The Tapestry (9 page)

12

H
enry VIII had ordered the destruction of the monasteries, thus ending a way of life held sacred in England for a thousand years. How could I tell him that it was the nuns who taught me to weave? But as he drummed his fingers on the table, growing impatient with my silence, I had no choice.

“I learned it while I served as a novice at the Dominican Order of sisters in Dartford,” I said.

I waited for him to erupt, to bellow. Here would come the famous, feared temper. But the king stroked his beard and said, “They had a loom, correct? Your work was not done with needles, I think.”

“No, Your Majesty. I mean, yes. We used a loom.”

“Your work was first-rate on the phoenix tapestry that the queen our wife purchased,” said the king. “It shows a certain delicacy, an interpretation of myth, that is too often lacking in these triptychs from Brussels.”

My cheeks hot, I said, “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“And you have begun another?” he said, leaning toward me across the table, his eyes alight with interest.

I explained that I’d ordered the design for
The Sorrow of Niobe
, a Greek queen who lost everything to the gods.

It would not seem possible for King Henry to look at me more intently, but that piece of news seemed to trigger some deep contemplation.

“Hubris, ahhhh,” he said. “You have made an interesting choice.”

“Pardon me, Your Majesty?”

A smile playing on his lips, the king said, “Niobe’s children were slain by the gods because of hubris. She had defied them, saying that her children were superior to all. For her pride and arrogance, for her overestimation of their importance, she was punished.”

I had seen the word
hubris
in relation to this myth but not understood its full meaning. Now my stomach twisted as I realized my choice could be seen as celebrating defiance of the gods. If King Henry saw himself as a sacred being—which seemed likely—then this tapestry would offend him.

“Pride is a sin, Your Highness,” I said.

“Very true, Cousin.” He sipped some wine and asked, “Will you use a living woman as your model for Niobe the queen?”

“I know that near the end of a weave, when finishing the faces, some have been known to use paintings or even living subjects as models,” I said, relieved at the change in course of conversation. “I suppose it is possible.”

The king beckoned for a servant, who shortly after darted away, and suddenly Master Thomas Culpepper appeared at the table. He bent over so that the king could say something to him alone. He nodded and then withdrew from the table. I tried to catch his eye—it felt wrong to fail to acknowledge Culpepper, my greatest friend at Whitehall after Catherine Howard—but he did not look in my direction.

“There is no substitute in art for experience,” said the king, approvingly. “Bearing that in mind, tell us what you think of our collection of tapestries. You see only a portion here at Whitehall, but we are proud of what is so displayed.”

And so went my discussion of tapestry with the king of England. As the sovereign worked his way through three more courses of food, we talked of the series I had seen thus far. He was eager to hear my opinions. The one in the main hall turned out be called
The Fall of Troy
. Most of the king’s tapestries told tales of classic Rome or stories of the Old Testament. “Our prize is still
The Story of David
, we purchased it twelve years ago,” he said. “We’ve assigned a man
in Brussels. And scouts in Italy and France and Flanders. We hate to think of losing a good tapestry, particularly if it’s to the king of France.”

This was a world I had not imagined. Of course I knew that the largest tapestries were woven in Brussels and that the wealthiest families prided themselves on their possessions. But this sprawling community of artisans and weavers, fueled by new ideas and techniques, financed by the competitive kings of Europe—I’d had only an inkling.

“Our grandfather, Edward the Fourth, built up a strong collection,” the king explained as he dove into the next course, one of roasted pig. “The king our father added to it; he had a perceptive eye for tapestry, as he did for all things. When he died, the Crown owned four hundred pieces of tapestry.”

“Four
hundre
d
?” It did not seem possible.

“The royal collection now stands at eighteen hundred tapestries.” He smiled proudly. “We had it inventoried. We do so periodically. We like to know exactly what we own.” He turned his head to the group of servants standing behind. “Fetch Sir Anthony Denny.”

Not a moment later, a thin, red-haired gentleman appeared, and the king ordered him to commence with a new inventory of the tapestries of Whitehall.

“Your Majesty, if I may?”

With a start, I turned toward the queen, who had called out to her husband in her quavering, heavily accented voice. I was overcome with shame at my incivility. I had been embroiled in conversation with the king for some time, and had made no effort to include the queen.

“Sire, I know—that you love the music,” she said slowly. “I have surprise.”

The doors swung open and four men strode in, carrying musical instruments. They were all dark, resembling each other to an unusual degree. With one graceful movement, the quartet bowed low to the king and queen.

The queen’s translator announced on her behalf, “These are the
Bassano brothers, come to court from Venice at the queen’s invitation, to entertain Your Majesty.”

King Henry looked truly taken aback. But he gathered himself and pointed at one of the brothers and asked what instrument he carried.

“It is called the violin, Sire,” the man answered in French.

I will never forget the performance of the Bassano brothers in the queen’s privy chamber. It could have been the potency of the wine, or my jangled nerves over conversing with King Henry, or my constant and underlying fear of the Palace of Whitehall. Perhaps it was all of those things. But I found the piercing, soaring, aching sound of that violin, the principal instrument in the quartet, so powerful that it was at times hard to draw breath.

I loved music—I used to play a
vihuela
, taught by my mother—but it had been a long time since I’d heard instruments play. When was the last occasion? It took me a moment, and then I remembered, with a twist of my heart. The wedding of Agatha and John Gwinn just a year ago. I danced at that wedding, the last one with Geoffrey Scovill, who admitted more than he should have of his feelings for me. Although I had always known—always. How much Geoffrey and I had hurt each other. And the Gwinns said he would leave Dartford. What if he’d already done so—and I’d never have the chance to speak to Geoffrey again.

The Bassano brothers finished, and the queen clapped her hands, well pleased. As for the king, he had gone still as a statute, his small blue eyes a touch bleary in his fleshy face.

We waited for his reaction. Surely he must be impressed.

Henry VIII cleared his throat and said, “Such music is not appropriate for a small dinner of family in a privy chamber.”

The queen’s face fell. I could not believe that His Majesty, known for his passion for music, did not appreciate what his wife had done. Standing behind her, Lady Rochford smirked.

The king continued, “Still, we shall be sure that these brothers from Venice are fairly compensated.”

I was in an odd way grateful for his coldness to Anne of Cleves, for it broke the spell. During the long discussion of tapestry, I had found it hard to hold on to my hatred of the king. It had almost seemed as if we
were
family, speaking of a common interest. His depth of knowledge of tapestry, his references and insights, were so exceptional that I had been quite carried away. But now I’d returned to earth. The king was a tyrant who had ordered the deaths of people I loved. He could never be my family.

The king rose to his feet with a groan, pulling himself up by gripping the top of his high-backed seat. He had eaten and drunk so much. It was surprising he was able to rise without assistance of strong-backed menservants.

“We bid you good day, Madame,” he said to his wife. “We have another matter of tapestry to discuss with our kinswoman, Joanna.”

Anne of Cleves said quietly, “Good day.”

I rose and curtsied to the queen. To prolong my time with the king was a daunting prospect. I’d hoped to be free of him by now. But at least this meant we would soon finish our business and I’d be able to leave for Dartford.

The king moved with difficulty from the queen’s privy chamber. He had been sitting a long time; his leg seemed now a source of utter agony. I wasn’t sure what was wrong with him—Master Culpepper had said something about open sores on the king’s leg requiring the constant attention of a physician.

We passed a portrait of his third queen, Jane Seymour, hanging on the wall. How pale and pensive she looked, as if she knew she would die before the marriage was two years old. I wondered which ghosts walked with King Henry along the passageways of Whitehall: the first wife he spurned; the second one he had killed; or the third one, whom he lost after she did her duty and produced a male heir. Perhaps it was not so strange the king showed no interest in Queen Anne, for he could well be a man worn down from being husband to the trio who preceded her.

Now that I stood close to him, that singular odor filled my
head. Aside from the fruit and floral extracts and the musk was the same indefinable smell—familiar and animal-like and somehow disgusting. At dinner I’d thought it came from one of the myriad dishes of meat. But we were far from the table now. In trying to place it, my mind skipped to a memory of Edmund treating a wound in the Dartford infirmary and then I had it—what I smelled was infected flesh. As much as he tried to cover it up, the king’s leg wound stank.

We finally arrived at the destination the king had in mind: the chamber housing
The Story of David
. It was undeniably magnificent, each glittering tapestry in the long series depicting an episode of the ancient king’s life. We stood side by side, saying nothing, for a few moments.

The skill of the weavers, undoubtedly working in Brussels, astonished me. In their hands, flatly woven wool and silken threads took on the appearance of curved, shiny battle armor; of a shimmering meadow of pink, red, and violet flowers; of the deep, soft folds of a lady’s gown; of the radiant sun itself.

“We come here often, for only this king of the Israelites could understand our destiny,” said Henry VIII, very solemn. “We are another David, chosen by God.”

I stole a glance at him. Did he truly believe this? King Henry’s face was red and slick with sweat, whether from the long meal in the candlelight or the stabbing pain of his leg, I did not know. “We must lead the people from the darkness and ignorance of papal superstition to truth and goodness,” he announced.

I clutched my hands tight, to keep them from trembling.

Although he did not turn from
The Story of David
to look at me, the king must have sensed my fear. “Do not be troubled, Joanna, for you were not at fault for seeking to become a nun. You are clearly a woman of intelligence. What you require is our instruction.”

I did not like the sound of that.

Sir Anthony Denny approached and, to my relief, reminded the king of a council meeting, but King Henry waved him off. “We shall
be there soon enough,” he said in that high, sharp voice. Then, his tone gentler, he said to me, “Tell us, Cousin, what you think of the paintings of Whitehall? You are knowledgeable about tapestry, we would like to discover what else you can speak to.”

“I appreciate art but know little of its technique, Your Majesty,” I said. “When a painting moves me, I am not sure of the reason.”

“And has a painting of mine moved you?” He turned to inspect me. “Ah, yes, one has.”

When I described the painting I had seen in the hall just before dinner, the king laughed a little. “You
are
a woman of surprises,” he said. “That is one of our favorites. It is adapted from a series done years ago by our court painter, Hans Holbein, called
The Dance of Death
.”

“Then the skeleton in the painting is . . .”

“ . . . death.” Henry VIII finished my sentence. “It appears in each one of the series, but to different people: a nobleman, a poor man, a merchant, an abbess, even a king. You understand, Joanna, death comes to all.”

I felt a chill. And for a fleeting second I thought I glimpsed fear in the king’s face, too. To believe yourself chosen by God to be another David, and yet to quake before mortality, what a strange state. Or was it guilt that haunted him, guilt for the monasteries he’d destroyed, the parade of martyrs he’d created?

The king said firmly, “We did not ask for your company after dinner to speak of death. Put Holbein and his fancies from your mind. We wish to commission your next tapestry
, The Sorrow of Niobe
, but we have a condition. We would choose the subject whose face you model Niobe’s on.”

It took me a moment to grasp what he was saying. “But Your Majesty, my loom is in Dartford. I do all my weaving there. Unless you plan to send this person to Kent, I don’t understand how it will be possible.”