“And in your heart you do.”
“I don’t think I was intended to be a mother, Damask. No. I want to dance at Court. I want to hunt with the royal party. To return to the Castle or the Palace—we were at Windsor recently and there we danced and talked and watched mummers or the play, and there is a ball. That is the life. Then I can forget.”
“What do you want to forget, Kate?”
“Oh,” she cried, “I am talking too much once more.”
The gardens at Remus were beautiful. My mother would have been delighted with them. I tried to remember details so that I could tell her about them when I returned home. There was one very favorite spot of mine—a garden with a pond in the center surrounded by a pleached alley; because it was summer the trees in this alley were thick with leaves. Kate and I used to like to sit by the pond and talk.
I was gratified that she had changed since I had come. The lines of discontent had disappeared from her mouth and she was constantly laughing—often at me, it was true, but in that tolerant, affectionate manner with which I was familiar.
It was in the pond garden that she talked to me of Bruno.
“I wonder where he went,” she said. “Do you believe that he disappeared in a cloud and went back to heaven? Or do you think it was to London to make his fortune?”
“He did disappear,” I mused. “He was found in the crib on that Christmas morning and Keziah did seem to lose her senses when she met Rolf Weaver. Her confession may have been false.”
“What purpose was there in his coming?”
“St. Bruno’s became rich after his arrival and it was due to him.”
“But what happened when Cromwell’s men came? Where were his miracles then?”
“Perhaps it was meant that they should have their way.”
“Then what was the purpose of sending a Holy Child just to make St. Bruno’s prosper for a few years so that greater riches could be diverted to the King’s coffers? And what of the confessions of Keziah and the monk? Keziah could never have made up such a story. Why should she?”
“It may have been some devil prompting her.”
“You have been visiting the witch in the woods.”
“I did because of Honeysuckle.”
“You are foolish, Damask. You have promised to take this child, you tell me. And your father agrees. You are a strange unworldly pair. The child of that beast and a wayward serving girl. And she is to be as your sister! What do you think will come of that?”
“I loved Keziah,” I said. “She was a mother to me. And the child could be Bruno’s sister. Have you thought of that?”
“If Keziah’s stories are true they would be half-brother and sister, would they not?”
“The relationship is there.”
“How like you, Damask. You fit events to truth as it pleases yourself. At one moment you want Bruno to be holy so he disappears up to heaven in a cloud; the next minute you want to make a reason for taking this child, so she is Bruno’s half-sister. You see you are not logical. Your thinking is muddled. How much easier it would be if you had simple motives like mine.”
“To get what you want from life and to make others pay for it.”
“It’s a good arrangement from the taker’s point of view.”
“It could never be a good arrangement—even if it worked.”
“It’s going to work for me,” said Kate blandly.
Whatever topic we started with, Bruno would find a way into our conversation. Kate would soften a little when she spoke of him. She often recalled details of those days when we used to go through the ivy-covered door and find him waiting for us. I was sure that at times she believed that Bruno was something more than human.
“Do you think we shall ever knew the truth about Bruno, Kate?” I asked.
“Who ever knows the whole truth about anybody?” was her reply.
I dispatched a messenger to my father to tell him of my safe arrival. I said I would be coming home shortly after the baby was born. I knew that Kate would not wish me to go. I had an idea that she visualized keeping me there as a companion for herself. She told me once that she needed me.
“And since you don’t altogether fancy Rupert I might arrange a grand marriage for you,” she promised me.
“My father would expect me to go home.”
“I am sure he is eager to see you married.”
But with the baby due to arrive at any time we were both awaiting the signs so that our conversation was often of the imminent birth. I went through the layette which had been prepared for the child and Kate and I discussed the names of boys and girls which we thought would be suitable for the infant.
Kate liked to talk about the Court and the King’s affairs and her recent adventures at Windsor made her feel that she was really very knowledgeable—particularly compared with a stay-at-home cousin.
The King’s marriage was the great topic for we all knew that he was greatly dissatisfied with his bride.
“It is a most unfortunate affair,” said Kate happily as we sat in the pond garden. I was stitching at a little garment I was making for the baby. Kate sat idly, her hands in her lap, watching me.
“Of course poor Anne of Cleves is a most unsuitable wife. The King would never have thought of taking her but for the state of affairs on the continent.”
I begged to hear more. I had heard rumors but I liked listening to Kate’s more racy version than those which had been vaguely alluded to at our dinner table.
“The King always hated the Emperor Charles and the King of France,” Kate explained, “and the thought of their joining up together was quite alarming. They say that he believed they were plotting a mischief against him. So he wanted allies on the Continent. Cromwell believed that the Duke of Cleves would be that ally; so why not make a firm alliance through marriage with the Duke’s sister?”
“And the lady was willing,” I said. “Did she know what had happened to Queen Katharine and Queen Anne?”
“Surely the whole world knows! It was bruited about Europe as I believe no other affair ever has been. The King’s Secret Matter was undoubtedly the world’s most well-known scandal. Ladies were not too willing. There was Mary of Guise—and she a widow. Very comely, said those who knew her. The King fancied her but she refused him for the King of Scotland. That is something he will not readily forgive the Scots. And now he is angry with Master Cromwell, because the lady of Cleves does not live up to his expectations. Remus saw the account which Cromwell’s man sent him of the lady. It compared her beauty with that of other ladies as being like the golden sun to the silver moon. She was said to surpass them all. And Holbein the artist made a portrait of her but omitted to put in the pockmarks. Her face is pitted with them. They say that when he saw her the King was horrified and disgusted and naturally furious with those who had brought her to him.”
“Poor woman!”
“She could not speak a word of English so she did not know what was being said about her.”
“She must have sensed the cold reception.”
“I was sorry for the King. I wondered whether he compared her with that other Anne. Do you remember her, Damask? How fascinating she was riding in her litter! Did you ever see anyone like her? So elegant…so attractive….She was a real Queen. I shall never forget her.”
“Nor I the day you blackmailed poor Tom Skillen into taking us up the river to see her pass by.”
“How grateful you should be to me. But for my astuteness you would never have seen Queen Anne Boleyn. No, I shall never forget her. She was unforgettable. How could the King have let her go for the sake of Jane Seymour! That is something I have never been able to understand. Jane was so simple, so dull….Compared with all that brilliance….”