The Heretic Wind: The Life of Mary Tudor, Queen of England

by Judith Arnopp

  “Then, we must give the people what they want, Rochester.”

  I sit down again and write to the council – the traitorous supporters of Jane’s coup.

  We are not ignorant of your consultations, to undo the provisions made for our preferment, nor of the great bands, and provisions forcible, wherewith ye be assembled and prepared – by whom, and to what end, God and you know, and nature cannot but fear some evil.

  I demand that they put aside their treason and pledge loyalty to me. I even promise them each a pardon if they obey me but … I have no intention of pardoning the ringleaders. I will watch and laugh as Northumberland dies.

  If I had expected them to lay down their weapons and fall to their knees, then I am sore disappointed. Instead, Northumberland has my messenger thrown into a dungeon and writes back in his own hand.

  My claim is spurious, he says, and reminds me of the act of parliament that illegitimised and disinherited me in my father’s day.

  My anger inflates into fury. I send word via the ambassadors to my cousin Charles in Spain, but there is little time for him to take action. As Northumberland, with the contents of the Tower munitions at his disposal, masses an army against me, I look at my band of trusty Catholics with debilitating despair.

  I must not be thwarted by my own lack of confidence.

  As my resolve begins to crumble, new arrivals ride in through the gate of Kenninghall: Sir Henry Bedingfield, John Shelton, Richard Southwell, Henry Radcliffe and with them they bring money, armed men and provisions, and above all, a determination that we will have victory. It is the fillip I need.

  I hurry down to greet them, look fondly on their lowered heads as they take knee before me. My former despair lightens, and I spy a glimmer of hope on the horizon.

  “In the morning,” I say, “we will ride on to Framlingham.”

  Framlingham – 12th July 1553

  Framlingham is the ancient seat of the Howard family. It is a vast structure, built for defence, and provides the perfect protection against Northumberland should he bring his forces against me. This time, when Rochester helps me into the saddle, I spare no thought for the fatigue of the journey. I now have men and arms at my back. Our army might be inferior to that of Northumberland but I have right on my side. The crown is my birthright and I have already suffered enough for it. Now, I shall make England mine, and punish those who dare attempt to wrest it from my grasp.

  As we ride out from Kenninghall, the locals gather to wave us off and their blessings fall like warm rain upon my face. I raise my gloved hand; a clenched fist to mark our imminent victory. I no longer even feel like Princess Mary, the suppressed and besmirched bastard of England.

  I am Queen of England now.

  I beckon Rochester to ride beside me.

  “Will they come, Robert? Do you really believe enough men will ride out in support of me?”

  “I believe they will, Your Majesty.”

  He waves his arm at the company that surrounds me. “Are these men already mustered not proof enough of the legitimacy of your claim.”

  I flush at the word legitimacy, so long used to hearing it directed against me. I glance at the riders ahead and behind. Strong, steel-clad men, well armed for battle. They will fight and die for me if needs be. The bright day darkens as the road dips into a wood, and I shiver in the sudden chill.

  “Don’t be troubled,” Robert says. “There is light ahead, look.”

  And, in the distance, I see the tunnel of darkness open again into the brilliant warmth of the sun. It gives me heart. I turn the full strength of my approval upon Rochester.

  “I am not afraid, Robert, I was merely chilled for a moment. How can I be afraid when men such as you are ready to lay down their lives for me?”

  It is coming on to dusk by the time we see the towers of Framlingham Castle in the distance. As we draw closer, the roadside begins to fill with people, ragged people; farmers, blacksmiths and women with children at foot.

  “God bless, Your Majesty!” they cry. “God keep you!” and I feel again that surge of love that has been missing from my life. While the allegiance of the upper classes shifts and turns, these people, these common simple folk, do not change.

  A slight incline rises ahead and the party breaks into a trot, increasing to a slow canter as we reach the summit and then…

  I draw in breath, pull my mount to a halt and look down on the meadows that surround Framlingham Castle. Wide acres of undulating pennants; fields spiked with spears; the setting sun glinting on a sea of shining steel. I raise a hand to my mouth in disbelief at the great concourse of men who have come to offer up their swords.

  Let battle commence in the morning, for tonight I will go to my bed happy, and confident that God will send us victory.

  I sleep like one blessed.

  St James’ Palace – November 1558

  “And did God send you victory, Your Majesty? Was there a great battle?”

  Anne’s voice drags me back from the past. The chamber has turned quite, quite dark. I am surprised to find myself in my bed, startled by the sudden ache in my joints, the gripe in my belly. For a while, I’d been young and victorious again; a rightful queen taking back her throne.

  As my consciousness returns to the miserable present, I wish I could have my life to live again. There are things I’d do differently, of course. I doubt there is a body on earth who would not make some small changes to the past. At the start of my reign I’d had such a sense of righteousness. I felt my trials were over and a new life beginning. If only I could have hung on to that feeling.

  On the day when Northumberland’s army conceded, my future stretched out like an endless golden sea. I would restore the old ways; make England merry again. I would marry, bear a string of heirs, and lead the Tudor dynasty into a new era of unblemished Catholicism. But I was blinded by it; by the crown, by the power, by false hope, by my own unshakeable faith.

  I believed all England longed as I did for a return to the true church but I was wrong. I had not yet learned that most men yearn for power and wealth; they have little care for the method of prayer. Even God in his Heaven cannot compete with the human lust for power on Earth.

  “No, Anne: there was no real battle. The people resisted Northumberland’s plan. Jane Grey was a stranger to the commoners but they had known me from my infancy, seen the indignities I had suffered. The people were the first to show their support for me and then, one by one, the knights and nobles followed. In the end, with few supporters left and knowing his cause was lost, Northumberland had no option but to surrender.”

  “What did you do?”

  Her face comes into clearer focus as she sits forward. I cannot make out the contours of her face but her hands are lit by the candle, and I notice they are clasped so tightly the tips of her fingers are turning white. I don’t remember ever having enjoyed such a captive audience.

  “What did I do? I sent the Earl of Arundel to arrest him, of course.”

  “And what about Lady Jane?”

  I sigh. Poor Jane. I’d rather not think of that.

  “Well, she was kept in the Tower. My hands were tied. I couldn’t let her go free. She had allowed herself to be declared queen, she had endorsed an army to be sent out against me. My advisors urged me to take her head but … I couldn’t, in all conscience, do that. Honourable confinement was the best I could offer.”

  “It must have been hard for you, she was your cousin.”

  “Yes, it was hard, and painful too. I’m glad you can see that. She might have been an annoying little Protestant who constantly tried to convert me but, first and foremost, she was my kin. We had been friends for a time. We had walked together in the garden at Chelsea with Elizabeth and Katherine Parr. Jane was family, and her betrayal was the worst of all … well, almost the worst.”

  A door opens. I cough feebly and turn my face toward the sound of swishing skirts, unsure who it is.

  “Susan?”

  “Yes, Your Maje
sty, it is me. I came to tell you that Sir Thomas Cornwallis has returned from Hatfield.”

  “Does he wish to see me?”

  “I believe so, Your Majesty. I will tidy you up a little first before I summon him.”

  I grimace at the child as she rises from the bedside to allow Susan access. A thrill of cold tingles on my scalp as my cap is removed and a comb is gently run through my thinning hair. I wonder what I look like these days. It is a year or more since I was able to clearly see my face. Of course, my women assure me I am still beautiful to behold, but they’d hardly dare say otherwise.

  Even in my youth I was merely pleasant looking, never beautiful like my mother. I have my father’s snub nose, his clenched stubborn chin, his direct gaze. A firm eye is never appreciated in a woman. It gained me the reputation of being difficult even before I’d had cause to be defiant about anything.

  Susan bids me sit forward. I groan while she fastens a clean shawl about my shoulders and eases me back on the pillows.

  “There,” she says. “You look lovely now.”

  “Do I, indeed?” I grumble. My head feels heavy, my neck aches. I slump on the pillows like an aged monkey. “Bring him in then,” I say.

  After a while, brisk footsteps enter the chamber, I hear a nervous cough and a flurry of movement. I imagine Cornwallis has swept off his hat and is making a gallant bow. A ridiculous gesture since I cannot see it.

  “Your Majesty, I hope I find you in good health.”

  “No, sir, you don’t. As must be quite plain.”

  “The physicians will have you well in no time…”

  “No. No, they won’t. Now, enough of your flannel. What did my sister say? Did she manage to hide her glee long enough to wish me well?”

  “She did, Your Majesty, and is most distressed by your present malady.”

  “Codswallop. She can’t wait to see me in my tomb. Did she swear to uphold my laws, protect the true religion?”

  I squint, longing to be able to see the lie in his face as he makes reply.

  “She did, Your Majesty. She also regrets that she cannot be with you in your time of…”

  “I have no wish to see her.”

  The only sound is the crackling of flames in the hearth, the sudden slump of a charred log. I cough at the smoke that wafts uninvited into the room.

  “They’ve already begun to leave me, you know. Flocking to her at Hatfield, no doubt. I imagine her court there is now larger than this one … just as her mother stole courtiers from my mother, now she is stealing mine.”

  He stumbles and stutters, unwilling to comment.

  “Oh, be quiet, Cornwallis. You can go. Tell them to send that child back … she is the only company worth having these days. She doesn’t argue, she doesn’t flatter…”

  “I am here, Your Majesty. I didn’t leave.”

  I grope for her and the comfort of a small smooth hand creeps into mine. Ignoring Cornwallis as he takes leave of me, I urge the child to sit again.

  “Your eyes are bad again today, Your Majesty?”

  “The sight comes and goes, child. One day I can see shapes and colours, the next I see nothing at all. Today is a dark day but tomorrow I might look upon your face again.”

  “And the pain in your belly?”

  “Not so bad this morning. Don’t worry, I shall live to finish my tale.”

  “What was it like to be queen, after so long of being ill used? Did you wreak vengeance on your enemies straight away?”

  I laugh, and my chest crackles with the effort.

  “Some of them, but with others … leniency was best. Those I allowed to live were spared for the sake of England. The men who had supported me were good men, stout Catholics and loyal to the realm but … they were not politicians and state craft is a specialised matter. I had to pardon some whose heads I would rather have taken, but a monarch’s life is always one of compromise ... or it should be.”

  Richmond – September 1553

  As I had expected, there are many complaints from the Protestants in and around court. I am advised to treat them with forbearance, and hope that Rochester is right when he advises me that persuasion rather than force is a better method of ensuring the return of the true faith.

  Simon Renard, an ambassador from the court of my cousin, Charles, quickly becomes my loyal adviser. Trying to ignore their failure to come to my aid when I needed it, I place my trust in him. I invite him to attend me without the knowledge of my council and he comes under cover of darkness.

  He is small, dark and bearded with large sad eyes like a spaniel. He bends over my hand, his lips rather too moist on my wrist.

  “I agree with the advice you’ve been given,” he says when I put it to him. “Leniency and patience is the best path … although your cousin, the Cardinal, will be difficult to convince.”

  Cardinal Pole, the son of my dearest friend, Margaret, is renowned for his intolerance. He fiercely desires England’s return to Rome no matter the cost.

  “I know little yet of such things, Renard, but even I can see that it is a matter that should not be hurried.”

  “Let them come back to grace of their own volition, Your Majesty. I am sure that once they see the error of their ways, the preferment good Catholics receive, they will realise it to be for the best.”

  It is not until it is over that the full extent of the damage caused by my brother’s regime becomes evident. They destroyed centuries of devotion; stripped the cathedrals and the parish churches bare. They silenced our religious music, our Latin prayers, and smashed our glorious architecture; our statues, our beautiful stained glass. So much has gone and so much of it is irreplaceable.

  I am determined to return as fully as I can to the old ways. I will replace the great roods burned in the heretic fires. I will restore the gilded lofts, the high gleaming altars of the true church, but I must do it slowly, by degrees.

  When the abbeys fell in my father’s time, the church properties were given to some of the most powerful lords in the kingdom. To demand the return of what they now see as their homes will only offend and alienate them against me. It is not enemies but friends I need.

  Within a few days of taking back my crown, I realised the loyal men who helped me were not politicians. I was forced to maintain the council that served my brother. They pushed a usurper onto my throne yet I now have to trust them; I can only hope that the realm of England means more to them than their aversion to me. It is while I am pondering on their dislike of me that I remember Norfolk is still in the Tower, as he has been since the last days of my father’s reign.

  There were many in England who cheered my father’s death, but I have no doubt Norfolk topped the list. Had the king not died when he did, the duke would surely have followed his son to the scaffold.

  Lazily, I recall my terror in the face of his mistreatment. I can punish him now. I have his houses, I have his wealth. Now, I can take his life.

  The only thing that stays my hand is his support for the old church. He can help me erase heresy from this land as no other can. I push aside the memory of his ill-treatment and sign his release from the Tower.

  A few days later, he comes into my presence, and I discover his arrogance is untainted by years in a Tower cell. He has shrunk in body, his skin is jaundiced from lack of air, but all else remains the same. Even his nerve.

  He removes his cap and stiffly lowers himself to his knees. “Your Majesty,” he says and I wait unsmiling and watch his discomfiture increase.

  Clutching the arms of the throne tightly, my knuckles white, I suppress the teenage girl that still lingers within me and longs to batter him about the head … until it resembles a baked apple. I wonder if he too remembers that day or if it is lost amid a thousand other insults... Our eyes meet and I see that he does. He both remembers and rues it.

  “My lord.” My lips curl into a sneer of their own accord. “You seem to be in good health considering the years you have languished at the king’s pleasure.”
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  “Oh, my bones do ache a bit, Your Majesty.”

  I expect they do. He must be eighty if he is a day but I feel no pity. Where was his compassion when he was in his prime and I a young defenceless girl?

  “You must be surprised to see me here, on the throne of England, my lord … after you fought so hard to keep me from it? I imagine you thought it a day that would never come.”

  “Indeed, it makes me very glad, Your Majesty. Had I been free I would, of course, have ridden in your support. I can only be thankful that my – my former home at Framlingham offered you such lavish hospitality.”

  His smile is cold, his rhetoric like stones against a frozen window.

  “I suppose you’d like it back? And your former office too?”

  “I am undeserving, Your Majesty, but nothing would give me greater pleasure.”

  My upper lip snarls.

  “And you swear to serve me, as loyally as you did my father?”

  “I will serve you loyally whether I am returned to royal favour or not. You are my queen, and I am yours to govern.”

  He bows low again. I am sickened by his smooth insincerity and long to unleash the fury I’ve suppressed for so long. But I must not. I need his experience and the support that only he can provide.

  I hold out my hand and try not to gag as he kisses my knuckles and pledges his lifelong fealty. When he has gone, I wipe the back of my hand on my skirt and call for wine.

  My heart is heavy. I doubt any service he does me can recompense for the despairing time I spent at Hatfield, but at least I have him where I need him. At my side.

  Within days of my entrance into the capital, Elizabeth arrives to congratulate me on my accession and swear allegiance. She rides into my capital and the crowds flock to greet her, all suspicion of her involvement in Northumberland’s plot forgotten by the public. They call out her name, throw greenery in her path as if she is some pagan goddess.

  As always, I am surprised when we come face to face. When we are apart, it is easy to forget she is a grown woman. Expecting a young girl, I am stunned by her composure, her flawless appearance, and her infuriating charm.