The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers (65 page)

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Authors: Margaret George

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I took a deep breath in the rarefied air of the opened shrine, before continuing.
“The sentence is this: in future you are to be called only
Bishop
Becket, and all mention of you in books of Common Prayer, lists of saints, and so forth, are to be stricken out.
“And we hereby condemn you to be burnt as a traitor, and your ashes scattered.”
I nodded to my unquestioning, obedient guards, who came forward, bent over the coffin, and began enfolding the bones within their robes of office. While we watched, they transferred the lumpy bundle—with a corner of the mitre protruding—to a new wooden chest, which they carried away.
A heavy feeling came upon the company, far heavier than when Becket’s remains were physically present. We could all hear the neat clicks of the guardsmen’s heels as they marched down the long length of the nave with their casket.
“There were, as I said, twenty-six cartloads of gold festooning the abomination that housed Becket’s miserable remains. I think an eighth-cartload for each of you who helped examine the justice of the matter would be most appropriate,” I said.
Thus I dismissed them. Even enriched as they were, there was no buoyancy in them as they took their leave and melted away into the gloom of the cathedral.
Only Cromwell remained, directly across from the emptied sarcophagus.
“Old bones smell ugly,” I finally said. “I would expect a fresh corpse to stink, or a waterlogged body. But this was clean, and dry.” I shook my head, wonderingly. The peculiar odour—of centuries of packaged, brooding death —was stronger than ever.
“It is done,” I said cheerfully, waving my hand—the one with the Becket ring on it.
Speak, Crum. Say something to banish the odd feeling I have inside ... a feeling I have not felt since ... I know not....
“Your Grace, this must end,” Cromwell said soberly. The taper lit only part of his face, but his words were chiselled and clear.
They said what I knew already.
“I understand that this was but a political gesture, made to give a little sport to the dull proceedings of dismantling and inventorying the vulgar, Papalist shrines,” he continued, putting the most flattering interpretation on it. “I understand it, but I fear it will be misunderstood by the people and exploited by your enemies. You are aware, Your Grace, that many already question your sanity? Your actions of late have played directly into the hands of your sworn enemies. It is you who are a traitor to yourself. For the law defines treason as ‘giving aid and comfort to the enemy’ and that is what you have been doing —by your lack of self-control, by your actions that are open to unkind, even malicious interpretations. Forgive me, Your Grace—” The boldness of his words now frightened him.
He had no way of knowing that it had all gone flat, that I was weary of my rebellion and bored with my schoolboyish howl against God, Who seemed—most humiliating of all—not to have taken much notice of it. Certainly He had not responded in any observable way.
LXXXIII
W
hat had the past year of unthinking, pain-filled rampage gained me? I was forced to take a fearless look and confront the results.
I was certainly richer, from the plunder and seizure of the monastic property and shrines. Abbey plate and jewels and manuscripts and vestments now adorned my palaces, and I was buying the loyalty and support of the gentlemen to whom I sold or leased the abbey lands, making sure they had a vested interest in preventing a return to the Papal fold. There was nothing like property and money to sway a man’s political leanings.
I was isolated in the larger world. In company with Job, I could lament,
For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.
The Pope had called for a war upon me, and lo! a miracle had occurred. Francis and Charles had actually made peace with one another, signed a truce, and loomed as allies against me.
My gleeful rage against the signs and relics of Popery, my allowance of the loosely worded (and interpreted) Ten Articles of Faith to Establish Christian Quietness had caused the Protestants to gain a pernicious foothold in England, and they were now trying to subvert my Church.
My orgy of self-pitying eating and drinking had expanded me beyond all recognition. I was obese, repulsive to look upon.
I had multiplied my troubles and problems. I had solved none and created new ones.
 
For several months I did nothing. I made few appearances, and those were restrained and circumspect. I passed no new laws and made no pronouncements. I reversed my eating habits, becoming as abstemious as a desert hermit, and found to my horror that the fat on me was firmly entrenched and did not obediently melt away at my command.
To check the dangerous foreign situation that had arisen, I decided to use monastic money to finance the construction of a chain of fortresses and defences all across the southern coastline, stretching from Sandown in the East to Pendennis in the West. I employed a Bohemian engineer, Stephen von Haschenperg, to design these castles, which would be constructed on new principles, allowing for the latest advances in cannon warfare. It would disappoint those who hoped that the monastic wealth might be used to found hospitals, colleges, schools. I was disappointed myself. But there can be no higher learning, no institutions of mercy, unless a country is at peace and not ravaged by her enemies.
I would halt the growing influence of Protestantism by rescinding the Ten Articles. They would be replaced by a conservative Act, setting forth the required orthodoxy of faith.
Parliament duly passed this Act of Six Articles. It affirmed the doctrine of Transubstantiation, noted it was not necessary to receive both bread and wine at Communion, said that priests could not marry, that vows of chastity were perpetual, that private Masses were permite it by severe means, for nothing else could prevail. This earned it the sarcastic popular sobriquet, “The Whip with Six Strings.”
In spite of my lack of interest, Cromwell had all the while been casting about in Europe for a bride for me. I had let him, for it amused him, and I wished to humour him. In the past year there had been several delicate queries made to Denmark (I have already spoken of the flippant Duchess Christina); to France (there were the three daughters of the Duc de Guise: Marie, Louise, and Renée; two cousins of Francis, Marie de Vendôme and Anne of Lorraine; as well as his own sister), and to Portugal (the Infanta).
None of these was seriously made—at least not on my part; although certainly on Cromwell’s—or seriously received. Cromwell’s diligence provided Hans Holbein with steady employment and lengthy travels and visits to the courts of Europe, but that was all. I had no desire—indeed, I had a revulsion —against the thought of remarrying. Now, in my personal inventory, I was forced to admit that I was no longer a very compelling object for a woman’s desires.
The very fact that I thought of it, grew concerned about it, was a signal that something was beginning to change, to stir....
In the meantime I guarded little Edward’s health, obsessively. He was not to be at court, because of the danger of infection, but kept at Havering—a clean manor in the country. His attendants were to be strictly limited in number, and all his linens, hangings, toys, and feeding utensils were to be washed and aired daily. As a result of all this seclusion I myself seldom saw him, but I rested secure in the knowledge that he was safe, and flourished. They said he had inherited Jane’s starry eyes. Yes, my Jane’s eyes had been like the sapphires from India. My Jane ...
The line of granite-faced castles was rising steadilyy pcame and made obeisance to England, in little tame waves. Across that water lay France, visible on clear days, but not today.
The water made the soothing slap-and-slide sounds meant to allay my fears. It was hypnotic, and seemed to say,
It is good, it is good, it is good.
... False waters. French-tainted waters.
I turned and looked behind me, at the round belligerence of my defence castle, so muted and grey against the equally dull greenish grey grass on the knolls surrounding it. War had the characteristics of an elephant: grey and wrinkled and bulky. Also expensive to feed and house.
Cromwell was no longer visible. He had left the high places and was undoubtedly inspecting the heart of the castle, where men and ammunition must quarter. If there were a weak spot there, he would find it and seek to have it corrected.
I continued to watch the cold, grey-green sea spread out before me. Watching the sea, I did not have to think; and I was weary of thinking. All my thoughts were unpleasant.
“Your Majesty.”
Cromwell was beside me. “Ah, Crum.”
“The underground provisions are marvellous!” he reported. “Although under the earth, the whitewash and simple designs and open chambers make them aesthetic and even restful. And the decision to have only large chambers is not only practical, but avoids that ugly, cramped feeling of being confined. Von Haschenperg is a genius!”
Even though Crum was no military tactician, he understood the needs of ordinary soldiers—had he himself not served as a mercenary in Italy?—and thus his comments were valuable.
“I am pleased you find it so.”
Together we stood and looked toward France. I knew our conversation must tread on this delicate matter. But I was not eager for it.
“My negotiations with the French for your bride have foundered,” he finally said, hands clasped behind his back, still staring out to sea.
“How so?” I likewise kept my eyes firmly fastened on invisible France.
“The three daughters of the Duc de Guise have proved ... difficult,” he said. “The first, Marie—”
The widow of the Duc de Longueville, I suddenly remembered. The silly old Duke, held captive in England, who had acted as Louis’s proxy in “consummating” his marriage to Mary ... was his widow yet alive?
“She is young, and although large in person, is thought to be attractive,” said Crum, answering my unasked question.
Large. I myself was “large.” “Well, as I am large myself—” I began.
“It seems she is betrothed to the King of Scots already,” said Cromwell.
James V, son of my sister Margaret. How old could he be, as James IV was killed in the Battle of Flodden in 1513.... Twenty-seven, then? Damn the Scots! I had heard little from them in a generation, had mistook their quietness for subservience.
“But her sisters, Louise and Renée, are said to be beautiful. I have sent Holbein to take their likenesses. Unfortunately, Renée, the most beautiful of the three, is I be is intelligent and loyal, and inclined to the match,” Cromwell said.
“And she
is
beautiful,” I added. Holbein’s portrait assured me of that. Intelligent—I needed that. And loyal—no less important.
“Indeed she is!”
“And not too Protestant? I’ll not have a Lutheran!”
“No, her house thinks as you do. A rare thing in these troubled times, to have recognized the twin dangers of Papacy and heresy.”
“Is her brother content to have her marry away from the Continent?”
“He is content, and ready to sign a marriage treaty.”
So here it was. I must marry again. Despite all my restrictions, both political and personal, it seemed a bride had been found to meet them. And beyond that, to provide a bit of exotica ... a Rhine Princess, whose device was two white swans, emblems of candour and innocence. There was a family legend in Cleves that a faerie swan, drawn in a boat down the Rhine by two white swans, had mysteriously “visited” a Duke of Cleves’s daughter long ago, and fathered her child. From him descended my Swan-Princess....
“Then send William Petre to join WotThat was also a form of mourning. So now I was reduced to just a few items that still fit me.
Yes, I had remained stout—even, truth to tell, grown stouter, which I had vowed would never happen. I cared, but I did not care. That is, part of me, whatever old part of me was left, cared; the rest, the hollow-shell Henry, did not.
Now, suddenly, I was anxious to acquire new trappings ... just as I had eagerly refurbished Father’s royal apartments so long ago. The tailor had called, and I prepared to be measured and choose fabrics, all in a high good humour.

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