In Great Waters (49 page)

Something inside Anne ached like a tired muscle. It was a heavy loss, to be glad that the Archbishop of Stour was a man of the world,
not a man of Heaven. But they had come too far. A little change in the words of the ceremony, that was all it would take. Henry would swear not to oppose the Church; she could ask him for that. Maybe even to “protect” it, or something innocuous like that. His people would be a Christian people, and he would protect them.

Anne thought of something she had seen in Erzebet’s letters, a letter she had not sent. It had been written to her sister, a letter which Anne’s rusty Magyar had taken a moment to translate.
When I have grandsons to hold the throne of England
, Erzebet had written,
all shall be well
. Anne was beginning to understand the long game her mother had played, had stretched her every nerve to play. Given English grandsons from her English daughters, Erzebet could have relaxed, seeing the succession moored in safe waters. Till then, the question was to keep her daughters alive. Anne steeled herself.
When I have Christian sons
, she thought.
Claybrook snatched my mother out of the game before she could see it completed. But I will complete it, and the ending shall be good. We have only to hold out
.

She wondered whether she should discuss the issue with Henry, or simply draw him to bed and try again to ensure a son to carry the precious Church to safety. Perhaps both. But Summerscales must be dealt with first.

“I am sorry, Samuel,” she said. “But all shall be better than you think. I shall speak to my husband, and you will see. All shall be well.”

Samuel bowed. He did not look at her face.

Anne did speak to Summerscales. She set him to composing a new vow of kingship, one that glossed over the upholding of the Church. The old man’s face was not pleased, but Anne held her head high and asked as calmly as she could, and he did not question her. Instead, he promised to study the matter. He did not say that he would do it, but he would consider it. Anne decided not to push, not yet; he could have a couple of days to compose his conscience. She would repay him in virtue when he did the right thing.

Anne thought of finding Henry to discuss it with him. But after a
while, she sent instead for John Claybrook. The message was politely worded, in the way of a request; he would know it for the command it was.
We recall you told us once
, Anne said,
that you liked to row upon the river. We wish you to join us on an excursion and show us your oarsmanship
.

After that, it only remained to go down to the river and wait.

John appeared alone, tethering his horse beside Anne’s. The boat awaited him, Anne already sitting in it. Her hand trailed in the water, feeling the lap and dip of the cold waves. She saw John glance quickly around, as if hoping she wouldn’t notice.

“My lord husband is not with us,” Anne said.

John looked up at her then, ducked his head. “Yes, your Majesty.”

Anne smiled as well as she could. “I have often wished to travel the river in a small boat,” she said. “Great excursions are a fine thing, but it would be pleasant to see the river from lower down. I am pleased you can join me, my lord.”

John bowed his head again. All her life, Anne remembered his face being merry, amused, amiable. There was no smile on it now. He could hardly have aged in the short weeks since she last saw him, carrying his bottle of poison, but there was a slackness to his expression, like a hanging limb, as if, unable to smile, he didn’t know what to do with his face.

“It is a great pleasure to see you again, my—your Majesty,” John said.

Anne extended a hand as he walked towards the boat. John hesitated for a moment, then took it, making the boat jolt and sway as he set foot aboard. His hand was hotter than Henry’s.

Anne sat in the boat and waited.

“Do you wish to go upstream or down, your Majesty?” John braced himself between the oars. Small though she was, Anne could have handled them, she reflected; if it came to a trial of strength between the two of them, she would have the deepsman’s vigour on her side. But he was a subject, and could do the rowing. She would sit and watch him toil.

“Upstream,” Anne said. “Let us have the current with you when
we return. You will be tired then, I think. That takes us towards your father’s land, I believe?”

“Indeed.” John turned his head aside to study the oars, handles of wood he would have to negotiate by grip and heft, not by sight. He leaned back, and began to row. The oars split the surface cleanly, a flower of water exploding upwards with each dip. The boat moved, dragging through the water slowly for the first few moments, then settling into its momentum, moving forward with a steady flow. John’s arms rotated, his body moving to and fro with each pull, as if he swam backwards through air.

“You row well,” Anne said. Muddy banks and draggled grass slipped past them; overhanging trees dipped their frazzled heads in the water.

“Thank you, your Majesty.” John’s voice, though a little breathless now, sounded stronger, as if the effort of exercise gave him some cover for his nerves.

There were no listening ears; only the dark banks drifting away from them. Time enough, Anne thought, to speak openly.

“My husband misses your company, I think,” she said.

John looked up. His face, a little flushed from rowing, was hesitant.

“He has spoken of you,” Anne said, seeing his predicament. John didn’t know how much Henry had said about his childhood. Married to him or not, Anne was still the Delamere that Henry’s protectors had sought to overthrow; she might easily resent John’s conspiracy. As far as John knew, this might even be an assassination, a lure away from prying eyes into some land of secretive punishment for his treason. Anne decided to leave him in uncertainty about her intentions for just a while longer. Just to see what he would do.

“Has he, your Majesty?” John trailed off, huffing as if the oars were heavy.

“He tells me you were playmates as boys,” Anne continued. “He holds great love for you, I think. I would say he trusts you above any man.”

An avenue of willows overhung them, drooping narrow branches
into the water. There was nothing to see either side but long twigs bowing weak-stemmed under their own weight.

“He will regret that he could not join us,” Anne said, as if John was not silent, emotion struggling on his face. “He has asked and asked that we should swim in the Thames together. He longs for it.”

John stopped rowing, and the boat rocked in the water. “I did not know there was poison in the wine,” he said. There was a raw edge to his voice, as if there was a hand around his throat.

Anne said nothing, raised an eyebrow. The suddenness with which John had broken out startled her; she sat very still, as if watching a deer she didn’t want to alarm into flight.

John rocked the oars on the edge of the boat. Out of the water, the paddles beat in the air like flags. “My father gave me wine to take,” he said hoarsely. “I wished to see Henry, to know if he was all right. And to know if he was going to name us. I did not think he would, but if he was tortured I did not want to end on the pyre. Henry—Henry and I watched the burning in Cornwall. I was so afraid I thought I would be sick, the whole time, but Henry just rode beside me, he insisted that he would go to it. He fears nothing, Henry. He just rides it down. I did not know what to do if he was captured. I just wished to see him. And—and my father gave me some wine to take. He told me to speak to Henry, to find out what was happening so that we could make plans. He always knew that—Henry cared for me more than for him. Henry hates my father, I think. I tried to tell him—I wished to tell him, he handled Henry all wrong, but what could I say? My father said Henry might speak to me, he would not speak to him.”

The boat was turning in the current, its nose floating round towards the bank, but John did not put his oars in the water to check it.

“I went home and told my father that Bishop Westlake did not seem ready to turn Henry in, that we might have some time in hand. And he said—he told me …” John’s face convulsed. “When he was counsellor to his Majesty Philip, my father felt sure he could direct the state. But when his Majesty turned more to the Bishop, my father was angry, he said things were slipping away from us. Then he said that
Henry was our best chance, that one iron in the fire was going cold and we should pull out the other one.” John spoke faster and faster. “But Henry ran away before he could do anything, and then he turned up in Bishop Westlake’s house, and—my lady, your Majesty, you must believe me, I had no hand in it. I never wished it. Henry has been my brother all my life. My father always told me, when I was a child, one day he and I might come out into the open, that Henry would be a greater king than—he told me about his Majesty Philip, too, but I did not—It did not seem …” The oars creaked on the sides of the boat as they turned in John’s frantic hands. “My father is a subtle man,” John said, drawing breath. “But when you are with Henry, subtlety does not seem to mean much. I never wished him harm, your Majesty. I will swear it on a Bible.”

Anne sat in the stern of the boat, one hand sheltering the other. Her voice was quiet. “What harm did you wish to us?”

John looked at her again. There were frightened tears in the corners of his eyes. “None to you, your Majesty, I swear it. Henry—I did not know what would become of you, of you all. I—I feared for England with your royal father lost. It was only after that my father would meet him—but—I—I was a child, when Henry was found. I heard my father talk of him, talk of him for years before I met him. I only thought I would meet him, that he would be my brother. Your Majesty—I knew that if Henry rose, there would be war. But I always meant to speak for you. You have been kind to me, in the past. Henry listens to me. I always meant to ask him to spare you.”

He had not mentioned Mary. Anne’s heart was pounding through her chest, but her face felt a long way away from it, cool in the damp air of the river. She could not give way to feeling now, not when this man was pleading before her. “You have lived a long time with—incompatible ideas, I think,” she said.

John blinked his eyes. “I swear to you, your Majesty, I only ever thought for the best. I prayed for the best, I prayed that God would see us through this. I—am no match for my father’s subtlety. I have tried to be his loyal son and Henry’s loyal friend, and I wished to be a loyal subject to England.”

To England
, Anne noted. Not
to you
. “I fear the time has come when you must choose between them,” she said.

John had smiled at her, chatted with her, when she had been a sad, scared little girl. It cut at her heart, to think how many secrets there were behind those smiles. She thought of John, a child confronted with a strange new brother, a conspiring father, a freakish heir to the throne. What would she have wished him to do? What would she have done?

God tell us to forgive
, Anne thought. But in her mind was Erzebet, screaming in a shroud of blood.

“I shall be loyal to you,” John was saying. “Henry has always been first in my heart, your Majesty. I—I wish to serve you so that my loyalties may reconcile. But I miss Henry, I shall be his loyal servant. Please, let me see him so I may tell him so.”

“What,” asked Anne, “do you know of the death of my mother?”

Wood creaked on wood, and John looked at her, wet-eyed and white-faced. “Your Majesty …”

Anne clenched her teeth together. “Do not tell me you were out of your father’s counsels,” she said. “Or that he did not tell you what he had done, after the doing of it. I can have you racked. Henry will not like it, but he does not like liars either. Do you wish to place yourself between me and him? Tell me what you know of my mother.”

The boat rocked. John looked away, dropped an oar in the water and gave a pull, turning the prow upstream again. His voice was very low. “He told me nothing,” he said. “Only that she died of a fever. But he did not speak of it much, and that was uncommon. He speaks a great deal of the doings of court, and how they may play out, how we can best anticipate possible advantages. He did not speak much of his plans after her death. He said—he said before she died, that—that we could ill afford a queen who burned bastards and punished those who opposed the burnings. He said once, it was a mercy that she was no longer with us. And after that, he did not speak of it again.”

Anne swallowed. “I do not believe you,” she said.

“I will swear it on a Bible, your Majesty.”

“If you would murder your queen, you would forswear yourself on a Bible.”

“I did not know.”

“You were no child then,” Anne said. “You were almost a man. My lord Claybrook must wish for a son to follow in his ways.”

“I was almost a man whose father did not trust him,” John said. He spoke with desperate haste. “Henry trusted me. My father wanted me to follow him, yes. But he did not trust me not to tell Henry.”

Anne sat silent for a moment. John sounded sincere. That didn’t mean he was telling the truth, but if he was lying, he was lying too well to see through. His lies must have been weighing very heavily on his conscience if he would spit them out on such little provocation. Perhaps, under pressure, John lacked a talent for secrets.