The Boleyn Inheritance

Jane Boleyn, Rochester, December 1539

‘Advise her about her dress!’ Lady Browne hisses at me, as if it is my fault that the new Queen of England looks so outlandish. ‘Jane Boleyn, tell me! Could she not have changed her dress in Calais?’

‘Who could have advised her?’ I ask reasonably. ‘All her ladies dress the same, after all.’

‘Lord Lisle could have advised her. He could have warned her that she couldn’t come to England looking like a friar in fustian. How can I be expected to keep her maids in order when they are laughing their heads off at her? I nearly had to smack Katherine Howard. That child has been one day in royal service and already she is mimicking the queen’s walk and, what is worse, she has her to the life.’

‘Maids are always naughty. You will command them.’

‘There is no time for dressmakers until she gets to London. She will have to go on as she has begun, even if she looks like a parcel. What is she doing now?’

‘She is resting,’ I say guardedly. ‘I thought I would leave her in peace for a moment.’

‘She is to be Queen of England,’ her ladyship snaps. ‘That is not a peaceful life for any woman.’

I say nothing.

‘Should we say anything to the king? Shall I speak to my husband?’ Lady Browne asks me, her voice very low. ‘Should we not tell Secretary Cromwell that we have … reservations? Will you say anything to the duke?’

I think quickly. I swear that I am not going to be the first to speak against this queen. ‘Perhaps you should speak to Sir Anthony,’ I say. ‘Privately, as his wife.’

‘Shall I tell him that we are agreed? Surely my lord Southampton realises that she is not fit to be queen. She is so graceless! And all but mute!’

‘I have no opinion, myself,’ I say rapidly.

She laughs at once. ‘Oh, Jane Boleyn, you always have an opinion; not much ever escapes you.’

‘Perhaps. But if the king has chosen her because she brings with her the Protestant alliance, if my lord Cromwell has chosen her because it makes us safe against Spain and France, then perhaps the fact that her hood is the size of a house will not matter to him. She can always change her hood. And I would not want to be the one to suggest to the king that the woman he has solemnly and unbreakably betrothed is not fit to be queen.’

That stops her in her tracks. ‘You think I would be mistaken to criticise her?’

I think of the white-faced girl who peeped out of the closet in Calais, too shy and too frightened to sit in a room with her own court, and I find that I want to defend her against this unkindness. ‘Well, I have no criticism to make of her,’ I say. ‘I am her lady in waiting. I may advise her as to her gowns or her hair if she asks me; but I would not have one word to say against her.’

‘Or at any rate, not yet,’ Lady Browne amends coldly. ‘Until you see an advantage for yourself.’

I let it pass for just as I am about to answer the door opens and the guard announces: ‘Mistress Catherine Carey, the queen’s maid in waiting.’

It is her. My niece. I have to face the child at last. I find a smile and I hold out my hands to her. ‘Little Catherine!’ I exclaim. ‘How you have grown!’

She takes my hands but she does not turn up her face to kiss my cheek. She looks at me quietly, as if she is taking the measure of me. The last time I saw her was when she stood behind her Aunt Anne the queen on the scaffold, and held her cloak as the queen put her head on the block. The last time she saw me was outside the courtroom when they called my name to go in to give evidence. I remember how she looked at me then: curiously. She looked at me so curiously, as if she had never seen such a woman before.

‘Are you cold? How was your journey? Will you have some wine?’ I am drawing her to the fire and she comes, but she is not eager. ‘This is Lady Browne,’ I say. Her curtsey is good, she is graceful. She has been well taught.

‘And how is your mother? And your father?’

‘They are well.’ Her voice is clear with just a hint of the country in her speech. ‘My mother sent you a letter.’

She brings it out of her pocket and hands it to me. I take it over to the light of the large square candle that we use in the royal household and break the seal.

Jane,

So starts Mary Boleyn, without a word of a title as if I did not hold the very name of her house in my name, as if I were not Lady Rochford while she lives at Rochford Hall. As if she did not have my inheritance and my house while I have hers, which is nothing.

Long ago I chose the love of my husband over the vanity and danger of the court, and we perhaps would all have been happier if you and my sister had done the same – God have mercy on her soul. I have no desire to return to court but I wish you and the new Queen Anne better fortune than before, and I hope that your ambitions bring you the happiness you seek, and not what some might think you deserve.

My uncle has commanded the attendance of my daughter Catherine at court and in obedience to him, she will arrive for the New Year. It is my instruction to her that she obeys only the king and her uncle, that she is guided only by my advice and her own good conscience. I have told her that, at the end, you were no friend to my sister nor my brother and advised her to treat you with the respect you deserve.

Mary Stafford

I am shaking after I have read this note and I re-read it again as if it might be different the second time. The respect I deserve? The respect I deserve? What did I do but lie and deceive to save the two of them till the very last moment, and then what did I do but protect the family from the disaster that they brought down on us? What could I do more? What should I have done differently? I obeyed the duke my uncle as I was bound to do, I did as he commanded me, and my deserts are these: that I am his faithful kinswoman and honoured as such.

Who is she to call me a woman who might have been a good wife? I loved my husband with every inch of my soul and being and I would have been everything to him if it were not for her and her sister and the net they made for him that he could not break, and that I could not break for him. Would he not be alive today if he had not gone down with his sister’s disgrace? Would he not be my husband and the father of our son today, if he had not been named with Anne and beheaded with Anne? And what did Mary do to save him? What did she ever do but suit herself?

I could scream with sheer rage and despair that she should set these thoughts running again in my head. That she should doubt my love of George, that she should reproach me! I am lost for words at the malice of her letter, at the veiled accusation. What else could I have done? I want to shout into her face. You were there, you were hardly the saviour of George and Anne. What else could any of us have done?

But she was always like this, she and her sister; they always had a way to make me feel that they saw better, understood better, considered better. From the moment that I married George I was aware that his sisters were supposed to be finer young women than I: one the king’s lover and then the other. One, in the end, the king’s wife and Queen of England. They were born for greatness! The Boleyn Sisters! And I was only ever a sister-in-law. Well, so be it. I have not got where I am today, I have not borne witness and sworn oaths to be reprimanded by a woman who ran away at the first sign of danger and married a man to hide in the country and pray Protestant prayers that good times would come.

Catherine, her daughter, looks at me curiously. ‘Did she show you this?’ I ask, my voice shaking. Lady Browne looks at me, avidly inquisitive.

‘No,’ Catherine says.

I put it into the fire, as if it were evidence against me. The three of us watch it burn to grey ash. ‘I will reply later,’ I say. ‘It was not at all important. For now, I will go and see that they have prepared your room.’

It is an excuse to get away from the two of them and the soft ash from the notepaper in the fire. I go quickly out and I call the maids and scold them for inattention, and then I go quietly to my own room and lean my hot forehead against the cool, thick glass. I shall ignore this slander, I shall ignore this insult, I shall ignore this enmity. Whatever its cause. I live in the heart of the court. I serve my king and my family. In time they shall all acknowledge me as the finest of the family, the Boleyn girl who served king and family to the end, never shrinking, never faltering, even if the king has grown fat and dangerous, and the family are all dead but me.

Katherine, Rochester, 31 December 1539

Now let me see, what do I have? What do I have now I am practically a grown-up lady at court?

I have three new gowns, which is good, but it is hardly a vast wardrobe for a girl who expects to be much observed and much commented on. I have three new hoods to match, which are very pretty but none of them are trimmed with anything more than gold lace and I see that many of the ladies of court have pearls and even precious stones on their hoods. I have some good gloves and a new cloak and a muff and a couple of lace collars, but I cannot say that I am overly indulged in my choice or quantity of clothes. And what is the point of being at court if I do not have a great deal of pretty things to wear?

For all my great hopes of court life, it is not proving to be very merry. We came down by boat from Gravesend in the worst weather I have ever seen, driving rain and terrible wind so my hood was all blown about and my hair a mess, and my new velvet cape got wet and I am sure it will be water-marked. The queen-to-be greeted us with a face as blank as a fish. They may say she is tired but she seems just amazed by everything, like some peasant come to town for the first time, she stares astounded at the commonest of sights. When people cheer for her she smiles and waves like a child at a travelling fair, but when she is called upon to greet a lord come to her court, she forever looks around for one of her Cleves companions and mutters to them in their stupid language, puts out her hand as if she was serving a joint of meat and says nothing in English at all.

When I was presented to her she barely looked at me, she looked at all of us new girls as if she did not know what we were doing in her chamber, nor what she should do with us. I thought she might at least ask for music and I have a song note-perfect and ready to sing but, absurdly, she said that she must pray and she went off and shut herself in her closet. My cousin Jane Boleyn says that she does that when she wants to be alone, and that it is a sign not of piety, but of her shyness, and that we must be kind to her and merry with her and she will soon learn our language and be less simple.

I can’t see it myself. She has a shift under her gown that comes up nearly to her chin. She has a hood that must be a ton in weight crammed on her head, she is broad in the shoulders and she could be any size in the hips under that pudding-bowl of a gown. Lord Southampton seems very taken with her, but perhaps he is just relieved that the journey will soon be over and his job done. The English ambassadors who were at Cleves with her chat to her in her language and then she is all smiles and chatters back at them like a quacking duckling. Lady Lisle seems to like her. Jane Boleyn is often at her side. But I am afraid that this is not going to be a very merry court for me, and what is the point of a court at all if it is not merry with dancing and flirtation? Indeed, what is the point of anyone being a young queen at all if she is not going to be merry and vain and silly?

Jane Boleyn, Rochester, 31 December 1539

There is to be a bull-baiting after dinner and Lady Anne is shown to the window that overlooks the courtyard so that she can have the best view. As soon as she appears at the window a cheer goes up from the men in the yard below, even though they are bringing out the dogs and it is rare for common men to break off from gambling at such a moment. She smiles and waves to them. She is always easy with the ordinary people, and they like her for it. Everywhere we have been on the road she has a smile for the people who come out to see her, and she will blow a kiss to little children who throw posies of flowers in her litter. Everyone is surprised at this. Not since Katherine of Aragon have we had a queen who is so smiling and pleasant to the common people, and not since Aragon has England relished the novelty of a foreign princess. No doubt this one will learn to be easy with the court too, in time.

I stand beside her on one side and one of her German friends is on the other so that he can tell her what is being said. Lord Lisle is there, of course, and Archbishop Cranmer. He is devoting himself to being pleasing, of course. She may be Cromwell’s candidate, and thus an asset for his rival; but his worst fear must have been that the king would bring in a Papist princess, and this reforming archbishop would see his church turned back to the old ways once more.

Some of the court are at the windows to see the baiting, some are gossiping quietly at the back of the room. I cannot hear exactly what is being said, but I think there are more than Lady Browne who think that the Lady Anne is not well-suited to the great position that she has been called on to fill. They judge her harshly for her shyness and her lack of speech. They blame her for her clothes and they laugh at her for not being able to dance or sing or play a lute. This is a cruel court, devoted to frivolity, and she is a girl easy to use as a butt for sarcasm. If this goes on, what will happen? She and the king are all but married. Nothing can stop the wedding. He can hardly send her home in disgrace, can he? For the crime of wearing a heavy hood? Not even the king can do that, surely? Not even this king can do it? It would bring Cromwell’s treaty down about his ears, it would bring down Cromwell himself, it would leave England friendless facing France and Spain without any Protestant alliance at our back. The king will never risk it, I am sure. But I cannot imagine what will happen.

Down in the yard below they are getting ready to release the bull, his handler unclips the rope from the ring in his nose, skips out of the way, vaults over the boards and the men who have been sitting on the wooden benches rise to their feet and start to shout bets. The bull is a great animal with heavy shoulders and a thick, ugly head. He turns this way and that, spotting the dogs from one little eye and then the other. The dogs are none too eager to be the first to run in, they are afraid of him in his power and his strength.

I feel a little breathless. I have not seen a bull-baiting since I was last at court, I had forgotten what a savage excitement it is to see the yapping dogs and the great beast that they will pull down. It is rare to see a bull as big as this one, his muzzle scarred from earlier fights, his horns barely blunted. The dogs hang back and bark, sharp, persistent barks with the thrilling sound of fear behind them. He turns from one to another, threatening them with the sweep of his horns, and they fall back into a circle around him.

One rushes in, and at once the bull spins, you would not think such a great animal could move so quickly, his head ploughs low and there is a scream like a human cry from the dog as the horns buffet his body, his bones are broken for sure. He is down and cannot crawl away, he is yelping like a baby, the bull stands over him, his head down, and grinds the side of his great horn into the screaming dog.

I find I am crying out, though whether for the dog or for the bull I couldn’t say. There is blood on the cobbles but the bull’s attack has left him unguarded to the other dogs, and another darts in and takes a bite at his ear. He turns, but at once another fastens on his throat and hangs there for a moment, his white teeth bared and gleaming in the torchlight, while the bull bellows for the first time and the roar of it makes all the maids scream and me among them, and everyone is now crowding to the windows to see as the bull rakes his head round and the dogs fall back and one of them howls with rage.

I find I am trembling, crying out for the dogs to go on! Go on! I want to see more, I want to see all of it, and Lady Anne beside me is laughing, she is excited too, she points to the bull where his ear is bleeding, and I nod and say, ‘He will be so angry! He will kill them for sure!’ And then suddenly, a bulky man I don’t know, a stranger smelling of sweat and wine and horses, pushes in front of us, into the window bay where we are standing, pushes rudely by me, and says to the Lady Anne, ‘I bring you greetings from the King of England,’ and he kisses her, full on the mouth.

At once I turn to shout for the guards. This is an old man of nearly fifty, a fat man, old enough to be her father. She thinks at once that he is some drunk fool who has managed to push his way into her chamber. She has greeted a hundred men, a thousand men, with a smile and an extended hand and now this man, wearing a marbled cape and a hood pulled over his head, comes up to her and pushes his face into hers and puts his slobbery mouth on hers.

Then I bite off my shout of alarm, I see his height, and I see the men who have come in with him in matching capes, and I know him at once for the king. At the same moment, like a miracle, at once he does not seem old and fat and distasteful. As soon as I know he is the king I see the prince that I have always seen, the one they called the handsomest prince in Christendom, the one that I was in love with myself. This is Henry, King of England, one of the most powerful men in the entire world, the dancer, the musician, the sportsman, the courtly knight, the lover. This is the idol of the English court, as big as the bull in the yard below us, as dangerous as a bull when wounded, as likely to turn on any challenger and kill.

I don’t curtsey because he is in disguise. I learned from Katherine of Aragon herself that one should never see through his disguises, he loves to unmask and wait for everyone to exclaim that they had no idea who the handsome stranger was, that they admired him for himself, without knowing that he was our wonderful young king.

And so, because I cannot warn Lady Anne, the scene in our gallery becomes a baiting to equal what is going on, bloodily, in the courtyard below us. She pushes him away, two firm hands against his fat chest, and her face, sometimes so dull and stolid, is burning with colour. She is a modest woman, an untouched girl, and she is horrified that this man should come and insult her. She rubs the back of her hand over her face to erase the taste of his lips. Then, terribly, she turns her head and spits his saliva from her mouth. She says something in German that needs no translation, clearly it is a curse against this commoner who has presumed to touch her, to breathe his wine-scented breath into her face.

He stumbles back, he, the great king, almost falls back before her contempt. Never in his life has a woman pushed him away, never in his life has he ever seen any expression in any woman’s face but desire and welcome. He is stunned. In her flushed face and bright, offended gaze he sees the first honest opinion of himself that he has ever known. In a terrible, blinding flash he sees himself as he really is: an old man, long past his prime, no longer handsome, no longer desirable, a man that a young woman would push roughly away from her because she could not stand his smell, because she could not bear his touch.

He reels back as if he has taken a mortal blow to the face, to his heart. I have never seen him like this before. I can almost see the thoughts running behind his stunned, flabby face. The sudden realisation that he is not handsome, the realisation that he is not desirable, the terrible realisation that he is old and ill and one day he will die. He is no longer the handsomest prince in Christendom, he is a foolish old man who thought that he could put on a cape and a hood and ride out to meet a girl of twenty-four, and she would admire the handsome stranger, and fall in love with the king.

He is shocked to his soul, and now he looks foolish and confused like a muddled grandfather. Lady Anne is magnificent, she is drawn up to her full height and she is angry, she is powerful, she is standing on her dignity and she shoots a look at him which dismisses him from her court as a man that no-one would want to know. ‘Leave me,’ she says in heavy-accented English, and she turns her shoulder on him as if she would push him away again.

She looks around the room for a guard to arrest this intruder, and she notices for the first time that no-one is springing to save her, we are all appalled, no-one knows what they can say or do to recover this moment: Lady Anne outraged, the king humbled in his own eyes, thrown down before us all. The truth of the king’s age and decay is suddenly, painfully, unforgiveably apparent. Lord Southampton steps forwards but is lost for words; Lady Lisle looks at me and I see my shock mirrored in her face. It is a moment of such intense embarrassment that all of us – we skilled flatterers, courtiers, liars – are lost for words. The world we have been building for thirty years, around our prince who is ageless, eternally handsome, irresistibly desirable, has been shattered about our ears – and by a woman we none of us respect.

He turns wordlessly, he almost stumbles as he goes, his stinking leg giving way beneath him, and Katherine Howard, that clever, clever little girl, catches her breath in a gasp of absolute admiration and says to him: ‘Ooh! Forgive me, sir! But I am new to court myself, a stranger like you. May I ask – who are you? What is your name?’