The Concubine (21 page)

“I’ll suffer uncomplainingly, if
Leda
is what you want,” George said.

“It is a vile piece,” Mark Smeaton said. “And why should keeping have improved it?”

“Mark,” Wyatt said, with some rancor, “has turned—what’s the new word? Puritan? Your reputation will not be sullied, my dear fellow. Everyone will know that you are responsible only for the tunes.”

Smeaton scowled. From the moment when Anne had appointed him, he had lived in a world of fantasy. His mind no longer accepted the fact that Anne belonged, or ever would belong, in any way, to Henry. She was not his mistress—every honest person about the Court admitted so much—and she never would be. Nor could she be his wife, circumstances would not allow it. Things would go forever as they were now, with Anne a goddess of purity whom all men might worship, but none touch. And her most devoted worshiper was Mark Smeaton, that man of genius.

And it was not fitting that she, so pure, so far removed from all fleshly things, should sit and watch—and by watching share, with Henry and other men, a vicarious excitement—while
Leda and the Swan
put up their lecherous performance. It might be a myth, it might be classical, it might be acceptable to these curled and scented young fops—but in the country, where he was bred, people had a word for such goings on, and not a nice one.

Smeaton would have been surprised had he known that George Boleyn’s mind was running on much the same lines, though in a different direction. When he and Wyatt had first proposed the masque of
Leda
, pleased with themselves because it was spectacular and full of most ingenious devices, she had recoiled. Now she was in favor of it. Why? There could be only one answer. Where formerly she had feared to provoke Henry’s lust, now she was willing to do so. Yet nothing had changed in the situation; at least nothing that anyone knew about. But Anne was clever; so far she’d handled things well, and if she now changed tactics, she must have good reason. It might well be that Henry’s passion was cooling; not to be wondered at. Few men had ever been tried so highly, frustrated upon one side by legal nonsense, and on the other by Anne’s caution.

George said, “Is it decided then? There’s not a man who will not sit there, sweating, and envy the Swan his watery progress—and his capture.” He looked into his sister’s eyes and knew that he had guessed aright.

“I grieved to shut
Leda
away,” Wyatt said. “And we can have it perfect by evening. There are few speeches. It was designed to appeal to the eye, rather than to the ear.”

“To the
eye
?” Brereton murmured. “I’d have set it lower.”

Mark said, “Shush” through his teeth.

“Shush yourself, Smeaton; and save your breath to blow your whistle.” Smeaton turned dizzy with fury. That was how they spoke to him, contemptuously, as though he were of no account, simply because he was lowly born. Yet they would say things that no decent yokel would dream of saying in the presence of a woman he respected. He controlled himself and said,

“Whistle? There is no whistle in
Leda
, surely?”

“There is also,” Anne said, “no sufficiently memorable song. Was that not one of the things I complained of, Thomas? It needs a song, a song of farewell from one of her human suitors, to be sung as the Swan carries her away. Could you make one, in the time? If you let Mark have the words an hour before supper he could set them.”

“My small talent is always at your service,” Wyatt said.

He was in love with her, too, but realistically, even at times cynically; capable of writing poems inspired by her, and as he wrote, of thinking that a hopeless love affair was an excellent spur for a poet.

She had asked for a farewell song; and she should have it. Immortal words were already assembling themselves in his mind as he left her apartment. Yet, finding himself going along the gallery with George Boleyn, he grumbled a little.

“Make me a new song, she says, as she might ask me to pluck her an apple. Good songs don’t come so easy.” He took a few more steps and added, “And it’s all very well to say that Smeaton can set the music in an hour. Given the words any musician could. I don’t like Smeaton’s manner lately. He has a swollen head.”

“Anne spoils him,” George agreed. “Poor oaf, he’s in love with her.” His sharp, not particularly kindly and yet tolerant eye had seen the truth about the musician’s state, and he thought—If what I think is about to happen happens, it’ll be such a shock to him to find that she’s only human after all, he’ll probably go off his head.

“It’s damned presumption on his part,” Wyatt said. “And he called
Leda
a vile piece. One of these days he’ll provoke me into cuffing his ears.”

They walked on. Within five minutes one of Thomas Cromwell’s young men, in a hiding place cunningly contrived, had scribbled down every word that had been spoken. Cromwell had learned one lesson from Wolsey’s fall—as you rose you made enemies and it was essential to know who they were. He had recruited and trained a little ring of spies, his very own; all young men who looked to him for preferment presently, and never questioned the orders he gave them. In every place where the Court was they had their secret posts, where they listened and scribbled.

“It may be the merest nonsense; but you need waste no time on trying to understand, or to discriminate. Merely write what you hear, as nearly as possible in the same words. And let me warn you,” he looked at each recruit in the same hard way, “that any man who mentions his employment, or anything he has learned while pursuing it, will rue his indiscretion for as long as he lives—which will not be long.”

Each evening they presented their day’s gleanings and before he slept Cromwell sorted it through. Much was tedious meaningless rubbish; much was of interest. It was truly amazing what people would say at a stairhead to a friend who seemed trustworthy.

The scrap of conversation between Wyatt and George Boleyn fell into the category of rubbish, and was discarded.

Yet for some reason a few words—“Lord Rochfort said that Smeaton was a poor oaf and was in love with the Lady”—stuck in Cromwell’s mind and were one day to come in useful.

The evening remained fine, though in the West, against the scarlet and gold of the sunset, great slate-colored clouds reared themselves into a fabulous city with towers and spires and minarets, and thunder growled somewhere in the distance. The entertainment was a marked success. All the little ingenious tricks worked and were applauded. Particularly George’s exit which called for skill, since he must carry Leda, still only half-willing, and board a flat little boat which had been moored just out of sight under the riverbank, and with a single thrust against the bank provide sufficient impulse to send it gliding away, giving the impression that it was he, the Swan, swimming. That was, for everyone with inside knowledge, the trickiest moment of all; there’d been two practical attempts, neither very successful, in the afternoon. On the first George had failed to land squarely and the tiny boat had tilted; on the second his propelling shove had not been powerful enough and he had been obliged to try again, which detracted from the illusion of reality. But tonight all went well; in the eerie, cloud-occluded, sunset light the disguised god bore his human bride away while Sir Harry Norris, the most desolate of Leda’s would-be lovers, sang, in his beautiful voice, Thomas Wyatt’s new song.

“Forget not yet,” the words mourned out on the evening air. Wyatt had written them out of love that he recognized as hopeless; Smeaton had put into the music all the love whose hopelessness he refused to see, and Norris was singing, as always in Anne’s presence, for her alone.

The heavy, sultry air, the strange light, the theme of the masque, the differing but potent feelings which three men had contributed to the perfection of the final song, even the soft noise of the doves in the trees, all had their aphrodisiac effect. Here and there in the assembly hand moved toward hand, eye caught eye; love was the thought in almost every mind; hopeful, sorrowful, confident, frustrated.

Henry thought—That song was written for me! “The cruel wrongs, the scornful ways, the painful patience and delays.” Haven’t I borne enough of them? “The which so constant hath thee loved, whose steadfast heart hath never moved.” Wasn’t that true of him, above any man ever, anywhere?

And
she
, he thought, had arranged this entertainment. This was her sweetly subtle way of telling him that she knew how well and truly he loved her and realized how much he had suffered for her sake. How much more delightful an acknowledgment made in such fashion than Catherine’s outspoken, “I love you, I have always loved you, I shall always love you.” Anne knew, better than anyone else, how to put flavor into living.

After all, what was there left to wait for? He was sick and tired of waiting. Once get Cranmer installed as Archbishop and the way was clear. He’d always insisted that he was a free man, hadn’t the time come to prove it?

There was Anne to consider, of course. And his promise not to demand favors. But surely tonight, even she…He turned his head to look at her and found that she was regarding him with some expression which, before he could read it, had changed to her usual one of calm inscrutability.

“Did you enjoy it, my lord?”

He said, in a thick whisper, “Sweetheart, if I could be granted one wish, I’d carry you off in just that way, and leave them all to stare.”

She said, “Why not?” but so softly that he could not be certain that he had heard aright.

“Not,” she said quickly, and still very softly, “that we will have any staring or gossip. We must be discreet.”

So she had said, “Why not?”; she was, after all this long time, surrendering. The blood began to move tumultuously in his body as though it had been dammed for years and then loosened. He was momentarily frightened lest he should have a fit. A fine thing it’d be, he thought, half-humorously, to die of joy…

Afterward he lay in the dark more puzzled, more disappointed, more depressed than he had ever been in his life. The great experience, so eagerly anticipated, so desperately sought and so hardly won, over and done with, and what was it after all?
Just another woman in a bed!
When he phrased it like that it sounded unbelievable, but there it was, it was true. All that promise, that hint of some peculiar and precious joy in store, was mere illusion. It was some trick of the eye. Between the sheets, in the dark, she was no different from Catherine, Bessie Blount, Mary Boleyn.

He lay there and knew that everything was wrong; even his sense of smell! For years and years, whenever he had been near her he had been conscious of the scent of her hair, not oversweet, not musky, in no way obtrusive, a dry, clean fragrance, all her own; but now, nearer to her than he had ever been, he was only aware of his own freshly soaped odor and the scented oil which he had had rubbed into his hair and beard. He’d said to Norris—the only one in his confidence—“This is my bridal night, I must make myself fit.” He could have cried when he thought of how he had soaked and scrubbed himself, put on his finest clothes and his jewels.

But that was all trivial nonsense. There were crueler thoughts. The mockery of the world, the words “the King’s conscience” being made a joke, Catherine’s tears, Wolsey’s last look, the falling out with the Pope, and at the end,
just another woman in a bed
.

No. No. He fought off the thought as vigorously as he had ever parried the onslaught of a human opponent in the lists. It couldn’t be true, for if it was, he had been wrong, and Henry Tudor was never wrong.

The iron weight which depression had laid upon his chest lifted a trifle. Henry Tudor was never wrong; he knew what he wanted and he got it, in the end, despite everything he got it. And if it seemed…No, never would he admit it. His mind flailed around and eventually fastened upon something to which it could cling.

She was a virgin; that was it. His
first
virgin. (So much for Catherine’s story!) It would be better later on.

As an explanation he accepted it; but it could not restore him fully. Even when he thought of next time, and next, there was none of that uprush of anticipation, the emotion which had sustained him all these years. The fact was that tonight marked a summit in his life; and from now on everything would be a decline.

No. No. He would not permit himself such thoughts. All would be well; it must be. He willed it so.

Then he realized that rightly he should not be thinking at all; he had imagined himself—a thousand, thousand times he had imagined himself, sated, brimful of content, falling asleep with his head on her breast. And now, here he lay, thinking…

And she? He never had understood her; the element of mystery had been part of her charm for him. But he had always thought that the moment of revelation would come…and here it was; no mystery had been revealed to him, no transcendental experience shared; just two bodies in a bed. And for this he had rocked the world!

Intolerable, he thought. He just could not lie here, wakeful, with his mind going round and round. He’d get up, go and find Norris, drink some wine, play a game of chess, divert himself. His premature return to his own apartments could be explained on the grounds of discretion. He had confided in Norris, Anne in her waiting woman. The truth, for many reasons should be kept secret for a month or two. Until marriage was possible.