The Boleyn Reckoning (15 page)

As William rode into Hampton Court on June 26 with Dominic at his side, he felt for the first time since the French war that he and Dominic were truly working as one. The relief of that mended relationship was nearly as great as when he greeted Minuette, radiant and waiting at their return.

This rediscovered trust came at the right time, for though their flying trip to Norfolk had suppressed the immediate violence, it had raised more questions than it had answered about the mob’s supporters. Within two hours of his return, William met with the Duke of Norfolk, who had been openly and blamelessly in London for the last month.

Norfolk’s reputation for blunt honesty didn’t fail him today. Upon bowing, his first critical comment was, “You are making a mistake, Your Majesty.”

William exchanged a long look with Dominic, the only counselor present, and could almost hear his friend’s caution.
Don’t let him goad you into quick offense
.

With a smile that wiser men than Norfolk knew to fear, William asked softly, “In what way?”

“In seeking to make these riots more than what they were. The men in Norwich were unhappy shopkeepers and merchants. They were not rebels.”

“Shopkeepers and merchants with a store of gunpowder and weapons, sufficient for a regiment of soldiers, carefully stowed around the city. They were funded, Norfolk, and dedicated. They
began their rebellion with a Roman mass in Norwich Cathedral, offered by my own ungrateful Bishop Thirlby. And to a man, they called me the bastard son of a whore and named my sister, Mary, queen.”

Looking suddenly like the twenty-year-old he was, the Duke of Norfolk said, “I … I didn’t know that, Your Majesty. I can see the danger there.”

Dominic, who had sat silently watchful to Norfolk’s right, now leaned forward. “Where else do you see danger?”

Norfolk was no fool. He answered Dominic’s real question, the one that lay heavily unasked beneath his words. “Examine my correspondence, my household—I swear, you’ll find no links to those men.”

“No, I don’t expect we will,” Dominic replied. “This is not an accusation, Norfolk, it’s a warning. His Majesty has dealt leniently with the Papists, and they repay him in insults and treason. Leniency is at an end. If more blood is shed, it will not lie on our hands.”

William let Dominic’s words hang in the silence for a moment before adding, “That is all, my lord Norfolk. For now. Lady Mary will be arriving at Hampton Court tomorrow for the birthday celebrations. I hope no disagreements will mar the festivities.”

Wrapping the slightly tattered edges of his position around him, the duke bowed with a touch of arrogance. “Who could possibly wish you harm, Your Majesty?” He stalked out of the chamber in much the way William did when he was displeased.

Dominic’s eyes met his after the door shut. “What do you think?” William asked.

“One can never predict what a Howard might do. I’d watch him.”

“Norfolk has got the message, and it will spread through the Catholics. Mary is being watched, and her letters read. So what do
I do about Spain? Philip is prepared to come to Dover in a few weeks’ time. He seems eager enough to marry Elizabeth, and bringing him here will soothe tempers a bit.”

Dominic shrugged. “I’m no good at the politics of matrimony.”

William laughed. “You must stop being so particular. All you need do is point your finger and you’d have yourself a wife. And one who is interested in more than your position, if that’s what you fear.”

With a restless movement, Dominic stood and went to the window that overlooked the privy garden. Maybe he was looking for one of the court women. Maybe not. In the last seven weeks, William had realized that he had no idea what Dominic’s personal life entailed. Or if he even had a personal life.

William returned to a conversation they’d had nearly a year ago, and not touched upon since. “Have you considered on Jane Grey as I once asked you to do? The Duchess of Suffolk has made it plain that her daughter is yours for the asking.”

“On whose asking—mine or yours?”

“Dominic—”

“Leave it, William. We have more important issues at hand. Like King Philip’s visit. And Lady Rochford’s trial. And a jilted and restless French army.”

“You haven’t fallen in love with a married woman, have you? Because that would be a complication. Not necessarily fatal—”

“What of your marriage?” Dominic interrupted. “You’ve announced no plans for a state wedding.”

William paused before answering. “No. We’ll make the coronation the grand affair—the wedding will be intimate. Perhaps only you and Elizabeth to witness. I’m thinking Christmas, with the coronation to be held on our twenty-first birthdays next summer. If all goes well, Minuette will be with child by that time.”

There was a long silence, long enough for William to feel the
tension that had crept into the room. He was trying to understand where it had come from—turning over every word he’d said to see where he’d gone wrong—when Dominic said, “If that’s all for now, I’m going to check in with Burghley and see how things are proceeding with Lady Rochford in the Tower.”

William let him go with an oddly hollow feeling inside that he tried to dismiss as paranoia. How could weeks of carefully reconstructing their friendship have been undone with one innocent conversation? He’d not even had the chance to tell Dominic of his plans for Minuette’s birthday tomorrow. Well enough—if Dominic did not want to share that kind of intimacy, then he could be made to wait until the morning, when he would be notified of his part in the planned ceremonies.

Politics, William thought a bit forlornly, was infinitely easier to cope with than friendships.

Mary arrived by water from Richmond, where she had spent the last month in a greater swirl of activity than she was accustomed to. With King Philip’s looming state visit, Mary had been flattered to be consulted by her brother’s men even while recognizing that they wanted to disarm her and keep her so busy that she would not think of behind-the-scenes political maneuvering. But she was capable of being both flattered and cautious. No word of disapproval would escape her at Elizabeth being offered to the Spanish king. Not publicly.

In private, she prayed with an intensity that had not been equaled since the early days of Anne Boleyn’s rise, when Mary had still believed that wrongs could be righted by pure faith. Twenty years on she knew better. Faith needed righteous force to triumph. And the arrival of Philip, representative of the pure faith in earthly form, might be what she had so long awaited. An opportunity to right wrongs.

Mary knew that many considered her if not unintelligent, then at least unimaginative. But she was her father’s daughter and she knew how to manipulate when it was necessary. She also knew the value of symbolism. The Spanish ambassador might have provided the material support for the Norwich protests, but Mary had suggested using Bishop Thirlby, knowing that his acquiescence in Henry VIII’s religious reforms had been for form’s sake only. And she had been right, for the bishop had seized upon the chance to offer mass to the brave souls now awaiting the punishment of heretics. She trusted Bishop Thirlby’s faith would sustain him in the difficult days ahead.

The events in Norwich had been a test. Now Mary was prepared to play in earnest. She began, as Catholics always began in England, with the Duke of Norfolk.

The duke came to see her within two hours of her arrival at Hampton Court. It was easier for Mary to come to court now that the hated false queen was dead, and she took satisfaction in the elegant furnishings and rich fabrics with which her chambers were adorned. She had dressed with special care for this audience, fussing with her still-thick hair so that the increasing strands of gray were not visible, and relying on the structure of her ebony and silver gown to deflect attention from her increasingly stout figure. It was not vanity; she knew that to be treated as royal, one must appear so.

Though this young Duke of Norfolk had been raised Protestant, he still kissed her hand and called her by the title heretics denied her. “It is a great pleasure to see you again, Your Highness.”

“You may sit,” Mary commanded. Norfolk took a stool that left him half a head shorter than she in her plumply cushioned chair. He seemed unaffected by this, his very young face more handsome than it should be, while his eyes were more cautious than those of most young men of twenty. But then most men of twenty hadn’t
lost a father to a treason charge at age ten and a grandfather to a Protestant plot just two years ago. A plot masterminded by the man Mary wished to discuss just now.

“Is it true Lord Rochford continues to receive visitors in state at Blickling Hall despite his disgrace?”

“So I have heard, Your Highness.” Norfolk cast a covert glance around the chamber, as if looking for spies to this conversation and wondering just how treacherous she intended to make it. “He does not appear to have been overly inconvenienced by the Norwich protests.”

Mary knew better than to speak plainly, but who could be surprised at her displeasure with Rochford’s continued arrogance? It would be more unusual if she didn’t speak of him.

“Is there any chance his status will change when Lady Rochford is brought to trial?” she asked.

“Unlikely. It is well known that Lady Rochford despises her husband. Any claims she makes against him will almost certainly be dismissed as spite. And despite their complicated relationship, Rochford is a great favorite with the king. I do not think William will send his uncle to the Tower, let alone the block.”

“So though he is deprived of his position as Lord Chancellor, George Boleyn remains a duke, he retains hold of the greatest private wealth in England, and he continues to work against those of the True Faith,” Mary summed up. “What damage might he do while King Philip is here?”

Norfolk shrugged. “What can he do? William has made it very plain he will not go back to the French marriage, so what options are there? One of them must marry a Catholic. William seems only too glad to offer up Elizabeth in exchange for his own liberty.”

Discussing marital plans left Mary feeling restless and dissatisfied.
She returned to the problem of Rochford sitting at Blickling Hall, unpunished. “He is the most dangerous man in England. He hounded and hunted your own grandfather to his death, smearing the Howard name and honour in the bargain. Not to mention the claims Rochford made against me in the same plot. Why should he remain untouched?”

“Because he is the king’s uncle,” Norfolk answered bluntly, and despite his youth, he had his grandfather’s arrogant surety. “Lady Mary”—no more use of her title now, she noted—“you will never persuade the king to charge his uncle with treason.”

She smiled, something she did so rarely that it felt strange on her face. “I do not mean to persuade the king to anything. I mean to act of my own accord. The greatest injury Rochford offered was against me and all Catholics—as their figurehead, I will see that injury punished.”

Norfolk looked wary, but not frightened. This young man might not burn with religious fervor, but he hated Rochford with a passion not to be taken lightly. A legacy from his grandfather, despite their ties to the Boleyns. “How?”

“We will speak again soon.” No need to tell him that her ideas of vengeance were hazy at best. Mary operated more on theory than practice, counting on the men she inspired to fill in the details. “Can I count on your support?”

A considering pause, but Mary knew her audience. This Duke of Norfolk could be swayed by personal appeal, so she added, “I would be in your debt.”

“I could ask for no greater honour, Your Highness.”

And that was one piece put in play.

The day before William’s twentieth birthday, Elizabeth received Robert Dudley in her favorite chamber at Hampton Court, the
one she’d had as her own since she was a child. The palace might be a little old-fashioned now, but she loved the tall, narrow windows and the red-bricked towers and courtyards. She remembered three years ago, looking down through her window to spy Robert’s dark head in Clock Court, and knew that however much anger passed between them, part of her would always be looking for Robert wherever she went.

“Tell me,” she said playfully as Robert crossed the room to stand next to her at a table spread with jewelry, “which do you think for William’s celebrations tomorrow? The Spanish ambassador will be present and I am meant to appear suitably demure.”

With raised eyebrows, Robert said, “I do not think even a religious habit would make you appear demure. And if Philip is any sort of man at all, it is yourself he will fall in love with, not some trumped-up image of submissive womanhood.”

He surveyed the pieces—pearls and gold and cabochon jewels in brilliant tones—and finally laid a finger on an enameled circlet of Tudor roses. “These, I think. A subtle reminder of position will be more effective than a blatant display of wealth.”

Elizabeth had been thinking the same thing, and she shook her head at this unnerving symmetry of thought. “Especially since Spain’s wealth is far greater than England’s. If Philip has me, it will be for my position and not my riches.”

“If Philip does not have you for love alone, than he does not deserve you.”

Would there ever be a time when that low, intimate voice failed to stir her blood and make her treacherous heart beat faster? Robert was clever and charming and duplicitous and probably incapable of fidelity … but for all that, she had not been so happy in months.

To disguise her pleasure, she retorted, “England has quite enough of royal love matches with William and Minuette. I believe
my brother has a grand gesture in mind for their shared birthday tomorrow. I hope he knows what he’s doing.”

As so many men seemed to ask her lately, Robert inquired, “Do you ever wonder about Minuette’s feelings in the matter?”

“Minuette is naturally concerned about the political ramifications, but she has loved William since they were children. Personally, of course she wishes for everyone to be contented. And I must admit, she seems to be learning very quickly. She may not be as far in over her head as I feared.”