Bouchier replied in the affirmative.
“It is well,” pursued Henry; “but what more? — for you look as if you had something further to declare.”
“Your majesty will not have forgotten how you exterminated the band of Herne the Hunter?” said Bouchier.
“Mother of Heaven, no!” cried the king, starting up; “I have not forgotten it. What of them? — Ha! have they come to life again? — do they scour the parks once more? That were indeed a marvel!”
“What I have to relate is almost as great a marvel,” returned Bouchier. “I have not heard of the resurrection of the band though for aught I know it may have occurred. But Herne has been seen again in the forest. Several of the keepers have been scared by him — travellers have been affrighted and plundered — and no one will now cross the great park after nightfall.”
“Amazement!” cried Henry, again seating himself; “once let the divorce be settled, and I will effectually check the career of this lawless and mysterious being.”
“Pray heaven your majesty may be able to do so!” replied Bouchier. “But I have always been of opinion that the only way to get rid of the demon would be by the aid of the Church. He is unassailable by mortal weapons.”
“It would almost seem so,” said the king. “And yet I do not like to yield to the notion.”
“I shrewdly suspect that old Tristram Lyndwood, the grandsire of the damsel upon whom your majesty has deigned to cast your regards, is in some way or other leagued with Herne,” said Bouchier. “At all events, I saw him with a tall hideous-looking personage, whose name I understand to be Valentine Hagthorne, and who, I feel persuaded, must be one of the remnants of the demon hunter’s band.”
“Why did you not arrest him?” inquired Henry.
“I did not like to do so without your majesty’s authority,” replied Bouchier. “Besides, I could scarcely arrest Hagthorne without at the same time securing the old forester, which might have alarmed the damsel. But I am ready to execute your injunctions now.”
“Let a party of men go in search of Hagthorne to-night,” replied Henry; “and while Mabel is brought to the castle to-morrow, do you arrest old Tristram, and keep him in custody till I have leisure to examine him.”
“It shall be done as you desire, my liege,” replied Bouchier, bowing and departing.
Shortly after this Henry, accompanied by Anne Boleyn, proceeded with his attendants to Saint George’s Chapel, and heard vespers performed. Just as he was about to return, an usher advanced towards him, and making a profound reverence, said that a masked dame, whose habiliments proclaimed her of the highest rank, craved a moment’s audience of him.
“Where is she?” demanded Henry.
“In the north aisle, an’t please your majesty,” replied the usher, “near the Urswick Chapel. I told her that this was not the place for an audience of your majesty, nor the time; but she would not be said nay, and therefore, at the risk of incurring your sovereign displeasure, I have ventured to proffer her request.”
The usher omitted to state that his chief inducement to incur the risk was a valuable ring, given him by the lady.
“Well, I will go to her,” said the king. “I pray you, excuse me for a short space, fair mistress,” he added to Anne Boleyn.
And quitting the choir, he entered the northern aisle, and casting his eyes down the line of noble columns by which it is flanked, and seeing no one, he concluded that the lady must have retired into the Urswick Chapel. And so it proved; for on reaching this exquisite little shrine he perceived a tall masked dame within it, clad in robes of the richest black velvet. As he entered the chapel, the lady advanced towards him, and throwing herself on her knees, removed her mask — disclosing features stamped with sorrow and suffering, but still retaining an expression of the greatest dignity. They were those of Catherine of Arragon.
Uttering an angry exclamation, Henry turned on his heel and would have left her, but she clung to the skirts of his robe.
“Hear me a moment, Henry — my king — my husband — one single moment — hear me!” cried Catherine, in tones of such passionate anguish that he could not resist the appeal.
“Be brief, then, Kate,” he rejoined, taking her hand to raise her.
“Blessings on you for the word!” cried the queen, covering his hand with kisses. “I am indeed your own true Kate — your faithful, loving, lawful wife!”
“Rise, madam!” cried Henry coldly; “this posture beseems not Catherine of Arragon.”
“I obey you now as I have ever done,” she replied, rising; “though if I followed the prompting of my heart, I should not quit my knees till I had gained my suit.”
“You have, done wrong in coming here, Catherine, at this juncture,” said Henry, “and may compel me to some harsh measure which I would willingly have avoided.”
“No one knows I am here,” replied the queen, “except two faithful attendants, who are vowed to secrecy; and I shall depart as I came.”
“I am glad you have taken these precautions,” replied Henry. “Now speak freely, but again I must bid you be brief.”
“I will be as brief as I can,” replied the queen; “but I pray you bear with me, Henry, if I unhappily weary you. I am full of misery and affliction, and never was daughter and wife of king wretched as I am. Pity me, Henry — pity me! But that I restrain myself, I should pour forth my soul in tears before you. Oh, Henry, after twenty years’ duty and to be brought to this unspeakable shame — to be cast from you with dishonour — to be supplanted by another — it is terrible!”
“If you have only come here to utter reproaches, madam, I must put an end to the interview,” said Henry, frowning.
“I do not reproach you, Henry,” replied Catherine meekly, “I only wish to show you the depth and extent of my affection. I only implore you to do me right and justice — not to bring shame upon me to cover your own wrongful action. Have compassion upon the princess our daughter — spare her, if you will not spare me!”
“You sue in vain, Catherine,” replied Henry. “I lament your condition, but my eyes are fully opened to the sinful state in which I have so long lived, and I am resolved to abandon it.”
“An unworthy prevarication,” replied Catherine, “by which you seek to work my ruin, and accomplish your union with Anne Boleyn. And you will no doubt succeed; for what can I, a feeble woman, and a stranger in your country, do to prevent it? You will succeed, I say — you will divorce me and place her upon the throne. But mark my words, Henry, she will not long remain there.”
The king smiled bitterly
“She will bring dishonour upon you,” pursued Catherine. “The woman who has no regard for ties so sacred as those which bind us will not respect other obligations.”
“No more of this!” cried Henry. “You suffer your resentment to carry you too far.”
“Too far!” exclaimed Catherine. “Too far! — Is to warn you that you are about to take a wanton to your bed — and that you will bitterly repent your folly when too late, going too far? It is my duty, Henry, no less than my desire, thus to warn you ere the irrevocable step be taken.”
“Have you said all you wish to say, madam?” demanded the king.
“No, my dear liege, not a hundredth part of what my heart prompts me to utter,” replied Catherine. “I conjure you by my strong and tried affection — by the tenderness that has for years subsisted between us — by your hopes of temporal prosperity and spiritual welfare — by all you hold dear and sacred — to pause while there is yet time. Let the legates meet to-morrow — let them pronounce sentence against me and as surely as those fatal words are uttered, my heart will break.”
“Tut, tut!” exclaimed Henry impatiently, “you will live many years in happy retirement.”
“I will die as I have lived — a queen,” replied Catherine; “but my life will not be long. Now, answer me truly — if Anne Boleyn plays you false—”
“She never will play me false!” interrupted Henry.
<
br /> “I say if she does,” pursued Catherine, “and you are satisfied of her guilt, will you be content with divorcing her as you divorce me?”
“No, by my father’s head!” cried Henry fiercely. “If such a thing were to happen, which I hold impossible, she should expiate her offence on the scaffold.”
“Give me your hand on that,” said Catherine.
“I give you my hand upon it,” he replied.
“Enough,” said the queen: “if I cannot have right and justice I shall at least have vengeance, though it will come when I am in my tomb. But it will come, and that is sufficient.”
“This is the frenzy of jealousy, Catherine,” said Henry.
“No, Henry; it is not jealousy,” replied the queen, with dignity. “The daughter of Ferdinand of Spain and Isabella of Castile, with the best blood of Europe in her veins, would despise herself if she could entertain so paltry a feeling towards one born so much beneath her as Anne Boleyn.”
“As you will, madam,” rejoined Henry. “It is time our interview terminated.”
“Not yet, Henry — for the love of Heaven, not yet!” implored Catherine. “Oh, bethink you by whom we were joined together! — by your father, Henry the Seventh — one of the wisest princes that ever sat on a throne; and by the sanction of my own father, Ferdinand the Fifth, one of the justest. Would they have sanctioned the match if it had been unlawful? Were they destitute of good counsellors? Were they indifferent to the future?”
“You had better reserve these arguments for the legates’ ears tomorrow, madam,” said Henry sternly.
“I shall urge them there with all the force I can,” replied Catherine, “for I will leave nought untried to hinder an event so fraught with misery. But I feel the struggle will be hopeless.”
“Then why make it?” rejoined Henry.
“Because it is due to you — to myself — to the princess our daughter — to our illustrious progenitors — and to our people, to make it,” replied Catherine. “I should be unworthy to be your consort if I acted otherwise — and I will never, in thought, word, or deed, do aught derogatory to that title. You may divorce me, but I will never assent to it; you may wed Anne Boleyn, but she will never be your lawful spouse; and you may cast me from your palace, but I will never go willingly.”
“I know you to be contumacious, madam,” replied Henry. “And now, I pray you, resume your mask, and withdraw. What I have said will convince you that your stay is useless.”
“I perceive it,” replied Catherine. “Farewell, Henry — farewell, loved husband of my heart — farewell for ever!”
“Your mask — your mask, madam!” cried Henry impatiently. “God’s death! footsteps are approaching. Lot no one enter here!” he cried aloud.
“I will come in,” said Anne Boleyn, stepping into the chapel just as Catherine had replaced her mask. “Ah! your majesty looks confused. I fear I have interrupted some amorous conference.”
“Come with me, Anne,” said Henry, taking her arm, and trying to draw her away— “come with me.”
“Not till I learn who your lady — love is,” replied Anne pettishly. “You affect to be jealous of me, my liege, but I have much more reason to be jealous of you. When you were last at Windsor, I heard you paid a secret visit to a fair maiden near the lake in the park, and now you are holding an interview with a masked dame here. Nay, I care not for your gestures of silence. I will speak.”
“You are distraught, sweetheart,” cried the king. “Come away.”
“No,” replied Anne. “Lot this dame be dismissed.”
“I shall not go at your bidding, minion!” cried Catherine fiercely.
“Ah!” cried Anne, starting, “whom have we here?”
“One you had better have avoided,” whispered Henry.
“The queen!” exclaimed Anne, with a look of dismay.
“Ay, the queen!” echoed Catherine, unmasking. “Henry, if you have any respect left for me, I pray you order this woman from my presence. Lot me depart in peace.”
“Lady Anne, I pray you retire,” said Henry. But Anne stood her ground resolutely.
“Nay, let her stay, then,” said the queen; “and I promise you she shall repent her rashness. And do you stay too, Henry, and regard well her whom you are about to make your spouse. Question your sister Mary, somewhile consort to Louis the Twelfth and now Duchess of Suffolk — question her as to the character and conduct of Anne Boleyn when she was her attendant at the court of France — ask whether she had never to reprove her for levity — question the Lord Percy as to her love for him — question Sir Thomas Wyat, and a host of others.”
“All these charges are false and calumnious!” cried Anne Boleyn.
“Let the king inquire and judge for himself,” rejoined Catherine; “and if he weds you, let him look well to you, or you will make him a scoff to all honourable men. And now, as you have come between him and me — as you have divided husband and wife — for the intent, whether successful or not, I denounce you before Heaven, and invoke its wrath upon your head. Night and day I will pray that you may be brought to shame; and when I shall be called hence, as I maybe soon, I will appear before the throne of the Most High, and summon you to judgment.”
“Take me from her, Henry!” cried Anne faintly; “her violence affrights me.”
“No, you shall stay,” said Catherine, grasping her arm and detaining her; “you shall hear your doom. You imagine your career will be a brilliant one, and that you will be able to wield the sceptre you wrongfully wrest from me; but it will moulder into dust in your hand — the crown unjustly placed upon your brow will fall to the ground, and it will bring the head with it.”
“Take me away, Henry, I implore you!” cried Anne.
“You shall hear me out,” pursued Catherine, exerting all her strength, and maintaining her grasp, “or I will follow you down yon aisles, and pour forth my malediction against you in the hearing of all your attendants. You have braved me, and shall feel my power. Look at her, Henry — see how she shrinks before the gaze of an injured woman. Look me in the face, minion — you cannot! — you dare not!”
“Oh, Henry!” sobbed Anne.
“You have brought it upon yourself,” said the king.
“She has,” replied Catherine; “and, unless she pauses and repents, she will bring yet more upon her head. You suffer now, minion, but how will you feel when, in your turn, you are despised, neglected, and supplanted by a rival — when the false glitter of your charms having passed away, Henry will see only your faults, and will open his eyes to all I now tell him?”
A sob was all the answer Anne could return.
“You will feel as I feel towards you,” pursued the queen— “hatred towards her; but you will not have the consolations I enjoy. You will have merited your fate, and you will then think upon me and my woes, and will bitterly, but unavailingly, repent your conduct. And now, Henry,” she exclaimed, turning solemnly to him, “you have pledged your royal word to me, and given me your hand upon it, that if you find this woman false to you she shall expiate her offence on the block. I call upon you to ratify the pledge in her presence.”
“I do so, Catherine,” replied the king. “The mere suspicion of her guilt shall be enough.”
“Henry!” exclaimed Anne.
“I have said it,” replied the king.
“Tremble, then, Anne Boleyn!” cried Catherine, “tremble! and when you are adjudged to die the death of an adulteress, bethink you of the prediction of the queen you have injured. I may not live to witness your fate, but we shall meet before the throne of an eternal Judge.”
“Oh, Henry, this is too much!” gasped Anne, and she sank fainting into his arms.
“Begone!” cried the king furiously. “You have killed her!”
“It were well for us both if I had done so,” replied Catherine. “But she will recover to work my misery and her own. To your hands I commit her punishment. May God bless you, Henry!”
With this she replaced he
r mask, and quitted the chapel.
Henry, meanwhile, anxious to avoid the comments of his attendants, exerted himself to restore Anne Boleyn to sensibility, and his efforts were speedily successful.
“Is it then reality?” gasped Anne, as she gazed around. “I hoped it was a hideous dream. Oh, Henry, this has been frightful! But you will not kill me, as she predicted? Swear to me you will not!”
“Why should you be alarmed?” rejoined the king. “If you are faithful, you have nothing to fear.”
“But you said suspicion, Henry — you said suspicion!” cried Anne.
“You must put the greater guard upon your conduct,” rejoined the king moodily. “I begin to think there is some truth in Catherine’s insinuations.”
“Oh no, I swear to you there is not,” said Anne— “I have trifled with the gallants of Francis’s court, and have listened, perhaps too complacently, to the love-vows of Percy and Wyat, but when your majesty deigned to cast eyes upon me, all others vanished as the stars of night before the rising of the god of day. Henry, I love you deeply, devotedly — but Catherine’s terrible imprecations make me feel more keenly than I have ever done before the extent of the wrong I am about to inflict upon her — and I fear that retributive punishment will follow it.”
“You will do her no wrong,” replied Henry. “I am satisfied of the justice of the divorce, and of its necessity; and if my purposed union with you were out of the question, I should demand it. Be the fault on my head.”
“Your words restore me in some measure, my liege,” said Anne. “I love you too well not to risk body and soul for you. I am yours for ever — ah!” she exclaimed, with a fearful look.
“What ails you, sweetheart?” exclaimed the king.
“I thought I saw a face at the window,” she replied— “a black and hideous face like that of a fiend.”
“It was mere fancy,” replied the king. “Your mind is disturbed by what has occurred. You had better join your attendants, and retire to your own apartments.”
The Works of William Harrison Ainsworth Page 349
