The Taming of the Queen

The court is to divide. The king is going to Whitehall to oversee the deaths of the Howards, father and son, and the complete destruction of their treasonous house, and the princesses and I are to go to Greenwich. The Seymours, Thomas and his brother Edward, will stay with the king, help him untangle the plot and name the guilty men. Under the king’s bright suspicious gaze the interrogations of servants, tenants, and enemies are read and reread, and then, I am certain, rewritten. All the vindictive spite that was directed at the reformers, my ladies and me, is now turned, like the mouth of a cannon, towards the Howards, and the great guns are ready to roar. The king’s sentiment, his mercy, his sense of justice, are put aside in an orgy of false evidence. The king wants to kill someone and the court wants to help him.

The Seymours are in the ascendancy, their religion is the king’s new preference, their family is kin to the royal line, their military skills are the saving of the nation and their companionship is all the king wants. All other rival houses are down in the dust.

The court comes to the outer steps of the palace for the lords to say goodbye to their ladies, and for those who are courting to exchange a look, a word, the touch of a hand. The gentlemen of the court come to say their farewells to me and then finally, Thomas Seymour makes his way towards me. We stand close together, my hand on my horse’s neck, the groom holding him steady.

‘At least you’re safe,’ he says in my ear. ‘Another year gone by, and you’re still safe.’

‘Are you going to marry Elizabeth?’ I ask him urgently.

‘He’s not spoken. Has he said anything to you?’

‘He asked me what I thought of it. I said what I could.’

He makes a little grimace, then he puts the groom aside with one gesture and he cups his hands to take my boot. Just the clasp of his warm hand on my foot reminds me how much I want him. ‘Ah God, Thomas.’

He throws me upwards and I swing my leg over the saddle and my maid comes forward and adjusts my skirts. We are silent while she does her work and then I am looking down on his dark curly head as he strokes my horse’s neck but he cannot put his hand on me. Not even on the toe of my boot.

‘Will you spend Christmas with the king?’

He shakes his head. ‘He wants me to look at Dover Castle.’

‘When will I see you again?’ I can hear the desolation in my voice.

He shakes his head, he doesn’t know. ‘At least you’re safe,’ he says as if that is all that matters. ‘Another year, who knows what will happen?’

I can’t bring myself to imagine that anything good will happen. ‘Merry Christmas, Thomas,’ I say quietly. ‘God bless you.’

He looks up, squinting a little against the brightness of the sky. This is the man that I love and he cannot come closer. He steps back and puts his hand to my horse’s head, gently strokes his nose, fingers his mouth, his sensitive snuffing nostrils. ‘Go safely’ he tells him. ‘You’re carrying a queen.’ He lowers his voice. ‘And my only love.’

GREENWICH PALACE, WINTER 1546

I think of Queen Katherine, who celebrated Christmas at Greenwich over a divided court while the king was in London courting Anne Boleyn, ordered to behave as if nothing was wrong. This time it is not lovemaking that keeps the king in the city but killing. They tell me that the court at Whitehall is closed to everyone but the Privy Council, and that the king and his advisors are going over and over the evidence that has been gathered against the Howards, father and son.

They tell me that the king has become devoted to scholarship. He studies Henry Howard’s careless letters as if they were a text, annotating every guilty admission, questioning every word of innocence. The king has become thorough, pedantic. Spite gives him energy and he follows the interrogations as if he is determined that the young man, the beautiful foolish young man, shall die because of his own light words, spoken without thought.

One night in early January, Henry Howard climbs out of the window of his prison cell, trying to escape the king’s mercy. They seize him just as he is about to slide down the chute for waste water and fall into the icy river. This is typical Henry Howard: daring as a boy. The act should remind everyone that he is an impulsive young man, a bit of a fool, but a brave reckless innocent; but instead of laughing at him and releasing him, they send for irons and keep him in shackles.