Read The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn Online
Authors: Robin Maxwell
The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn (28 page)
E
LIZABETH SAT STUNNED
and staring blindly at the halos around the flickering candles, tears coursing down her cold cheeks.
“Mother,” she whispered. She sighed, expelling all the breath she had in her body, and felt hardly able to draw another in again. The revelation had shaken her very soul.
Her mother had loved her
.
Adored her. Fought to keep her by her side. But it seemed to Elizabeth, reading between the words, that this consuming mother love had taken Anne quite as much by surprise as its disclosure had taken Elizabeth. Anne had for so long fought for the crown, struggled to love Henry, and defended herself against her enemies that the child who would be born to her had become in her thinking the desired Prince.
What a great love it must have been, thought Elizabeth, for her mother to have overcome the catastrophe of Elizabeth’s female-ness. Or was it, she wondered, quite simply what motherhood meant? A child is born of your body and you are helpless to do other than love it whether it be male or female, docile or a shrieking horror, beautiful or monstrously deformed. But Anne, it seemed to Elizabeth, had felt more deeply, fought more bravely, groveled more pitifully, and believed in Elizabeth’s destiny more stridendy than any mother was wont to do for a
daughter
.
She had loved her.
And what of Henry, her faithless father? What was she to think of him? It was wrong to vilify him, she knew. He was the King and, according to unwritten but age-old English law, he had the right to a mistress, whatever he felt for his Queen.
He had died the year Elizabeth was fourteen, and by that time he had been transformed from the gloriously handsome, hale, and merry King whose likeness graced portraits, tapestries, jewelry, furniture, and coin to the obscene mountain of flesh whose eyes were mere slits in a bloated, lecherous face. And who, for his great size and diseased leg, had to be carted about from room to room on a litter carried by six men. She had seen him for what he’d become and knew that he had cared very little for her. Elizabeth had been only a valuable political asset to Henry, a princess to marry to a foreign prince, and he had rarely bothered to see her over the years.
Whenever she had been called to audience with him, her child’s heart had quivered with fear such as most men reserve for their day of judgment before God. She dared not meet his eye, for she knew that always he required complete obedience and submission to himself. That was a child’s unalterable duty to a parent. And of course Henry was king and well acquainted with mindless obedience from his subjects, no matter how high or noble. She would, during such audiences, fall many times to her knees and remain entirely silent at his feet, breathing in the stench of the rotting flesh and putrid bandages of his sore leg. He would forget sometimes that his daughter was there, moving on to other business and only releasing her from prostration when her knees were bruised and she was faint from the noxious fumes.
And yet, Elizabeth mused, she had always somehow loved her father, admired his power and the loyalty he inspired in his subjects. And she reveled in the parallels that many of her courtiers drew between his character and physique in his younger days and her own. She had always found a way to forgive him his trespasses, his ignorance of her personal existence, his dark and vicious tantrums. His murder of her mother.
Stop, Elizabeth commanded herself silently as she replaced the diary in her locked chest. She could think on this no longer. It was quite enough for one night, to have learned that she had been cherished by her mother. Something inside the young queen felt to be expanding, growing like a seedling breaking through soft earth, unfurling its tenderest parts and reaching for the warm sun above. And as the morning light crept in through her mullioned windows, Elizabeth Tudor, daughter of Anne Boleyn, found herself smiling.
“Your Majesty!”
Elizabeth turned to see her royal secretary William Cecil rushing to catch up with her as she moved down Richmond’s Long Gallery, taking the only exercise she would manage on this cold and rainy afternoon. Cecil unashamedly plowed through the crush of her waiting ladies who surrounded her like a flock of gaudy birds, and strode along at her side.
“Good day, my lord. I hope you’re well. I did miss our morning conference.”
“Debate with the privy council was heated and we only just concluded, Your Majesty.”
She gestured with her finger for him to begin the report, but he demurred, casting a disapproving glance at the twittering ladies.
“You have my complete attention,” said Elizabeth.
But Cecil was stubborn and refused to speak whilst among such a flighty audience.
“Very well.” She turned to her ladies and dismissed them with the most subde lift of her chin. They dispersed and almost magically disappeared. She and Cecil were finally alone in the long hall which echoed with rain pattering on the windows.
“Let me guess,” began Elizabeth. “Scodand. You want me to throw more of my money at the Protestant rebels.”
“It is imperative,” pleaded Cecil.
“I’ve sent too much already. I’m very poor, Cecil. And I doubt the French will take kindly to my openly opposing their allies.” “Then you wish the Catholics to rule the country?” Elizabeth sighed with exasperation. “Then send your troops and make a stand.” “No. I will not.”
“You are wrong, Madame, and entirely ill advised in this decision!”
Elizabeth stopped and wheeled on her councillor with the intention of chewing the head completely off his neck. But his look was so sincere and so determinably
right
that she paused. William Cecil was the most conscientious of her advisors and the most prodigiously well informed. Her former steward was a staunch Protestant and had somehow managed to make himself indispensable to her Catholic sister Mary during her reign while remaining faithful to Elizabeth.
She realized that he
always
took this position in support of English intervention with the Scots. He had believed in the right-ness of it since the 1540s when he himself had fought at the battle of Pinkie.
“I am not inclined to agree with you just now, Lord Cecil. Speak to me of it in a week or two.”
“In that case, I shall resign my post,” he said suddenly.
“What!”
“That is how strongly I feel. It would be a mistake of unparalleled proportions, and I could no longer call myself your advisor if you insisted on pursuing such a disastrous course.”
Elizabeth stared at her secretary, searching his face for even a glimmer of indecision. There was none. Not the smallest particle of doubt.
“Very well. See to the details and make full report to me.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty. I promise you will be glad of your decision.” He turned to go.
“Do you also promise that when we are finished paying for a foreign war we will have enough money for our own government?”
“No, Madame. But I will promise that your northern borders will be safe from a Catholic invasion in future.”
“Well, that is something,” said Elizabeth tartly. “That is something.”
2 December 1533
Diary,
I am sick with an anger that lives like some black rat gnawing at my belly. They have taken Elizabeth from me, taken her to Hatfield where she’ll live with strangers who’ll soon become her family. I am the Queen and I am helpless in this unnatural matter. Torn from my child, trapped within cold tradition — rules made by men with no care for women’s hearts.
Miserable too is my hatred grown blacker every day for the Lady Mary. How wretched was my luck that, finally past the dreadful battle with her mother Katherine, I should have no respite, none at all. For like a dragon rising from the ashes of its slain predecessor, Mary looms large, fangs bared, burning eyes fixed on the crown she claims as hers. She defies her father, sweetly stubborn as her mother has done, but defies him all the same. When told she was no longer Henry’s heir, her title Princess of England stripped away and now simply Lady Mary, she replied that she knew of no Princess of England save her self and refused to answer to any name but that which she had earned rightly in God’s eyes and under English law.
This girl, just seventeen, flirts with treason, for she knows these words and quietly rebellious deeds inflame the population who still hate me, the Great Whore, and Elizabeth, the Little Whore, and would gladly see this Spanish bitch upon the throne. O Diary, I have prayed fervently that my subjects come to love me and my child. But they are too perverse. When I give generously to the poor in every town into which we move our Court — £10 for a cow to feed their children when several shillings would make that purchase possible — it is said the witch tries to buy her subjects’ love. And tho the people hate the scurvy Pope and clergy, rail against corruption and indulgences, they would have a Papist Queen again and long for Catholic ritual. I do not understand!
Here at Court the Lady Mary has her loyal followers as well who, given half a chance, would raise a traitorous banner in her name for all those common folk to follow. There is always whispering that speaks of my well deserved downfall. And this low gossip lives always with Mary at its center. Somehow the girl’s spirit must be bent or broken, but I fear Henry’s plan for this will come to a bitter end. He has ordered Mary hie to Hatfield, take up residence there and serve as Maid of Honor to her half sister Elizabeth. I asked the King, Why place a viper in our daughter’s nursery? But he dismissed my worries, seeing Mary only disobedient, never dangerous.
Mayhaps I see enemies lurking behind every tree but I feel Henry’s scheme and his dismissal of my fears as some mild revenge upon myself. Revenge for his humiliation that a daughter, not a son, was born. For tho he pursues this Act of Succession into law, he remains distant from me, coming to my bed only as need prescribes. I would in deed be blind if I did not see the way his eyes devour my pretty maids, or deaf if I did not hear the bitter tone he uses when he calls me his Queen.
The love for Henry which I nursed to feeble life now withers on its slender vine, for it was fed most volubly by his great passion, and not from some inner well within my self. The lack of that love from him to me which I took as my daily measure for so many years, leaves me hollow and bereft. My friend and brother George is still away, Ambassador to France. And now my child is taken from my arms. Here am I left among the wolves at Court who, given any chance, would tear the very flesh from my bones.
I must be strong, inhale some courage and begin again. My enemies shall not have what they desire. I have struggled for this place and name and will not be moved to doubting it. Queen Anne am I. Let them try to shake me from this throne. Let them try.
Yours faithfully,
Anne
7 April 1534
Diary,
I am pregnant once again. Henry is delighted with the news and hopeful for his son. But wary of another disappointment, he is ever distant, mildly cruel. Whispered gossip has him sleeping not with courtly ladies only, but with low prostitutes that he visits in the town. I worried of the poxes he might bring to our bed, and so designed to take my self to a crone I’d heard had cures better than any apothecary’s medicines.
On this year’s first spring day I dressed modestly and making no commotion of my going, sent for a plain carriage and usual driver. Companion for the journey was Purkoy, a pup given me by cousin Francis Bryan as a gift. Small and comfortable in my lap, he lets me pet him endlessly, his velvet fur between my mindless fingers. He follows loyal at my heels, a sweet and childish subject who loves me blindly.
The sun shone hot upon my shoulders at the palace gate. Several people stared but no one spoke to me and merely bowed for my passing. But when the carriage came my good driver’d been replaced by some liveried stranger, tall and coarsely handsome —John he said his name was. His smile as he helped me in was half a leer, and I hoped he was a good man who loved his Queen. But using some precautions I determined he should never see the crone I visited for he might, if his loyalties were elsewhere placed, believe me conspiring with witches and begin malicious rumors — for I know this is how ugly gossip starts.
So we rode out that fine warm day, John the driver, Purkoy and my self— flew clattering down the cobble streets, then narrow alleys to a small tenement house in ill repair. Purkoy tucked under my arm, I took care when I knocked, that John should not see the wrinkled woman who opened up the rude and creaking door.
“You’re welcome, good lady,” said she and beckoned me inside. ‘Twas not the dark and morbid place that I’d imagined, nor what was grimly promised from the street. Sun shone in thro garden door and windows casting light and shadows on the trestle tables piled high with drying flowers, herbs, and even living insects inside jars. More plants hung, heads down from ceiling beams, throwing fragrant odors from them, and something burning in a pearly shell gave off a sweet smelling smoke that hung in curls above it. A grey parrot with a crimson tail and curved black beak sat perched near the window without a cage. Head cocked, the bird barked like a dog and set poor Purkoy trembling in my arms.
The old woman did not know my true identity, for tho kind she did not bow or grovel to my self. I was happy for the masquerade, for all things and people have a way of changing with that intelligence. So I hid my hands lest she see that famous finger and know me, and I was henceforth just the Lady Anna.
“Put your dog down and let him go sniffing, Madame. He’ll find lots to please his nose in here.” I put him down to roam. “Then what’ll ye have today?” said the crone, her brown spotted hands already back to grinding yellow seeds within a wooden mortar. “Something for your pregnancy?”
A laugh escaped me, for there was no way that this woman could have known my new condition.
“That is not my need, but can you tell me if ‘tis girl or boy?”
“Naaa, that is past my knowing. I may be a good physician in my way but I’m no seer, no Madame, that I’m not.”
I took the same liberty as Purkoy, eyeing all manner of strange bottles on the shelves, their contents some familiar, some exotic, some dry, some in liquid brew — all piquing my curiosity. I saw a yellow broom flower that Henry’s wont to drink distilled in water against surfeits of the stomach, and barbere berries, good for diarrhoea and fevers.
“My husband is straying from our bed. I fear infection from it.”
“Aye, a good fear to have. Does he show signs of illness — red rashes on his body, palms, soles, a raw sore on his member, loss of hair on face or head?”
“No, none of these.”
The old woman looked at me, made examination of my face, seemed to search my soul with her eyes.
“You’re no longer young, but a pretty woman still. Why does he stray, do you suppose?”
My laugh sounded bitter to my ears. “‘Tis a long sad story for a cold winter’s night,” said I.
She smiled, showing a surprise of still good teeth, small and white.
“Perhaps you’ll come back and tell it to me. And I’ll tell you one, too. Old as I am, men still confound me, the way they find and quickly lose love. If they could only love their wives as they do their mothers.”
She shook her head, then bade me come into the light. I gazed out the window at her tangled garden as she made examination of my hair, nails, skin, eyes, breath. She raised her stiff arms so that I should do the same, and then she felt my breasts.
“You’re well enough,” she said at last. “Healthy humors flow within your veins. You’re melancholic, tho, and I can give you such for that.” She went to her shelves and looked from side to side and back again. Eyes lit upon the bottle she desired. I moved to her side to see its contents — a dark green powder.
“What’s it called?”
“‘Tis motherwort. Just make a simple tonic with some clear water. Drink it down. There is no better herb to take melancholy vapors from the heart, to strengthen it and make you merry and cheerful as once you were.”
“You’re sure, are you, that I was once merry?”
“Oh, very sure, Madame.”
“How so?”
“Just a wee sparkle yet left o’er in those sad eyes.”
Purkoy stood under the grey parrot’s perch yapping at it, and the bird yapped back in Purkoy’s own voice. I picked him up as the old lady tipped some motherwort onto a sheet of parchment, folded it into an envelope and sealed it with some orange wax. I paid her what she asked.
“Come back and see me if you see the signs on him or on your self the same.” She opened her door. “Good luck to you, Madame, and Godspeed.”
‘Twas strange, for I wished not to go. The company of this plain old woman in so humble an abode had warmed me, given me more ease than all the rich comforts of the Court. But I could neither stay nor tell her of my heart’s true desires. I took the parchment envelope and then I took her hands. “You are very kind,” said I and gently squeezed her spindly fingers with my own. I heard the parrot call “Good day! Good day!” and then I closed the door.
John scrambled down from the driver’s seat, helped me in amongst the cushions. Courtesy forbade him asking me my business, but I could see the question burning in his eyes. He climbed up again but before he spurred the horses on, the old lady’s door creaked open once again and she bustled forth, smiling with her pearly teeth, almost breathless.
“Madame!” she cried. I leaned out the window and she thrust another parchment packet in my hand. “Something for your pregnancy. A rich potion for kidneys and the liver.” I fumbled for my purse but she stayed my hand. “No, a gift from me.” And that was all. She turned and disappeared inside her house.
The horses, whipped to go, jolted the carriage forward, and sudden tears were likewise jolted from my eyes. They fell for neither pain nor anger, but for that old woman’s rare sympathy for another woman. I pulled Purkoy close to me and was glad for him, but he is poor substitute for the little one I so long to hold.
Yours faithfully,
Anne