Bring Up the Bodies (32 page)

‘I've got it wrong, then?' Wriothesley says. ‘Because I thought, marrying her to a subject, to some low man, that was a plan thought up by the queen that is now?'

He shrugs. The young man gives him a glassy look. It will be some years before he understands why.

Edward Seymour seeks an interview with him. There is no doubt in his mind that the Seymours will come to his table, even if they have to sit under it and catch the crumbs.

Edward is tense, hurried, nervous. ‘Master Secretary, taking the long view –'

‘In this matter, a day would be a long view. Get your girl out of it, let Carew take her to his house down in Surrey.'

‘Do not think I wish to know your secrets,' Edward says, picking his words. ‘Do not think I wish to pry into matters that are not for me. But for my sister's sake I would like to have some indication –'

‘Oh, I see, you want to know if she should order her wedding clothes?' Edward gives him an imploring look. He says soberly, ‘We are going to seek an annulment. Just now I do not know on what grounds.'

‘But they will fight,' Edward says. ‘The Boleyns if they go down will take us with them. I have heard of serpents that, though they are dying, exude poison through their skins.'

‘Did you ever pick up a snake?' he asks. ‘I did once, in Italy.' He holds out his palms. ‘I am unmarked.'

‘Then we must be very secret,' Edward says. ‘Anne must not know.'

‘Well,' he says wryly, ‘I do not think we can keep it from her for ever.'

But she will know all the sooner, if his new friends do not stop trapping him in anterooms, blocking his path and bowing to him; if they do not stop this whispering and eyebrow raising and digging each other with their elbows.

He says to Edward, I must go home and shut the door and consult with myself. The queen is plotting something, I know not what, something devious, something dark, perhaps so dark that she herself does not know what it is, and as yet is only dreaming of it: but I must be quick, I must dream it for her, I shall dream it into being.

According to Lady Rochford, Anne complains that since she rose from childbed Henry is always watching her; and not in the way he used to.

For a long time he has noticed Harry Norris watching the queen; and from some eminence, perched like a carved falcon over a doorway, he has seen himself watching Harry Norris.

For now, Anne seems oblivious to the wings that hover over her, to the eye that studies her path as she jinks and swerves. She chatters about her child Elizabeth, holding up on her fingers a tiny cap, a pretty ribboned cap, just come from the embroiderer.

Henry looks at her flatly as if to say, why are you showing me this, what is it to me?

Anne strokes the scrap of silk. He feels a needle point of pity, an instant of compunction. He studies the fine silk braid that edges the queen's sleeve. Some woman with the skills of his dead wife made that braid. He is looking very closely at the queen, he feels he knows her as a mother knows her child, or a child its mother. He knows every stitch in her bodice. He notes the rise and fall of her every breath. What is in your heart, madam? That is the last door to be opened. Now he stands on the threshold and the key is in his hand and he is almost afraid to fit it into the lock. Because what if it doesn't, what if it doesn't fit and he has to fumble there, with Henry's eyes on him, hear the impatient click of the royal tongue, as surely his master Wolsey once heard it?

Well, then. There was an occasion – in Bruges, was it? – when he had broken down a door. He wasn't in the habit of breaking doors, but he had a client who wanted results and wanted them today. Locks can be picked, but that's for the adept with time to spare. You don't need skill and you don't need time if you've got a shoulder and a boot. He thinks, I wasn't thirty then. I was a youth. Absently his right hand rubs his left shoulder, his forearm, as if remembering the bruises. He imagines himself entering Anne, not as a lover but as a lawyer, and rolled in his fist his papers, his writs; he imagines himself entering the heart of the queen. In its chambers he hears the click of his own boot heels.

At home, he takes from his chest the Book of Hours that belonged to his wife. It was given to her by her first husband Tom Williams, who was a good enough fellow, but not a man of substance like himself. Whenever he thinks of Tom Williams now it is as a blank, a faceless waiting man dressed in the Cromwell livery, holding his coat or perhaps his horse. Now that he can handle, at his whim, the finest texts in the king's library, the prayer book seems a poor thing; where is the gold leaf? Yet the essence of Elizabeth is in this book, his poor wife with her white cap, her blunt manner, her sideways smile and busy crafts-woman's fingers. Once he had watched Liz making a silk braid. One end was pinned to the wall and on each finger of her raised hands she was spinning loops of thread, her fingers flying so fast he couldn't see how it worked. ‘Slow down,' he said, ‘so I can see how you do it,' but she'd laughed and said, ‘I can't slow down, if I stopped to think how I was doing it I couldn't do it at all.'

LONDON, APRIL–MAY 1536

‘Come and sit with me a while.'

‘Why?' Lady Worcester is wary.

‘Because I have cakes.'

She smiles. ‘I am greedy.'

‘I even have a waiter to serve them.'

She eyes Christophe. ‘This boy is a waiter?'

‘Christophe, first Lady Worcester requires a cushion.'

The cushion is plump with down and embroidered with a pattern of hawks and flowers. She takes it in her two hands, strokes it absently, then positions it behind her and leans back. ‘Oh, that's better,' she smiles. Pregnant, she rests a composed hand on her belly, like a Madonna in a painting. In this small room, its window open to mild spring air, he is holding a court of inquiry. He does not mind who comes in to see him, who is noticed as they come and go. Who would not pass the time with a man who has cakes? And Master Secretary is always pleasant and useful. ‘Christophe, hand my lady a napkin, and go and sit in the sun for ten minutes. Close the door behind you.'

Lady Worcester – Elizabeth – watches the door close; then she leans forward and whispers, ‘Master Secretary, I am in such trouble.'

‘And this,' he indicates her person, ‘cannot be easy. Is the queen jealous of your condition?'

‘Well, she keeps me close to her, and she need not. She asks me each day how I do. I could not have a fonder mistress.' But her face shows doubt. ‘In some ways it would be better if I were to go home to the country. As it is, kept before the court, I am pointed at by all.'

‘Do you think then it is the queen herself who began the murmurs against you?'

‘Who else?'

A rumour is going about the court that Lady Worcester's baby is not the earl's child. Perhaps it was spread out of malice; perhaps as someone's idea of a joke: perhaps because someone was bored. Her gentle brother, the courtier Anthony Browne, has stormed into her rooms to take her to task: ‘I told him,' she says, ‘don't pick on me. Why me?' As if sharing her indignation, the curd tart on her palm quakes in its pastry shell.

He frowns. ‘Let me take you back a step. Is your family blaming you because people are talking about you, or because there is truth in what they say?'

Lady Worcester dabs her lips. ‘You think I will confess, just for cakes?'

‘Let me smooth this over for you. I should like to help you if I can. Has your husband reason to be angry?'

‘Oh, men,' she says. ‘They are always angry. They are so angry they can't count on their fingers.'

‘So it could be the earl's?'

‘If it is a strong boy I dare say he will own it.' The cakes are distracting her: ‘That white one, is that almond cream?'

Lady Worcester's brother, Anthony Browne, is Fitzwilliam's half-brother. (All these people are related to each other. Luckily, the cardinal left him a chart, which he updates whenever there is a wedding.) Fitzwilliam and Browne and the aggrieved earl have been conferring in corners. And Fitzwilliam has said to him, can you find out, Crumb, for I am sure I cannot, what the devil is going on among the queen's waiting-women?

‘And then there's the debts,' he says to her. ‘You are in a sad place, my lady. You have borrowed from everyone. What did you buy? I know there are sweet young men about the king, witty young men too, always amorous and ready to write a lady a letter. Do you pay to be flattered?'

‘No. To be complimented.'

‘You should get that free.'

‘I believe that is a gallant speech.' She licks her fingers. ‘But you are a man of the world, Master Secretary, and you know that if you yourself wrote a woman a poem you would enclose a bill.'

He laughs. ‘True. I know the value of my time. But I did not think your admirers were so miserly.'

‘But they have so much to do, these boys!' She selects a candied violet, nibbles it. ‘I do not know why we speak of idle youths. They are busy day and night, making their careers. They wouldn't send their account in. But you must buy them a jewel for their cap. Or some gilt buttons for a sleeve. Fee their tailor, perhaps.'

He thinks of Mark Smeaton, in his finery. ‘Does the queen pay out in this way?'

‘We call it patronage. We don't call it paying out.'

‘I accept your correction.' Jesus, he thinks, a man could use a whore, and call it ‘patronage'. Lady Worcester has dropped some raisins on the table and he feels the urge to pick them up and feed them to her; probably that would be all right with her. ‘So when the queen is a patron, does she ever, does she ever patronise in private?'

‘In private? How could I know?'

He nods. It's tennis, he thinks. That shot was too good for me. ‘What does she wear, to patronise?'

‘I have not myself seen her naked.'

‘So you think, these flatterers, you don't think she goes to it with them?'

‘Not in my sight or hearing.'

‘But behind a closed door?'

‘Doors are often closed. It is a common thing.'

‘If I were to ask you to bear witness, would you repeat that on oath?'

She flicks a speck of cream away. ‘That doors are often closed? I could go so far.'

‘And what would be your fee for that?' He is smiling; his eyes rest on her face.

‘I am a little afraid of my husband. Because I have borrowed money. He does not know, so please…hush.'

‘Point your creditors in my direction. And for the future, if you need a compliment, draw on the bank of Cromwell. We look after our customers and our terms are generous. We are known for it.'

She puts down her napkin; picks a last primrose petal from the last cheese cake. She turns at the door. A thought has struck her. Her hand bunches her skirts. ‘The king wants a reason to put her aside, yes? And the closed door will be enough? I would not wish her harm.'

She grasps the situation, at least partly. Caesar's wife must be above reproach. Suspicion would ruin the queen, a crumb or a sliver of truth would ruin her faster; you wouldn't need a bed sheet with a snail-trail left by Francis Weston or some other sonneteer. ‘Put her aside,' he says. ‘Yes, possibly. Unless these rumours prove to be misunderstandings. As I'm sure they will in your case. I am sure your husband will be contented when the child is born.'

Her face clears. ‘So you will speak to him? But not about the debt? And speak to my brother? And William Fitzwilliam? You will persuade them to leave me alone, please? There is nothing I have done, that other ladies have not.'

‘Mistress Shelton?' he says.

‘That would be no news.'

‘Mistress Seymour.'

‘That would be news indeed.'

‘Lady Rochford?'

She hesitates. ‘Jane Rochford does not like the sport.'

‘Why, is my lord Rochford inept?'

‘Inept.' She seems to taste the word. ‘I have not heard her describe it like that.' She smiles. ‘But I have heard her describe it.'

Christophe is back. She sails past him, a woman disburdened. ‘Oh, look at that,' Christophe says. ‘She has picked all the petals off the top, and left the crumb.'

Christophe sits down to stuff his maw with the remnants. He craves honey, sugar. You can never mistake a boy who was brought up hungry. We are coming to the sweet season of the year, when the air is mild and the leaves pale, and lemon cakes are flavoured with lavender: egg custards, barely set, infused with a sprig of basil; elderflowers simmered in a sugar syrup and poured over halved strawberries.

 

St George's Day. All over England, cloth and paper dragons sway in noisy procession through the streets, and the dragon-slayer after them in his armour of tin, beating an old rusty sword on his shield. Virgins plait wreaths of leaves, and spring flowers are carried into church. In the hall at Austin Friars, Anthony has hung from the ceiling beams a beast with green scales, a rolling eye and a lolling tongue; it looks lascivious, and reminds him of something, but he can't remember what.

This is the day the Garter knights hold their chapter, where they elect a new knight if any member has died. The Garter is the most distinguished order of chivalry in Christendom: the King of France is a member, so is the King of Scots. So is Monseigneur the queen's father, and the king's bastard Harry Fitzroy. This year the meeting is at Greenwich. The foreign members will not attend, it is understood, and yet the chapter serves as a gathering of his new allies: William Fitzwilliam, Henry Courtenay the Marquis of Exeter, my lord of Norfolk, and Charles Brandon, who seems to have forgiven him, Thomas Cromwell, for shoving him around the presence chamber: who now seeks him out and says, ‘Cromwell, we have had our differences. But I always did say to Harry Tudor, now take note of Cromwell, let him not go down with his ingrate master, for Wolsey has taught him his tricks and he may be useful to you accordingly.'

‘Did you so, my lord? I am much bound to you for that word.'

‘Aye, well, we see the consequence, for now you are a rich man, are you not?' He chuckles. ‘And so is Harry rich.'

‘And I am always glad to bestow gratitude in the proper quarter. May I ask, who will my lord vote for in the Garter chapter?'

Brandon gives him a strenuous wink. ‘Depend on me.'

There is one vacancy, caused by the death of Lord Bergavenny; there are two men who expect to have it. Anne has been pressing the merits of brother George. The other candidate is Nicholas Carew; and when soundings have been taken and the votes have been counted it is Sir Nicholas whose name is read out by the king. George's people are quick to limit the damage, to give out that they didn't expect anything: that Carew was promised the next vacancy, that King Francis himself asked the king three years ago to give it him. If the queen is displeased, she does not show it, and the king and George Boleyn have a project to discuss. The day after May Day, a royal party is to ride down to Dover to inspect the new work on the harbour, and George will accompany it in his capacity as Warden of the Cinque Ports: an office which he fills badly, in his, Cromwell's opinion. He himself plans to ride down with the king. He could even go over to Calais for a day or two, and order matters there; so he gives out, the rumour of his arrival serving to keep the garrison on the
qui vive
.

Harry Percy has come down from his own country for the Garter meeting, and is now at his house at Stoke Newington. That might be useful, he says to his nephew Richard, I might send someone to see him and sound him out, whether he might be prepared to give back word on this pre-contract business. Go myself, if I need to. But we must take this week hour by hour. Richard Sampson is waiting for him, Dean of the Chapel Royal, Doctor of Canon Law (Cambridge, Paris, Perugia, Siena): the king's proctor in his first divorce.

‘Here is a pretty pickle,' is all the dean will say, laying down his folios in his precise way. There is a mule cart outside, groaning with further folios, well-wrapped to save them from adverse weather: the documents go all the way back to the king's first expressed dissatisfaction with his first queen. At which time, he says, to the dean, we were all young. Sampson laughs; it is a clerical laugh, like the creak of a vestment chest. ‘I barely recall being young, but I suppose we were. And some of us carefree.'

They are going to try for nullity, see if Henry can be released. ‘I hear Harry Percy bursts into tears at the sound of your name,' Sampson says.

‘They much exaggerate. The earl and I have had many civil interchanges these last months.'

He keeps turning over papers from the first divorce, and finding the cardinal's hand, amending, suggesting, drawing arrows in the margin.

‘Unless,' he says, ‘Anne the queen would decide to enter religion. Then the marriage would be dissolved of itself.'

‘I'm sure she would make an excellent abbess,' Sampson says politely. ‘Have you sounded out my lord archbishop yet?'

Cranmer is away. He has been putting it off. ‘I have to show him,' he tells the dean, ‘that our cause, that is to say, the cause of the English Bible, will get on better without her. We want the living word of God to sound in the king's ears like music, not like Anne's ingrate whining.'

He says ‘we', including the dean out of courtesy. He is not at all sure that, in his heart, Sampson is devoted to reform, but it is outward compliance that concerns him, and the dean is always cooperative.

‘This little matter of sorcery.' Sampson clears his throat. ‘The king does not mean us to pursue it seriously? If it could be proved that some unnatural means were used to draw him into the marriage, then of course his consent could not be free, the contract is of no effect; but surely, when he says he was seduced by charms, by spells, he was speaking, as it were, in figures? As a poet might speak of a lady's fairy charms, her wiles, her seductions…? Oh, by the Mass,' the dean says mildly. ‘Do not look at me in that way, Thomas Cromwell. It is a business I would rather not meddle in. I would rather have Harry Percy again, and between us beat him into sense. I would rather bring out the matter of Mary Boleyn, whose name, I must say, I hoped never to hear again.'

He shrugs. He sometimes thinks about Mary; what it would have been like, if he had taken her up on her offers. That night in Calais, he had been so close he could taste her breath, sweetmeats and spices, wine…but of course, that night in Calais, any man with functioning tackle would have done for Mary. Gently, the dean breaks into his train of thought: ‘May I suggest? Go and talk to the queen's father. Talk to Wiltshire. He's a reasonable man, we were at Bilbao together on embassy a few years back, I always found him to be reasonable. Get him to ask his daughter to go quietly. Save us all twenty years of grief.'

 

To ‘Monseigneur', then: he has Wriothesley to take the record of the meeting. Anne's father brings his own folio, while brother George brings only his delightful self. He is always a sight to see: George likes his clothes braided and tasselled, stippled and striped and slashed. Today he wears white velvet over red silk, scarlet rippling from each gash. He is reminded of a picture he saw once in the Low Countries, of a saint being flayed alive. The skin of the man's calves was folded neatly over his ankles, like soft boots, and his face wore an expression of unblinking serenity.