1
Mary
All I have ever wanted was to be loved, to find on this earth a love as true and everlasting as God’s.
A
s Father lay dying, I remembered a time when he had well and truly loved me; a time when he had called me the most valuable jewel in his kingdom, his most precious pearl, dearer than any diamond. Those were the days when he would burst through the door, like the bright golden sun imperiously brushing aside an ugly black rain cloud, and sweep me up into his arms and ask, “How fares my best sweetheart?” and kiss me and call me “the pearl of my world!” Easter of the year I turned five, upon a whim of his, to illustrate this, he had me dressed in a white gown, cap, and dainty little shoes so densely encrusted with pearls I seemed to be wearing nothing else, they were sewn so thick and close. And when I walked into the royal chapel between him and my mother, holding their hands, turning my head eagerly from left to right to smile up at them, I walked in love.
On my next birthday, my sixth, I awoke to find a garden of fragrant rosemary bushes, one for each year of my life, growing out of gilded pots, their branches spangled with golden tinsel and glowing mysteriously from within with circles of rosy pink, sunny yellow, sapphire blue, emerald green, and ruby red light, emanating, I discovered, from little lanterns with globes of colored glass concealed inside. My father had created a veritable fairyland for me, peopled with beautiful fairies and evil imps, grotesque goblins and mischievous elves, leering trolls, playful pixies, crook-backed gnomes, and gossamer-winged sprites, and the Fairy Queen herself, flame-haired and majestic in emerald green, all made of sugar and marzipan in a triumph of confectioner’s art. I stood before them timid and unsure, hardly daring to move or breathe, in case they truly were real and might work some terrible magic upon me if I dared interfere with them, until Father laughed and bit the head off a hobgoblin to show me I had nothing to fear. And there were four gaily costumed dwarves, two little women and two little men, every seam, and even their tiny shoes and caps, sewn with rows of tiny tinkling gold bells, to cavort and dance and play with me. We joined hands and danced rings around the rosemary bushes until we grew dizzy and fell down laughing. And when I sat down to break my fast, Father took it upon himself to play the servant and wait upon me. When he tipped the flagon over my cup, golden coins poured out instead of breakfast ale and overflowed into my lap and spilled onto the floor where the dwarves gathered them up for me.
In those days we were very much a family and, to my child’s eyes, a
happy
family. Before I was of an age to sit at table and attend banquets and entertainments with them, Mother and Father used to come into my bedchamber every night to hear my prayers on their way to the Great Hall. How I loved seeing them in all their jewels and glittering finery standing side by side, smiling down at me, Father with his arm draped lovingly about Mother’s shoulders, both of them with love and pride shining in their eyes as they watched me kneel upon my velvet cushioned prie-dieu in my white nightgown and silk-beribboned cap, eyes closed, brow intently furrowed, hands devoutly clasped as I recite my nightly prayers. And when I was old enough to don my very own sparkling finery and go with them to the Great Hall, I cherished each and every shared smile, sentimental heart-touched tear, and merry peal of laughter as, together, we delighted in troupes of dancing dogs and acrobats, musicians, minstrels, morris dancers, storytellers, and ballad singers.
And we served God together. Faithful and devout, we attended Mass together every day in the royal chapel. My mother spent untold hours kneeling in her private chapel before a statue of the Blessed Virgin surrounded by candles, a hair shirt chafing her lily-white skin red and raw beneath her somberly ornate gowns, and hunger gnawing at her belly as she persevered in fasting, begging Christ’s mother to intercede on her behalf so that her womb might quicken with the son my father desired above all else.
When the heretic Martin Luther published his vile and evil blasphemies, Father put pen to paper and wrote a book to refute them and defend the holy sacraments. When it was finished he had a copy bound in gold and sent a messenger to present it to the Pope, who, much impressed, declared it “a golden book both inside and out,” and dubbed Father “Defender of the Faith.” To celebrate this accolade, Father ordered all the pamphlets and books, the writings of Martin Luther that had been confiscated throughout the kingdom, assembled in the courtyard in a great heap. In a gown of black velvet and cloth-of-gold, with a black velvet cap trimmed with gold beads crowning my famous, fair marigold hair, I stood with Mother, also clad in black and gold, upon a balcony overlooking the courtyard, holding tight to her hand, and clasping a rosary of gold beads to my chest as I, always shortsighted, squinted down at the scene below. I felt such a rush of pride as Father, clad like Mother and I in black and gold, strode forth with a torch in his hand and set Luther’s lies ablaze. I watched proudly as the curling white plumes of smoke rose up, billowing, wafting, twirling, and swirling, as they danced away on the breeze.
I also remember a very special day when I was dressed for a very special occasion in pomegranate-colored velvet and cloth-of-gold encrusted with sparkling white diamonds, lustrous pearls from the Orient, regal purple amethysts, and wine-dark glistening garnets, with a matching black velvet hood covering my hair, caught up beneath it in a pearl-studded net of gold. I was being presented to the Ambassadors of my cousin, the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V. Though he was many years older than myself, it was Mother’s most dearly cherished desire that we would marry; she had always wanted a Spanish bridegroom for me and raised me as befitted a lady of Spain, and the Ambassadors had come to judge and consider my merits as a possible bride for Charles.
As I curtsied low before those distinguished gentlemen in their somber black velvets and sharp-pointed beards like daggers made of varnished hair, suddenly the solemnity of the moment was shattered by Father’s boisterous laughter. He clapped his hands and called for music, then there he was, a jewel-encrusted giant sweeping his “best sweetheart” up in his strong, powerful arms, tossing me up high into the air, and catching me when I came down, skirts billowing, laughing and carefree, for all the world like a woodcutter and his daughter instead of the King of England and his little princess.
“This girl never cries!” he boasted when Mother sat forward anxiously in her chair, a worried frown creasing her brow, and said, “My Lord, take care, you will frighten her!”
But I just laughed and threw my arms around his neck, his bristly red beard tickling my cheek, and begged for more.
The musicians struck up a lively measure, and he led me to the center of the floor, took my tiny hand in his, and shouted that I was his favorite dancing partner, and never in all his years had he found a better one.
As the skipping, prancing steps of the dance took us past the Ambassadors, suddenly he ripped the hood and net from my hair and tossed them into their startled midst. He combed his fingers through the long, thick, rippling waves, then more gold than red on account of my youth—I was but nine years old at the time—and his pride and joy in me showed clear upon his face.
“What hair my sweetheart has!” he cried. “My Lords, I ask you, have you
ever
seen such hair?”
And indeed he spoke the truth. In my earliest years I had Mother’s Spanish gold hair lovingly united with Father’s Tudor red, blending beautifully into an orange-yellow shade that caused the people to fondly dub me “Princess Marigold.” “God bless our Princess Marigold!” they would shout whenever I rode past in a litter or barge or mounted sidesaddle upon my piebald pony, smiling and waving at them before reserved dignity replaced childish enthusiasm.
Though it may seem vain to say it, I had such beautiful hair in my youth, as true and shining an example as there ever was of why a woman’s tresses are called her crowning glory. But before my youth was fully past it began to thin and fade until its lustrous beauty and abundance were only a memory and I was glad to pin it up and hide it under a hood, inside a snood or net, or beneath a veil.
But oh how I treasured the memory of Father’s pride in me and my beautiful hair! The day he danced with me before the Ambassadors became one of my happiest memories.
I would never forget the way he swept me up in his arms and spun me round and round, my marigold hair flying out behind my head like a comet’s tail, as he danced me from one end of the Great Hall to the other.
I
never
thought the love he felt for me then would ever diminish or die. I thought my earthly father’s love, like our Heavenly Father’s love, was permanent, unchanging, and everlasting.
“This girl never cries!” Father had said. Little did he know I would make up for a childhood filled with unshed tears by crying whole oceans of them in later years, and that most of them would be spilled on account of him, the callousness and cruelty he would mete out to me in place of the love and affection he once gave so freely and unconditionally to me.
But that was yet to come, and in those early days I truly was a princess. I sat on my own little gilded and bejeweled throne, set upon a dais, and upholstered in purple velvet with a canopy of estate, dripping with gold fringe, above me, and a plump purple cushion below me to rest my feet upon. And I wore gowns of velvet, damask, and brocade, silk, satin, silver, and gold; I sparkled with a rainbow of gems, and snuggled in ermine and sable when I was cold; gloves of the finest Spanish leather sheathed my hands; I walked in slippers made of cushion-soft velvet embroidered with pearls, gems, or gilt thread, and when I rode, boots of Spanish leather with silken tassels encased my feet; and underneath my finery only the finest lawns and linens touched my skin. But it was not the prestige and finery I liked best; being my father’s daughter was what delighted my heart most. And during the bad years that followed the blissful ones, I used to think there was nothing I would not give to hear him call me “my best sweetheart” again.
Having no son to initiate into the manly pursuits, Father made do as best he could with me. He took me with him to the archery butts, and when I was nine he gave me my first hawk and taught me to fly her. We rode out at the head of a small retinue, me in my velvet habit, dyed the deep green of the forest, sidesaddle upon my piebald pony, the bells on my goshawk’s jesses jingling, and the white plume on my cap swaying. And Father, a giant among men, powerfully muscular yet so very graceful, astride his great chestnut stallion, clad in fine white linen and rich brown hunting leathers, with bursts of rainbow light blazing out from the ring of white diamonds that encircled the brim of his velvet cap, and the jaunty white plume that topped it bouncing in the breeze.
We were following our hawks when we came to a large ditch filled with muddy water so dark we could not discern the bottom. Father made a wager with one of his men that he could swing himself across it on a pole. But when he tried, the pole snapped beneath his weight, and Father fell with a great splash, headfirst into the murky water. His legs and arms flailed and thrashed the surface frantically, but his head never appeared; it was stuck fast, mired deep in the mud below.
Edmund Moody, Father’s squire, who would have given his life a hundred times over for him, did not hesitate. He dove in and worked to free my father’s head. I could not bear to stand there doing nothing but watching helplessly, praying and wringing my hands, fearing that my beloved father might drown, so I recklessly plunged in, my green velvet skirts billowing up about my waist, floating on the muddy water like a lily pad. As I went to assist Master Moody, the tenacious mud sucked at my boots so that every step was a battle, slowing me down and showing me how it must be holding Father’s head in a gluelike grip.
But through our diligent and determined efforts, Father was at last freed. Sputtering and gasping, coughing and gulping in mouthfuls of air, Father emerged and, leaning heavily between us, we helped him onto the grass, and he lay with his head in my lap as I tenderly cleaned the mud from his hair and face. An awed and humble cottager’s wife brought us pears, cheese, and nuts in her apron, and we sat in the sun and feasted upon them as if they were the finest banquet while the sun dried us. Father made a joke about how my skirts had floated about me like a lily pad and called me his lily. And when we returned to the palace he summoned a goldsmith and commissioned a special jeweled and enameled ring for me to commemorate that day when I had helped save his life—a golden frog and a pink and white lily resting on a green lily pad. It was the greatest of my worldly treasures, and for years afterward a week scarcely passed when it did not grace my finger. Even when I did not wear it, I kept it safe in a little green velvet pouch upon my person so I would always know it was there with me, a proud and exquisite emblem of Father’s love for me.
Those were the happy days before the sad years of ignominy and disgrace, penury, indifference, and disdain, the callousness and cruelty he learned under the tutelage of The Great Whore, Anne Boleyn, the threats and veiled coercion, followed by a sort of uneasy tolerance, a truce, when he offered me a conditional love wherein I must betray my conscience, my most deeply cherished beliefs, and my own mother’s sainted memory, and capitulate where she herself had held firm, if I wanted to bask in the sun of his love again.