Page 86 of Boleyn Traitor
‘No – but this time, with a Howard queen on the throne...’
‘I doubt that even Kitty Howard can persuade the king that his royal niece should marry her brother Charles. Remember what he said last time about entrapment! Lady Margaret’s only just got out of Syon Abbey, you’d have thought she’d have learned her lesson.’
‘It’s not as bad as last time. Not a betrothal – only poetry-promises. But I wouldn’t leave court without warning you.’
‘You shouldn’t leave court at all,’ I say crossly. ‘All the queen’s friends are young and foolish, and the king is not a young and foolish husband.’
‘She can enchant him, and you can manage her,’ she reassures me.
‘Oh, he dotes on her; but a young court reminds him that he is old enough to be their grandfather. Her youth is amemento morifor him.’
‘A courtier’s work is to build up the king,’ Anne Herbert warns. ‘Not diminish him.’
‘She’s just seventeen!’ I say despairingly. ‘How can she not make him feel old and tired by comparison?’
Windsor Castle, Autumn
1540
WE ARE BARELYreturned to Windsor Castle when Lady Agnes the old Dowager Duchess of Norfolk announces that she is coming to visit her beloved step-granddaughter.
At once, the vain young queen becomes a frightened schoolgirl again. ‘Don’t leave us alone,’ she begs me. ‘You don’t know what she’s like when she’s angry. And I always make her angry, whatever I do!’
‘She can’t be angry with the Queen of England,’ I point out. ‘Threaten her with a writ of attainder for treason and throw her in the Tower.’
‘Oh!’ She gasps on a little laugh. ‘Oh! If only I could! But you can’t put old ladies in the Tower.’
I don’t disagree, though Lady Margaret Pole is still waiting for her pardon in the Tower. ‘Well, at any rate, she can’t scold you,’ I assure her. ‘You only owe obedience to your husband the king, and to the head of your house. And the duke isn’t coming with her, is he?’
‘Oh God no!’ she says, more afraid than ever. ‘Is he? I can’t face the two of them together. I’ll say I’m ill.’
‘No, you can’t,’ I tell her. ‘But I’ll stay with you. She can’t scold you in front of me. It’s part of my duties to make sure that you are happy.’
‘Really?’ She is diverted at once. ‘Is it your duty to make me happy?’
‘Lawful joys,’ I say dampeningly. ‘Only lawful joys.’
THE DOWAGER DUCHESSis not overawed by the greatness of the motherless girl that she raised – nourishing her with neglect – in her country house at Horsham and in the shabby grandeur of Norfolk House, Lambeth. The old lady, lean as a well-bred old hound, is accompanied by her daughter the Countess of Bridgewater, a woman so honed by disaster that nothing can hurt or frighten her. Together, they walk into Windsor Castle, like a pair of raiders, scanning for loot in the echoing great state rooms, as if they see nothing to admire: not rich tapestries on the walls, nor gilding on the dark-blue beams, nor the view of the Thames winding through the woodlands of the valley below.
They both curtsey as low as they should to a queen.
‘Lady Grandmother. Dear Cousin,’ the queen says feebly. ‘So welcome.’
Behind them comes the queen’s uncle Lord William Howard and his wife Lady Margaret, behind them, her brothers Charles and George. That is when I know that they have come in force, to make Katheryn do something for them.
‘I’ll trouble you for a chair, Your Grace. I’m not any younger than when I took you in, a nobody without a penny to your name, no mother and a worthless father,’ the dowager duchess begins.
‘Very grateful,’ Katheryn whispers, sinking into her throne and waving that everyone can sit. I stand behind her.
‘We’ll speak with you alone,’ the old lady announces, glaring at me.
I swore to the little queen that I would not abandon her to this family visit even before I knew the old dowager duchess was so terrifying, and her daughter, flinty-faced.
‘Stay,’ Katheryn squeaks.
‘The queen requests my presence,’ I say grandly.
‘Then you’ll keep this between ourselves,’ the dowager duchess commands, turning sharp blue eyes on me. ‘You’re a Howard by marriage, if not by birth.’
