“How would you like me to proceed, sire?” the steward asked.
Henry waved his stout hand as if dismissing an idiot. “Tell her I expect the queen’s jewels to be in my presence within days or I shall have charges pressed upon her for thievery.”
The queen’s jewels, soon to be Anne’s, quickly arrived. Anne and I went through them together, comparing them with her wardrobe in advance of making suggestions to Henry’s jeweler on how to reset some so as to show off her garments, and the woman who wore them, to best advantage.
“You heard that Katherine remarked that she could not allow the jewels to adorn me, the scandal of Christendom?” Anne tried on a ring, too big round for her slender fingers.
“I did,” I said.
“And yet, here they are.” Anne slipped on a bracelet. “I shall ask Henry to have this refit. And also one made with those rubies.” She pointed to an outdated necklace with stunning stones. “It will be good for me to wear them in Boulogne.”
She stood up and, a bit regally, swept her hand toward the treasure. “Would you take care of these, then? I’d best get some rest afore tonight’s fitting for my gown. ’Twill need to be attended to quickly in order to be ready by September.”
“Yes, my lady,” I said. I don’t think she heard the irony in my subservient voice. Mayhap it was a tone she was growing accustomed to and enjoyed.
I carefully gathered up the queen’s jewels and thought about the king’s expensive taste—not for rings and bracelets, but for stubborn women.
There were only days before the ceremony at Windsor to invest Anne as Marquess of Pembroke, and trouble to sort out afore it began.
FIFTEEN
Year of Our Lord 1532
Windsor Castle
Calais
Whitehall Palace
At the end of August we made our way to Windsor Castle, which had been prepared for Anne’s investment ceremony. She was to be made Marquess of Pembroke, a rank that not only prepared her to be a royal consort but would befit her to meet with others of great rank while in France. We readied her in her rooms. Her aunt, the Duchess of Norfolk, had been selected to carry Anne’s mantle of ermine and her coronet. This was a great honor, but the arrogant duchess found it not so. She dithered back and forth but finally, on the day itself, sent her lady-in-waiting to deliver the news.
“My lady the Duchess of Norfolk sends her regrets, madam. She must decline the honor of serving you during today’s ceremony.”
Anne turned toward her. I watched the woman through narrow eyes: it had been she I’d seen at the reformer meetings. “Why must she decline?”
“She did not tell me, my lady.” The woman held herself with a haughtiness equal to her mistress’s. All knew it was a deep insult and I hoped Anne would address it directly. She did not disappoint.
“Then I shall inform you why,” Anne said. Her black eyes flashed and her mouth tightened. “Though the king required her father’s head but a few years back as payment for treason, the duchess feels that her dignity, and rank, preclude her from serving a Boleyn, even one about to be the queen.”
The ladies in the room gasped. All knew it to be true but none had yet said the word “queen” aloud when connected with Anne. Unspoken also was the knowledge that the duchess was one of Katherine of Aragon’s staunchest friends.
Anne, for once, seemed at a loss. I felt for her. She was stuck. The Countesses of Derby and Rutland were already serving her but she needed another highborn woman of sufficient rank to carry her mantle and coronet in order to keep her head high among the nobility. This was one dilemma Henry could not get her out of.
Please help her, I prayed, startling myself that I did.
Then the Duchess of Norfolk’s own daughter quietly spoke up. “I shall be pleased and privileged to carry your mantle and coronet, my lady, if you’ll permit me.”
Dear, dear Mary Howard. However did she spring from the loins of Elizabeth Howard and that hellhound duke?
Anne walked over and hugged Mary. “Thank you, Cousin. I would be honored to have your service. And here”—she reached over to her box of jewels—“let us find something that shall catch the Duke of Richmond’s attention, besides the lady who will wear it, of course.”
Mary laughed; all knew that she and the king’s son were in love. Her mother opposed the match. Mary now had a more powerful ally than her mother.
That morning Anne was conducted into the king’s presence with her ladies all round her. Her shining hair tumbled over her shoulders like a black river in the sunshine; my arms ached with the hundreds of brushstrokes I’d given it so it would appear thusly. Her olive-tinted skin was warm with the crimson velvet of her gown. The jewels had been quickly reset and now shimmered in the morning sunlight streaming in through the high clerestory windows.
Henry was flanked by the Duke of Norfolk, whose daughter carried Anne’s mantle, and the Duke of Suffolk, who looked as though he’d eaten spoilt meat. Anne knelt before the king and Bishop Gardiner, yea, he who had just months before argued with Henry for the church’s supremacy over the king, read out her patent. “This patent confers to you, and all your offspring, the title of Marquess of Pembroke, and all the attendant honor and income which comes with such title.”
The title was notable. It not only permanently placed Anne in the nobility, it made her rich. It had once belonged to Henry’s beloved uncle Jasper Tudor and was worth one thousand pounds per year income, a fortune, but one that would not go far. Like all nobility, Anne would be expected to spend, give, employ, and dress according to her rank. No other woman had ever been given the rank of marquess before. It had been solely an honor for men.
I watched Gardiner’s face as he spoke. He showed not a trace of hypocrisy. There were some at court who believed that the pope was the ultimate law for both church and state in England and some who felt that both were rightly vested in the king. A few, like Gardiner, seemed to know not whether they were fish or fowl and, for that, were respected not by either.
Mary Howard stepped forward and Henry took the crimson velvet mantle, trimmed in royal ermine, and the gold coronet of a marquess from her small hands. He gave her a reassuring look. “Thank you, mistress,” he said with especial kindness. Mary curtseyed and stepped back. Anne remained kneeling as the king draped her with the mantle and crowned her with the coronet. Their eyes met and locked at that precise moment and I knew, instinctively, what they were both thinking.
The next time this happens it will be at a coronation.
Henry had ordered a sumptuous meal of roast oxen and stewed fruit and creamy syllabubs lightly curdled with wine to celebrate the occasion. He and Anne both sat on the dais up front. I sat nearby and, after eating richly and dancing with a few friends, prepared to return to my rooms.
“My lady?” A voice came from behind me. “A dance?”
’Twas the man who’d given me his pew on Easter Sunday. “Sir Anthony,” I said, delighted.
“Just Anthony, to my friends.” He smiled at me and I smiled back afore I could stop myself.
“Anthony, then. How do you fare?”
“I fare well, mistress.” He called me by an unmarried maid’s title, and, though I was a widow, I did not correct him. “Happy to be here to celebrate this occasion with the marquess.” He nodded toward Anne, who was flushed with success and the love of a powerful man. “Would you like to dance?” I was about to beg off when he held up his hand. “Please, help an old man whose joints grow stiff with lack of use.”