Reluctant Queen: Tudor Historical Novel About Mary Rose Tudor, the Defiant Little Sister of King Henry VIII (27 page)

It was late summer. The countryside looked lush and ripe, the hedgerows garlanded with cow parsley and foxgloves, the fields full of swaying corn; a fitting time, Mary felt, for her body too, to ripen with the fruit of the womb. Although she had only missed one of her monthly courses and could not be certain she was pregnant, Mary still longed to share her hopes with Charles. But given his current preoccupation she wasn’t sure how he would take the news. Maybe he would balk and complain at the likely cost of the ceremonies due to such a high-born infant.

Besides, at the moment, he spent so much time out on the estate or with their neighbours, seeking news of the court that he was scarcely at home. And when he did return he was so inclined to be morose she scarce knew how to broach the subject. So she nursed the secret to herself.

One day, gathering roses in the garden, her eyes misted over as she thought back to that other time in the garden, with Charles. How long ago that seemed. Their love had been so new then, so fresh. They should have seized their chance for happiness then. They would scarcely have endured more trouble if they had done so. She smiled through suddenly damp eyes as she remembered how he had plucked red and white roses for her, the white for York and the red for Lancashire and how their passion had scattered them on the ground. Her smile faded. Such bitter-sweet memories.

She glanced up. Charles was striding towards her. She smiled a welcome and quickly wiped any hint of tears from her lashes as she tried to gauge his mood. ‘Hello, my love.’ She pressed her nose against the flowers and breathed in their heady scent. ‘I was just gathering some flowers for our bed-chamber. Do you remember when—?’

Brusquely, he waved away the fond memories she had wanted to share with him. ‘You’re lucky to find something to occupy you, Mary. I would that I could find pleasure in such trivial pursuits.’

Mary’s smile faded as his words made plain he had little interest in recalling the early days of their love. But once, he had found joy in such simple pleasures, she reminded herself in an attempt to ease her hurt. Tentatively, she asked, ‘Why are you so vexed, Charles? Has something happened to annoy you?’

He banged his hat against his thigh with such ferocity that he knocked it out of shape which only increased his ill-temper. ‘Nothing but the same old annoyance. The same man who irks me. Stuck in this backwater for weeks is sufficient to make any man brood on the wrongs done to him. It’s well enough for a woman, such a life. But a man, Mary, needs to be at the centre of things, to help run affairs, to have a voice on the Council. I cannot be satisfied with the life of a simple country squire.’

Such was his frustration that Mary decided to keep the news of her suspected pregnancy to herself for a while longer. It was clear he was not in the right mood to share her joy. Always emotional, pregnancy made her more so. She blinked away the threatening dampness from her eyes, only too conscious he had grown impatient with her tears. She didn’t know whether to be pleased or sorry that he hadn’t even noticed them, never mind enquired as to their cause. Instead, he turned remorselessly on to the subject he had ranted about these many weeks: Wolsey.

‘He was the one who forced us from the court,’ he complained. ‘He fears my friendship with the king. He wants to be the only one able to influence his thoughts.’

Roughly, he pulled a rose from its bush and robbed it of its pretty petals. ‘These accursed debts. They could be settled tomorrow if Wolsey desired it, I know. Damn the man for the butcher’s cur he is.’

Mary stiffened behind the screening bouquet and pleaded, ‘Please, Charles, do not speak so. Wolsey has been a good friend to us. He was the only one willing to help us in our troubles. But for him, Henry might have let the Council have their way,’ she reminded him, hoping to recall to his mind the fear he had endured in Paris and thus kill his resentment before it grew dangerous. ‘They would have had your head, my love, but for Wolsey. We both do know it.’

‘How long am I expected to be grateful that he wrote a few letters and spoke a few soft words to the king? Simple enough deeds. Anyone could have done such.’

‘But they didn’t, Charles, did they?’ Mary reminded him. ‘Your friends at court were conspicuous by their silence.’ She grasped his arm. ‘We owe the Cardinal much, Charles. Pray don’t make an enemy of him. He’s a very clever man.’

Charles pulled his arm from her grasp. ‘And I am not? Is that what you are saying?’ He scowled ‘Why should I fear the butcher’s cur? What could he do to me that he hasn’t already done?’

‘I don’t know, Charles,’ Mary told him wearily. ‘But I’d rather not find out. Leave him be, please. Don’t vex him any more. My lord of Norfolk would be only too pleased if you made of the Cardinal a mortal enemy.’

As Mary looked at his bitter expression fear clutched at her heart. Why couldn’t he be happy? There was such peace here in the country, such tranquillity. She couldn’t understand how anyone could fail to find contentment in a home as beautiful as Westhorpe. But Charles wasn’t happy and the realisation saddened her. His heart was with the court and its doings and not with her. Briefly, Mary thought of King Louis, her aged first husband, and how easily contented he had been. He had asked only for her company, music from her lute and a little fondling. She had made him happy. Why could it not be the same with this husband whom she so desperately wanted to please?

But nowadays it seemed nothing pleased him. Certainly, nothing she did seemed to do so. On a small, sad sigh, she left him to his brooding and turned away, heading for their bed-chamber, so she could arrange the pretty roses that had now, for her, lost their bloom.

After all Mary’s misgivings, when she finally told Charles of her pregnancy, he was delighted. To her great joy he was very attentive during the long months of waiting. They were both pleased when they learned that Queen Catherine had, in February, the month before Mary’s own babe was expected, finally produced a healthy babe herself. Although only a girl, it seemed likely to live, unlike the son she had been carrying at the time of Mary’s departure for France. That infant, although full-term, had died shortly after his birth, during Mary’s sojourn at the French court.

Mary’s child arrived not many weeks after Catherine’s daughter. Her labour was long and agonising, but, late in the March evening, she presented Charles with a son and heir. The birth of the child seemed to help Charles regain his good humour. His attentiveness during the pregnancy happily continued after the birth. Mary was overjoyed at the way he kept popping into her chamber to check on her and his son, round-eyed with wonder that she had presented him with such a precious gift. Mary, full of the happiness of new motherhood, now understood how much sadness the loss of previous babies had brought to her brother and Catherine.

Charles wanted to name their son after the king. ‘Who knows?’ he said, ‘but that it may persuade your brother to be kinder to our son’s foolish father.’

Although his words revealed that Charles hadn’t lost all his worldly ambition, Mary was glad to see that he could mock himself. She felt overcome with love for him and grasped his hand. She had had a long sleep after her ordeal and felt rested.

Susan, her maid, had freshened her and she was glowing with the radiance that new motherhood bestowed. Readily, she smiled her agreement. ‘Henry, it shall be.’

She knew, from his pleased expression, that she had won her husband’s heart all over again. But this time, Mary forbade herself from entertaining romantic girlish notions of love. She was a woman now and a mother. She accepted that although her love for Charles was strong, his for her was lighter and more easily borne. She believed he truly loved her, even so, as much as he was capable of loving any woman. It was simply that he lacked her ability for deep emotion; had he not always sought love where there would be other benefits also? It was the way of the world and he had his way to make in it, not being born to high estate. He had had dalliances in plenty, Mary didn’t doubt it. He had even been married. Several times.

Mary, older and a little wiser, forced such unwelcome thoughts from her mind. Charles was hers now. He loved her. They had a son. And as he rightly said, this son she had given him might indeed bring her brother’s favour.

King Henry, wistful as he was for a son of his own, made much of his young namesake. He even acted as his Godfather. After Henry’s little daughter, the Princess Mary, he named his nephew by Mary and Charles as heir to the throne. Charles had been overwhelmed by this, especially as Henry had set aside the prior claim of his elder sister Margaret’s sons in their favour. Mary’s labour completed the trinity of royal lyings-in, for her sister, Margaret, had presented her second husband with a baby daughter, Margaret, the previous October.

Great state was held at little Harry’s christening. The king and the Cardinal both acted as sponsors. Mary began to hope that this indicated a rapprochement between her brother, the Cardinal and her husband. Charles had, for some time, been barely tolerated, as he had opposed the league against France for which Wolsey had pushed. In consequence, they had been forced to spend most of their time banished to their estates, much to Charles’s frustration.

Now, Henry made much of his young namesake. Mary would catch him gazing wistfully at her son. She knew how much he longed for a boy of his own. Daily, she prayed that he and Catherine would be blessed with a son as had she and Charles.

Quiet in the country after the birth celebrations, Mary followed with astonishment the adventures of her elder sister, Margaret. After her secret marriage to Archibald Douglas, the Council had transferred the regency of her two sons by the king to her late husband’s first cousin, John Stewart, the Earl of Albany and next heir to the Scottish throne after James IV’s two sons by Margaret. Besieged, the pregnant Margaret had been forced to flee the country, leaving her boys and her regency in the power of Albany. She had given birth to Archibald Douglas’s child, Margaret, in Northumberland the previous October.

Now, Mary heard her sister was heading south and Mary and Charles were amongst those summoned to court to welcome her.

They returned to court in May. Mary was excited. It was so many years since she had seen her elder sister that she could scarce remember her. Margaret had been married into Scotland, to King James IV, years before at the age of thirteen when Mary had been a mere child of seven. Widowed just before her twenty-fourth birthday, Margaret had secretly married Archibald Douglas, the Earl of Angus.

Mary, her memories of her sister few and hazy, was convinced she and her sister would have much in common; had they not both dared to enter into secret marriages? Were they not now both mothers? Excitedly, she looked forward to their reunion.

The court was at Greenwich and it was to Greenwich Palace, its gardens bursting forth with the buds of May, that Margaret came. To Mary’s disappointment, though Margaret had her new daughter with her, she had been forced to leave behind her two sons by the king.

Mary remembered her sister had been a pretty girl. But pregnancies and discontent had tarnished her looks. Only in her middle twenties, not only were her looks and figure more those of a middle-aged matron, her manner regally arrogant, she also spoke down to her younger sister, as if she were still truly a child to be dismissed.

Mary was disappointed to find the combination little to her liking. But this was her long-absent and only sister, she reminded herself. Margaret had had much with which to contend and she must not expect her to readily shed her troubles and indulge in sisterly confidences. After the many travails she had experienced in Scotland, Margaret’s character would inevitably have formed into a tougher fabric. She must make allowances.

‘Well, sister,’ Mary said with a smile. ‘It is good to see you. Let us hope our next meeting is not so long-awaited.’ She made to kiss Margaret, but her sister’s kiss in return, was perfunctory.

Instead of returning her friendly overture, Margaret ignored it and burst out instead in an angry tirade of grievances against the way the fates had treated her. ‘I wouldn’t have been here now, but for that foolish Council,’ she told Mary, bitterly. ‘They had the temerity to offer the regency to that French cur, Albany, instead of letting it remain in my hands. I am, after all, the mother of the king. That Frenchman, brought up in France as he was, can’t even speak the language.’

Taken aback by her sister’s anger, Mary tried to soothe her. ‘He is the heir-presumptive, Margaret, cousin to the late King James. Surely it is his right? Scotland has need of a strong man to rule it. It has ever been a wild, ungovernable place. I’m sure the Council thought it would be too much for a woman.’

‘What do you know of the matter, Mary?’ Margaret demanded sharply. ‘Sheltered by our brother till you were all of eighteen, how could you know aught of Scotland or her problems? You say they need a man to rule? They’ll have a hard task finding one of those in Scotland.’ The lords of the north were dismissed with a contemptuous wave of the hand. ‘I’m more man than any of them, but they’re too full of overbearing male arrogance to realise it.’

Dismayed, Mary stared at her sister and thought that maybe Margaret’s own arrogance might have had something to do with her rejection by the Council. It was a thought she kept to herself. Instead, she asked, ‘Where is your husband, Margaret? I had expected to see him also. Will he be coming to court?’

‘Nay. He let the Council reject me for the regency. Let that fool Archibald Douglas stay in the north. What would I want with him here?’

From her sister’s dismissive tone, Mary guessed that this second marriage had already soured. Mary was sorry for it. Hoping her assumption was in error, Mary said, ‘Surely, sister, you wish the father of your new daughter to be with you?’

Margaret let out a harsh laugh and laid a hand on her belly. ‘Douglas did his work,’ she said. ‘He was quite content for me to do the rest alone. As I said, Mary, let him stay in the north. He’s not wanted here.’