Murder Most Royal: The Story of Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard - Jean Plaidy

She laughed delightedly. “That is what everyone says to me now! Do you remember the stick you gave me with which to tap on the wall?”

They were laughing over their memories.

“And the adventures you used to have...and how we used to ride in the paddock...and how you...”

“Said I would marry you!”

“You did, you know, Thomas, and then you never did anything about it!”

“I never forgot!” he lied. “But now...” He looked across the garden and over the hedge to the windows of the palace. Even now, he thought, little hot jealous eyes might have caught sight of him. Living close to the King he knew something of his rages. Dangerously sweet was this contact with Catherine.

“It is too late now,” she said soberly, and she looked very sad. She saw Thomas as the lover to whom she had been betrothed for many years; she forgot Manox and Derham and believed that she had loved Thomas always.

“Suppose that we had married when it was suggested a year or so ago,” said Thomas.

“How different our lives would have been then!”

“And now,” he said, “I risk my life to speak to you.”

Her eyes widened with terror. “Then we must not stay here.” She laughed suddenly. They did not know the King, these people who were afraid of him. His Majesty was all kindness, all eagerness to make people happy really. As if he would hurt her cousin if she asked him not to!

“Catherine,” said Thomas, “I shall risk my life again and again. It will be worth it.”

He took her hand and kissed it, and left her in the pond garden.

They could not resist meeting secretly. They met in dark corridors; they feared that if it reached the ears of the King that they were meeting thus, there would be no more such meetings. Sometimes he touched her fingers with his, but nothing more; and after the first few meetings they were in love with each other.

There was a similarity in their natures; both were passionate, reckless people; they were first cousins and they knew now that they wished to enjoy a closer relationship; and because, when they had been children, they had plighted their troth in the paddock of Hollingbourne, they felt life had been cruel to them to keep them apart and bring them together only when it was too late for them to be lovers.

Catherine had little fear for herself, but she feared for him. He, a reckless adventurer who had been involved in more than one dangerous escape, was afraid not for himself but for her.

They would touch hands and cry out to each other: “Oh, why, oh, why did it have to happen thus!”

She would say to him, “I shall be passing along the corridor that leads to the music room at three of the clock this afternoon.”

He would answer: “I will be there as if by accident.”

All their meetings were like that. They would long for them all day, and then when they reached the appointed spot, it might be that someone was there, and it was impossible for them to exchange more than a glance. But to them both this danger was very stimulating.

There was one occasion when he, grown more reckless by the passing of several days which did not bring even a glimpse of her, drew her from the corridor into an antechamber and shut the door on them.

“Catherine,” he said, “I can endure this no longer. Dost not realize that thou and I were meant one for the other from the first night I climbed into thy chamber? We were but children then, and the years have been cruel to us, but I have a plan. Thou and I will leave the palace together. We will hide ourselves and we will marry.”

She was pale with longing, ever ready to abandon herself to the passion of the moment, but it seemed to her that she heard her cousin’s voice warning her. Catherine would never know the true story of Anne Boleyn, but she had loved her and she knew her end had been terrible. Anne had been loved by the same huge man; those eyes had burned hotly for Anne; those warm, moist hands had caressed her. Anne had had no sad story of a cousin to warn her.

Culpepper was kissing her hands and her lips, Catherine’s healthy young body was suggesting surrender. Perhaps with Manox or Derham she would have surrendered; but not with Culpepper. She was no longer a lighthearted girl. Dark shadows came pursuing her out of the past. Doll Tappit’s high voice. “The cries of the torture chambers are terrible....”

Catherine knew how the monks of the Charterhouse had died; she could not bear to think of others suffering pain, but to contemplate one she loved being vilely hurt was sufficient to stem her desire. She remembered how Derham had run for his life; but then she had been plain Catherine Howard. What of him who dared to love her whom the King had chosen for his Queen!

“Nay, nay!” she cried, tears falling from her eyes. “It cannot be! Oh, that it could! I would give all my life for one year of happiness with you. But I dare not. I fear the King. I must stay here because I love you.”

She tore herself away; there must be no more such meetings.

“Tomorrow...” she agreed weakly. “Tomorrow.”

She ran to her apartment, where, since Anne had left for Richmond, she enjoyed the state of a queen. She was greeted by one of her attendants, Jane Rochford, widow of her late cousin George Boleyn. Lady Rochford looked excited. There was a letter for Catherine, she said.

“A letter?” cried Catherine. “From whom?”

Catherine did not receive many letters; she took this one and opened it; she frowned for she had never been able to read very easily.

Jane Rochford was at her side.

“Mayhap I could assist?”

Jane had been very eager to ingratiate herself with Catherine; she had not liked the last Queen; Jane had decided to adhere to the Catholic cause and support Catherine Howard against Anne of Cleves.

Catherine handed her the letter.

“It is from a Jane Bulmer,” said Jane, “and it comes from York.”

“I remember. It is from Jane Acworth who went to York to marry Mr. Bulmer. Tell me what she says.”

Jane Bulmer’s letter was carefully worded. She wished Catherine all honor, wealth and good fortune. Her motive in writing was to ask a favor of Catherine, and this was that she should be found a place at court. Jane was unhappy in the country; she was desolate. A command from the future Queen to Jane’s husband to bring his wife to court would make Jane Bulmer very happy, and she begged for Catherine’s help.

The threat was in the last sentence.

“I know the Queen of Britain will not forget her secretary....”

Her secretary! Jane Bulmer it was who had written those revealing, those intimate and passionate letters to Derham; Jane Bulmer knew everything that had happened.

Catherine sat very still as Jane Rochford read to her; her face was rosy with shame.

Jane Rochford was not one to let such signs pass unnoticed. She, as well as Catherine, read into those words a hint of blackmail.

On a hot July day Cromwell made the journey from the Tower to Tyburn. Tyburn it was because it was not forgotten that he was a man of lowly origins; he could smile at this, though a short while ago it would have angered him; but what does a man care when his head is to be cut off, whether it be done at Tower Hill or Tyburn?

He had obeyed his master to the last; he had been more than the King’s servant; he had been the King’s slave. But to his cry for mercy, had his most gracious Prince been deaf. He had done with Cromwell. He had not allowed Cromwell to speak in his own defense. Cromwell’s fall would help to bring back Henry’s popularity, for the people of England hated Cromwell.

His friends? Where were they? Cranmer? He could laugh at the thought of Cranmer’s being his friend. Only a fool would expect loyalty in the face of danger from weak-kneed Cranmer. He knew that the Archbishop had declared himself smitten with grief; he had told the King that he had loved Cromwell, and the more for the love he had believed him to bear His Grace the King; he had added that although he was glad Cromwell’s treason was discovered, he was very sorrowful, for whom should the King trust in future?

He had said almost the same words when Anne Boleyn had been taken to the Tower. Poor Cranmer! How fearful he was. He must have faced death a thousand times in his imagination. There was never a man quicker to dissociate himself from a fallen friend!

Crowds had gathered to see Cromwell’s last moments. He recognized many enemies. He thought of Wolsey, who would have faced this, had he lived long enough. He had walked in the shadow of Wolsey, had profited by his example, by his brilliance and his mistakes; he had followed the road to power and had found it led to Tyburn.

There was one in the crowd who shed a tear for him. It was Thomas Wyatt, who had been as eager as Cromwell himself that the Lutheran doctrines should be more widely understood. Their eyes met. Cromwell knew that Wyatt was trying to reassure him, to tell him that cruelties he had inflicted on so many had been done at Henry’s command and that Cromwell was not entirely responsible for them. This young man did not know of the part Cromwell had played in the destruction of Anne Boleyn. Cromwell hoped then that he never would. His heart warmed to Wyatt.

“Weep not, Wyatt,” he said, “for if I were not more guilty than thou wert when they took thee, I should not be in this pass.”

It was time for him to make his last speech, to lay his head upon the block. He thought of all the blood he had caused to be shed, and tried to pray, but he could think of nothing but blood, and the scream of men in agony and the creaking of the rack.

Onto his thick neck, the axe descended; his head rolled away from his body as four years before, had Anne Boleyn’s.

The King was enchanted with his bride. In the great hall at Hampton Court, he proclaimed her Queen. None had known the King in such humor for years; he was rejuvenated.

A few days after the proclamation, he took her from Hampton Court to Windsor, and astonished everyone by cutting himself off from the court that he might enjoy the company of his bride in private. Catherine seemed doubly pleasing in the King’s eyes, coming after Anne of Cleves; she was gentle yet ever ready to laugh; she had no disconcerting wit to confound him; her conversation held not a trace of cleverness, only kindness. She was a passionate creature, a little afraid of him, but not too much so; she was responsive and womanly; and never had the King felt such drowsy and delicious peace. If she had a fault it was her generosity, her kindness to others. She would give away her clothes and jewels, explaining, her head a little on one side, her dewy lips parted, “But it becomes her so, and she had so little....” Or, “She is poor, if we could but do something for her, how happy I should be!” She was irresistible and he could not bring himself to reprimand her for this overlavishness; he liked it; for he too came in for his share of her generosity. He would kiss her and stroke her and tickle her; and have her shrieking with laughter. Never had he dreamed of such blessedness.

Anne of Cleves was ordered to come to court to pay homage to the new Queen. There was a good deal of speculation in the court as to how the displaced queen would feel when kneeling to one who had but a short time ago been her maid of honor. It was expected that Catherine would demand great homage from Anne of Cleves to prove to herself and to the court that she was safely seated on the throne and had command of the King’s affection. But when Anne came and knelt before the new Queen, Catherine impulsively declared that there should be no ceremony.

“You must not kneel to me!” she cried, and the two Queens embraced each other with tears of affection in their eyes, and it was Anne of Cleves who was moved to pity, not Catherine Howard.

Catherine would do honor to her cousin’s daughter, Elizabeth, partly because she was her cousin’s daughter, and partly because, of all her step-children, she loved Elizabeth best.

Mary was disposed to be friendly, but only because Catherine came from a family which adhered to the old Catholic faith, and Mary’s friendship for people depended entirely on whether or not they were what she called true Catholics. Mary was six years older than her father’s wife, and she thought the girl over-frivolous. Catherine accepted Mary’s disapproval of her at first because she knew the Princess had suffered so much, but eventually she was goaded into complaining that Mary showed her little respect; she added that if only Mary would remember that although she was young she was the Queen, she would be ready to be friendly. This resulted in a sharp reprimand to Mary from the King; but friendship was not made that way, and how could poor, plain, frustrated Mary help feeling certain twinges of jealousy for sparkling Catherine whose influence over the King appeared to be unlimited. Mary was more Spanish than English; she would often sink into deepest melancholy; she would spend hours on her knees in devotion, brooding on her mother’s dreary tragedy and the break with Rome; preferring to do this rather than sing and dance and be gay. On her knees she would pray that the King might come back to the true faith in all its old forms, that he might follow the example of her mother’s country and earn the approval of heaven by setting up an Inquisition in this careless island and torturing and burning all those who deserved such a fate, since they were heretics. How could soft-hearted, frivolous Catherine ever bring the King to take this duty upon himself! No, there could be no real friendship between Catherine and Mary.

Little Edward was not quite two years old; pale of face; solemn-eyed, he was watched over by his devoted nurse, Mrs. Sibell Penn, who was terrified that some cold breath of air might touch him and end his frail life.

Of course it was Elizabeth whom Catherine must love most, for the child already had a look of Anne, for all that she had inherited her father’s coloring. She would have Elizabeth at the table with them, occupying the place of honor next to Mary. She begged privileges for Elizabeth.

“Ah!” said Henry indulgently. “It would seem that England has a new ruler, and that Queen Catherine!”

“Nay!” she replied. “For how could I, who am young and foolish, rule this great country? That is for one who is strong and clever to do.”

He could not show his love sufficiently. “Do what thou wilt, sweetheart,” he said, “for well thou knowest, I have heart to refuse thee naught.”

He liked to watch them together—his favorite child and his beloved Queen. Seeing them thus, he would feel a deep contentment creep into his mind. Anne’s child is happy with my new Queen, he would tell himself; and because it would seem to him that there might be a plea for forgiveness in that thought, he would hastily assure himself that there was nothing for Anne to forgive.

He and Catherine rode together in the park at Windsor. He had never wandered about so unattended before; and he enjoyed to the full each day he shared with this lovely laughing girl. It was pleasant to throw off the cares of kingship and be a lover. He wished he were not so weighty, though he never could abide lean men; still, to puff and pant when you were the lover of a spritely young girl was in itself a sad state of affairs. But Catherine feigned not to notice the puffing and looked to it that he need not exert himself too much in his pursuit of her. She was perfect; his rose without a single thorn.