Page 110 of Boleyn Traitor
‘If you could find a little private gallery like we met before?’ Kitty whispers. ‘Please, Jane. I can’t bear that every day he is one side of the king and I am the other, and some days I never even say one word to him.’
‘I can’t go wandering around the Bishop of Lincoln’s palace, looking for a quiet corner! What explanation could I give?’
‘You could say that you were meeting a lover!’ she suggests, giggling. ‘Go on, Jane. You’re young enough and pretty enough. Why shouldn’t you be sneaking out to meet someone? It could be Culpeper?’
‘Because if the queen’s chief lady-in-waiting is sneaking out to meet a lover, then it reflects badly on the queen!’ I reprove her; but I can’t help smiling.
‘He says he’d meet you the moment you invited him. He says any of them would.’
I laugh. ‘Oh, don’t be so ridiculous, Kitty! I can’t meet a young man any more than you can.’
‘Just once. I swear, just this once.’
‘It’s not possible.’
The brightness drains from her face, and she brings her horse beside me and reaches out to clasp my hands on the reins. I have never seen her so serious. ‘Jane, I am not laughing now. I really cannot bear...’ She breaks off. ‘It’s hard for me to do what I have to...’ She stops herself saying more. ‘I don’t see how to get through these days... these nights...’
She pauses for a moment and lets my hand go, takes up her own reins. Her face is grim; she looks like a woman in lifetime imprisonment. I think: we have driven her too hard; she cannot break down now.
‘I have to have something, one thing that makes me happy!’ she says piteously. ‘If I am to smile all the time and dance every night... If I have to greet him when they roll him into my bed... if I have to let him... Jane, if I have to let him do what he must... and it’s not like... it’s not like lovemaking... I swear to God, I have to have some moment in the day when I am happy, when I am myself.’
There is such a bitter contrast between her fine gown, her bejewelled hat, and the deadness of her hazel eyes. I think: if I can just get her to York, he will crown her there, and then she is queen and we are halfway to the prize. I think: I have to get her through this year; he cannot last another winter. I think: I am a hardened courtier, but even I balk at forcing an unwilling young woman – really, a girl – into the bed of an old man for what is no better than a rape. This is brutal work; it is wicked work. If the price of her obedience is to see Thomas Culpeper once, I cannot refuse her. Better for me that I make themeeting safe than the two young lovers betray themselves. Better for me that I amVenusin this story of courtly love than that Catherine Tilney steps into my place and wins the power of a confidante.
‘Very well – just this once, I’ll see if there is a stair or a gallery or somewhere you can meet, but it can only be this once and only for a moment.’
‘Just once, just for a moment,’ she promises, and at once, childlike, she is transformed. Her face is radiant; the colour floods into her cheeks. ‘Just once, Jane, and then I can face Lincoln and tonight. I swear I’ll never ask you for anything again.’
WE MAKE Agrand entry to Lincoln, the streets cleaned, ankle deep in silvery sand, the bells of the cathedral pealing, the citizens on their knees to beg pardon for the uprising, the clergy of the church and the officials of the town bringing gifts and reciting welcomes. Kitty is bored to tears by the Latin addresses, but her eyes are so wide, her mouth naturally upturned in a smile, that even when she is most sulky, she looks angelically beautiful.
We enter the cathedral for a long church service where Kitty kneels and stands and bows her head in prayer and kisses the crucifix and listens to a long welcome in Latin and a hymn in her praise without fidgeting. She does not glance towards Thomas Culpeper, who stands behind the king. She is as queenly as if she were born to it and not effortfully playacting.
The thanksgiving service lasts for hours; only Lady Mary pays attention all the way through, and when it is finally over, the royal couple leave the cathedral under the soaring west door and walk down the hill hand in hand over the swept paving stones to the bishop’s palace. I can see from Kitty’s awkward walk that he is leaning on her. The favourites close up, fearing that Kitty will stagger under his weight; but they don’t dare to offer help.
He is flushed and sweaty by the time we get down the hill, dragging his foot over the hard cobbles of the entrance. As soon as the gatesare closed on the gawping faces, he rounds furiously on Katheryn and sends her to her rooms. He beckons Culpeper and Seymour to either side, and they half-lift him indoors. As they manhandle him up the stairs, we hear a muffled groan of pain, and Kitty hurries out of earshot, with us running behind her.
She has a beautiful suite of rooms with large Venetian glass windows where she can see both cathedral and castle and the people still lingering in the streets below. My bedroom is the next floor up, adjoining her bathroom. It is the bedroom for the captain of the watch, and it guards a stair that runs directly to the rear of the palace, the stables, and the garden. I unpack my own things and then open the locked door and go down the little circular stone staircase to the inner ward, where the garden runs down the hill. It is perfect for a secret entrance.
The king has recovered his temper by dinnertime, and there are long speeches of praise that cheer him, but it is not going to be a late night. He eats hugely; every dish goes first to him and then to the queen and then out to the court in order of precedence. Nothing comes from the king’s place untouched; he takes a spoon of everything and often double or even treble portions. Kitty beside him, pecking at her food, looks more and more birdlike, more and more ethereal. It seems quite impossible that she should be his wife. She looks as if she would break beneath his weight when he mounts her and be smothered by the fat of his chest.
But he will not get to her bed tonight. My uncle shoots me an angry look, but no one can stop the king eating himself into a torpor. By the time he is hauled to his feet and stands swaying, he is sodden with drink and flatulent with food. He thanks the bishop for good company, kisses Kitty’s hand, and beckons his favourites to help him to his rooms. The young maids look hopefully at the queen, hoping for dancing and a merry night now that the old king is going to bed, but Kitty disappoints them by rising and going to her rooms.
We pretend to get ready for bed, dressing Kitty in her nightdress and ornate night robe, tying her nightcap on her head and orderingthe maids to their beds. Kitty tells Catherine Tilney that she will sit with me for a while in my bedroom.
Catherine watches as I set the queen a chair and stoke up my little fire. ‘Shall I wait?’ she asks.
‘No, I’ll put the queen to bed,’ I tell her, and close the door on her surprised face.
As soon as she is gone, Kitty leaps to her feet.
‘Not yet,’ I say. ‘Not until they are all quiet and the lights are out all around the palace.’
‘But he won’t wait in the dark!’
‘He has to wait,’ I say firmly. ‘We’re not letting him in until I am sure that the whole palace is silent.’
She takes off her nightcap and frees her hair from the plait in a tumble of golden-brown waves. ‘You’re never meeting him like that,’ I say flatly. ‘Put your cap back on.’
Instead, she borrows a velvet hood of mine and puts a dark-velvet cape over her night robe. ‘There.’
