The King's Secret Matter (20 page)

It seemed to him that he had reached a stage of his life when all that he longed for most was denied him. He wanted the crown of France and cynical François stood between him and it; he wanted a son and Katharine stood between him and that goal; he wanted a young girl who had caught his imagination, and she flouted him, telling him that he, being married, was in no position to make advances to her.

So he, the King, was frustrated of his three greatest desires. It was a state of affairs which he had not thought possible.

He knew the position in Europe was so bad that it could not continue; and if he did not win France this year, perhaps he would win it some other year. He would never give up hope. The matter of getting a son was more urgent. He was not old
by any means, but being thirty-four years of age he was no longer a boy. He was impatient for sons. Yet he remained married to Katharine – if it was a marriage. His conscience was telling him that it was not, and that the sooner he made this known to his people the more pleased God would be with him. But Thomas Wolsey was to be trusted and he had said: Wait.

And then the girl. He had seen her at the Court, and had been maddened at the thought of her marrying Percy – maddened with the foolish young man for thinking to take what the King desired, and with the girl herself for agreeing to the marriage; then he had seen her in her father's garden at Hever, where she had treated him not as the King but as a would-be lover who did not please her. He should have been angry; he should have had the girl sent to the Tower; but a strange softness, which he had never felt before, had come to him. He had merely allowed himself to be so treated, which was wonderfully mysterious.

He had ridden away from Hever, still thinking of her and – although he was surprised at himself for doing so – had visited the place again and again . . . not as a King honouring a subject but as a humble suitor cap in hand.

Yet she continued to resist him. So here again he was frustrated.

A king must not consider his own personal desires, he told himself. I must not think of her but of these men who come from François.

He stood at the window looking out on the river, but he did not see it because instead he saw a garden at Hever and in it the most fascinating young woman he had ever known.

There was a bustle below, and as he turned from the
window, roughly jolted from his dream of Hever, the Cardinal came into the room.

The King was surprised by his unceremonious entry, and by the fact that his cap was somewhat askew. The pockmarked face was as pale as ever but the brown eyes gleamed so that Henry knew the Cardinal came to announce some matter of importance.

‘Your Grace . . . news . . .'

Wolsey was breathless and the King saw that behind him stood a man who was obviously travel-stained and looked as though he had ridden far.

‘What news?' demanded the King who, in spite of the excitement, was still faintly bemused by memories of the bold and haughty girl who had dared repulse him.

‘From the battlefield, Your Grace. The Imperial troops have routed the French at Pavia. The French army is destroyed and François himself is the Emperor's prisoner.'

Henry clapped his hands together and his great joy showed in his face.

At last the vision of Hever was replaced by one of a handsome, golden-haired, golden-bearded King receiving the crown at Rheims.

‘This is news which gives me the greatest pleasure. It is certain . . . ? There has been no mistake?'

The Cardinal turned to the travel-stained man behind him, who came forward and bowed low before the King.

‘Your Grace, this is true. The King of France has been taken prisoner at Pavia and is now the Emperor's captive.'

Henry laid his hand on the man's shoulder. ‘You are as welcome as the Angel Gabriel was to the Virgin Mary!' he declared. ‘Why, Thomas,' he went on, turning to the
Cardinal, ‘this is the best news we have had for many a long day.'

Wolsey bowed his head as though in assent; and while the King fired questions at the messenger he slipped away to send his own messenger to meet the French emissaries. He wished them to be told that the King could not see them as he had hoped to on this day.

‘Now,' Henry wrote to the Emperor Charles, ‘is the time for us to invade France jointly. Let us meet in Paris. Let France be handed to me that it may come under the domination of England. I shall then have the greatest pleasure in accompanying Your Imperial Highness to Rome where I shall see you crowned.'

He was so delighted that he went about the Court in high good humour. He was jubilant with Katharine, for was it not her nephew who had captured the King of France? Had not she helped to strengthen the bonds between the two countries? Their daughter was the affianced bride of the Emperor who was now more powerful than ever. When she married him and had her first son, that son should be proclaimed the future King of England, lord of Ireland and Wales, and now . . . France. This boy would be the greatest monarch in the world, for he would also inherit Spain, Austria, the Netherlands, Naples, Sicily and the recently discovered dominions of the New World. This would be a boy with Tudor blood in his veins. Perhaps it was not so important that
he
had no son when his grandson would be a monarch such as the world had never seen before.

He was gay and jovial with his Queen – although he could
not bring himself to share her bed. The memories of a laughing girl, who would not be put out of his mind, prevented that.

As for the girl herself, who had more respect for her own virtue than the King's royalty, she should be dismissed from his mind. There would be other girls at his Court only too eager to comfort him for her loss.

Those were good days, spent chiefly in making plans for his coronation in France.

Katharine was delighted; at last she could share the King's pleasure. He liked to walk with her in the gardens of the Palace, his arm in hers while he made plans for his journey to France.

But Henry could not forgive Charles's ambassador for the manner in which he had written of himself and the Chancellor, and de Praet was still kept a prisoner in his house. In vain did Katharine plead for him; in vain did she ask permission for the man to come and see her. Henry became sullen when she mentioned these matters, and replied shortly that he would not tolerate spies in England, even Spanish spies. And finally, when the dispirited de Praet asked for leave to return to his own country and Henry gave it, Katharine was not allowed to see him before he left; she consoled herself however that never had Henry's friendship for Charles been so firm as it was at this time, so that the fact that Charles had no ambassador in England did not seem so important as it would have been a short time ago.

When the Emperor read Henry's letter he raised his eyebrows in dismay.

Henry crowned in Rheims King of France! Himself
crowned in Rome! The English King had no idea of the situation.

Charles had taken the French King prisoner, it was true, and that was a success; the army which had served with François was disbanded, but that did not constitute all the men at arms in France. Charles himself had suffered enormous losses; his army was only in slightly better condition than that of the French; moreover he had no money to pay his mercenaries.

Charles was a realist. He knew that the Italian princes, who had had to submit to him, did so with great unwillingness, that the Pope was watching his movements with anxiety. His mercenaries had demanded the spoils of battle as he could not pay them, and as a result the countryside had been ravaged as the troops passed through; and as the sullen people were ready to revolt against the conqueror, this was no time to talk of crowning ceremonies. Henry seemed to think that war was a game and that the winner received all the spoils of victory. Had he not learned yet that in wars such as this there were often very little spoils?

The Emperor was weary of battle. He had the upper hand now; François was in prison in Madrid, and while he was there it would be possible to make him agree to humiliating terms. It was a matter of taking what he could; but it was totally unrealistic to imagine that he could take France and hand it to his ally as though it were a particularly fine horse or even a castle.

‘When will my uncle grow up?' he sighed.

There was another matter which was disturbing him. He was twenty-four years of age and affianced to Mary who was nine. He was tired of waiting, and his ministers had implied that the people of Spain were eager for an alliance with Portugal.

His cousin, Isabella of Portugal, was of a marriageable age at this present time, and her dowry was nine hundred thousand golden ducats. How useful such a sum would be! And Mary's dowry? He had had it already in loans from her father, and he knew that to take Mary would merely be to wipe off the debts he had incurred in the war.

He wanted a wife now . . . not in three years' time. In three years' time he might have a lusty son. When he went to war he would have a Queen to leave in Spain as his regent. Moreover Portugal had always been closely allied with Spain. The people wanted one of their own as their Queen, not a strange little girl who, although half Spanish, would seem to them wholly English.

True, he had given his promise, but his grandfathers had made promises when it was expedient to do so; and when state policy demanded that those promises should be broken, they broke them. Charles was sorry because his aunt would be hurt and the King of England would be angry. But he did not greatly care for the King of England. A strip of Channel divided them and they had always been uneasy allies.

Wolsey had turned against him he knew from the few letters he had received from de Praet; and he was certain that he had not received all that de Praet had written. Wolsey was a wily fellow and it was unfortunate that they should be enemies, but that must be accepted.

He could not simply jilt Mary, but he could make a condition that her parents would find it impossible to fulfil. Suppose he demanded that she be sent at once to Spain? He knew his aunt would never agree to part with her daughter at this stage. He would demand half as much again as Henry had already paid towards the cost of the war, knowing that this would be refused. But these would be the terms he
would insist on if he were to carry out his part of the bargain.

The Portuguese ambassador was waiting to see him; he would have to have something to tell him when he came. He must decide whether there should be discussions between the two countries regarding the betrothal of himself and Isabella.

He therefore sent for a gentleman of his entourage, and while he was waiting for him he wrote a letter which, on account of the news it contained, he put into code.

When the Knight Commander Peñalosa was shown into his presence, he signed to him to be seated.

‘I have a letter here which you are to take to England. It is in code, so you must go at once to de Praet who will decode it for you. Then you will read the contents and discuss with de Praet and the Queen the best manner of putting the proposals it contains to the King of England. De Praet will then inform me of the King's reception of this news. This is of the utmost importance. You must leave at once.'

Peñalosa left with the letter and prepared to set out for England, while Charles received the Portuguese ambassador.

By the time Peñalosa reached England, de Praet had left and there was no one who could decode the letter. Peñalosa sought an audience with the Queen, but the Cardinal, who was more watchful of her than ever, had so surrounded her with his spies that Peñalosa was never allowed to see her except in public. If Katharine's eyes alighted on him by chance she had no notion that he was an important messenger from her nephew.