The Unfaithful Queen: A Novel of Henry VIII's Fifth Wife (31 page)

“What now!” my husband exclaimed, his face a knot of anxious wrinkles. He had just received word that the citizens of both Lincoln and York, those cheering, pacific subjects who had seemed to welcome us with such good will when we were among them, were once again in revolt. He was still reeling from the shock and deep disappointment that his planned meeting with his royal nephew had not happened. And now, wounded and angry, he was dealt an even more severe blow. For the physicians were saying that the prince lay near death from a quartan fever.

Prince Edward had been brought to Nonsuch, to a newly completed wing of the vast palace which was slowly rising (apart from the collapsed tower) and promising to be a magnificent structure. We set out from Hampton Court at once, traveling the short distance to the new palace quickly. We found Dr. Butts and Dr. Chambers watching over the prince, with his nurses and the others in his household in attendance in an outer chamber. The chief apothecary, Thomas Alsop, occupied a chamber of his own where his assistants were at work preparing potions and syrups.

At my first sight of the boy I realized that he was much more ill than he had been the last time I saw him. He was so still he was almost corpse-like. There was only his rasping cough to indicate that he still lived. Thin and weak-looking, with dark circles under his closed eyes, he lay inert, sweating heavily, in the grip of the fever.

“He has been bled twice,” Dr. Chambers told the king. “But the surgeon would not bleed him a third time because it was the day of the new moon and besides that, the air was too cold. As soon as the moon waxes, and the weather warms, he will be bled again.”

“There is no doubt it is a quartan fever then?” my husband demanded.

“No doubt. The heat rises within him every third day, and lingers through a fourth. See how his nails have no color. How his body swells—and sweats. The crisis comes and goes, but there is no lessening of it, except by bleeding.”

I remembered very well how the prince had looked when ill the previous year. How small and fragile he had seemed. Even now he appeared to be very small, though his fourth birthday had just been celebrated.

“Can you not apply a poultice? I have made many such myself, as you know well, to be used on my legs. They are effective.”

“But not against fever. For fever there is only bleeding—and prayer.”

“Bleeding did not save my wife,” I heard the king say in an undertone, speaking more to himself than to the physician. “My good wife. The one who gave me a son.”

A weak son, I wanted to say but did not. And of course I did not want the prince to be too weak to survive.

We stayed by the prince’s bedside, sleeping in his bedchamber and taking our meals near him. The king conferred often with the apothecary and his assistants, giving them advice, checking and approving every remedy they concocted. He paced up and down the bedchamber, impatient to see the results of the treatment the prince had been given.

On the third day of our stay the surgeon came. The moon was waxing, he announced, and he could bleed Edward again. He opened a vein and the prince’s blood dripped slowly into a bowl. Yet still the fever increased. Hour by hour his small body grew more red and hot, his cheeks fairly burning to the touch. The physicians were anxious, and the king was fairly beside himself with frustration and worry.

“By all the saints!” he cried out, “Can nothing be done?”

A long silence spread through the room. Then I heard a timid voice say, “There is a wise woman.”

It was one of the prince’s nurses, a gentle young girl.

“Speak up, girl!” the king said irritably. “What wise woman?”

“She comes from Cuddington.” Cuddington I knew to be the village that had been destroyed in order for Nonsuch to rise.

“Yes—and what of her?”

“She—she has the healing power.”

The king looked at the girl, his eyes narrow, his gaze shrewd.

“Have you seen her perform healings?”

“If you please, Your Majesty, she healed many who were stricken of the plague.”

“And you know this for a certainty.”

“Yes, Your Majesty. She healed my mother and my two young sisters.”

“Well, she can do no harm. Bring her here.”

“She is here already, Your Majesty. She has been waiting to be of service.”

My husband looked at Dr. Chambers.

“Why did no one tell me this!”

The physician shook his head. “We put no faith in such witchcraft, sire. Only proven remedies are effective—”

But the king only pushed the old man aside.

“Bring her in!” he said to the girl, who went out of the room and soon returned with a much older woman, stout and grey-haired but vigorous in her movements, and with a face of surprising youthfulness. Her skin was smooth, her forehead unlined. There was a radiance about her. She carried a basket, which she handed to the girl. Then the newcomer curtseyed deeply to the king, and again to me.

“Can you heal my son!” The king’s words were a demand, not a question.

The wise woman smiled, a luminous smile.

“Yes, sire.” Taking her basket, she drew from it an earthen pot. She removed the cap and bent over the prince’s small bed.

At this Dr. Butts stepped forward.

“Your Majesty, you cannot let this—this leech—do harm to your son! I pray you, dismiss her at once!”

King Henry silenced him.

“Go on,” he said to the wise woman, who proceeded to take some of the contents of the pot on her fingers and smear it over the prince’s body. The stench of the substance was terrible. I drew away and put my pomander to my nose.

“What is that you are using?” King Henry asked.

“First I roast a fat cat. Then I stuff it with bear and hedgehog fat and herbs.”

“What herbs?”

She began to reel off a long list of names, from rue and rosemary to other plants unfamiliar to me.

“The compound is from an old herbal that has been in my family since the days of King Henry—the fifth King Henry. I have never known it to fail.”

The physicians began to protest again and this time the king sent them out of the room.

Three times over the next few hours the compound was spread over the prince’s corpse-like body, until he began to wriggle and shake himself and then, to our astonishment, he slowly sat up.

The wise woman nodded. “Yes,” she said quietly. “The fever is leaving him.”

Under the direction of his benefactor, the prince was bathed, then dressed in warm flannel, and then given supper.

The physicians were brought in to observe the remarkable change in their patient.

“I would never have believed it,” Dr. Chambers said, shaking his head. “The apothecary must be given the formula for that stinking grease.”

“For that life-giving balm, you mean, don’t you?” was my tart retort. I had not forgiven Dr. Chambers for the way he had treated me when I confided in him, or for telling the entire court that I was barren.

But the physician ignored my remark, and went into the apothecary’s chamber without taking any notice of me.

My husband came over to me and put his arm around me, a gesture he had not made in some time. He was clearly overcome with relief and joy at the prince’s great improvement.

“Ah, Catherine! What a near thing! My boy! My dear boy! He does seem so much better, does he not?”

“Indeed he does,” I said with a smile. “He has his father’s strength.”

We stayed at Nonsuch another day and a night, until it seemed certain that the prince would recover completely. Then, after giving the wise woman a fat purse of gold coins and thanking her with fervent courtesy, my husband and I climbed into our waiting carriage for the return to Hampton Court.

FIFTEEN

IT
was the time of autumn that I liked best, that unsure end of the season when the weather varies day by day and the gold and auburn leaves are everywhere underfoot and a few warm days linger on. I was glad to be back in my apartments at Hampton Court, with their view of the river and its mists. I could see the barges coming up from London, discharging their passengers and taking on new ones. I had no wish to be among them. I had had more than enough of traveling, now it was time to settle in and wait in peace for the winter season to come, with its cheering holidays and its cold blasts.

It was as I sat watching out my window, Jonah scampering nearby, that I caught a glimpse of a familiar tall rotund man, coming ashore from a wherry and striding toward the river stairs. It was Uncle William, returned from France. I had not expected him. I was overjoyed to see him.

“Dearest Catherine!” His greeting was warm as ever, his smile wide and comforting. I led him into my bedchamber where I knew we would not be disturbed.

“Do you think we could have some of your good calming poppy broth?” he asked as we seated ourselves comfortably near the warm fire. “I feel the need of a soothing posset. I don’t know whether the news has reached you yet, but I was caught in a very bad storm—the worst I’ve ever encountered—coming back from France.”

“But how terrible!” Pausing just long enough to ask my chamberer for the poppy broth, I fixed my attention on my uncle, who was describing the crippling of his vessel in the high waves and fierce winds.

“We didn’t sink, though it seemed for a time as though we would. The vessel was badly damaged. I confess to you, Catherine, I was lucky to escape alive. Unfortunately, everything I had with me—most of my possessions, other than the furnishings of Oxenheath—was lost. Even some of my treasured family heirlooms.”

He took a long breath and, in expelling it, seemed to shrink down, as if in unburdening himself about the loss of his possessions he had lost something of his girth.

The broth arrived and we both sipped it, anticipating its calming effect.

“At least you survived. That is all that matters.”

He nodded. “Of course, only—”

“Only what?”

“The terror of it all lingers. Some of the fear has stayed with me, maybe because I’m old.” He grinned. “Old and fat—but lucky.”

“Like Jonah here,” I said, picking up the monkey. “You know I named him after Jonah in the Bible, who was lucky too.”

“Thrown into the sea during a terrible storm, as I recall—but then rescued by a whale. I saw no whales while enduring that alarming crossing.”

As we sat together, sipping our broth, I saw a further change come over Uncle William. His look was, as always, benign, but tinged with concern.

“I fear there is another storm coming, Catherine,” he said after a time. “And I must be the one to tell you about it.”

I stopped petting Jonah and put him down.

Uncle William licked his lips and set down his cup of broth. He took a deep breath.

“The king has left Hampton Court, Catherine. He left last night, in haste and in secret. He went to London to meet with his councilors.” He paused, then took another breath and went on. “I’m very much afraid, my dearest girl, that the king is about to set you aside.”

I felt my knees turn to water. I thought I was going to faint. I reached out to Uncle William, who took my hand in his two strong warm hands, which felt slightly moist.

“You must be brave, and listen carefully to what I am going to tell you. Can you do that?”

My head felt muzzy. I could not think clearly.

“I will try.” My words were so soft I could hardly hear them.

“That’s my girl. This is what you must understand, Catherine. We Howards are under assault. All of us. I was summoned back from France because our family is being attacked on all sides. I have been accused of stealing funds from the royal treasury. Your uncle Thomas is accused of conspiring against the throne, and concealing treason. Your grandmother is accused of treason, of stealing valuable papers and burning them. And you—you are being made the center of it all, I’m sorry to say.”

“I?”

He nodded gravely.

“Because I am Jocasta’s daughter.”

“No, dear. Because you are—to use Archbishop Cranmer’s words—unchaste.”

I began to cry then. There was no help for it. I could not even try to conceal from Uncle William what was well known to Grandma Agnes and no doubt to Uncle Thomas and Uncle William as well. That Francis had been my lover and Henry Manox my would-be seducer, my partner in lechery.

After a few moments I managed to wipe my eyes and look into Uncle William’s kind face once again.

“But I never allowed Henry Manox to take my maidenhead,” I said softly. “And I was handfasted to Francis Dereham. We were husband and wife. At least I believed we were.”

“Your crime, Catherine, was in concealing what you have just confessed to me. Your unchastity made you unfit to become queen. Also your untruthfulness about it. You betrayed the king every day that you continued to conceal your past.”

I pulled my hand out of Uncle William’s grasp and buried my head in my hands. I could bear no more.

I felt him pat me on the shoulder, meaning to comfort me.

“Drink your poppy broth,” he said. “I will be back later to talk to you further.”

*   *   *

I did not know what to do. As soon as Uncle William left me, I rushed, panic-stricken, into the corridor outside my apartments. But there were guardsmen there, a dozen or more, and they blocked my path. I was told, firmly but courteously, that it was the king’s command that I keep to my own rooms.

My women had disappeared. Even the boy who came in to bring my firewood did not come as he usually did. Where was Joan? Where was Lady Rochford? And all my other maids of honor and ladies? I looked out of my bedchamber window at the river, and saw the royal barge, moored near the river stairs.

Had my husband returned? Could I appeal to him for mercy? I watched the barge, but saw no one enter or leave it. I was hungry. How was I to eat if there were no servants to bring me food from the kitchens?

I found some apples one of the servants had left behind, and fell on them hungrily. I tried to sleep, but could not. I was far too worried. When would Uncle William return? Where were my women? As if to echo the turmoil I was feeling, the skies began to darken and soon a dismal rain began to fall.