The Autobiography of Henry VIII by Margaret George

Author:Margaret George
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-03-13T05:00:00+00:00

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It was May Eve, and I lay at Oxford. I had come to inspect Wol-sey Therefore I gave my blessings to the nuptials and arranged that the wedding should take place at St. George's Chapel in Windsor. It was not to be a state affair, even though Fitzroy's titles gave him formidable rank as a peer of England: Duke of Richmond and Somerset, Lord Warden of the Marches, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and Lord High Admiral of England, Wales, Ireland, Normandy, Gascony, and Aquitaine. It was not to be a state affair simply because to do such a thing, at the very time that the Oath of Succession was being administered, would be to focus undue attention upon yet another claimant to the succession. The issue was heated enough already when loyalties were pulled between two females, Mary and Elizabeth. Reminding everyone of a comely royal lad of marriageable age was not politic. He was comely. I was proud of him, proud of his Tudor looks and his sensitivity and regal bearing. And still another reason was that Anne did not care to be reminded of my living son, since she had not given me one of her own. That Bessie had was a continual insult to her. It puzzled me then, why Anne had not. It was not for lack of coupling, or for lack of joy in our bed. Since I had returned from my "pilgrimage," there had been no more of that earlier trouble. Our bodies spoke even sometimes when our words could not bridge the gap between us--by that I mean the gap that separates each individual from any other. Nonetheless we were son-less. The Princess Elizabeth was a year old now, thriving at Hatfield House, attended by her sister Mary, who insisted on referring to Anne as "Madam Pembroke" even now. She was as stubborn as Katherine.... Katherine. As I selected my rings from an octagonal inlaid Spanish box, I thought of Katherine. She had refused the Oath, as I had expected. But her manner of doing so was to barricade herself in her rooms at Buckden and refuse to admit Brandon or to speak to him and his commissioners. He waited two days in her Great Hall for her to emerge so he could apprehend her and force her answer. When he ascertained that she had a cook, provisions, and her confessor locked up with her, he knew she would not come out for six months, would perhaps even starve herself to death in there and call herself a martyr for it. Her confessor would give her last rites and send her soul right up to heaven. In disgust, he left, after dismissing the rest of her servants and carrying off her furniture. The townspeople reviled him and threatened his life even for that. An ugly mob, they surrounded the house and harassed my commissioners, waving their stupid pitchforks and hoes. That was enough. I needed no Anne to urge me to end this childish, stubborn, and aggravating behaviour of Katherine's.

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