Secrets of the Tudor Court (13 page)

“Come, lie down,” he says, bringing me to his bedchamber and helping me onto the bed where I lie facedown. “Leave the back open to let it air. Cloth will be hell when you do have to dress again.” He informs me of this as though from personal experience, and for the first time I wonder how he was raised, who may have executed the same form of discipline on an innocent little boy. Who by starting a cycle of violence inadvertently gave him the right to continue it. “Drink this,” he commands in his eerily gentle voice, handing me a goblet containing a hot posset. “It will help you sleep.”

“Will I wake up?” I ask in a small voice.

He smiles. “Of course you’ll wake up.”

I squeeze back tears. I do not want to wake up.

A few hours later my eyes flutter open to the gentle shaking of my shoulder.

“Up now,” Norfolk is whispering. The room is dark save one brazier. “To the maidens’ chamber with you. The hour is late.”

“No…” I murmur. I do not want to remain, but neither can I bear to face the other girls.

“Sit up!” Norfolk commands.

I struggle onto my elbow, then lean on my hand as I right myself to a sitting position. I am still too small for my feet to reach the floor, though his bed sits so high off the ground I doubt even his do. I stare at him in groggy helplessness. Everything looks so far away and distorted.

Norfolk laces up my chemise and dress. My back screams out in rebellion at being covered and I moan. Norfolk retrieves another object I dread; the hairbrush. At these ministrations I whimper. I am too tired to fear chastisement and he offers none, by God’s grace. He brings the brush through my hair in swift, painful strokes, then sits behind me, drawing it into a thick plait that he arranges over my shoulder.

I begin to laugh. The sound is strange in my ears. It is the Howard laugh. A laugh void of merriment.

“What?” Norfolk asks.

“I was just thinking,” I say, and wonder if it is the posset that makes me so bold. “Should your ducal responsibilities become too heady, you could consider court hairdressing.”

To my surprise he chuckles, and as my laugh becomes genuine tears fill my throat and course down my cheeks. My gut twists and quakes as I pull my sobs inward.

He places my hood atop my head. “Now what have you learned, Mary?”

I lower my eyes. “I shall always obey you,” I promise, swallowing my tears.

He nods. “Then there shall be no need to repeat this.” He takes my hand and leads me through his presence chamber to the door. “Good night, Mary.”

I dip into a stiff curtsy. My back is searing in pain. I turn and allow a guard to escort me to my chamber. I will not think of this night. I will obey. I will always obey. Then it won’t happen again.

I have learned.

“Where were you?” Anne Savage, another of Anne’s ladies, inquires as I trudge into the chamber and ready myself for bed. Her eyes bear a wicked glint, as though I may have gone where I’m not supposed to and she is hoping for the details.

I force a smile. “Talking to my lord father,” I tell her. “We talked well into the night. It was the silliest thing,” I go on, swallowing tears. “He made me tell him about everything over and over, just so he could feel like he was reliving it all.”

“Funny,” says Lady Savage. “I always thought your father was a severe man.”

“He seems that way, I know,” I tell her and am almost convinced myself. “But he is so gentle. He loves me very much.”

She nods but her expression is sad.

The next morning a little silver box bearing my name is delivered to the maidens’ chamber. Madge Shelton seizes it from the messenger.

“‘Mary Howard’?” She regards me in awe. “A gift for little Mary Howard?” She sits on our bed. I run to her to retrieve it, but she has opened it, pulling out a little silver ring inlaid with a fiery opal. “Look!” she cries to the other girls.

“How sweet,” Anne Savage says, admiring it.

“Come now, girls, let Mary see it,” Mary Carey says as she retrieves the box and ring, handing them to me, her beautiful face wrought with gentleness. “’Tis her gift, after all.”

I examine the little ring, the quintessence of daintiness. On either side of the opal the silver has been wrought into roses. I slip it over my middle finger; it is a perfect fit. I tilt my hand this way and that, admiring the colors the stone gives off as the light hits it from each new direction.

“What a fine stone!” Madge exclaims. “Such fire!”

“No,” I say. “It is a rainbow. A captive rainbow.”

In the bottom of the little silver jewelry box my eyes catch sight of a note. I unfold it and read the few words with care.
He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him promptly. Proverbs 13:24.
Tears fill my eyes. He loves me. He does. That is why he is so strict; he honors God’s Word because he wants me to be the best I can be. Yes, that must be it. My heart lifts. I push away the cynical thought that he may just be placating me with a trinket, assuaging whatever guilt he is still capable of summoning, while buying my loyalty. Nor do I acknowledge for long the notion that by accepting this gift I make this form of discipline permissible. These are thoughts I push from my mind. I will not entertain the idea that Norfolk’s gesture bears anything but the purest intentions.

I look down at my ring, the colors catching in the light; brilliant reds, oranges, yellows, greens, and purples, all shimmering against a pearly backdrop. A rainbow indeed. As God promised Noah not to punish the world with another flood, perhaps this is Norfolk’s pledge to me; a rainbow to ease my sufferings, an assurance that there will be no more beatings if I heed him. If I am good.

I
will
be good, I vow. I will not contradict him. I will not be like Mother and hold true to convictions that serve me not; and if I do, at least I shall have the conscientiousness not to admit them.

As I regard my opal, my rainbow stone as I call it now, another thought strikes me: the beach with Harry Fitzroy and our rainbow, another promise of youth and beauty and brighter times to come.

I clasp my hands together and hold them to my chest, smiling. Norfolk could not have chosen a more perfect gift.

“Who is it from?” Madge inquires, cutting through my pretty thoughts.

“My lord Norfolk,” I tell her. “Because he loves me so much,” I add with a bright smile.

“A dear man, Uncle Thomas,” says Mary Carey, her voice filled with irony.

Anne’s Secret

S
o immersed am I in how to conceal my own pain that I do not realize Anne is changing. From Christmas through Epiphany, Anne moves a little slower. Though she laughs and smiles often, joking with her courtiers and ladies, keeping the atmosphere one of constant merriment, she is pale, drawn. She tires easily and naps whenever she can.

One morning I sit at her feet while she plays with my hair. She enjoys experimenting on my thick locks, as if I were a doll, but I do not mind. Her ministrations are nothing compared to Norfolk’s; indeed, she is very gentle and it is soothing to feel a woman’s touch. She is almost motherly, though she is only about twelve years my senior.

“You’re such a pretty little girl,” she says, which surprises me as I still believed she found my nose offensive. “It’s that hair of yours. I will make you a good marriage; you can count on it.”

“I thank you, Lady Anne,” I say.

“A pity you’re so small, though,” she adds. “It will make childbirth difficult. You’re delicate as a bird. It’s from your father’s side, I should think. He’s such a little thing, himself.”

I giggle at what Norfolk would make of her describing him thus. I imagine he would not be thrilled with the depiction.

“I am small myself, though,” Anne goes on to say with a smile. “But endowed with a woman’s curves. I think I’ll do just fine.” At this she rubs her belly, looking down on it with an expression of sheer joy.

I turn toward her, resting my hand on her knee, smiling. “Lady Anne…?”

She nods.

I throw my arms around her. “Oh, my dearest lady, I am so happy for you!”

Anne returns the embrace, laughing, then pulls away. “Thank you, my darling. You mustn’t tell a soul.” Her lips curve into that smile no one can imitate, least of all me. She places a tapered finger to her lips to illustrate her point. “Think, my dear little Mary. Soon you shall have a new cousin who will be the future king of England!”

I squeeze my arms about myself in delight. “Oh, Lady Anne!” I am beside myself with joy. This means that soon all this bother with the divorce from the princess dowager—Anne’s pregnancy has cemented my view of Catherine as the princess dowager now—will be over, and we can celebrate the happiness of King Henry and his forever queen, Anne!

At once Anne’s face darkens. She grips my upper arms tight, her nails biting into my tender flesh. “And don’t say a word to your father. It’s my news. I’ll tell him.”

“Of course, Lady Anne,” I answer with wide eyes. As much as I am beholden to report to him the events of Anne’s life, I cannot betray her in this. A mother, especially a queen, has the right to impart this happy news herself.

Her face softens, her smile warm and charming again. “You’re a good girl,” she tells me, stroking my cheek.

“I am?” I ask her, tears lighting my eyes before I can contain them.

She takes my hands. “You are. Now I want you to dress in your finest. Tonight you will accompany me and some of the other ladies to Hampton Court.”

“Why?”

Her smile widens. It can never be called a grin, however. It is too well sculpted and perhaps not spontaneous enough for that description. “Another secret. The king and I are to be married tonight.” She waves a hand. “You will witness it, along with Henry Norris and a handful of others.”

I raise my eyebrows. “Then will it be over at last?” I dare ask. “Have you had word on the divorce?”

She shrugs. “It’s as good as done; just a few more legal formalities.” She clicks her tongue in disgust. “That stupid woman!” she says, shaking her head, and I assume she means Catherine of Aragon. She leans back on her chaise then, continuing. “Cranmer is still hesitating. He doesn’t want to be archbishop because swearing oaths to the pope would compromise his reformist beliefs. But Henry will find a way around that.” Her eyes are half-closed, as though she has just partaken of some decadent, satisfying sweet-meat. “He finds a way around everything. Soon we all will have what we want.”

“I do hope so,” I say with fervor.

In a burst of energy Anne sits up, waving her hands toward the door. “Out with you now! Go pick out your gown!”

“Yes, my lady!” I cry in delight as I scramble to my feet and head to the maidens’ chamber, thinking how wonderful everything is turning out.

We all will have what we want, Anne said. I wonder what that means for me. As I make to my chamber I cannot help but question myself: what do I want? What would make me happy? Can Anne, this woman who seems destined to change the world, grant me happiness, too?

At Hampton Court we gather in the presence chamber. Anne is glowing in her white dress with its diamond-covered bodice and state jewels gracing her elegant throat. The priest mutters something about not being able to perform the service without a license, but the king, magnanimous in his furs and velvet, insists he has it “in safe keeping” and so the ceremony commences unhindered.

I carry my lady’s long train, my heart light as I ponder her happiness. As they are joined in holy matrimony, tears stream down my cheeks. Handsome Henry Norris is compelled to lean over and squeeze my arm.

“Now, now, Mistress Mary, no tears,” he says in his gentle voice. “This is a happy day.”

“Oh, such a happy day,” I say, swallowing the lump in my throat. I can only pray that their days will always be so happy and filled with hope.

I do not think of Catherine alone in the North, cold and underserved. I do not think of her daughter, separated from the mother she so reveres because of Anne and King Henry’s selfishness. I do not think of that at all. They are the past.

This dark-haired creature before me, my cousin, is the future. The mother of a prince. The queen of England.

Anna Regina

A
nne’s happiness over her pregnancy sends her into a state of such bliss that I find myself dreaming of babies and wondering when I, too, might be able to join the elite set of women who are fortunate enough to add “mother” to their string of illustrious titles. I will not be as my mother, the long-suffering duchess who does not enjoy her children but rather pushes us away from her one by one. I will be loving and kind and make sure they remain in my household, where I will hire the finest tutors to educate them.

All this I am thinking on one lovely spring day while the courtiers play in the garden, each so young and merry and filled with hope, when Anne exclaims to her brother George, “Women crave the most unusual things when with child. I know I’m in a mood for fruit—some pears, perhaps? Can any be found?”

George tilts his dark head back and laughs, then orders some fruit to be brought to the sister he adores and fawns over. It makes me long for my own brother, and wonder if such affection will ever be exchanged between us. Before he left to serve Harry Fitzroy, my brother was nothing but funny and sweet—the family prankster, hiding frogs in our beds and mice in our shoes. But now his loyalty to Norfolk obscures everything, even his fondness for me. Unwanted bitterness churns my gut as I recall his eagerness to report to Norfolk my innocent ride on the beach with Harry. What has this world come to if one cannot rely on her own brother? I blink back tears at the thought. Surely I can trust him. Surely he was just abiding by his conscience as we all must. I can hope.

Anne’s statement about her craving to her own loving and loyal brother sets the court aflame in gossip, just as she intends. Her words are repeated over and over, and in no time at all it is common knowledge that not only is Anne with child, she is also married to King Henry.