The Last Boleyn (48 page)

“You are still bitter, Mary, though I do not blame you. You have never learned to just accept the inevitable the way I have, nor do you ever attack him as Anne does.”

“Have you always accepted the inevitable, brother?”

“Ever since I had to marry Jane and I saw that the fact I wanted Margot Wyatt more than anything was nothing to him. Yes, Mary. Since then I have taken my pleasures out of sight of them all and be damned to them. Except for mother and Anne, of course.”

“Are you telling me there has been someone else to fill the void Jane could never fill in your life?” she prodded, intrigued.

“Not really someone like Staff is to you, Mary. Several someones over the years, you might say. There is a certain woman living at Beaulieu now, and she is content to await the few days I can seize to spend there. Anne knows, of course, but I warrant father and Cromwell have missed this one.” He grinned like a small boy who has gotten away with stealing chickens from the farmer. “Beyond that, I am much busy on king's business. Speaking of that, I understand you correspond with Master Cromwell.”

“Yes, we do. Is that the nature of your business here, to tell us we are to lose our last line to the court?”

“No, of course not. I wanted mostly to see you and know how you are faring. It is a small manor, but a productive one, I would judge.”

“Do not try to put me off, George. I have been around longer than you and know how things go. Did Cromwell or father send you? I cannot dare to hope it was Anne.”

“I am sorry, Mary. It was not Anne. Truly, Cromwell sends his fondest greetings. Do you actually trust Cromwell, then?”

“My Lord Stafford is not such an innocent to trust Cromwell, but they have made some sort of bargain to work together it would seem. George, will you carry a letter I have written to him? We usually wait until he sends a messenger and then just return a note with the man.”

“I shall take it back for you. You alone wrote this letter? Is it secret?”

“Not secret, but I want him, and anyone he would care to tell, to know what it is really like for me now. Anne has not forgiven me, and I am grieved for that, but I regret nothing. It is there on the mantel. If you will get it, I will read you a part. Thank you. I do not want it to be secret, George. It is my letter to the world, if you would call it that.”

She began to read from the parchment, “You see, Master Cromwell, the world sets little store by me and My Lord Stafford, and I have freely chosen to live a simple, honest life with him. Still, we do wish to regain the favor of the king and queen. For well I might have had a greater man of birth and a higher, but I assure you I could never have had one that loved me so well, nor a more honest man. I had rather beg my bread with him than be the greatest queen christened. And I believe verily he would not forsake me even to be a king.”

“I should like a copy of that, love,” came Staff's voice behind her chair. “It is most beautiful and likely to be wasted on the silly ears at court.” He leaned over her chair and kissed her on the cheek. “George, you are welcome here to Wivenhoe. Did you come to see if you are an uncle again?”

They shook hands warmly, and Staff sat on the hearth bench near Mary's chair. He had been working hard at something, for his hair was windblown and there was rich, dark mud on his boots. “Then you have a message?” Staff's eyes bored into George's wary ones.

“I think you are the sort of man with whom it is best to come straight to the point, Staff,” George ventured.

“And I think you will find that your sister is that sort of woman, George. Say on, but realize that anything which concerns Mary is now of utmost importance to me.”

“Yes, of course. I bear a request from father.”

“He could not come himself?” Mary asked sharply.

“Hush, love,” Staff said. “Do not goad George, for he is only the messenger, not Thomas Boleyn incarnate.”

“Things are as bad as I am sure Cromwell has told you,” George began slowly. “Anne does not conceive of another royal child, although the king has bedded her off and on all summer. He goes from mistress to mistress as he has long done, but father fears that he is increasingly under the influence of one lady and her rapacious family.”

“Jane Seymour still,” Mary thought aloud. “Does she still hold him off? Then it would seem she has taken her ambitions and tactics from the queen.”

“Exactly, Mary. That is exactly what father says. The Boleyns must hold the king, pull him from the Seymours until Anne bears the heir. Or, if she cannot, father fears Elizabeth will never get to the throne. It will be the bastard Fitzroy or...” His words hung in the air, and Mary feared as she had long ago learned to do when father sought her help. Staff and Mary said nothing and George cleared his throat.

“Sister, do you not remember how the king referred to you as the woman who bore live sons the day he discovered Anne was not really with child and they argued so terribly?”

“Yes. I remember. It was an awful scene. If this has to do with my son Harry, George, tell father to forget it. The king knows well, and has for some time, that the lad is not his flesh and blood.” She rose awkwardly to her feet. “Father's secret trips to Hatfield to fill the boy's head with dreams were quite wasted. Whatever he is thinking, the answer is no. No, no, no!”

Staff rose to stand beside her and rubbed her shoulders as if to tell her to keep calm. “I am fine, my lord, truly,” she assured him, but her voice quavered.

“I think you are wrong, sister,” George pressed on. “I have seen the boy a few months ago. He looks Tudor through and through.”

Mary took a step toward George, ignoring Staff's gentle touch trying to push her back to her seat. “He is a Carey through and through! He resembles Will Carey!”

“Then that just goes to show how people can disagree over it, but not be certain, sister. The lad is tall and healthy and clever, and Fitzroy is skinny and often weakly. His Grace will leap at the chance to declare Harry his own, if only you will say so.”

“Mary,” Staff's voice came low at her, but she could not stop the flow of feelings.

“I will not keep calm and be silent, my lord. I cannot!” She tried not to shout, but she could not control her voice. “Tell your father that Harry is William Carey's son and would have been his heir if His Grace had not taken the boy's lands and birthright and given them to his love Anne Boleyn and his henchman Cromwell.”

“Some believe he took the Carey possessions to show to the world that the boy was not Will Carey's son, Mary,” George pursued doggedly.

“I have heard that argument before, and it is a lie. If father even suggests to the king that Harry is his son, I shall walk all the way to London if I must and deny it to the king's face! Tell father that. Tell him that someday he should try to love someone when they can do him no service for his dreadful lust for Boleyn power! Tell him that he should go back to Hever, for our foolish mother loves him still, though how she does I can never fathom. Tell him...”

Staff's arms were around her in the next moment, almost in the same instant in which she felt the first stabbing pain. It surely was the child, but she was so beside herself with anger and hurt that it could have been her mind playing tricks on her again.

Staff carefully picked her up in his arms when he saw the pain on her face. George stood by, clearly distraught as Staff carried her from the parlor and up the silent stairs.

“I saw the ghost. He touched me,” she said to Staff between the waves of pain. Staff shouted for Nancy from where he stood and bent over Mary, untying her long linen sleeves from her bodice. “Did you, sweetheart? Today? Where?”

She meant to answer and to tell him how warm and comforting the memory was, but a sharp pain swept her words away. Staff was removing her shoes and telling her how much he loved her when Nancy's face appeared close over her. “Stephen has gone for the midwife, Lady Mary. I will not leave you.”

“Can we send for my mother, Staff?” Mary heard herself ask suddenly. “Send George away and tell him to bring mother.”

“I shall ask him, love, but I think he must return to court.” Concern was stamped on Staff's strong features, and she gripped his hand tight in the next wave of pain. “We shall send Stephen to bring your mother for a visit after the child is born as we discussed, all right?”

“Father will not like her to come here to Wivenhoe, Staff.”

“Then your father be damned, my love. Lady Elizabeth will come.”

Nancy and Staff had her into a clean loose frock now, and she felt much better, and not so tired. But surely the Lord in Heaven would give her strength for this trial. She was no longer afraid.

“You do not fear to have the child here, do you, Mary?”

“Here at Wivenhoe, my lord? Of course not.”

“In this room, I mean. Did you think you saw the ghost in here?”

“How did you know, Staff? Did I tell you?”

“No, sweetheart. I guessed. Nancy said you were standing wildly in the hall, and when you told me you saw the ghost...”

“He opened the door and came in to see me when I was resting,” she interrupted his gentle question. “I heard him on the stairs and then he touched my back. Then I was not afraid any longer, Staff, and I am not afraid now.”

“That is fine, my love. That is as it should be.”

“Do you think I am dreaming or lying, Staff? Tell me you believe it!”

“Of course I believe it. Did I not tell you he would want a good look at my beautiful wife?”

She started to laugh at his tease, but the dark hands of pain descended on her again. She bit her lip to stop the scream. Then Nancy shooed Staff from the room as Mary began the hours of labor to bring forth a child for Wivenhoe.

A son was born nearly at midnight and they called him Andrew William as they had decided. They wanted the child to have his own freely given first name and not be named for someone in high position as were Henry and Catherine. William they gave as a middle name in remembrance of Staff's dead father and for Staff's own first name. Mary whispered the baby's name over and over on her lips and wondered, as she finally fell asleep, if the watchful ghost would come to see his namesake. Staff was beside himself with joy and pride. Nancy told her later that he had even wept, and Stephen had been sent to fetch a whole keg of precious wine from the cellar in celebration.

The next midmorn, George came to see the child before he and his man set off on the road back to Greenwich. He looked nervous and bleary-eyed to Mary, as though he had not slept. “George, I am sorry you must be the bearer of news back to court, not only that I will have none of his nefarious plot to dupe His Grace into believing Harry is his, but that you are the one who will tell them that Staff and I have a son when one is desperately needed elsewhere.”

“Coward that I am, sister, I may lie low on that news until Cromwell tells someone, though Anne could hear it best from me perhaps. She needs me more and more now, Mary. I try to cushion her pain as best I can, but she gets wild sometimes and no one can stand her actions or the things she says.”

“Every woman needs a man to cushion her pain, George.” Mary reached out and took Staff's hand.

“Jane rants and raves about the time I spend with Anne, of course. It is almost as though she were jealous, but I know that cannot be, since Anne is only my sister and not some paramour.”

“I resented Eleanor Carey once in much the same way. She and Will were somehow soulmates, and I resented that. I can understand Jane's unease.”

She thought George meant to argue the point, but he suddenly blurted, “Forgive me for upsetting you so, sister. I fear it brought on the child.”

“No, George. All is well. The child came in his own time.”

George nodded and shuffled nervously to glance at the sleeping newborn babe again. “Well, there is no red hair on this one,” he observed foolishly, but Mary did not let the words upset her. “I will be on the road, then. Thank you, Staff and Mary, for your hospitality. It is wondrous quiet here at Wivenhoe. I am not sure how I would do here after a while.”

“It is that calm and quiet we love, George. Farewell.” She smiled weakly up at him.

George bent to kiss Mary's cheek and shake Staff's hand. Staff walked him out of the room and down the stairs. Their voices faded away and the room was suddenly silent again. No boards creaked and she began to doze.

Staff came back just as the babe started to fuss for nursing. He lifted the brown-haired mite into Mary's arms and lay down carefully next to them. He watched while his son suckled greedily and Mary felt her love flow out to them both. When the child slept again, Staff said suddenly, “I wish to thank you again for our son, my love. Catherine is quite beside herself with joy, and it will be a battle to keep her from picking him up all the time. She wants to cuddle him like a doll.”

“And so do I, my love, though he is more—much more. My first love child, though the Lord above knows I cherish the other two also. But I would die for this one.”

“I pray that will never be a necessity, sweet, only that you change the toddling clothes, wipe the nose, and untangle the leading strings.”

“What else did George tell you in private after I made my dramatic exit, Staff?”

He reached over and lazily stroked her loose golden hair as he spoke quietly. “Your little cousin Madge Shelton is to marry Henry Norris, for one thing.”

“Anne never managed to be rid of Madge? She could not accomplish even that?”

“No, though His Grace beds no longer with the girl. As for the other gossip, there was not much to interest you.”

“What else did he say of the Boleyn fortunes and the queen, Staff? Please, I would know. I will worry less then, truly.”

“Remember you are here with me and safe, sweetheart, but things are bad and getting worse. Unless Anne can somehow conceive, the dire handwriting is on the royal wall.”