It is 17 April when the king makes his visit. At dawn there are showers. By ten o'clock the air is mild as buttermilk. He is up and in a chair, from which he rises. My dear Cromwell: Henry kisses him firmly on both cheeks, takes him by the arms and (in case he thinks he is the only strong man in the kingdom) he sits him back, decisively, in his chair. ‘You sit and give me no argument,’ Henry says. ‘Give me no argument for once, Master Secretary.’
The ladies of the house, Mercy and his sister-in-law Johane, are decked out like Walsingham madonnas on a feast day. They curtsey low, and Henry sways above them, informally attired, jacket of silver brocade, vast gold chain across his chest, his fists flashing with Indian emeralds. He has not wholly mastered the family relationships, for which no one can blame him. ‘Master Secretary's sister?’ he says to Johane. ‘No, forgive me. I remember now that you lost your sister Bet at the same time my own lovely sister died.’
It is such a simple, human sentence, coming from a king; at the mention of their most recent loss, tears well into the eyes of the two women, and Henry, turning to one, then the other, with a careful forefinger dots them from their cheeks, and makes them smile. The little brides Alice and Jo he whirls up into the air as if they were butterflies, and kisses them on the mouth, saying he wishes he had known them when he was a boy. The sad truth is, do you not notice, Master Secretary, the older one gets, the lovelier the girls?
Then eighty will have its advantages, he says: every drab will be a pearl. Mercy says to the king, as if talking to a neighbour, give over, sir: you're no age. Henry stretches out his arms and displays himself before the company: ‘Forty-five in July.’
He notes the incredulous hush. It does the job. Henry is gratified.
Henry walks around and looks at all his paintings and asks who the people are. He looks at Anselma, the Queen of Sheba, on the wall. He makes them laugh by picking up Bella and talking to her in Honor Lisle's atrocious French. ‘Lady Lisle sent the queen a little creature even smaller. He tips his head to one side and his ears prick up, as if to say, why are you speaking to me? So she calls him Pourquoi.’ When he speaks of Anne his voice drips uxorious sentiment: like clear honey. The women smile, pleased to see their king set such an example. ‘You know him, Cromwell, you have seen him on her arm. She takes him everywhere. Sometimes,’ and now he nods judiciously, ‘I think she loves him better than me. Yes, I am second to the dog.’
He sits smiling, no appetite, watching as Henry eats from the silver dishes Hans has designed.
Henry speaks kindly to Richard, calling him cousin. He signals for him to stand by while he talks to his councillor, and for others to retreat a little way. What if King Francis this and Francis that, should I cross the sea myself to patch together some sort of deal, would you cross over yourself when you are on your feet again? What if the Irish, what if the Scots, what if it all gets out of hand and we have wars like in Germany and peasants crowning themselves, what if these false prophets, what if Charles overruns me and Katherine takes the field, she is of mettlesome temper and the people love her, God knows why for I do not.
If that happens, he says, I will be out of this chair and take the field, my own sword in my hand.
When the king has enjoyed his dinner he sits by him and talks softly about himself. The April day, fresh and showery, puts him in mind of the day his father died. He talks of his childhood: I lived at the palace at Eltham, I had a fool called Goose. When I was seven the Cornish rebels came up, led by a giant, do you remember that? My father sent me to the Tower to keep me safe. I said, let me out, I want to fight! I wasn't frightened of a giant from the west, but I was frightened of my grandmother Margaret Beaufort, because her face was like a death's head, and her grip on my wrist was like a skeleton's grip.
When we were young, he says, we were always told, your grandmother gave birth to your lord father the king when she was a little creature of thirteen years. Her past was like a sword she held over us. What, Harry, are you laughing in Lent? When I, at little more years than you, gave birth to the Tudor? What, Harry, are you dancing, what, Harry, are you playing at ball? Her life was all duty. She kept twelve paupers in her house at Woking and once she made me kneel down with a basin and wash their yellow feet, she's lucky I didn't throw up on them. She used to start praying every morning at five. When she knelt down at her priedieu she cried out from the pain in her knees. And whenever there was a celebration, a wedding or a birth, a pastime or an occasion of mirth, do you know what she did? Every time? Without failing? She wept.
And with her, it was all Prince Arthur. Her shining light and her creeping saint. ‘When I became king instead, she lay down and died out of spite. And on her deathbed, do you know what she told me?’ Henry snorts. ‘Obey Bishop Fisher in all things! Pity she didn't tell Fisher to obey me!’
When the king has left with his gentlemen, Johane comes to sit with him. They talk quietly; though everything they say is fit to be overheard. ‘Well, it came off sweetly.’
‘We must give the kitchen a present.’
‘The whole household did well. I am glad to have seen him.’
‘Is he what you hoped?’
‘I had not thought him so tender. I see why Katherine has fought so hard for him. I mean, not just to be queen, which she thinks is her right, but to have him for a husband. I would say he is a man very apt to be loved.’
Alice bursts in. ‘Forty-five! I thought he was past that.’
‘You would have bedded him for a handful of garnets,’ Jo sneers. ‘You said so.’
‘Well, you for export licences!’
‘Stop!’ he says. ‘You girls! If your husbands should hear you.’
‘Our husbands know what we are,’ Jo says. ‘We are full of ourselves, aren't we? You don't come to Austin Friars to look for shy little maids. I wonder our uncle doesn't arm us.’
‘Custom constrains me. Or I'd send you to Ireland.’
Johane watches them rampage away. When they are out of earshot, she checks over her shoulder and murmurs, you will not credit what I am going to say next.
‘Try me.’
‘Henry is frightened of you.’
He shakes his head. Who frightens the Lion of England?
‘Yes, I swear to you. You should have seen his face, when you said you would take your sword in your hand.’
The Duke of Norfolk comes to visit him, clattering up from the yard where his servants hold his plumed horse. ‘Liver, is it? My liver's shot to pieces. And these five years my muscles have been wasting. Look at that!’ He sticks out a claw. ‘I've tried every physician in the realm, but they don't know what ails me. Yet they never fail to send in their accounts.’
Norfolk, he knows it for a fact, would never pay anything so mere as a doctor's bill.
‘And the colics and the gripes,’ the duke says, ‘they make my mortal life a Purgatory. Sometimes I'm at stool all night.’
‘Your Grace should take life more easily,’ Rafe says. Not bolt your food, he means. Not race about in a lather like a post horse.
‘I intend to, believe me. My niece makes it clear she wants none of my company and none of my counsel. I'm for my house at Kenninghall, and Henry can find me there if he wants me. God restore you, Master Secretary. St Walter is good, I hear, if a job's getting too much for you. And St Ubald against the headache, he does the trick for me.’ He gropes inside