Part 34 (2/2)
The king and I looked at each other.
He looked stunned. ”Before G.o.d, I never meant to hurt her.”
”About some s.h.i.+rts?”
”The queen still sews my s.h.i.+rts for me. Anne didn't know. She has taken it badly.”
”Oh,” I said.
Henry shook his head. ”I shall tell the queen she shall no longer sew them for me.”
”I think that would be wise,” I said gently.
”And when she comes out, will you tell her that I was much grieved to have caused her so much pain? And tell her that the offense will never be repeated?”
”Yes,” I said. ”I'll tell her.”
”I shall send for a goldsmith and have him make her something pretty,” he said, warming to the thought. ”And when she is happy again she will forget that this quarrel ever took place.”
”She will be happy by the time she has rested,” I said hopefully. ”Of course it's hard for her, waiting to be married to you. She loves you so very much.”
For a moment he looked like the boy who had been in love with Katherine. ”Yes, that's why she calls up such a storm. Because she loves me so much.”
”Of course,” I rea.s.sured him. The last thing I wanted was for Henry to see how disproportionate Anne's anger was to the facts.
He looked tender again. ”I know. I have to be patient with her. And she's very young, and she knows almost nothing of the world.”
I kept my mouth shut, thinking of the young girl I had been when my family had handed me over to him, and how I had never been allowed a whispered protest, let alone a temper tantrum.
”I'll get her some rubies,” he said. ”A virtuous woman, rubies, you know.”
”She'll like that,” I said with certainty.
Henry gave her rubies, and she rewarded him with more than a smile. She came back to her room very late one night with her gown all disheveled and her hood in her hand. I had been asleep in bed, I never waited up for her as she used to do for me. She pulled the covers off me to make me wake up and unlace her.
”I did what you said and he adored it,” she said. ”And I let him play in my hair and with my b.r.e.a.s.t.s.”
”So you are friends again,” I said. I unlaced her stomacher and pulled the petticoat over her head.
”And Father is to become an earl,” Anne said with quiet satisfaction. ”Earl of Wilts.h.i.+re and Ormonde. I am to be Lady Anne Rochford and George will be Lord Rochford. Father is to go back to Europe to make the peace, and Lord George our brother is to go with him. Lord George our brother is to become one of the king's most favored amba.s.sadors.”
I gasped at this tumble of favors. ”An earldom for Father?”
”Yes.”
”And George will be Lord Rochford! How grand for him, he'll love it! And an amba.s.sador!”
”As he has always wanted.”
”And me?” I asked. ”What is there for me?”
Anne fell into bed and let me pull her shoes off her feet and peel down her stockings. ”You stay as the widow Lady Carey,” she said. ”Just the other Boleyn girl. I can't do everything, you know.”
Christmas 1529 THE COURT WAS TO MEET AT GREENWICH, AND THE QUEEN was to be present. She was to receive every honor and Anne was not to be seen. was to be present. She was to receive every honor and Anne was not to be seen.
”What now?” I asked George. I sat on his bed while he lounged in the window seat. His man was packing his trunks for his trip to Rome, and every now and then George would look up and shout at his impa.s.sive servant: ”Not the blue cape, it has the moth.” Or: ”I hate that hat, give it to Mary for young Henry.”
”What now?” He repeated my question.
”I've been summoned to the queen's apartments and I am to live in my old room in her wing of the palace. Anne is to be in her rooms at the tiltyard all on her own. I think Mother is to stay with her, but I, and all the ladies in waiting, are to wait on the queen, not on Anne.”
”It can't be a bad sign,” George said. ”He's expecting a lot of people out of the City to watch them dine over the days of Christmas. The last thing he can afford are the merchants and the city traders saying that he is incontinent. He wants everyone to think that he has chosen Anne for the benefit of England, not for l.u.s.t.”
I glanced a little nervously at the servant.
”Joss is all right,” George said. ”Rather deaf, thank G.o.d. Aren't you, Joss?”
The man did not turn his head.
”Oh well, leave us,” George said. Still the man went on, stolidly packing.
”All the same you should take care,” I said.
George raised his voice. ”Leave us, Joss. You can finish later.”
The man started, looked round, bowed to George and to me, and went out.
George left the window seat and sprawled on the bed at my side. I pulled his head down so that it rested in my lap and made myself comfortable against the headboard.
”D'you think it will ever happen?” I asked idly. ”It feels as if we have been planning this wedding for a hundred years.”
He had closed his dark eyes but now he opened them and looked up at me. ”G.o.d knows,” he said. ”G.o.d knows what it will have cost when it does come: the happiness of a queen, the safety of the throne, the respect of the people, the sanct.i.ty of the church. Sometimes it seems to me as if you and I have spent our lives working for Anne, and I don't even know what we have gained from it.”
”And you an heir to an earldom? To two earldoms?”
”I wanted to go on crusade and murder unbelievers,” he said. ”I wanted to come home to a beautiful woman in a castle who would wors.h.i.+p me for my courage.”
”And I wanted a hop field and an apple orchard and a sheep run,” I said.
”Fools,” George said, and closed his eyes.
He was asleep in a few minutes. I held him gently, watching his chest rise and fall, and then I leaned my head back against the brocade covering the headboard and closed my eyes and drifted into sleep myself.
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