However, the current royal marital woes did not discourage the king from courting a new lady, Catherine Howard, pretty, young and vivacious—and one who could speak the king’s English—a cousin to Anne Boleyn, no less. After my erroneously thinking that Jane Seymour would not keep the king’s attention enough for him to wed her, I predicted that the Howard girl would hold out for wife instead of mistress. It did seem to me that each time the king considered a new wife, he chose one quite the opposite from the one he was replacing, but they all had learned to use the same tactics.
For this interview, I had dressed carefully but circumspectly in a simple dark-hued gown. My thick hair was pulled back under a borrowed gabled hood which His Majesty’s still-mourned Queen Jane had brought back into fashion. Trembling, I waited in the presence chamber until my name was announced; one of the yeomen guards at the withdrawing room door swept it open for me.
“Your Majesty,” I said as I curtsied before him as deeply as I could manage and yet look graceful.
I stayed down a moment because I feared my face would show shock or alarm. How greatly the red-haired Adonis, the once athletic, virile man, had changed. Henry Tudor, who would have his forty-ninth birthday later this month of June 1540, not only filled the chair upon which he sat but overspilled it. His eyes, now beady like a trapped animal’s, seemed to have sunk into his florid face. His auburn hair had grayed and thinned. And I could see from the vantage point of my curtsy, before he indicated I should rise, that his right leg was wrapped with a big, seeping bandage under his bulging silk stockings. And this was the man now courting a nineteen-year-old girl who loved to dance? At least, I prayed silently, let him be in a good humor.
“Cromwell, Earl of Essex, brought you to court years ago,” he said without so much as inquiring about Elizabeth’s progress, though the child had spent some time with him the day before and was thrilled to have had even a few minutes of his attention.
Dear Lord in heaven,
I thought,
he is going to dismiss me from my duties. Cromwell will pull me down with him.
I struggled to strengthen my backbone and my voice. “That is correct, Your Grace. I must admit that Master Cromwell, as he was then called, was impressed with my diligent learning and my desire to serve Your Majesty, which I have done these years with great pride and purpose.”
“Ah. Yes,” he said, stroking his salt-and-red-pepper beard and regarding me through narrowed eyes. “At any rate, the child cares deeply for you, and you seem to have done a good service to her, but for her misliking needlework, which all women should favor.”
“Yes, Your Majesty. But she rides beautifully, though she could never sit a horse as well as you.”
He merely nodded. I recalled that no compliment could possibly overreach with this man who was so used to being praised. “Mistress Kat,” he said. “She calls you Kat.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“And tells me you have a pet name for her: lovey.”
“She is a lovely child, a great honor to Your Majesty in her learning and her looks.”
“True. She has a sharp, busy little mind. Hair as crimson as my sister’s—the Tudor rose, they called her. But to business.”
Cromwell’s chant, I thought: to business. Always to business. I had to force myself to breathe. What would happen to the man who had been for a time another Wolsey, as powerful in this realm as the king? What would become of me if this man sent me away from his daughter? What if he had learned that I had abetted his stubborn daughter Mary’s defiance years ago? Worse, what if Tom Seymour, who yet rode high in his regard as his heir’s uncle, had told him dreadful lies about my character?
“I like someone solid and sober and staid around that child,” he said, tapping his beringed fingers on the carved arm of his chair. They had grown as puffy as sausages. “I know you have a rural upbringing and favor the new learning and reformed religion.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“And have an impeccable reputation.”
Thank God, neither Tom Seymour nor Cromwell had told him different. Or was he baiting me?
“Yes, Sire, though to live at court off and on is to invite rumors, some of which are most unfair to reputations.”
“Very true. But, mistress, my point is this, so heed me well. Because Elizabeth carries her wanton mother’s blood, she must be closely watched. She must not be encouraged to be frivolous or fanciful—or, later, flirty. She must be encouraged to follow my ruling and not to inquire of or romanticize her mother. Unlike the Boleyn, her cousin Catherine Howard is virtue personified. Elizabeth’s mother did not set a good example for the girl, and she must needs be reminded of that.”
The ring I wore almost burned my finger, stoking anger in me. If I tried to fight him in any way, I knew I would lose Elizabeth, lose the opportunity to help her at least be near her brother’s throne someday.
“I understand completely what you are saying, Your Majesty,” I managed, then actually bit my tongue to keep from declaring
but I believe you are completely wrong.
“Good. I like a reasonable woman. Then we are agreed.”
I know not why, but a rebellious, rapturous thought rose within me, one I prayed would not cause harm if pursued.
“Your Grace, I was hoping I could make a request—about the Lady Elizabeth’s riding. I can certainly work with her to develop her needlework, and I vow to have proof of that in your hands soon, but she could benefit from a riding instructor—to improve her already inherent talents that have come from you.”
“
Hm
, yes, I suppose I can spare a man. Or was there someone in the countryside you recommend?”
Ha, Cromwell,
I thought perversely.
Your vaunted power with the king is slipping, but he is asking me for advice.
“I know not, Your Grace, and would leave such judgments to you, of course,” I said, deciding to try to get my way by a feminine wile and not to stand up to him as I longed to do. My words came in a rush. “But I do know that I have seen only one man who rides as smoothly as you do, and that is John Ashley, who I have heard serves with your Master of the Horse here at court.”
I was afraid again. What if John had become ambitious in my absence and no longer wanted to escape the hothouse of the court? What if he would curse me for having him assigned to rural places in service to the daughter of the disgraced Anne Boleyn? No, John had cared deeply for the Boleyn heritage. Surely, I could pay him back for his kindnesses to me this way. I prayed he had not formed an attachment to another woman. How deeply I longed to see him.
“I’ll arrange it forthwith and look forward to a pretty piece of needlework from your lovey,” the king told me with a dismissive wave.
I thanked him, curtsied and backed a few steps away before turning toward the door. My love for my royal charge—and, yes, fear for my own well-being—had kept my contempt for this man from my face and voice. Yet now I understood how Anne Boleyn had stomached saying the words on the scaffold to praise the cruel and brutal king who had ruined her and could ruin any of us, even my Elizabeth.
That very evening,
after Elizabeth fell asleep while a maid slept in a truckle bed nearby, I stepped out into the corridor at Greenwich. I was instantly on edge, for it was dim and deserted. Ever since Tom had attacked me when I was alone in the hall at Westminster Palace, I was wary of such situations. But my chamber was just next door so I hastened toward it, hearing only the swish of my own skirts and footsteps and—“Kat! Kat!”
I nearly bolted, until I recognized that voice. My hand to the door latch, I hesitated. “John?”
He appeared at the top of the servants’ staircase and gestured to me. I quickly recalled what I had rehearsed all day since my interview with the king. If John was pleased with his new assignment, I would be modest, or if he did not know I had put his name forth, I would not mention how it came about. If he was unhappy, I would apologize and beg his forgiveness. If—
As I stepped closer, in the shadows between the top balustrade and the wall, he pulled me into his arms and kissed me.
Any words, any thoughts, went sailing into the wild blue. His hands anchored me to him breast to chest, soft thighs to his rock-hard ones. His codpiece thrust my petticoats against the bottom of my belly. I was quickly so dizzy I thought I must be tumbling down the stairs with him. It went on and on until we both came up for air, breathing in unison.
“Did the king ask you?” I gasped out.
“Told me, more like, and told me who suggested it.”
“Yes, I thought—”
He was kissing me again, his hands roving my waist and back, then tipping my head to possess my mouth fully again. I tilted into him, any will of my own gone as yielding as water.
When we finally broke the next kiss, he whispered, “The king is in a roaring good mood because of the young girl he’s enamored with—his next wife, no doubt—but he’s not my concern. Kat, I’ve waited for some real sign from you that you cared for me, especially after you avoided me when I first pursued you. So you had not a bit of self-interest in getting me appointed to the same household you are in?” Laughter mellowed his deep voice. “You did it only for the Lady Elizabeth, of course.” Holding my chin in his big callused hand, he looked deep into my eyes, demanding the truth and all I longed to give him.
“Why, what could there be in it for me?” I teased back, my voice shaky. As much as I wanted John Ashley, his passion almost frightened me—or, rather, my own did. I wanted to lie with him here and now, whoever came upon us be damned. “I did it for Hatfield’s horses, which are in dire need of care,” I told him with a low laugh. “Besides, you told me you want to write a book about the art of riding, and I am writing a book about my life, so late into the evenings, we can write side by side, that is all.”
He chuckled, then sobered when we heard voices echo down the hall. “We will serve Elizabeth well together, Kat,” he whispered hotly against my ear. “And I pray there will be fewer people about in the country to catch us together, sunny days outside away from prying eyes, for do you not need riding lessons too?” he asked with a crooked grin and a soft double-bump against my hips.
Even though I felt so warm, I blushed. At the age of thirty-four, I was blushing! But I had been so busy that suitors of any sort—a plague on Tom Seymour—had not been part of my experience. Yet I could not allow our banter and heady feelings to cloak reality. “Jesting aside, I’ve no doubt Cromwell still has spies in rural houses too,” I insisted.
“Soon, I think, he’ll have no more need of spies,” he said, looking right, then left, as if the walls had ears. I recall once, in Devon, Cromwell had said that very thing. “I scent it in the air,” John added, standing me back a bit as the voices of at least two women came closer. “I hear Humpty Dumpty is heading for a fall, and all the king’s horses and all the king’s men will never put him back together again—or want to. Even his so-called friends hate Cromwell for climbing too far. I must go now, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart !
No one had ever called me that, nor had a pet name been so precious. He kissed me yet again, quickly, hard, and was halfway down the first flight of stairs when Lady Joan and a chambermaid passed in the corridor. I heard them open then close a door. Silence again.
Touching my sweetly bruised, tingling lips with two fingertips, I was almost brazen enough to call down the staircase to John that the coast was clear now. But I did not want him to think I was an easy mark, however much I might have acted like one just now. Strangely, as ever, despite initially being seduced to desire Tom years ago, my feelings for John were not only wilder but deeper than that. Yes, he and I would flee this world and rear Elizabeth safely in the country, almost as if she were our own.
Shortly thereafter,
before we were allowed to leave London, word came that Cromwell had been arrested for treason—bribes, dispensing heretical books, and nefarious plans to wed Mary Tudor and become king. It was like the charges against Anne all over again, I thought, everything thrown in to besmirch the accused and assure conviction. Well, for all I knew, he was guilty. Selfish as I was, I prayed continually that he would not be forced to give up the names of those who had spied for him. Seven weeks in the Tower, who knew what he would say?
I feared, too, from what John had said, that Cromwell had somehow recruited him, so he could be named too. Why were we not released forthwith to return to Hatfield? Was everything at a standstill now that the king’s fourth marriage had been annulled and he was prepared to wed Catherine Howard, his “virtue personified,” as he’d put it?
He married her on July 28, 1540, and rode off on a long honeymoon progress beginning at his rural palace of Oatlands. In His Majesty’s usual exquisite timing, it was the very day that, on Tower Hill where had died the men accused of treason with Queen Anne, Cromwell was beheaded.
I went through the motions of the normal agenda with Elizabeth that day, listening to her chatter, sitting in on her lessons with her tutor, William Grindal, then rehearsing Latin and French with her, even pretending I was happy for her when she was allowed to visit her three-year-old brother, who was also visiting at court with his protective uncles, Edward and Tom. I was sure the Seymour brothers were elated about—perhaps even the cause of—Cromwell’s shameful, grisly fate. Although Cromwell had manipulated me as if I were a puppet, he had saved me from obscurity and obtained my initial placement at court, so I was sad for his dreadful demise.
Late in the day, morose and exhausted, I sat on a turf bench overlooking the Thames flowing past Greenwich Palace and watched John work with Elizabeth on a graveled circle as she sat proudly on her pony, elegant and serious for her nearly seven years. I wished he would not let her make too much progress lest the king keep him here when we departed, for John had told me that His Majesty’s Master of the Horse was loath to let him go. He had left John in charge of the royal stables here because he had gone to Oatlands with the king.