The Boleyn Inheritance

Katherine, Hampton Court,
November 1541

Now, let me see, what do I have now?

Surprise, surprise! I have no friends and I thought I had dozens.

I have no lovers, and I thought I was pestered by them.

I don’t even have a family; as it turns out, they are all gone.

I have no husband, for he won’t see me; and I don’t even have a confessor, for the archbishop himself has become my inquisitor. Everyone is so mean to me, and it is so unfair. I don’t know what to think or say. They came to me when I was dancing with my ladies and said that it was the king’s orders that I was not to leave my rooms.

For a moment – I am such a fool, grandmother was right when she said that there never was a greater fool than me – I thought it was a masque and that someone would come in costume and capture me, and then someone would come in costume and rescue me, and there would be a joust or a mock battle on the river or something amusing. The whole country had said prayers on the Sunday to thank God for me, so I was expecting some kind of celebration on the day after. So I waited in my room, behind the locked doors, looking forward to a knight errant coming, perhaps even a tower coming to my window, or a mock siege, perhaps a cavalcade riding into the garden, and I said to my ladies: “Here’s a good joke, I expect!” But we waited all day in my room, and even though I rushed and changed my dress to be ready, no one came. I called for music and to make merry, and then Archbishop Cranmer came and said that the time for dancing was over.

Oh, he can be so unkind! He looks so serious, as if there is something very wrong. And then he asks me about Francis Dereham! Francis Dereham of all people, only in my service at the request of my own respectable grandmother! As if it is my fault! And all because some pathetic tittle-tattle talebearer has told the archbishop that there was a flirtation at Lambeth, as though anyone should care about that now! And I must say, if I were archbishop, I would try to be a better person than one who listens to such gossip.

So I say that all this is most untrue, and if I can see the king, I will easily persuade him not to hear a word against me. And then my lord Cranmer gives me a real fright, for he says in a most awful voice: “That, Madam, is why you will not see His Grace until your name has been utterly cleared. We will inquire into every circumstance until we have utterly scotched every slur against you.”

Well, I don’t reply because I know that my slur cannot be utterly scotched, or anything like it; but surely, all that at Lambeth was a matter between a maid and a young man, and now that I am married to the king, who should trouble themselves about what happened all that long time ago? Why, it is a lifetime ago, it is all of two years ago! Who should care one way or another now?

Perhaps it will all blow over in the morning. The king has his funny whims sometimes; he takes against one man or another and has them beheaded, and often he is sorry afterward. He took against poor Queen Anne of Cleves, and she got away with Richmond Palace and being his best sister. So we go to bed quite cheerful, and I ask Lady Rochford what she thinks, and she looks rather queer and says that she thinks I may get through it if I keep my nerve and deny everything. This is rather cold comfort from her, who saw her own husband go to the gallows denying everything. But I don’t tell her so, for fear of making her angry.

Katherine Tylney sleeps with me, and she laughs as she gets into bed and says that she bets I wish she were Tom Culpepper. I say nothing, for I do wish it. I wish it so much that I could cry for him. Long after she is snoring I lie awake and wish that everything had been different for me, and Tom had come to the house at Lambeth and perhaps fought with Francis and perhaps killed him, and then taken me away and married me. If he had come for me, then I would never have been queen and never had my necklace of table diamonds. But I should have slept the whole night in his arms, and sometimes that seems a better choice. It seems a better choice tonight, for sure.

I sleep so badly that I am awake at dawn. I lie in the quiet with the gray light shining through the shutters, and I think that I would give all my jewels to see Tom Culpepper and hear his laugh. I would give my fortune to be in his arms. Please God he knows that I am kept in my rooms and does not think that I am keeping away from him. It would be too awful if, when I come out, he has taken offense at my neglect and is courting someone else. I would die if he were to take a fancy to another girl. I really think my heart would break.

I would send him a note if I dared, but no one is to leave my rooms, and I dare not trust one of the servants with a message. They come with breakfast to my rooms; I am not even allowed to go out to eat. I am not even to go to chapel; a confessor is to come to my rooms to pray with me before the archbishop comes to talk with me again.

I really do begin to think this is not right; I should perhaps protest against it. I am Queen of England. I cannot be kept in my rooms as if I were a naughty girl. I am fully grown, I am a lady, I am a Howard. I am wife to the king. Who do they think I am? I am Queen of England, after all. I think I shall speak to the archbishop and tell him that he cannot treat me so. I think about this until I become quite indignant and resolve that I shall insist to the archbishop that he treat me with proper respect.

And then he doesn’t come! We spent the whole morning sitting around, trying to sew things, trying to appear seriously employed in case the door suddenly opens and my lord the archbishop walks in. But no! It is not till the end of the afternoon, and a dreary afternoon at that, that the door opens and he enters, his kindly face all grave.

My ladies all flutter up as if they were themselves as innocent as a flock of butterflies, imprisoned with a moldy slug. I remain seated; after all, I am queen. I just wish I could look like Queen Anne did when they came for her. She really did look innocent; she really did look unjustly accused. I am sorry now that I signed a piece of paper to bear witness against her. I realize now how very unpleasant it is to be doubted. But how was I to know that one day I would be in the same case?

The archbishop walks up to me as if he were terribly sorry for something. He has his sad face on, as if he were struggling with an argument inside his own head. For a moment I am certain that he is going to apologize for being so unkind to me yesterday, and beg my pardon and release me.

“Your Grace,” he says very quietly. “I am so much grieved to discover that you have employed the man Francis Dereham in your household.”

For a moment I am so amazed that I don’t say anything. Everyone knows this. Good God, Francis has caused enough trouble at court for everyone to know it. He has hardly been discreet. How should the archbishop discover it? As well as claim to discover Hull! “Well, yes,” I say, “as everyone knows.”

Down go his eyes again, clasp go his hands together over his cassocked tummy. “We know that you had relations with Dereham when you were at your grandmother’s house,” he says. “He has confessed it.”

Oh! The fool. Now I cannot deny it. Why would he say such a thing? Why would he be such a slack-mouthed braggart?

“What are we to suppose, but that you put your paramour in a position close to you for a bad purpose?” he asks. “Where you could meet every day? Where he could come to you without your ladies being present? Even unannounced?”

“Well, suppose nothing,” I say pertly enough. “And he isn’t my paramour anyway. Where is the king? I want to see him.”

“You were Dereham’s lover at Lambeth, you were not a virgin when you married the king, and you were his lover after your marriage,” he says. “You are an adulteress.”

“No!” I say again. The truth is all muddled up with a lie, and besides, I don’t know what they know for sure. If only Francis had been born with the sense to shut up. “Where is the king? I insist that I see him!”

“It is the king himself who has ordered me to inquire into your conduct,” he says. “You cannot see him until you have answered my questions and your name is cleared without blemish.”

“I shall see him!” I jump to my feet. “You shan’t keep me from my husband. It has to be against the law!”

“Anyway, he has gone.”

“Gone?” For a moment it feels as if the floor has rocked under my quick feet as if I were dancing on a barge. “Gone? Where has he gone? He can’t have gone. We’re staying here until we go to Whitehall for Christmas. There is nowhere else to go to; he wouldn’t just leave me here. Where has he gone?”

“He has gone to Oatlands Palace.”

“To Oatlands?” This is the house where we were married. He would never go there without me. “That is a lie! When did he go? This cannot be true!”

“I had to tell him – it was the greatest sadness of my life – that you had been Dereham’s lover and that I fear you are his lover still,” Cranmer says. “God knows I would have spared him that news. I thought he would lose his mind for grief; you have broken his heart, I think. He left for Oatlands at once, taking only the smallest household. He will see no one; you have broken his heart and ruined yourself.”

“Gracious no,” I say feebly. “Oh, gracious, no.” This is very bad, indeed, but if he has taken Thomas with him, then at least my dearest love is safe, and we are not suspected. “He will be lonely without me,” I say, hoping that the archbishop will name his companions.

“He is like to go mad of grief,” he says flatly.

“Oh, dear.” Well, what can I say? The king was mad as a March hare before any of this, and that, in fairness, cannot be laid at my door.

“Has he no companions?” I ask cleverly. Pray God that Thomas is safe.

“The Groom of the Chamber,” he replies. So thank God Thomas is in no danger. “All you can do now is confess.”

“But I have done nothing!” I exclaim.

“You took Dereham into your household.”

“At my grandmother’s request. And he has not been alone with me, nor so much as touched my hand.” I draw a little strength from my true innocence. “Archbishop, you have done very wrong to upset the king. You don’t know what he’s like when he is upset.”

“All you can do is confess. All you can do is confess.”

This is so like being some poor soul trudging toward Smithfield with a fagot of wood to be burned to death that I stop, and giggle, from sheer terror. “Really, Archbishop, I have done nothing. And I confess every day, you know I do, and I have never done anything.”

“You laugh?” he says, horrified.

“Oh, only from the shock!” I say impatiently. “You must let me go to Oatlands, Archbishop. Indeed, you must. I have to see the king to explain.”

“No, you have to explain to me, my child,” he says earnestly. “You have to tell me what you did at Lambeth, and what you did thereafter. You have to make a full and honest confession, and perhaps then I can save you from the scaffold.”

“The scaffold?” I shriek the word as if I have never heard it before. “What do you mean, the scaffold?”

“If you have betrayed the king, then this is an act of treason,” he says slowly and clearly, as if I am a child. “The punishment for treason is death. You must know that.”

“But I have not betrayed him,” I gabble at him. “The scaffold! I could swear it on the Bible. I could swear it on my life. I’ve never committed treason, I’ve never committed anything! Ask anyone! Ask anyone! I am a good girl, you know I am; the king calls me his rose, his rose without a thorn. I have no other will than his…”

“Indeed, you will have to swear to all of this on the Bible. And so you should make very sure that there is not a word of a lie. Now, tell me about what took place between you and the young man at Lambeth. And remember, God hears every word you say; and besides, we already have his confession, he has told us everything.”

“What has he confessed?” I ask.

“Never you mind. You tell me. What did you do?”

“I was very young,” I say. I peep up at him in case he is disposed to be sorry for me. He is! He is! His eyes are actually filled with tears. This is such a good sign that I feel much more confident. “I was very young, and all the girls in the ladies’ chamber were badly behaved, I am afraid. They were not good friends and advisors to me.”

He nods. “They allowed the young men of the household to come into the girls’ chamber?”

“They did. And Francis came in at night to court another girl; but then he took a fancy to me.” I pause. “She wasn’t half as pretty as me, and I didn’t even have my lovely clothes then.”

The archbishop sighs for some reason. “This is vanity. You are supposed to be confessing your sin with the young man.”

“I am! I am confessing. I am very distressed. He was very pressing. He insisted. He swore he was in love with me, and I believed him. I was very young. He promised me marriage; I thought we were married. He insisted.”

“He came to your bed?”

I want to say no. But if that fool Dereham has told them everything, then all I can do is make it seem better. “He did. I did not invite him, but he insisted. He forced me.”

“He raped you?”

“Yes, almost.”

“Did you not cry out? You were in the room with all the other young ladies? They would have heard you.”

“I let him do it. But I did not want it.”

“So he lay with you.”

“Yes. But he was never naked.”

“He was fully dressed?”

“I mean, he was never naked except for when he took his hose down. And then he was.”

“He was, what?”

“He was naked then.” Even to me this sounds weak.

“And he took your virginity.”

I cannot see a way to avoid this. “Er…”

“He was your lover.”

“I don’t think…”

He rises from his feet as if he would go. “This does you no good at all. I cannot save you if you lie to me.”

I am so afraid of his walking away that I cry out and run after him and catch his arm. “Please, Archbishop. I will tell you. I am just so ashamed, and so sorry…” I am sobbing now, he looks so stern; if he does not take my side, then how shall I explain all this to the king? I am afraid of the archbishop, but I am utterly terrified of the king.

“Tell me. You lay with him. You were as husband and wife to each other.”

“Yes,” I say, driven to honesty. “Yes, we were.”

He lifts my hand from his arm as if I have some infection of the skin and he does not want to touch me. As if I am a leper. I, who only two days ago was so precious that the whole country thanked God that the king had found me! It is not possible. It is not possible that everything could have gone so wrong so quickly.

“I shall consider your confession,” he says. “I shall take it to God in prayer. I have to tell the king. We will consider what charges you will have to face.”

“Can’t we just forget that it all happened?” I whisper, my hands twisting together, the rings heavy on my fingers. “It was so long ago. It was years ago. Nobody can even remember it. The king doesn’t need to know; you said yourself, it will break his heart. Just tell him that nothing important happened, and can’t everything be as it was?”

He looks at me as if I am quite mad. “Queen Katherine,” he says gently. “You have betrayed the King of England. The punishment is death. Can you not understand that?”

“But this was all long before I was married,” I whimper. “It wasn’t betraying the king. I hadn’t even met him. Surely the king will forgive me for my errors as a girl?” I can feel the sobs coming up into my throat, and I can’t hold them back. “Surely he won’t cruelly judge me for my childhood errors when I was nothing but a little girl with poor guardians?” I gulp. “Surely His Grace will be kind to me? He has loved me, and I have made him so happy. He thanked God for me, and this, this is nothing.” The tears are pouring down my face. I am not pretending to be sorry; I am absolutely appalled to be here, facing this awful man, having to twist myself up in lies to make things look better. “Please, sir, please forgive me. Please tell the king that I have done nothing that matters.”

The archbishop pulls away from me. “Calm yourself. Calm yourself. We will say no more now.”

“Say you will forgive me, say that the king will forgive me.”

“I hope he will; I hope he can. I hope you can be saved.”

I grab onto him, sobbing without control. “You cannot go until you promise me I will be safe.”

He drags himself to the door though I am clinging to him like a wailing child. “Madam, you must be calm.”

“How can I be calm when you tell me that the king is angry with me? When you tell me that the punishment is death? How can I be calm? How can I be calm? I’m only sixteen, I can’t be accused, I can’t be-”

“Let me go, Madam; this behavior does not serve you.”

“You shan’t go without blessing me.”

He pushes me from him and then crosses the air rapidly above my head. “There. There you are, in nomine… filii…There, now be quiet.”

I throw myself down on the floor to sob, but I hear the door close behind him, and even though he is not there to see me, I cannot stop crying. Even when the inner door opens and my ladies come in, I am still crying. Even when they flutter round me and pat me on the head, I do not sit up and cheer up. I am so afraid now, I am so afraid.