Patience, Princess Catherine (16 page)

Ushered at last into the king's privy chamber, I knelt three times, as required. The king glared at me. "What is it you want, madam?" he demanded.

"I have come to beg your help, Your Grace," I said, and described the straitened circumstances in which I found myself, unable even to properly feed my few servants. "Often, we have only spoiled fish and rotting vegetables and would go hungry were it not for the kindness of the duke of Buckingham who calls upon me from time to time with a gift of venison from his deer park."

The king peered at me from beneath craggy brows. I remembered the first time we had met, at Dogmersfield, and how King Henry had raised my veil and gazed at me with frank approval. Now he scowled. He saw me not as a lady in need of the assistance of the gallant knight he professed to be, but as a mere nuisance.

The king spoke. "You did not come naked from Spain, surely? You brought with you a goodly amount of plate and jewels, did you not, my lady Catherine?"

I agreed that I had.

"It is our understanding that upon the occasion of your marriage the plate and jewels became the property of your lawful husband, Arthur, prince of Wales. And upon the death of our beloved son Arthur, we became heir to all of his property, including the plate and jewels. Yet, you have continued to use this property, have you not, madam?"

I barely managed to stammer, "I have, Your Grace."

"And perhaps you have even sold several pieces for your own profit?" His eyes glittered cruelly. "Plundered the property of the Crown?"

I could scarcely believe what I heard: The king was accusing me of stealing! He smiled malignantly. I was trembling, but I willed strength to my limbs and steadiness to my voice. "I have sold only what is rightfully the property of the king of Spain, and only in time of dire necessity."

"We are under no obligation to provide further for you, madam," said the king coldly. "The prince of Wales repudiated the marriage agreement before his fourteenth birthday. Your support became entirely your father's duty, not ours. Anything we give you is merely Christian alms. Be grateful for what you have." He turned away, waving his hand in dismissal.

So it was true! Henry had broken his promise to me!

"Such words are not worthy of Your Grace!" I cried. Nearly blinded by tears of humiliation, I made the necessary obeisances and fled from his chamber.

Soon after that dreadful scene I wrote to my father, congratulating him on his new marriage and describing what had happened. "If you have no money to spare from your treasury for me and my people," I wrote, "I entreat you, send me a new ambassador to replace Don Rodrigo, who is old and ill and unable to fulfill his duties. Send a gentleman who will truly be of assistance in dealing with the English king. Surely we are not meant to accept King Henry's statement that the prince of Wales has repudiated our agreement."

At the same time I wrote to the Observant Franciscans, the order to which my mother had been devoted, asking them to send a priest who could hear my confessions in Spanish, the language in which I prayed, the language of my heart.

Within a few months Fray Diego Fernandez, an intelligent, educated man of agreeable demeanor, arrived in my household. I immediately placed my trust in this devout man of the cloth with whom I also shared intellectual interests. The friar soon became my closest confidant, the only person on whose wisdom I believed I could completely rely.

Nevertheless, there were times when I felt that Fray Diego had in some ways taken the place of Doña Elvira. My duenna had assumed the duty of protecting my reputation. Fray Diego was concerned with protecting my soul. Soon after the friar's arrival Princess Mary invited me to travel with her for an event at court. Perhaps, I thought, this meant that I was still betrothed after all or might have the betrothal reinstated. But when I informed Fray Diego of my plans, the friar forbade me to attend. Asked the reason, he replied, "To avoid the appearance of sin, my child."

"What could possibly appear sinful when I am in the company of the king's daughter and her suite?" I protested.

"It is a mortal sin to take issue with your spiritual advisor, who sees more clearly than you the presence of evil," the friar reminded me sternly. "Is it not obvious that God has sent me to you, Lady Catalina, and that you must therefore be obedient to me in all things?"

And so I obeyed.

Months later my father wrote to me that a new ambassador was on his way to England, a nobleman named Gutierre Gomez de Fuensalida. My father assured me that Fuensalida would do everything necessary to soften the king in his treatment of me. And, best of all, Fuensalida was carrying with him the balance of my dowry, sixty-five thousand ducats, the coin of Aragon. I knew King Henry well enough to believe that with the rest of my dowry in hand he would surely reinstate my betrothal.

At last,
I thought, with relief,
all will be well.
But I had thought that before, and I had been wrong.

 

Fuensalida arrived early in 1508 and took up residence at a mansion belonging to a wealthy Italian banker, Francesco Grimaldi. From the first, I found this aristocratic new ambassador haughty in demeanor. I soon realized he was arrogant, pompous, and humorless as well.

Ambassador Fuensalida took an immediate and intense dislike to Fray Diego, seldom missing an opportunity to slip some criticism of my confessor into our conversations. Fray Diego was much admired for his piety by the ladies of my court, and Fuensalida insinuated that the young friar was not above taking advantage of this. Fuensalida claimed that Fray Diego frequently exchanged the humble homespun robes of the Franciscans for the garments of a prosperous merchant and crept from the palace chapel to the dark passages of London where he indulged his weakness for drinking and fornication.

"The man is not fit to hear your confessions, my lady!" insisted Fuensalida. "He deserves to be removed from his position."

Nothing the ambassador said could have made me angrier. "What impertinence!" I cried. "What right have you to make such accusations?"

I had not thought there could be anyone less committed to my interests or more infuriating than Rodrigo Gonzales de Puebla, but alas, here he was!

 

My confessor and the new ambassador were not the only sources of strife in my little household. My ladies, who had been away from Spain for seven years, longed to return to their families. They were no longer the gay young maidens who had sailed from Spain believing they would find husbands at the English court. Maria de Salinas's former suitor had wed someone else after she was unable to provide a dowry. Her disappointment showed daily in her face, from which the fresh beauty had faded.

Maria and the others blamed Fray Diego for persuading me to remain in England in the hope of one day marrying Prince Henry, a hope my ladies saw as futile.

At least once a fortnight Francesca de Caceres, also dowerless, begged me to return to Spain. When I refused even to discuss the matter, she struck out at me angrily. "Catalina, why do you persist in your stubborn refusal to face the truth?" she cried, her face flushed. "You are no better off than any of us. King Henry will marry his son to the wealthiest daughter of the most powerful ruler he can find, and where will you be then? Let us return to Spain, where our families will provide for us, and we can hold up our heads with dignity!"

Stung by her words, I replied hotly, "How dare you speak to me in this manner! I am pledged to marry Prince Henry. My faith is in God that I shall one day reign as queen of this country. It is my duty to remain here. What do
you
understand of duty?"

After this heated exchange, Francesca, always one of my closest and most trusted friends, stopped pleading and turned to plotting. Through Fuensalida, she had made the acquaintance of his host, Signor Grimaldi. Without my knowledge, the increasingly rebellious and disloyal Francesca became a frequent visitor at the Grimaldi mansion. Soon the elderly banker made her an offer of marriage, and she accepted.

Francesca herself was too frightened or ashamed to tell me what she had done and sent Inez to break the news. "If she cannot go back to Spain," said Inez, "Francesca has made up her mind to marry the low-born Italian."

I was furious. Immediately I sent for Francesca, who stood before me, pale and quaking. "Ungrateful wretch!" I shouted. "How dare you betray me!"

Francesca threw herself at my feet. "I beg you, madam, forgive me. I have been so unhappy!"

"Duty must come before happiness, Francesca," I said coldly. "I forbid you ever to see Signor Grimaldi again. And I forbid you to have anything more to do with that deceitful ambassador who encouraged you in this scheme."

"As you wish, madam," Francesca whispered and fled from my presence without waiting for my dismissal.

Imagine then how shocked and horrified I was to learn that after our interview Francesca fled to her lover's house under cover of darkness. The next day, before I discovered her whereabouts, she married Grimaldi. Her treachery wounded me deeply, and I knew I could never forgive her.

It was simple to make out who was to blame for the dissatisfaction and intrigue that was growing like mold throughout my little court: Fuensalida.

 

By the autumn of 1508 I understood that the new ambassador himself had abandoned all hope of my marrying Prince Henry.

"Relations have worsened between England and Spain," said Fuensalida. "There is the grim possibility of war, and virtually no possibility of marriage."

"Can this be true?" I asked, deeply shaken by his words. "I had heard that King Henry wished to marry my sister and betroth his children to her children. And now he talks of war?"

The ambassador shrugged. "Political winds blow first one direction, then another."

Later I was appalled to discover that the ambassador had taken it upon himself, without consulting me, to have Grimaldi transfer my dowry money out of England for safe keeping. "Better than having the English seize it," he explained. "I was simply acting in your best interests, my lady princess. I have also taken the precaution of requesting a ship to take you and your suite away from this gloomy place forever, should the need arise."

I had given up years of my life to marry Prince Henry, and I was more determined than ever to be his wife and his queen. "I would rather die in England than go back to Spain without achieving my marriage," I told him. As soon as he had left my chambers I wrote the same sentiment to my father, adding, "Your ambassador here is a traitor. Recall him at once, and punish him as he deserves."

 

Most members of my household were openly rebellious, arguing among themselves but united in their desire to return to Spain, with my consent or without it. Princess Mary's ladies-in-waiting and the gentlemen of her suite blamed me for the delay of Mary's betrothal to my eight-year-old nephew, Charles, though I had nothing to do with the postponements. The king's mother, countess of Richmond and Derby, publicly ignored me, treating me as though I did not exist. It seemed I had no friends save Fray Diego.

Then Fuensalida informed me of the king's conclusion that a marriage between Henry and me was contrary to the Word of God. Members of the king's council were now asserting that my marriage to Arthur had been consummated: Arthur had boasted of it the morning after our wedding night, had he not? There were many who claimed to have heard him! Spots of blood were seen on the sheets! "A marriage between Prince Henry and his brother's widow would be a sin," the king insisted, apparently forgetting that two years earlier the pope himself had granted approval for the marriage.

 

As the year 1509 began, my life was in utter turmoil. Most of the silver and gold plate and all of my jewels had been sold at a great loss, simply in order to live. My treasurer, Juan de Cuero, boldly reproved me for using some of the money to buy books and other necessities for Fray Diego. Cuero sided with Fuensalida in his dislike of my confessor.

"You are no longer mistress of your own court, madam," Cuero said in one of several unpleasant conversations. "It seems that you have made Fray Diego Fernandez master over us all."

Stunned by his audacity, I replied angrily, "Perhaps, sir, the time has come at last for you to leave my service. I bid you a safe journey to Spain."

"As you wish, madam," said my treasurer, bowing, but not as low as he should have.

Soon many others of their own choice were packing for their journey back to Spain. Unfortunately, Fuensalida was not among them.

***

By the beginning of the Lenten season I had reached the lowest point of my life. Early one morning as I made my way to the chapel royal for mass, a mendicant dressed in tatters, his face hidden by a hood, stepped out of the shadows, begging for alms. I nearly passed by his pleas, for my own purse held only a few small coins of little value. The beggar followed after me, pleading, until I halted and gave him half of what I had. As I dropped the coins into his palm, I noticed that his hand was clean, white, smooth—not at all the hand of a beggar. During this exchange, he slipped a sealed letter from his sleeve into mine, murmured thanks, and slunk away.

The letter, whatever it was, seemed to burn through the cloth of my gown as I knelt through the long prayers, surrounded on every side by members of my court. When at last mass ended, I told my ladies that I wished to be left alone for a period of contemplation and quickly darted into a deserted alcove to read the letter. My hands were trembling as I broke the seal—the seal of the prince of Wales—and read the few lines written there in a graceful hand.

 

My dear lady princess Catalina: I have entrusted this letter to my loyal friend, Charles Brandon, who has come to you dressed in beggar's rags. Many times in the months past, forbidden by my father, the king, to be in your presence, I have wished to assure you that it is not I who is the cause of your distress. I know
no proper words with which to continue this letter other than to say that I am your obedient servant, Henry, prince of Wales.