Philippa Gregory - The Boleyn Inheritance

Clearly, there is only one woman.

Only one woman, brought to England by Thomas Cromwell, befriended by Lord Lisle, unmanning the king so that he was impotent on the night of his wedding and every night thereafter.

No one has named the witch yet; they are gathering evidence.

Princess Mary’s departure has been brought forward, and I have only a moment with her as we wait for them to bring the horses round from the stables.

“You know I am innocent of any wrongdoing,” I say to her under cover of the noise of the servants running around and her guards calling for their horses. “Whatever you hear in the future about me, please believe me: I am innocent.”

“Of course,” she says levelly. She does not look at me. She is Henry’s daughter; she has served a long apprenticeship in learning not to betray herself. “I shall pray for you every day. I shall pray that they all see your innocence as I do.”

“I am certain that Lord Lisle is innocent, too,” I say.

“Without doubt,” she replies in the same abrupt way.

“Can I save him? Can you?”

“No.”

“Princess Mary, on your faith, can nothing be done?”

She risks a sideways glance at me. “Dearest Anne, nothing. There is nothing to do but to keep our own counsel and pray for better times.”

“Will you tell me something?”

She looks around and sees that her horses have not yet come. She takes my arm and we walk a little way toward the stable yard as if we are looking to see how long they will be. “What is it?”

“Who is this Pole family? And why does the king fear the Papists when he defeated them so long ago?”

“The Poles are the Plantagenet family, of the House of York, some would say the true heirs to the throne of England,” she says. “Lady Margaret Pole was my mother’s truest friend; she was as a mother to me, she is utterly loyal to the throne. The king has her in the Tower now, with all of her family that he could capture. They are accused of treason, but everyone knows they have committed no offense but being of Plantagenet blood. The king is so fearful for his throne that I think he will not allow this family to live. Lady Margaret’s two grandsons, two little boys, are in the Tower also, God help them. She, my dearest Lady Margaret, she will not be allowed to live. Others of the family are in exile; they can never come home.”

“They are Papists?” I ask.

“Yes,” she says quietly. “They are. One of them, Reginald, is a cardinal. Some would say they are the true kings of the true faith of England. But that would be treason, and you would be put to death for saying it.”

“And why does the king fear the Papists so much? I thought England was converted to the reformed faith? I thought the Papists were defeated?”

Princess Mary shakes her head. “No. I should think fewer than half the people welcome the changes, and many wish for the old ways back again. When the king denied the authority of the Pope and destroyed the monasteries, there was a great rising of men in the north of the country, determined to defend the church and the holy houses. They called it the Pilgrimage of Grace, and they marched under the banner of the five wounds of Jesus Christ. The king sent the hardest man in the kingdom against them at the head of the army, and he feared them so badly that he called for a parley, spoke with sweet words, and promised them a pardon and a parliament.”

“Who was that?” Already I know.

“Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk.”

“And the pardon?”

“As soon as the army had disbanded, he beheaded the leaders and hanged the followers.” She speaks with as little inflection as if she is complaining that the luggage wagon is badly packed. “He promised a parliament and a pardon on the king’s sacred word. He gave his own word, too, on his honor. It meant nothing.”

“They are defeated?”

“Well, he hanged seventy monks from the roof timbers of their own abbey,” she says bitterly. “So they won’t defy him again. But no, I believe the true faith will never be defeated.”

She turns us so that we are strolling back to the door again. She smiles and nods at someone who calls “Safe journey” to her, but I cannot smile, too.

“The king fears his own people,” she says. “He fears rivals. He even fears me. He is my father, and yet sometimes I think he has gone half mad with mistrust. Any fear he has, however foolish, is real to him. If he so much as dreams that Lord Lisle has betrayed him, then Lord Lisle is a dead man. If someone suggests that his troubles with you are part of a plot, then you are in the gravest of danger. If you can get away, you should do. He cannot tell fear from truth. He cannot tell nightmares from reality.”

“I am Queen of England,” I say. “They cannot accuse me of witchcraft.”

She turns to face me for the first time. “That won’t save you,” she says. “It didn’t save Anne Boleyn. They accused her of witchcraft and they found the evidence and they found her guilty. She was as much queen as you.” She suddenly laughs as if I have said something funny, and I see that some of my ladies have come out of the hall and are watching us. I laugh, too, but I am sure anyone could hear the fear in my voice. She takes my arm. “If anyone asks me what we were talking about when we walked out and back to the steps again, I shall say that I was complaining that I would be late, and I was afraid of being tired.”

“Yes,” I agree, but I am so frightened that I am shaking as if I were chilled with cold. “I shall say you were looking to see when they would be ready.”

Princess Mary presses my arm. “My father has changed the laws of this land,” she says. “It is now a crime of treason, punishable by death, even to think ill of the king. You don’t have to say anything; you don’t have to do anything. Your own secret thoughts are treason now.”

“I am queen,” I maintain stubbornly.

“Listen,” she says bluntly. “He has changed the process of justice, too. You don’t have to be condemned by a court. You can be condemned to death on a Bill of Attainder. That is nothing more than the king’s order, supported by his parliament. And they never refuse to support him. Queen or beggar, if the king wants you dead, he just has to order it now. He does not even have to sign the warrant for an execution, he only has to use a seal.”

I find I am clenching my jaw to stop my teeth from chattering. “What do you think I should do?”

“Get away,” she says. “Get away before he comes for you.”

After she has gone I feel as if my last friend has left court. I go back to my rooms and my ladies set up a table of cards. I let them start to play, and then I summon my ambassador and take him into the window bay, where we cannot be overheard, to ask him if anyone has questioned him about me. He says they have not; he is ignored by everyone, isolated as if he were carrying the plague. I ask him if he could hire or buy two fast horses and keep them outside the castle walls in case of my sudden need. He says he has no money to hire or buy horses, and in any case the king has guards on my doors night and day. The men who I thought were there to keep me safe, to open the doors to my presence chamber, to announce my guests, are now my jailers.

I am very afraid. I try to pray, but even the words of the prayers are a trap. I cannot appear as if I am becoming a Papist, a Papist like Lord Lisle is now said to be; and yet I must not appear to have held to my brother’s religion; the Lutherans are suspected of being part of Cromwell’s plot to ruin the king.

When I see the king, I try to behave pleasantly and calmly before him. I dare not challenge him, nor even protest my innocence. Most frightening of all is his manner to me, which is now warm and friendly, as if we were acquaintances about to part after a short journey together. He behaves as if our time together has been an enjoyable interlude that is now naturally drawing to a close.