His nephew Richard says, ‘You put that coat away when the cardinal came down. You had no heart for it.’
‘Yes, but now I am feeling cheerful. I am not going to appear before the bridegroom as a mourner.’
‘No?’ Christophe says. ‘With this king one needs a reversible garment. One never knows, is it dying or dancing?’
‘Your English is improving, Christophe.’
‘Your French is where it was.’
‘What do you expect, of an old soldier? I am not likely to write verse.’
‘But you curse well,’ Christophe says, encouragingly. ‘Perhaps the best I have heard. Better than my father, who as you know was a great robber and feared through his province.’
‘Would your father recognise you?’ Richard Cromwell asks. ‘I mean, if he saw you now? Half an Englishman, and in my uncle’s livery?’
Christophe turns down his mouth. ‘By now he is probably hanged.’
‘Don’t you care?’
‘I spit on him.’
‘No need for that,’ he says soothingly. ‘Coat, Christophe? Go and seek?’
Gregory says, ‘The last time we all went out together …’
Richard says, ‘Do not. Do not say it. Do not even think of the other one.’
‘I know,’ Gregory says amiably. ‘My tutors have imbued me with it, from my earliest days. Do not talk about severed heads at a wedding.’
The king’s wedding was in fact yesterday, a small and private ceremony; today they are a loyal deputation, ready to congratulate the new queen. The colours of his working wardrobe are those sombre and expensive shades the Italians call berettino: the grey-brown of leaves around the feast of St Cecilia, the grey-blue of Advent light. But today an effort is called for, and Christophe is helping him into his festival garment, marvelling at it, when Call-Me-Risley hurries in. ‘Not late, am I?’ He stands back. ‘Sir, are you wearing that?’
‘Of course he is!’ Christophe is offended. ‘Your opinion not wanted.’
‘It’s only that the cardinal’s people wore orange tawny, and so if it reminds the king … he may not like to be reminded …’ Call-Me falters. Last night’s conversation is like a stain on his own garment, something he can’t brush out. He says meekly, ‘Of course, the king may admire it.’
‘If he doesn’t, he can tell me to take it off. Mind he does not do the same with your head.’
Call-Me flinches. He is sensitive even for a redhead. He shrinks a little as they go out into the sun. ‘Call-Me,’ Gregory says, ‘did you see, Dick Purser ran up the tree and caught the cat. Father, can he have some addition to his wages?’
Christophe mutters something. It sounds like, heretic.
‘What?’ he says.
‘Deek Purser, heretic,’ Christophe says. ‘Believes the host is but bread.’
‘But so do we!’ Gregory says. ‘Surely, or … wait …’ Doubt crosses his face.
‘Gregory,’ Richard says, ‘what we want from you is less theology and more swagger. Prepare for the king’s new brothers – the Seymours will be in glory today. If Jane gives the king a son, they will be great men, Ned and Tom. But mind. So will we.’
For this is England, a happy country, a land of miracles, where stones underfoot are nuggets of gold and the brooks flow with claret. The Boleyns’ white falcon hangs like a sorry sparrow on a fence, while the Seymour phoenix is rising. Gentlefolk of an ancient breed, foresters, masters of Wolf Hall, the king’s new family now rank with the Howards, the Talbots, the Percys and the Courtenays. The Cromwells – father, son and nephew – are of an ancient breed too. Were we not all conceived in Eden? When Adam delved and Eve span/Who was then the gentleman? When the Cromwells stroll out this week, the gentlemen of England get out of their way.
The king wears green velvet: he is a verdant lawn, starred with diamonds. Parting from his old friend William Fitzwilliam, his treasurer, he takes Master Secretary’s arm, draws him into a window embrasure, and stands blinking in the sunlight. It is the last day of May.
So, the wedding night: how does one ask? The new bride is of such virginal aspect that it would not surprise him if she had slipped beneath the bed and spent the night rigid on her back, praying. And Henry, as several women have told him, needs a lot of encouragement.
The king whispers, ‘Such freshness. Such delicacy. Such maidenly pudeur.’
‘I am happy for your Majesty.’ He thinks, yes, yes: but did you manage it?
‘I have come out of Hell into Heaven, and all in one night.’
That is the answer he needed.
The king says, ‘The whole matter has been, as we all know, a difficult and delicate … and you have shown, Thomas, both expedition and firmness.’ He glances around the room. ‘Gentlemen – and ladies too, I may say – have prompted me: Majesty, it is not time Master Cromwell received his deserts? You know I have hesitated to promote you, only because your grip is wanted in the House of Commons. But,’ he smiles, ‘the House of Lords is equally unruly, and wants a master. So, to the Lords you shall go.’
He bows. Small rainbows flit and dance across the stonework.
‘The queen is with her women,’ Henry says. ‘She is getting her courage up. I have asked her to show herself to the court. Go to her, and speak a few comfortable words. Lead her out, if you can.’
He turns, and there at once is Ambassador Chapuys. He is one of the Emperor’s French-speaking subjects, not a Spaniard but a Savoyard. Though he has been in England some years now, he does not venture conversation in our language; his skills are not sharp enough for the kind of conversation an ambassador needs to hold. His keen ears have picked out the word ‘pudeur’ and smiling he asks, ‘Well, Master Secretary, whose is the shame?’
‘Not shame. Modesty. A proper modesty, on the bride’s part.’
‘Ah. I thought it might be your king who is shamed. Considering the events of recent days. And what came out in the courtroom, about his lack of skill and vigour with the other one.’
‘We have only George Boleyn’s word for that.’
‘Well, if the lady slept with George, as you allege – with her own brother – you would imagine there would be pillow-talk, and what more natural than that she should complain of her husband’s incapacity? But I can see that Lord Rochford cannot defend his version, now his head is off.’ The ambassador is afflicted by a brightness in the eye, a twitch of the lips: which he controls. ‘So the royal bridegroom has hit the mark. And he thinks that till last night Madame Jane was a virgin? But of course he can’t tell. He thought Anne Boleyn was a virgin, and that, believe me, strained the credulity of all Europe.’
The ambassador is right. When it comes to maidenheads, Henry is easier to play than a penny whistle.
‘I suppose he will be content with Madame Jane a month or two,’ Chapuys says, ‘till his eye lights on some other lady. Then it will be found that Jane has misled him – she was not free to marry after all, as she had some pre-contract with another gentleman. Yes?’
Eustache is fishing. He knows Anne Boleyn’s head is off, but he wants to know on what grounds her marriage was dissolved. For it had to be dissolved: death was not enough to take her child Eliza out of the succession, it had to be shown the marriage was no marriage, defective from the start. And how did the king’s clergy achieve this for him? He, Thomas Cromwell, is not about to say. He simply inclines his head and makes his way through the crush, changing his language as he goes. The new queen speaks only her mother tongue: and even that, not very often. Her brother Edward speaks French well. The younger brother, Tom Seymour – he doesn’t know what he speaks. He knows he never listens.