The Scarlet Peacock

by Field, David

‘No, Thomas,’ Henry replied sadly, ‘unless you can double your prayers to God to grant me a male heir.’

  *

  On February 6th 1514, an elated Thomas Wolsey stood at the altar in the chapel of Lambeth Palace facing William Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury. Around Thomas’s neck hung the crux pectoralis, the pectoral cross and the ancient symbol of high office in the Church of Rome, while the ring of office had just been placed on his gloved hand by the wizened old man who stood before him with a pale smile of resignation, surrounded by the Bishops of London, Winchester, Norwich, Exeter, St. Asaph and Llandaff, who were also participating in Thomas’s consecration as Bishop of Lincoln. On Thomas’s head was the heavily jewelled bishop’s mitre whose weight he would have to learn to endure if others were to witness him in all his splendour, while in his hand he held the baculus pastoralis, which was better known as a ‘crozier’, and which symbolised its holder as a shepherd called to tend his flock.

  Thomas turned to face the small but very select audience in the chapel as the Archbishop raised a hand above his head and administered the final blessing.

  ‘May almighty God bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.’

  A murmur of ‘Amen’ rose up from the body of the congregation, and it was all over. The choir struck up the departing anthem as Thomas was led out by the remaining bishops to the smaller chapel belonging to the Bishop of London, in which certain preliminary ceremonies had earlier been conducted. As Thomas entered, the last in the line, Warham had already been disrobed by an attendant, and stood waiting for him, the ironic smile still on his face.

  ‘Now that you are one of those under my Episcopal authority, Thomas, I shall expect more respect from you in Council.’

  ‘You have always had my respect, my lord Archbishop,’ Thomas replied with a grin. ‘The more direct question is whether or not you will have my co-operation.’

  With some regret, Thomas allowed Thomas Larke to remove his chasuble and all the other clerical garments above his simple alb, over which he slipped his freshly laundered soutane before walking sedately to the Great Hall of the Bishop’s Palace in order to host the small repast laid out along several boards down the centre. Henry himself had opted not to attend, so as not to steal the attention from his new bishop, but he had ordered several leading nobles to the ceremony, as a mark of respect. One of these was his personal favourite, and lifelong companion, Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, who sidled up to Thomas as he symbolically broke a huge, specially baked, manchet loaf, lifted the cloth from a huge flagon of Rhenish wine and poured himself a generous measure.

  ‘Thomas, we must speak privily,’ Suffolk urged him. Thomas smiled at him indulgently.

  ‘Charles, my dear friend, nothing short of the death of the King could be so urgent on this day of days. Call on me tomorrow at Bridewell, and you shall have my undivided attention, as ever, but for today, please allow me to play the genial host.’

  Suffolk withdrew, his face a picture of pain and anguish, and Thomas heard a mocking voice behind him.

  ‘I trust that, at least for today, you are wearing clean hose.’

  Thomas groaned inwardly and turned to face the grinning visage of Thomas Howard, who continued

  ‘And before you tell me to cross myself because here comes a bishop, you should know that here comes an earl.’

  ‘Of this I am already aware, Thomas, and I must congratulate you, not only on your father’s elevation to the highest rank of noble, but also the bravery of both of you in defeating the Scots while we took on the French.’

  Thomas had been advised the previous week that in return for leading the victorious English forces at Flodden, Thomas Howard Senior had been raised from his rank as Earl of Surrey to be reinvested with the title of Duke of Norfolk, previously lost to the family as the result of his father’s support for Richard of Gloucester at Sutton Cheney, in the battle that was now generally known after the name of the nearest town of any size, Market Bosworth. Since Thomas’s namesake son had also fought bravely in the vanguard of his father’s massed armies, he had been graciously allowed to assume the title of ‘Earl of Surrey’.

  ‘I assume you took no part in the fighting?’ Howard enquired with a sneer.

  ‘No indeed,’ Thomas assured him. ‘I did, however, organise the feeding, deployment and spiritual comfort of fifty thousand men, while you presumably accounted for the deaths of a dozen or so.’

  ‘Is it true that you have arranged for the Princess Mary to be wed to the King of France?’

  ‘No,’ Thomas replied with a shake of the head, ‘I merely suggested it to his Majesty.’

  ‘Then we owe you much thanks – our family that is,’ Howard replied. ‘Two of my nieces are to travel with the Lady Mary to the Court of France as her ladies. Mary and Anne Boleyn, my sister’s daughters. She is married to Thomas Boleyn, one of his Majesty’s ambassadors to the Low Countries’

  ‘Delighted to have been of service,’ Thomas replied with a smirk. ‘Now, if you would excuse me, the King requires my presence at Richmond ere nightfall. Your brother in law Boleyn may well find that matters diplomatic have been transferred to France.’

  CHAPTER 6

  Affairs of the heart

  Thomas climbed out of the barge alongside the Royal Architect, and they both ascended the steps cut into the grass slope in order to survey the old Hospitaller farm building, from whose decaying roof rafters the crows took off in noisy protest as they walked closer. Thomas frowned as he surveyed the modesty of the edifice.

  ‘Knock it all down and begin again, your Grace?’ the architect enquired.

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Thomas replied as he visualised the finished product in his imagination. ‘I have in mind a grand courtyard entrance, with guest chambers all around it in a quadrangle, like our finest university halls. A flight of steps at the far end of the courtyard, with stables to one side, and the steps leading up to a grand corridor, from which may be accessed the largest banqueting hall you have ever constructed.’

  ‘And your private quarters? Shall they run along the upper level at the front, to command a grand view of the river?’

  Thomas sniffed in disapproval.

  ‘You and I have just had the misfortune to travel along that river, Sir Henry. It is, as your nose will have detected should it be as sensitive as mine, little more than a flowing guardrobe of other people’s shit. I do not wish to throw open my casement in order to smell that when the wind blows from the south. My apartments shall be towards the back, and the vista shall be that of ornamental gardens, with perhaps a maze. Here at the front, more gardens, planted with herbs and flowers that will detract the more sensitive noble noses from the pestilence of what flows past lower down.’

  ‘And the cost? Does your Grace wish to restrict the expense to a particular amount?’

  ‘No, his Grace does not,’ Thomas replied emphatically. ‘Fear not for the cost, master architect, simply apply to my steward when you have need of more money, and it shall be forthcoming. How soon shall it all be ready?’

  The architect thought for a moment, then replied uncertainly.

  ‘It will depend upon the weather, your Grace. We are at present blessed with a warm dry summer, but once the Autumn returns, with its gales and rain …’

  ‘All the more reason to make a swift start, master architect. I wish my new residence here at Hampton to be ready by this time next year, and once the roof is in place the internal fittings may commence regardless of the weather. Make this your first priority or the King shall hear of it, since it is my intention to entertain the entire Court here at Midsummer’s Eve. Now, who is this that disturbs our business?’

  While they had been talking, they had become aware of three horsemen pounding down the grass slope towards them. They slid to a halt, and a tall, heavily bearded giant of a man leapt from his mount and strode purposefully towards Thomas, gesturing the architect aside with an imperious wave of the hand.

  ‘My Lord of Suffo
lk,’ the architect muttered deferentially as he bowed away backwards. Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, slightly out of breath from his urgent ride, strode away down the slope, calling to Thomas as he did so.

  ‘Walk with me a pace, Thomas,’ he all but commanded, ‘for we must talk privily.’

  Thomas looked Brandon up and down with a slight air of disapproval once he caught up with him.

  ‘I bid you call on me at Bridewell,’ Thomas reminded him. ‘As you can see, I am presently engaged in detailed discussion with the King’s architect regarding my new country residence. Can your matter not wait?’

  ‘Can any affair of the heart wait, Thomas? I attended as you requested at Bridewell, only to be advised that you were out here in the country, engaged in some matter or other that cannot possibly compare with the sickness that my soul suffers as the result of your meddling.’

  ‘And what meddling would that be, precisely?’ Thomas enquired guardedly, although there could be no doubt what Suffolk was referring to.

  Charles had been awarded his title – one of only three dukedoms in the nation – as the result of his father’s bravery. William Brandon had been the standard bearer to Henry Tudor at the Battle of Bosworth, and had paid with his life when he became one of only two men standing between the terrified Henry and a berserk, axe-wielding Richard of Gloucester. The newly crowned Henry VII had not forgotten what he owed to the Brandon family, and William’s orphaned son Charles had been raised in the royal nurseries at Eltham and Westminster alongside Prince Arthur, and after Arthur’s untimely death Charles became a natural companion to the boisterous Prince of Wales, now King Henry VIII, seven years his junior.

  This had rendered him something of a hero figure, and childhood romantic fantasy, to the royal princesses, and in particular the youngest and most beautiful of them all, the Princess Mary, who was now in her eighteenth year and about to be shipped off to France like a consignment of trade goods. It was no secret that the tall, dashing, muscular adventurer and the radiant and headstrong girl with the long and characteristic red-gold Tudor hair had been mutually attracted for several years, and that the development of their passion had only been restrained by the fact that Brandon was not of noble birth, while Mary was the most negotiable princess in Europe.

  Suffolk was now beside himself with anxiety.

  ‘You have traded the Lady Mary for some perceived advantage at the Court of France.’

  ‘I have done no such thing,’ Thomas advised him cautiously. Brandon was still a royal favourite and confidante, and it was as well not to incur his displeasure, although in this matter it had been the will of the vastly more powerful Henry that had officially prevailed.

  ‘Spare me the honeyed shit, Thomas,’ Brandon glared back at him. ‘Hal does whatever you tell him, everyone knows that.’

  ‘I am certainly fortunate that his Majesty is graciously disposed to follow my counsel in some matters,’ Thomas oozed, ‘but it is hardly for a mere Bishop and King’s Almoner to determine the destiny of the most eligible princess in England. Particularly not one who is such a favourite of the King.’

  ‘She is also a favourite of mine, Thomas, as you must know, and you do me no favour by wrenching her from my side to marry that old man who has a face like a pitted pear, who is plagued with the gout, and who is three times her age.’

  It was time for Thomas to strike back, albeit diplomatically.

  ‘Would you wish to marry her yourself, Charles? Do you therefore not still grieve for your late wife in Westhorpe?’

  Brandon flushed with anger at the reproof, since his matrimonial escapades were the talk of the Court. He had first proposed marriage to Anne Browne, daughter of the Governor of Calais and his wife, a descendant of the once powerful Neville family. He had also got Anne pregnant before the nuptials could be celebrated, and had then thrown her over in favour of her aunt, the wealthy Margaret Mortimer. His marriage to Margaret was annulled at the instigation of the indignant Browne family, and Brandon and Anne Browne had finally tied the knot in a very public ceremony attended by King Henry himself. This was hardly the perfect track record for a romantic troubadour seeking the hand of a beautiful princess, and Brandon knew it, even though Anne Browne had died of the sweating sickness four years previously.

  ‘You do me wrong to remind me of the impetuosity of my youth,’ Brandon complained. ‘My heart has ever belonged to the Lady Mary – is there nothing that can be done to change Henry’s mind?’

  ‘The preparations are well advanced,’ Thomas advised him. ‘She will sail from Dover on a favourable Autumn tide, under the protection of my Lord of Norfolk and accompanied by two of his granddaughters as ladies in waiting. She is already ceremonially wed to Louis, through the good offices of the Duc de Longueville, and it wants only the final bedding across the Channel.’

  Brandon shuddered.

  ‘The mere thought of my beautiful Mary being pawed by that ugly old man, and I could run a sword through his innards! Does Henry care nothing for her, that he sends her to be violated by a scrofulous old goat?’

  ‘Patience, my dear Charles,’ Thomas urged him. ‘King Louis will not live forever, and I am advised by one of Lady Mary’s attendants that she has wrought from King Henry a promise that when Louis is no longer, she may then marry the man of her choice. She did not name you in that regard, but everyone knows where her true heart lies.’

  ‘Truly, Thomas?’ Brandon enquired breathlessly. ‘This is not merely another of your honeyed reassurances, designed to deflect the arrows of displeasure?’

  ‘Truly, Charles. It is, of course, little more than rumour through the mouth of a menial Court servant, but I had it from him while negotiating a mild penance in punishment for his lying with his cousin while drunk.’

  Brandon placed a heavy mailed riding glove on Thomas’s shoulder, and stooped in order to look him firmly in the eye.

  ‘Thomas, I am, as ever, in your debt. If I might prevail upon our friendship further, and should Hal say anything more regarding the true alignment of Lady Mary’s heart, do you remember me kindly to her brother.’

  ‘Rest assured, Charles,’ Thomas smiled back as he wriggled out from under the heavy hand, ‘you are forever at the forefront of my thoughts, and I will ever work for your happy advancement, as I feel sure I may also rely upon your good offices.’

  ‘Indeed you may, Thomas, indeed you may,’ Charles reassured him as he walked back to his companions with a broad smile and remounted his courser. As they thundered back up the slope, Thomas waved his architect back over.

  ‘Now, master architect – the matter of the number of chimneys.’

  *

  The doors to the Queen’s Presence Chamber swung inwards, and Thomas walked serenely into the presence, dressed in his bishop’s regalia and doing his best to look unconcerned. Since he was no longer tutoring the Queen in English, there was no obvious reason for the summons he had received via one of her grooms, but his spies told him that Katherine was in a foul humour of late, and he believed he knew precisely why.

  Katherine sat in a high chair, her needlepoint on her lap, piercing Thomas with a steely glare as he walked towards her and bowed obsequiously. The Queen’s ladies slid away on cue, leaving only Bessie Blount by her side, but Katherine turned to her and curtly dismissed her as well. Thomas waited until Bessie had bowed through the side door that would have taken her to the Queen’s Privy Chamber, then raised an enquiring eyebrow.

  Katherine gestured for him to take the chair beside her.

  ‘And take off that ridiculous hat, Tomaz – you are not here to say Mass.’

  Thomas dutifully removed his mitre, glad to be rid of its weight, and laid it ceremoniously on the floor beside his chair, then looked back at Katherine.

  ‘Why did you dismiss Mistress Blount, your Highness? Surely, protocol dictates . .’ ‘Protocol mierda, Tomaz! What we have to discuss should be overheard by no-one, since it will bring no credit upon either of us.’

  ‘I a
m gratified to note that your Majesty’s English has so far improved that only the oath needed to be in Spanish.’

  ‘Mierda – shit – it smells the same in any language when you are covered in it.’

  ‘Highness?’

  ‘Why are you conspiring against me, Tomaz?’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes, you. And do not reply to my questions with questions of your own.’

  ‘In what way does your Highness consider that I am conspiring against you?’

  Katherine ‘humphed’ loudly, unimpressed by Thomas’s attempt at evasion.

  ‘The Lady Mary was intended as a bride for my nephew Charles – to marry her to that old pedo Louis was an insult to my family.’

  Thomas couldn’t resist an involuntary chortle at the description of the King of France as a fart, but he straightened his face immediately for his response.

  ‘That was your husband’s decision, your Highness, not mine.’

  ‘No doubt under your guidance as ever, Tomaz. And why do you persist in calling me “your Highness”? We were once “Tomaz and Katherine”. Do you no longer have affection for me?’

  ‘As much as ever I did, my lady, but you have grown so much in dignity that it seems almost insulting to address my Queen by her given name.’

  ‘My given name was “Katarina”, Tomaz. It is Spanish, and I ask again, why do you persuade my husband to so insult my royal family?’

  ‘I did not persuade him, Katherine – he persuaded himself. And on the subject of insults, it ill pleased him that your father failed to come to his banner – twice.’

  ‘So he punishes my father by taking away his grandson’s bride – is that how diplomacy is conducted in this country, by playing upon matters of the heart?’

  ‘You forget that English troops under your direction took the life of James of Scotland, the beloved husband of the Princess Margaret.’

  ‘That is not the same thing, Tomaz. James chose to take the field of battle. And I will not have my mind diverted by your skilled tongue. Answer me truly if you love me, Tomaz - has the King taken a mistress?’