The Sixth Wife: The Story of Katherine Parr Read online

He looked at them slyly, all those gentlemen who, a short time before, he had dismissed that he might be alone with Katharine.

  “Come forward!” he cried. “Come and pay your respects to the new Queen of England.”

  KATHARINE WAS IN her own apartments. With dry, tragic eyes she stared before her; she was trying to look into a future which she knew would be filled with danger.

  There was no escape; she knew that now.

  Nan, her faithful woman, had wept openly when she had heard the news. Katharine’s own sister, Anne Herbert, had come quickly to court. They did not speak of their compassion, but they showed it in their gestures, in the very intonations of their voices. They loved her, those two; they prayed for her and they wept for her; but they did not let her hear their prayers, nor see their tears.

  It was the day after the King had announced his intention to marry her that Seymour came secretly to her apartments.

  Nan let him in. Nan was terrified. She had been so happy serving Lady Latimer. Life, she realized now, had been so simple in the country mansions of Yorkshire and Worcester. Why had they not returned to the country immediately after the death of Lord Latimer? Why had they stayed that the King’s amorous and fickle eyes might alight on her lady?

  There was danger all around, and Sir Thomas made that danger more acute by coming to her apartment. Nan remembered the stories she had heard of another Thomas—Culpepper—who had visited the apartments of another Catharine; and remembering that bitter and tragic story she wondered if the story of Katharine Parr would be marred by similar events. Was she destined for the same bitter end?

  “I must see Lady Latimer,” said Sir Thomas. “It is imperative.”

  And so he was conducted to her chamber.

  He took her hands in his and kissed them fervently.

  “Kate… Kate… how could this happen to us?”

  “Thomas,” she answered, “I wish that I were dead.”

  “Nay, sweetheart. Do not wish that. There is always hope.”

  “There is no hope for me.”

  He put his arms about her and held her close to him. He whispered: “He cannot live for ever.”

  “I cannot endure it, Thomas.”

  “You must endure it. We must both endure it. He is the King. Forget not that.”

  “I tried,” she said. “I tried…. And, Thomas, if he knew that you were here…”

  He nodded, and his eyes sparkled with the knowledge of his danger.

  “Thus do I love you,” he told her. “Enough to risk my life for you.”

  “I would not have you do that. Oh, Thomas, that will be the most difficult thing that faces me. I shall see you…you whom I love. I must compare you. You…you who are all that I admire… all that I love. He…he is so different.”

  “He is the King, my love. I am the subject. And you will not be burdened with my presence. I have my orders.”

  “Thomas! No …not… the Tower?”

  “Nay! He does not consider me such a serious rival as that. I depart at sunrise for Flanders.”

  “So…I am to lose you, then?”

  “’ Twere safer for us, sweetheart, not to meet for a while. So thinks the King. That is why he is sending me with Dr. Wotton on an embassy to Flanders.”

  “How long will you be away?”

  “Methinks the King will find good reason to keep me there… or out of England… for a little while.”

  “I cannot bear it. I know I cannot.”

  He took her face in his hands. “My heart, like yours, is broken, sweetheart. But we must bear this pain. It will pass. I swear it will pass. And our hearts will mend, for one day we shall be together.”

  “Thomas, can you believe that?”

  “I believe in my destiny, Kate. You and I shall be together. I know it.”

  “Thomas, if the King were to discover that you had been here…”

  “Ah, perhaps he would give me this hour, since he is to have you for the rest of his life.”

  “For the rest of my life, you mean!” she said bitterly.

  “Nay. He is an old man. His fancy will not stray to others as once it did. One year… two years… who knows? Cheer up, my Kate. Today we are broken-hearted, but tomorrow the future is ours.”

  “You must not stay here. I feel there are spies, watching my every movement.”

  He kissed her and caressed her afresh; and after a time he took his leave, and on the next tide sailed for Flanders.

  IN THE QUEEN’S closet at Hampton Court, Gardiner performed the ceremony. This was not hurried and secret as in the case of Anne Boleyn; this was a royal wedding.

  The Princesses Mary and Elizabeth stood behind the King and his bride, and with them the King’s niece, the Lady Margaret Douglas. Lady Herbert, the Queen’s sister, and other great ladies and gentlemen were present.

  The King was in excellent humor on this his marriage morning. The jewels flashed on his dalmatica; the shrewd eyes sparkled and the royal tongue licked the tight lips, for she was a comely creature, this bride of his, and he was a man who needed a wife. He felt, as he had said that morning to his brother-in-law, Lord Hertford, that this marriage would be the best he had ever made.

  The July sun was hot and the bride felt as though she would faint with the oppressive atmosphere in the room and the fear within her.

  A nightmare had sprung into life. She was here in Hampton Court being married to the King, here in a palace surrounded by gardens which Henry had planned with Anne Boleyn, on whose walls were the entwined initials, the H. and A. which had had to be changed hastily to H. and J. Along the gallery which led to the chapel, the youthful Catharine Howard had run one day, screaming for mercy. It was said that both Anne and Catharine haunted this place. And here, in the palace of hideous memories, she, Katharine Parr, was now being married to Henry the Eighth.

  There was no longer hope of escape. The King was close. His breath scorched her. The nuptial ring was being put on her finger.

  No. No longer hope. The King in that tragic moment had made Katharine Parr his sixth wife.

  CHAPTER

  II

  THE KING WAS NOT DISPLEASED WITH HIS NEW WIFE. She had the gentlest hands that had ever wrapped a bandage about his poor suffering leg, and in the first few weeks of his marriage he discovered that he had not only got himself a comely wife, but the best of nurses. Nervous and timid she was during those first weeks, as though feeling herself unworthy to receive the great honors which were being showered upon her.

  “Why, bless your modest heart, Kate,” he told her, “you have no need to fear us. We like you. We like your shapely person and your gentle hands. We know that you have been raised to a great position in this land, but let that not disturb you, for you are worthy, Kate. We find you worthy.”

  She wore the jewels—those priceless gems—which had been worn by her predecessors.

  “Look at these rubies, Kate.” He would lean heavily on her and bite her ear in a moment of playfulness. Why had she thought that elderly men were less interested in fleshly pleasures than the younger ones? She realized that the experience afforded her by Lords Borough and Latimer had taught her little. “You’ll look a Queen in these! And don’t forget you wear them through the King’s grace. Don’t forget that, my Kate.”

  And she herself, because she was by nature kindly and gentle and looked for that good in others which was such an integral part of her own character, was more quickly resigned to this marriage than others might have been.

  Yet there were nights when she lay awake in the royal bed, that mountain of diseased flesh beside her, thinking of her new life as Queen of England. Of the King she knew a good deal, for the affairs of kings are watched closely by those about them, and this man was a supreme ruler whose slightest action could send reverberations through the kingdom.

  What sort of man was he whom she had married? First, because she had been the victim of this quality, she must think of him as the sensualist. Indeed, his sensuality was so great that
it colored every characteristic he possessed. But he was far more than a man who delighted in pandering to his senses with fair women, good food and the best of wine; he was a King, and for all his selfindulgence, he was a King determined to rule. When he had been a young man, his delight in his healthy body had proved so great that he had preferred to leave the government of state affairs to his able Wolsey. But he had changed. He was the ruler now. And through that selfishness, that love of indulgence, that terrifying cruelty, there could be seen the strong man, the man who knew how to govern in a turbulent age, a man to whom the greatness of his country was of the utmost importance because he, Henry the Eighth, was synonymous with England. But for his monster conscience and a surprising primness in the sensualist, he would have resembled any lusty man of the times. But he was apart. He must be right in all things; he must placate his conscience; and it was those acts, demanded of him by the conscience, which made him the most cruel tyrant of his age.

  What would happen to her in the months to come? wondered Katharine, staring at the ornate tester, although there was not enough light to show her its magnificent workmanship. And what of Thomas Seymour, temporarily banished from his country because he had been known to cast covetous eyes on the woman the King had decided to make his wife! How was he bearing the banishment?

  What are this King’s subjects, Katharine asked herself, but figures to be moved about at his pleasure? Some please him for a while, and he lifts them up and keeps them close beside him until he sees others who please him more; then those who delighted him a week before are discarded; and if that prim quality within him suggests that the favorite of yesterday be removed by death, the conscience demands that this should be done. For the King must always be able to answer his conscience, no matter how much blood must be spilled to bring about this state of concord between a self-willed sensualist and his conscience.

  So Katharine prayed in the silences of the nights for the courage of which she knew she would have great need. Often she thought of a friend with whom she had been on terms of affection before she came to court. This was the Reformer, Anne Askew, herself the victim of an undesired marriage; she thought of Anne’s courage and determination and she longed to emulate her.

  But I am a coward, thought Katharine. I cannot bear to think of the cell, and the sound of tolling bells, bringing to me a message of destruction. I cannot bear to think of leaving that cell for Tower Green and the executioner’s ax.

  Her prayer for courage, it seemed, did not go unanswered, for as the days passed her fears diminished and she felt that a new sense was developing within her which would make her aware of encroaching danger and give her the calm she would need to face it.

  Some might have loathed the task which was thrust upon them. Each day it was her duty now to bathe the leg, to listen to his cries of rage when he was in pain; but oddly enough, instead of nauseating her, this filled her with pity for him. To see this man—this all-powerful King—such a prey to his hideous infirmity, was a sorry sight. Once when he looked at her he had seen her eyes filled with tears. He had softened immediately.

  “Tears, Kate? Tears?”

  “You suffer so.”

  Then those little eyes, which could be so cruel, also filled with tears, and the fat hand which was heavy with flashing jewels came down to pat her shoulders.

  “You’re a good woman, Kate,” he said. “Methinks I made a good choice when I took you to wife.”

  She had asked that her sister Anne, Lady Herbert, might be a lady of her bedchamber, and that Margaret Neville, the only daughter of Lord Latimer, be one of her maids of honor.

  “Do as you will, Kate,” said the King when she had made the request. “You’re a good woman and a wise one, and you’ll surround yourself with others of your kind.”

  Yes, the King was pleased. This marriage had not begun with one of those burning infatuations such as he had felt for Anne Boleyn and Catharine Howard. That was all to the good. This, he assured himself, was a wise choice, a choice made while the judgment was cool and sober.

  Then there were the children. He had made it clear to her that he wished her to take a stepmotherly interest in them, and for thisshe was grateful. It had been one of her deepest regrets that she had no children of her own, and that her strong maternal nature had always to be placated with stepchildren. Well, it had been so before, and never had she found anything but joy in mothering the children of those other women.

  The royal children were as responsive as had been those of her other marriages. How happy she was to be so obviously welcome in their apartments! Poor children, they had known so many different stepmothers and they were accustomed to such changes.

  When, as their stepmother, she paid them her first visit, they were all ceremoniously assembled to greet her.

  Little Edward looked so puny that she wanted to take him in her arms and weep over him. Yet while he moved her with pity, he filled her with dread. This was the only male heir, and the King wished for others.

  He put his hand in hers and, on sudden impulse, dispensing with that ceremony due to the heir to the throne, she knelt and kissed him, and, following her lead, he put his arms about her neck.

  “Welcome, dear Mother,” he said; and in his voice was all the yearning of a little boy who has never known a mother and always longed for one, and whose childish pleasures had been overlaid by the great duties demanded of an heir to the throne.

  “We are going to love each other,” she said.

  “I am glad you are to be our stepmother,” he answered.

  The Lady Mary knelt before her. Poor Mary, who was almost as unhealthy as Edward. She never dispensed with what she considered the right formalities, and this was a solemn occasion for Mary—the greeting of the new Queen of England. Previously it had been Lady Latimer who must kneel to the Lady Mary; now the position was reversed, and although there had been warm friendship between them, Mary never forgot the demands of etiquette.

  “Rise, dear Mary,” said Katharine; and she kissed the slightly younger woman.

  “Welcome, dear Mother,” said Mary. “I am glad to welcome you.”

  And then Elizabeth came forward, dropping a pretty curtsy and lifting her sparkling eyes to her stepmother’s face.

  “I, too, am pleased,” she said; and when she had received her stepmother’s kiss, as though on sudden impulse, she followed her brother’s example and, putting her arms about Katharine’s neck, kissed her.

  Little Jane Grey, who was waiting with her sister Katharine to welcome the Queen, thought that Elizabeth seemed more pleased than any of them. Little Jane noted a good deal more than people guessed, for she never spoke, even to her beloved Edward, of all that she saw. She did not believe that Elizabeth was really half as pleased as Edward or Mary, although she was not displeased. (Who could be to welcome such a gentle and charming lady as the new Queen?) It was merely that Elizabeth could show great pleasure or great sorrow as she wished, and the more easily than others because she did not feel these emotions deeply and could remain in control of herself.

  Now Elizabeth stood back that the Queen might greet the little Greys, and while Jane knelt before the Queen and was kissed by her, she was thinking that Elizabeth was not really so pleased because the King had married a good lady, but because this lady would be easy to persuade; and Elizabeth would know how to persuade her to ask the King to give her what she most needed; and what Elizabeth needed was that position which she considered hers by right. She wished to be received at court, not as the Lady Elizabeth, the bastard, but as a Princess; and she wished to have an income that she might buy beautiful clothes; she wished to have jewels with which to adorn her person. Jane felt sure that that was what Elizabeth was thinking as she greeted Katharine Parr.

  And yet, when they had dispensed with ceremony as far as Mary would allow them, and were all gay and happy together, Jane noticed that it was Elizabeth’s gay chatter which most charmed the Queen.

  Edward kept close to Jane, and now a
nd then held her hand and looked at her with fresh tenderness. He was thinking that his father must be very happy to have this new stepmother for a wife, and that a wife could be a great help to a King.

  Then he felt suddenly happy because of Jane, who was quiet and gentle and very clever—she was not unlike the new stepmother in these things—for Edward knew that Queen Katharine was quiet, gentle and learned.

  While Elizabeth was talking to their stepmother, Edward said to Jane: “It is a good thing to have a wife, Jane. If a king loves her dearly and she is good and kind and clever, that is a very good thing. You are kind, Jane, and good and clever. You are beautiful too.”

  Then he and Jane smiled at each other, because there was such accord between them that they did not always have to put their thoughts into words, and Jane knew that Edward meant that he wished he might have her for his Queen when he grew up.

  The King too visited his son’s apartment on that day, for he wished to see how his wife was faring with his children.

  His approach was heralded as he came slowly to those apartments.

  “The King comes this way!”

  Waiting women and ushers, guards and gentlemen-at-arms were alert, terrified that he might glance their way and find some fault, hoping that he would give them a nod of approval.

  And into the room he hobbled, beside him one of his gentlemen on whom he might lean. His doublet was of crimson velvet, striped and slashed with white satin. About his neck was a gold collar from which hung a magnificent and very large pearl. His cloak was of purple velvet; and on his left leg he wore the Garter. He glittered with jewels; they adorned his cap, his doublet and his cloak; they sparkled on the pouch of cloth of gold which hung at his side and which hid from view the dagger with the jeweled hilt. The color of his face almost matched that of his cloak, so purple was it with the exertion of walking; but at the moment its expression was one of beaming kindliness. It pleased him to see his new wife and his children together.

  As he entered the room all fell to their knees.

  He surveyed them with contentment, until he examined more closely the face of his little son. The boy was wan and there were dark shadows under his eyes. That tutor of his was letting him work too hard; he would have a word with the fellow.