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diff --git a/27432.txt b/27432.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..49adfd4 --- /dev/null +++ b/27432.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7550 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Fifth Queen Crowned, by Ford Madox Ford + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Fifth Queen Crowned + + +Author: Ford Madox Ford + + + +Release Date: December 7, 2008 [eBook #27432] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FIFTH QUEEN CROWNED*** + + +E-text prepared by Verity White, Suzanne Shell, and the Project Gutenberg +Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) + + + + +-----------------------------------------------------------+ + | Transcriber's note: | + | | + | This edition of _The Fifth Queen Crowned_ was extracted | + | from an omnibus edition of the trilogy. The two previous | + | books of the trilogy are _The Fifth Queen_ and _Privy | + | Seal: His Last Venture_. | + | | + | Inconsistent hyphenation in the original document has | + | been preserved. | + +-----------------------------------------------------------+ + + + + + +THE FIFTH QUEEN CROWNED + +A Romance + +_"Da habt Ihr schon das End vom Lied"_ + + + + + + + +To +Arthur Marwood + + + + +CONTENTS + + PART ONE + The Major Cord + + PART TWO + The Threatened Rift + + PART THREE + The Dwindling Melody + + PART FOUR + The End of the Song + + + + +PART ONE + +THE MAJOR CHORD + + +I + +'The Bishop of Rome----' + +Thomas Cranmer began a hesitating speech. In the pause after the words +the King himself hesitated, as if he poised between a heavy rage and a +sardonic humour. He deemed, however, that the humour could the more +terrify the Archbishop--and, indeed, he was so much upon the joyous side +in those summer days that he had forgotten how to browbeat. + +'Our holy father,' he corrected the Archbishop. 'Or I will say my holy +father, since thou art a heretic----' + +Cranmer's eyes had always the expression of a man's who looked at +approaching calamity, but at the King's words his whole face, his closed +lips, his brows, the lines from his round nose, all drooped suddenly +downwards. + +'Your Grace will have me write a letter to the--to his--to him----' + +The downward lines fixed themselves, and from amongst them the +panic-stricken eyes made a dumb appeal to the griffins and crowns of his +dark green hangings, for they were afraid to turn to the King. Henry +retained his heavy look of jocularity: he jumped at a weighty gibe-- + +'My Grace will have thy Grace write a letter to his Holiness.' + +He dropped into a heavy impassivity, rolled his eyes, fluttered his +swollen fingers on the red and gilded table, and then said clearly, 'My. +Thy. His.' + +When he was in that mood he spoke with a singular distinctness that came +up from his husky and ordinary joviality like something dire and +terrible--like that something that upon a clear smooth day will suggest +to you suddenly the cruelty that lies always hidden in the limpid sea. + +'To Caesar--egomet, I mineself--that which is Caesar's: to him--that is to +say to his Holiness, our lord of Rome--the things which are of God! But +to thee, Archbishop, I know not what belongs.' + +He paused and then struck his hand upon the table: 'Cold porridge is thy +portion! Cold porridge!' he laughed; 'for they say: Cold porridge to the +devil! And, since thou art neither God's nor the King's, what may I call +thee but the devil's self's man?' + +A heavy and minatory silence seemed to descend upon him; the +Archbishop's thin hands opened suddenly as if he were letting something +fall to the ground. The King scowled heavily, but rather as if he were +remembering past heavinesses than for any present griefs. + +'Why,' he said, 'I am growing an old man. It is time I redded up my +house.' + +It was as if he thought he could take his time, for his heavily pursed +eyes looked down at the square tips of his fingers where they drummed on +the table. He was such a weighty man that the old chair in which he sat +creaked at the movement of his limbs. It was his affectation of courtesy +that he would not sit in the Archbishop's own new gilded and great chair +that had been brought from Lambeth on a mule's back along with the +hangings. But the other furnishings of that Castle of Pontefract were as +old as the days of Edward IV--even the scarlet wood of the table had +upon it the arms of Edward IV's Queen Elizabeth, side by side with that +King's. Henry noted it and said-- + +'It is time these arms were changed. See that you have here fairly +painted the arms of my Queen and me--Howard and Tudor--in token that we +have passed this way and sojourned in this Castle of Pontefract.' + +He was dallying with time as if it were a luxury to dally: he looked +curiously round the room. + +'Why, they have not housed you very well,' he said, and, as the +Archbishop shivered suddenly, he added, 'there should be glass in the +windows. This is a foul old kennel.' + +'I have made a complaint to the Earl Marshal,' Cranmer said dismally, +'but 'a said there was overmuch room needed above ground.' + +This room was indeed below ground and very old, strong, and damp. The +Archbishop's own hangings covered the walls, but the windows shot +upwards through the stones to the light; there was upon the ground of +stone not a carpet but only rushes; being early in the year, no +provision was made for firing, and the soot of the chimney back was +damp, and sparkled with the track of a snail that had lived there +undisturbed for many years, and neither increasing, because it had no +mate, nor dying, because it was well fed by the ferns that, behind the +present hangings, grew in the joints of the stones. In that low-ceiled +and dark place the Archbishop was aware that above his head were fair +and sunlit rooms, newly painted and hung, with the bosses on the +ceilings fresh silvered or gilt, all these fair places having been given +over to kinsmen of the yellow Earl Marshal from the Norfolk Queen +downwards. And the temporal and material neglect angered him and filled +him with a querulous bitterness that gnawed up even through his dread of +a future--still shadowy--fall and ruin. + +The King looked sardonically at the line of the ceiling. He had known +that Norfolk, who was the Earl Marshal, had the mean mind to make him +set these indignities upon the Archbishop, and loftily he considered +this result as if the Archbishop were a cat mauled by his own dog whose +nature it was to maul cats. + +The Archbishop had been standing with one hand on the arm of his heavy +chair, about to haul it back from the table to sit himself down. He had +been standing thus when the King had entered with the brusque words-- + +'Make you ready to write a letter to Rome.' + +And he still stood there, the cold feet among the damp rushes, the cold +hand still upon the arm of the chair, the cap pulled forward over his +eyes, the long black gown hanging motionless to the boot tops that were +furred around the ankles. + +'I have made a plaint to the Earl Marshal,' he said; 'it is not fitting +that a lord of the Church should be so housed.' + +Henry eyed him sardonically. + +'Sir,' he said, 'I am being brought round to think that ye are only a +false lord of the Church. And I am minded to think that ye are being +brought round to trow even the like to mine own self.' + +His eyes rested, little and twinkling like a pig's, upon the opening of +the Archbishop's cloak above his breastbone, and the Archbishop's right +hand nervously sought that spot. + +'I was always of the thought,' he said, 'that the prohibition of the +wearing of crucifixes was against your Highness' will and the teachings +of the Church.' + +A great crucifix of silver, the Man of Sorrows depending dolorously from +its arms and backed up by a plaque of silver so that it resembled a +porter's badge, depended over the black buttons of his undercoat. He had +put it on upon the day when secretly he had married Henry to the papist +Lady Katharine Howard. On the same day he had put on a hair shirt, and +he had never since removed either the one or the other. He had known +very well that this news would reach the Queen's ears, as also that he +had fasted thrice weekly and had taken a Benedictine sub-prior out of +chains in the tower to be his second chaplain. + +'Holy Church! Holy Church!' the King muttered amusedly into the stiff +hair of his chin and lips. The Archbishop was driven into one of his +fits of panic-stricken boldness. + +'Your Grace,' he said, 'if ye write a letter to Rome you will--for I see +not how ye may avoid it--reverse all your acts of this last twenty +years.' + +'Your Grace,' the King mocked him, 'by your setting on of chains, +crucifixes, phylacteries, and by your aping of monkish ways, ye have +reversed--well ye know it--all my and thy acts of a long time gone.' + +He cast himself back from the table into the leathern shoulder-straps of +the chair. + +'And if,' he continued with sardonic good-humour, 'my fellow and servant +may reverse my acts--videlicet, the King's--wherefore shall not +I--videlicet, the King--reverse what acts I will? It is to set me below +my servants!' + +'I am minded to redd up my house!' he repeated after a moment. + +'Please it, your Grace----' the Archbishop muttered. His eyes were upon +the door. + +The King said, 'Anan?' He could not turn his bulky head, he would not +move his bulky body. + +'My gentleman!' the Archbishop whispered. + +The King looked at the opposite wall and cried out-- + +'Come in, Lascelles. I am about cleaning out some stables of mine.' + +The door moved noiselessly and heavily back, taking the hangings with +it; as if with the furtive eyes and feathery grace of a blonde fox +Cranmer's spy came round the great boards. + +'Ay! I am doing some cleansing,' the King said again. 'Come hither and +mend thy pen to write.' + +Against the King's huge bulk--Henry was wearing purple and black upon +that day--and against the Archbishop's black and pillar-like form, +Lascelles, in his scarlet, with his blonde and tender beard had an air +of being quill-like. The bones of his knees through his tight and thin +silken stockings showed almost as those of a skeleton; where the King +had great chains of gilt and green jewels round his neck, and where the +Archbishop had a heavy chain of silver, he had a thin chain of fine gold +and a tiny badge of silver-gilt. He dragged one of his legs a little +when he walked. That was the fashion of that day, because the King +himself dragged his right leg, though the ulcer in it had been cured. + +Sitting askew in his chair at the table, the King did not look at this +gentleman, but moved the fingers of his outstretched hand in token that +his crook of the leg was kneeling enough for him. + +'Take your tablets and write,' Henry said; 'nay, take a great sheet of +parchment and write----' + +'Your Grace,' he added to the Archbishop, 'ye are the greatest penner of +solemn sentences that I have in my realm. What I shall say roughly to +Lascelles you shall ponder upon and set down nobly, at first in the +vulgar tongue and then in fine Latin.' He paused and added-- + +'Nay; ye shall write it in the vulgar tongue, and the Magister Udal +shall set it into Latin. He is the best Latinist we have--better than +myself, for I have no time----' + +Lascelles was going between a great cabinet with iron hinges and the +table. He fetched an inkhorn set into a tripod, a sandarach, and a roll +of clean parchment that was tied around with a green ribbon. + +Upon the gold and red of the table he stretched out the parchment as if +it had been a map. He mended his pen with a little knife and kneeled +down upon the rushes beside the table, his chin level with the edge. His +whole mind appeared to be upon keeping the yellowish sheet straight and +true upon the red and gold, and he raised his eyes neither to the +Archbishop's white face nor yet to the King's red one. + +Henry stroked the short hairs of his neck below the square grey beard. +He was reflecting that very soon all the people in that castle, and very +soon after, most of the people in that land would know what he was about +to say. + +'Write now,' he said. '"Henry--by the grace of God--Defender of the +Faith--King, Lord Paramount."' He stirred in his chair. + +'Set down all my styles and titles: "Duke +Palatine--Earl--Baron--Knight"--leave out nothing, for I will show how +mighty I am.' He hummed, considered, set his head on one side and then +began to speak swiftly-- + +'Set it down thus: "We, Henry, and the rest, being a very mighty King, +such as few have been, are become a very humble man. A man broken by +years, having suffered much. A man humbled to the dust, crawling to kiss +the wounds of his Redeemer. A Lord of many miles both of sea and land." +Why, say-- + +'"Guide and Leader of many legions, yet comes he to thee for guidance." +Say, too, "He who was proud cometh to thee to regain his pride. He who +was proud in things temporal cometh to thee that he may once more have +the pride of a champion in Christendom----"' + +He had been speaking as if with a malicious glee, for his words seemed +to strike, each one, into the face of the pallid figure, darkly standing +before him. And he was aware that each word increased the stiff and +watchful constraint of the figure that knelt beside the table to write. +But suddenly his glee left him; he scowled at the Archbishop as if +Cranmer had caused him to sin. He pulled at the collar around his +throat. + +'No,' he cried out, 'write down in simple words that I am a very sinful +man. Set it down that I grow old! That I am filled with fears for my +poor soul! That I have sinned much! That I recall all that I have done! +An old man, I come to my Saviour's Regent upon earth. A man aware of +error, I will make restitution tenfold! Say I am broken and aged and +afraid! I kneel down on the ground----' + +He cast his inert mass suddenly a little forward as if indeed he were +about to come on to his knees in the rushes. + +'Say----' he muttered--'say----' + +But his face and his eyes became suffused with blood. + +'It is a very difficult thing,' he uttered huskily, 'to meddle in these +sacred matters.' + +He fell heavily back into his chair-straps once more. + +'I do not know what I will have you to say,' he said. + +He looked broodingly at the floor. + +'I do not know,' he muttered. + +He rolled his eyes, first to the face of the Archbishop, then to +Lascelles-- + +'Body of God--what carved turnips!' he said, for in the one face there +was only panic, and in the other nothing at all. He rolled on to his +feet, catching at the table to steady himself. + +'Write what you will,' he called, 'to these intents and purposes. Or +stay to write--I will send you a letter much more good from the upper +rooms.' + +Cranmer suddenly stretched out, with a timid pitifulness, his white +hands. But, rolling his huge shoulders, like a hastening bear, the King +went over the rushes. He pulled the heavy door to with such a vast force +that the latch came again out of the hasp, and the door, falling slowly +back and quivering as if with passion, showed them his huge legs +mounting the little staircase. + + * * * * * + +A long silence fell in that dim room. The Archbishop's lips moved +silently, the spy's glance went, level, along his parchment. Suddenly he +grinned mirthlessly and as if at a shameless thought. + +'The Queen will write the letter his Grace shall send us,' he said. + +Then their eyes met. The one glance, panic-stricken, seeing no issue, +hopeless and without resource, met the other--crafty, alert, fox-like, +with a dance in it. The glances transfused and mingled. Lascelles +remained upon his knees as if, stretching out his right knee behind him, +he were taking a long rest. + + +II + +It was almost within earshot of these two men in their dim cell that the +Queen walked from the sunlight into shadow and out again. This great +terrace looked to the north and west, and, from the little hillock, +dominating miles of gently rising ground, she had a great view over +rolling and very green country. The original builders of the Castle of +Pontefract had meant this terrace to be flagged with stone: but the +work had never been carried so far forward. There was only a path of +stone along the bowshot and a half of stone balustrade; the rest had +once been gravel, but the grass had grown over it; that had been +scythed, and nearly the whole space was covered with many carpets of +blue and red and other very bright colours. In the left corner when you +faced inwards there was a great pavilion of black cloth, embroidered +very closely with gold and held up by ropes of red and white. Though +forty people could sit in it round the table, it appeared very small, +the walls of the castle towered up so high. They towered up so high, so +square, and so straight that from the terrace below you could hardly +hear the flutter of the huge banner of St George, all red and white +against the blue sky, though sometimes in a gust it cracked like a huge +whip, and its shadow, where it fell upon the terrace, was sufficient to +cover four men. + +To take away from the grimness of the flat walls many little banners had +been suspended from loopholes and beneath windows. Swallow-tailed, long, +or square, they hung motionless in the shelter, or, since the dying away +of the great gale three days before, had looped themselves over their +staffs. These were all painted green, because that was the Queen's +favourite colour, being the emblem of Hope. + +A little pavilion, all of green silk, at the very edge of the platform, +had all its green curtains looped up, so that only the green roof +showed; and, within, two chairs, a great leathern one for the King, a +little one of red and white wood for the Queen, stood side by side as if +they conversed with each other. At the top of it was a golden image of a +lion, and above the peak of the entrance another, golden too, of the +Goddess Flora, carrying a cornucopia of flowers, to symbolise that this +tent was a summer abode for pleasantness. + +Here the King and Queen, for the four days that they had been in the +castle, had delighted much to sit, resting after their long ride up from +the south country. For it pleased Henry to let his eyes rest upon a +great view of this realm that was his, and to think nothing; and it +pleased Katharine Howard to think that now she swayed this land, and +that soon she would alter its face. + +They looked out, over the tops of the elm trees that grew right up +against the terrace wall; but the land itself was too green, the fields +too empty of dwellings. There was no one but sheep between all the +hedgerows: there was, in all the wide view, but one church tower, and +where, in place and place, there stood clusters of trees as if to +shelter homesteads--nearly always the homesteads had fallen to ruin +beneath the boughs. Upon one ridge one could see the long walls of an +unroofed abbey. But, to the keenest eye no men were visible, save now +and then a shepherd leaning on his crook. There was no ploughland at +all. Now and then companies of men in helmets and armour rode up to or +away from the castle. Once she had seen the courtyard within the keep +filled with cattle that lowed uneasily. But these, she had learned, had +been taken from cattle thieves by the men of the Council of the Northern +Borders. They were destined for the provisioning of that castle during +her stay there, they being forfeit, whether Scotch or English. + +'Ah,' she said, 'whilst his Grace rides north to meet the King's Scots I +will ride east and west and south each day.' + + * * * * * + +At that moment, whilst the King had left Cranmer and his spy and, to +regain his composure, was walking up and down in her chamber, she was +standing beside the Duke of Norfolk about midway between the end of the +terrace and the little green pavilion. + +She was all in a dark purple dress, to please the King whose mood that +colour suited; and the Duke's yellow face looked out above a suit all of +black. He wore that to please the King too, for the King was of opinion +that no gathering looked gay in its colours that had not many men in +black amongst the number. + +He said-- + +'You do not ride north with his Grace?' + +He leaned upon his two staves, one long and of silver, the other shorter +and gilt; his gown fell down to his ankles, his dark and half-closed +eyes looked out at a tree that, struck lately by lightning, stretched up +half its boughs all naked from a little hillock beside a pond a mile +away. + +'So it is settled between his Grace and me,' she said. She did not much +like her uncle, for she had little cause. But, the King being away, she +walked with him rather than with another man. + +'I ask, perforce,' he said, 'for I have much work in the ordering of +your progresses.' + +'We meant that you should have that news this day,' she said. + +He shot one glance at her face, then turned his eyes again upon the +stricken tree. Her face was absolutely calm and without expression, as +it had been always when she had directed him what she would have done. +He could trace no dejection in it: on the other hand, he gave her credit +for a great command over her features. That he had himself. And, in the +niece's eyes, as they moved from the backs of a flock of sheep to the +dismantled abbey on the ridge, there was something of the enigmatic +self-containment that was in the uncle's steady glance. He could observe +no dejection, and at that he humbled himself a little more. + +'Ay,' he said, 'the ordering of your progresses is a heavy burden. I +would have you commend what I have done here.' + +She looked at him, at that, as if with a swift jealousy. His eyes were +roving upon the gay carpets, the pavilions, and the flags against the +grim walls, depending in motionless streaks of colour. + +'The King's Grace's self,' she said, 'did tell me that all these things +he ordered and thought out for my pleasuring.' + +Norfolk dropped his eyes to the ground. + +'Aye,' he said, 'his Grace ordered them and their placing. There is no +man to equal his Grace for such things; but I had the work of setting +them where they are. I would have your favour for that.' + +She appeared appeased and gave him her hand to kiss. There was a little +dark mole upon the third finger. + +'The last niece that I had for Queen,' he said, 'would not suffer me to +kiss her hand.' + +She looked at him a little absently, for, because since she had been +Queen--and before--she had been a lonely woman, she was given to +thinking her own thoughts whilst others talked. + +She was troubled by the condition of her chief maid Margot Poins. Margot +Poins was usually tranquil, modest, submissive in a cheerful manner and +ready to converse. But of late she had been moody, and sunk in a dull +silence. And that morning she had suddenly burst out into a smouldering, +heavy passion, and had torn Katharine's hair whilst she dressed it. + +'Ay,' Margot had said, 'you are Queen: you can do what you will. It is +well to be Queen. But we who are dirt underfoot, we cannot do one single +thing.' + +And, because she was lonely, with only Lady Rochford, who was foolish, +and this girl to talk to, it had grieved the Queen to find this girl +growing so lumpish and dull. At that time, whilst her hair was being +dressed, she had answered only-- + +'Yea; it is good to be a Queen. But you will find it in Seneca----' and +she had translated for Margot the passage which says that eagles are as +much tied by weighty ropes as are finches caught in tiny fillets. + +'Oh, your Latin,' Margot had said. 'I would I had never heard the sound +of it, but had stuck to clean English.' + +Katharine imagined then that it was some new flame of the Magister +Udal's that was troubling the girl, and this troubled her too, for she +did not like that her maids should be played with by men, and she loved +Margot for her past loyalties, readiness, and companionship. + + * * * * * + +She came out of her thoughts to say to her uncle, remembering his speech +about her hands-- + +'Aye; I have heard that Anne Boleyn had six fingers upon her right +hand.' + +'She had six upon each, but she concealed it,' he answered. 'It was her +greatest grief.' + +Katharine realised that his sardonic tone, his bitter yellow face, the +croak in his voice, and his stiff gait--all these things were signs of +his hostility to her. And his mention of Anne Boleyn, who had been +Queen, much as she was, and of her bitter fate, this mention, if it +could not be a threat, was, at least, a reminder meant to give her fears +and misgiving. When she had been a child--and afterwards, until the very +day when she had been shown for Queen--her uncle had always treated her +with a black disdain, as he treated all the rest of the world. When he +had--and it was rarely enough--come to visit her grandmother, the old +Duchess of Norfolk, he had always been like that. Through the old +woman's huge, lonely, and ugly halls he had always stridden, halting a +little over the rushes, and all creatures must keep out of his way. Once +he had kicked her little dog, once he had pushed her aside; but +probably, then, when she had been no more than a child, he had not known +who she was, for she had lived with the servants and played with the +servants' children, much like one of them, and her grandmother had known +little of the household or its ways. + +She answered him sharply-- + +'I have heard that you were no good friend to your niece, Anne Boleyn, +when she was in her troubles.' + +He swallowed in his throat and gazed impassively at the distant oak +tree, nevertheless his knee trembled with fury. And Katharine knew very +well that if, more than another, he took pleasure in giving pain with +his words, he bore the pain of other's words less well than most men. + +'The Queen Anne,' he said, 'was a heretic. No better was she than a +Protestant. She battened upon the goods of our Church. Why should I +defend her?' + +'Uncle,' she said, 'where got you the jewel in your bonnet?' + +He started a little back at that, and the small veins in his yellow +eye-whites grew inflamed with blood. + +'Queen----' he brought out between rage and astonishment that she +should dare the taunt. + +'I think it came from the great chalice of the Abbey of Rising,' she +said. 'We are valiant defenders of the Church, who wear its spoils upon +our very brows.' + +It was as if she had thrown down a glove to him and to a great many that +were behind him. + +She knew very well where she stood, and she knew very well what her +uncle and his friends awaited for her, for Margot, her maid, brought her +alike the gossip of the Court and the loudly voiced threats and +aspirations of the city. For the Protestants--she knew them and cared +little for them. She did not believe there were very many in the King's +and her realm, and mostly they were foreign merchants and poor men who +cared little as long as their stomachs were filled. If these had their +farms again they would surely return to the old faith, and she was +minded to do away with the sheep. For it was the sheep that had brought +discontent to England. To make way for these fleeces the ploughmen had +been dispossessed. + +It was natural that Protestants should hate her; but with Norfolk and +his like it was different. She knew very well that Norfolk came there +that day and waited every day, watching anxiously for the first sign +that the King's love for her should cool. She knew very well that they +said in the Court that with the King it was only possession and then +satiety. And she knew very well that when Norfolk's eyes searched her +face it was for signs of dismay and of discouragement. And when Norfolk +had said that he himself had placed the banners, the tents, the +pavilions and carpets that made gay all that grim terrace of the air, he +was essaying to make her think that the King was abandoning the task of +doing her honour. This had made her angry, for it was such folly. Her +uncle should have known that the King had discussed all these things +with her, asking her what she liked, and that all these bright colours +and these plaisaunces were what her man had gallantly thought out for +her. She carried her challenge still further. + +'It ill becomes us Howards and all like us,' she said, 'to talk of how +we will defend the Church of God----' + +'I am a swordsman only,' he said. 'Give me that----' + +She was not minded to listen to him. + +'It becomes us ill,' she said; 'and I take shame in it. For, a very few +years agone we Howards were very poor. Now we are very rich--though it +is true that my father is still a very poor man, and your stepmother, my +grandmother, has known hard shifts. But we Howards, through you who are +our head, became amongst the richest in the land. And how?' + +'I have done services----' the Duke began. + +'Why, there has been no new wealth made in this realm,' she said; 'it +came from the Church. Consider what you have had of this Abbey of +Risings that I speak of, because I knew it well as a child, and saw many +times then, sparkling in that which held the blood of my Saviour, the +jewel that is now in your cap.' + +The Abbey of Risings, after the visitors had been to it and the monks +had been driven out, had fallen to the Duke of Norfolk. And his men had +stripped the lead from the roofs, the glass from the windows, the very +tiles from the floor. And this little abbey was only one of many, large +and small, that had fallen to the Duke, so that it was true enough that, +through him, the Howards had become a very rich family. + +Norfolk burst into a sudden speech-- + +'I hold these things only as a trust,' he said. 'I am ready to restore.' + +'Why, that is very well,' Katharine said; 'and I have hopes that soon +you will be called to make that restoration to your God.' + +Norfolk looked at the square toes of his shoes for a long time. + +'Will you have _all_ things to be given back?' he said at last after he +had thought much. + +'The King will have all things be as they were before the Queen +Katharine, my namesake of Aragon, was undone,' Katharine answered. 'And +me he will have to take her place so that all things shall be as before +they were.' + +The Duke, leaning on his silver and gold staves, shrugged his shoulders +very slowly. + +'This will make a very great confusion,' he said. + +'Ay,' Katharine answered, 'there will a very many be confounded, and a +great number of hundreds be much annoyed.' + +She broke in again upon his slow meditations-- + +'Sir,' she said, 'this is a very pitiful thing! Privy Seal that is dead +and done with worked with a very great cunning. Well he knew that for +most men the heart resideth in the pocket. Therefore, though ye said all +that he rode this land with a bridle of iron, he was very careful to +stop all your mouths alike with pieces of gold. It was not only to his +friends that he gave what had been taken from God, but he was very +careful that much also should fall into the greedy mouths of those that +cried out. If he had not done this, do you think that he would have +remained so long above the earth that he made weary? No. But since he +made all rich alike with this plunder, so there was no man, either +Catholic or Lutheran, very anxious to have him away. And, now that he is +dead he worketh still. For who among you lords that do call yourselves +sons of the Church, but holdeth of the Church's goods? Oh, bethink you! +bethink you! The moment is at hand when ye may work restoration. See +that ye do it willingly and with good hearts, smoothing and making plain +the way by which the bruised feet of our Saviour shall come across this, +His land.' + +Norfolk kept his eyes upon the ground. + +'Why, for me,' he said, 'I am very willing. This day I will send to set +clerks at work discovering that which is mine and that which came from +the Church; but I think you will find some that will not do it so +eagerly.' + +She believed him very little; and she said-- + +'Why, if you will do this thing I think there will not many be +behindhand.' + +He did what he could to conceal his wincing, and her voice changed its +tone. + +'Sir,' she said, and she was eager and pleading, 'you have many men that +take counsel with you, for I trow that you and my Lord of Winchester do +lead such lords as be Catholic in this realm. I know very well that you +and my Lord Bishop of Winchester and such Catholic lords would have me +to be your puppet and so work as you would have me, giving back to the +Church such things as have fallen to Protestants or to men that ye +mislike. But that may not be, for, since I owe mine advancement not to +you, nor to mine own efforts, but to God alone, so to God alone do I owe +fealty.' + +She stretched out towards him the hand that he had kissed. The tail of +her coif fell almost to her feet; her body in the fresh sunlight was all +cased in purple velvet, only the lawn of her undershirt showed, white +and tremulous at her wrists and her neck; and, fair and contrasted with +the gold of her hair, her face came out of its abstraction, to take on a +pitiful and mournful earnestness. + +'Sir,' she said, 'if you shall speak for God in the councils that you +will hold, believe that your rewards shall be very great. I think that +you have been a man of a very troubled mind, for you have thought only +or mostly of the affairs of this world. But do now this one good stroke +for God His piteous sake, and such a peace shall descend upon you as you +have never yet known. You shall have no more griefs; you shall have no +more fears. And that is better than the jewels of chalices, and than +much lead from the roofs of abbeys. Speak you thus in these councils +that you shall hold, give you such advice to them that come to you +seeking it, and this I promise you--for it is too little a thing to +promise you the love of a Queen and a King's favour, though that too ye +shall not lack--but this I promise you, that there shall descend upon +your heart that most blessed miracle and precious wealth, the peace of +God.' + + +III + +When Henry was calmed by his pacing in her chamber he came out to her in +the sunlight, rolling and bear-like, and so huge that the terrace seemed +to grow smaller. + +'Chuck,' he said to her, 'I ha' done a thing to pleasure thee.' He moved +two fingers upwards to save the Duke of Norfolk from falling to his +knees, caught Katharine by the elbow, and, turning upon himself as on a +huge pivot, swung her round him so that they faced the pavilion. 'Sha't +not talk with a citron-faced uncle,' he said; 'sha't save sweet words +for me. I will tell thee what I ha' done to pleasure thee.' + +'Save it a while and do another ere ye tell me,' she said. + +'Now, what is your reasoning about that, wise one?' he asked. + +She laughed at him, for she took pleasure in his society and, except +when she was earnest to beg things of him, she was mostly gay at his +side. + +'It takes a woman to teach kings,' she said. + +He answered that it took a Queen to teach him. + +'Why,' she said, 'listen! I know that each day ye do things to pleasure +me, things prodigal or such little things as giving me pouncet boxes. +But you will find--and a woman, quean or queen, knows it well--that to +take the full pleasure of her lover's surprises well, she must have an +easy mind. And to have an easy mind she must have granted her the +little, little boons she asketh.' + +He reflected ponderously upon this point and at last, with a sort of +peasant's gravity, nodded his head. + +'For,' she said, 'if a woman is to take pleasure she must guess at what +you men have done for her. And if she be to guess pleasurably, she must +have a clear mind. And if I am to have a clear mind I must have a maiden +consoled with a husband.' + +Henry seated himself carefully in the great chair of the small pavilion. +He spread out his knees, blinked at the view and when, having cast a +look round to see that Norfolk was gone--for it did not suit her that he +should see on what terms she was with the King--she seated herself on a +little foot-pillow at his feet, he set a great hand upon her head. She +leaned her arms across over his knees, and looked up at him appealingly. + +'I do take it,' he said, 'that I must make some man rich to wed some +poor maid.' + +'Oh, Solomon!' she said. + +'And I do take it,' he continued with gravity, 'that this maid is thy +maid Margot.' + +'How know you that?' she said. + +'I have observed her,' he maintained gravely. + +'Why, you could not well miss her,' she answered. 'She is as big as a +plough-ox.' + +'I have observed,' he said--and he blinked his little eyes as if, +pleasurably, she were, with her words, whispering around his head. 'I +have observed that ye affected her.' + +'Why, she likes me well. She is a good wench--and to-day she tore my +hair.' + +'Then that is along of a man?' he asked. 'Didst not stick thy needle in +her arm? Or wilto be quit of her?' + +She rubbed her chin. + +'Why, if she wed, I mun be quit of her,' she said, as if she had never +thought of that thing. + +He answered-- + +'Assuredly; for ye may not part man and lawful wife were you seven times +Queen.' + +'Why,' she said, 'I have little pleasure in Margot as she is.' + +'Then let her go,' he answered. + +'But I am a very lonely Queen,' she said, 'for you are much absent.' + +He reflected pleasurably. + +'Thee wouldst have about thee a little company of well-wishers?' + +'So that they be those thou lovest well,' she said. + +'Why, thy maid contents me,' he answered. He reflected slowly. 'We must +give her man a post about thee,' he uttered triumphantly. + +'Why, trust thee to pleasure me,' she said. 'You will find out a way +always.' + +He scrubbed her nose gently with his heavy finger. + +'Who is the man?' he said. 'What ruffler?' + +'I think it is the Magister Udal,' she answered. + +Henry said-- + +'Oh ho! oh ho!' And after a moment he slapped his thigh and laughed like +a child. She laughed with him, silverly upon a little sound between 'ah' +and 'e.' He stopped his laugh to listen to hers, and then he said +gravely-- + +'I think your laugh is the prettiest sound I ever heard. I would give +thy maid Margot a score of husbands to make thee laugh.' + +'One is enough to make her weep,' she said; 'and I may laugh at thee.' + +He said-- + +'Let us finish this business within the hour. Sit you upon your chair +that I may call one to send this ruffler here.' + +She rose, with one sinuous motion that pleased him well, half to her +feet and, feeling behind her with one hand for the chair, aided herself +with the other upon his shoulder because she knew that it gave him joy +to be her prop. + +'Call the maid, too,' she said, 'for I would come to the secret soon.' + +That pleased him too, and, having shouted for a knave he once more shook +with laughter. + +'Oh ho,' he said, 'you will net this old fox, will you?' + +And, having sent his messenger off to summon the Magister from the Lady +Mary's room, and the maid from the Queen's, he continued for a while to +soliloquise as to Udal's predicament. For he had heard the Magister rail +against matrimony in Latin hexameters and doggerel Greek. He knew that +the Magister was an incorrigible fumbler after petticoats. And now, he +said, this old fox was to be bagged and tied up. + +He said-- + +'Well, well, well; well, well!' + +For, if a Queen commanded a marriage, a marriage there must be; there +was no more hope for the Magister than for any slave of Cato's. He was +cabined, ginned, trapped, shut in from the herd of bachelors. It pleased +the King very well. + +The King grasped the gilded arms of his great chair, Katharine sat +beside him, her hands laid one within another upon her lap. She did not +say one single word during the King's interview with Magister Udal. + +The Magister fell upon his knees before them and, seeing the laughing +wrinkles round the King's little eyes, made sure that he was sent +for--as had often been the case--to turn into Latin some jest the King +had made. His gown fell about his kneeling shins, his cap was at his +side, his lean, brown, and sly face, with the long nose and crafty eyes, +was like a woodpecker's. + +'Goodman Magister,' Henry said. 'Stand up. We have sent for thee to +advance thee.' Without moving his head he rolled his eyes to one side. +He loved his dramatic effects and wished to await the coming of the +Queen's maid, Margot, before he gave the weight of his message. + +Udal picked up his cap and came up to his feet before them; he had +beneath his gown a little book, and one long finger between its leaves +to keep his place where he had been reading. For he had forgotten a +saying of Thales, and was reading through Caesar's Commentaries to find +it. + +'As Seneca said,' he uttered in his throat, 'advancement is doubly sweet +to them that deserve it not.' + +'Why,' the King said, 'we advance thee on the deserts of one that finds +thee sweet, and is sweet to one doubly sweet to us, Henry of Windsor +that speak sweet words to thee.' + +The lines on Udal's face drooped all a little downwards. + +'Y'are reader in Latin to the Lady Mary,' the King said. + +'I have little deserved in that office,' Udal answered; 'the lady reads +Latin better than even I.' + +'Why, you lie in that,' Henry said, ''a readeth well for she's my +daughter; but not so well as thee.' + +Udal ducked his head; he was not minded to carry modesty further than in +reason. + +'The Lady Mary--the Lady Mary of England----' the King said +weightily--and these last two words of his had a weight all their own, +so that he added, 'of England' again, and then, 'will have little longer +need of thee. She shall wed with a puissant Prince.' + +'I hail, I felicitate, I bless the day I hear those words,' the Magister +said. + +'Therefore,' the King said--and his ears had caught the rustle of +Margot's grey gown--'we will let thee no more be reader to that my +daughter.' + +Margot came round the green silk curtains that were looped on the corner +posts of the pavilion. When she saw the Magister her great, fair face +became slowly of a fiery red; slowly and silently she fell, with motions +as if bovine, to her knees at the Queen's side. Her gown was all grey, +but it had roses of red and white silk round the upper edges of the +square neck-place, and white lawn showed beneath her grey cap. + +'We advance thee,' Henry said, 'to be Chancellier de la Royne, with an +hundred pounds by the year from my purse. Do homage for thine office.' + +Udal fell upon one knee before Katharine, and dropping both cap and +book, took her hand to raise to his lips. But Margot caught her hand +when he had done with it and set upon it a huge pressure. + +'But, Sir Chancellor,' the King said, 'it is evident that so grave an +office must have a grave fulfiller. And, to ballast thee the better, the +Queen of her graciousness hath found thee a weighty helpmeet. So that, +before you shall touch the duties and emoluments of this charge you +shall, and that even to-night, wed this Madam Margot that here kneels.' + +Udal's face had been of a coppery green pallor ever since he had heard +the title of Chancellor. + +'Eheu!' he said, 'this is the torture of Tantalus that might never +drink.' + +In its turn the face of Margot Poins grew pale, pushed forward towards +him; but her eyes appeared to blaze, for all they were a mild blue, and +the Queen felt the pressure upon her hand grow so hard that it pained +her. + +The King uttered the one word, 'Magister!' + +Udal's fingers picked at the fur of his moth-eaten gown. + +'God be favourable to me,' he said. 'If it were anything but +Chancellor!' + +The King grew more rigid. + +'Body of God,' he said, 'will you wed with this maid?' + +'Ahi!' the Magister wailed; and his perturbation had in it something +comic and scarecrowlike, as if a wind shook him from within. 'If you +will make me anything but a Chancellor, I will. But a Chancellor, I dare +not.' + +The King cast himself back in his chair. The suggested gibe rose +furiously to his lips; the Magister quailed and bent before him, +throwing out his hands. + +'Sire,' he said, 'if--which God forbid--this were a Protestant realm I +might do it. But oh, pardon and give ear. Pardon and give ear----' + +He waved one hand furiously at the silken canopy above them. + +'It is agreed with one of mine in Paris that she shall come hither--God +forgive me, I must make avowal, though God knows I would not--she shall +come hither to me if she do hear that I have risen to be a Chancellor.' + +The King said, 'Body of God!' as if it were an earthquake. + +'If it were anything else but Chancellor she might not come, and I would +wed Margot Poins more willingly than any other. But--God knows I do not +willingly make this avowal, but am in a corner, _sicut vulpis in +lucubris_, like a fox in the coils--this Paris woman is my wife.' + +Henry gave a great shout of laughter, but slowly Margot Poins fell +across the Queen's knees. She uttered no sound, but lay there +motionless. The sight affected Udal to an epileptic fury. + +'Jove be propitious to me!' he stuttered out. 'I know not what I can +do.' He began to tear the fur of his cloak and toss it over the +battlements. 'The woman is my wife--wed by a friar. If this were a +Protestant realm now--or if I pleaded pre-contract--and God knows I ha' +promised marriage to twenty women before I, in an evil day, married +one--eheu!--to this one----' + +He began to sob and to wring his thin hands. + +'_Quod faciam? Me miser! Utinam. Utinam----_' + +He recovered a little coherence. + +'If this were a Protestant land ye might say this wedding was no +wedding, for that a friar did it; but I know ye will not suffer that----' +His eyes appealed piteously to the Queen. + +'Why, then,' he said, 'it is not upon my head that I do not wed this +wench. You be my witness that I would wed; it gores my heart to see her +look so pale. It tears my vitals to see any woman look pale. As +Lucretius says, "Better the sunshine of smiles----"' + +A little outputting of impatient breath from Katharine made him stop. + +'It is you, your Grace,' he said, 'that make me thus tied. If you would +let us be Protestant, or, again, if I could plead pre-contract to void +this Paris marriage it would let me wed with this wench--eheu--eheu. Her +brother will break my bones----' + +He began to cry out so lamentably, invoking Pluto to bear him to the +underworld, that the King roared out upon him-- + +'Why, get you gone, fool.' + +The Magister threw himself suddenly upon his knees, his hands clasped, +his gown drooping over them down to his wrists. He turned his face to +the Queen. + +'Before God,' he said, 'before high and omnipotent Jove, I swear that +when I made this marriage I thought it was no marriage!' He reflected +for a breath and added, at the recollection of the cook's spits that had +been turned against him when he had by woman's guile been forced into +marriage with the widow in Paris, 'I was driven into it by force, with +sharp points at my throat. Is that not enow to void a marriage? Is that +not enow? Is that not enow?' + +Katharine looked out over the great levels of the view. Her face was +rigid, and she swallowed in her throat, her eye being glazed and hard. +The King took his cue from a glance at her face. + +'Get you gone, Goodman Rogue Magister,' he said, and he adopted a +canonical tone that went heavily with his rustic pose. 'A marriage made +and consummated and properly blessed by holy friar there is no undoing. +You are learned enough to know that. Rogue that you be, I am very glad +that you are trapped by this marriage. Well I know that you have dangled +too much with petticoats, to the great scandal of this my Court. Now you +have lost your preferment, and I am glad of it. Another and a better +than thou shall be the Queen's Chancellor, for another and a better than +thou shall wed this wench. We will get her such a goodly husband----' + +A low, melancholy wail from Margot Poins' agonised face--a sound such as +might have been made by an ox in pain--brought him to a stop. It wrung +the Magister, who could not bear to see a woman pained, up to a pitch of +ecstatic courage. + +'_Quid fecit Caesar_,' he stuttered; 'what Caesar hath done, Caesar can do +again. It was not till very lately since this canon of wedding and +consummating and blessing by a holy friar hath been derided and +contemned in this realm. And so it might be again----' + +Katharine Howard cried out, 'Ah!' Her features grew rigid and as ashen +as cold steel. And, at her cry, the King--who could less bear than Udal +to hear a woman in pain--the King sprang up from his chair. It was as +amazing to all them as to hunters it is to see a great wild bull charge +with a monstrous velocity. Udal was rigid with fear, and the King had +him by the throat. He shook him backwards and forwards so that his book +fell upon the Queen's feet, bursting out of his ragged gown, and his +cap, flying from his opened hand, fell down over the battlement into an +elm top. The King guttered out unintelligible sounds of fury from his +vast chest and, planted on his huge feet, he swung the Magister round +him till, backwards and staggering, the eyes growing fixed in his brown +and rigid face, he was pushed, jerking at each step of the King, out of +sight behind the green silk curtains. + +The Queen sat motionless in her purple velvet. She twisted one hand into +the chain of the medallion about her throat, and one hand lay open and +pale by her side. Margot Poins knelt at her side, her face hidden in the +Queen's lap, her two arms stretched out beyond her grey coifed head. For +a minute she was silent. Then great sobs shook her so that Katharine +swayed upon her seat. From her hidden face there came muffled and +indistinguishable words, and at last Katharine said dully-- + +'What, child? What, child?' + +Margot moved her face sideways so that her mouth was towards Katharine. + +'You can unmake it! You can unmake the marriage,' she brought out in +huge sobs. + +Katharine said-- + +'No! No!' + +'You unmade a King's marriage,' Margot wailed. + +Katharine said-- + +'No! No!' She started and uttered the words loudly; she added pitifully, +'You do not understand! You do not understand!' + +It was the more pitiful in that Margot understood very well. She hid her +face again and only sobbed heavily and at long intervals, and then with +many sobs at once. The Queen laid her white hand upon the girl's head. +Her other still played with the chain. + +'Christ be piteous to me,' she said. 'I think it had been better if I +had never married the King.' + +Margot uttered an indistinguishable sound. + +'I think it had been better,' the Queen said; 'though I had jeoparded my +immortal part.' + +Margot moved her head up to cry out in her turn-- + +'No! No! You may not say it!' + +Then she dropped her face again. When she heard the King coming back and +breathing heavily, she stood up, and with huge tears on her red and +crumpled face she looked out upon the fields as if she had never seen +them before. An immense sob shook her. The King stamped his foot with +rage, and then, because he was soft-hearted to them that he saw in +sorrow, he put his hand upon her shoulder. + +'Sha't have a better mate,' he uttered. 'Sha't be a knight's dame! +There! there!' and he fondled her great back with his hand. Her eyes +screwed tightly up, she opened her mouth wide, but no words came out, +and suddenly she shook her head as if she had been an enraged child. Her +loud cries, shaken out of her with her tears, died away as she went +across the terrace, a loud one and then a little echo, a loud one and +then two more. + +'Before God!' the King said, 'that knave shall eat ten years of prison +bread.' + +His wife looked still over the wooded enclosures, the little stone +walls, and the copses. A small cloud had come before the sun, and its +shadow was moving leisurely across the ridge where stood the roofless +abbey. + +'The maid shall have the best man I can give her,' the King said. + +'Why, no good man would wed her!' Katharine answered dully. + +Henry said-- + +'Anan?' Then he fingered the dagger on the chain before his chest. + +'Why,' he added slowly, 'then the Magister shall die by the rope. It is +an offence that can be quitted with death. It is time such a thing were +done.' + +Katharine's dull silence spurred him; he shrugged his shoulders and +heaved a deep breath out. + +'Why,' he said, 'a man can be found to wed the wench.' + +She moved one hand and uttered-- + +'I would not wed her to such a man!' as if it were a matter that was not +much in her thoughts. + +'Then she may go into a nunnery,' the King said; 'for before three +months are out we will have many nunneries in this realm.' + +She looked upon him a little absently, but she smiled at him to give him +pleasure. She was thinking that she wished she had not wedded him; but +she smiled because, things being as they were, she thought that she had +all the authorities of the noble Greeks and Romans to bid her do what a +good wife should. + +He laughed at her griefs, thinking that they were all about Margot +Poins. He uttered jolly grossnesses; he said that she little knew the +way of courts if she thought that a man, and a very good man, might not +be found to wed the wench. + +She was troubled that he could not better read what was upon her mind, +for she was thinking that her having consented to his making null his +marriage with the Princess of Cleves that he might wed her would render +her work always the more difficult. It would render her more the target +for evil tongues, it would set a sterner and a more stubborn opposition +against her task of restoring the Kingdom of God within that realm. + +Henry said-- + +'Ye hannot guessed what my secret was? What have I done for thee this +day?' + +She still looked away over the lands. She made her face smile-- + +'Nay, I know not. Ha' ye brought me the musk I love well?' + +He shook his head. + +'It is more than that!' he said. + +She still smiled-- + +'Ha' ye--ha' ye--made make for me a new crown?' + +She feared a little that that was what he had done. For he had been +urgent with her, many months, to be crowned. It was his way to love +these things. And her heart was a little gladder when he shook his head +once again and uttered-- + +'It is more than that!' + +She dreaded his having made ready in secret a great pageant in her +honour, for she was afraid of all aggrandisements, and thought still it +had been better that she had remained his sweet friend ever and not the +Queen. For in that way she would have had as much empire over him, and +there would have been much less clamour against her--much less clamour +against the Church of her Saviour. + +She forced her mind to run upon all the things that she could wish for. +When she said it must be that he had ordered for her enough French +taffetas to make twelve gowns, he laughed and said that he had said that +it was more than a crown. When she guessed that he had made ready such a +huge cavalcade that she might with great comfort and safety ride with +him into Scotland, he laughed, contented that she should think of going +with him upon that long journey. He stood looking at her, his little +eyes blinking, his face full of pride and joy, and suddenly he uttered-- + +'The Church of God is come back again.' He touched his cap at the sacred +name. 'I ha' made submission to the Pope.' + +He looked her full in the face to get all the delight he might from her +looks and her movements. + +Her blue eyes grew large; she leaned forward in her chair; her mouth +opened a little; her sleeves fell down to the ground. 'Now am I indeed +crowned!' she said, and closed her eyes. '_Benedicta sit mater dei!_' +she uttered, and her hand went over her heart place; '_deo clamavi nocte +atque die._' + +She was silent again, and she leaned more forward. + +'_Sit benedicta dies haec; sit benedicta hora haec benedictaque, +saeculum saeculum, castra haec._' + +She looked out upon the great view: she aspired the air. + +'_Ad colles_,' she breathed, '_levavi oculos meos; unde venit salvatio +nostra!_' + +'Body of God,' Henry said, 'all things grow plain. All things grow +plain. This is the best day that ever I knew.' + + +IV + +The Lady Mary of England sat alone in a fair room with little arched +windows that gave high up on to the terrace. It was the best room that +ever she had had since her mother, the Queen Katharine of Aragon, had +been divorced. + +Dressed in black she sat writing at a large table before one window. Her +paper was fitted on to a wooden pulpit that rose before her; one book +stood open upon it, three others lay open too upon the red and blue and +green pattern of the Saracen rug that covered her table. At her right +hand was a three-tiered inkstand of pewter, set about with the white +feathers of pens; and the snakelike pattern of the table-rug serpentined +in and out beneath seals of parcel gilt, a platter of bread, a sandarach +of pewter, books bound in wooden covers and locked with chains, books in +red velvet covers, sewn with silver wire and tied with ribbons. It ran +beneath a huge globe of the world, blue and pink, that had a golden pin +in it to mark the city of Rome. There were little wooden racks stuck +full with written papers and parchments along the wainscoting between +the arched windows, but all the hangings of the other walls were of +tinted and dyed silks, not any with dark colours, because Katharine +Howard had deemed that that room with its deep windows in the thick +walls would be otherwise dark. The room was ten paces deep by twenty +long, and the wood of the floor was polished. Against the wall, behind +the Lady Mary's back, there stood a high chair upon a platform. Upon the +platform a carpet began that ran up the wall and, overhead, depended +from the gilded rafters of the ceiling so that it formed a dais and a +canopy. + +The Lady Mary sat grimly amongst all these things as if none of them +belonged to her. She looked in her book, she made a note upon her +paper, she stretched out her hand and took a piece of bread, putting it +in her mouth, swallowing it quickly, writing again, and then once more +eating, for the great and ceaseless hunger that afflicted her gnawed +always at her vitals. + +A little boy with a fair poll was reaching on tiptoe to smell at a pink +that depended from a vase of very thin glass standing in the deep +window. The shield of the coloured pane cast a little patch of red and +purple on to his callow head. He was dressed all in purple, very square, +and with little chains and medallions, and a little dagger with a golden +sheath was about his neck. In one hand he had a piece of paper, in the +other a pencil. The Lady Mary wrote; the child moved on tiptoe, with a +sedulous expression of silence about his lips, near to her elbow. He +watched her writing for a long time with attentive eyes. + +Once he said, 'Sister, I----' but she paid him no heed. + +After a time she looked coldly at his face and then he moved along the +table, fingered the globe very gently, touched the books and returned to +her side. He stood with his little legs wide apart. Then he sighed, then +he said-- + +'Sister, the Queen did bid me ask you a question.' + +She looked round upon him. + +'This was the Queen's question,' he said bravely: +'"_Cur_--why--_nunquam_--never--_rides_--dost thou +smile--_cum_--when--_ego, frater tuus_--I, thy little +brother--_ludo_--play--_in camera tua_--in thy chamber?"' + +'Little Prince,' she said, 'art not afeared of me?' + +'Aye, am I,' he answered. + +'Say then to the Queen,' she said, '"_Domina Maria_--the Lady +Mary--_ridet nunquam_--smileth never--_quod_--because--_timoris +ratio_--the reason of my fear--_bona et satis_--is good and +sufficient."' + +He held his little head upon one side. + +'The Queen did bid me say,' he uttered with his brave little voice, +'"Holy Writ hath it: _Ecce quam bonum et dignum est fratres--fratres----_"' +He faltered without embarrassment and added, 'I ha' forgot the words.' + +'Aye!' she said, 'they ha' been long forgotten in these places; I deem +it is overlate to call them to mind.' + +She looked upon him coldly for a long time. Then she stretched out her +hand for his paper. + +'Your Highness, I will set you a copy.' + +She took his paper and wrote-- + +'_Malo malo mala._' + +He held it in his chubby fist, his head on one side. + +'I cannot conster it,' he said. + +'Why, think upon it,' she answered. 'When I was thy age I knew it +already two years. But I was better beaten than thou.' + +He rubbed his little arm. + +'I am beaten enow,' he said. + +'Knowest not what a swingeing is,' she answered. + +'Then thou hadst a bitter childhood,' he brought out. + +'I had a good mother,' she cut him short. + +She turned her face to her writing again; it was bitter and set. The +little prince climbed slowly into the chair on the dais. He moved +sturdily and curled himself up on the cushion, studying the words on the +paper all the while with a little frown upon his brows. Then, shrugging +his shoulders, he set the paper upon his knee and began to write. + +At that date the Lady Mary was still called a bastard, though most men +thought that that hardship would soon be reversed. It was said that +great honours had been shown her, and that was apparent in the +furnishing of her rooms, the fineness of her gear, the increase in the +number of the women that waited on her, and the store of sweet things +that was provided for her to eat. A great many men noted the chair with +a dais that was set up always where she might be, in her principal room, +and though her ladies said that she never sat in it, most men believed +that she had made a pact with the King to do him honour and so to be +reinstated in the estate in which she held her own. It was considered, +too, that she no longer plotted with the King's enemies inside or out of +the realm; it was at least certain that she no longer had men set to +spy upon her, though it was noted that the Archbishop's gentleman, +Lascelles, nosed about her quarters and her maids. But he was always +spying somewhere and, as the Archbishop's days were thought to be +numbered, he was accounted of little weight. Indeed, since the fall of +Thomas Cromwell there seemed to be few spies about the Court, or almost +none at all. It was known that gentlemen wrote accounts of what passed +to Gardiner, the Bishop of Winchester. But Gardiner was gone back into +his see and appeared to have little favour, though it was claimed for +him that he had done much to advance the new Queen. So that, upon the +whole, men breathed much more freely--and women too--than in the days +before the fall of Privy Seal. The Queen had made little change, and +seemed to have it in mind to make little more. Her relatives had, nearly +none of them, been advanced. There were few Protestants oppressed, +though many Catholics had been loosed from the gaols, most notably him +whom the Archbishop Cranmer had taken to be his chaplain and confessor, +and others that other lords had taken out of prison to be about them. + +All in all the months that had passed since Cromwell's fall had gone +quietly. The King and Queen had gone very often to mass since Katharine +had been shown for Queen in the gardens at Hampton Court, and saints' +days and the feasts of the life of our Lady had been very carefully +observed, along with fasts such as had used to be observed. The King, +however, was mightily fond with his new Queen, and those that knew her +well, or knew her servants well, expected great changes. Some were much +encouraged, some feared very much, but nearly all were heartily glad of +that summer of breathing space; and the weather was mostly good, so that +the corn ripened well and there was little plague or ague abroad. + +Thus most men had been heartily glad to see the new Queen upon her +journey there to the north parts. She had ridden upon a white horse with +the King at her side; she had asked the names of several that had come +to see her; she had been fair to look at; and the King had pardoned +many felons, so that men's wives and mothers had been made glad; and +most old men said that the good times were come again, with the price of +malt fallen and twenty-six to the score of herrings. It was reported, +too, that a cider press in Herefordshire had let down a dozen firkins of +cider without any apples being set in it, and this was accounted an omen +of great plenty, whilst many sheep had died, so that men who had set +their fields down in grass talked of giving them to the plough again, +and upon St Swithin's Day no rain had fallen. All these things gave a +great contentment, and many that in the hard days had thought to become +Lutheran in search of betterment, now looked in byres and hidden valleys +to find priests of the old faith. For if a man could plough he might +eat, and if he might eat he could praise God after his father's manner +as well as in a new way. + +Thus, around the Lady Mary, whilst she wrote, the people of the land +breathed more peace. And even she could not but be conscious of a new +softness, if it was only in the warmth that came from having her +window-leads properly mended. She had hardly ever before known what it +was to have warm hands when she wrote, and in most days of the year she +had worn fur next her skin, indoors as well as out. But now the sun beat +on her new windows, and in that warmth she could wear fine lawn, so +that, in spite of herself, she took pleasure and was softened, though, +since she spoke to no man save the Magister Udal, and to him only about +the works of Plautus or the game of cards that they played together, few +knew of any change in her. + +Nevertheless, on that day she had one of her more ill moods and, +presently, having written a little more, she rang a small silver bell +that was shaped like a Dutch woman with wide skirts. + +'The Prince annoys me,' she said to her woman; 'send for his lady +governess.' + +The woman, dressed all in black, like her mistress, and with a little +frill of white cambric over her temples as if she were a nun, stood in +the open doorway that was just level with the Lady Mary's chair, so that +the stone wall of the passage caught the light from the window. She +folded her hands before her. + +'Alack, Madam,' she said, 'your Madamship knows that at this hour his +Highness' lady governess taketh ever the air.' + +The little boy in the chair looked over his paper at his sister. + +'Send for his physician then,' Mary said. + +'Alack, sister,' the little Prince said before the woman could move, 'my +physician is ill. _Jacet_--He lieth--_in cubiculo_--in his bed.' + +The Lady Mary would not look round on him. + +'Get thee, then,' she uttered coldly, 'to thine own apartments, Prince.' + +'Alack, sister,' he answered,'thou knowest that I may not walk along the +corridors alone for fear some slay me. Nor yet may I be anywhere save +with the Queen, or thee, or with my uncles, or my lady governess, or my +physicians, for fear some poison me.' + +He spoke with a clear and shrill voice, and the woman cast down her +eyes, trembling a little, partly to hear such a small, weary child speak +such a long speech as if by wizardry--for it was reported among the +serving maids that he had been overlooked--and partly for fear of the +black humour that she perceived to be upon her mistress. + +'Send me then my Magister to lay out cards with me,' the Lady Mary said. +'I cannot make my studies with this Prince in my rooms.' + +'Alack, Madam,' the girl said. She was high coloured and with dark eyes, +but when she faltered then the colour died from her cheeks. The Lady +Mary surveyed her coldly, for she was in the mood to give pain. She +uttered no words. + +'Alack, alack----' the maid whimpered. She was full of fear lest the +Lady Mary should order her to receive short rations or many stripes; she +was filled with consternation and grief since her sweetheart, a server, +had told her that he must leave her. For it was rumoured that the +Magister had been cast into gaol for sweethearting, and that the King +had said that all sweethearts should be gaoled from thenceforth. 'The +Magister is gaoled,' she said. + +'Wherefore?' the Lady uttered the one expressionless word. + +'I do not know,' the maid wailed; 'I do not know.' + +The form of the Archbishop's gentleman glided noiselessly behind her +back. His eyes shot one sharp, sideways glance in at the door, and, like +a russet fox, he was gone. He was so like a fox that the Lady Mary, when +she spoke, used the words-- + +'Catch me that gentleman.' + +He was brought to the doorsill by the panting maid, for he had walked +away very fast. He stood there, blinking his eyes and stroking his +fox-coloured beard. When the Lady Mary beckoned him into the room he +pulled off his cap and fell to his thin knees. He expected her to bid +him rise, but she left him there. + +'Wherefore is my secretary gaoled?' she asked cruelly. + +He ran his finger round the rim of his cap where it lay on the floor +beside him. + +'That he is gaoled, I know,' he said; 'but the wherefore of it, not.' + +He looked down at the floor and she down at his drooped eyelids. + +'God help you,' she uttered scornfully. 'You are a spy and yet know no +more than a Queen's daughter.' + +'God help me,' he repeated gravely and touched his eyelid with one +finger. 'What passed, passed between the King and him. I know no more +than common report.' + +'Common report?' she said. 'I warrant thee thou wast slinking around the +terrace. I warrant thee thou heardst words of the King's mouth. I +warrant thee thou followedst here to hear at my doorhole how I might +take this adventure.' + +One of his eyelids moved delicately, but he said no word. The Lady Mary +turned her back on him and he expected her order to be gone. But she +turned again-- + +'Common report?' she uttered once more. 'I do bid you give me the common +report upon this, that the Queen sends to me every day this little +Prince to be alone with me two hours.' + +He winced with his eyebrows again. + +'Out with the common report,' she said. + +'Madam,' he uttered, 'it is usually commended that the Queen should seek +to bring sister and Prince-brother together.' + +She shrugged her stiff shoulders up to her ears. + +'What a poor liar for a spy,' she said. 'It is more usually +reported'--and she turned upon the little Prince--'that the Queen sends +thee here that I may work thee a mischief so that thou die and her child +reign after the King thy father.' + +The little Prince looked at her with pensive eyes. At that moment +Katharine Howard came to the room door and looked in. + +'Body of God,' the Lady Mary said; 'here you spy out a spy committing +treason. For it is still treason to kneel to me. I am of illegal birth +and not of the blood royal.' + +Katharine essayed her smile upon the black-avised girl. + +'Give me leave,' she said. + +'Your Grace's poor room,' Mary said, 'is open ever to your Grace's +entry. _Ubi venis ibi tibi._' + +The Queen bade her waiting women go. She entered the room and looked at +Lascelles. + +'I think I know thy face,' she said. + +'I am the Archbishop's poor gentleman,' he answered. 'I think you have +seen me.' + +'No. It is not that,' she said. 'It was long ago.' + +She crossed the room to smell at the pinks in the window. + +'How late the flowers grow,' she said. 'It is August, yet here are still +vernal perfumes.' + +She was unwilling to bid the gentleman rise and go, because this was the +Lady Mary's room. + +'Where your Grace is, there the spring abideth,' Mary said sardonically. +'_Ecce miraculum sicut erat, Joshua rege._' + +The little Prince came timidly down to beg a flower from the Queen and +they all had their backs upon the spy. He ran his hands down his beard +and considered the Queen's words. Then swiftly he was on his feet and +through the door. He was more ready to brave the Lady Mary's after-wrath +than let the Queen see him upon his knees. For actually it was a treason +to kneel to the Lady Mary. It had been proclaimed so in the old days +when the King's daughter was always subject to new debasements. And who +knew whether now the penalty of treason might not still be enacted? It +was certain that the Queen had no liking for the Archbishop. Then, what +use might she not make of the fact that the Archbishop's man knelt, +seeming to curry favour, though in these days all men knelt to her, even +when the King was by? He cursed himself as he hastened away. + +The Queen looked over her shoulder and caught the glint of his red heel +as it went past the doorpost. + +'In our north parts,' she said, and she was glad that Lascelles had +fled, 'the seasons come ever tardily.' + +'Well, your Grace has not delayed to blossom,' Mary said. + +It was part of her humour when she was in a taunting mood to call the +Queen always 'your Grace' or 'your Majesty' at every turn of the phrase. + +Katharine looked at the pink intently. Her face had no expression, she +was determined at once to have a cheerful patience and not to show it in +her face. + +The little Prince stole his hand into hers. + +'Wherefore did my father--_rex pater meus_--pummel the man in the long +cloak?' he asked. + +'You knew it then?' Katharine asked of her stepdaughter. + +'I knew it not,' the Lady Mary answered. + +'I saw it from this window, but my sister would not look,' the Prince +said. + +The Queen was going to shut, with her own hand, the door, the little boy +trotting behind her, but, purple-clothed and huge, the King was there. + +'Well, I will not be shut out in mine own castle,' he said pleasantly. + +In those, the quiet days of his realm when most things were going well, +his face beneath his beard had taken a rounder and a smoother outline. +He moved with motions less hasty than those he had had two years before, +and when he had cast a task off it was done with and went out of his +mind, so that he appeared a very busy man with, between whiles, the +leisure to saunter. + +'In a half hour,' he said, 'I go north to meet the King o' Scots. I +would I had not the long journey to make but could stay with ye. It is +pleasant here; the air is livening.' He caught his little son by the +armpits and hoisted him on to his purple shoulders. 'Hey, princekin,' he +said, 'what news ha' you o' the day?' + +The little Edward pulled his father's bonnet off that he might the +better see the huge brows and the little eyes. + +'I told my sister that you did pummel a man in a long gown. What is even +"long gown" in the learned tongue?' He played daintily and languidly +with the hair of the King's temples, and when the King had said that he +might call it '_doctorum toga_,' he added, 'But my sister would not come +to look.' + +'Well, thy sister is a monstrous learned wench,' the King said with a +heavy benignity. 'She could not leave her book.' + +The Lady Mary stood rigid, with a mock humility. She had her hands +clasped before her, the folds of her black skirt fell stiffly just to +the ground. She pursed her lips and strove with herself to speak, for +she was minded to exhibit disdain, but her black mood was too strong for +her. + +'I did not read in my book, because I could not,' she said numbly. 'Your +son disturbed my reading. But I did not come to look, because I would +not.' + +With one arm round the boy's little waist as he sat on high, and one +hand on the little feet, the King looked at his daughter in a sudden hot +rage; for to speak contemptuously of his son was a thing that filled him +with anger and surprise. He opened his mouth to shout. Katharine Howard +was gently turning a brass sphere with the constellations upon it that +stood upon the table. She moved her fair face round towards the King and +set her finger upon her lips. He shrugged his shoulders, prince and all +moving up together, and his face took on the expression, half abashed +and half resigned, of a man who is reminded by his womankind that he is +near to a passionate folly. + +Katharine by that time had schooled him how to act when Mary was in that +humour, and he let out no word. + +'I do not like that this Prince should play in my room,' the Lady Mary +pursued him relentlessly, and he was so well lessoned that he answered +only-- + +'Ye must fight that cock with Kat. It is Kat that sends him, not I.' + +Nevertheless he was too masterful a man to keep his silence altogether; +he was, besides, so content upon the whole that he was sure he could +hold his temper in check, and the better to take breath for a long +speech, he took the little boy from his shoulder and planted his feet +abroad on the carpet. + +'See now, Moll,' he said, 'make friends!' and he stretched out a large +hand. She shrugged her shoulders half invisibly. + +'I will kneel down to the King of this country and to the Supreme Head +of the Church as it is here set up by law. What more would you have of +me?' + +'See now, Moll!' he said. + +He fingered the medal upon his chest and cast about for words. + +'Let us have peace in this realm,' he said. 'We are very near it.' + +She raised her eyelids with a tiny contempt. + +'It hangs much around you,' he went on. 'Listen! I will tell ye the +whole matter.' + +Slowly and sagaciously he disentangled all his coil of policies. His +letter to the Holy Father was all drafted and ready to be put into fine +words. But, before he sent it, he must be sure of peace abroad. It was +like this-- + +'Ye know,' he said, 'though great wrangles have been in the past betwixt +him and thee and mine own self, how my heart has ever been well inclined +to my nephew, thy cousin the Emperor. There are in Christendom now only +he and France that are anyways strong to stand against me or to invade +me. But France I ha' never loved, and him much.' + +'Ye are grown gentle then,' Mary said, 'and forgiving in your old age, +for ye know I ha' plotted against you with my cousin and my cousin with +me.' + +'It is a very ancient tale,' the King said. 'Forget it, as do I and he.' + +'Why, you live in the sun where the dial face moves. I in the shadow +where Time stays still. To me it is every day a new tale,' the Lady Mary +answered. + +His face took on an expression of patience and resignation that angered +her, for she knew that when her father looked so it was always very +difficult to move him. + +'Why, all the world forgets,' he said. + +'Save only I,' she answered. 'I had only one parent--a mother. She is +dead: she was done to death.' + +'I have pardoned your cousin that he plotted against me,' he stuck to +his tale, 'and he me what I did against your mother.' + +'Well, he was ever a popinjay,' the Lady Mary said. + +'Lately,' Henry continued, 'as ye wiz he had grown very thick with +Francis of France. He went across the French country into the +Netherlands, so strict was their alliance. It is more than I would do to +trust myself to France's word. All Holland marvelled.' + +'What is this to me?' the Lady Mary said. 'Will you send me across +France to the Netherlands?' + +He left her gibe alone. + +'But in these latter months,' he said, 'Kat and I ha' weakened with true +messages and loyal conceits this unholy alliance.' + +'Why, I ha' heard,' Mary said, 'ye did send the Duke of Norfolk to tell +the King o' France that my cousin had said in private that he was the +greater King of the twain. These be princely princes!' + +'An unholy alliance it was,' Henry went on his way, 'for the Emperor is +a very good Christian and a loyal son of the Church. But Francis +worships the devil--I have heard it said and I believe it--or, at least, +he believes not in God and our Saviour; and he pays allegiance to the +Church only when it serves his turn, now holding on, now letting go. I +am glad this alliance is dissolving.' + +'Why, I am glad to hear you speak like this,' Mary said bitterly. 'You +are a goodly son to Mother Church.' + +The King took her scorn with a shrug of the shoulders. + +'I am glad this alliance is dissolved or dissolving,' he said, 'for when +it is fully dissolved I will make my peace with Rome. And I long for +that day, for I am weary of errors.' + +'Well, this is a very goodly tale,' Mary said. 'I am glad you are minded +to escape hell-flame. What is it all to me?' + +'The burden of it rests with thee,' he answered, 'for thou alone canst +make thy cousin believe in my true mind.' + +'God help me,' Mary said. + +'See you, Moll,' the King broke in on her eagerly, 'if you will marry +the Infant of Spain----' + +'God's sakes,' she said lightly, 'my cousin's son will wed no bastard as +I be.' + +He brushed her jest aside with one hand. + +'See you,' he said, 'now I ride to the north to meet the King o' Scots. +That nephew of mine has always been too thick with Francis. But I will +be so friendly with him. And see you, with the Scots cut away and the +Emperor unloyal, the teeth of Francis are drawn. I might not send my +letter to the Pope with all Christendom arrayed together against me. But +when they are set by the ears I am strong enow.' + +'Oh, good!' the Lady Mary said. 'Strong enow to be humble!' + +Her eyes sparkled so much and her bosom so heaved, that Katharine moved +solicitously and swiftly to come between them. + +'See you, Moll,' the King said, 'forgive the ill I wrought thee, and so +shall golden days come again. Once more there shall be a deep peace with +contented husbandmen and the spreading of the vines abroad upon the +stakes. And once more _venite creator spiritus_ shall be sung in this +land. And once more you shall be much honoured; nay, you shall be as one +that saved this realm----' + +She screamed out-- + +'Stay your tongue!' with such a shrill voice that the King's words were +drowned. Katharine Howard ran in between them, but she pushed her aside, +speaking over her shoulder. + +'Before God,' she said, 'you gar me forget that you are the King that +begot me illegally.' + +Katharine turned upon the King and sought to move him from the room. But +he was still of opinion that he could convince his daughter and stood +his ground, looking over her shoulder as Mary had done. + +'Body of God!' Mary said. 'Body of God! That a man could deem me so +base!' She looked, convulsed, into Henry's eyes. 'Can you bring my +mother alive by the truckling and cajoling and setting lying prince +against lying prince? You slew my mother by lies, or your man slew her +by poison. It is all one. And will you come to me that you have decreed +misbegotten, to help you save your soul!' + +There was such a violent hatred in her tone that the King could bring no +word out, and she swept on-- + +'Could even a man be such a dull villain? To creep into heaven by +bribing his daughter! To creep into heaven by strengthening himself with +lies about one prince to another till he be strong enow to be humble! +This is a king! This is even a man! I would be ashamed of such manhood!' + +She took a deep breath. + +'What can you bribe me with? A marriage with my cousin's son? Why, he +has deserted my mother's cause. I had rather wed a falconer than that +prince. You will have me no longer called bastard? Why, I had rather be +called bastard than the acknowledged child of such a royal King. You +will cover me with brocades and set me on high? By God, the sun in the +heaven has looked upon such basenesses that I seek only a patch of +shade. God help me; you will recall the decree that said my mother was +not a Queen! God help us! God help us all! You will ennoble my mother's +memory. With a decree! Can all the decrees you can make render my mother +more sacred? When you decreed her not a Queen, did a soul believe it? If +now you decree that a Queen she was, who will believe you? I think I had +rather you left it alone, it is such a foul thing to have been thy +wife!' + +The saying of these things had pleased her so much that she gained +control of her tongue. + +'You cannot bribe me,' she said calmly. 'You have naught to give that I +have need of.' + +But the King was so used to his daughter's speeches that, though he had +seldom seen her so mutinous, he could still ignore them. + +'Well,' he said, 'I think you are angered with me for having set the +Magister in gaol----' + +'And in addition,' the Lady Mary pursued her own speech, for she deemed +that she had thought of a thing to pain both him and the Queen, 'how +might I with a good conscience tell my cousin that you have a true +inclination to him? I do believe you have; it is this lady that has +given it you. But how much longer will this lady sway you? No doubt the +King o' Scots hath a new lady for you--and she will be on the French +side, for the King o' Scots is the French King's man.' + +The King opened his mouth convulsively, but Katharine Howard laid her +hand right across it. + +'You must be riding soon,' she said. 'I have had a collation set in my +chamber.' She was so used by now to the violent humours of these +Tudors. 'You have still to direct me,' she added, 'what is to be done +with these rived cattle.' + +As they went through the door, the little Prince holding his father's +hand and she moving him gently by the shoulder, the child said-- + +'I thought ye wad ha' little profit speaking to my sister in her then +mood.' + +The King, in the gallery, looked with a gentle apprehension at his wife. + +'I trow ye think I ha' done wrong,' he said. + +She answered-- + +'Oh nay; she must come to know one day what your Grace had to tell her. +Now it is over. But I would not have had you heated. For it is ill to +start riding in a sweat. You shall not go for an hour yet.' + +That pleased him, for it made him think she was unwilling he should go. + +In her own room the Lady Mary sat back in her chair and smiled grimly at +the ceiling. + +'Body of God,' she said, 'I wish he had married this wench or ever he +saw my mother.' Nevertheless, upon reflection, she got pleasure from the +thought that her mother, with her Aragonia pride, had given the King +some ill hours before he had put her away to her death. Katharine of +Aragon had been no Katharine Howard to study her lord's ways and twist +him about her finger; and Mary took her rosary from a nail beside her +and told her beads for a quarter hour to calm herself. + + +V + +There fell upon the castle a deep peace when the King and most of the +men were gone. The Queen had the ordering of all things in the castle +and of most in the realm. Beneath her she had the Archbishop and some +few of the lords of the council who met most days round a long table in +the largest hall, and afterwards brought her many papers to sign or to +approve. But they were mostly papers of accounts for the castles that +were then building, and some few letters from the King's envoys in +foreign courts. Upon the whole, there was little stirring, though the +Emperor Charles V was then about harrying the Protestant Princes of +Almain and Germany. That was good enough news, and though the great +castle had well-nigh seven hundred souls, for the most part women, in +it, yet it appeared to be empty. High up upon the upper battlements the +guards kept a lazy watch. Sometimes the Queen rode a-hawking with her +ladies and several lords; when it rained she held readings from the +learned writers amongst her ladies, to teach them Latin better. For she +had set a fashion of good learning among women that did not for many +years die out of the land. In that pursuit she missed the Magister Udal, +for the ladies listened to him more willingly than to another. They were +reading the _True History of Lucian_, which had been translated into +Latin from the Greek about that time. + +What occupied her most was the writing of the King's letter to the Pope. +Down in their cellar the Archbishop and Lascelles wrought many days at +this very long piece of writing. But they made it too humble to suit +her, for she would not have her lord to crawl, as if in the dust upon +his belly, so she told the Archbishop. Henry was to show contrition and +repentance, desire for pardon and the promise of amendment. But he was a +very great King and had wrought greatly. And, having got the draft of it +in the vulgar tongue, she set about herself to turn it into Latin, for +she esteemed herself the best Latinist that they had there. + +But in that again she missed the Magister at last, and in the end she +sent for him up from his prison to her ante-chamber where it pleased her +to sit. It was a tall, narrow room, with much such a chair and dais as +were in the room of the Lady Mary. It gave on to her bedchamber that was +larger, and it had little, bright, deep windows in the thick walls. From +them there could be seen nothing but the blue sky, it was so high up. +Here she sat, most often with the Lady Rochford, upon a little stool +writing, with the parchments upon her knee or setting a maid to sew. The +King had lately made her a gift of twenty-four satin quilts. Most of her +maids sat in her painted gallery, carding and spinning wool, but usually +she did not sit with them, since she was of opinion that they spoke more +freely and took more pleasure when she was not there. She had brought +many maids with her into Yorkshire for this spinning, for she believed +that this northern wool was the best that could be had. Margot Poins sat +always with these maids to keep them to their tasks, and her brother had +been advanced to keep the Queen's door when she was in her private +rooms, being always without the chamber in which she sat. + +When the Magister came to her, she had with her in the little room the +Lady Rochford and the Lady Cicely Rochford that had married the old +knight when she was Cicely Elliott. Udal had light chains on his wrists +and on his ankles, and the Queen sent her guards to await him at her +outer door. The Lady Cicely set back her head and laughed at the +ceiling. + +'Why, here are the bonds of holy matrimony!' she said to his chains. 'I +ha' never seen them so plain before.' + +The Magister had straws on his cloak, and he limped a little, being +stiff with the damp of his cell. + +'_Ave, Regina!_' he said. '_Moriturus te saluto!_' He sought to kneel, +but he could not bend his joints; he smiled with a humorous and rueful +countenance at his own plight. + +The Queen said she had brought him there to read the Latin of her +letter. He ducked his brown, lean head. + +'_Ha_,' he said, '_sine cane pastor_--without his dog, as Lucretius +hath it, the shepherd watches in vain. Wolves--videlicet, errors--shall +creep into your marshalled words.' + +Katharine kept to him a cold face and, a little abashed, he muttered +under his breath-- + +'I ha' played with many maids, but this is the worst pickle that ever I +was in.' + +He took her parchment and read, but, because she was the Queen, he +would not say aloud that he found solecisms in her words. + +'Give me,' he said, 'your best pen, and let me sit upon a stool!' + +He sat down upon the stool, set the writing on his knee, and groaned +with his stiffness. He took up his task, but when those ladies began to +talk--the Lady Cicely principally about a hawk that her old knight had +training for the Queen, a white sea hawk from Norway--he winced and +hissed a little because they disturbed him. + +'Misery!' he said; 'I remember the days when no mouse dared creak if I +sat to my task in the learned tongues.' + +The Queen then remembered very well how she had been a little girl with +the Magister for tutor in her father's great and bare house. It was +after Udal had been turned out of his mastership at Eton. He had been in +vile humour in most of those days, and had beaten her very often and +fiercely with his bundle of twigs. It was only afterwards that he had +called her his best pupil. + +Remembering these things, she dropped her voice and sat still, thinking. +Cicely Elliott, who could not keep still, blew a feather into the air +and caught it again and again. The old Lady Rochford, her joints swollen +with rheumatism, played with her beads in her lap. From time to time she +sighed heavily and, whilst the Magister wrote, he sighed after her. +Katharine would not send her ladies away, because she would not be alone +with him to have him plague her with entreaties. She would not go +herself, because it would have been to show him too much honour then, +though a few days before she would have gone willingly because his +vocation and his knowledge of the learned tongues made him a man that it +was right to respect. + +But when she read what he had written for her, his lean, brown face +turning eagerly and with a ferreting motion from place to place on the +parchment, she was filled with pity and with admiration for the man's +talent. It was as if Seneca were writing to his master, or Pliny to the +Emperor Trajan. And, being a very tender woman at bottom-- + +'Magister,' she said, 'though you have wrought me the greatest grief I +think ye could, by so injuring one I like well, yet this is to me so +great a service that I will entreat the King to remit some of your +pains.' + +He stumbled up from his stool and this time managed to kneel. + +'Oh, Queen,' he said, '_Doctissima fuisti_; you were the best pupil that +ever I had----' She tried to silence him with a motion of her hand. But +he twined his lean hands together with the little chains hanging from +them. 'I call this to your pitiful mind,' he brought out, 'not because I +would have you grateful, but to make you mindful of what I suffer--_non +quia grata sed ut clemens sis_. For, for advancement I have no stomach, +since by advancing me you will advance my wife from Paris, and for +liberty I have no use since you may never make me free of her. Leave me +to rot in my cell, but, if it be but the tractate of Diodorus Siculus, a +very dull piece, let me be given some book in a learned tongue. I faint, +I starve, I die for lack of good letters. I that no day in my life have +passed--_nulla die sine_--no day without reading five hours in goodly +books since I was six and breeched. Bethink you, you that love +learning----' + +'Now tell me,' Cicely Elliott cried out, 'which would you rather in your +cell--the Letters of Cicero or a kitchen wench?' + +The Queen bade her hold her peace, and to the Magister she uttered-- + +'Books I will have sent you, for I think it well that you should be so +well employed. And, for your future, I will have you set down in a +monastery where there shall be for you much learning and none of my sex. +You have done harm enow! Now, get you gone!' + +He sighed that she had grown so stern, and she was glad to be rid of +him. But he had not been gone a minute into the other room when there +arose such a clamour of harsh voices and shrieks and laughter that she +threw her door open, coming to it herself before the other ladies could +close their mouths, which had opened in amazement. + +The young Poins was beating the Magister, so that the fur gown made a +greyish whirl about his scarlet suit in the midst of a tangle of spun +wool; spinning wheels were overset, Margot Poins crashed around upon +them, wailing; the girls with their distaffs were crouching against the +window-places and in corners, crying out each one of them. + +The Queen had a single little gesture of the hand with which she +dismissed all her waiting-women. She stood alone in the inner doorway +with the Lady Cicely and the Lady Rochford behind her. The Lady Rochford +wrung her gouty hands; the Lady Cicely set back her head and laughed. + +The Queen spoke no word, but in the new silence it was as if the +Magister fell out of the boy's hands. He staggered amidst the trails of +wool, nearly fell, and then made stiff zigzags towards the open outer +door, where his prison guards awaited him, since they had no warrant to +enter the antechamber. He dragged after him a little trail of fragments +of spinning wheels and spindles. + +'Well, there's a fine roister-doister!' the Lady Cicely laughed behind +the Queen's back. The Queen stood very still and frowned. To her the +disturbance was monstrous and distasteful, for she was minded to have +things very orderly and quiet. The boy, in his scarlet, pulled off his +bonnet and panted, but he was not still more than a second, and suddenly +he called out to the Queen-- + +'Make that pynot to marry my sister!' + +Margot Poins hung round him and cried out-- + +'Oh no! Oh no!' + +He shook her roughly loose. + +'An' you do not wed with him how shall I get advancement?' he said. ''A +promised me that when 'a should come to be Chancellor 'a would advance +me.' + +He pushed her from him again with his elbow when she came near. + +'Y've grown over familiar,' the Queen said, 'with being too much near +me. Y'are grown over familiar. For seven days you shall no longer keep +my door.' + +Margot Poins raised her arms over her head, then she leant against a +window-pane and sobbed into the crook of her elbow. The boy's slender +face was convulsed with rage; his blue eyes started from his head; his +callow hair was crushed up. + +'Shall a man----' he began to protest. + +'I say nothing against that you did beat this Magister,' the Queen said. +'Such passions cannot be controlled, and I pass it by.' + +'But will ye not make this man to wed with my sister?' the boy said +harshly. + +'I cannot. He hath a wedded wife!' + +He dropped his hands to his side. + +'Alack; then my father's house is down,' he cried out. + +'Gentleman Guard,' Katharine said, 'get you for seven days away from my +door. I will have another sentry whilst you bethink you of a worthier +way to advancement.' + +He gazed at her stupidly. + +'You will not make this wedding?' he asked. + +'Gentleman Guard,' Katharine said, 'you have your answer. Get you gone.' + +A sudden rage came into his eyes; he swallowed in his throat and made a +gesture of despair with his hand. The Queen turned back into her room +and busied herself with her task, which was the writing into a little +vellum book of seven prayers to the Virgin that the Lady Elizabeth, +Queen Anne Boleyn's daughter, a child then in London, was to turn each +one into seven languages, written fair in the volume as a gift, against +Christmas, for the King. + +'I would not have that boy to guard my door,' the Lady Cicely said to +the Queen. + +'Why, 'tis a good boy,' Katharine answered; 'and his sister loves me +very well.' + +'Get your Highness another,' the Lady Cicely persisted. 'I do not like +his looks.' + +The Queen gazed up from her writing to where the dark girl, her figure +raked very much back in her stiff bodice, played daintily with the +tassels of the curtain next the window. + +'My Lady,' Katharine said, 'my Highness must get me a new maid in place +of Margot Poins, that shall away into a nunnery. Is not that grief +enough for poor Margot? Shall she think in truth that she has undone her +father's house?' + +'Then advance the springald to some post away from you,' the Lady Cicely +said. + +'Nay,' the Queen answered; 'he hath done nothing to merit advancement.' + +She continued, with her head bent down over the writing on her knee, her +lips moving a little as, sedulously, she drew large and plain letters +with her pen. + +'By Heaven,' the Lady Cicely said, 'you have too tickle a conscience to +be a Queen of this world and day. In the time of Caesar you might have +lived more easily.' + +The Queen looked up at her from her writing; her clear eyes were +untroubled. + +'Aye,' she said. '_Lucio Domitio, Appio Claudio consulibus_----' + +Cicely Rochford set back her head and laughed at the ceiling. + +'Aye, your Highness is a Roman,' she tittered like a magpie. + +'In the day of Caesar it was simple to do well,' the Queen said. + +'Why, I do not believe it,' Cicely answered her. + +'Cousin! Cousin!' The old Lady Rochford warned her that this was the +Queen, not her old playmate. + +'But now,' the Queen said, 'with such a coming together and a concourse +of peoples about us; with such holes and corners in a great Court----' +She paused and sighed. + +'Well, if I may not speak my mind,' Cicely Rochford said to the old +lady, 'what good am I?' + +'I did even what I might to keep this lamb Margot from the teeth of that +wolf Magister,' the Queen said. 'I take shame to myself that I did no +more. I will do a penance for it. But still I think that these be +degenerate days.' + +'Oh, Queen of dreams and fancies,' Cicely Rochford said. 'I am very +certain that in the days of your noble Romans it was as it is now. Tell +me, if you can, that in all your readings of hic and hoc you lit not +upon such basenesses? You will not lay your hand upon your heart and say +that never a man of Rome bartered his sister for the hope of +advancement, or that never a learned doctor was a corrupter of youth? I +have seen the like in the plays of Plautus that here have been played at +Court.' + +'Why,' the Queen said, 'the days of Plautus were days degenerated and +fallen already from the ancient nobleness.' + +'You should have Queened it before Goodman Adam fell,' Cicely Rochford +mocked her. 'If you go back before Plautus, go back all the way.' + +She shrugged her shoulders up to her ears and uttered a little sound +like '_Pfui!_' Then she said quickly-- + +'Give me leave to be gone, your Highness, that I may not grow over +familiar like the boy with the pikestaff, for if it do not gall you it +shall wring the withers of this my old husband's cousin!' + +The old Lady Rochford, who was always thinking of what had been said two +speeches ago, because she was so slow-witted, raised her gouty hands in +the air and opened her mouth. But the Queen smiled faintly at Cicely. + +'When I ask you to mince matters in my little room you shall do it. It +was Lucius the Praetor that went always accompanied by a carping Stoic +to keep him from being puffed up, and it was a good custom.' + +'Before Heaven,' Cicely Rochford said in the midst of her curtsey at the +door, 'shall I have the office of such a one as Diogenes who derided +Alexander the Emperor? Then must my old husband live with me in a tub!' + +'Pray you,' the Queen said after her through the door, 'look you around +and spy me out a maid to be my tiring-woman and ward my spinsters. For +nowadays I see few maids to choose from.' + +When she was gone the old Lady Rochford timorously berated the Queen. +She would have her be more distant with knights' wives and the like. For +it was fitting for a Queen to be feared and deemed awful. + +'I had rather be loved and deemed pitiful,' Katharine answered. 'For I +was once such a one--no more--than she or thou, or very little more. +Before the people I bear myself proudly for my lord his high honour. But +I do lead a very cloistered life, and have leisure to reflect upon for +what a little space authority endureth, and how that friendship and true +love between friends are things that bear the weather better.' She did +not say her Latin text, for the old lady had no Latin. + + +VI + +In the underground cell, above the red and gold table that afternoon, +Lascelles wrought at a fair copy of the King's letter to the Pope, +amended as it had been by Udal's hand. The Archbishop had come into the +room reading a book as he came from his prayers, and sate him down in +his chair at the tablehead without glancing at his gentleman. + +'Prithee, your Grace,' Lascelles said, 'suffer me to carry this letter +mine own self to the Queen.' + +The Archbishop looked up at him; his mournful eyes started wide; he +leaned forward. + +'Art thou Lascelles?' he asked. + +'Aye, Lascelles I am,' the gentleman answered; 'but I have cut off my +beard.' + +The Archbishop was very weak and startled; he fell into an anger. + +'Is this a time for vanities?' he said. 'Will you be after the wenches? +You look a foolish boy! I do not like this prank.' + +Lascelles put up his hand to stroke his vanished beard. His risible lips +writhed in a foxy smile; his chin was fuller than you would have +expected, round and sensuous with a dimple in the peak of it. + +'Please it, your Grace,' he said, 'this is no vanity, but a scheme that +I will try.' + +'What scheme? What scheme?' the Archbishop said. 'Here have been too +many schemes.' He was very shaken and afraid, because this world was +beyond his control. + +'Please it, your Grace,' Lascelles answered, 'ask me not what this +scheme is.' + +The Archbishop shook his head and pursed his lips feebly. + +'Please it, your Grace,' Lascelles urged, 'if this scheme miscarry, your +Grace shall hear no more of it. If this scheme succeed I trow it shall +help some things forward that your Grace would much have forwarded. +Please it, your Grace, to ask me no more, and to send me with this +letter to the Queen's Highness.' + +The Archbishop opened his nerveless hands before him; they were pale and +wrinkled as if they had been much soddened in water. Since the King had +bidden him compose that letter to the Pope of Rome, his hands had grown +so. Lascelles wrote on at the new draft of the letter, his lips +following the motions of his pen. Still writing, and with his eyes down, +he said-- + +'The Queen's Highness will put from her her tirewoman in a week from +now.' + +The Archbishop moved his fingers as who should say-- + +'What is that to me!' His eyes gazed into the space above his book that +lay before him on the table. + +'This Margot Poins is a niece of the master-printer Badge, a Lutheran, +of the Austin Friars.' Lascelles pursued his writing for a line further. +Then he added-- + +'This putting away and the occasion of it shall make a great noise in +the town of London. It will be said amongst the Lutherans that the Queen +is answerable therefor. It will be said that the Queen hath a very lewd +Court and companionship.' + +The Archbishop muttered wearily-- + +'It hath been said already.' + +'But not,' Lascelles said, 'since she came to be Queen.' + +The Archbishop directed upon him his hang-dog eyes, and his voice was +the voice of a man that would not be disturbed from woeful musings. + +'What use?' he said bitterly; and then again, 'What use?' + +Lascelles wrote on sedulously. He used his sandarach to the end of the +page, blew off the sand, eyed the sheet sideways, laid it down, and set +another on his writing-board. + +'Why,' he brought out quietly, 'it may be brought to the King's +Highness' ears.' + +'What way?' the Archbishop said heavily, as if the thing were +impossible. His gentleman answered-- + +'This way and that!' The King's Highness had a trick of wandering about +among his faithful lieges unbeknown; foreign ambassadors wrote abroad +such rumours which might be re-reported from the foreign by the King's +servants. + +'Such a report,' Lascelles said, 'hath gone up already to London town by +a swift carrier.' + +The Archbishop brought out wearily and distastefully-- + +'How know you? Was it you that wrote it?' + +'Please it, your Grace,' his gentleman answered him, 'it was in this +wise. As I was passing by the Queen's chamber wall I heard a great +outcry----' + +He laid down his pen beside his writing-board the more leisurely to +speak. + +He had seen Udal, beaten and shaking, stagger out from the Queen's door +to where his guards waited to set him back in prison. From Udal he had +learned of this new draft of the letter; of Udal's trouble he knew +before. Udal gone, he had waited a little, hearing the Queen's voice and +what she said very plainly, for the castle was very great and quiet. +Then out had come the young Poins, breathing like a volcano through his +nostrils, and like to be stricken with palsy, boy though he was. Him +Lascelles had followed at a convenient distance, where he staggered and +snorted. And, coming upon the boy in an empty guard-room near the great +gate, he had found him aflame with passion against the Queen's +Highness. + +'I,' the boy had cried out, 'I that by my carrying of letters set this +Howard where she sits! I!--and this is my advancement. My sister cast +down, and I cast out, and another maid to take my sister's place.' + +And Lascelles, in the guard-chamber, had shown him sympathy and reminded +him that there was gospel for saying that princes had short memories. + +'But I did not calm him!' Lascelles said. + +On the contrary, upon Lascelles' suggestion that the boy had but to hold +his tongue and pocket his wrongs, the young Poins had burst out that he +would shout it all abroad at every street corner. And suddenly it had +come into his head to write such a letter to his Uncle Badge the printer +as, printed in a broadside, would make the Queen's name to stink, until +the last generation was of men, in men's nostrils. + +Lascelles rubbed his hands gently and sinuously together. He cast one +sly glance at the Archbishop. + +'Well, the letter was written,' he said. 'Be sure the broadside shall be +printed.' + +Cranmer's head was sunk over his book. + +'This lad,' Lascelles said softly, 'who in seven days' time again shall +keep the Queen's door (for it is not true that the Queen's Highness is +an ingrate, well sure am I), this lad shall be a very useful confidant; +a very serviceable guide to help us to a knowledge of who goes in to the +Queen and who cometh out.' + +The Archbishop did not appear to be listening to his gentleman's soft +voice and, resuming his pen, Lascelles finished his tale with-- + +'For I have made this lad my friend. It shall cost me some money, but I +do not doubt that your Grace shall repay.' + +The Archbishop raised his head. + +'No, before God in heaven on His throne!' he said. His voice was shrill +and high; he agitated his hands in their fine, tied sleeves. 'I will +have no part in these Cromwell tricks. All is lost; let it be lost. I +must say my prayers.' + +'Has it been by saying of your Grace's prayers that your Grace has lived +through these months?' Lascelles asked softly. + +'Aye,' the Archbishop wrung his hands; 'you girded me and moved me when +Cromwell lay at death, to write a letter to the King's Highness. To +write such a letter as should appear brave and faithful and true to +Privy Seal's cause.' + +'Such a letter your Grace wrote,' Lascelles said; 'and it was the best +writing that ever your Grace made.' + +The Archbishop gazed at the table. + +'How do I know that?' he said in a whisper. 'You say so, who bade me +write it.' + +'For that your Grace lives yet,' Lascelles said softly; 'though in those +days a warrant was written for your capture. For, sure it is, and your +Grace has heard it from the King's lips, that your letter sounded so +faithful and piteous and true to him your late leader, that the King +could not but believe that you, so loyal in such a time to a man +disgraced and cast down beyond hope, could not but be faithful and loyal +in the future to him, the King, with so many bounties to bestow.' + +'Aye,' the Archbishop said, 'but how do I know what of a truth was in +the King's mind who casteth down to-day one, to-morrow another, till +none are left?' + +And again Cranmer dropped his anguished eyes to the table. + + * * * * * + +In those days still--and he slept still worse since the King had bidden +him write this letter to Rome--the Archbishop could not sleep on any +night without startings and sweats and cryings out in his sleep. And he +gave orders that, when he so cried out, the page at his bedside should +wake him. + +For then he was seeing the dreadful face of his great master, Privy +Seal, when the day of his ruin had come. Cromwell had been standing in a +window of the council chamber at Westminster looking out upon a +courtyard. In behind him had come the other lords of the council, +Norfolk with his yellow face, the High Admiral, and many others; and +each, seating himself at the table, had kept his bonnet on his head. So +Cromwell, turning, had seen them and had asked with his hard insolence +and embittered eyes of hatred, how they dared be covered before he who +was their president sat down. Then, up against him in the window-place +there had sprung Norfolk at the chain of the George round his neck, and +Suffolk at the Garter on his knee; and Norfolk had cried out that Thomas +Cromwell was no longer Privy Seal of that kingdom, nor president of that +council, but a traitor that must die. Then such rage and despair had +come into Thomas Cromwell's terrible face that Cranmer's senses had +reeled. He had seen Norfolk and the Admiral fall back before this +passion; he had seen Thomas Cromwell tear off his cap and cast it on the +floor; he had heard him bark and snarl out certain words into the face +of the yellow dog of Norfolk. + +'_Upon your life you dare not call me traitor!_' and Norfolk had fallen +back abashed. + +Then the chamber had seemed to fill with an awful gloom and darkness; +men showed only like shadows against the window lights; the constable of +the Tower had come in with the warrants, and in that gloom the earth had +appeared to tremble and quake beneath the Archbishop's feet. + + * * * * * + +He crossed himself at the recollection, and, coming out of his stupor, +saw that Lascelles was finishing his writings. And he was glad that he +was here now and not there then. + +'Prithee, your Grace,' the gentleman's soft voice said, 'let me bear, +myself, this letter to the Queen.' + +The Archbishop shivered frostily in his robes. + +'I will have no more Cromwell tricks,' he said. 'I have said it'; and he +affected an obdurate tone. + +'Then, indeed, all is lost,' Lascelles answered; 'for this Queen is very +resolved.' + +The Archbishop cast his eyes up to the cold stone ceiling above him. He +crossed himself. + +'You are a very devil,' he said, and panic came into his eyes, so that +he turned them all round him as if he sought an issue at which to run +out. + +'The Papist lords in this castle met on Saturday night,' Lascelles said; +'their meeting was very secret, and Norfolk was their head. But I have +heard it said that not one of them was for the Queen.' + +The Archbishop shrank within himself. + +'I am not minded to hear this,' he said. + +'Not one of them was for the Queen altogether; for she will render all +lands and goods back to the Church, and there is no one of them but is +rich with the lands and goods of the Church. That they that followed +Cromwell are not for the Queen well your Grace knoweth,' his gentleman +continued. + +'I will not hear this; this is treason,' the Archbishop muttered. + +'So that who standeth for the Queen?' Lascelles whispered. 'Only a few +of the baser sort that have no lands to lose.' + +'The King,' the Archbishop cried out in a terrible voice; 'the King +standeth for her!' + +He sprang up in his chair and then sank down again, covering his mouth +with his hands, as if he would have intercepted the uttered words. For +who knew who listened at what doors in these days. He whispered +horribly-- + +'What a folly is this. Who shall move the King? Will reports of his +ambassadors that Cleves, or Charles, or Francis miscall the Queen? You +know they will not, for the King is aware of how these princes batten on +carrion. Will broad sheets of the Lutheran? You know they will not, for +the King is aware of how those coggers come by their tales. Will the +King go abroad among the people any more to hear what they say? You know +he will not. For he is grown too old, and his fireside is made too +sweet----' + +He wavered, and he could not work himself up with a longer show of +anger. + +'Prithee,' Lascelles said, 'let me bear this letter myself to the +Queen.' His voice was patient and calm. + +The Archbishop lay back, impotent, in his chair. His arms were along the +arms of it: he had dropped his book upon the table. His long gown was +draped all over him down to his feet; his head remained motionless; his +eyes did not wink, and gazed at despair; his hands drooped, open and +impotent. + +Suddenly he moved one of them a very little. + + +VII + +It was the Queen's habit to go every night, when the business of the day +was done, to pray, along with the Lady Mary, in the small chapel that +was in the roof of the castle. To vespers she went with all the Court to +the big chapel in the courtyard that the King had builded especially for +her. But to this little chapel, that was of Edward IV's time, small and +round-arched, all stone and dark and bare, she went with the Lady Mary +alone. Her ladies and her doorguards they left at the stair foot, on a +level with the sleeping rooms of the poorer sort, but up the little +stairway they climbed by themselves, in darkness, to pray privately for +the conversion of England. For this little place was so small and so +forgotten that it had never been desecrated by Privy Seal's men. It had +had no vessels worth the taking, and only very old vestments and a few +ill-painted pictures on the stone walls that were half hidden in the +dust. + +Katharine had found this little place when, on her first day at +Pontefract, she had gone a-wandering over the castle with the King. For +she was curious to know how men had lived in the old times; to see their +rooms and to mark what old things were there still in use. And she had +climbed thus high because she was minded to gaze upon the huge expanse +of country and of moors that from the upper leads of the castle was to +be seen. But this little chapel had seemed to her to be all the more +sacred because it had been undesecrated and forgotten. She thought that +you could not find such another in the King's realm at that time; she +was very assured that not one was to be found in any house of the King's +and hers. + +And, making inquiries, she had found that there was also an old priest +there served the chapel, doing it rather secretly for the well-disposed +of the castle's own guards. This old man had fled, at the approach of +the King's many, into the hidden valleys of that countryside, where +still the faith lingered and lingers now. For, so barbarous and remote +those north parts were, that a great many people had never heard that +the King was married again, and fewer still, or none, knew that he and +his wife were well inclined again towards Rome. + +This old priest she had had brought to her. And he was so well loved +that along with him came a cluster of weather-battered moorsmen, right +with him into her presence. They kneeled down, being clothed with skins, +and several of them having bows of a great size, to beg her not to harm +this old man, for he was reputed a saint. The Queen could not understand +their jargon but, when their suit was interpreted to her by the Lord +Dacre of the North, and when she had had a little converse with the old +priest, she answered that, so touched was her heart by his simplicity +and gentleness, that she would pray the good King, her lord and master, +to let this priest be made her confessor whilst there they stayed. And +afterwards, if it were convenient, in reward for his faithfulness, he +should be made a prior or a bishop in those parts. So the moorsmen, +blessing her uncouthly for her fairness and kind words, went back with +their furs and bows into their fastnesses. One of them was a great lord +of that countryside, and each day he sent into the castle bucks and moor +fowl, and once or twice a wolf. His name was Sir John Peel, and Sir John +Peel, too, the priest was called. + +So the priest served that little altar, and of a night, when the Queen +was minded next day to partake of the host, he heard her confession. On +other nights he left them there alone to say their prayers. It was +always very dark with the little red light burning before the altar and +two tapers that they lit beneath a statue of the Virgin, old and black +and ill-carved by antique hands centuries before. And, in that +blackness, they knelt, invisible almost, and still in the black gowns +that they put on for prayers, beside a low pillar that gloomed out at +their sides and vanished up into the darkness of the roof. + +Having done their prayers, sometimes they stayed to converse and to +meditate, for there they could be very private. On the night when the +letter to Rome was redrafted, the Queen prayed much longer than the Lady +Mary, who sat back upon a stool, silently, to await her finishing--for +it seemed that the Queen was more zealous for the converting of those +realms again to the old faith than was ever the Lady Mary. The tapers +burned with a steady, invisible glow in the little side chapel behind +the pillar; the altar gleamed duskily before them, and it was so still +that through the unglassed windows they could hear, from far below in +the black countryside, a tenuous bleating of late-dropped lambs. +Katharine Howard's beads clicked and her dress rustled as she came up +from her knees. + +'It rests more with thee than with any other in this land,' her voice +reverberated amongst the distant shadows. A bat that had been drawn in +by the light flittered invisibly near them. + +'Even what?' the Lady Mary asked. + +'Well you know,' the Queen answered; 'and may the God to whom you have +prayed, that softened the heart of Paul, soften thine in this hour!' + +The Lady Mary maintained a long silence. The bat flittered, with a +leathern rustle, invisible, between their very faces. At last Mary +uttered, and her voice was taunting and malicious-- + +'If you will soften my heart much you must beseech me.' + +'Why, I will kneel to you,' the Queen said. + +'Aye, you shall,' Mary answered. 'Tell me what you would have of me.' + +'Well you know!' Katharine said again. + +In the darkness the lady's voice maintained its bitter mirth, as it were +the broken laughter of a soul in anguish. + +'I will have you tell me, for it is a shameful tale that will shame you +in the telling.' + +The Queen paused to consider of her words. + +'First, you shall be reconciled with, and speak pleasantly with, the +King your father and my lord.' + +'And is it not a shameful thing you bid me do, to bid me speak pleasant +words to him that slew my mother and called me bastard?' + +The Queen answered that she asked it in the name of Christ, His pitiful +sake, and for the good of this suffering land. + +'None the less, Queen, thou askest it in the darkness that thy face may +not be seen. And what more askest thou?' + +'That when the Duke of Orleans his ambassadors come asking your hand in +marriage, you do show them a pleasant and acquiescent countenance.' + +The sacredness of that dark place kept Mary from laughing aloud. + +'That, too, you dare not ask in the light of day, Queen,' she said. 'Ask +on!' + +'That when the Emperor's ambassadors shall ask for your hand you shall +profess yourself glad indeed.' + +'Well, here is more shame, that I should be prayed to feign this +gladness. I think the angels do laugh that hear you. Ask even more.' + +Katharine said patiently-- + +'That, having in reward of these favours, been set again on high, having +honours shown you and a Court appointed round you, you shall gladly play +the part of a princess royal to these realms, never gibing, nor sneering +upon this King your father, nor calling upon the memory of the wronged +Queen your mother.' + +'Queen,' the Lady Mary said, 'I had thought that even in the darkness +you had not dared to ask me this.' + +'I will ask it you again,' the Queen said, 'in your room where the light +of the candles shines upon my face.' + +'Why, you shall,' the Lady Mary said. 'Let us presently go there.' + + * * * * * + +They went down the dark and winding stair. At the foot the procession of +the _coucher de la royne_ awaited them, first being two trumpeters in +black and gold, then four pikemen with lanthorns, then the marshal of +the Queen's household and five or seven lords, then the Queen's ladies, +the Lady Rochford that slept with her, the Lady Cicely Rochford; the +Queen's tiring-women, leaving a space between them for the Queen and the +Lady Mary to walk in, then four young pages in scarlet and with the +Queen's favours in their caps, and then the guard of the Queen's door, +and four pikemen with torches whose light, falling from behind, +illumined the path for the Queen's steps. The trumpeters blew four +shrill blasts and then four with their fists in the trumpet mouths to +muffle them. The brazen cries wound down the dark corridors, fathoms and +fathoms down, to let men know that the Queen had done her prayers and +was going to her bed. This great state was especially devised by the +King to do honour to the new Queen that he loved better than any he had +had. The purpose of it was to let all men know what she did that she +might be the more imitated. + +But the Queen bade them guide her to the Lady Mary's door, and in the +doorway she dismissed them all, save only her women and her door guard +and pikemen who awaited her without, some on stools and some against the +wall, ladies and men alike. + +The Lady Mary looked into the Queen's face very close and laughed at her +when they were in the fair room and the light of the candles. + +'Now you shall say your litany over again,' she sneered; 'I will sit me +down and listen.' And in her chair at the table, with her face averted, +she dug with little stabs into the covering rug the stiletto with which +she was wont to mend her pens. + +Standing by her, her face fully lit by the many candles that were upon +the mantel, the Queen, dressed all in black and with the tail of her +hood falling down behind to her feet, went patiently through the list of +her prayers--that the Lady Mary should be reconciled with her father, +that she should show at first favour to the ambassadors that sued for +her hand for the Duke of Orleans, and afterwards give a glad consent to +her marriage with the Prince Philip, the Emperor's son; and then, having +been reinstated as a princess of the royal house of England, she should +bear herself as such, and no more cry out upon the memory of Katharine +of Aragon that had been put away from the King's side. + +The Queen spoke these words with a serious patience and a level voice; +but when she came to the end of them she stretched out her hand and her +voice grew full. + +'And oh,' she said, her face being set and earnest in entreaty towards +the girl's back, 'if you have any love for the green and fertile land +that gave birth both to you and to me----' + +'But to me a bastard,' the Lady Mary said. + +'If you would have the dishoused saints to return home to their loved +pastures; if you would have the Mother of God and of us all to rejoice +again in her dowry; if you would see a great multitude of souls, gentle +and simple reconducted again towards Heaven----' + +'Well, well!' the Lady Mary said; 'grovel! grovel! I had thought you +would have been shamed thus to crawl upon your belly before me.' + +'I would crawl in the dust,' Katharine said. 'I would kiss the mire from +the shoon of the vilest man there is if in that way I might win for the +Church of God----' + +'Well, well!' the Lady Mary said. + +'You will not let me finish my speech about our Saviour and His mother,' +the Queen said. 'You are afraid I should move you.' + +The Lady Mary turned suddenly round upon her in her chair. Her face was +pallid, the skin upon her hollowed temples trembled-- + +'Queen,' she called out, 'ye blaspheme when ye say that a few paltry +speeches of yours about God and souls will make me fail my mother's +memory and the remembrances of the shames I have had.' + +She closed her eyes; she swallowed in her throat and then, starting up, +she overset her chair. + +'To save souls!' she said. 'To save a few craven English souls! What are +they to me? Let them burn in the eternal fires! Who among them raised a +hand or struck a blow for my mother or me? Let them go shivering to +hell.' + +'Lady,' the Queen said, 'ye know well how many have gone to the stake +over conspiracies for you in this realm.' + +'Then they are dead and wear the martyr's crown,' the Lady Mary said. +'Let the rest that never aided me, nor struck blow for my mother, go rot +in their heresies.' + +'But the Church of God!' the Queen said. 'The King's Highness has +promised me that upon the hour when you shall swear to do these things +he will send the letter that ye wot of to our Father in Rome.' + +The Lady Mary laughed aloud-- + +'Here is a fine woman,' she said. 'This is ever the woman's part to +gloss over crimes of their men folk. What say you to the death of Lady +Salisbury that died by the block a little since?' + +She bent her body and poked her head forward into the Queen's very face. +Katharine stood still before her. + +'God knows,' she said. 'I might not stay it. There was much false +witness--or some of it true--against her. I pray that the King my Lord +may atone for it in the peace that shall come.' + +'The peace that shall come!' the Lady Mary laughed. 'Oh, God, what +things we women are when a man rules us. The peace that shall come? By +what means shall it have been brought on?' + +'I will tell you,' she pursued after a moment. 'All this is cogging and +lying and feigning and chicaning. And you who are so upright will crawl +before me to bring it about. Listen!' + +And she closed her eyes the better to calm herself and to collect her +thoughts, for she hated to appear moved. + +'I am to feign a friendship to my father. That is a lie that you ask me +to do, for I hate him as he were the devil. And why must I do this? To +feign a smooth face to the world that his pride may not be humbled. I am +to feign to receive the ambassadors of the Duke of Orleans. That is +cogging that you ask of me. For it is not intended that ever I shall wed +with a prince of the French house. But I must lead them on and on till +the Emperor be affrighted lest your King make alliance with the French. +What a foul tale! And you lend it your countenance!' + +'I would well----' Katharine began. + +'Oh, I know, I know,' Mary snickered. 'Ye would well be chaste but that +it must needs be other with you. It was the thief's wife said that. + +'Listen again,' she pursued, 'anon there shall come the Emperor's men, +and there shall be more cogging and chicaning, and honours shall be +given me that I may be bought dear, and petitioning that I should be set +in the succession to make them eager. And then, perhaps, it shall all be +cried off and a Schmalkaldner prince shall send ambassadors----' + +'No, before God,' Katharine said. + +'Oh, I know my father,' Mary laughed at her. 'You will keep him tied to +Rome if you can. But you could not save the venerable Lady of Salisbury, +nor you shall not save him from trafficking with Schmalkaldners and +Lutherans if it shall serve his monstrous passions and his vanities. And +if he do not this yet he will do other villainies. And you will cosset +him in them--to save his hoggish dignity and buttress up his heavy +pride. All this you stand there and ask.' + +'In the name of God I ask it,' Katharine said. 'There is no other way.' + +'Well then,' the Lady Mary said, 'you shall ask it many times. I will +have you shamed.' + +'Day and night I will ask it,' Katharine said. + +The Lady Mary sniffed. + +'It is very well,' she said. 'You are a proud and virtuous piece. I will +humble you. It were nothing to my father to crawl on his belly and +humble himself and slaver. He would do it with joy, weeping with a +feigned penitence, making huge promises, foaming at the mouth with oaths +that he repented, calling me his ever loved child----' + +She stayed and then added-- + +'That would cost him nothing. But that you that are his pride, that you +should do it who are in yourself proud--that is somewhat to pay oneself +with for shamed nights and days despised. If you will have this thing +you shall do some praying for it.' + +'Even as Jacob served so will I,' Katharine said. + +'Seven years!' the Lady Mary mocked at her. 'God forbid that I should +suffer you for so long. I will get me gone with an Orleans, a Kaiserlik, +or a Schmalkaldner leaguer before that. So much comfort I will give +you.' She stopped, lifted her head and said, 'One knocks!' + +They said from the door that a gentleman was come from the Archbishop +with a letter to the Queen's Grace. + + +VIII + +There came in the shaven Lascelles and fell upon his knees, holding up +the sheets of the letter he had copied. + +The Queen took them from him and laid them upon the great table, being +minded later to read them to the Lady Mary, in proof that the King very +truly would make his submission to Rome, supposing only that his +daughter would make submission to her. + +When she turned, Lascelles was still kneeling before the doorway, his +eyes upon the ground. + +'Why, I thank you,' she said. 'Gentleman, you may get you gone back to +the Archbishop.' + +She was thinking of returning to her duel of patience with the Lady +Mary. But looking upon his blond and agreeable features she stayed for a +minute. + +'I know your face,' she said. 'Where have I seen you?' + +He looked up at her; his eyes were blue and noticeable, because at times +of emotion he was so wide-lidded that the whites showed round the pupils +of them. + +'Certainly I have seen you,' the Queen said. + +'It is a royal gift,' he said, 'the memory of faces. I am the +Archbishop's poor gentleman, Lascelles.' + +The Queen said-- + +'Lascelles? Lascelles?' and searched her memory. + +'I have a sister, the spit and twin of me,' he answered; 'and her name +is Mary.' + +The Queen said-- + +'Ah! ah!' and then, 'Your sister was my bed-fellow in the maid's room at +my grandmother's.' + +He answered gravely-- + +'Even so!' + +And she-- + +'Stand up and tell me how your sister fares. I had some kindnesses of +her when I was a child. I remember when I had cold feet she would heat a +brick in the fire to lay to them, and such tricks. How fares she? Will +you not stand up?' + +'Because she fares very ill I will not stand upon my feet,' he answered. + +'Well, you will beg a boon of me,' she said. 'If it is for your sister I +will do what I may with a good conscience.' + +He answered, remaining kneeling, that he would fain see his sister. But +she was very poor, having married an esquire called Hall of these parts, +and he was dead, leaving her but one little farm where, too, his old +father and mother dwelt. + +'I will pay for her visit here,' she said; 'and she shall have lodging.' + +'Safe-conduct she must have too,' he answered; 'for none cometh within +seven miles of this court without your permit and approval.' + +'Well, I will send horses of my own, and men to safeguard her,' the +Queen said. 'For, sure, I am beholden to her in many little things. I +think she sewed the first round gown that ever I had.' + +He remained kneeling, his eyes still upon the floor. + +'We are your very good servants, my sister and I,' he said. 'For she did +marry one--that Esquire Hall--that was done to death upon the gallows +for the old faith's sake. And it was I that wrote the English of most of +this letter to his Holiness, the Archbishop being ill and keeping his +bed.' + +'Well, you have served me very well, it is true,' the Queen answered. +'What would you have of me?' + +'Your Highness,' he answered, 'I do well love my sister and she me. I +would have her given a place here at the Court. I do not ask a great +one; not one so high as about your person. For I am sure that you are +well attended, and places few there are to spare about you.' + +And then, even as he willed it, she bethought her that Margot Poins was +to go to a nunnery. That afternoon she had decided that Mary Trelyon, +who was her second maid, should become her first, and others be moved up +in a rote. + +'Why,' she said, 'it may be that I shall find her an occupation. I will +not have it said--nor yet do it--that I have ever recompensed them that +did me favours in the old times, for there are a many that have served +well in the Court that then I was outside of, and those it is fitting +first to reward. Yet, since, as you say you have writ the English of +this letter, that is a very great service to the Republic, and if by +rewarding her I may recompense thee, I will think how I may come to do +it.' + +He stood up upon his feet. + +'It may be,' he said, 'that my sister is rustic and unsuited. I have not +seen her in many years. Therefore, I will not pray too high a place for +her, but only that she and I may be near, the one to the other, upon +occasions, and that she be housed and fed and clothed.' + +'Why, that is very well said,' the Queen answered him. 'I will bid my +men to make inquiries into her demeanour and behaviour in the place +where she bides, and if she is well fitted and modest, she shall have a +place about me. If she be too rustic she shall have another place. Get +you gone, gentleman, and a good-night to ye.' + +He bent himself half double, in the then newest courtly way, and still +bent, pivoted through the door. The Queen stayed a little while musing. + +'Why,' she said, 'when I was a little child I fared very ill, if now I +think of it; but then it seemed a little thing.' + +'Y'had best forget it,' the Lady Mary answered. + +'Nay,' the Queen said. 'I have known too well what it was to go +supperless to my bed to forget it. A great shadowy place--all shadows, +where the night airs crept in under the rafters.' + +She was thinking of the maids' dormitory at her grandmother's, the old +Duchess. + +'I am climbed very high,' she said; 'but to think----' + +She was such a poor man's child and held of only the littlest account, +herding with the maids and the servingmen's children. At eight by the +clock her grandmother locked her and all the maids--at times there were +but ten, at times as many as a score--into that great dormitory that +was, in fact, nothing but one long attic or grange beneath the bare +roof. And sometimes the maids told tales or slept soon, and sometimes +their gallants, grooms and others, came climbing through the windows +with rope ladders. They would bring pasties and wines and lights, and +coarsely they would revel. + +'Why,' she said, 'I had a gallant myself. He was a musician, but I have +forgot his name. Aye, and then there was another, Dearham, I think; but +I have heard he is since dead. He may have been my cousin; we were so +many in family, I have a little forgot.' + +She stood still, searching her memory, with her eyes distant. The Lady +Mary surveyed her face with a curious irony. + +'Why, what a simple Queen you are!' she said. 'This is something +rustic.' + +The Queen joined her hands together before her, as if she caught at a +clue. + +'I do remember me,' she said. 'It was a make of a comedy. This Dearham, +calling himself my cousin, beat this music musician for calling himself +my gallant. Then goes the musicker to my grandam, bidding the old +Duchess rise up again one hour after she had sought her bed. So comes my +grandam and turns the key in the padlock and looketh in over all the +gallimaufrey of lights and pasties and revels. + +'Why,' she continued. 'I think I was beaten upon that occasion, but I +could not well tell why. And I was put to sleep in another room. And +later came my father home from some war. And he was angry that I had +consorted so with false minions, and had me away to his own poor house. +And there I had Udal for my Magister and evil fare and many beatings. +But this Mary Lascelles was my bed-fellow.' + +'Why, forget it,' the Lady Mary said again. + +'Other teachers would bid me remember it that I might remain humble,' +Katharine answered. + +'Y'are humble enow and to spare,' the Lady Mary said. 'And these are not +good memories for such a place as this. Y'had best keep this Mary +Lascelles at a great distance.' + +Katharine said-- + +'No; for I have passed my word.' + +'Then reward her very fully,' the Lady Mary commended, and the Queen +answered-- + +'No, for that is against my conscience. What have I to fear now that I +be Queen?' + +Mary shrugged her squared shoulders. + +'Where is your Latin,' she said, 'with its _nulla dies felix_--call no +day fortunate till it be ended.' + +'I will set another text against that,' she said, 'and that from holy +sayings--that _justus ab aestimatione non timebit_.' + +'Well,' Mary answered, 'you will make your bed how you will. But I think +you would better have learned of these maids how to steer a course than +of your Magister and the Signor Plutarchus.' + +The Queen did not answer her, save by begging her to read the King's +letter to his Holiness. + +'And surely,' she said, 'if I had never read in the noble Romans I had +never had the trick of tongue to gar the King do so much of what I +will.' + +'Why, God help you,' her step-daughter said. 'Pray you may never come to +repent it.' + + + + +PART TWO + +THE THREATENED RIFT + + +I + +In these summer days there was much faring abroad in the broad lands to +north and to south of the Pontefract Castle. The sunlight lay across +moors and uplands. The King was come with all his many to Newcastle; but +no Scots King was there to meet him. So he went farther to northwards. +His butchers drove before him herds of cattle that they slew some of +each night: their hooves made a broad and beaten way before the King's +horses. Behind came an army of tent men: cooks, servers, and sutlers. +For, since they went where new castles were few, at times they must +sleep on moorsides, and they had tents all of gold cloth and black, with +gilded tent-poles and cords of silk and silver wire. The lords and +principal men of those parts came out to meet him with green boughs, and +music, and slain deer, and fair wooden kegs filled with milk. But when +he was come near to Berwick there was still no Scots King to meet him, +and it became manifest that the King's nephew would fail that tryst. +Henry, riding among his people, swore a mighty oath that he would take +way even into Edinburgh town and there act as he listed, for he had with +him nigh on seven thousand men of all arms and some cannon which he had +been minded to display for the instruction of his nephew. But he had, in +real truth, little stomach for this feat. For, if he would go into +Scotland armed, he must wait till he got together all the men that the +Council of the North had under arms. These were scattered over the whole +of the Border country, and it must be many days before he had them all +there together. And already the summer was well advanced, and if he +delayed much longer his return, the after progress from Pontefract to +London must draw them to late in the winter. And he was little minded +that either Katharine or his son should bear the winter travel. Indeed, +he sent a messenger back to Pontefract with orders that the Prince +should be sent forthwith with a great guard to Hampton Court, so that he +should reach that place before the nights grew cold. + +And, having stayed in camp four days near the Scots border--for he loved +well to live in a tent, since it re-awoke in him the ardour of his youth +and made him think himself not so old a man--he delivered over to the +Earl Marshal forty Scots borderers and cattle thieves that had been +taken that summer. These men he had meant to have handed, pardoned, to +the Scots King when he met him. But the Earl Marshal set up, along the +road into Scotland, from where the stone marks the border, a row of +forty gallows, all high, but some higher than others; for some of the +prisoners were men of condition. And, within sight of a waiting crowd of +Scots that had come down to the boundaries of their land to view the +King of England, Norfolk hanged on these trees the forty men. + +And, laughing over their shoulders at this fine harvest of fruit, +gibbering and dangling against the heavens on high, the King and his +host rode back into the Border country. It was pleasant to ride in the +summer weather, and they hunted and rendered justice by the way, and +heard tales of battle that there had been before in the north country. + +But there was one man, Thomas Culpepper, in the town of Edinburgh to +whom this return was grievous. He had been in these outlandish parts now +for more than nineteen months. The Scots were odious to him, the town +was odious; he had no stomach for his food, and such clothes as he had +were ragged, for he would wear nothing that had there been woven. He was +even a sort of prisoner. For he had been appointed to wait on the King's +Ambassador to the King of Scots, and the last thing that Throckmorton, +the notable spy, had done before he had left the Court had been to write +to Edinburgh that T. Culpepper, the Queen's cousin, who was a dangerous +man, was to be kept very close and given no leave of absence. + +And one thing very much had aided this: for, upon receiving news, or the +rumour of news, that his cousin Katharine Howard--he was her mother's +brother's son--had wedded the King, or had been shown for Queen at +Hampton Court, he had suddenly become seized with such a rage that, +incontinently, he had run his sword through an old fishwife in the +fishmarket where he was who had given him the news, newly come by sea, +thinking that because he was an Englishman this marriage of his King +might gladden him. The fishwife died among her fish, and Culpepper with +his sword fell upon all that were near him in the market, till, his heel +slipping upon a haddock, he fell, and was fallen upon by a great many +men. + +He must stay in jail for this till he had compounded with the old +woman's heirs and had paid for a great many cuts and bruises. And Sir +Nicholas Hoby, happening to be in Edinburgh at that time, understood +well what ailed Thomas Culpepper, and that he was mad for love of the +Queen his cousin--for was it not this Culpepper that had brought her to +the court, and, as it was said, had aforetime sold farms to buy her food +and gowns when, her father being a poor man, she was well-nigh starving? +Therefore Sir Nicholas begged alike the Ambassador and the King of Scots +that they would keep this madman clapped up till they were very certain +that the fit was off him. And, what with the charges of blood ransom and +jailing for nine months, Culpepper had no money at all when at last he +was enlarged, but must eat his meals at the Ambassador's table, so that +he could not in any way come away into England till he had written for +more money and had earned a further salary. And that again was a matter +of many months, and later he spent more in drinking and with Scots women +till he persuaded himself that he had forgotten his cousin that was now +a Queen. Moreover, it was made clear to him by those about him that it +was death to leave his post unpermitted. + +But, with the coming of the Court up into the north parts, his +impatience grew again, so that he could no longer eat but only drink and +fight. It was rumoured that the Queen was riding with the King, and he +swore a mighty oath that he would beg of her or of the King leave at +last to be gone from that hateful city; and the nearer came the King the +more his ardour grew. So that, when the news came that the King was +turned back, Culpepper could no longer compound it with himself. He had +then a plenty of money, having kept his room for seven days, and the +night before that he had won half a barony at dice from a Scots archer. +But he had no passport into England; therefore, because he was afraid to +ask for one, being certain of a refusal, he blacked his face and hands +with coal and then took refuge on a coble, leaving the port of Leith for +Durham. He had well bribed the master of this ship to take him as one of +his crew. In Durham he stayed neither to wash nor to eat, but, having +bought himself a horse, he rode after the King's progress that was then +two days' journey to the south, and came up with them. He had no wits +left more than to ask of the sutlers at the tail of the host where the +Queen was. They laughed at this apparition upon a haggard horse, and one +of them that was a notable cutpurse took all the gold that he had, only +giving him in exchange the news that the Queen was at Pontefract, from +which place she had never stirred. With a little silver that he had in +another bag he bought himself a provision of food, a store of drink, and +a poor Kern to guide him, running at his saddle-bow. + +He saw neither hills nor valleys, neither heather nor ling: he had no +thoughts but only that of finding the Queen his cousin. At times the +tears ran down his begrimed face, at times he waved his sword in the air +and, spurring his horse, he swore great oaths. How he fared, where he +rested, by what roads he went over the hills, that he never knew. +Without a doubt the Kern guided him faithfully. + +For the Queen, having news that the King was nearly come within a day's +journey, rode out towards the north to meet him. And as she went along +the road, she saw, upon a hillside not very far away, a man that sat +upon a dead horse, beating it and tugging at its bridle. Beside him +stood a countryman, in a garment of furs and pelts, with rawhide boots. +She had a great many men and ladies riding behind her, and she had come +as far as she was minded to go. So she reined in her horse and sent two +prickers to ask who these men were. + +And when she heard that this was a traveller, robbed of all his money +and insensate, and his poor guide who knew nothing of who he might be, +she turned her cavalcade back and commanded that the traveller should be +borne to the castle on a litter of boughs and there attended to and +comforted until again he could take the road. And she made occasion upon +this to comment how ill it was for travellers that the old monasteries +were done away with. For in the old time there were seven monasteries +between there and Durham, wherein poor travellers might lodge. Then, if +a merchant were robbed upon the highways, he could be housed at +convenient stages on his road home, and might afterwards send recompense +to the good fathers or not as he pleased or was able. Now, there was no +harbourage left on all that long road, and, but for the grace of God, +that pitiful traveller might have lain there till the ravens picked out +his eyes. + +And some commended the Queen's words and actions, and some few, behind +their hands, laughed at her for her soft heart. And the more Lutheran +sort said that it was God's mercy that the old monasteries were gone; +for they had, they said, been the nests for lowsels, idle wayfarers, +palmers, pilgrims, and the like. And, praise God, since that clearance +fourteen thousand of these had been hanged by the waysides for sturdy +rogues, to the great purging of the land. + + +II + +In the part of Lincolnshire that is a little to the northeastward of +Stamford was a tract of country that had been granted to the monks of St +Radigund's at Dover by William the Conqueror. These monks had drained +this land many centuries before, leaving the superintendence of the work +at first to priors by them appointed, and afterwards, when the dykes, +ditches, and flood walls were all made, to knights and poor gentlemen, +their tenants, who farmed the land and kept up the defences against +inundations, paying scot and lot to a bailiff and water-wardens and +jurats, just as was done on the Romney marshes by the bailiff and jurats +of that level. + +And one of these tenants, holding two hundred acres in a simple fee from +St Radigund's for a hundred and fifty years back, had been always a man +of the name of Hall. It was an Edward Hall that Mary Lascelles had +married when she was a maid at the Duchess of Norfolk's. This Edward +Hall was then a squire, a little above the condition of a groom, in the +Duchess's service. His parents dwelled still on the farm which was +called Neot's End, because it was in the angle of the great dyke called +St Neot's and the little sewer where St Radigund's land had its boundary +stone. + +But in the troublesome days of the late Privy Seal, Edward Hall had +informed Throckmorton the spy of a conspiracy and rising that was +hatching amongst the Radigund's men a little before the Pilgrimage of +Grace, when all the north parts rose. For the Radigund's men cried out +and murmured amongst themselves that if the Priory was done away with +there would be an end of their easy and comfortable tenancy. Their rents +had been estimated and appointed a great number of years before, when +all goods and the produce of the earth were very low priced. And the +tenants said that if now the King took their lands to himself or gave +them to some great lord, very heavy burdens would be laid upon them and +exacted; whereas in some years under easy priors the monks forgot their +distant territory, and in bad seasons they took no rents at all. And +even under hard and exacting priors the monks could take no more than +their rentals, which were so small. They said, too, that the King and +Thomas Cromwell would make them into heathen Greeks and turn their +children to be Saracens. So these Radigund's men meditated a rising and +conspiracy. + +But, because Edward Hall informed Throckmorton of what was agate, a +posse was sent into that country, and most of the men were hanged and +their lands all taken from them. Those that survived from the jailing +betook themselves to the road, and became sturdy beggars, so that many +of them too came to the gallows tree. + +Most of the land was granted to the Sieur Throckmorton with the abbey's +buildings and tithe barns. But the Halls' farm and another of near three +hundred acres were granted to Edward Hall. Then it was that Edward Hall +could marry and take his wife, Mary Lascelles, down into Lincolnshire to +Neot's End. But when the Pilgrimage of Grace came, and the great risings +all over Lincolnshire, very early the rioters came to Neot's End, and +they burned the farm and the byres, they killed all the beasts or drove +them off, they trampled down the corn and laid waste the flax fields. +And, between two willow trees along the great dyke, they set a pole, and +from it they hanged Edward Hall over the waters, so that he dried and +was cured like a ham in the smoke from his own stacks. + +Then Mary Lascelles' case was a very miserable one; for she had to fend +for the aged father and bedridden mother of Edward Hall, and there were +no beasts left but only a few geese and ducks that the rebels could not +lay their hands on. And the only home that they had was the farmhouse +that was upon Edward Hall's other farm, and that they had let fall +nearly into ruin. And for a long time no men would work for her. + +But at last, after the rebellion was pitifully ended, a few hinds came +to her, and she made a shift. And it was better still after Privy Seal +fell, for then came Throckmorton the spy into his lands, and he brought +with him carpenters and masons and joiners to make his house fair, and +some of these men he lent to Mary Hall. But it had been prophesied by a +wise woman in those parts that no land that had been taken from the +monks would prosper. And, because all the jurats, bailiffs, and +water-wardens had been hanged either on the one part or the other and no +more had been appointed, at about that time the sewers began to clog up, +the lands to swamp, murrain and fluke to strike the beasts and the +sheep, and night mists to blight the grain and the fruit blossoms. So +that even Throckmorton had little good of his wealth and lands. + +Thus one morning to Mary Hall, who stood before her door feeding her +geese and ducks, there came a little boy running to say that men-at-arms +stood on the other side of the dyke that was very swollen and grey and +broad. And they shouted that they came from the Queen's Highness, and +would have a boat sent to ferry them over. + +The colour came into Mary Hall's pale face, for even there she had heard +that her former bedfellow was come to be Queen. And at times even she +had thought to write to the Queen to help her in her misery. But always +she had been afraid, because she thought that the Queen might remember +her only as one that had wronged her childish innocence. For she +remembered that the maids' dormitory at the old Duchess's had been no +cloister of pure nuns. So that, at best, she was afraid, and she sent +her yard-worker and a shepherd a great way round to fetch the larger +boat of two to ferry over the Queen's men. Then she went indoors to redd +up the houseplace and to attire herself. + +To the old farmstead, that was made of wood hung over here and there +with tilework with a base of bricks, she had added a houseplace for the +old folk to sit all day. It was built of wattles that had had clay cast +over them, and was whitened on the outside and thatched nearly down to +the ground like any squatter's hut; it had cupboards of wood nearly all +round it, and beneath the cupboards were lockers worn smooth with men +sitting upon them, after the Dutch fashion--for there in Lincolnshire +they had much traffic with the Dutch. There was a great table made of +one slab of a huge oak from near Boston. Here they all ate. And above +the ingle was another slab of oak from the same tree. Her little old +step-mother sat in a stuff chair covered with a sheep-skin; she sat +there night and day, shivering with the shaking palsy. At times she let +out of her an eldritch shriek, very like the call of a hedgehog; but she +never spoke, and she was fed with a spoon by a little misbegotten son of +Edward Hall's. The old step-father sat always opposite her; he had no +use of his legs, and his head was always stiffly screwed round towards +the door as if he were peering, but that was the rheumatism. To atone +for his wife's dumbness, he chattered incessantly whenever anyone was on +that floor; but because he spoke always in Lincolnshire, Mary Hall could +scarce understand him, and indeed she had long ceased to listen. He +spoke of forgotten floods and ploughings, ancient fairs, the boundaries +of fields long since flooded over, of a visit to Boston that King Edward +IV had made, and of how he, for his fair speech and old lineage, had +been chosen of all the Radigund's men to present into the King's hands +three silver horseshoes. Behind his back was a great dresser with railed +shelves, having upon them a little pewter ware and many wooden bowls for +the hinds' feeding. A door on the right side, painted black, went down +into the cellar beneath the old house. Another door, of bars of iron +with huge locks from the old monastery, went into the old house where +slept the maids and the hinds. This was always open by day but locked in +the dark hours. For the hinds were accounted brutish lumps that went +savage at night, like wild beasts, so that, if they spared the master's +throat, which was unlikely, it was certain that they would little spare +the salted meat, the dried fish, the mead, metheglin, and cyder that +their poor cellar afforded. The floor was of stamped clay, wet and +sweating but covered with rushes, so that the place had a mouldering +smell. Behind the heavy door there were huge bolts and crossbars against +robbers: the raftered ceiling was so low that it touched her hair when +she walked across the floor. The windows had no glass but were filled +with a thin reddish sheep-skin like parchment. Before the stairway was a +wicket gate to keep the dogs--of whom there were many, large and fierce, +to protect them alike from robbers and the hinds--to keep the dogs from +going into the upper room. + +Each time that Mary Hall came into this home of hers her heart sank +lower; for each day the corner posts gave sideways a little more, the +cupboard bulged, the doors were loth to close or open. And more and more +the fields outside were inundated, the lands grew sour, the sheep would +not eat or died of the fluke. + +'And surely,' she would cry out at times, 'God created me for other +guesswork than this!' + +At nights she was afraid, and shivered at the thought of the fens and +the black and trackless worlds all round her; and the ravens croaked, +night-hawks screamed, the dog-foxes cried out, and the flames danced +over the swampy grounds. Her mirror was broken on the night that they +hanged her husband: she had never had another but the water in her +buckets, so that she could not tell whether she had much aged or whether +she were still brown-haired and pink-cheeked, and she had forgotten how +to laugh, and was sure that there were crow's-feet about her eyelids. + +Her best gown was all damp and mouldy in the attic that was her bower. +She made it meet as best she could, and indeed she had had so little fat +living, sitting at the head of her table with a whip for unruly hinds +and louts before her--so little fat living that she could well get into +her wedding-gown of yellow cramosyn. She smoothed her hair back into her +cord hood that for so long had not come out of its press. She washed her +face in a bucket of water: that and the press and her bed with grey +woollen curtains were all the furnishing her room had. The straw of the +roof caught in her hood when she moved, and she heard her old +father-in-law cackling to the serving-maids through the cracks of the +floor. + +When she came down there were approaching, across the field before the +door, six men in scarlet and one in black, having all the six halberds +and swords, and one a little banner, but the man in black had a sword +only. Their horses were tethered in a clump on the farther side of the +dyke. Within the room the serving-maids were throwing knives and pewter +dishes with a great din on to the table slab. They dropped +drinking-horns and the salt-cellar itself all of a heap into the rushes. +The grandfather was cackling from his chair; a hen and its chickens ran +screaming between the maids' feet. Then Lascelles came in at the +doorway. + + +III + +The Sieur Lascelles looked round him in that dim cave. + +'Ho!' he said, 'this place stinks,' and he pulled from his pocket a +dried and shrivelled orange-peel purse stuffed with cloves and ginger. +'Ho!' he said to the cornet that was come behind him with the Queen's +horsemen. 'Come not in here. This will breed a plague amongst your men!' +and he added-- + +'Did I not tell you my sister was ill-housed?' + +'Well, I was not prepared against this,' the cornet said. He was a man +with a grizzling beard that had little patience away from the Court, +where he had a bottle that he loved and a crony or two that he played +all day at chequers with, except when the Queen rode out; then he was of +her train. He did not come over the sill, but spoke sharply to his men. + +'Ungird not here,' he said. 'We will go farther.' For some of them were +for setting their pikes against the mud wall and casting their swords +and heavy bottle-belts on to the table before the door. The old man in +the armchair began suddenly to prattle to them all--of a horse-thief +that had been dismembered and then hanged in pieces thirty years +before. The cornet looked at him for a moment and said-- + +'Sir, you are this woman's father-in-law, I do think. Have you aught to +report against her?' He bent in at the door, holding his nose. The old +man babbled of one Pease-Cod Noll that had no history to speak of but a +swivel eye. + +'Well,' the grizzled cornet said, 'I shall get little sense here.' He +turned upon Mary Hall. + +'Mistress,' he said, 'I have a letter here from the Queen's High Grace,' +and, whilst he fumbled in his belt to find a little wallet that held the +letter, he spoke on: 'But I misdoubt you cannot read. Therefore I shall +tell you the Queen's High Grace commandeth you to come into her +service--or not, as the report of your character shall be. But at any +rate you shall come to the castle.' + +Mary Hall could find no words for men of condition, so long she had been +out of the places where such are found. She swallowed in her throat and +held her breast over her heart. + +'Where is the village here?' the cornet said, 'or what justice is there +that can write you a character under his seal?' + +She made out to say that there was no village, all the neighbourhood +having been hanged. A half-mile from there there was the house of Sir +Nicholas Throckmorton, a justice. From the house-end he might see it, or +he might have a hind to guide him. But he would have no guide; he would +have no man nor maid nor child to go from there to the justice's house. +He set one soldier to guard the back door and one the front, that none +came out nor went beyond the dyke-end. + +'Neither shall you go, Sir Lascelles,' he said. + +'Well, give me leave with my sister to walk this knoll,' Lascelles said +good-humouredly. 'We shall not corrupt the grass blades to bear false +witness of my sister's chastity.' + +'Ay, you may walk upon this mound,' the cornet answered. Having got out +the packet of the Queen's letter, he girded up his belt again. + +'You will get you ready to ride with me,' he said to Mary Hall. 'For I +will not be in these marshes after nightfall, but will sleep at +Shrimpton Inn.' + +He looked around him and added-- + +'I will have three of your geese to take with us,' he said. 'Kill me +them presently.' + +Lascelles looked after him as he strode away round the house with the +long paces of a stiff horseman. + +'Before God,' he laughed, 'that is one way to have information about a +quean. Now are we prisoners whilst he inquires after your character.' + +'Oh, alack!' Mary Hall said, and she cast up her hands. + +'Well, we are prisoners till he come again,' her brother said +good-humouredly. 'But this is a foul hole. Come out into the sunlight.' + +She said-- + +'If you are with them, they cannot come to take me prisoner.' + +He looked her full in the eyes with his own that twinkled inscrutably. +He said very slowly-- + +'Were your mar-locks and prinking-prankings so very evil at the old +Duchess's?' + +She grew white: she shrank away as if he had threatened her with his +fist. + +'The Queen's Highness was such a child,' she said. 'She cannot remember. +I have lived very godly since.' + +'I will do what I can to save you,' he said. 'Let me hear about it, as, +being prisoners, we may never come off.' + +'You!' she cried out. 'You who stole my wedding portion!' + +He laughed deviously. + +'Why, I have laid it up so well for you that you may wed a knight now if +you do my bidding. I was ever against your wedding Hall.' + +'You lie!' she said. 'You gar'd me do it.' + +The maids were peeping out of the cellar, whither they had fled. + +'Come upon the grass,' he said. 'I will not be heard to say more than +this: that you and I stand and fall together like good sister and goodly +brother.' + +Their faces differed only in that hers was afraid and his smiling as he +thought of new lies to tell her. Her face in her hood, pale beneath its +weathering, approached the colour of his that shewed the pink and white +of indoors. She came very slowly near him, for she was dazed. But when +she was almost at the sill he caught her hand and drew it beneath his +elbow. + +'Tell me truly,' she said, 'shall I see the Court or a prison?... But +you cannot speak truth, nor ever could when we were tiny twins. God help +me: last Sunday I had the mind to wed my yard-man. I would become such a +liar as thou to come away from here.' + +'Sister,' he said, 'this I tell you most truly: that this shall fall out +according as you obey me and inform me'; and, because he was a little +the taller, he leaned over her as they walked away together. + + * * * * * + +On the fourth day from then they were come to the great wood that is to +south and east of the castle of Pontefract. Here Lascelles, who had +ridden much with his sister, forsook her and went ahead of the slow and +heavy horses of that troop of men. The road was broadened out to forty +yards of green turf between the trees, for this was a precaution against +ambushes of robbers. Across the road, after he had ridden alone for an +hour and a half, there was a guard of four men placed. And here, whilst +he searched for his pass to come within the limits of the Court, he +asked what news, and where the King was. + +It was told him that the King lay still at the Fivefold Vents, two days' +progress from the castle, and as it chanced that a verderer's pricker +came out of the wood where he had been to mark where the deer lay for +to-morrow's killing, Lascelles bade this man come along with him for a +guide. + +'Sir, ye cannot miss the way,' the pricker said surlily. 'I have my deer +to watch.' + +'I will have you to guide me,' Lascelles said, 'for I little know these +parts.' + +'Well,' the pricker answered him, 'it is true that I have not often seen +you ride a-hawking.' + +Whilst they went along the straight road, Lascelles, who unloosened the +woodman's tongue with a great drink of sherry-sack, learned that it was +said that only very unwillingly did the King lie so long at the Fivefold +Vents. For on the morrow there was to be driven by, up there, a great +herd of moor stags and maybe a wolf or two. The King would be home with +his wife, it was reported, but the younger lords had been so importunate +with him to stay and abide this gallant chase and great slaughter that, +they having ridden loyally with him, he had yielded to their prayers and +stayed there--twenty-four hours, it was said. + +'Why, you know a great deal,' Lascelles answered. + +'We who stand and wait had needs have knowledge,' the woodman said, 'for +we have little else.' + +'Aye, 'tis a hard service,' Lascelles said. 'Did you see the Queen's +Highness o' Thursday week borrow a handkerchief of Sir Roger Pelham to +lure her falcon back?' + +'That did not I,' the woodman answered, 'for o' Thursday week it was a +frost and the Queen rode not out.' + +'Well, it was o' Saturday,' Lascelles said. + +'Nor was it yet o' Saturday,' the woodman cried; 'I will swear it. For +o' Saturday the Queen's Highness shot with the bow, and Sir Roger +Pelham, as all men know, fell with his horse on Friday, and lies up +still.' + +'Then it was Sir Nicholas Rochford,' Lascelles persisted. + +'Sir,' the woodman said, 'you have a very wrong tale, and patent it is +that little you ride a-hunting.' + +'Well, I mind my book,' Lascelles said. 'But wherefore?' + +'Sir,' the woodman answered, 'it is thus: The Queen when she rides +a-hawking has always behind her her page Toussaint, a little boy. And +this little boy holdeth ever the separate lures for each hawk that the +Queen setteth up. And the falcon or hawk or genette or tiercel having +stooped, the Queen will call upon that eyass for the lure appropriated +to each bird as it chances. And very carefully the Queen's Highness +observeth the laws of the chase, of venery and hawking. For the which I +honour her.' + +Lascelles said, 'Well, well!' + +'As for the borrowing of a handkerchief,' the woodman pursued, 'that is +a very idle tale. For, let me tell you, a lady might borrow a jewelled +feather or a scarlet pouch or what not that is bright and shall take a +bird's eye--a little mirror upon a cord were a good thing. But a +handkerchief! Why, Sir Bookman, that a lady can only do if she will +signify to all the world: "This knight is my servant and I his +mistress." Those very words it signifieth--and that the better for it +showeth that that lady is minded to let her hawk go, luring the +gentleman to her with that favour of his.' + +'Well, well,' Lascelles said, 'I am not so ignorant that I did not know +that. Therefore I asked you, for it seemed a very strange thing.' + +'It is a very foolish tale and very evil,' the man answered. 'For this I +will swear: that the Queen's Highness--and I and her honour for +it--observeth very jealously the laws of wood and moorland and chase.' + +'So I have heard,' Lascelles said. 'But I see the castle. I will not +take you farther, but will let you go back to the goodly deer.' + +'Pray God they be not wandered fore,' the woodman said. 'You could have +found this way without me.' + + * * * * * + +There was but one road into the castle, and that from the south, up a +steep green bank. Up the roadway Lascelles must ride his horse past four +men that bore a litter made of two pikes wattled with green boughs and +covered with a horse-cloth. As Lascelles passed by the very head of it, +the man that lay there sprang off it to his feet, and cried out-- + +'I be the Queen's cousin and servant. I brought her to the Court.' +Lascelles' horse sprang sideways, a great bound up the bank. He galloped +ten paces ahead before the rider could stay him and turn round. The man, +all rags and with a black face, had fallen into the dust of the road, +and still cried out outrageously. The bearers set down the litter, wiped +their brows, and then, falling all four upon Culpepper, made to carry +him by his legs and arms, for they were weary of laying him upon the +litter from which incessantly he sprang. + +But before them upon his horse was Lascelles and impeded their way. +Culpepper drew in and pushed out his legs and arms, so that they all +four staggered, and-- + +'For God's sake, master,' one of them grunted out, 'stand aside that we +may pass. We have toil enow in bearing him.' + +'Why, set the poor gentleman down upon the litter,' Lascelles said, 'and +let us talk a little.' + +The men set Culpepper on the horse-cloth, and one of them knelt down to +hold him there. + +'If you will lend us your horse to lay him across, we may come more +easily up,' one said. In these days the position and trade of a spy was +so little esteemed--it had been far other with the great informers of +Privy Seal's day--that these men, being of the Queen's guard, would talk +roughly to Lascelles, who was a mere poor gentleman of the Archbishop's +if his other vocation could be neglected. Lascelles sat, his hand upon +his chin. + +'You use him very roughly if this be the Queen's cousin,' he said. + +The bearer set back his beard and laughed at the sky. + +'This is a coif--a poor rag of a merchant,' he cried out. 'If this were +the Queen's cousin should we bear him thus on a clout?' + +'I am the Queen's cousin, T. Culpepper,' Culpepper shouted at the sky. +'Who be you that stay me from her?' + +'Why, you may hear plainly,' the bearer said. 'He is mazed, doited, +starved, thirsted, and a seer of visions.' + +Lascelles pondered, his elbow upon his saddle-peak, his chin caught in +his hand. + +'How came ye by him?' he asked. + +One with another they told him the tale, how, the Queen being ridden +towards the north parts, at the extreme end of her ride had seen the +man, at a distance, among the heather, flogging a dead horse with a +moorland kern beside him. He was a robbed, parched, fevered, and amazed +traveller. The Queen's Highness, compassionating, had bidden bear him to +the castle and comfort and cure him, not having looked upon his face or +heard his tongue. For, for sure then, she had let him die where he was; +since, no sooner were these four, his new bearers, nearly come up among +the knee-deep heather, than this man had started up, his eyes upon the +Queen's cavalcade and many at a distance. And, with his sword drawn and +screaming, he had cried out that, if that was the Queen, he was the +Queen's cousin. They had tripped up his heels in a bed of ling and +quieted him with a clout on the poll from an axe end. + +'But now we have him here,' the eldest said; 'where we shall bestow him +we know not.' + +Lascelles had his eyes upon the sick man's face as if it fascinated him, +and, slowly, he got down from his horse. Culpepper then lay very still +with his eyes closed, but his breast heaved as though against tight and +strong ropes that bound him. + +'I think I do know this gentleman for one John Robb,' he said. 'Are you +very certain the Queen's Highness did not know his face?' + +'Why, she came not ever within a quarter mile of him,' the bearer said. + +'Then it is a great charity of the Queen to show mercy to a man she hath +never seen,' Lascelles answered absently. He was closely casting his +eyes over Culpepper. Culpepper lay very still, his begrimed face to the +sky, his hands abroad above his head. But when Lascelles bent over him +it was as if he shuddered, and then he wept. + +Lascelles bent down, his hands upon his knees. He was afraid--he was +very afraid. Thomas Culpepper, the Queen's cousin, he had never seen in +his life. But he had heard it reported that he had red hair and beard, +and went always dressed in green with stockings of red. And this man's +hair was red, and his beard, beneath coal grime, was a curly red, and +his coat, beneath a crust of black filth, was Lincoln green and of a +good cloth. And, beneath the black, his stockings were of red silk. He +reflected slowly, whilst the bearers laughed amongst themselves at this +Queen's kinsman in rags and filth. + +Lascelles gave them his bottle of sack to drink empty among them, that +he might have the longer time to think. + +If this were indeed the Queen's cousin, come unknown to the Queen and +mazed and muddled in himself to Pontefract, what might not Lascelles +make of him? For all the world knew that he loved her with a mad +love--he had sold farms to buy her gowns. It was he that had brought her +to Court, upon an ass, at Greenwich, when her mule--as all men knew--had +stumbled upon the threshold. Once before, it was said, Culpepper had +burst in with his sword drawn upon the King and Kate Howard when they +sat together. And Lascelles trembled with eagerness at the thought of +what use he might not make of this mad and insolent lover of the +Queen's! + +But did he dare? + +Culpepper had been sent into Scotland to secure him up, away at the +farthest limits of the realm. Then, if he was come back? This grime was +the grime of a sea-coal ship! He knew that men without passports, +outlaws and the like, escaped from Scotland on the Durham ships that +went to Leith with coal. And this man came on the Durham road. Then.... + +If it were Culpepper he had come unpermitted. He was an outlaw. Dare +Lascelles have trade with--dare he harbour--an outlaw? It would be +unbeknown to the Queen's Highness! He kicked his heels with impatience +to come to a resolution. + +He reflected swiftly: + +What hitherto he had were: some tales spread abroad about the Queen's +lewd Court--tales in London Town. He had, too, the keeper of the Queen's +door bribed and talked into his service and interest. And he had his +sister.... + +His sister would, with threatening, tell tales of the Queen before +marriage. And she would find him other maids and grooms, some no doubt +more willing still than Mary Hall. But the keeper of the Queen's door! +And, in addition, the Queen's cousin mad of love for her! What might he +not do with these two? + +The prickly sweat came to his forehead. Four horsemen were issuing from +the gate of the castle above. He must come to a decision. His fingers +trembled as if they were a pickpocket's near a purse of gold. + +He straightened his back and stood erect. + +'Yes,' he said very calmly, 'this is my friend John Robb.' + +He added that this man had been in Edinburgh where the Queen's cousin +was. He had had letters from him that told how they were sib and rib. +Thus this fancy had doubtless come into his brain at sight of the Queen +in his madness. + +He breathed calmly, having got out these words, for now the doubt was +ended. He would have both the Queen's door-keeper and the Queen's mad +lover. + +He bade the bearers set Culpepper upon his horse and, supporting him, +lead him to a room that he would hire of the Archbishop's chamberlain, +near his own in the dark entrails of the castle. And there John Robb +should live at his expenses. + +And when the men protested that, though this was very Christian of +Lascelles, yet they would have recompense of the Queen for their toils, +he said that he himself would give them a crown apiece, and they might +get in addition what recompense from the Queen's steward that they +could. He asked them each their names and wrote them down, pretending +that it was that he might send each man his crown piece. + +So, when the four horsemen were ridden past, the men hoisted Culpepper +into Lascelles' horse and went all together up into the castle. + +But, that night, when Culpepper lay in a stupor, Lascelles went to the +Archbishop's chamberlain and begged that four men, whose names he had +written down, might be chosen to go in the Archbishop's paritor's guard +that went next dawn to Ireland over the sea to bring back tithes from +Dublin. And, next day, he had Culpepper moved to another room; and, in +three days' time, he set it about in the castle that the Queen's cousin +was come from Scotland. By that time most of the liquor had come down +out of Culpepper's brain, but he was still muddled and raved at times. + + +IV + +On that third night the Queen was with the Lady Mary, once more in her +chamber, having come down as before, from the chapel in the roof, to +pray her submit to her father's will. Mary had withstood her with a more +good-humoured irony; and, whilst she was in the midst of her pleadings, +a letter marked most pressing was brought to her. The Queen opened it, +and raised her eyebrows; she looked down at the subscription and +frowned. Then she cast it upon the table. + +'Shall there never be an end of old things?' she said. + +'Even what old things?' the Lady Mary asked. + +The Queen shrugged her shoulders. + +'It was not they I came to talk of,' she said. 'I would sleep early, for +the King comes to-morrow and I have much to plead with you.' + +'I am weary of your pleadings,' the Lady Mary said. 'You have pleaded +enow. If you would be fresh for the King, be first fresh for me. Start a +new hare.' + +The Queen would have gainsaid her. + +'I have said you have pleaded enow,' the Lady Mary said. 'And you have +pleaded enow. This no more amuses me. I will wager I guess from whom +your letter was.' + +Reluctantly the Queen held her peace; that day she had read in many +ancient books, as well profane as of the Fathers of the Church, and she +had many things to say, and they were near her lips and warm in her +heart. She was much minded to have good news to give the King against +his coming on the morrow; the great good news that should set up in that +realm once more abbeys and chapters and the love of God. But she could +not press these sayings upon the girl, though she pleaded still with her +blue eyes. + +'Your letter is from Sir Nicholas Throckmorton,' the Lady Mary said. +'Even let me read it.' + +'You did know that that knight was come to Court again?' the Queen said. + +'Aye; and that you would not see him, but like a fool did bid him depart +again.' + +'You will ever be calling me a fool,' Katharine retorted, 'for giving +ear to my conscience and hating spies and the suborners of false +evidence.' + +'Why,' the Lady Mary answered, 'I do call it a folly to refuse to give +ear to the tale of a man who has ridden far and fast, and at the risk of +a penalty to tell it you.' + +'Why,' Katharine said, 'if I did forbid his coming to the Court under a +penalty, it was because I would not have him here.' + +'Yet he much loved you, and did you some service.' + +'He did me a service of lies,' the Queen said, and she was angry. 'I +would not have had him serve me. By his false witness Cromwell was cast +down to make way for me. But I had rather have cast down Cromwell by the +truth which is from God. Or I had rather he had never been cast down. +And that I swear.' + +'Well, you are a fool,' the Lady Mary said. 'Let me look upon this +knight's letter.' + +'I have not read it,' Katharine said. + +'Then will I,' the Lady Mary answered. She made across the room to where +the paper lay upon the table beside the great globe of the earth. She +came back; she turned her round to the Queen; she made her a deep +reverence, so that her black gown spread out stiffly around her, and, +keeping her eyes ironically on Katharine's face, she mounted backward up +to the chair that was beneath the dais. + +Katharine put her hand over her heart. + +'What mean you?' she said. 'You have never sat there before.' + +'That is not true,' the Lady Mary said harshly. 'For this last three +days I have practised how, thus backward, I might climb to this chair +and, thus seemly, sit in it.' + +'Even then?' Katharine asked. + +'Even then I will be asked no more questions,' her step-daughter +answered. 'This signifieth that I ha' heard enow o' thy voice, Queen.' + +Katharine did not dare to speak, for she knew well this girl's tyrannous +and capricious nature. But she was nearly faint with emotion and reached +sideways for the chair at the table; there she sat and gazed at the girl +beneath the dais, her lips parted, her body leaning forward. + +Mary spread out the great sheet of Throckmorton's parchment letter upon +her black knees. She bent forward so that the light from the mantel at +the room-end might fall upon the writing. + +'It seemeth,' she said ironically,'that one descrieth better at the +humble end of the room than here on high'--and she read whilst the Queen +panted. + +At last she raised her eyes and bent them darkly upon the Queen's face. + +'Will you do what this knight asks?' she uttered. 'For what he asks +seemeth prudent.' + +'A' God's name,' Katharine said, 'let me not now hear of this man.' + +'Why,' the Lady Mary answered coolly, 'if I am to be of the Queen's +alliance I must be of the Queen's council and my voice have a weight.' + +'But will you? Will you?' Katharine brought out. + +'Will you listen to my voice?' Mary said. 'I will not listen to yours. +Hear now what this goodly knight saith. For, if I am to be your +well-wisher, I must call him goodly that so well wishes to you.' + +Katharine wrung her hands. + +'Ye torture me,' she said. + +'Well, I have been tortured,' Mary answered, 'and I have come through it +and live.' + +She swallowed in her throat, and thus, with her eyes upon the writing, +brought out the words-- + +'This knight bids you beware of one Mary Lascelles or Hall, and her +brother, Edward Lascelles, that is of the Archbishop's service.' + +'I will not hear what Throckmorton says,' Katharine answered. + +'Ay, but you shall,' Mary said, 'or I come down from this chair. I am +not minded to be allied to a Queen that shall be undone. That is not +prudence.' + +'God help me!' the Queen said. + +'God helps most willingly them that take counsel with themselves and +prudence,' her step-daughter answered; 'and these are the words of the +knight.' She held up the parchment and read out: + +'"Therefore I--and you know how much your well-wisher I be--upon my +bended knees do pray you do one of two things: either to put out both +these twain from your courts and presence, or if that you cannot or will +not do, so richly to reward them as that you shall win them to your +service. For a little rotten fruit will spread a great stink; a small +ferment shall pollute a whole well. And these twain, I am advised, +assured, convinced, and have convicted them, will spread such a rotten +fog and mist about your reputation and so turn even your good and +gracious actions to evil seeming that--I swear and vow, O most high +Sovereign, for whom I have risked, as you wot, life, limb and the fell +rack----"' + +The Lady Mary looked up at the Queen's face. + +'Will you not listen to the pleadings of this man?' she said. + +'I will so reward Lascelles and his sister as they have merited.' the +Queen said. 'So much and no more. And not all the pleadings of this +knight shall move me to listen to any witness that he brings against any +man nor maid. So help me, God; for I do know how he served his master +Cromwell.' + +'For love of thee!' the Lady Mary said. + +The Queen wrung her hands as if she would wash a stain from them. + +'God help me!' she said. 'I prayed the King for the life of Privy Seal +that was!' + +'He would not hear thee,' the Lady Mary said. She looked long upon the +Queen's face with unmoved and searching eyes. + +'It is a new thing to me,' she said,'to hear that you prayed for Privy +Seal's life.' + +'Well, I prayed,' Katharine said, 'for I did not think he worked treason +against the King.' + +The Lady Mary straightened her back where she sat. + +'I think I will not show myself less queenly than you,' she said. 'For I +be of a royal race. But hear this knight.' + +And again she read: + +'"I have it from the lips of the cornet that came with this Lascelles to +fetch this Mary Lascelles or Hall: I, Throckmorton, a knight, swear that +I heard with mine own ears, how for ever as they rode, this Lascelles +plied this cornet with questions about your high self. As thus: 'Did you +favour any gentleman when you rode out, the cornet being of your guard?' +or, 'Had he heard a tale of one Pelham, a knight, of whom you should +have taken a kerchief?'--and this, that and the other, for ever, till +the cornet spewed at the hearing of him. Now, gracious and most high +Sovereign Consort, what is it that this man seeketh?"' + +Again the Lady Mary paused to look at the Queen. + +'Why,' Katharine said, 'so mine enemies will talk of me. I had been the +fool you styled me if I had not awaited it. But----' and she drew up +her body highly. 'My life is such and such shall be that none such arrow +shall pierce my corslet.' + +'God help you,' the Lady Mary said. 'What has your life to do with it, +if you will not cut out the tongues of slanderers?' + +She laughed mirthlessly, and added-- + +'Now this knight concludes--and it is as if he writhed his hands and +knelt and whined and kissed your feet--he concludeth with a prayer that +you will let him come again to the Court. "For," says he, "I will clean +your vessels, serve you at table, scrape the sweat off your horse, or do +all that is vilest. But suffer me to come that I may know and report to +you what there is whispered in these jail places."' + +Katharine Howard said-- + +'I had rather borrow Pelham's kerchief.' + +The Lady Mary dropped the parchment on to the floor at her side. + +'I rede you do as this knight wills,' she said; 'for, amidst the little +sticklers of spies that are here, this knight, this emperor of spies, +moves as a pillow of shadow. He stalks amongst them as, in the night, +the dread and awful lion of Numidia. He shall be to you more a corslet +of proof than all the virtue that your life may borrow from the precepts +of Diana. We, that are royal and sit in high places, have our feet in +such mire.' + +'Now before God on His throne,' Katharine Howard said, 'if you be of +royal blood, I will teach you a lesson. For hear me----' + +'No, I will hear thee no more,' the Lady Mary answered; 'I will teach +thee. For thou art not the only one in this land to be proud. I will +show thee such a pride as shall make thee blush.' + +She stood up and came slowly down the steps of the dais. She squared +back her shoulders and folded her hands before her; she erected her +head, and her eyes were dark. When she was come to where the Queen sat, +she kneeled down. + +'I acknowledge thee to be my mother,' she said, 'that have married the +King, my father. I pray you that you do take me by the hand and set me +in that seat that you did raise for me. I pray you that you do style me +a princess, royal again in this land. And I pray you to lesson me and +teach me that which you would have me do as well as that which it befits +me to do. Take me by the hand.' + +'Nay, it is my lord that should do this,' the Queen whispered. Before +that she had started to her feet; her face had a flush of joy; her eyes +shone with her transparent faith. She brushed back a strand of hair from +her brow; she folded her hands on her breasts and raised her glance +upwards to seek the dwelling-place of Almighty God and the saints in +their glorious array. + +'It is my lord should do this!' she said again. + +'Speak no more words,' the Lady Mary said. 'I have heard enow of thy +pleadings. You have heard me say that.' + +She continued upon her knees. + +'It is thou or none!' she said. 'It is thou or none shall witness this +my humiliation and my pride. Take me by the hand. My patience will not +last for ever.' + +The Queen set her hand between the girl's. She raised her to her feet. + +When the Lady Mary stood high and shadowy, in black, with her white face +beneath that dais, she looked down upon the Queen. + +'Now, hear me!' she said. 'In this I have been humble to you; but I have +been most proud. For I have in my veins a greater blood than thine or +the King's, my father's. For, inasmuch as Tudor blood is above Howard's, +so my mother's, that was royal of Spain, is above Tudor's. And this it +is to be royal---- + +'I have had you, a Queen, kneel before me. It is royal to receive +petitions--more royal still it is to grant them. And in this, further, I +am more proud. For, hearing you say that you had prayed the King for +Cromwell's life, I thought, this is a virtue-mad Queen. She shall most +likely fall!--Prudence biddeth me not to be of her party. But shall I, +who am royal, be prudent? Shall I, who am of the house of Aragon, be +more afraid than thou, a Howard? + +'I tell you--No! If you will be undone for the sake of virtue, blindly, +and like a fool, unknowing the consequences, I, Mary of Aragon and +England, will make alliance with thee, knowing that the alliance is +dangerous. And, since it is more valiant to go to a doom knowingly than +blindfold, so I do show myself more valiant than thou. For well I +know--since I saw my mother die--that virtue is a thing profitless, and +impracticable in this world. But you--you think it shall set up temporal +monarchies and rule peoples. Therefore, what you do you do for profit. I +do it for none.' + +'Now, by the Mother of God,' Katharine Howard said, 'this is the +gladdest day of my life.' + +'Pray you,' Mary said, 'get you gone from my sight and hearing, for I +endure ill the appearance and sound of joy. And, Queen, again I bid you +beware of calling any day fortunate till its close. For, before midnight +you may be ruined utterly. I have known more Queens than thou. Thou art +the fifth I have known.' + +She added-- + +'For the rest, what you will I will do: submission to the King and such +cozening as he will ask of me. God keep you, for you stand in need of +it.' + + * * * * * + +At supper that night there sat all such knights and lordlings as ate at +the King's expense in the great hall that was in the midmost of the +castle, looking on to the courtyard. There were not such a many of them, +maybe forty; from the keeper of the Queen's records, the Lord d'Espahn, +who sat at the table head, down to the lowest of all, the young Poins, +who sat far below the salt-cellar. The greater lords of the Queen's +household, like the Lord Dacre of the North, did not eat at this common +table, or only when the Queen herself there ate, which she did at midday +when there was a feast. + +Nevertheless, this eating was conducted with gravity, the Lord d'Espahn +keeping a vigilant eye down the table, which was laid with a fair white +cloth. It cost a man a fine to be drunk before the white meats were +eaten--unless, indeed, a man came drunk to the board--and the +salt-cellar of state stood a-midmost of the cloth. It was of silver from +Holland, and represented a globe of the earth, opened at the top, and +supported by knights' bannerets. + +The hall was all of stone, with creamy walls, only marked above the iron +torch-holds with brandons of soot. A scutcheon of the King's arms was +above one end-door, with the Queen's above the other. Over each window +were notable deers' antlers, and over each side-door, that let in the +servers from the courtyard, was a scutcheon with the arms of a king +deceased that had visited the castle. The roof was all gilded and +coloured, and showed knaves' faces leering and winking, so that when a +man was in drink, and looked upwards with his head on his chair back, +these appeared to have life. The hall was called the Dacre Hall, because +the Lords Dacre of the North had built it to be an offering to various +kings that died whilst it was a-building. + +Such knights as had pages had them behind their chairs, holding napkins +and ready to fill the horns with wine or beer. From kitchens or from +buttery-hatches the servers ran continually across the courtyard and +across the tiled floor, for the table was set back against the farther +wall, all the knights being on the wall side, since there were not so +many, and thus it was easier to come to them. There was a great clatter +with the knives going and the feet on the tiles, but little conversing, +for in that keen air eating was the principal thing, and in five minutes +a boar or a sheep's head would be stripped till the skull alone was +shown. + +It was in this manner that Thomas Culpepper came into the hall when they +were all well set to, without having many eyes upon him. But the Lord +d'Espahn was aware, suddenly, of one that stood beside him. + +'Gentleman, will you have a seat?' he said. 'Tell me your name and +estate, that I may appoint you one.' He was a grave lord, with a pointed +nose, dented at the end, a grey, square beard, and fresh colours on his +face. He wore his bonnet because he was the highest there, and because +there were currents of air at the openings of the doors. + +Thomas Culpepper's face was of a chalky white. Somewhere Lascelles had +found for him a suit of green and red stockings. His red beard framed +his face, but his lips were pursed. + +'Your seat I will have,' he said, 'for I am the Queen's cousin, T. +Culpepper.' + +The Lord d'Espahn looked down upon his platter. + +'You may not have my seat,' he said. 'But you shall have this seat at my +right hand that is empty. It is a very honourable seat, but mine you may +not have for it is the Queen's own that I hold, being her vicar here.' + +'Your seat I will have,' Culpepper said. + +The Lord d'Espahn was set upon keeping order and quiet in that place +more than on any other thing. He looked again down upon his platter, and +then he was aware of a voice that whispered in his ear-- + +'A' God's name, humour him, for he is very mad,' and, turning his eyes a +little, he saw that it was Lascelles above his chair head. + +'Your seat I will have,' Culpepper said again. 'And this fellow, that +tells me he is the most potent lord there is here, shall serve behind my +chair.' + +The Lord d'Espahn took up his knife and fork in one hand and his manchet +of bread in the other. He made as if to bow to Culpepper, who pushed him +by the shoulder away. Some lordlings saw this and wondered, but in the +noise none heard their words. At the foot of the table the squires said +that the Lord d'Espahn must have been found out in a treason. Only the +young Poins said that that was the Queen's cousin, come from Scotland, +withouten leave, for love of the Queen through whom he was sick in the +wits. This news ran through the castle by means of servers, cooks, +undercooks, scullions, maids, tiring-maids, and maids of honour, more +swiftly than it progressed up the table where men had the meats to keep +their minds upon. + +Culpepper sat, flung back in his chair, his eyes, lacklustre and open, +upon the cloth where his hands sprawled out. He said few words--only +when the Lord d'Espahn's server carved boar's head for him, he took one +piece in his mouth and then threw the plate full into the server's face. +This caused great offence amongst the serving-men, for this server was a +portly fellow that had served the Lord d'Espahn many years, and had a +face like a ram's, so grave it was. Having drunk a little of his wine, +Culpepper turned out the rest upon the cloth; his salt he brushed off +his plate with his sleeve. That was remembered for long afterwards by +many men and women. And it was as if he could not swallow, for he put +down neither meat nor drink, but sat, deadly and pale, so that some said +that he was rabid. Once he turned his head to ask the Lord d'Espahn-- + +'If a quean prove forsworn, and turn to a Queen, what should her true +love do?' + +The Lord d'Espahn never made any answer, but wagged his beard from side +to side, and Culpepper repeated his question three separate times. +Finally, the platters were raised, and the Lord d'Espahn went away to +the sound of trumpets. Many of the lords there came peering round +Culpepper to see what sport he might yield. Lascelles went away, +following the scarlet figure of the young Poins, working his hand into +the boy's arm and whispering to him. The servers and disservers went to +their work of clearing the board. + +But Culpepper sat there without word or motion, so that none of those +lords had any sport out of him. Some of them went away to roast pippins +at the Widow Amnot's, some to speak with the alchemist that, on the +roof, watched the stars. So one and the other left the room; the torches +burned out, most of them, and, save for two lords of the Archbishop's +following, who said boldly that they would watch and care for this man, +because he was the Queen's cousin, and there might be advancement in it, +Culpepper was left alone. + +His sword he had not with him, but he had his dagger, and, just as he +drew it, appearing about to stab himself in the heart, there ran across +the hall the black figure of Lascelles, so that he appeared to have been +watching through a window, and the two lords threw themselves upon +Culpepper's arm. And all three began to tell him that there was better +work for him to do than that of stabbing himself; and Lascelles brought +with him a flagon of _aqua vitae_ from Holland, and poured out a little +for Culpepper to drink. And one of the lords said that his room was up +in the gallery near the Queen's, and, if Culpepper would go with him +there, they might make good cheer. Only he must be silent in the going +thither; afterwards it would not so much matter, for they would be past +the guards. So, linking their arms in his, they wound up and across the +courtyard, where the torchmen that waited on their company of diners to +light them, blessed God that the sitting was over, and beat their +torches out against the ground. + +In the shadow of the high walls, and some in the moonlight, the +serving-men held their parliament. They discoursed of these things, and +some said that it was a great pity that T. Culpepper was come to Court. +For he was an idle braggart, and where he was disorder grew, and that +was a pity, since the Queen had made the Court orderly, and servants +were little beaten. But some said that like sire was like child, and +that great disorders there were in the Court, but quiet ones, and the +Queen the centre. But these were mostly the cleaners of dishes and the +women that swept rooms and spread new rushes. Upon the whole, the cooks +blessed the Queen, along with all them that had to do with feeding and +the kitchens. They thanked God for her because she had brought back the +old fasts. For, as they argued, your fast brings honours to cooks, +since, after a meagre day, your lord cometh to his trencher with a +better appetite, and then is your cook commended. The Archbishop's cooks +were the hottest in this contention, for they had the most reason to +know. The stablemen, palfreniers, and falconers' mates were, most part +of them, politicians more than the others, and these wondered to have +seen, through their peep-holes and door-cracks, the Queen's cousin go +away with these lords that were of the contrary party. Some said that T. +Culpepper was her emissary to win them over to her interests, and some, +that always cousins, uncles, and kin were the bitterest foes a Queen +had, as witness the case of Queen Anne Boleyn and the Yellow Dog of +Norfolk who had worked to ruin her. And some said it was marvellous that +there they could sit or stand and talk of such things--for a year or so +ago all the Court was spies, so that the haymen mistrusted them that +forked down the straw, and meat-servers them with the wine. But now each +man could talk as he would, and it made greatly for fellowship when a +man could sit against a wall, unbutton in the warm nights, and say what +he listed. + +The light of the great fires grew dull in the line of kitchen windows; +sweethearting couples came in through the great gateway from the +grass-slopes beneath the castle walls. There was a little bustle when +four horsemen rode in to say that the King's Highness was but nine miles +from the castle, and torchmen must be there to light him in towards +midnight. But the Queen should not be told for her greater pleasure and +surprise. Then all these servingmen stood up and shook themselves, and +said--'To bed.' For, on the morrow, with the King back, there would +surely be great doings and hard work. And to mews and kennels and huts, +in the straw and beds of rushes, these men betook themselves. The young +lords came back laughing from Widow Amnot's at the castle foot; there +was not any light to be seen save one in all that courtyard full of +windows. The King's torchmen slumbered in the guard-room where they +awaited his approach. Darkness, silence, and deep shadow lay everywhere, +though overhead the sky was pale with moonlight, and, from high in the +air, the thin and silvery tones of the watchman's horn on the roof +filtered down at the quarter hours. A drowsy bell marked the hours, and +the cries and drillings of the night birds vibrated from very high. + + +V + +Coming very late to her bedroom the Queen found awaiting her her +tiring-maid, Mary Trelyon, whom she had advanced into the post that +Margot Poins had held, and the old Lady Rochford. + +'Why,' she said to her maid, 'when you have unlaced me you may go, or +you will not love my service that keeps you so late.' + +Mary Trelyon cast her eyes on the ground, and said that it was such +pleasure to attend her mistress, that not willingly would she give up +that discoiffing, undoing of hair, and all the rest, for long she had +desired to have the handling of these precious things and costly +garments. + +'No, you shall get you gone,' the Queen said, 'for I will not have you, +sweetheart, be red-lidded in the morning with this long watching, for +to-morrow the King comes, and I will have him see my women comely and +fair, though in your love you will not care for yourselves.' + +Standing before her mirror, where there burned in silver dishes four +tall candles with perfumed wicks, Katharine offered her back to the +loosening fingers of this girl. + +'I would not have you to think,' she said, 'that I am always thus late +and a gadabout. But this day'--the Queen's eyes sparkled, and her cheeks +were red with exaltation--'this day and this night are one that shall be +marked with red stones in the calendar of England, and late have I +travailed so to make them be.' + +The girl was very black-avised, and her face beneath her grey hood--for +the Queen's maids were all in grey, with crowned roses, the device that +the King had given her at their wedding, worked in red silk on each +shoulder--her face beneath her grey hood was the clear shape of the thin +end of an egg. She worked at the unlacing of the Queen's gown, so that +she at last must kneel down to it. + +Having finished, she remained upon her knees, but she twisted her +fingers in her skirt as if she were bashful, yet her face was perturbed +with red flushes on the dark cheeks. + +The Queen, feeling that she knelt there upon her loosened gown and did +not get her gone, said-- + +'Anan?' + +'Please you let me stay,' the girl said; but Katharine answered-- + +'I would commune with my own thoughts.' + +'Please you hear me,' the girl said, and she was very earnest; but the +Queen answered-- + +'Why, no! If you have any boon to ask of me, you know very well that +to-morrow at eleven is the hour for asking. Now, I will sit still with +the silence. Bring me my chair to the table. The Lady Rochford shall put +out my lights when I be abed.' + +The girl stood up and rolled, with a trick of appeal, her eyes to the +old Lady Rochford. This lady, all in grey too, but with a great white +hood because she was a widow, sat back upon the foot of the great bed. +Her face was perturbed, but it had been always perturbed since her +cousin, the Queen Anne Boleyn, had fallen by the axe. She put a gouty +and swollen finger to her lips, and the girl shrugged her shoulders with +a passion of despair, for she was very hot-tempered, and it was as if +mutinously that she fetched the Queen her chair and set it behind her +where she stood before the mirror taking off her breast jewel from its +chain. And again the girl shrugged her shoulders. Then she went to the +little wall-door that corkscrewed down into the courtyard through the +thick of the wall. Immediately after she was gone they heard the +lockguard that awaited her without set on the great padlock without the +door. Then his feet clanked down the stairway, he being heavily loaded +with weighty keys. It was the doors along the corridor that the young +Poins guarded, and these were never opened once the Queen was in her +room, save by the King. The Lady Rochford slept in the anteroom upon a +truckle-bed, and the great withdrawing-room was empty. + +It was very still in the Queen's room and most shadowy, except before +the mirror where the candle flames streamed upwards. The pillars of the +great bed were twisted out of dark wood; the hangings of bed and walls +were all of a dark blue arras, and the bedspread was of a dark red +velvet worked in gold with pomegranates and pomegranate leaves. Only the +pillows and the turnover of the sheets were of white linen-lawn, and the +bed curtains nearly hid them with shadows. Where the Queen sat there was +light like that of an altar in a dim chapel, for the room was so huge. + +She sat before her glass, silently taking off her golden things. She +took the jewel off the chain round her neck and laid it in a casket of +gold and ivory. She took the rings off her fingers and hung them on the +lance of a little knight in silver. She took off her waist where it hung +to a brooch of feridets, her pomander of enamel and gold; she opened it +and marked the time by the watch studded with sable diamonds that it +held. + +'Past eleven,' she said, 'if my watch goes right.' + +'Indeed it is past eleven,' the Lady Rochford sighed behind her. + +The Queen sat forward in her chair, looking deep into the shadows of her +mirror. A great relaxation was in all her limbs, for she was very tired, +so that though she was minded to let down her hair she did not begin to +undo her coif, and though she desired to think, she had no thoughts. +From far away there came a muffled sound as if a door had been roughly +closed, and the Lady Rochford shot out a little sound between a scream +and a sigh. + +'Why, you are very affrighted,' the Queen said. 'One would think you +feared robbers; but my guards are too good.' + +She began to unloosen from her hood her jewel, which was a rose +fashioned out of pink shell work set with huge dewdrops of diamonds and +crowned with a little crown of gold. + +'God knows,' she said, 'I ha' trinkets enow for robbers. It takes me too +long to undo them. I would the King did not so load me.' + +'Your Highness is too humble for a Queen,' the old Lady Rochford +grumbled. 'Let me aid you, since the maid is gone. I would not have you +speak your maids so humbly. My Cousin Anne that was the Queen----' + +She came stiffly and heavily forward from the bed with her hands out to +discoif her lady; but the Queen turned her head, caught at her fat hand, +put it against her cheek and fondled it. + +'I would have your Highness feared by all,' the old lady said. + +'I would have myself by all beloved,' Katharine answered. 'What, am I to +play the Queen and Highness to such serving-maids as I was once the +fellow and companion to?' + +'Your Highness should not have sent the wench away,' the old woman said. + +'Well, you have taken on a very sour voice,' the Queen said. 'I will +study to pleasure you more. Get you now back and rest you, for I know +you stand uneasily, and you shall not uncoif me.' + +She began to unpin her coif, laying the golden pins in the silver +candle-dishes. When her hair was thus set free of a covering, though it +was smoothly braided and parted over her forehead, yet it was lightly +rebellious, so that little mists of it caught the light, golden and +rejoiceful. Her face was serious, her nose a little peaked, her lips +rested lightly together, and her blue eyes steadily challenged their +counterparts in the mirror with an assured and gentle glance. + +'Why,' she said, 'I believe you have the right of it--but for a queen I +must be the same make of queen that I am as a woman. A queen gracious +rather than a queen regnant; a queen to grant petitions rather than one +to brush aside the petitioners.' + +She stopped and mused. + +'Yet,' she said, 'you will do me the justice to say that in the open and +in the light of day, when men are by or the King's presence demands it, +I do ape as well as I may the painted queens of galleries and the +stately ladies that are to be seen in pictured books.' + +'I would not have had you send away the maid,' the old Lady Rochford +said. + +'God help me,' the Queen answered. 'I stayed her petition till the +morrow. Is that not queening it enough?' + +The Lady Rochford suddenly wrung her hands. + +'I had rather,' she said, 'you had heard her and let her stay. Here +there are not people enough to guard you. You should have many scores of +people. This is a dreary place.' + +'Heaven help me,' the Queen said. 'If I were such a queen as to be +affrighted, you would affright me. Tell me of your cousin that was a +sinful queen.' + +The Lady Rochford raised her hands lamentably and bleated out-- + +'Ah God, not to-night!' + +'You have been ready enough on other nights,' the Queen said. And, +indeed, it was so much the practice of this lady to talk always of her +cousin, whose death had affrighted her, that often the Queen had begged +her to cease. But to-night she was willing to hear, for she felt afraid +of no omens, and, being joyful, was full of pity for the dead +unfortunate. She began with slow, long motions to withdraw the great +pins from her hair. The deep silence settled down again, and she hummed +the melancholy and stately tune that goes with the words-- + + _'When all the little hills are hid in snow,_ + _And all the small brown birds by frost are slain,_ + _And sad and slow_ + _The silly sheep do go,_ + _All seeking shelter to and fro--_ + _Come once again_ + _To these familiar, silent, misty lands----'_ + +And-- + +'Aye,' she said; 'to these ancient and familiar lands of the dear +saints, please God, when the winter snows are upon them, once again +shall come the feet of God's messenger, for this is the joyfullest day +this land hath known since my namesake was cast down and died.' + +Suddenly there were muffled cries from beyond the thick door in the +corridor, and on the door itself resounding blows. The Lady Rochford +gave out great shrieks, more than her feeble body could have been deemed +to hold. + +'Body of God!' the Queen said, 'what is this?' + +'Your cousin!' the Lady Rochford cried out. She came running to the +Queen, who, in standing up, had overset her heavy chair, and, falling to +her knees, she babbled out--'Your cousin! Oh, let it not all come again. +Call your guard. Let it not all come again'; and she clawed into the +Queen's skirt, uttering incomprehensible clamours. + +'What? What? What?' Katharine said. + +'He was with the Archbishop. Your cousin with the Archbishop. I heard +it. I sent to stay him if it were so'; and the old woman's teeth +crackled within her jaws. 'O God, it is come again!' she cried. + +The door flung open heavily, but slowly, because it was so heavy. And, +in the archway, whilst a great scream from the old woman wailed out down +the corridors, Katharine was aware of a man in scarlet, locked in a +struggle with a raging swirl of green manhood. The man in scarlet fell +back, and then, crying out, ran away. The man in green, his bonnet off, +his red hair sticking all up, his face pallid, and his eyes staring like +those of a sleep-walker, entered the room. In his right hand he had a +dagger. He walked very slowly. + +The Queen thought fast: the old Lady Rochford had her mouth open; her +eyes were upon the dagger in Culpepper's hand. + +'I seek the Queen,' he said, but his eyes were lacklustre; they fell +upon Katharine's face as if they had no recognition, or could not see. +She turned her body round to the old Lady Rochford, bending from the +hips so as not to move her feet. She set her fingers upon her lips. + +'I seek--I seek----' he said, and always he came closer to her. His +eyes were upon her face, and the lids moved. + +'I seek the Queen,' he said, and beneath his husky voice there were bass +notes of quivering anger, as if, just as he had been by chance calmed by +throwing down the guard, so by chance his anger might arise again. + +The Queen never moved, but stood up full and fair; one strand of her +hair, loosened, fell low over her left ear. When he was so close to her +that his protruded hips touched her skirt, she stole her hand slowly +round him till it closed upon his wrist above the dagger. His mouth +opened, his eyes distended. + +'I seek----' he said, and then--'Kat!' as if the touch of her cool and +firm fingers rather than the sight of her had told to his bruised senses +who she was. + +'Get you gone!' she said. 'Give me your dagger.' She uttered each word +roundly and fully as if she were pondering the next move over a +chequer-board. + +'Well, I will kill the Queen,' he said. 'How may I do it without my +knife?' + +'Get you gone!' she said again. 'I will direct you to the Queen.' + +He passed the back of his left hand wearily over his brow. + +'Well, I have found thee, Kat!' he said. + +She answered: 'Aye!' and her fingers twined round his on the hilt of the +dagger, so that his were loosening. + +Then the old Lady Rochford screamed out-- + +'Ha! God's mercy! Guards, swords, come!' The furious blood came into +Culpepper's face at the sound. His hand he tore from Katharine's, and +with the dagger raised on high he ran back from her and then forward +towards the Lady Rochford. With an old trick of fence, that she had +learned when she was a child, Katharine Howard set out her foot before +him, and, with the speed of his momentum, he pitched over forward. He +fell upon his face so that his forehead was upon the Lady Rochford's +right foot. His dagger he still grasped, but he lay prone with the drink +and the fever. + +'Now, by God in His mercy,' Katharine said to her, 'as I am the Queen I +charge you----' + +'Take his knife and stab him to the heart!' the Lady Rochford cried out. +'This will slay us two.' + +'I charge you that you listen to me,' the Queen said, 'or, by God, I +will have you in chains!' + +'I will call your many,' the Lady Rochford cried out, for terror had +stopped up the way from her ears to her brain, and she made towards the +door. But Katharine set her hand to the old woman's shoulder. + +'Call no man,' she commanded. 'This is a device of mine enemies to have +men see this of me.' + +'I will not stay here to be slain,' the old woman said. + +'Then mine own self will slay you,' the Queen answered. Culpepper moved +in his stupor. 'Before Heaven,' the Queen said, 'stay you there, and he +shall not again stand up.' + +'I will go call----' the old woman besought her, and again Culpepper +moved. The Queen stood right up against her; her breast heaved, her face +was rigid. Suddenly she turned and ran to the door. That key she +wrenched round and out, and then to the other door beside it, and that +key too she wrenched round and out. + +'I will not stay alone with my cousin,' she said, 'for that is what mine +enemies would have. And this I vow, that if again you squeak I will have +you tried as being an abettor of this treason.' She went and knelt down +at her cousin's head; she moved his face round till it was upon her lap. + +'Poor Tom,' she said; he opened his eyes and muttered stupid words. + +She looked again at Lady Rochford. + +'All this is nothing,' she said, 'if you will hide in the shadow of the +bed and keep still. I have seen my cousin a hundred times thus muddied +with drink, and do not fear him. He shall not stand up till he is ready +to go through the door; but I will not be alone with him and tend him.' + +The Lady Rochford waddled and quaked like a jelly to the shadow of the +bed curtains. She pulled back the curtain over the window, and, as if +the contact with the world without would help her, threw back the +casement. Below, in the black night, a row of torches shook and +trembled, like little planets, in the distance. + +Katharine Howard held her cousin's head upon her knees. She had seen him +thus a hundred times and had no fear of him. For thus in his cups, and +fevered as he was with ague that he had had since a child, he was always +amenable to her voice though all else in the world enraged him. So that, +if she could keep the Lady Rochford still, she might well win him out +through the door at which he came in. + +And, first, when he moved to come to his knees, she whispered-- + +'Lie down, lie down,' and he set one elbow on to the carpet and lay over +on his side, then on his back. She took his head again on to her lap, +and with soft motions reached to take the dagger from his hand. He +yielded it up and gazed upwards into her face. + +'Kat!' he said, and she answered-- + +'Aye!' + +There came from very far the sound of a horn. + +'When you can stand,' she said, 'you must get you gone.' + +'I have sold farms to get you gowns,' he answered. + +'And then we came to Court,' she said, 'to grow great.' + +He passed his left hand once more over his eyes with a gesture of +ineffable weariness, but his other arm that was extended, she knelt +upon. + +'Now we are great,' she said. + +He muttered, 'I wooed thee in an apple orchard. Let us go back to +Lincolnshire.' + +'Why, we will talk of it in the morning,' she said. 'It is very late.' + +Her brain throbbed with the pulsing blood. She was set to get him gone +before the young Poins could call men to her door. It was maddeningly +strange to think that none hitherto had come. Maybe Culpepper had struck +him dead with his knife, or he lay without fainting. This black enigma, +calling for haste that she dare not show, filled all the shadows of that +shadowy room. + +'It is very late,' she said, 'you must get you gone. It was compacted +between us that ever you would get you gone early.' + +'Aye, I would not have thee shamed,' he said. He spoke upwards, slowly +and luxuriously, his head so softly pillowed, his eyes gazing at the +ceiling. He had never been so easy in two years past. 'I remember that +was the occasion of our pact. I did wooe thee in an apple orchard to the +grunting of hogs.' + +'Get you gone,' she said; 'buy me a favour against the morning.' + +'Why,' he said, 'I am a very rich lord. I have lands in Kent now. I will +buy thee such a gown ... such a gown.... The hogs grunted.... There is a +song about it.... Let me go to buy thy gown. Aye, now, presently. I +remember a great many things. As thus ... there is a song of a lady +loved a swine. Honey, said she, and hunc, said he.' + +Whilst she listened a great many thoughts came into her mind--of their +youth at home, where indeed, to the grunting of hogs, he had wooed her +when she came out from conning her Plautus with the Magister. And at the +same time it troubled her to consider where the young Poins had bestowed +himself. Maybe he was dead; maybe he lay in a faint. + +'It was in our pact,' she said to Culpepper, 'that you should get you +gone ever when I would have it.' + +'Aye, sure, it was in our pact,' he said. + +He closed his eyes as if he would fall asleep, being very weary and come +to his desired haven. Above his closed eyes Katharine threw the key of +her antechamber on to the bed. She pointed with her hand to that door +that the Lady Rochford should undo. If she could get her cousin through +that door--and now he was in the mood--if she could but get him through +there and out at the door beyond the Big Room into the corridor, before +her guard came back.... + +But the Lady Rochford was leaning far out beyond the window-sill and did +not see her gesture. + +Culpepper muttered-- + +'Ah; well; aye; even so----' And from the window came a scream that +tore the air-- + +'The King! the King!' + +And immediately it was as if the life of a demon had possessed Culpepper +in all his limbs. + +'Merciful God!' the Queen cried out. 'I am patient.' + +Culpepper had writhed from her till he sat up, but she hollowed her hand +around his throat. His head she forced back till she held it upon the +floor, and whilst he writhed with his legs she knelt upon his chest with +one knee. He screamed out words like: 'Bawd,' and 'Ilcock,' and +'Hecate,' and the Lady Rochford screamed-- + +'The King comes! the King comes!' + +Then Katharine said within herself-- + +'Is it this to be a Queen?' + +She set both her hands upon his neck and pressed down the whole weight +of her frame, till the voice died in his throat. His body stirred +beneath her knee, convulsively, so that it was as if she rode a horse. +His eyes, as slowly he strangled, glared hideously at the ceiling, from +which the carven face of a Queen looked down into them. At last he lay +still, and Katharine Howard rose up. + +She ran at the old woman-- + +'God forgive me if I have killed my cousin,' she said. 'I am certain +that now He will forgive me if I slay thee.' And she had Culpepper's +dagger in her hand. + +'For,' she said, 'I stand for Christ His cause: I will not be undone by +meddlers. Hold thy peace!' + +The Lady Rochford opened her mouth to speak. + +'Hold thy peace!' the Queen said again, and she lifted up the dagger. +'Speak not. Do as I bid thee. Answer me when I ask. For this I swear as +I am the Queen that, since I have the power to slay whom I will and none +question it, I will slay thee if thou do not my bidding.' + +The old woman trembled lamentably. + +'Where is the King come to?' the Queen said. + +'Even to the great gate; he is out of sight,' was her answer. + +'Come now,' the Queen commanded. 'Let us drag my cousin behind my +table.' + +'Shall he be hidden there?' the Lady Rochford cried out. 'Let us cast +him from the window.' + +'Hold your peace,' the Queen cried out. 'Speak you never one word more. +But come!' + +She took her cousin by the arm, the Lady Rochford took him by the other +and they dragged him, inert and senseless, into the shadow of the +Queen's mirror table. + +'Pray God the King comes soon,' the Queen said. She stood above her +cousin and looked down upon him. A great pitifulness came into her face. + +'Loosen his shirt,' she said. 'Feel if his heart beats!' + +The Lady Rochford had a face full of fear and repulsion. + +'Loosen his shirt. Feel if his heart beats,' the Queen said. 'And oh!' +she added, 'woe shall fall upon thee if he be dead.' + +She reflected a moment to think upon how long it should be ere the King +came to her door. Then she raised her chair, and sat down at her mirror. +For one minute she set her face into her hands; then she began to +straighten herself, and with her hands behind her to tighten the laces +of her dress. + +'For,' she continued to Lady Rochford, 'I do hold thee more guilty of +his death than himself. He is but a drunkard in his cups, thou a +palterer in sobriety.' + +She set her cap upon her head and smoothed the hair beneath it. In all +her movements there was a great swiftness and decision. She set the +jewel in her cap, the pomander at her side, the chain around her neck, +the jewel at her breast. + +'His heart beats,' the Lady Rochford said, from her knees at Culpepper's +side. + +'Then thank the saints,' Katharine answered, 'and do up again his +shirt.' + +She hurried in her attiring, and uttered engrossed commands. + +'Kneel thou there by his side. If he stir or mutter before the King be +in and the door closed, put thy hand across his mouth.' + +'But the King----' the Lady Rochford said. 'And----' + +'Merciful God!' Katharine cried out again. 'I am the Queen. Kneel +there.' + +The Lady Rochford trembled down upon her knees; she was in fear for her +life by the axe if the King came in. + +'I thank God that the King is come,' the Queen said. 'If he had not, +this man must have gone from hence in the sight of other men. So I will +pardon thee for having cried out if now thou hold him silent till the +King be in.' + +There came from very near a blare of trumpets. Katharine rose up, and +went again to gaze upon her cousin. The dagger she laid upon her table. + +'He may hold still yet,' she said. 'But I charge you that you muzzle him +if he move or squeak.' + +There came great blows upon the door, and through the heavy wood, the +Ha-ha of many voices. Slowly the Queen moved to the bed, and from it +took the key where she had thrown it. There came again the heavy +knocking, and she unlocked the door, slowly still. + +In the corridor there were many torches, and beneath them the figure of +the King in scarlet. Behind him was Norfolk all in black and with his +yellow face, and Cranmer in black and with his anxious eyes, and behind +them many other lords. The King came in, and, slow and stately, the +Queen went down on her knees to greet him. The torch-light shone upon +her jewels and her garments; her fair face was immobile, and her eyes +upon the ground. The King raised her up, bent his knee to her, and +kissed her on the hands, and so, turning to the men without, he uttered, +roundly and fully, and his cheeks were ruddy with joy, and his eyes +smiled-- + +'My lords, I am beholden to the King o' Scots. For had he met me I had +not yet been here. Get you to your beds; I could wish ye had such +wives----' + +'The King! the King!' a voice muttered. + +Henry said-- + +'Ha, who spoke?' + +There was a faint squeak, a dull rustle. + +'My cousin Kat----' the voice said. + +The King said-- + +'Ha!' again, and incredulous and haughty he raised his brows. + +Above the mirror, in the great light of the candles, there showed the +pale face, the fishy, wide-open and bewildered eyes of Culpepper. His +hair was dishevelled in points; his mouth was open in amazement. He +uttered-- + +'The King!' as if that were the most astonishing thing, and, standing +behind the table, staggered and clutched the arras to sustain himself. + +Henry said-- + +'Ha! Treason!' + +But Katharine whispered at his ear-- + +'No; this my cousin is distraught. Speak on to the lords.' + +In the King's long pause several lords said aloud-- + +'The King cried "Treason!" Draw your swords!' + +Then the King cast his cap upon the ground. + +'By God!' he said. 'What marlocking is this? Is it general joy that +emboldens ye to this license? God help me!' he said, and he stamped his +foot upon the ground--'Body of God!' And many other oaths he uttered. +Then, with a sudden clutching at his throat, he called out-- + +'Well! well! I pardon ye. For no doubt to some that be young--and to +some that be old too--it is an occasion for mummeries and japes when a +good man cometh home to his dame.' + +He looked round upon Culpepper. The Queen's cousin stood, his jaw still +hanging wide, and his body crumpled back against the arras. He was +hidden from them all by wall and door, but Henry could not judge how +long he would there remain. Riding through the night he had conned a +speech that he would have said at the Queen's door, and at the times of +joy and graciousness he loved to deliver great speeches. But there he +said only-- + +'Why, God keep you. I thank such of you as were with me upon the +campaign and journey. Now this campaign and journey is ended--I dissolve +you each to his housing and bed. Farewell. Be as content as I be!' + +And, with his great hand he swung to the heavy door. + + + + +PART THREE + +THE DWINDLING MELODY + + +I + +The Lady Rochford lay back upon the floor in a great faint. + +'Heaven help me!' the Queen said. 'I had rather she had played the +villain than been such a palterer.' She glided to the table and picked +up the dagger that shone there beneath Culpepper's nose. 'Take even +this,' she said to the King. 'It is an ill thing to bestow. Sword he +hath none.' + +Having had such an estimation of his good wife's wit that, since he +would not have her think him a dullard, he passed over the first +question that he would have asked, such as, 'I think this be thy cousin +and how came he here?' + +'Would he have slain me?' he asked instead, as if it were a little +thing. + +'I do not think so,' Katharine said. 'Maybe it was me he would have +slain.' + +'Body of God!' the King said sardonically. 'He cometh for no cheap +goods.' + +He had so often questioned his wife of this cousin of hers that he had +his measure indifferent well. + +'Why,' the Queen said, 'I do not know that he would have slain me. Maybe +it was to save me from dragons that he came with his knife. He was, I +think, with the Archbishop's men and came here very drunk. I would pray +your Highness' Grace to punish him not over much for he is my mother's +nephew and the only friend I had when I was very poor and a young +child.' + +The King hung his head on his chest, and his rustic eyes surveyed the +ground. + +'I would have you to think,' she said, 'that he has been among evil men +that advised and prompted him thus to assault my door. They would ruin +and undo him and me.' + +'Well I know it,' Henry said. He rubbed his hand up his left side, +opened it and dropped it again--a trick he had when he thought deeply. + +'The Archbishop,' he said, 'babbled somewhat--I know not what--of a +cousin of thine that was come from the Scots, he thought, without leave +or license.' + +'But how to get him hence, that my foes triumph not?' the Queen said, +'for I would not have them triumph.' + +'I do think upon it,' the King said. + +'You are better at it than I,' she answered. + +Culpepper stood there at gaze, as if he were a corpse about which they +talked. But the speaking of the Queen to another man excited him to +gurgle and snarl in his throat like an ape. Then another mood coming +into the channels of his brain-- + +'It was the King my cousin Kate did marry. This then is the Queen; I had +pacted with myself to forget this Queen.' He spoke straight out before +him with the echo of thoughts that he had had during his exile. + +'Ho!' the King said and smote his thigh. 'It is plain what to do,' and +in spite of his scarlet and his bulk he had the air of a heavy but very +cunning peasant. He reflected for a little more. + +'It fits very well,' he brought out. 'This man must be richly rewarded.' + +'Why,' Katharine said; 'I had nigh strangled him. It makes me tremble to +think how nigh I had strangled him. I would well he were rewarded.' + +The King considered his wife's cousin. + +'Sirrah,' he said, 'we believe that thou canst not kneel, or kneeling, +couldst not well again arise.' + +Culpepper regarded him with wide, blue, and uncomprehending eyes. + +'So, thou standing as thou makest shift to do, we do make thee the +keeper of this our Queen's ante-room.' + +He spoke with a pleasant and ironical glee, since it joyed him thus to +gibe at one that had loved his wife. He--with his own prowess--had +carried her off. + +'Master Culpepper,' he said--'or Sir Thomas--for I remember to have +knighted you--if you can walk, now walk.' + +Culpepper muttered-- + +'The King! Why the King did wed my cousin Kat!' + +And again-- + +'I must be circumspect. Oh aye, I must be circumspect or all is lost.' +For that was one of the things which in Scotland he had again and again +impressed upon himself. 'But in Lincoln, in bygone times, of a summer's +night----' + +'Poor Tom!' the Queen said; 'once this fellow did wooe me.' + +Great tears gathered in Culpepper's eyes. They overflowed and rolled +down his cheeks. + +'In the apple-orchard,' he said, 'to the grunting of hogs ... for the +hogs were below the orchard wall....' + +The King was pleased to think that it had been in his power to raise +this lady an infinite distance above the wooing of this poor lout. It +gave him an interlude of comedy. But though he set his hands on his hips +and chuckled, he was a man too ready for action to leave much time for +enjoyment. + +'Why weep?' he said to Culpepper. 'We have advanced thee to the Queen's +ante-chamber. Come up thither.' + +He approached to Culpepper behind the mirror table and caught him by the +arm. The poor drunkard, his face pallid, shrank away from this great +bulk of shining scarlet. His eyes moved lamentably round the chamber and +rested first upon Katharine, then upon the King. + +'Which of us was it you would ha' killed?' the King said, to show the +Queen how brave he was in thus handling a madman. And, being very +strong, he dragged the swaying drunkard, who held back and whose head +wagged on his shoulders, towards the door. + +'Guard ho!' he called out, and before the door there stood three of his +own men in scarlet and with pikes. + +'Ho, where is the Queen's door-ward?' he called with a great voice. +Before him, from the door side, there came the young Poins; his face was +like chalk; he had a bruise above his eyes; his knees trembled beneath +him. + +'Ho thou!' the King said, 'who art thou that would hinder my messenger +from coming to the Queen?' + +He stood back upon his feet; he clutched the drunkard in his great fist; +his eyes started dreadfully. + +The young Poins' lips moved, but no sound came out. + +'This was my messenger,' the King said, 'and you hindered him. Body of +God! Body of God!' and he made his voice to tremble as if with rage, +whilst he told this lie to save his wife's fair fame. 'Where have you +been? Where have you tarried? What treason is this? For either you knew +this was my messenger--as well I would have you know that he is--and it +was treason and death to stay him. Or, if because he was drunk and +speechless--as well he might be having travelled far and with +expedition--ye did not know he was my messenger; then wherefore did ye +not run to raise all the castle for succour?' + +The young Poins pointed to the wound above his eye and then to the +ground of the corridor. He would signify that Culpepper had struck him, +and that there, on the ground, he had lain senseless. + +'Ho!' the King said, for he was willing to know how many men in that +castle had wind of this mischance. 'You lay not there all this while. +When I came here along, you stood here by the door in your place.' + +The young Poins fell upon his knees. He shook more violently than a +naked man on a frosty day. For here indeed was the centre of his +treason, since Lascelles had bidden him stay there, once Culpepper was +in the Queen's room, and to say later that there the Queen had bidden +him stay whilst she had her lover. And now, before the King's tremendous +presence, he had the fear at his heart that the King knew this. + +'Wherefore! wherefore!' the King thundered, 'wherefore didst not cry +out--cry out--"Treason, Raise the watch!"? Hail out aloud?' + +He waited, silent for a long time. The three pikemen leaned upon their +pikes; and now Culpepper had fallen against the door-post, where the +King held him up. And behind his back the Queen marvelled at the King's +ready wit. This was the best stroke that ever she had known him do. And +the Lady Rochford lay where she had feigned to faint, straining her +ears. + +With all these ears listening for his words the young Poins knelt, his +teeth chattering like burning wood that crackles. + +'Wherefore? wherefore?' the King cried again. + +Half inaudibly, his eyes upon the ground, the boy mumbled, 'It was to +save the Queen from scandal!' + +The King let his jaw fall, in a fine aping of amazement. Then, with the +huge swiftness of a bull, he threw Culpepper towards one of the guards, +and, leaning over, had the kneeling boy by the throat. + +'Scandal!' he said. 'Body of God! Scandal!' And the boy screamed out, +and raised his hands to hide the King's intolerable great face that +blazed down over his eyes. + +The huge man cast him from him, so that he fell over backwards, and lay +upon his side. + +'Scandal!' the King cried out to his guards. 'Here is a pretty scandal! +That a King may not send a messenger to his wife withouten scandal! God +help me....' + +He stood suddenly again over the boy as if he would trample him to a +shapeless pulp. But, trembling there, he stepped back. + +'Up, bastard!' he called out. 'Run as ye never ran. Fetch hither the +Lord d'Espahn and His Grace of Canterbury, that should have ordered +these matters.' + +The boy stumbled to his knees, and then, a flash of scarlet, ran, his +head down, as if eagles were tearing at his hair. + +The King turned upon his guard. + +'Ho!' he said, 'you, Jenkins, stay here with this my knight cousin. +You, Cale and Richards, run to fetch a launderer that shall set a +mattress in the ante-chamber for this my cousin to lie on. For this my +cousin is the Queen's chamber-ward, and shall there lie when I am here, +if so be I have occasion for a messenger at night.' + +The two guards ran off, striking upon the ground before them as they ran +the heavy staves of their pikes. This noise was intended to warn all to +make way for his Highness' errand-bearers. + +'Why,' the King said pleasantly to Jenkins, a guard with a blond and +shaven face whom he liked well, 'let us set this gentleman against the +wall in the ante-room till his bed be come. He hath earned gentle usage, +since he hasted much, bringing my message from Scotland to the Queen, +and is very ill.' + +So, helping his guard gently to conduct the drunkard into his wife's +dark ante-room, the King came out again to his wife. + +'Is it well done?' he asked. + +'Marvellous well done,' she answered. + +'I am the man for these difficult times!' he answered, and was glad. + +The Queen sighed a little. For if she admired and wondered at her lord's +power skilfully to have his way, it made her sad to think--as she must +think--that so devious was man's work. + +'I would,' she said, 'that it was not to such an occasion that I spurred +thee.' + +Her eyes, being cast downwards, fell upon the Lady Rochford, by the +table. + +'Ho, get up,' she cried. 'You have feigned fainting long enough. But for +you all this had been more easy. I would have you relieve mine eyes of +the sight of your face.' She moved to aid the old woman to rise, but +before she was upon her knees there stood without the door both the Lord +d'Espahn and the Archbishop. They had waited just beyond the +corridor-end with a great many of the other lords, all afraid of +mysteries they knew not what, and thus it was that they came so soon +upon the young Poins' summoning. + + +II + +The King thought fit to change his mood, so that it was with uplifted +brows and a quizzing smile at the corners of his mouth that for a minute +he greeted these frightened lords in the doorway. They stood there +silent, the Archbishop very dejected, the Lord d'Espahn, with his grey +beard, very erect and ruddy featured. + +'Why, God help me,' the King said, 'what make of Court is this of mine +where a King may not send a messenger to his wife?' + +The Archbishop swallowed in his throat; the Lord d'Espahn did not speak +but gazed before him. + +'You shall tell me what befell, for I am ignorant,' the King said; 'but +first I will tell you what I do know. + +'Why, come out with me into the corridor, wife,' he cried over his +shoulder. 'For it is not fitting that these lords come into thy +apartment. I will walk with them and talk.' + +He took the Archbishop by the elbow and the Lord d'Espahn by the upper +arm, and, leaning upon them, propelled them gently before him. + +'Thus it was,' he said; 'this cousin of my wife's was in the King o' +Scots' good town of Edinboro'. And, being there, he was much upon my +conscience--for I would not have a cousin of my wife's be there in +exile, he being one that formerly much fended for her....' + +He spoke out his words and repeated these things for his own purposes, +the Queen following behind. When they were come to the corridor-end, +there he found, as he had thought, a knot of lords and gentlemen, +babbling with their ears pricked up. + +'Nay, stay,' he said, 'this is a matter that all may hear.' + +There were there the Duke of Norfolk and his son, young Surrey with the +vacant mouth, Sir Henry Wriothesley with the great yellow beard, the +Lord Dacre of the North, the old knight Sir N. Rochford, Sir Henry Peel +of these parts, with a many of their servants, amongst them Lascelles. +Most of them were in scarlet or purple, but many were in black. The Earl +of Surrey had the Queen's favour of a crowned rose in his bonnet, for he +was of her party. The gallery opened out there till it was as big as a +large room, broad and low-ceiled, and lit with torches in irons at the +angles of it. On rainy days the Queen's maids were here accustomed to +play at stool-ball. + +'This is a matter that all may hear,' the King said, 'and some shall +render account.' He let the Lord d'Espahn and the Archbishop go, so that +they faced him. The Queen looked over his shoulder. + +'As thus ...' he said. + +And he repeated how it had lain upon his conscience and near his heart +that the Queen's good cousin languished in the town of Edinburgh. + +'And how near we came to Edinboro' those of ye that were with me can +make account.' + +And, lying there, he had taken occasion to send a messenger with others +that went to the King o' Scots--to send a messenger with letters unto +this T. Culpepper. One letter was to bid him hasten home unto the Queen, +and one was a letter that he should bear. + +'For,' said the King, 'we thought thus--as ye wist--that the King o' +Scots would come obedient to our summoning and that there we should lie +some days awaiting and entertaining him. Thus did I wish to send my +Queen swift message of our faring, and I was willing that this, her +cousin and mine, should be my postman and messenger. For he should--I +bade him--set sail in a swift ship for these coasts and so come quicker +than ever a man might by land.' + +He paused to observe the effect of his words, but no lord spoke though +some whispered amongst themselves. + +'Now,' he said, 'what stood within my letter to the Queen was this, +after salutations, that she should reward this her cousin that in the +aforetime had much fended for her when she was a child. For I was aware +how, out of a great delicacy and fear of nepotism, such as was shown by +certain of the Popes now dead, she raised up none of her relations and +blood, nor none that before had aided her when she was a child and poor. +But I was willing that this should be otherwise, and they be much helped +that before had helped her since now she helpeth me and assuageth my +many and fell labours.' + +He paused and went a step back that he might stand beside the Queen, and +there, before them all, Katharine was most glad that she had again set +on all her jewels and was queen-like. She had composed her features, and +gazed before her over their heads, her hands being folded in the lap of +her gown. + +'Now,' the King said, 'this letter of mine was a little thing--but great +maybe, since it bore my will. Yet'--and he made his voice minatory--'in +these evil and tickle times well it might have been that that letter +held delicate news. Then all my plots had gone to ruin. How came it that +some of ye--I know not whom!--thus letted and hindered my messenger?' + +He had raised his voice very high. He stayed it suddenly, and some there +shivered. + +He uttered balefully, 'Anan!' + +'As Christ is my Saviour,' the Lord d'Espahn said, 'I, since I am the +Queen's Marshal, am answerable in this, as well I know. Yet never saw I +this man till to-night at supper. He would have my seat then, and I gave +it him. Ne let ne hindrance had he of me, but went his way where and +when he would.' + +'You did very well,' the King said. 'Who else speaks?' + +The Archbishop looked over his shoulder, and with a dry mouth uttered, +'Lascelles!' + +Lascelles, deft and blond and gay, shouldered his way through that +unwilling crowd, and fell upon his knees. + +'Of this I know something,' he said; 'and if any have offended, +doubtless it is I, though with good will.' + +'Well, speak!' the King said. + +Lascelles recounted how the Queen, riding out, had seen afar this +gentleman lying amid the heather. + +'And if she should not know him who was her cousin, how should we who +are servants?' he said. But, having heard that the Queen would have this +poor, robbed wayfarer tended and comforted, he, Lascelles, out of the +love and loyalty he owed her Grace, had so tended and so comforted him +that he had given up to him his own bed and board. But it was not till +that day that, Culpepper being washed and apparelled--not till that day +a little before supper, had he known him for Culpepper, the Queen's +cousin. So he had gone with him that night to the banquet-hall, and +there had served him, and, after, had attended him with some lords and +gentles. But, at the last, Culpepper had shaken them off and bidden them +leave him. + +'And who were we, what warrants had we, to restrain the Queen's noble +cousin?' he finished. 'And, as for letters, I never saw one, though all +his apparel, in rags, was in my hands. I think he must have lost this +letter amongst the robbers he fell in with. But what I could do, I did +for love of the Queen's Grace, who much hath favoured me.' + +The King studied his words. He looked at the Queen's face and then at +those of the lords before him. + +'Why, this tale hath a better shewing,' he said. 'Herein appeareth that +none, save the Queen's door-ward, came ever against this good knight and +cousin of mine. And, since this knight was in liquor, and not overwise +sensible--as well he might be after supping in moors and deserts--maybe +that door-ward had his reasonable reasonings.' + +He paused again, and looking upon the Queen's face for a sign: + +'If it be thus, it is well,' he said, 'I will pardon and assoil you all, +if later it shall appear that this is the true truth.' + +Lascelles whispered in the Archbishop's ear, and Cranmer uttered-- + +'The witnesses be here to prove it, if your Highness will.' + +'Why,' the King said, 'it is late enough,' and he leered at Cranmer, +for whom he had an affection. He looked again upon the Queen to see how +fair she was and how bravely she bore herself, upright and without +emotion. 'This wife of mine,' he said, 'is ever of the pardoning side. +If ye had so injured me I had been among ye with fines and amercements. +But she, I perceive, will not have it so, and I am too glad to be smiled +upon now to cross her will. So, get you gone and sleep well. But, before +you go, I will have you listen to some words....' + +He cleared his throat, and in his left hand took the Queen's. + +'Know ye,' he said, 'that I am as proud of this my Queen as was ever +mother of her first-born child. For lo, even as the Latin poet saith, +that, upon bearing a child, many evil women are led to repentance and +right paths, so have I, your King, been led towards righteousness by +wedding of this lady. For I tell you that, but for certain small +hindrances--and mostly this treacherous disloyalty of the King o' Scots +that thus with his craven marrow hath featorously dallied to look upon +my face--but for that and other small things there had gone forth this +night through the dark to the Bishop of Rome certain tidings that, +please God, had made you and me and all this land the gladdest that be +in Christendom. And this I tell you, too, that though by this +misadventure and fear of the King o' Scots, these tidings have been +delayed, yet is it only for a little space and, full surely, that day +cometh. And for this you shall give thanks first to God and then to this +royal lady here. For she, before all things, having the love of God in +her heart, hath brought about this desired consummation. And this I say, +to her greater praise, here in the midmost of you all, that it be noised +unto the utmost corners of the world how good a Queen the King hath +taken to wife.' + +The Queen had stood very motionless in the bright illuminations and +dancings of the torches. But at the news of delay, through the King of +Scots, a spasm of pain and concern came into her face. So that, if her +features did not again move they had in them a savour of anguish, her +eyebrows drooping, and the corners of her mouth. + +'And now, good-night!' the King pursued with raised tones. 'If ever ye +slept well since these troublous times began, now ye may sleep well in +the drowsy night. For now, in this my reign, are come the shortening +years like autumn days. Now I will have such peace in land as cometh to +the husbandman. He hath ingarnered his grain; he hath barned his fodder +and straw; his sheep are in the byres and in the stalls his oxen. So, +sitteth he by his fireside with wife and child, and hath no fear of +winter. Such a man am I, your King, who in the years to come shall rest +in peace.' + +The lords and gentlemen made their reverences, bows and knees; they +swept round in their coloured assembly, and the Queen stood very tall +and straight, watching their departure with saddened eyes. + +The King was very gay and caught her by the waist. + +'God help me, it is very late,' he said. 'Hearken!' + +From above the corridor there came the drowsy sound of the clock. + +'Thy daughter hath made her submission,' the Queen said. 'I had thought +this was the gladdest day in my life.' + +'Why, so it is,' he said, 'as now day passeth to day.' The clock ceased. +'Every day shall be glad,' he said, 'and gladder than the rest.' + +At her chamber door he made a bustle. He would have the Queen's women +come to untire her, a leech to see to Culpepper's recovery. He was +willing to drink mulled wine before he slept. He was afraid to talk with +his wife of delaying his letter to Rome. That was why he had told the +news before her to his lords. + +He fell upon the Lady Rochford that stood, not daring to go, within the +Queen's room. He bade her sit all night by the bedside of T. Culpepper; +he reviled her for a craven coward that had discountenanced the Queen. +She should pay for it by watching all night, and woe betide her if any +had speech with T. Culpepper before the King rose. + + +III + +Down in the lower castle, the Archbishop was accustomed, when he +undressed, to have with him neither priest nor page, but only, when he +desired to converse of public matters--as now he did--his gentleman, +Lascelles. He knelt above his kneeling-stool of black wood; he was +telling his beads before a great crucifix with an ivory Son of God upon +it. His chamber had bare white walls, his bed no curtains, and all the +other furnishing of the room was a great black lectern whereto there was +chained a huge Book of the Holy Writ that had his Preface. The tears +were in his eyes as he muttered his prayers; he glanced upwards at the +face of his Saviour, who looked down with a pallid, uncoloured face of +ivory, the features shewing a great agony so that the mouth was opened. +It was said that this image, that came from Italy, had had a face +serene, before the Queen Katharine of Aragon had been put away. Then it +had cried out once, and so remained ever lachrymose and in agony. + +'God help me, I cannot well pray,' the Archbishop said. 'The peril that +we have been in stays with me still.' + +'Why, thank God that we are come out of it very well,' Lascelles said. +'You may pray and then sleep more calm than ever you have done this +sennight.' + +He leant back against the reading-pulpit, and had his arm across the +Bible as if it had been the shoulder of a friend. + +'Why,' the Archbishop said, 'this is the worst day ever I have been +through since Cromwell fell.' + +'Please it your Grace,' his confidant said, 'it shall yet turn out the +best.' + +The Archbishop faced round upon his knees; he had taken off the jewel +from before his breast, and, with his chain of Chaplain of the George, +it dangled across the corner of the fald-stool. His coat was unbuttoned +at the neck, his robe open, and it was manifest that his sleeves of +lawn were but sleeves, for in the opening was visible, harsh and grey, +the shirt of hair that night and day he wore. + +'I am weary of this talk of the world,' he said. 'Pray you begone and +leave me to my prayers.' + +'Please it your Grace to let me stay and hearten you,' Lascelles said, +and he was aware that the Archbishop was afraid to be alone with the +white Christ. 'All your other gentry are in bed. I shall watch your +sleep, to wake you if you cry out.' + +And in his fear of Cromwell's ghost that came to him in his dreams, the +Archbishop sighed-- + +'Why stay, but speak not. Y'are over bold.' + +He turned again to the wall; his beads clicked; he sighed and remained +still for a long time, a black shadow, huddled together in a black gown, +sighing before the white and lamenting image that hung above him. + +'God help me,' he said at last. 'Tell me why you say this is _dies +felix_?' + +Lascelles, who smiled for ever and without mirth, said-- + +'For two things: firstly, because this letter and its sending are put +off. And secondly, because the Queen is--patently and to all +people--proved lewd.' + +The Archbishop swung his head round upon his shoulders. + +'You dare not say it!' he said. + +'Why, the late Queen Katharine from Aragon was accounted a model of +piety, yet all men know she was over fond with her confessor,' Lascelles +smiled. + +'It is an approved lie and slander,' the Archbishop said. + +'It served mightily well in pulling down that Katharine,' his confidant +answered. + +'One day'--the Archbishop shivered within his robes--'the account and +retribution for these lies shall be to be paid. For well we know, you, +I, and all of us, that these be falsities and cozenings.' + +'Marry,' Lascelles said, 'of this Queen it is now sufficiently proved +true.' + +The Archbishop made as if he washed his hands. + +'Why,' Lascelles said, 'what man shall believe it was by chance and +accident that she met her cousin on these moors? She is not a compass +that pointeth, of miraculous power, true North.' + +'No good man shall believe what you do say,' the Archbishop cried out. + +'But a multitude of indifferent will,' Lascelles answered. + +'God help me,' the Archbishop said, 'what a devil you are that thus hold +out and hold out for ever hopes.' + +'Why,' Lascelles said, 'I think you were well helped that day that I +came into your service. It was the Great Privy Seal that bade me serve +you and commended me.' + +The Archbishop shivered at that name. + +'What an end had Thomas Cromwell!' he said. + +'Why, such an end shall not be yours whilst this King lives, so well he +loves you,' Lascelles answered. + +The Archbishop stood upon his feet; he raised his hands above his head. + +'Begone! Begone!' he cried. 'I will not be of your evil schemes.' + +'Your Grace shall not,' Lascelles said very softly, 'if they miscarry. +But when it is proven to the hilt that this Queen is a very lewd +woman--and proven it shall be--your Grace may carry an accusation to the +King----' + +Cranmer said-- + +'Never! never! Shall I come between the lion and his food?' + +'It were better if your Grace would carry the accusation,' Lascelles +uttered nonchalantly, 'for the King will better hearken to you than to +any other. But another man will do it too.' + +'I will not be of this plotting,' the Archbishop cried out. 'It is a +very wicked thing!' He looked round at the white Christ that, upon the +dark cross, bent anguished brows upon him. 'Give me strength,' he said. + +'Why, your Grace shall not be of it,' Lascelles answered, 'until it is +proven in the eyes of your Grace--ay, and in the eyes of some of the +Papist Lords--as, for instance, her very uncle--that this Queen was +evil in her life before the King took her, and that she hath acted very +suspicious in the aftertime.' + +'You shall not prove it to the Papist Lords,' Cranmer said. 'It is a +folly.' + +He added vehemently-- + +'It is a wicked plot. It is a folly too. I will not be of it.' + +'This is a very fortunate day,' Lascelles said. 'I think it is proven to +all discerning men that that letter to him of Rome shall never be sent.' + +'Why, it is as plain as the truths of the Six Articles,' Cranmer +remonstrated, 'that it shall be sent to-morrow or the next day. Get you +gone! This King hath but the will of the Queen to guide him, and all her +will turns upon that letter. Get you gone!' + +'Please it your Grace,' the spy said, 'it is very manifest that with the +Queen so it is. But with the King it is otherwise. He will pleasure the +Queen if he may. But--mark me well--for this is a subtle matter----' + +'I will not mark you,' the Archbishop said. 'Get you gone and find +another master. I will not hear you. This is the very end.' + +Lascelles moved his arm from the Bible. He bent his form to a bow--he +moved till his hand was on the latch of the door. + +'Why, continue,' the Archbishop said. 'If you have awakened my fears, +you shall slake them if you can--for this night I shall not sleep.' + +And so, very lengthily, Lascelles unfolded his view of the King's +nature. For, said he, if this alliance with the Pope should come, it +must be an alliance with the Pope and the Emperor Charles. For the King +of France was an atheist, as all men knew. And an alliance with the Pope +and the Emperor must be an alliance against France. But the King o' +Scots was the closest ally that Francis had, and never should the King +dare to wage war upon Francis till the King o' Scots was placated or +wooed by treachery to be a prisoner, as the King would have made him if +James had come into England to the meeting. Well would the King, to +save his soul, placate and cosset his wife. But that he never dare do +whilst James was potent at his back. + +And again, Lascelles said, well knew the Archbishop that the Duke of +Norfolk and his following were the ancient friends of France. If the +Queen should force the King to this Imperial League, it must turn +Norfolk and the Bishop of Winchester for ever to her bitter foes in that +land. And along with them all the Protestant nobles and all the Papists +too that had lands of the Church. + +The Archbishop had been marking his words very eagerly. But suddenly he +cried out-- + +'But the King! The King! What shall it boot if all these be against her +so the King be but for her?' + +'Why,' Lascelles said, 'this King is not a very stable man. Still, man +he is, a man very jealous and afraid of fleers and flouts. If we can +show him--I do accede to it that after what he hath done to-night it +shall not be easy, but we may accomplish it--if before this letter is +sent we may show him that all his land cries out at him and mocks him +with a great laughter because of his wife's evil ways--why then, though +in his heart he may believe her as innocent as you or I do now, it shall +not be long before he shall put her away from him. Maybe he shall send +her to the block.' + +'God help me,' Cranmer said. 'What a hellish scheme is this.' + +He pondered for a while, standing upright and frailly thrusting his hand +into his bosom. + +'You shall never get the King so to believe,' he said; 'this is an idle +invention. I will none of it.' + +'Why, it may be done, I do believe,' Lascelles said, 'and greatly it +shall help us.' + +'No, I will none of it,' the Archbishop said. 'It is a foul scheme. +Besides, you must have many witnesses.' + +'I have some already,' Lascelles said, 'and when we come to London Town +I shall have many more. It was not for nothing that the Great Privy Seal +commended me.' + +'But to make the King,' Cranmer uttered, as if he were aghast and +amazed, 'to make the King--this King who knoweth that his wife hath done +no wrong--who knoweth it so well as to-night he hath proven--to make +_him_, him, to put her away ... why, the tiger is not so fell, nor the +Egyptian worm preyeth not on its kind. This is an imagination so +horrible----' + +'Please it your Grace,' Lascelles said softly, 'what beast or brute hath +your Grace ever seen to betray its kind as man will betray brother, son, +father, or consort?' + +The Archbishop raised his hands above his head. + +'What lesser bull of the herd, or lesser ram, ever so played traitor to +his leader as Brutus played to Caesar Julius? And these be times less +noble.' + + + + +PART FOUR + +THE END OF THE SONG + + +I + +The Queen was at Hampton, and it was the late autumn. She had been sad +since they came from Pontefract, for it had seemed more than ever +apparent that the King's letter to Rome must be ever delayed in the +sending. Daily, at night, the King swore with great oaths that the +letter must be sent and his soul saved. He trembled to think that if +then he died in his bed he must be eternally damned, and she added her +persuasions, such as that each soul that died in his realms before that +letter was sent went before the Throne of Mercy unshriven and +unhouselled, so that their burden of souls grew very great. And in the +midnights, the King would start up and cry that all was lost and himself +accursed. + +And it appeared that he and his house were accursed in these days, for +when they were come back to Hampton, they found the small Prince Edward +was very ill. He was swollen all over his little body, so that the +doctors said it was a dropsy. But how, the King cried, could it be a +dropsy in so young a child and one so grave and so nurtured and tended? +Assuredly it must be some marvel wrought by the saints to punish him, or +by the Fiend to tempt him. And so he would rave, and cast tremulous +hands above his head. And he would say that God, to punish him, would +have of him his dearest and best. + +And when the Queen urged him, therefore, to make his peace with God, he +would cry out that it was too late. God would make no peace with him. +For if God were minded to have him at peace, wherefore would He not +smoothe the way to this reconciliation with His vicegerent that sat at +Rome in Peter's chair? There was no smoothing of that way--for every day +there arose new difficulties and torments. + +The King o' Scots would come into no alliance with him; the King of +France would make no bid for the hand of his daughter Mary; it went ill +with the Emperor in his fighting with the Princes of Almain and the +Schmalkaldners, so that the Emperor would be of the less use as an ally +against France and the Scots. + +'Why!' he would cry to the Queen, 'if God in His Heaven would have me +make a peace with Rome, wherefore will He not give victory over a parcel +of Lutheran knaves and swine? Wherefore will He not deliver into my +hands these beggarly Scots and these atheists of France?' + +At night the Queen would bring him round to vowing that first he would +make peace with God and trust in His great mercy for a prosperous issue. +But each morning he would be afraid for his sovereignty; a new letter +would come from Norfolk, who had gone on an embassy to his French +friends, believing fully that the King was minded to marry to one of +them his daughter. But the French King was not ready to believe this. +And the King's eyes grew red and enraged; he looked no man in the face, +not even the Queen, but glanced aside into corners, uttered blasphemies, +and said that he--he!--was the head of the Church and would have no +overlord. + +The Bishop Gardiner came up from his See in Winchester. But though he +was the head of the Papist party in the realm, the Queen had little +comfort in him. For he was a dark and masterful prelate, and never +ceased to urge her to cast out Cranmer from his archbishopric and to +give it to him. And with him the Lady Mary sided, for she would have +Cranmer's head before all things, since Cranmer it was that most had +injured her mother. Moreover, he was so incessant in his urging the King +to make an alliance with the Catholic Emperor that at last, about the +time that Norfolk came back from France, the King was mightily enraged, +so that he struck the Bishop of Winchester in the face, and swore that +his friend the Kaiser was a rotten plank, since he could not rid himself +of a few small knaves of Lutheran princes. + +Thus for long the Queen was sad; the little Prince very sick; and the +King ate no food, but sat gazing at the victuals, though the Queen +cooked some messes for him with her own hand. + + * * * * * + +One Sunday after evensong, at which Cranmer himself had read prayers, +the King came nearly merrily to his supper. + +'Ho, chuck,' he said, 'you have your enemies. Here hath been Cranmer +weeping to me with a parcel of tales writ on paper.' + +He offered it to her to read, but she would not; for, she said, she knew +well that she had many enemies, only, very safely she could trust her +fame in her Lord's hands. + +'Why, you may,' he said, and sat him down at the table to eat, with the +paper stuck in his belt. 'Body o' God!' he said. 'If it had been any but +Cranmer he had eaten bread in Hell this night. 'A wept and trembled! +Body o' God! Body o' God!' + +And that night he was more merry before the fire than he had been for +many weeks. He had in the music to play a song of his own writing, and +afterwards he swore that next day he would ride to London, and then at +his council send that which she would have sent to Rome. + +'For, for sure,' he said, 'there is no peace in this world for me save +when I hear you pray. And how shall you pray well for me save in the old +form and fashion?' + +He lolled back in his chair and gazed at her. + +'Why,' he said, 'it is a proof of the great mercy of the Saviour that He +sent you on earth in so fair a guise. For if you had not been so fair, +assuredly I had not noticed you. Then would my soul have gone +straightway to Hell.' + +And he called that the letter to Rome might be brought to him, and read +it over in the firelight. He set it in his belt alongside the other +paper, that next day when he came to London he might lay it in the hands +of Sir Thomas Carter, that should carry it to Rome. + +The Queen said: 'Praise God!' + +For though she was not set to believe that next day that letter would be +sent, or for many days more, yet it seemed to her that by little and +little she was winning him to her will. + + +II + +Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, had builded him a new tennis court in +where his stables had been before poverty had caused him to sell the +major part of his horseflesh. He called to him the Duke of Norfolk, who +was of the Papist cause, and Sir Henry Wriothesley who was always +betwixt and between, according as the cat jumped, to see this new +building of his that was made of a roofed-in quadrangle where the stable +doors were bricked up or barred to make the grille. + +But though Norfolk and Wriothesley came very early in the afternoon, +while it was yet light, to his house, they wasted most of the daylight +hours in talking of things indifferent before they went to their +inspection of this court. They stood talking in a long gallery beneath +very high windows, and there were several chaplains and young priests +and young gentlemen with them, and most of the talk was of a +bear-baiting that there should be in Smithfield come Saturday. Sir Henry +Wriothesley matched seven of his dogs against the seven best of the +Duke's, that they should the longer hold to the bear once they were on +him, and most of the young gentlemen wagered for Sir Henry's dogs that +he had bred from a mastiff out of Portugal. + +But when this talk had mostly died down, and when already twilight had +long fallen, the Bishop said-- + +'Come, let us visit this new tennis place of mine. I think I shall show +you somewhat that you have not before seen.' + +He bade, however, his gentlemen and priests to stay where they were, +for they had all many times seen the court or building. When he led the +way, prelatical and black, for the Duke and Wriothesley, into the lower +corridors of his house, the priests and young gentlemen bowed behind his +back, one at the other. + +In the courtyard there were four hounds of a heavy and stocky breed that +came bounding and baying all round them, so that it was only by +vigilance that Gardiner could save Wriothesley's shins, for he was a man +that all dogs and children hated. + +'Sirs,' the Bishop said, 'these dogs that ye see and hear will let no +man but me--not even my grooms or stablemen--pass this yard. I have bred +them to that so I may be secret when I will.' + +He set the key in the door that was in the bottom wall of the court. + +'There is no other door here save that which goes into the stable where +the grille is. There I have a door to enter and fetch out the balls that +pass there.' + +In the court itself it was absolute blackness. + +'I trow we may talk very well without lights,' he said. 'Come into this +far corner.' + +Yet, though there was no fear of being overheard, each of these three +stole almost on tiptoe and held his breath, and in the dark and shadowy +place they made a more dark and more shadowy patch with their heads all +close together. + +Suddenly it was as if the Bishop dropped the veil that covered his +passions. + +'I may well build tennis courts,' he said, and his voice had a ring of +wild and malignant passion. 'I may well build courts for tennis play. +Nothing else is left for me to do.' + +In the blackness no word came from his listeners. + +'You too may do the like,' the Bishop said. 'But I would you do it +quickly, for soon neither the one nor the other of you but will be +stripped so bare that you shall not have enough to buy balls with.' + +The Duke made an impatient sound like a drawing in of his breath, but +still he spoke no word. + +'I tell you, both of you,' the Bishop's voice came, 'that all of us have +been fooled. Who was it that helped to set on high this one that now +presses us down? I did! I!... + +'It was I that called the masque at my house where first the King did +see her. It was I that advised her how to bear herself. And what +gratitude has been shown me? I have been sent to sequester myself in my +see; I have been set to gnaw my fingers as they had been old bones +thrown to a dog. Truly, no juicy meats have been my share. Yet it was I +set this woman where she sits....' + +'I too have my griefs,' the Duke of Norfolk's voice came. + +'And I, God wot,' came Wriothesley's. + +'Why, you have been fooled,' Gardiner's voice; 'and well you know it. +For who was it that sent you both, one after the other, into France +thinking that you might make a match between the Lady Royal and the Duke +of Orleans?--Who but the Queen?--For well she knew that ye loved the +French and their King as they had been your brothers. And well we know +now that never in the mind of her, nor in that of the King whom she +bewitches and enslaves, was there any thought save that the Lady Royal +should be wedded to Spain. So ye are fooled.' + +He let his voice sink low; then he raised it again-- + +'Fooled! Fooled! Fooled! You two and I. For who of your friends the +French shall ever believe again word that you utter. And all your goods +and lands this Queen will have for the Church, so that she may have +utter power with a parcel of new shavelings, that will not withstand +her. So all the land will come in to her leash.... We are fooled and +ruined, ye and I alike.' + +'Well, we know this,' the Duke's voice said distastefully. 'You have no +need to rehearse griefs that too well we feel. There is no lord, either +of our part or of the other, that would not have her down.' + +'But what will ye do?' Gardiner said. + +'Nothing may we do!' the voice of Wriothesley with its dismal terror +came to their ears. 'The King is too firmly her Highness's man.' + +'Her "Highness,"' the Bishop mocked him with a bitter scorn. 'I believe +you would yet curry favour with this Queen of straw.' + +'It is a man's province to be favourable in the eyes of his Prince,' the +buried voice came again. 'If I could win her favour I would. But well ye +know there is no way.' + +'Ye ha' mingled too much with Lutheran swine,' the Bishop said. 'Now it +is too late for you.' + +'So it is,' Wriothesley said. 'I think you, Bishop, would have done it +too had you been able to make your account of it.' + +The Bishop snarled invisibly. + +But the voice of Norfolk came malignantly upon them. + +'This is all of a piece with your silly schemings. Did I come here to +hear ye wrangle? It is peril enow to come here. What will ye do?' + +'I will make a pact with him of the other side?' the Bishop said. + +'Misery!' the Duke said; 'did I come here to hear this madness? You and +Cranmer have sought each other's heads this ten years. Will you seek his +aid now? What may he do? He is as rotten a reed as thou or Wriothesley.' + +The Bishop cried suddenly with a loud voice-- + +'Ho, there! Come you out!' + +Norfolk set his hand to his sword and so did Wriothesley. It was in both +their minds, as it were one thought, that if this was a treason of the +Bishop's he should there die. + +From the blackness of the wall sides where the grille was there came the +sound of a terroring lock and a creaking door. + +'God!' Norfolk said; 'who is this?' + +There came the sound of breathing of one man who walked with noiseless +shoes. + +'Have you heard enow to make you believe that these lords' hearts are +true to the endeavour of casting the Queen down?' + +'I have heard enow,' a smooth voice said. 'I never thought it had been +otherwise.' + +'Who is this?' Wriothesley said. 'I will know who this is that has heard +us.' + +'You fool,' Gardiner said; 'this man is of the other side.' + +'They have come to you!' Norfolk said. + +'To whom else should we come,' the voice answered. + +A subtler silence of agitation and thought was between these two men. At +last Gardiner said-- + +'Tell these lords what you would have of us?' + +'We would have these promises,' the voice said; 'first, of you, my Lord +Duke, that if by our endeavours your brother's child be brought to a +trial for unchastity you will in no wise aid her at that trial with your +voice or your encouragement.' + +'A trial!' and 'Unchastity!' the Duke said. 'This is a winter madness. +Ye know that my niece--St Kevin curse her for it--is as chaste as the +snow.' + +'So was your other niece, Anne Boleyn, for all you knew, yet you dogged +her to death,' Gardiner said. 'Then you plotted with Papists; now it is +the turn of the Lutherans. It is all one, so we are rid of this pest.' + +'Well, I will promise it,' the Duke said. 'Ye knew I would. It was not +worth while to ask me.' + +'Secondly,' the voice said, 'of you, my Lord Duke, we would have this +service: that you should swear your niece is a much older woman than she +looks. Say, for instance, that she was in truth not the eleventh but the +second child of your brother Edmund. Say that, out of vanity, to make +herself seem more forward with the learned tongues when she was a child, +she would call herself her younger sister that died in childbed.' + +'But wherefore?' the Duke said. + +'Why,' Gardiner answered, 'this is a very subtle scheme of this +gentleman's devising. He will prove against her certain lewdnesses when +she was a child in your mother's house. If then she was a child of ten +or so, knowing not evil from good, this might not undo her. But if you +can make her seem then eighteen or twenty it will be enough to hang +her.' + +Norfolk reflected. + +'Well, I will say I heard that of her age,' he said; 'but ye had best +get nurses and women to swear to these things.' + +'We have them now,' the voice said. 'And it will suffice if your Grace +will say that you heard these things of old of your brother. For your +Grace will judge this woman.' + +'Very willingly I will,' Norfolk said; 'for if I do not soon, she will +utterly undo both me and all my friends.' + +He reflected again. + +'Those things will I do and more yet, if you will.' + +'Why, that will suffice,' the voice said. It took a new tone in the +darkness. + +'Now for you, Sir Henry Wriothesley,' it said. 'These simple things you +shall promise. Firstly, since you have the ear of the Mayor of London +you shall advise him in no way to hinder certain meetings of Lutherans +that I shall tell you of later. And, though it is your province so to +do, you shall in no wise hinder a certain master printer from printing +what broadsides and libels he will against the Queen. For it is +essential, if this project is to grow and flourish, that it shall be +spread abroad that the Queen did bewitch the King to her will on that +night at Pontefract that you remember, when she had her cousin in her +bedroom. So broadsides shall be made alleging that by sorcery she +induced the King to countenance his own shame. And we have witnesses to +swear that it was by appointment, not by chance, that she met with +Culpepper upon the moorside. But all that we will have of you is that +you will promise these two things--that the Lutherans may hold certain +meetings and the broadsides be printed.' + +'Those I will promise,' came in Wriothesley's buried voice. + +'Then I will no more of you,' the other's words came. They heard his +hands feeling along the wall till he came to the door by which he had +entered. The Bishop followed him, to let him out by a little door he had +had opened for that one night, into the street. + +When he came back to the other two and unfolded to them what was the +scheme of the Archbishop's man, they agreed that it was a very good +plan. Then they fell to considering whether it should not serve their +turn to betray this plan at once to the Queen. But they agreed that, if +they preserved the Queen, they would be utterly ruined, as they were +like to be now, whereas, if it succeeded, they would be much the better +off. And, even if it failed, they lost nothing, for it would not readily +be believed that they had aided Lutherans, and there were no letters or +writings. + +So they agreed to abide honourably by their promises--and very certain +they were that if clamour enough could be raised against the Queen, the +King would be bound into putting her away, though it were against his +will. + + +III + +In the Master Printer Badge's house--and he was the uncle of Margot and +of the young Poins--there was a great and solemn dissertation towards. +For word had been brought that certain strangers come on an embassy from +the Duke of Cleves were minded to hear how the citizens of London--or at +any rate those of them that held German doctrines--bore themselves +towards Schmalkaldnerism and the doctrines of Luther. + +It was understood that these strangers were of very high degree--of a +degree so high that they might scarce be spoken to by the meaner sort. +And for many days messengers had been going between the house of the +Archbishop at Lambeth and that of the Master Printer, to school him how +this meeting must be conducted. + +His old father was by that time dead--having died shortly after his +granddaughter Margot had been put away from the Queen's Court--so that +the house-place was clear. And of all the old furnishings none remained. +There were presses all round the wall, and lockers for men to sit upon. +The table had been cleared away into the printer's chapel; a lectern +stood a-midmost of the room, and before the hearth-place, in the very +ingle, there was set the great chair in which aforetimes the old man had +sat so long. + +Early that evening, though already it was dusk, the body of citizens +were assembled. Most of them had haggard faces, for the times were evil +for men of their persuasion, and nearly all of them were draped in black +after the German fashion among Lutherans of that day. They ranged +themselves on the lockers along the wall, and with set faces, in a +funereal row, they awaited the coming of this great stranger. There were +no Germans amongst them, for so, it was given out, he would have +it--either because he would not be known by name or for some other +reason. + +The Master Printer, in the pride of his craft, wore his apron. He stood +in the centre of the room facing the hearth-place; his huge arms were +bare--for bare-armed he always worked--his black beard was knotted into +little curls, his face was so broad that you hardly remarked that his +nose was hooked like an owl's beak. And about the man there was an air +of sombreness and mystery. He had certain papers on his lectern, and +several sheets of the great Bible that he was then printing by the +Archbishop's license and command. They sang all together and with loud +voices the canticle called 'A Refuge fast is God the Lord.' + +Then, with huge gestures of his hands, he uttered the words-- + +'This is the very word of God,' and began to read from the pages of his +Bible. He read first the story of David and Saul, his great voice +trembling with ecstasy. + +'This David is our King,' he said. 'This Saul that he slew is the Beast +of Rome. The Solomon that cometh after shall be the gracious princeling +that ye wot of, for already he is wise beyond his years and beyond most +grown men.' + +The citizens around the walls cried 'Amen.' And because the strangers +tarried to come, he called to his journeymen that stood in the inner +doorway to bring him the sheets of the Bible whereon he had printed the +story of Ehud and Eglon. + +'This king that ye shall hear of as being slain,' he cried out, 'is that +foul bird the Kaiser Carl, that harries the faithful in Almain. This +good man that shall slay him is some German lord. Who he shall be we +know not yet; maybe it shall be this very stranger that to-night shall +sit to hear us.' + +His brethren muttered a low, deep, and uniform prayer that soon, soon +the Lord should send them this boon. + +But he had not got beyond the eleventh verse of this history before +there came from without a sound of trumpets, and through the windows the +light of torches and the scarlet of the guard that, it was said, the +King had sent to do honour to this stranger. + +'Come in, be ye who ye may!' the printer cried to the knockers at his +door. + +There entered the hugest masked man that they ever had seen. All in +black he was, and horrifying and portentous he strode in. His sleeves +and shoulders were ballooned after the German fashion, his sword clanked +on the tiles. He was a vision of black, for his mask that appeared as +big as another man's garment covered all his face, though they could see +he had a grey beard when sitting down. He gazed at the fire askance. + +He said--his voice was heavy and husky-- + +'_Gruesset Gott_,' and those of the citizens that had painfully attained +to so much of that tongue answered him with-- + +'_Lobet den Herr im Himmels Reich!_' + +He had with him one older man that wore a half-mask, and was trembling +and clean-shaven, and one younger, that was English, to act as +interpreter when it was needed. He was clean-shaven, too, and in the +English habit he appeared thin and tenuous. They said he was a gentleman +of the Archbishop's, and that his name was Lascelles. + +He opened the meeting with saying that these great strangers were come +from beyond the seas, and would hear answers to certain questions. He +took a paper from his pouch and said that, in order that he might stick +to the points that these strangers would know of, he had written down +those questions on that paper. + +'How say ye, masters?' he finished. 'Will ye give answers to these +questions truly, and of your knowledge?' + +'Aye will we,' the printer said, 'for to that end we are gathered here. +Is it not so, my masters?' + +And the assembly answered-- + +'Aye, so it is.' + +Lascelles read from his paper: + +'How is it with this realm of England?' + +The printer glanced at the paper that was upon his lectern. He made +answer-- + +'Well! But not over well!' + +And at these words Lascelles feigned surprise, lifting his well-shapen +and white hand in the air. + +'How is this that ye say?' he uttered. 'Are ye all of this tale?' + +A deep 'Aye!' came from all these chests. There was one old man that +could never keep still. He had huge limbs, a great ruffled poll of +grizzling hair, and his legs that were in jerkins of red leather kicked +continuously in little convulsions. He peered every minute at some new +thing, very closely, holding first his tablets so near that he could see +only with one eye, then the whistle that hung round his neck, then a +little piece of paper that he took from his poke. He cried out in a deep +voice--'Aye! aye! Not over well. Witchcraft and foul weather and rocks, +my mates and masters all!' so that he appeared to be a seaman--and +indeed he traded to the port of Antwerp, in the Low Countries, where he +had learned of some of the Faith. + +'Why,' Lascelles said, 'be ye not contented with our goodly King?' + +'Never was a better since Solomon ruled in Jewry,' the shipman cried +out. + +'Is it, then, the Lords of the King's Council that ye are discontented +with?' + +'Nay, they are goodly men, for they are of the King's choosing,' one +answered--a little man with a black pill-hat. + +'Why, speak through your leader,' the stranger said heavily from the +hearth-place. 'Here is too much skimble-skamble.' The old man beside him +leaned over his chair-back and whispered in his ear. But the stranger +shook his head heavily. He sat and gazed at the brands. His great hands +were upon his knees, pressed down, but now and again they moved as if he +were in some agony. + +'It is well that ye do as the Lord commandeth,' Lascelles said; 'for in +Almain, whence he cometh, there is wont to be a great order and +observance.' He held his paper up again to the light. 'Master Printer, +answer now to this question: Find ye aught amiss with the judges and +justices of this realm?' + +'Nay; they do judge indifferent well betwixt cause and cause,' the +printer answered from his paper. + +'Or with the serjeants, the apparitors, the collectors of taxes, or the +Parliament men?' + +'These, too, perform indifferent well their appointed tasks,' the +printer said gloomily. + +'Or is it with the Church of this realm that ye find fault?' + +'Body of God!' the stranger said heavily. + +'Nay!' the printer answered, 'for the supreme head of that Church is the +King, a man learned before all others in the law of God; such a King as +speaketh as though he were that mouthpiece of the Most High that the +Antichrist at Rome claimeth to be.' + +'Is it, then, with the worshipful the little Prince of Wales that ye are +discontented?' Lascelles read, and the printer answered that there was +not such another Prince of his years for promise and for performance, +too, in all Christendom. + +The stranger said from the hearth-place-- + +'Well! we are commended,' and his voice was bitter and ironical. + +'How is it, then,' Lascelles read on, 'that ye say all is not over well +in the land?' + +The printer's gloomy and black features glared with a sudden rage. + +'How should all be well with a land,' he cried, 'where in high places +reigns harlotry?' He raised his clenched fist on high and glared round +upon his audience. 'Corruption that reacheth round and about and down +till it hath found a seedbed even in this poor house of my father's? Or +if it is well with this land now, how shall it continue well when +witchcraft rules near the King himself, and the Devil of Rome hath there +his emissaries.' + +A chitter of sound came from his audience, so that it appeared that they +were all of a strain. They moved in their seats; the shipman cried out-- + +'Ay! witchcraft! witchcraft!' + +The huge bulk of the stranger, black and like a bull's, half rose from +its chair. + +'Body of God!' he cried out. 'This I will not bear.' + +Again the older man leaned solicitously above him and whispered, +pleading with his hands, and Lascelles said hastily-- + +'Speak of your own knowledge. How should you know of what passes in high +places?' + +'Why!' the printer cried out, 'is it not the common report? Do not all +men know it? Do not the butchers sing of it in the shambles, and the +bot-flies buzz of it one to the other? I tell you it is spread from here +into Almain, where the very horse-sellers are a-buzz with it.' + +In his chair the stranger cried out-- + +'Ah! ah!' as if he were in great pain. He struggled with his feet and +then sat still. + +'I have heard witnesses that will testify to these things,' the printer +said. 'I will bring them here into this room before ye.' He turned upon +the stranger. 'Master,' he said, 'if ye know not of this, you are the +only man in England that is ignorant!' + +The stranger said with a bitter despair-- + +'Well, I am come to hear what ye do say!' + +So he heard tales from all the sewers of London, and it was plain to him +that all the commonalty cried shame upon their King. He screamed and +twisted there in his chair at the last, and when he was come out into +the darkness he fell upon his companion, and beat him so that he +screamed out. + +He might have died--for, though the King's guard with their torches and +halberds were within a bowshot of them, they stirred no limb. And it was +a party of fellows bat-fowling along the hedges of that field that came +through the dark, attracted by the glare of the torches, the blaze of +the scarlet clothes, and the outcry. + +And when they came, asking why that great man belaboured this thin and +fragile one, black shadows both against the light, the big man answered, +howling-- + +'This man hath made me bounden to slay my wife.' + +They said that that was a thing some of them would have been glad of. + +But the great figure cast itself on the ground at the foot of a tree +that stretched up like nerves and tentacles into the black sky. He tore +the wet earth with his fingers, and the men stood round him till the +Duke of Norfolk, coming with his sword drawn, hunted them afar off, and +they fell again to beating the hedges to drive small birds into their +nets. + +For, they said, these were evidently of the quality whose griefs were +none of theirs. + + +IV + +The Queen was walking in the long gallery of Hampton Court. The +afternoon was still new, but rain was falling very fast, so that through +the windows all trees were blurred with mist, and all alleys ran with +water, and it was very grey in the gallery. The Lady Mary was with her, +and sat in a window-seat reading in a book. The Queen, as she walked, +was netting a silken purse of a purple colour; her gown was very richly +embroidered of gold thread worked into black velvet, and the heavy day +pressed heavily on her senses, so that she sought that silence more +willingly. For three days she had had no news of her lord, but that +morning he was come back to Hampton, though she had not yet seen him, +for it was ever his custom to put off all work of the day before he came +to the Queen. Thus, if she were sad, she was tranquil; and, considering +only that her work of bringing him to God must begin again that night, +she let her thoughts rest upon the netting of her purse. The King, she +had heard, was with his council. Her uncle was come to Court, and +Gardiner of Winchester, and Cranmer of Canterbury, along with Sir A. +Wriothesley, and many other lords, so that she augured it would be a +very full council, and that night there would be a great banquet if she +was not mistaken. + +She remembered that it was now many months since she had been shown for +Queen from that very gallery in the window that opened upon the +Cardinal's garden. The King had led her by the hand. There had been a +great crying out of many people of the lower sort that crowded the +terrace before the garden. Now the rain fell, and all was desolation. A +yeoman in brown fustian ran bending his head before the tempestuous +rain. A rook, blown impotently backwards, essayed slowly to cross +towards the western trees. Her eyes followed him until a great gust blew +him in a wider curve, backwards and up, and when again he steadied +himself he was no more than a blot on the wet greyness of the heavens. + +There was an outcry at the door, and a woman ran in. She was crying out +still: she was all in grey, with the white coif of the Queen's service. +She fell down upon her knees, her hands held out. + +'Pardon!' she cried. 'Pardon! Let not my brother come in. He prowls at +the door.' + +It was Mary Hall, she that had been Mary Lascelles. The Queen came over +to raise her up, and to ask what it was she sought. But the woman wept +so loud, and so continually cried out that her brother was the fiend +incarnate, that the Queen could ask no questions. The Lady Mary looked +up over her book without stirring her body. Her eyes were awakened and +sardonic. + +The waiting-maid looked affrightedly over her shoulders at the door. + +'Well, your brother shall not come in here,' the Queen said. 'What would +he have done to you?' + +'Pardon!' the woman cried out. 'Pardon!' + +'Why, tell me of your fault,' the Queen said. + +'I have given false witness!' Mary Hall blubbered out. 'I would not do +it. But you do not know how they confuse a body. And they threaten with +cords and thumbscrews.' She shuddered with her whole body. 'Pardon!' she +cried out. 'Pardon!' + +And then suddenly she poured forth a babble of lamentations, wringing +her hands, and rubbing her lips together. She was a woman passed of +thirty, but thin still and fair like her brother in the face, for she +was his twin. + +'Ah,' she cried, 'he threated that if I would not give evidence I must +go back to Lincolnshire. You do not know what it is to go back to +Lincolnshire. Ah, God! the old father, the old house, the wet. My +clothes were all mouldered. I was willing to give true evidence to save +myself, but they twisted it to false. It was the Duke of Norfolk ...' + +The Lady Mary came slowly over the floor. + +'Against whom did you give your evidence?' she said, and her voice was +cold, hard, and commanding. + +Mary Hall covered her face with her hands, and wailed desolately in a +high note, like a wolf's howl, that reverberated in that dim gallery. + +The Lady Mary struck her a hard blow with the cover of her book upon the +hands and the side of her head. + +'Against whom did you give your evidence?' she said again. + +The woman fell over upon one hand, the other she raised to shield +herself. Her eyes were flooded with great teardrops; her mouth was open +in an agony. The Lady Mary raised her book to strike again: its covers +were of wood, and its angles bound with silver work. The woman screamed +out, and then uttered-- + +'Against Dearham and one Mopock first. And then against Sir T. +Culpepper.' + +The Queen stood up to her height; her hand went over her heart; the +netted purse dropped to the floor soundlessly. + +'God help me!' Mary Hall cried out. 'Dearham and Culpepper are both +dead!' + +The Queen sprang back three paces. + +'How dead!' she cried. 'They were not even ill.' + +'Upon the block,' the maid said. 'Last night, in the dark, in their +gaols.' + +The Queen let her hands fall slowly to her sides. + +'Who did this?' she said, and Mary Hall answered-- + +'It was the King!' + +The Lady Mary set her book under her arm. + +'Ye might have known it was the King,' she said harshly. The Queen was +as still as a pillar of ebony and ivory, so black her dress was, and so +white her face and pendant hands. + +'I repent me! I repent me!' the maid cried out. 'When I heard that they +were dead I repented me and came here. The old Duchess of Norfolk is in +gaol: she burned the letters of Dearham! The Lady Rochford is in gaol, +and old Sir Nicholas, and the Lady Cicely that was ever with the Queen; +the Lord Edmund Howard shall to gaol and his lady.' + +'Why,' the Lady Mary said to the Queen, 'if you had not had such a fear +of nepotism, your father and mother and grandmother and cousin had been +here about you, and not so easily taken.' + +The Queen stood still whilst all her hopes fell down. + +'They have taken Lady Cicely that was ever with me,' she said. + +'It was the Duke of Norfolk that pressed me most,' Mary Lascelles cried +out. + +'Aye, he would,' the Lady Mary answered. + +The Queen tottered upon her feet. + +'Ask her more,' she said. 'I will not speak with her.' + +'The King in his council ...' the girl began. + +'Is the King in his council upon these matters?' the Lady Mary asked. + +'Aye, he sitteth there,' Mary Hall said. 'And he hath heard evidence of +Mary Trelyon the Queen's maid, how that the Queen's Highness did bid her +begone on the night that Sir T. Culpepper came to her room, before he +came. And how that the Queen was very insistent that she should go, upon +the score of fatigue and the lateness of the hour. And she hath deponed +that on other nights, too, this has happened, that the Queen's Highness, +when she hath come late to bed, hath equally done the same thing. And +other her maids have deponed how the Queen hath sent them from her +presence and relieved them of tasks----' + +'Well, well,' the Lady Mary said, 'often I have urged the Queen that she +should be less gracious. Better it had been if she had beat ye all as I +have done; then had ye feared to betray her.' + +'Aye,' Mary Hall said, 'it is a true thing that your Grace saith there.' + +'Call me not your Grace,' the Lady Mary said. 'I will be no Grace in +this court of wolves and hogs.' + +That was the sole thing that she said to show she was of the Queen's +party. But ever she questioned the kneeling woman to know what evidence +had been given, and of the attitude of the lords. + +The young Poins had sworn roundly that the Queen had bidden him to +summon no guards when her cousin had broken in upon her. Only Udal had +said that he knew nothing of how Katharine had agreed with her cousin +whilst they were in Lincolnshire. It had been after his time there that +Culpepper came. It had been after his time, too, and whilst he lay in +chains at Pontefract that Culpepper had come to her door. He stuck to +that tale, though the Duke of Norfolk had beat and threatened him never +so. + +'Why, what wolves Howards be,' the Lady Mary said, 'for it is only +wolves, of all beasts, that will prey upon the sick of their kind.' + +The Queen stood there, swaying back as if she were very sick, her eyes +fast closed, and the lids over them very blue. + +It was only when the Lady Mary drew from the woman an account of the +King's demeanour that she showed a sign of hearing. + +'His Highness,' the woman said, 'sate always mute.' + +'His Highness would,' the Lady Mary said. 'He is in that at least +royal--that he letteth jackals do his hunting.' + +It was only when the Archbishop of Canterbury, reading from the +indictment of Culpepper, had uttered the words: 'did by the obtaining of +the Lady Rochford meet with the Queen's Highness by night in a secret +and vile place,' that the King had called out-- + +'Body of God! mine own bedchamber!' as if he were hatefully mocking the +Archbishop. + +The Queen leant suddenly forward-- + +'Said he no more than that?' she cried eagerly. + +'No more, oh your dear Grace,' the maid said. And the Queen shuddered +and whispered-- + +'No more!--And I have spoken to this woman to obtain no more than "no +more."' + +Again she closed her eyes, and she did not again speak, but hung her +head forward as if she were thinking. + +'Heaven help me!' the maid said. + +'Why, think no more of Heaven,' the Lady Mary said, 'there is but the +fire of hell for such beasts as you.' + +'Had you such a brother as mine----' Mary Hall began. But the Lady Mary +cried out-- + +'Cease, dog! I have a worse father, but you have not found him force me +to work vileness.' + +'All the other Papists have done worse than I,' Mary Hall said, 'for +they it was that forced us by threats to speak.' + +'Not one was of the Queen's side?' the Lady Mary said. + +'Not one,' Mary Hall answered. 'Gardiner was more fierce against her +than he of Canterbury, the Duke of Norfolk than either.' + +The Lady Mary said-- + +'Well! well!' + +'Myself I did hear the Duke of Norfolk say, when I was drawn to give +evidence, that he begged the King to let him tear my secrets from my +heart. For so did he abhor the abominable deeds done by his two nieces, +Anne Boleyn and Katharine Howard, that he could no longer desire to +live. And he said neither could he live longer without some comfortable +assurance of His Highness's royal favour. And so he fell upon me----' + +The woman fell to silence. Without, the rain had ceased, and, like heavy +curtains trailing near the ground, the clouds began to part and sweep +away. A horn sounded, and there went a party of men with pikes across +the terrace. + +'Well, and what said you?' the Lady Mary said. + +'Ask me not,' Mary Lascelles said woefully. She averted her eyes to the +floor at her side. + +'By God, but I will know,' the Lady Mary snarled. 'You shall tell me.' +She had that of royal bearing from her sire that the woman was amazed at +her words, and, awakening like one in a dream, she rehearsed the +evidence that had been threated from her. + +She had told of the lascivious revels and partings, in the maid's garret +at the old Duchess's, when Katharine had been a child there. She had +told how Marnock the musicker had called her his mistress, and how +Dearham, Katharine's cousin, had beaten him. And how Dearham had given +Katharine a half of a silver coin. + +'Well, that is all true,' the Lady Mary said. 'How did you perjure +yourself?' + +'In the matter of the Queen's age,' the woman faltered. + +'How that?' the Lady Mary asked. + +'The Duke would have me say that she was more than a young child.' + +The Lady Mary said, 'Ah! ah! there is the yellow dog!' She thought for a +moment. + +'And you said?' she asked at last. + +'The Duke threated me and threated me. And say I, "Your Grace must know +how young she was." And says he, "I would swear that at that date she +was no child, but that I do not know how many of these nauseous Howard +brats there be. Nor yet the order in which they came. But this I will +swear that I think there has been some change of the Queen with a whelp +that died in the litter, that she might seem more young. And of a surety +she was always learned beyond her assumed years, so that it was not to +be believed."' + +Mary Lascelles closed her eyes and appeared about to faint. + +'Speak on, dog,' Mary said. + +The woman roused herself to say with a solemn piteousness-- + +'This I swear that before this trial, when my brother pressed me and +threated me thus to perjure myself, I abhorred it and spat in his face. +There was none more firm--nor one half so firm as I--against him. But +oh, the Duke and the terror--and to be in a ring of so many villainous +men....' + +'So that you swore that the Queen's Highness, to your knowledge, was +older than a child,' the Lady Mary pressed her. + +'Ay; they would have me say that it was she that commanded to have these +revels....' + +She leaned forward with both her hands on the floor, in the attitude of +a beast that goes four-footed. She cried out-- + +'Ask me no more! ask me no more!' + +'Tell! tell! Beast!' the Lady Mary said. + +'They threated me with torture,' the woman panted. 'I could do no less. +I heard Margot Poins scream.' + +'They have tortured her?' the Lady Mary said. + +'Ay, and she was in her pains elsewise,' the woman said. + +'Did she say aught?' the Lady Mary said. + +'No! no!' the woman panted. Her hair had fallen loose in her coif, it +depended on to her shoulder. + +'Tell on! tell on!' the Lady Mary said. + +'They tortured her, and she did not say one word more, but ever in her +agony cried out, "Virtuous! virtuous!" till her senses went.' + +Mary Hall again raised herself to her knees. + +'Let me go, let me go,' she moaned. 'I will not speak before the Queen. +I had been as loyal as Margot Poins.... But I will not speak before the +Queen. I love her as well as Margot Poins. But ... I will not----' + +She cried out as the Lady Mary struck her, and her face was lamentable +with its opened mouth. She scrambled to one knee; she got on both, and +ran to the door. But there she cried out-- + +'My brother!' and fell against the wall. Her eyes were fixed upon the +Lady Mary with a baleful despair, she gasped and panted for breath. + +'It is upon you if I speak,' she said. 'Merciful God, do not bid me +speak before the Queen!' + +She held out her hands as if she had been praying. + +'Have I not proved that I loved this Queen?' she said. 'Have I not fled +here to warn her? Is it not my life that I risk? Merciful God! Merciful +God! Bid me not to speak.' + +'Speak!' the Lady Mary said. + +The woman appealed to the Queen with her eyes streaming, but Katharine +stood silent and like a statue with sightless eyes. Her lips smiled, for +she thought of her Redeemer; for this woman she had neither ears nor +eyes. + +'Speak!' the Lady Mary said. + +'God help you, be it on your head,' the woman cried out, 'that I speak +before the Queen. It was the King that bade me say she was so old. I +would not say it before the Queen, but you have made me!' + +The Lady Mary's hands fell powerless to her sides, the book from her +opened fingers jarred on the hard floor. + +'Merciful God!' she said. 'Have I such a father?' + +'It was the King!' the woman said. 'His Highness came to life when he +heard these words of the Duke's, that the Queen was older than she +reported. He would have me say that the Queen's Highness was of a +marriageable age and contracted to her cousin Dearham.' + +'Merciful God!' the Lady Mary said again. 'Dear God, show me some way to +tear from myself the sin of my begetting. I had rather my mother's +confessor had been my father than the King! Merciful God!' + +'Never was woman pressed as I was to say this thing. And well ye +wot--better than I did before--what this King is. I tell you--and I +swear it----' + +She stopped and trembled, her eyes, from which the colour had gone, wide +open and lustreless, her face pallid and ashen, her mouth hanging open. +The Queen was moving towards her. + +She came very slowly, her hands waving as if she sought support from the +air, but her head was erect. + +'What will you do?' the Lady Mary said. 'Let us take counsel!' + +Katharine Howard said no word. It was as if she walked in her sleep. + + +V + +The King sat on the raised throne of his council chamber. All the Lords +of his Council were there and all in black. There was Norfolk with his +yellow face who feigned to laugh and scoff, now that he had proved +himself no lover of the Queen's. There was Gardiner of Winchester, +sitting forward with his cruel and eager eyes upon the table. Next him +was the Lord Mayor, Michael Dormer, and the Lord Chancellor. And so +round the horse-shoe table against the wall sat all the other lords and +commissioners that had been appointed to make inquiry. Sir Anthony +Browne was there, and Wriothesley with his great beard, and the Duke of +Suffolk with his hanging jaw. A silence had fallen upon them all, and +the witnesses were all done with. + +On high on his throne the King sat, monstrous and leaning over to one +side, his face dabbled with tears. He gazed upon Cranmer who stood on +high beside him, the King gazing upwards into his face as if for comfort +and counsel. + +'Why, you shall save her for me?' he said. + +Cranmer's face was haggard, and upon it too there were tears. + +'It were the gladdest thing that ever I did,' he said, 'for I do believe +this Queen is not so guilty.' + +'God of His mercy bless thee, Cranmer,' he said, and wearily he touched +his black bonnet at the sacred name. 'I have done all that I might when +I spoke with Mary Hall. It shall save me her life.' + +Cranmer looked round upon the lords below them; they were all silent but +only the Duke of Norfolk who laughed to the Lord Mayor. The Lord Mayor, +a burly man, was more pallid and haggard than any. All the others had +fear for themselves written upon their faces. But the citizen was not +used to these trials, of which the others had seen so many. + +The Archbishop fell on his knees on the step before the King's throne. + +'Gracious and dread Lord,' he said, and his low voice trembled like that +of a schoolboy, 'Saviour, Lord, and Fount of Justice of this realm! +Hitherto these trials have been of traitor-felons and villains outside +the circle of your house. Now that they be judged and dead, we, your +lords, pray you that you put off from you this most heavy task of judge. +For inasmuch as we live by your life and have health by your health, in +this realm afflicted with many sores that you alone can heal and dangers +that you alone can ward off, so we have it assured and certain that many +too great labours and matters laid upon you imperil us all. In that, as +well for our selfish fears as for the great love, self-forgetting, that +we have of your person, we pray you that--coming now to the trial of +this your wife--you do rest, though well assured we are that greatly and +courageously you would adventure it, upon the love of us your lords. +Appoint, therefore, such a Commission as you shall well approve to make +this most heavy essay and trial.' + +So low was his voice that, to hear him, many lords rose from their seats +and came over against the throne. Thus all that company were in the +upper part of the hall, and through the great window at the further end +the sun shone down upon them, having parted the watery clouds. To their +mass of black it gave blots and gouts of purple and blue and scarlet, +coming through the dight panes. + +'Lay off this burden of trial and examination upon us that so willingly, +though with sighs and groans, would bear it.' + +Suddenly the King stood up and pointed, his jaw fallen open. Katharine +Howard was coming up the floor of the hall. Her hands were folded before +her; her face was rigid and calm; she looked neither to right nor to +left, but only upon the King's face. At the edge of the sunlight she +halted, so that she stood, a black figure in the bluish and stony gloom +of the hall with the high roof a great way above her head. All the lords +began to pull off their bonnets, only Norfolk said that he would not +uncover before a harlot. + +The Queen, looking upon Henry's face, said with icy and cold tones-- + +'I would have you to cease this torturing of witnesses. I will make +confession.' + +No man then had a word to say. Norfolk had no word either. + +'If you will have me confess to heresy, I will confess to heresy; if to +treason, to treason. If you will have me confess to adultery, God help +me and all of you, I will confess to adultery and all such sins.' + +The King cried out-- + +'No! no!' like a beast that is stabbed to the heart; but with cold eyes +the Queen looked back at him. + +'If you will have it adultery before marriage, it shall be so. If it be +to be falseness to my Lord's bed, it shall be so; if it be both, in the +name of God, be it both, and where you will and how. If you will have +it spoken, here I speak it. If you will have it written, I will write +out such words as you shall bid me write. I pray you leave my poor women +be, especially them that be sick, for there are none that do not love +me, and I do think that my death is all that you need.' + +She paused; there was no sound in the hall but the strenuous panting of +the King. + +'But whether,' she said, 'you shall believe this confession of mine, I +leave to you that very well do know my conversation and my manner of +life.' + +Again she paused and said-- + +'I have spoken. To it I will add that heartily I do thank my sovereign +lord that raised me up. And, in public, I do say it, that he hath dealt +justly by me. I pray you pardon me for having delayed thus long your +labours. I will get me gone.' + +Then she dropped her eyes to the ground. + +Again the King cried out-- + +'No! no!' and, stumbling to his feet he rushed down upon his courtiers +and round the table. He came upon her before she was at the distant +door. + +'You shall not go!' he said. 'Unsay! unsay!' + +She said, 'Ah!' and recoiled before him with an obdurate and calm +repulsion. + +'Get ye gone, all you minions and hounds,' he cried. And running in upon +them he assailed them with huge blows and curses, sobbing lamentably, so +that they fled up the steps and out on to the rooms behind the throne. +He came sobbing, swift and maddened, panting and crying out, back to +where she awaited him. + +'Unsay! unsay!' he cried out. + +She stood calmly. + +'Never will I unsay,' she said. 'For it is right that such a King as +thou should be punished, and I do believe this: that there can no agony +come upon you such as shall come if you do believe me false to you.' + +The coloured sunlight fell upon his face just down to the chin; his +eyes glared horribly. She confronted him, being in the shadow. High up +above them, painted and moulded angels soared on the roof with golden +wings. He clutched at his throat. + +'I do not believe it,' he cried out. + +'Then,' she said, 'I believe that it shall be only a second greater +agony to you: for you shall have done me to death believing me +guiltless.' + +A great motion of despair went over his whole body. + +'Kat!' he said; 'Body of God, Kat! I would not have you done to death. I +have saved your life from your enemies.' + +She made him no answer, and he protested desperately-- + +'All this afternoon I have wrestled with a woman to make her say that +you are older than your age, and precontracted to a cousin of yours. I +have made her say it at last, so your life is saved.' + +She turned half to go from him, but he ran round in front of her. + +'Your life is saved!' he said desperately, 'for if you were +precontracted to Dearham your marriage with me is void. And if your +marriage with me is void, though it be proved against you that you were +false to me, yet it is not treason, for you are not my wife.' + +Again she moved to circumvent him, and again he came before her. + +'Speak!' he said, 'speak!' But she folded her lips close. He cast his +arms abroad in a passion of despair. 'You shall be put away into a +castle where you shall have such state as never empress had yet. All +your will I will do. Always I will live near you in secret fashion.' + +'I will not be your leman,' she said. + +'But once you offered it!' he answered. + +'Then you appeared in the guise of a king!' she said. + +He withered beneath her tone. + +'All you would have you shall have,' he said. 'I will call in a +messenger and here and now send the letter that you wot of to Rome.' + +'Your Highness,' she said, 'I would not have the Church brought back to +this land by one deemed an adult'ress. Assuredly, it should not +prosper.' + +Again he sought to stay her going, holding out his arms to enfold her. +She stepped back. + +'Your Highness,' she said, 'I will speak some last words. And, as you +know me well, you know that these irrevocably shall be my last to you!' + +He cried--'Delay till you hear----' + +'There shall be no delay,' she said; 'I will not hear.' She smoothed a +strand of hair that had fallen over her forehead in a gesture that she +always had when she was deep in thoughts. + +'This is what I would say,' she uttered. And she began to speak +levelly-- + +'Very truly you say when you say that once I made offer to be your +leman. But it was when I was a young girl, mazed with reading of books +in the learned tongue, and seeing all men as if they were men of those +days. So you appeared to me such a man as was Pompey the Great, or as +was Marius, or as was Sylla. For each of these great men erred; yet they +erred greatly as rulers that would rule. Or rather I did see you such a +one as was Caesar Julius, who, as you well wot, crossed a Rubicon and set +out upon a high endeavour. But you--never will you cross any Rubicon; +always you blow hot in the evening and cold at dawn. Neither do you, as +I had dreamed you did, rule in this your realm. For, even as a crow that +just now I watched, you are blown hither and thither by every gust that +blows. Now the wind of gossips blows so that you must have my life. And, +before God, I am glad of it.' + +'Before God!' he cried out, 'I would save you!' + +'Aye,' she answered sadly, 'to-day you would save me; to-morrow a foul +speech of one mine enemy shall gird you again to slay me. On the morrow +you will repent, and on the morrow of that again you will repent of +that. So you will balance and trim. If to-day you send a messenger to +Rome, to-morrow you will send another, hastening by a shorter route, to +stay him. And this I tell you, that I am not one to let my name be +bandied for many days in the mouths of men. I had rather be called a +sinner, adjudged and dead and forgotten. So I am glad that I am cast to +die.' + +'You shall not die!' the King cried. 'Body of God, you shall not die! I +cannot live lacking thee. Kat---- Kat----' + +'Aye,' she said, 'I must die, for you are not such a one as can stay in +the wind. Thus I tell you it will fall about that for many days you will +waver, but one day you will cry out--Let her die this day! On the morrow +of that day you will repent you, but, being dead, I shall be no more to +be recalled to life. Why, man, with this confession of mine, heard by +grooms and mayors of cities and the like, how shall you dare to save me? +You know you shall not. + +'And so, now I am cast for death, and I am very glad of it. For, if I +had not so ensured and made it fated, I might later have wavered. For I +am a weak woman, and strong men have taken dishonourable means to escape +death when it came near. Now I am assured of death, and know that no +means of yours can save me, nor no prayers nor yielding of mine. I came +to you for that you might give this realm again to God. Now I see you +will not--for not ever will you do it if it must abate you a jot of your +sovereignty, and you never will do it without that abatement. So it is +in vain that I have sinned. + +'For I trow that I sinned in taking the crown from the woman that was +late your wife. I would not have it, but you would, and I yielded. Yet +it was a sin. Then I did a sin that good might ensue, and again I do it, +and I hope that this sin that brings me down shall counterbalance that +other that set me up. For well I know that to make this confession is a +sin; but whether the one shall balance the other only the angels that +are at the gates of Paradise shall assure me. + +'In some sort I have done it for your Highness' sake--or, at least, that +your Highness may profit in your fame thereby. For, though all that do +know me will scarcely believe in it, the most part of men shall needs +judge me by the reports that are set about. In the commonalty, and the +princes of foreign courts, one may believe you justified of my blood, +and, for this event, even to posterity your name shall be spared. I +shall become such a little dust as will not fill a cup. Yet, at least, I +shall not sully, in the eyes of men to come, your record. + +'And that I am glad of; for this world is no place for me who am mazed +by too much reading in old books. At first I would not believe it, +though many have told me it was so. I was of the opinion that in the end +right must win through. I think now that it never shall--or not for many +ages--till our Saviour again come upon this earth with a great glory. +But all this is a mystery of the great goodness of God and the +temptations that do beset us poor mortality. + +'So now I go! I think that you will not any more seek to hinder me, for +you have heard how set I am on this course. I think, if I have done +little good, I have done little harm, for I have sought to injure no +man--though through me you have wracked some of my poor servants and +slain my poor simple cousin. But that is between you and God. If I must +weep for them yet, though I was the occasion of their deaths and +tortures, I cannot much lay it to my account. + +'If, by being reputed your leman, as you would have it, I could again +set up the Church of God, willingly I would do it. But I see that there +is not one man--save maybe some poor simple souls--that would have this +done. Each man is set to save his skin and his goods--and you are such a +weathercock that I should never blow you to a firm quarter. For what am +I set against all this nation? + +'If you should say that our wedding was no wedding because of the +pre-contract to my cousin Dearham that you have feigned was made--why, I +might live as your reputed leman in a secret place. But it is not very +certain that even at that I should live very long. For, if I lived, I +must work upon you to do the right. And, if that I did, not very long +should I live before mine enemies again did come about me and to you. +And so I must die. And now I see that you are not such a man as I would +live with willingly to preserve my life. + +'I speak not to reprove you what I have spoken, but to make you see that +as I am so I am. You are as God made you, setting you for His own +purposes a weak man in very evil and turbulent times. As a man is born +so a man lives; as is his strength so the strain breaks him or he +resists the strain. If I have wounded you with these my words, I do ask +your pardon. Much of this long speech I have thought upon when I was +despondent this long time past. But much of it has come to my lips +whilst I spake, and, maybe, it is harsh and rash in the wording. That I +would not have, but I may not help myself. I would have you wounded by +the things as they are, and by what of conscience you have, in your +passions and your prides. And this, I will add, that I die a Queen, but +I would rather have died the wife of my cousin Culpepper or of any other +simple lout that loved me as he did, without regard, without thought, +and without falter. He sold farms to buy me bread. You would not imperil +a little alliance with a little King o' Scots to save my life. And this +I tell you, that I will spend the last hours of the days that I have to +live in considering of this simple man and of his love, and in praying +for his soul, for I hear you have slain him! And for the rest, I commend +you to your friends!' + +The King had staggered back against the long table; his jaw fell open; +his head leaned down upon his chest. In all that long speech--the +longest she had ever made save when she was shown for Queen--she had not +once raised or lowered her voice, nor once dropped her eyes. But she had +remembered the lessons of speaking that had been given her by her master +Udal, in the aforetime, away in Lincolnshire, where there was an orchard +with green boughs, and below it a pig-pound where the hogs grunted. + +She went slowly down over the great stone flags of the great hall. It +was very gloomy now, and her figure in black velvet was like a small +shadow, dark and liquid, amongst shadows that fell softly and like +draperies from the roof. Up there it was all dark already, for the +light came downwards from the windows. She went slowly, walking as she +had been schooled to walk. + +'God!' Henry cried out; 'you have not played false with Culpepper?' His +voice echoed all round the hall. + +The Queen's white face and her folded hands showed as she turned-- + +'Aye, there the shoe pinches!' she said. 'Think upon it. Most times you +shall not believe it, for you know me. But I have made confession of it +before your Council. So it may be true. For I hope some truth cometh to +the fore even in Councils.' + +Near the doorway it was all shadow, and soundlessly she faded away among +them. The hinge of the door creaked; through it there came the sound of +the pikestaves of her guard upon the stone of the steps. The sound +whispered round amidst the statues of old knights and kings that stood +upon corbels between the windows. It whispered amongst the invisible +carvings of the roof. Then it died away. + +The King made no sound. Suddenly he cast his hat upon the paving. + + * * * * * + +KATHARINE HOWARD was executed on +Tower Hill, the 13th of February, in the 33rd year +of the reign of KING HENRY VIII. + +MDXLI-II + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FIFTH QUEEN CROWNED*** + + +******* This file should be named 27432.txt or 27432.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/4/3/27432 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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