Part 50 (1/2)

”Some bread,” he said. ”A couple of mugs of small ale. Some fruit if you have it, for the lady. A couple of eggs, boiled, a little ham perhaps? A cheese? Anything nice.”

”This is my first batch of the day,” the man grumbled. ”I have hardly broken my own fast. Never mind running around slicing ham for the gentry.”

A little c.h.i.n.k and the gleam of a silver coin changed everything.

”I have some excellent ham in my larder and a cheese just up from the country that my own cousin made,” the baker said persuasively. ”And my wife shall rise and pour you the small ale herself. She's a good brewer, there's not a better taste in all of London.”

”Thank you,” William said gracefully as he sat down beside me and winked, and rested his arm comfortably around my waist.

”Newly wed?” the man asked, shoveling loaves out of the oven and seeing William's gaze on my face.

”Yes,” I said.

”Long may it last,” he said doubtfully, and turned the loaves onto the wooden counter.

”Amen to that,” William said quietly, and drew me to him and kissed me on the lips and whispered privately in my ear: ”I am going to love you like this forever.”

William saw me into the little wicket gate to the Tower before going down to the river, hiring a river boatman and entering through the watergate. Madge Shelton was in our room when I got in, but too absorbed in brus.h.i.+ng her hair and changing her gown to wonder where I had been so early in the morning. Half the court seemed to be waking up in the wrong beds. The triumph of Anne, the mistress who had become a wife, was an inspiration to every loose girl in the country.

I washed my face and hands and dressed ready to go with Anne and the other ladies to matins. Anne, in her first day of queens.h.i.+p, was dressed very richly in a dark gown with a jeweled hood and a long string of pearls twisted twice around her neck. She still wore her golden ”B” for Boleyn, and carried a prayerbook encased in gold leaf. She nodded when she saw me and I dropped into a deep curtsy and followed the hem of her gown as if I was honored to do so.

After Ma.s.s and after breakfast with the king, Anne started to reorganize her household. Many of Queen Katherine's servants had transferred their loyalty without much inconvenience, like the rest of us they would rather be attached to a rising star than to the lost queen. My eye was caught by the name Seymour.

”Are you having a Seymour girl as your lady in waiting?” I asked curiously.

”Which one?” George asked idly, pulling the list toward him. ”That Agnes is said to be a terrible wh.o.r.e.”

”Jane,” Anne said. ”But I shall have Aunt Elizabeth, and Cousin Mary. I should think we have enough Howards to outweigh the influence of one Seymour.”

”Who asked for her place?” George inquired.

”They're all asking for places,” Anne said wearily. ”All of them, all of the time. I thought one or two women from other families would be a sop. The Howards can't have everything.”

George laughed. ”Oh, why not?”

Anne pushed her chair back from the table and rested her hand on her belly and sighed. George was alert.

”Tired?” he asked.

”A little gripe.” She looked at me. ”It doesn't matter, does it? Little nips of pain? They don't mean anything?”

”I had quite bad pains with Catherine, and she went full term, and then an easy birth.”

”They don't mean that it'll be a girl though, do they?” George said anxiously.

I looked at the two of them, the matching long Boleyn noses and long faces and those eager eyes. They were the same features that had looked back at me from my own mirror for all of my life, except that now I had lost that hungry expression.

”Be at peace,” I said gently to George. ”There's no reason in the world why she should not have the most beautiful son. And worrying is the worst thing she can do.”

”As well tell me not to breathe,” Anne snapped. ”It's like carrying the whole future of England in my belly. And the queen miscarried over and over again.”

”Because she was not his proper wife,” George said soothingly. ”Because their marriage was never valid. Of course G.o.d will give you a son.”

Silently, she stretched her hand across the table. George gripped it tight. I looked at both of them, at the absolute desperation of their ambition, still riding them as hard as when they were the children of a small lord on the rise. I looked at them and knew the relief of my escape.

I waited for a moment and then I said, ”George, I have heard some gossip about you which is not to your credit.”

He looked up with his merry, wicked smile. ”Surely not!”

”It is serious,” I said.

”Who have you been listening to?” he returned.

”Court whispers,” I said. ”They say that Sir Francis Weston is part of a wild circle, you among them.”

He glanced quickly at Anne, as if to see what she knew.

She looked inquiringly at me. She was clearly ignorant of what was being said. ”Sir Francis is a loyal friend.”

”The queen has spoken.” George tried to make a joke.

”Because she doesn't know the half of it, and you do,” I snapped back.

Anne was alerted by that. ”I have to be all but perfect,” she said. ”I can't let them have anything that they could whisper to the king against me.”

George patted her hand. ”It's nothing,” he soothed her again. ”Don't fret. A couple of wild nights and a little too much to drink. A couple of bad women and some high gambling. I'd never be a discredit to you, Anne, I promise.”

”It's more than that,” I said flatly. ”They say that Sir Francis is George's lover.”

Anne's eyes widened, she reached for George at once. ”George, no?”

”Absolutely not.” He took her hand in a comforting clasp.

She turned a cold face to me. ”Don't come to me with your nasty stories, Mary,” she said. ”You're as bad as Jane Parker.”

”You had better take care,” I warned George. ”Any mud thrown at you sticks to us all.”

”There's no mud,” he replied, but his eyes were on Anne's face. ”Nothing at all.”

”You had better be sure,” she said.

”Nothing at all,” he repeated.

We left her to rest and went out to find the rest of the court who were playing quoits with the king.