Gilt (23 page)

“I couldn’t have guessed you would go back to your apartments,” Culpepper said coolly. “I searched the most unusual nooks and crannies, delving into the very depths of the palace.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to bear the buttery innuendoes issuing from Culpepper’s mouth. He was so glib, so smarmy, and so horrible. I didn’t know how Cat could stand to be near him.

“Sometimes it is as if my queen is a friend of the fairy folk,” King Henry said. “She can be as light as gossamer, ethereal. It is no wonder to me that you could not find her. It has taken my entire life to find one like her.”

The courtiers smiled, and the ladies tittered about romance. I wanted to cry.

“But I am real, my lord,” Cat said. “Firm flesh and bone. Certainly not transparent.”

“No, my love,” the king murmured, and held out a hand to
her. She stood by him, and he wrapped a giant arm around her tiny waist. He was almost as tall sitting down as she was standing up. He laid his head upon her breast.

“I am famished, my lord,” she said, and extricated herself.

She came to the table and picked delicately at the food laid out there. She glanced up at me, taking no notice of the pain in my face. But she stopped, staring, eyes upon my pendant.

“Where did you get that?”

“From the king,” I said. “For the hide-and-seek game.”

“What about your reward, Your Majesty?” Alice asked Cat. “Surely yours will be the greatest, as you were the last one found.”

“Oh, my prize!” Cat cried.

If she had been anyone else, she would have left it. She would have had the grace to win the game, however dishonestly, and let it go. But not Cat. She returned to the king and perched on his lap, ignoring his wince.

“Your prize, my love, is to be married to me,” he said quietly, lovingly.

“The most handsome man in the world,” Cat said. She said it as if she had repeated these words a thousand times already.

“I do have a gift for you,” the king said. He gestured to a servant who brought forward a plain wooden box, perfectly square, with a hinged lid. It fit perfectly in her lap. Just the right size for a crown. She stared at it, one finger on the catch.

“Open it,” the king said.

Cat threw one look out into the room. One minute glance
that hit its mark without question. Culpepper. I felt faint with relief. If Cat got her crown, Culpepper would be history.

The box opened silently, revealing its sumptuous lining of crimson silk. On which sat a wreath fashioned from the blooms of a pink rose.

“My rose without a thorn,” the king said. He picked up the wreath and placed it on her still unruly curls.

Cat attempted a smile, her eyes on the lining of the box.

“Kitty got an emerald,” she whispered.

“There is more,” the king said. “But you shall have to wait for it until we get to York.”

“York!” Cat cried. “But that will be forever!”

The king smiled. It didn’t seem to bother him that his wife was just a child. And a deceitful one at that.

“But wait you must,” he said. His smile faltered as he shifted again in his chair.

“We will leave you now, my lord,” Cat said.

“Yes,” the king agreed. “We begin our journey as soon as possible.”

As one, we turned to look out of the window, expecting to see the rain still churning from the sky. But we saw only white clouds and green hills and just the faintest hint of sunshine.

“We cannot have you tired on the first day of the progress,” the king added.

“Of course not,” Cat said.

We all knew that the king meant that
he
could not be tired for the first day of the progress. He already looked exhausted. Like he wanted to be alone. I left the room with the rest of the ladies, leaving the king behind with his devious favorites and his uxorious oblivion.

W
E LOST OURSELVES IN THE CHAOS OF MOVING THE EXTENSIVE HOUSEHOLD
and all of its contents through the English countryside. Each day’s embarkation took the entire morning. By the time the last horses left a place, the king and queen, at the head of the procession, had already stopped for lunch. Which took hours.

We moved from London to Dunstable, Ampthill to Collyweston, stopping at royal residences and the houses of the great and the good along the way. No single palace could contain us all, so additional housing had to be found, tents erected, beasts slaughtered, bread requisitioned, beds made, and every comfort supplied.

I often rode pillion behind Edmund. I told myself it was to enjoy the fresh air. But really I found myself enjoying the feel of my arms around him, the rumble of his voice against me. It ignited something deep inside me that I recognized with acute embarrassment as lust. Cat would be gratified to know that if we ever formed an attachment, it would be driven solely by sex. There seemed little chance we would ever form a bond through conversation, as he didn’t say much.

Everywhere we went, the populace thronged to watch our passage. Our entourage clogged the roads and paths, trampled the fields, left trash and excrement in its wake, and yet everyone seemed happy to see us.

“Long live King Henry!” they shouted.

They wore baggy clothing of coarse materials, sometimes patched and torn, their beards untrimmed. They smelled different, too. Like fields and mud, something I found not altogether unpleasant.

They cheered for Cat, too. They called for her blessing. But I don’t think I was the only one who saw the determination and concentration it cost her to keep from drawing back from the filthy hands of the toothless peasant women and men cowed by life. She couldn’t bear for their want, their need, to be transferred to her. She couldn’t stand to be in their presence. And they grew wary and sullen in hers.

I watched her closely, constantly. I watched her work hard to ignore Culpepper.

But I couldn’t ignore him. He flirted with all the girls, jested with the king and his men. He and Edmund Standebanke lived in each other’s pockets. He went hawking and hunting when we stopped somewhere for more than a few hours. He went nowhere near the queen.

I almost began to believe that Cat had changed her mind. That perhaps one taste was all she needed.

She spent more time in the company of Jane Boleyn, who appeared younger every day. I saw her reach into her pocket
less and less, and wondered if the memory of Anne Boleyn was being erased by the reality of Catherine Howard.

Then we crossed into Lincolnshire, the wellspring of the rebellion five years before. The Lincolnshire Uprising began as a protest of the suppression of the monasteries. But it got out of hand, demanding tax reforms and the repeal of property laws, and lead to riots and the forcible occupation of Lincoln Cathedral. It spurred the Pilgrimage of Grace in Yorkshire and everything ended in a round of bloody executions.

We had a picnic a few miles outside of Lincoln, the region’s capital. I fancied I could see the cathedral high on Lincoln Cliff in the distance. We stopped again just outside the city for the king and queen to change their clothes. The king, dressed head to foot in cloth of gold, glowed as if he were Apollo himself. And by his side, Cat was Diana, her gown a tissue of cloth of silver, studded with jewels and embroidered in gold. She wore her hair bound in a caul of white silk studded with sapphires and rode a white horse.

At the gates of the city, the mayor and town gentry approached and made speeches. Groveling supplication for forgiveness. They knelt and cried, “Jesus save your Grace!” And all was forgiven. That easily.

We walked on aching feet through the gates and up to the cathedral. The building shone in the waning summer light, blinding over the brick edifices surrounding it. Inflated on sanctity, it towered over the town and all the people in it. The king claimed it as the tallest building in the world. He
insisted that he and Cat take communion there. I couldn’t imagine that Cat had confessed her sins. She was too wary of the wagging tongues of priests. Though truly, entering that great space, the light coming in kaleidoscopically through the stained glass, and the pigeons flying high overhead like angels amongst the ribs, would make anyone want to fall on her knees and confess.

The city was full of exhausted and drunken revelers by the time we exited the cathedral into the darkened streets. I wanted nothing more than to roll onto my pallet and fall asleep. We had a few days in Lincoln. Perhaps we could rest. Really rest.

The Bishops’ Palace stood close by the cathedral, renovated and decorated, made warm and comforting by the Duke of Norfolk, who stood at the gate to welcome the king and queen. I carefully avoided looking for William. I didn’t need the pain of seeing him look for Alice. I didn’t need the pain of seeing him, period. The loss of him still felt like a hole in my chest the size of a fist.

The rooms sat tight on top of each other, accessed by dark stairwells and interconnecting doors. The queen’s apartments were surrounded by the rooms of her ladies, separated from the king by the centuries’ old west hall, dark and cavernous compared to the gaudy-bright great hall of Hampton Court. Cat kissed the king lightly and he hobbled off to bed, followed by his men.

The city pressed in against the towers of the palace. Torchlight marked revelers in the streets below us, visible from
the squat, narrow windows. Cat turned to her ladies as soon as we reached her bedchamber.

“I require only Mistress Tylney and Lady Rochford,” she said “The rest of you should get some sleep.”

Groans of appreciation rose, and the room emptied within seconds.

Jane and I helped Cat to take off the glowing silver-white gown. Despite Cat’s vow never to wear the same gown twice, I folded it carefully and packed it away. It seemed sacrilege to dispose of it.

I felt toilworn and depleted, and Jane looked like a ghost, her skin pale as thin parchment and her eyes sunken into black sockets. When Cat’s hair had been brushed and her nightgown straightened, I removed my slippers and sighed at the freedom of it.

“Do not undress yet,” Cat said.

“Why?” I asked, unable to prevent the peevishness in my voice. “Cat, I’m exhausted. We’ve spent eight days on the road and I’ve worked my fingers off, and I just want four hours of sleep before you have to get up tomorrow.”

“Well, I’m sorry, Kitty, but you’ll just have to attend to your queen for a change instead of to your own selfish desires. You are here under my auspices. You are here to do my bidding. You are not here for your own pleasure.”

I knew that only too well.

She stared at me for a long moment. Jane stood frozen, her breath held.

“Well?” Cat snapped. “Do you not know how to curtsey? Do you not know how to pay me proper respect?”

Her voice rose ever higher until it became an indignant screech.

I dipped into a curtsey and refused to look at her.

Before she could say more, a knock came at the outer door of her chamber. She looked up, her eyes ringed white and wide with fear. Her expression caused my heart to judder.

“Who is it?” she said. “Kitty, go see.”

I stepped tentatively to the door, unsure whether I should expect a cabal of Lincolnshire rebels or the wrath of the king himself. A single guard stood there, the scent of the night and smoke outside still clinging to his garments.

“I wish to tell the queen …” he paused as if considering his words. “I would like to make sure she feels protected.”

“Oh,” I said, my alarm increasing, but he didn’t wait for my response.

“I found the back stairs door unlocked and standing open,” he reported, his words tumbling over each other. “The stairs lead directly to the queen’s apartments. I searched the stairs and the surrounding area, but found no one. I secured the door and locked it myself. She is in no danger.”

My mind raced back to the cheering people at the gates of the city that afternoon. The faces all blended in my memory, mouths agape with what I had thought was joy but could easily have been rage. I wondered if the noise and crowds had hidden an assassin. I shuddered at the thought of the hordes still in
the streets, massing beneath the overhanging buildings, drinking and cursing into the night.

“Please, dear lady,” the guard said, “be not afraid. I secured the door myself. No one can get in.”

“Thank you,” I tried to say, but a pebble of fear clogged my throat. I cleared it and said, “Thank you very much. I shall let the queen know.”

He bowed.

“I must return to my rounds. You are all safe with me.”

“I’m sure,” I said, and smiled at him. I did not know the man but had seen him before. His presence was understated and unobtrusive, but ever-present. And indeed, I did feel safe with him on duty.

I returned to the bedchamber and Cat’s questioning eyes.

“It was a guard.” I wondered how I could tell her without making it sound too terrifying. Danger had been averted. She need not fear for her life.

“What did he want?” Cat said. “What reason could he possibly have for knocking on my door at such a late hour?”

I decided just to tell her straight and hope she could sleep that night.

“He said the back stairs door was left unlocked and hanging open. He said he locked the door and checked the area and believes that there is no danger.”