, perhaps I will not be here next Christmas.

  Nan embraces her without hesitation, falling into her arms as if they are two survivors from a secret war that only they remember. Anne hugs her tightly and then holds my sister at arm’s length to read her face.

  ‘You are well?’ she asks. Her accent is still German, like the cawing of a crow, even after all these years in England.

  ‘I am well,’ Nan says mistily, as if moved by a kiss from this ghost. ‘And my sister is Queen of England!’

  I can’t be the only person to think this rather awkward, given that this rounded, smiling woman was queen one reign before mine, and dismissed from the royal bed and the throne faster than anyone else has ever been. But Anne turns, still holding my sister close, and smiles at me. ‘God bless Your Majesty,’ she says sweetly. ‘And may your reign be long.’

  Unlike yours, I hope; but I incline my head and smile back at her.

  ‘And is the king in good health?’ she asks, knowing that I have to lie, for it is illegal to suggest that he is ill.

  ‘He is in very good health,’ I say stoutly.

  ‘And inclining to the reform of religion?’ she asks hopefully.

  Of course, she was raised a Lutheran, though who knows what she believes now? Certainly, she has never written anything of note.

  ‘The king is a great scholar of the Bible,’ I say, choosing my words carefully.

  ‘We make progress,’ Nan assures her. ‘We really do.’

  That night at dinner I sit on one side of the king, Anne of Cleves on my right hand, honoured before the court as the king’s sister – as he chooses to call her. I make sure I am smiling as if I am without any care in the world, while beside me I hear him eat, grunt, belch, pant and eat again. I have become ridiculously sensitive to the noise of him dining; no music can drown it out, no conversation can distract me. I hear the snuffle that he makes when he is tipping a bowl to drink the juices of the meat, the crack of the bones of little birds in his strong jaws, and the loud sucking on sweetmeats and sugar. He makes another noise when he drinks his wine, great gulps and then a sort of pant into the bowl of the wineglass as he catches his breath, as if he is swimming and drinking the lake. I turn my head and speak to Anne of Cleves; I smile down the table at Princess Elizabeth. Catherine Brandon dips her head coquettishly as the king sends down a special dish to her, and Nan glances at me as if to ensure that I have noticed this. I look around the court, at all the people serving themselves onto their heaped plates, snapping their fingers for the servers to bring them more and more wine, and I think: this court has become a monster that is devouring itself, a dragon that eats its own tail for greed.

  I am afraid of the cost of keeping this bloated household, the thousands of servants to run after the hundreds of lords, their ladies, their horses, their dogs. It is not that I am cautious – I was raised to run a noble household; I don’t like anything mean – but this is extravagance and luxury fuelled by the destruction of the churches. Only the wealth of a thousand years of the church could pay for this excess. It is as if the court is a great clockwork toy, with a gear and a great wheel that takes in holy wealth and throws out dross every hour, every minute, just as the king will feast now but will vomit later, or strain in pain on the close-stool, clinging to Anthony Denny’s extended hand and calling for Doctor Wendy to administer an enema to purge him.

  I see that Edward Seymour has an empty place at his side, on his right hand, a seat of honour, and at once I am alert, wondering if he expects Thomas. The noise of the king spooning oyster broth from a golden bowl, and then dipping manchet bread and sucking it, dies away. I cannot even hear the rattle of the golden spoon as he bangs it against the golden dish to prompt the server to give him more. I am watching the door at the end of the hall and, almost as if I have summoned him, as if my desire has created a spectre, Thomas, in a dark blue cape, comes quietly into the room, swings the cape from his shoulders and gives it to his page, and comes forward to his brother’s table.

  He is here. I look away at once. I cannot believe it. He is here.

  Edward’s warm welcome is unfeigned. He jumps to his feet and hugs Thomas, holding him tightly. The two exchange rapid words, and then hug again. Then Thomas steps away from the Seymour table and approaches the dais where we are sitting. He bows to the king, then to me and to the prince beside his father, and to the princesses, then lastly to Anne of Cleves, whom he escorted to England to be queen. His dark eyes go over us all indifferently, and when the king beckons him forward he steps up to speak across the high table and stands at a slight angle, so his shoulder is towards me and I see his face only in profile, and he does not look at me.

  I remember not to crane my head to listen to their conversation. There are some words about the ships and the winter quarters, and the king tells Thomas to take his seat and dine, and sends a dish of venison stew to the Seymour table at once, and some pastries and a pie and slices of a roast boar. Thomas bows, sits beside his brother and still does not look towards me. I know this only because when his eyes are on me I feel a heat in my face as if I had a slight fever. I don’t even have to see that he is looking at me for this to happen. It is as if my body knows, without my knowing, as if he can touch me without touching.

  But tonight I am cool and I look straight ahead as he does, so our gazes go past each other and rest on indifferent objects, at opposite ends of the hall, as if we had never been eyes locked, hands-clasped, bodies entwined at all.

  After dinner there is masquing in the new way, with the dancers taking partners from the court. I have said that I will not dance and I am glad to stand beside the king, my slim hand on his great shoulder, and avoid the danger of having to go hand-clasped with Thomas. I don’t think I could bear to be close to him. I am sure I could not dance. I don’t think that I could stand.

  The king watches the dancers, applauding one or another. He puts his hand around my waist, while I look fixedly at the windows where a pale winter sun is setting over the trees in the gardens. He slides his hand downwards to pat my buttocks. I make sure that I don’t flinch. I don’t look at Thomas, I look blindly out of the window, and when the king r
eleases me and I can step aside, I see that Thomas has gone.

  HAMPTON COURT PALACE, WINTER 1546

  At the gift-giving for the New Year Princess Elizabeth asks me to accompany her to take her present to the king. Together with Princess Mary we go to his presence chamber where he is receiving his court and giving and dispensing gifts. He almost always gives a purse of money, and Anthony Denny is at his side, tactfully judging the correct weight of the purse for each smiling recipient. Everyone falls back when the princesses and I enter the room and I curtsey to Henry but step aside, so that Elizabeth can go forward alone. I look around for Thomas, and see he is standing near to the king, a fat purse in his hand. Carefully, he looks away from me, carefully, I keep my eyes on Elizabeth.

  ‘Your Majesty, my honoured father,’ she says in her clear voice, speaking French. As he smiles at her she changes into Latin. ‘I have brought your Christmas gift. It is not riches in the eyes of the world but it is a treasure from heaven. It is worthless from the hands of its maker, for that was I, your most humble daughter, who made the translation and the copy for you. But I know that you love the author, and I know that you love the work and that gives me the courage to offer you: this.’

  From behind her back she brings out her beautifully written translation of my private prayers, translated into Latin, French and Italian. She goes towards her father, bows very low and puts it into his hands.

  The court bursts into applause and the king beams. ‘This is a work of great learning and good sense,’ he says. ‘Published by my wife and approved by every scholar. And here it is translated by another good scholar into a work of great beauty. I am proud that my wife and my daughter are women of scholarship. Learning is an ornament to a good woman, not a distraction.’

  ‘And what do you have for your stepmother?’ he asks Elizabeth.