The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn (33 page)

28 January 1536

Diary,

That which I most feared has come to pass. I have miscarried of my saviour, for the small bloodied flesh expelled from my womb was clearly male.

The great celebration of Katherine’s death had gone on for weeks. No mourning black in Court or public was allowed by Henry. Feasts, dancing, masques, even masses were sung in rejoicing, and those who loved the lady mourned in secret under pain of death. A joust was called but far from wishing noise and jostling crowds, I sought quiet privacy, and stayed to my apartments with Margaret Lee and Niniane who entertained us merrily with Chaucer’s verse and song.

Then with sudden sounds like soldiers massing at my chamber door which quite alarmed us all, my Uncle Norfolk burst upon our quiet afternoon with evil news. The King lay in the tiltyard dead, thrown from his stallion in a joust and crushed by the mighty war horse fallen on his Majesty’s body! The sharp pain of fear pierced my limbs, head, belly and all strength ebbed from my veins. Margaret claimed I grew pale as death and she tried to comfort me. But Norfolk, like some malignant viper, struck at my fragile heart with harsh words. With Henry dead, he said, I was surely lost, for there was no one loyal to Elizabeth and her succession to the throne. If I fought for her, claimed my self Regent, great strife and civil war would sure be England’s lot. All this while I mourned the sudden loss of Henry, that loss tinged with unpleasant joy that the beast was dead. Then Norfolk left, not bothering to bow, as tho I was Queen no longer.

Dazed, mortified, reeling with all terrible possibilities I began to tremble uncontrolled. Margaret and Niniane strove to warm me, stay these convulsions, comfort me with kind words, but all I knew was wanting Elizabeth in my arms, for danger danced all round us like some macabre troupe of shadow players. Margaret took her leave, promised she would have Elizabeth brought to me, as well as my few loyal men.

But when they came — Wyatt, Norris, Weston — they brought news that the King lived! In deed, the man had been two hours in a dead faint, but now was back upon his horse with threats to ride again. Well, I took to my bed then for sheer exhaustion of spirit. Tho Niniane found ways to coax some laughter from such perverse occurrences, I grew only more pale and weak. And on the day Katherine was laid to rest, blood flowed from between my thighs and my babe died within my body. The midwife made examination of the tiny thing and said it had the appearance of a male child. This was told to Henry who came to my chambers in a fury even greater than when Elizabeth was born a girl.

He did not shriek at me, but spoke coldly. “I see clearly God does not wish to give me male children.” When I said that this was not God’s doing, that this premature birth came with news of his own death, roughly handled by Norfolk, he was neither moved nor consoled. He had no pity for my weak condition or my loss — only his — and strode from the room without a backward glance saying he would speak to me when I’d recovered.

Margaret Lee who’d stayed so close and faithful, burst to tears upon his leaving. I thought to comfort her saying I would surely have another babe, but she was inconsolable, speaking her fears to me. All Court buzzed with gossip that Henry now believed he’d been seduced thro my sorcery, and our marriage was null. God, he said, had shown him the truth of this with his failure to allow us sons, and now he meant to make a virtuous wife of Jane Seymour. Sorcery! I a witch! My six fingered hand, the Devil’s mark upon my neck, the potions I had used to heal his pains, magick in my fingers that soothed his aching head. These had finally come to haunt me. I saw that my fate was no better than Katherine’s, and Elizabeth’s no better than Mary’s. Banished Queen and bastard child sent to distant bleak houses with no leave to even seek the others comfort.

My limbs are weak, my heart heavy. I lie abed with no will to leave it. What shall become of us?

Yours faithfully,

Anne

6 February 1536

Diary,

How bitter is this day. My beloved Purkoy’s dead. News of his demise was delivered by the King with as much unkindness as false news of his own death was delivered by my Uncle Norfolk. I was praying with my Chaplain Matthew Parker when Henry came exploding thro my chamber door to say that he was off to London for Shrove Tuesday, and that he required me to stay behind in Greenwich. I begged him please to let me join him, for Elizabeth was housed in London and I had need of seeing her. He refused that request and, too, refused to even take a list of measurements for several silken caps I wanted made for her, saying cruelly she had little need for such fine caps, and asking had I nothing better to do with my time than write silly lists of useless things.

My temper flared at hearing such rude sentiments about our daughter, and I chastised him roundly saying his inconsistent love gave others leave to show disloyalty. Even Master Cromwell now lifted his cap at mention of the Lady Mary’s name. To this Henry made no reply, at least none that satisfied. He made move to go and I held his arm speaking harsh truths of his new mistress Lady Jane.

“She plays you, Henry, plays you as I used to do. In fact she plays
my
games. I hear she would not take the purse of gold sovereigns that you gave her, would she Henry? Would not soil her virtue nor her honor taking such a gift if she were not first your lawful wife? Are you so blind you cannot see that she has two clever brothers who seek advancement for them selves thro her?”

“Hold your wicked tongue, Madame. Hold or have it silenced for you.”

“And how would you have me silenced, Henry? Divorce me? Send me to a nunnery?”

“Do not try my patience, Anne. ‘Tis worn dangerous thin.”

But I found courage and faced him, held his mad glittering eyes with mine.

“I never loved you, Henry. Never once in those ten years.” His mouth quivered but his jaw held firm as I goaded his pride with a coy smile. “Did you think I came to love you? Yes, you did.” The color rose in his fat cheeks as I spoke those lying words for truly, Diary, I
had
loved him once for a time, before I gave my self to him. And in Calais, and that winter after. But now I gave him no satisfaction of that love.

“Go and have your horse faced, mealy mouthed girl,” I cried. “Have her! But you best remove from your memory all thoughts that Anne Boleyn ever loved Your Gracious Majesty. For she never did. Never.”

He fixed me with his terrible stare and in that moment I thought that he might raise his hand and kill me with a blow. Instead he said, “Your dog is dead.” And then he smiled. “Pity, since he was surely your most loyal servant.” I never saw Henry go, so blinded was I by instant tears. Tears that he had satisfaction seeing he had caused.

Yours faithfully,

Anne

9 April 1536

Diary,

Briefly I believed that all was well again. Ambassador Cha-puys had relayed a message from the Emperor that he wished to deal with Henry and my self with hopes of some treaty with him, now that Katherine’s death removed a great obstacle from the path to our alliance. That he wished to treat with my self as well as Henry pleased me greatly and bespoke Charles’ new respect for me as Queen. And this Spanish scheme pleased Secretary Cromwell mightily, since he of late believed the French were poor and unreliable friends. More than this I think he worried at one day finding England left to stand alone against both Spain and France. And so was planned a round of meetings and festivities with Chapuys at their center.

Henry made no move excluding me from these plans, and I made great preparations for a private dinner in my chambers after mass for the High Lords, with Chapuys as the guest of honor, hoping that some important business might be accomplished at my table. All was well at mass with Bishop Cranmer offering a most politick sermon, and many pleasant smiles returned from Chapuys to my self. But when ‘twas time for the Ambassador to repair unto my chambers, Henry slyly routed him and members of the Privy Council to his own apartments and left me presiding o’er some hollow feast whose main course was my humiliation.

In the end the King never did accept Chapuys’ terms, for he demanded first that Henry now submit his will to the Pope, and second legitimize his bastard Mary. Cromwell, furious his own careful plans were in a shambles, took his leave and went home ill, where now five days later still he lies. His discomfiture, I fear, is my only consolation in the matter.

These days Henry makes little demonstration of his love for Elizabeth and no pretence at all for me. I think my days at Court are numbered, and several of my ladies dare to speak to me of distant convents where a discarded Queen might find sanctuary.

There is little that consoles me lately. Only Mark Smeaton’s sweet music and Niniane’s foolishness are balms to my sore soul. A few staunch friends still surround me, Thomas Wyatt, Henry Norris, Francis Weston. Their flattery and flirtation I know to be much less true romantic ardor — for I am no longer beautiful — but more of brave constancy and Courtly love. This kind attention grows in me for them a passionate and most profound love, more deep that what I knew for Percy or the King, and more rare than what I feel toward Elizabeth, for she is tied to me in flesh and blood and body. ‘Tis friendship in its finest flower, the gift of one unselfish heart unto another. And for this I am altogether grateful.

I care little for most women as they have always hated and mistrusted me, but Margaret Lee is more a sister than I ever had in Mary. How she dotes upon my self. She is Mistress of the Queen’s Body and ‘tis her duty to see to my care, but I know she chooses overcarefully the clothing I should wear to be the ones that are to my advantage — color, style and flattering cut. She preens me endlessly, warms my chilly feet and hands and rubs my aching head with such tenderness I am sometimes brought to tears.

And sweet George. No woman had a better brother than I do in him. We share memories of our lives that stretch back in time to childhood days. He teases me still, and in our laughter all care and sorrow of the present vanish magickally. I close my eyes and hear him creeping up the curved stair to my room in Hever Hall where we whispered, lest our childish voices planning great wars and silly entertainments be heard.

I see us in an autumn wood at Edenbridge, he crowning me with a flower wreath, naming me Queen of the Leaves. “Fall to your knees, for I am your Liege!” I would grandly shout, and down would tumble red and gold and orange leaves in their thousands. George would cry, “All powerful Majesty, see how your subjects bow to your command!” Then we would shriek with laughter till our bellies ached with it. Once I was the Queen of England. Now I am only Queen of the Leaves.

Yours faithfully,

Anne

I am a prisoner, Diary, a prisoner in the Tower of London. Woe to me for I am surely finished, accused of adultery, nay treason. For in England adultery practiced by a Queen is treason and treason is death. This is no just accusation to be argued in a court for its fair outcome. No, a distant nunnery will never do, for Henry needs me dead. Mark Smeaton and Henry Norris poor boys, accused of carnal knowledge of the Queen are also in the Tower. ‘Tis said that they’ve confessed to laying with me. Surely they have not for they are honest men and this heinous accusation is altogether false. A lie. Have they been tortured into such confessions? Shall I be tortured too? Cromwell, this must be his scheme. He’d turned on me of late. And he is capable of such a deed as this. I watched him guide the King thro the maze of his divorces from Katherine and the Pope, and into my bed. Those beady eyes. That cruel mouth. I saw the look of him leading that evil delegation into my rooms. Even silent as he allowed my Uncle Norfolk to serve me with arrest, Cromwell’s foul presence cast a pall of doom around my head. They took me in the light of day upriver on a rude barge for all to see my disgrace. No friend nor loyal courtier escorted me, only horrid enemies and harridans. Lady Kingston, my aunt the Lady Boleyn, Mistress Coffin whose name so fits her. No kind words could they afford. They stood behind and out of my sight. I felt their eyes on me staring at my neck and I felt my sanity slip from my mind and join with the swirling river currents leaving my brain empty of good sense and reason. O God help me. I think that when I came here I acted badly, not a Queen. I laughed and wept and trembled uncontrollably. The barge brought me to the Tower steps and I grew so cold looking at those grey weeping prison walls I faltered then and fell upon my knees. Lord Kingston, Constable of the Fortress there to meet me caught my arm and said a kind word. I think ‘twas kind for I remember little of that time except my asking if I should be taken to a dungeon and Lord Kingston saying no, that I should be lodged within my old apartments, those in which I’d stayed before my Coronation. And I remember too that as I was led to my rooms I saw the Tower’s fat raven hop hop hopping cross the green and laughed at its an ticks, but in that moment heard the Fortress cannon booming cross the Thames announcing my arrival and saw a wooden scaffold, place of execution. Thomas More, I thought, good Father More. His head rolling upon the green grass and so I cried bitterly. Master Kingston guided me thro my prison door and made to leave. I clutched his arm and cried, Shall I die without justice? He replied the poorest subject the King hath, hath justice. I laughed a mad laugh. He looked on me with pity. I called for a mirror to see how a pitiful Queen should look, but they did not obey my command. I am trapped here. Trapped with these horrid women who taunt me saying all London now rejoices on the street at my arrest and that now the Lady Mary, nay Princess Mary shall take her lawful place in the succession. They hate me but attend me carefully. I know they’ve been told, Remember all she says, she will incriminate her self further. I know they listen but I cannot hold my tongue. Gibberish spills from my mouth like water from a deep well of fear, calling curses to my enemies that if I die all England should be punished for seven years with droughts and pestilences. Elizabeth, Elizabeth what have I done to you? If I am a traitor then you are naught but a traitor’s child. You have surely lost your mother, lost the future crown and mayhaps lost your life. I am to blame I am to blame I am to blame. Sweet girl forgive me. And my Mother. She will die of sorrow. Die as I die. Jesu help me. I am all alone and so afraid.

Anne