The Sixth Wife: The Story of Katherine Parr Read online

  Of Surrey’s intentions that afternoon none could be sure. He seemed to be inviting the King’s displeasure. Perhaps he was thinking of those royal arms which had been given to his family five hundred years before; perhaps, as he spoke again, he was thinking that he was more royal than the heavy, diseased man who sat in the ornamented chair.

  “I like nothing of Wyatt’s so well as that which ran thus: ‘And wilt thou leave me thus….’ Marry! I forget how it goes. Oh, this was it. Your Grace will remember.

  “‘And wilt thou leave me thus!

  That hath loved thee so long

  In wealth and woe among:

  And is thy heart so strong

  As for to leave me thus?’ ”

  Henry’s face was contorted, whether with rage against Surrey or the pain of his leg none could be sure.

  “You liked those verses, did you?” he roared. “Methinks there is a cheapness in the sentiment.”

  There was complete silence as the Earl and the King looked at each other. Every member of the gathering was aware that Surrey had quoted the words which Wyatt had written to Anne Boleyn. It seemed to Katharine, sitting fearfully beside the King, longing for the privacy of her home in Yorkshire, that Surrey was like a gorgeous dragonfly determined to tease an already angry bull.

  “Cheapness, Your Grace?” said Surrey. “In Wyatt’s appeal to an unkind mistress? Poor Wyatt!”

  Henry looked almost defiantly at those about him, as though he was determined to show them that Surrey’s careless words had not reminded him of Anne Boleyn. “I liked that fellow, Wyatt… fool that he ofttimes was. I mourned his death. Marry, it is a year ago! But what subject is this for a lady’s ears? Death? No! We will not speak of it. I would have speech with Lady Latimer… and I would have speech alone.”

  Even as he said those words he remembered the old days, when, wishing to play the lover, he had grasped his opportunities. He had not then found it necessary to dismiss his courtiers so pointedly. But he would do what he wished…now and for ever. He was their King and they should remember it.

  They were bowing as they left the chamber. It seemed to him that Seymour hesitated, and Seymour had never looked quite so handsome as he did at that moment.

  “Why do you linger, brother?” demanded the King.

  Seymour said: “I am sorry if I have offended Your Grace.”

  “The sight of you offends us when we have dismissed you. Go, I say.”

  They were alone. Katharine could hear the heavy hammering of her own heart. She had never really been so frightened in the whole of her life as she was at this moment, and when Henry leaned toward her she had difficulty in suppressing a cry of dismay.

  Henry was laughing and his voice was gentle. “What thought you of the verses, eh? Come. The truth.”

  “They were well enough, I thought,” stammered Katharine. “But I, being a woman, could give no judgment that would interest Your Majesty.”

  “And you, being a woman, must have such soft feeling for the poet’s handsome person that you have little thought to bestow upon his verses, eh?”

  “My Lord King, I have been twice widowed. I am not a young girl to harbor such soft thoughts of a poet.”

  Henry patted his thigh—that one which was sound and not affected by the ulcers which were creeping up from his leg. “Are you sure of that, Kate?” he asked slyly. “For ’tis hard to believe you have been twice widowed, and did I not know that you had been to bed first with my Lord Borough and afterward with my Lord Latimer, I’d not believe it.”

  Katharine smiled nervously. “Your Majesty knows that I am an old woman…well past my thirtieth year.”

  “Old, Kate! Nay. Not so. Not so. For if you are old, what of us? Would you call your King an old man? Treason, my Lady Latimer. Treason, Kate!”

  “My Lord King,” began Katharine breathlessly, “I assure Your Highness…”

  The King gripped her knee. “Rest easy, girl! I feel no anger. ’Twas a joke. Nay, you’re as fresh as a young girl, and if you are thirty years old, well then, thirty is as good an age as any.”

  “But it is old, Your Majesty… for a woman. I vow it is.”

  “I forbid you to say it,” said Henry playfully. “You are not old, Kate, and your King forbids you to say you are.”

  “Your Grace is too kind to me.”

  His next words filled her with horror. “Aye!” He squeezed her knee. “And ready to be kinder. Ready to be kinder.”

  Katharine now began to understand all those significant glances which had been cast in her direction during the past weeks. Others had been aware of what she had failed to notice. Yet she could not believe the truth even now. Frantically she sought in her mind for some means of escape.

  “I am unworthy …” she faltered.

  Henry looked momentarily stern. “A King is the best judge of a subject’s worthiness.”

  She was really frightened. He who was accustomed to speaking with the ministers of his own government and the ambassadors of others knew how to imbue his words with deep meaning. He was telling her that it was not for her to say whether or not she would have him. He was the best judge, and he it would be who made the choice.

  “We have been lenient with you and yours, have we not?” he said on a softer note.

  “Your Majesty is a great and good King to all his subjects.”

  He nodded, smiling. “That is so. But to some subjects he is known to be overmerciful at times.”

  “I am but a foolish woman, Sire.”

  “You’re a very pretty one, Kate—which is all your King asks you to be.”

  She could only repeat nervously: “Your Grace is too kind to me.”

  “And, did I not tell thee, ready to be kinder? Latimer was a traitor to his King.”

  “Oh, no, Sire…never that.”

  The King lifted his stick and rapped the floor with it. Katharine drew away from him, flinching.

  “We like not contradictions,” he growled. “Your husband was a traitor. Why did I not have him in chains? Do you know?” He laughed and she detected the return of that indulgence which disturbed her more than his anger. “No, you do not know, Kate. You’re too modest a woman to know the reason for that. Latimer deserved to go to the block, and I pardoned him. And why, think you?” He slapped his healthy thigh. “Because I liked his wife. That’s the answer. By God, that’s the answer. I said to myself, ‘Latimer’s wife…she’s a good wife to Latimer. Would to God there were more like her in our kingdom!’ That’s what I said, Kate. Here. Come nearer. Look at me. Don’t be afraid of me. Look at your King.”

  She obeyed him and looked into his face, noting the cruel little mouth, the pouchy cheeks that had once been ruddy and were now purple; she saw the knotted veins at his temples, and those eyes which suggested shrewdness and a certain refusal to face the truth. She read there, mingling sensuality and primness; she saw the hypocrisy, the refusal to see himself except as he wished to be. There, in his face, were the marks of those characteristics which were at the very root of his nature and which had made him the man he was, the man who had sent thousands to their death, the murderer who saw himself as a saint. And she was terrified because she knew that he was inviting her to take that place from which it was an easy step to the block. Inviting her? If only that were true! He was commanding her.

  “There!” he continued. “Now you see we speak sincerely. Don’t be afraid, Kate. Don’t hold back. ‘Would to God,’ I said, ‘that there were more like her in our kingdom. Would to God I was blessed with a wife like Latimer’s.’ Oh, Kate, you were another man’s wife.” His voice had dropped to a whisper; the little mouth seemed to grow smaller, tighter, more prim. “And though I be a King of this realm, to pluck where I will, I said to myself. ‘A man’s wife is his wife.’” His mouth slackened; the shrewd eyes traveled slowly from the neck of her velvet gown to her feet. The sensualist had taken the place of the moralist. “Well, Kate, Latimer’s dead now.”

  “Your Grace, he is so la
tely dead.”

  “Long enough for a wench like you to lay aside her mourning. You are too fair to spend your time in mourning. Time won’t wait, Kate. How are you going to give your husband all those fine sons he will ask of you if you spend your nights crying for a husband who is dead and gone?”

  Oh God, help me, she prayed silently. Now he talks of sons. Thus must he have talked to the first Queen Katharine, to Anne Boleyn, to Jane Seymour. And then those continuous disasters. Two girls and one sickly boy was all he had in spite of his endeavors. Here was a tragic pattern starting again. A son! A son! I want a son. And if you cannot provide one, there is always the ax or the sword to remove you, to make place for another who will give me sons.

  “You are overcome,” she heard the King say gently. “The honor is too great for you. You are too modest, Kate.”

  “My Lord … my Lord …” she began desperately. “I understand not….”

  “Over-humble, that is what you are, sweetheart. You have been the wife of those two old men—men of some position it is true, but they have made you humble.”

  She thought longingly of them now. Kindly Lord Borough; gentle Lord Latimer. They had been old, but they had not looked at her as the King was now looking; they had not disgusted her, nauseated her. She had dreamed of a third marriage—to the man she loved. She dared not think of him now; she was afraid that if she did she would be compelled to cry out: “I love Thomas Seymour.”

  He could be so malignant, this man, so cruel. If she spoke those words, not only she, but Thomas, would be sent to the Tower. It was so easy, for a woman whom the King had chosen for his wife, to commit treason.

  “Too humble,” he was murmuring, “so that you dare not consider the prize which is held out to you. Do not be affrighted, Kate. Listen to what your lord the King tells you. I am no longer in the first sweet flush of youth. Ah, youth! Do you know, Kate, when I was a young man I would hunt all day, tire out six horses and be as fresh as when I started? Then I had that accursed accident, and my leg broke out in ulcers… and none of the cures in Christendom have been able to take them away. I was a King among men then, Kate. Had God not chosen me to rule this realm, then would men have pointed at me and said, ‘There goes a King!’”

  “I doubt it not, my Lord.”

  “You doubt it not! You doubt it not! That is good, Kate. Ah, did you but know what your sovereign has suffered, you would long to comfort him.”

  “I would not dare presume…”

  “We give our permission for the presumption. Think of your King’s poor sick leg, Kate, and weep for him.”

  “Weep for Your Majesty, who is both great and glorious!”

  “Tush! You think of matters of state. A king is a man as well as a king. You know I married my brother’s widow. Twenty years, Kate— twenty years of marriage that was no marriage. For twenty years I lived in sin… with my own brother’s widow. Unintentional sin, though. I was tricked. I was cheated. And England all but robbed of an heir! You know our story, Kate.”

  “I know of Your Majesty’s sorrows.”

  Henry nodded. He was passing into that mood of sentimentality and selfpity which contemplation of the past brought with it. He took a lace kerchief and wiped a tear from his eye. He could always weep for the injustices that had come to him through his marriages. “To some men it would have been simple,” he said. “I was happily married. I had one daughter. Suffice it that I had given England a future Queen, though a son had been denied me. Then, Kate, I understood. It was my conscience, my most scrupulous conscience that told me I could no longer risk England’s security by continuing with a marriage that was no marriage. No marriage, Kate! Can you realize what that meant? The King of England was living in sin with his brother’s widow. Small wonder that God did not grant us a son! So I wrestled with myself, and my conscience told me that I must end that marriage. I must take a new wife.”

  Henry had stood up; he now seemed unaware of the shrinking woman, who immediately rose, as she must not be seated while the King stood. Katharine realized that it was not to her that he was talking now. He began to shout and his fist was clenched.

  “I took to wife a black-browed witch! I was cajoled by sorcery. She would have poisoned my daughter, the lady Mary. My son, Richmond, died soon after she laid her wicked head on the block… died slowly, lingeringly. That was the result of the spells she laid upon him. The devil had made her beautiful. I was entrapped by sorcery. She should have burned at the stake.” He began to speak more softly. “But I was ever merciful to those that pleased me… and she pleased me… once.”

  There was silence in the chamber but for the rustling of the silken curtains as they moved in the draft. The King’s face was gray, and his eyes went to the curtains as though he looked for someone there.

  He turned suddenly and saw Katharine standing beside him. He seemed startled to find her there.

  “Ah, yes,” he sighed. “Kate… Kate… Sit down, Kate.”

  “Your Grace,” she said, “was most unhappy in his marriages.”

  “Aye!” He spoke softly now, and all the selfpity was back in his voice. “Most unhappy. And then came Jane… poor gentle Jane, Jane whom I loved truly. She gave me my son and then she died. The most cruel blow of all!”

  Katharine began to pray again silently and fervently. Oh God, save me. Save me from this man. Save me from the King.

  She knew more of him than he realized. In her country house she had heard how he had received the news of Jane Seymour’s death. Bluntly he had told his ministers that the death of his wife meant little to him beside the great joy he had in his newborn son.

  “Had Jane but lived!” he was saying. “Ah, had Jane but lived!” He turned to Katharine and she felt the hot hand on her knee, caressing her thigh. She longed to beg him to desist, but she dared not.

  “You are cold, Kate,” he said. “You tremble. ’tis all this talk of my miseries. Sometimes I wonder if I have paid for my most glorious reign with my most miserable domestic life. If that be so, Kate, I must be content. A king ofttimes must forget he is a man. A king is the slave of his country as is never the humblest citizen. You know the rest of my sad story?”

  “I do, my lord.”

  “I am young enough to enjoy a wife, Kate.”

  “Your Grace has many happy years before him, I trust and pray.”

  “Well spoken. Come nearer, Kate.”

  She hesitated, but he had had enough of reluctance.

  “Hurry! Now! Here, help me up. This accursed leg gives me much pain.” He stood beside her, towering above her. She felt his hot, sour breath on her cheek. “Do you like me, Kate?”

  How to escape him she did not know. She fell on her knees.

  “I am the most obedient of your subjects, Sire.”

  “Yes, yes, yes,” said Henry testily. “But enough of kneeling. Get up. Be done with maiden modesty. You have been twice a wife. It becomes you not to play the reluctant virgin.”

  “I am overwhelmed,” said Katharine, rising.

  “Then you need no longer be. I like you, Kate, and you shall be my Queen.”

  “No, no, Sire. I am too unworthy. I could not…”

  “It is for us to say who is or who is not worthy to share our throne.” He was losing patience. Now was the time for kissing and fondling, for that excitement which should chase away the ghosts he had conjured up.

  “I know it, my lord King, but…”

  “Know this also, Kate. I choose you for wife. I am tired of the celibate state. I was never meant to bear it. Come, Kate, give me that which I found but once and held so short a while before death intervened. Give me married happiness. Give me your love. Give me sons.”

  Katharine cried: “I am too unworthy, Your Majesty. I am no longer in my prime….”

  Henry stopped the words with a loud kiss on her mouth. “Speak up!” he cried. “Speak up. What’s all this you are saying?”

  Katharine cried in desperation: “If you love me then… then you must
needs love me. But ’t would be better to be your mistress than your wife, an it please Your Grace.”

  He was overcome with horror. The little mouth was tight with outraged modesty. “It pleases me not!” he shouted. “It pleases me not at all to hear such wanton talk. You are shameless.”

  “Yes, Sire, indeed yes, and unworthy to be your wife.”

  “You said you would be our mistress and not our wife. Explain yourself. Explain yourself.”

  Katharine covered her face with her hands. She thought of two women who had knelt on Tower Green, who had laid their heads on the block at the command of this man. They had been his wives. Already she seemed to sense the executioner beside her, his ax in his hand, the blade turned toward her.

  Henry had taken her by the shoulder and was shaking her.

  “Speak up, I said. Speak up.” His voice had softened. He was seeing himself now as he wished to see himself—the mighty, omnipotent King, whom no woman could resist, just as they had been unable to resist him in the days of his youth when he had had beauty, wealth, kingship and all that a woman could desire.

  “It is on account of mine own unworthiness,” faltered Katharine.

  He forced her hands from her face and put an arm about her. He kissed her with violence. Then, releasing her, he began to roar: “Here, page! Here, man! Call Gardiner. Call Wriothesley…Surrey…Seymour… call them all. I have news I wish to impart to their lordships.”

  He smiled at Katharine.

  “You must not be afraid of this great honor,” he said. “Know you this: I can take you up and lift you to the greatest eminence…and I will do it.”

  She was trembling, thinking: Yes, and you can cast me down. You can marry me; and marriage with the King, it is said with truth, may be the first step toward the Tower and the block.

  The courtiers came hurrying back to the chamber. The King stood smiling at them.