“He would now. Cromwell is using torture to get the confessions that he wants. Did she speak of the king?”
“Torture? He is torturing priests?”
“Yes. Did the Maid speak of the king?”
“She spoke as she always does. That if he tried to set the queen aside, his days would be numbered. But she said nothing more than she has said to the king himself.”
“Did she ever say that we would take the throne? Did she ever say that?”
I am not going to tell my son that she foresaw his marrying the princess and becoming king consort. I’m not going to tell him that she predicted that the Plantagenet line would be the royal family of England once again. “I won’t say. Not even to you, my dear.”
“Lady Mother, Thomas More himself warned her against predicting greatness for a family like ours. He reminded her of what happened to the Buckingham chaplain who knew a prophecy and whispered it to Buckingham. He warned her that the false prophet led our cousin on to dream of greatness, and then the king was led on to cut him down. The king cut down both prophet and the hero of his prophecy, and now the duke’s confessor and the duke are dead.”
“So I don’t ever speak of prophecies.” Silently, I add: “Or curses.”
Montague nods, as if he is reassured. “Half of the court have met with her to have their fortunes told or to pray with her,” he says. “We’ve done no more than this. You’re sure, aren’t you? That we have done no more than this?”
“I don’t know what she might have said to Cousin Gertrude. And are you sure of Geoffrey?”
Montague smiles ruefully. “Well, at any rate, I’m sure that Geoffrey would never betray us,” he says. “I think he’s been to Syon and traveled with her to Canterbury. But so have many others. Fisher and More among them.”
“Thousands have heard her preach,” I point out. “Thousands have met with her privately. If Thomas Cromwell wants to arrest everyone who has prayed with the Maid of Kent, then he will have to arrest most of the kingdom. If he wants to arrest those who think the queen is wrongly put aside, he will have to arrest everyone in the kingdom but the Duke of Norfolk, the Boleyns, and the king himself. Surely we would be safe, my son? We’d be lost in the crowd.”
But Thomas Cromwell is a bolder man than I realized. A more ambitious man than I realized. He arrests the Maid of Kent, he arrests seven holy men with her, and once again, he arrests John Fisher, the bishop, and Thomas More, the former Lord Chancellor, as if they were nobodies whom he could pick up from the street and fling in the Tower for nothing more than disagreeing with him.
“He can’t arrest a bishop for speaking with a nun!” Princess Mary says. “He simply cannot.”
“They say that he has,” I reply.
BEAULIEU, ESSEX, WINTER 1533
I don’t expect us to be invited to court for Christmas, though I hear that they are keeping very great estate and celebrating another pregnancy. They say that the woman who calls herself queen is walking with her head stiffly high, and her hand forever clasped to her belly, where they are letting out the laces on her stomacher. They say that she is confident it will be a boy this time. I imagine she is on her knees every night, praying for him.
Under these circumstances I doubt that they will want my assistance. I have attended so many royal lyings-in that disappointment hangs around me like a dark cloak. I doubt that they will want the princess at court either, so I order the household to prepare for the feast at Beaulieu. I don’t expect the princess to be very merry—she is not even allowed to send her mother a gift or the good wishes of the season. I suspect that the woman who calls herself queen has warned people not to visit or send gifts; but the princess is a princess to us, and her state demands that we hold a Christmas feast.
Although they are forbidden to pay their respects it’s touching to see how the country people send her their love and support. There is a constant stream of apples and cheeses and even smoked hams coming to the door with the good wishes of the local farmers’ wives. All my family, even the most distant cousins, send her a little Christmas gift. The churches for miles around pray for her by name and for her mother, and every servant in the house and every visitor refers to her as “Her Grace the Princess” and serves her on bended knee.
I don’t order them to honor her state and defy the king; but in our house at Beaulieu it is as if he never spoke. Many of the people in her service have been with her since she was a little girl. She has always been “Her Grace” to us; even if we wanted to rename her, we would not be able to remember it. Lady Anne Hussey boldly calls her by her true title and when anyone remarks on it says that she’s forty-three and too old to change her ways.
The princess and I are mounting up to go hunting on a bright winter morning. We are in the central courtyard with her little court on their horses and ready to trot out, passing around the stirrup cup with some hot wine to keep out the cold, the hounds running everywhere, sniffing everything, sometimes bursting into excited yelping. The princess’s Master of Horse helps her into the saddle as I stand at the horse’s head, patting his neck. Without thinking, I ease my finger under the girth of her horse to check that it is as tight as it can be. The Master of Horse smiles at me and ducks his head in a little bow. “I wouldn’t leave Her Grace’s girth loose,” he said. “Never.”
I have a shamefaced blush. “I know you wouldn’t,” I say. “But I can’t let her mount without checking it.”
Princess Mary laughs. “She’d have me on a pillion saddle behind you, if she could,” she says naughtily. “She’d have me ride a donkey.”
“I’m supposed to keep you safe,” I say. “In the saddle or out of it.”
“She’ll be safe enough on Blackie,” he says, and then something at the gate catches his eye and he turns and says quietly to me, “Soldiers!”
I scramble up onto the mounting block so I can see over the tossing heads of the horses that there are soldiers running into the yard, and behind them a man on a great horse with a standard unfurling.
“Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk.”
Princess Mary moves, as if she would dismount, but I nod to her to stay in the saddle and I stand tall, like a statue on a pedestal, waiting for the Duke of Norfolk to ride up to me.
“Your Grace,” I say coldly. I loved his father, the old duke, who was a loyal adherent to the queen. I am fond of his wife, my cousin, and he makes her quite miserable. There is nothing I like about him, this man who has stepped into the shoes of a greater father, and inherited all of the ambition and none of the wisdom.
“My Lady Countess,” he says. He looks past me at the princess. “Lady Mary,” he says very loudly.
There is a stirring as everyone hears him, and everyone wants to contradict him. I see the head of his guard look quickly around, as if to count our numbers and assess his danger. I see him note that we are going hunting and that many of the men have a dagger at their side or a knife in a scabbard. But Howard is safe enough, he has commanded his guard to come fully armed, ready for a fight.
Coolly I count their number, and their weapons, and I look at the hard-faced duke and wonder what he hopes to achieve. The Princess Mary’s face is turned slightly away, as if she cannot hear him, as if she does not know that he is there.
“I have brought you news of changes to the household,” he says, loudly enough for her to hear. Still, she does not deign to look at him. “His Grace the King commands that you are to come to court.”
That catches her; she turns, her face alight, smiling. “To court?” she asks.
Grimly, he goes on. I realize that this is no pleasure to him. This is dirty work that he will have to do, and probably worse than this, if he is going to serve the king and the woman who now calls herself queen.