Queen's Gambit: A Novel of Katherine Parr (24 page)

On the day of her arrival she had waved a
white hand in Dot’s direction, asking, ‘Who is
that
?’ She
hadn’t even bothered to lower her voice.

Meg had explained that Dot was the
Queen’s loyal servant, that she had been Meg’s own nurserymaid, and that
they had all come together from Snape.

Then Elizabeth had said, ‘How could
the Queen
possibly want to be served by a rough girl like that. Have you
seen the size of her hands?’

But that is not the worst of it, for Dot
knows her place. And why would a Princess – for that is what she is, even if no one is
allowed to say it – why would a Princess think anything of
her
? No, the worst
of it is that this Lady Elizabeth, with her learning and her lineage, has woven a web
around
Meg. They share their books and their lessons and their bed and
they walk side by side in the palace gardens and ride out together in the park. Lady
Elizabeth is trouble; it is written all over her, and Dot can read
that
clearly
enough.

Elizabeth thinks of no one but herself, and
the Queen – she is attached to the Queen – and Dot has seen her give Rig a surreptitious
kick when the Queen is turned away, so jealous is she of her stepmother’s
affection, even for a dog. She is in need of a mother, Dot supposes, though she has her
nurse, Mistress Astley, who is worse even than Elizabeth for looking down her nose at
Dot. And so it is that Dot’s sympathy for Elizabeth has all been used up, and she
refuses to marvel over the poem like the others. She hates that this child is writing
poems for everyone to coo over, and
she
can’t even read.

The two girls come to sit on the window seat
near to where Dot is now on her knees, running a wet rag over the skirtings.

‘Which would you rather,’ says
Elizabeth, ‘to be able to fly or to be invisible?’

Dot can barely stop herself shouting out,
that is
our
game, the game
I
invented.

‘To be invisible,’ says Meg.

‘You have made invisibility an art as
it is, Meg Neville. I would rather fly. Imagine being able to soar up above the trees,
above the clouds. You could look down on everything, like God …’ She pauses a
moment. ‘But if you were invisible you could spy on Robert Dudley. He’s the
one they want you to marry, isn’t he?’

‘I don’t know,’ Meg
replies.

Dot has heard nothing of this but she has
seen Robert Dudley about the place, with his mother, who is sometimes
in the Queen’s rooms. He’s nothing but a pup, a good few years younger
than Meg. A handsome pup maybe, but he has a little too much swagger for Dot’s
taste.

‘I suppose he’s not too
ugly,’ Elizabeth says. ‘But you won’t want him.’ She leans in
and whispers something in Meg’s ear.

Meg pulls away with a look of disgust.
‘That is horrible.’

Katherine takes a deep breath and enters
the council chamber. The room falls silent. Wriothesley, ever obsequious, jumps off the
bench to pull out the chair for her.

‘I shall stand,’ she says.

She has never yet sat at a council meeting.
She needs as much height as she can get, to stop herself feeling like a small girl
before a crowd of grown men. Her gown is Tudor green, lest the council forget whose wife
she is, but it is made of a heavy brocade quite unsuitable for the airless August day.
Wriothesley is on his knee now and has her hand, planting a desiccated kiss on the back
of it. The councillors are at the table, loosely divided by their allegiances: Gardiner
and his conservative cronies are to one side, with Rich among them, Hertford and the
Archbishop, with the reformers, to the other. She has the majority by a whisker.
Wriothesley scuttles back to his seat.

She wipes the back of her hand discreetly
against the fabric of her gown. ‘We shall commence with the plague,’ she
announces, careful to keep her voice steady, authoritative. ‘I intend to issue a
proclamation. No one shall come to court whose house is infected.’

A few, Hertford and the Archbishop among
them, nod in agreement, but most hold a sullen silence. Katherine can feel a sheen of
sweat gathering on her forehead, hopes it is not visible. They all agree with her
proclamation. Their resistance, though, at being told by a woman, thickens the air.

‘Any who dispute this?’ She
clenches her jaw and avoids Gardiner’s hatchet glare – he, of all of them,
mustn’t see any diffidence in her. ‘We shall decide the wording after this
meeting.’ She nods towards the Clerk of Council, then continues briskly.
‘The King requires a shipment of lead.’

‘This is of the utmost urgency,’
says Wriothesley. ‘We must see that it leaves Dover immediately.’

‘Has it not occurred to you, esteemed
councillor’ – she barely hides her sarcasm – ‘that our English fishermen
apprehended a French ship off the south coast not a week ago? There are sure to be
others. If we send the lead now it is unlikely to arrive safely.’

Wriothesley sniffs and says nothing, his
squirrel face pinched.

‘I say the shipment sails. We cannot
leave our troops without the means to arm themselves.’ It is Gardiner now, looking
about the table for support.

She can feel them all watching her for the
remotest sign of weakness, a minuscule twitch of the eye, a catch in her breath.
‘I think not, Gardiner,’ she chimes. ‘Unless it is your intention to
offer an entire shipment of lead and the vessel that carries it, men and all, to our
enemy.’

A few titters spill out. Gardiner opens his
mouth to speak.

But Katherine brings her fist down hard on
the table, twice. ‘The shipment shall remain in dock until a safe passage can be
assured.’

Gardiner lets out an angry snort, bringing a
hand up to touch his crucifix. Hertford smirks, swivelling his eyes across the table.
Sometimes he is so like his brother, it gives her heart a jolt. But Hertford is rendered
slighter, with his features less symmetrically configured, as if God had practised on
the elder brother and found perfection in the younger.
She watches him
carefully, as she does them all. Hertford is pale as a field of unharvested wheat, his
darting eyes hard to read. But Katherine at least knows that, whatever he thinks of her,
they share the same beliefs and are unified by shared enemies.

My enemy’s enemy is my friend.

She remembers the line, can’t remember
where it’s from. She’d never thought herself the sort to foster enemies, but
then she’d never imagined herself holding the reins of England. For now, Hertford
is her friend. She wonders, though, what would happen were the King not to return. Would
he turn on her, try to grab the regency for himself? He is Prince Edward’s oldest
uncle, after all. And history is littered with ambitious uncles.

‘Any who disagree?’ she
asks.

It is only Gardiner who lifts a half-hearted
hand.

‘Carried,’ she calls.

The clerk dips his pen and scribbles.

She moves to the next item on the agenda.
‘The King needs troops mustered for the French campaign. Four thousand men. See
that it is done, Wriothesley, Hertford.’ She nods firmly at each of them.
‘We shall decide how to transport them at a later date. You will be travelling to
France soon, will you not, Hertford?’

The atmosphere has warmed a little. She has
to prove herself fit to rule in each and every meeting – has to stand firm, divest
herself entirely of her femininity, no chinks. Not a man at this table believes a woman
capable of ruling. But she thinks of Mary of Hungary, who successfully husbands three
territories. Katherine strives to emulate her example. But even the Archbishop, who is
her firmest ally, has reservations. She has had private conversations with him these
last
weeks, talked much of religion. They have read the same books.
She catches his eye. He smiles. He is a known reformer and even has a wife lurking
somewhere, it is said. Gardiner had tried to unseat him not so long ago, hatched a plot,
tried to get him to the scaffold, but the King put a stop to it. Henry is attached to
his Lutheran Archbishop. She can see how it works now, the careful balancing act that
has been maintained by the King. Never allowing one faction to gain a stronger hold than
the other, holding them all at bay.

‘Now the Scottish Borders,’ she
says. ‘Hertford, what news?’

Hertford details the skirmishes along the
Borders, which need to be kept in hand. The councillors argue about how best to resolve
the issue with so many troops needed in France.

‘The Scots have been on the run since
Edinburgh was sacked,’ Rich reminds them.

‘The troops are better used in
Boulogne,’ Wriothesley adds with a sniff. His constant sniffing irritates.
‘The Scots pose no threat to us.’

‘Are we forgetting the lessons of
history, councillors?’ Her hands are trembling; she tucks them away, crossing her
arms solidly. ‘Think back to Flodden Field.’

Last time Henry was campaigning in France,
thirty years ago, the Scots thought to take advantage. Catherine of Aragon was Regent
then – the only other of Henry’s Queens he had trusted with the role. Katherine
remembers hearing of it as a girl; it was talked of for years, had made a lasting
impression. The Queen took a hard line, against the odds, and James IV was killed at
Flodden Field. She’d sent Henry the Scottish king’s bloody coat – a triumph
indeed. ‘Recruit more troops, mercenaries if necessary,’ she states, leaving
no room for dissent. ‘Funds will have to be released.’

It is agreed. Katherine senses the atmosphere
in the chamber shift to a reluctant respect.

She can hear someone practising the
virginals in her rooms, a few faltering bars of a repeated melody drifting in through
the open window. It is probably Elizabeth. Elizabeth seems fascinated by
Katherine’s regency, begs to sit in on council meetings, offers to inscribe
letters of state, to help with anything. That is impossible, but Katherine encourages
her interest. They talk of women who have ruled, how femininity must be set aside to
earn the trust of men. Elizabeth has the makings of a good Queen, though she will never
be more than a consort.

The music stops, there is a faint laugh. Meg
will not be far; those two have become inseparable. Meg is quite renewed these days,
ready for marriage. She thinks of the women gathered in her rooms, heads bowed over
their needlework, a hubbub of quiet chat; there will be a game of cards, someone
reading. Her chambers are full of books now, many banned, in innocent covers, tucked
away in corners, down the sides of things, treated with caution. They all know those
books hold the potential for trouble. She rejects that thought for fear of weakening –
no chinks. Besides, she reminds herself, she is Regent; Henry has made her untouchable.
A cat slinks past the window, treading carefully on the narrow sill, distracted for a
moment by a pigeon, watching it, crouched, waiting, before continuing on.

The discussion turns to problems with the
persecution of French residents in London. It becomes quite heated. Several councillors,
voices raised, bay for their deportation, some for imprisonment.

‘We are at war with France. These
people are our enemies,’ calls Wriothesley.

Shame
he
cannot be sent to fight the
French, thinks Katherine. He sniffs again and Hertford thrusts a handkerchief at him. He
looks at it as if he has never seen such a thing before.

‘Blow your nose, man,’ barks
Hertford.

Wriothesley snorts into the linen.

‘The problem lies not with the
émigrés,’ Katherine says, loud and clear, cutting through the noise, ‘but
with those who persecute them. I am not in favour of deportation. I say we come down
hard on the rabble who victimize them.’

‘With all respect,’ pipes up
Hertford, ‘if we show too much leniency we are likely to have more trouble on our
hands.’

‘Most of these people have been in
London for generations. They can’t simply be got rid of,’ counters the
Archbishop.

Thank God he is with her. Without Hertford,
though, Katherine knows she will struggle to hold her position.

‘I will write to the King on the
matter,’ she says firmly. ‘For the present the émigrés stay, and any who
trouble them will be punished accordingly.’

Hertford will be gone in days. He is needed
in France. She will have to sharpen her powers of persuasion with the council. She
wonders again what would happen were the King not to return. She would be alone at the
helm of England, protector of a child King; it is written in Henry’s will. How
could she continue this careful balancing act without her husband at her shoulder? She
would have to find a way, would have to forge powerful allegiances. She asks herself
whether she would have the stomach to send someone to the scaffold … an enemy,
perhaps … but a friend? The thought swims sickeningly in her head.

‘Any other matters?’

‘Various minor land disputes,’
says the clerk, waving a sheaf of papers.

They plod through a list of petty issues and
eventually she closes the meeting. She maintains her erect posture as she walks the
length of the gallery. As soon as the door to her privy chamber is closed behind her,
however, she slumps against it, tugging at the laces of her gown, pulling the great
heavy thing off her, untying her hood, throwing it down as she crumples to the floor,
her kirtle spread out around her.

Udall stands before the company seated in
the Queen’s watching room. He wears an elaborate doublet of purple brocade, a
colour he is not entitled to wear. Huicke had discouraged him, said it lacked respect.
But then Katherine enjoys the fact that he’s not a hem kisser. She can’t
abide the sycophants. Even Stanhope purrs around Katherine’s ankles these days,
suggesting passages from Luther that might interest her or proffering little gifts, a
pair of brocade sleeves, a fan, a book. It is true they share certain opinions, but it
is clear as day to Huicke that Stanhope is feathering her own nest.