Page 98 of Love, Remember Me

"This is a great tragedy, my lords," the archbishop said quietly. "I take no joy in any of this. The queen is barely eighteen. If these charges are proved further, then she will end her days shortly on Tower Green as did her relative, Anne Boleyn, God assoil her soul." Thomas Cranmer had greatly admired Anne Boleyn, and tried to save her.

"Why should you care?" Norfolk snapped at him. "If my niece is convicted, then you can find a good reformed churchwoman to place by the king's side. Is not that what you and your allies really want, sir?"

"If you had not been in such a hurry to get your niece married off to the king so the Howards might be all-powerful, Thomas Howard," the archbishop thundered, "the king should not have been joined with such an unsuitable wife. None of this would have happened but for your ambition. This girl's death will be on your conscience forever."

"You would believe chamberers over a Howard?"

"Do you think it, then, a plot by the queen's chamberers to discredit her, and why would they do such a thing?" Cranmer asked.

"Women are difficult creatures at best," Norfolk muttered. "Who knows why they do any of the things that they do?"

"My lords, this bickering is getting us nowhere," the Duke of Suffolk interposed. "We have other witnesses to hear today."

Mistress Alice Restwold was brought in, and she was followed by Joan Bulmer. Both of them said essentially the same thing that Katherine Tylney and Margaret Morton had said. Each added small details that the others had perhaps forgotten, overlooked, or not been privy to, but basically their testimony was identical. They were thanked and dismissed to go back to their confinement in the Tower.

The final piece of evidence that day was a letter found among Tom Culpeper's possessions. It had been written in the spring of the year in the queen's own hand. It was dreadfully composed, badly spelt, and ended with the tender words,Yours as long as life endures, Catherine.

There was now no doubt in any of the Privy Council's minds that Catherine Howard was involved in an adulterous relationship with Thomas Culpeper. No one wanted to tell the king, but Charles Brandon, the Duke of Suffolk, knew that the duty would fall to him. He was not only the king's best friend, but Lord President of the Privy as well.

The king was wild with anger over the discovery of his wife's infidelity. Suffolk tempered the blow as best he could, but there was really no gentle way in which to impart such news.

"Give me a sword!" Henry shouted. "I will go to Syon and kill her myself, Charles! Ahh, the false bitch, and I loved her!Never again!Catherine! Catherine!" Then he began to weep.

The council took it upon themselves to issue communiques to their ambassadors in key courts in Europe explaining the latest events in the king's ongoing marital woes. The queen's behavior was referred to asabominable.

François I, France's king, and a renowned lecher, sent his dear brother Henry a most sympathetic letter of condolence.

I am sorry to hear of the displeasure and trouble which has been caused by the lewd and naughty behavior of the Queen. Albeit, knowing my good brother to be a prince of prudence, virtue and honor, I do require him to shift off the said displeasure and wisely, temperately, like myself, not reputing his honor to rest in the lightness of a woman, but to thank God of all, comforting himself in God's goodness. The lightness of women cannot bend the honor of men.

Privately François I said to the English ambassador, Sir William Paulet, of Catherine Howard, "She hath done wondrous naughty," and then he chuckled with a great appreciation of the queen's sexual behavior.

On the twenty-second day of November the Privy Council voted to take away Catherine Howard's title of queen. She was now simply Mistress Howard again. Two days later she was indicted for "having led an abominable, base, carnal, voluptuous, and vicious life before marriage, like a common harlot with divers persons, maintaining however the outward appearance of chastity and honesty." She was further accused of having led the king on, and having married him under false pretenses, and for having imperiled the crown with the possibility of bastards.

The indictment, read to the former queen at Syon House, elicited far less response than the knowledge that she was no longer queen. When the members of the council had gone, Cat looked to Nyssa and asked, "Will they kill me?"

Lady Baynton looked startled by the young woman's frankness, while Kate and Bessie began to cry.

"If you are found guilty," Nyssa said, "aye, I think they will. For a queen to cuckold her king is treason."

"Oh," Cat replied, then she grew more cheerful. "They have but the word of my chamberers," she said. "Surely they will not believe them if I deny it? I am a Howard."

"They have others to question, Cat. There is Lady Rochford, and Masters Dereham and Culpeper as well. How could you trust old Lady Ferretface, Cat? Particularly after what she did to your cousin Anne. I never understood why Duke Thomas tolerated her after that."

"Because she was vulnerable, and he could use her," Cat said bluntly. "Lady Ferretface." She giggled. "Is that what you called her? She does look rather like a ferret, doesn't she?"

"My brothers called her that," Nyssa said.

"Is that adorable cherub Giles still with the lady Anne?" Cat was once again turning the subject away from the unpleasant.

"Aye, he is," Nyssa told her.

"We must really begin to think of Christmas," Cat said. "There is a most marvelous stand of trees just beyond the house to the north. Lady Baynton, do you think we will be allowed to gather branches? And we must have candles, and a Yule log as well."

The subject of death, of treason, of all things unpleasant, was now closed. And why not? thought Nyssa. She understands even if she will not admit to it. This may be her last Christmas, and she wants to make it merry. Why shouldn't she? "We must have a wassail bowl, and roasted apples too," Nyssa told Cat. "We always have them atRiversEdge."

"Do you think we will have a boar with an apple in its mouth?" Kate Carey wondered aloud. "I always love it when the boar is brought in!"

"And will there be music, do you think?" Bessie asked.

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