The Last Boleyn by Karen Harper

Author:Karen Harper
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780307345387
Publisher: Crown/Archetype
Published: 2006-02-28T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY

April 27, 1526

Hampton Court

The weeks, days and hours were precious now and not to be dreaded as Mary had feared: each meal, each walk through the wood-paneled and tapestried halls of Greenwich, Whitehall, Nonesuch, or Hampton—any moment she might see Staff.

Their times together were often fleeting and bittersweet, but Mary treasured each in her heart. The stares, rude barbs, and affronts to her as the king’s now-cast-off mistress bothered her not at all. Anne’s self-centeredness, the lack of her father’s goodwill which she had once coveted—what did that matter now that William Stafford loved her and she belonged, body and heart, to him only?

They had become as clever as the king’s court spies, Staff teased her. Sometimes Mary’s trusted maid Nancy went between them with information about when one of them was unexpectedly free or where to meet, but usually they managed unaided. When Will, as Esquire to the Body, fulfilled his duties as royal valet and companion to the king by sleeping within call of the royal bedroom, Staff sometimes dared to come to her, but often they met in the dead of night in some unoccupied bedroom or other empty chamber in reach of whatever palace the court visited. Staff seemed to know everything: Will’s schedule, what rooms in what halls were vacant, when to dare much, and when they must go endless days not chancing a tryst. Mary trusted Staff completely, as completely as she desired and loved him.

But it had been almost a week now, the longest they had not dared, and this chilly and damp late April day here at Hampton Court was starting to seep into her bones. After each time they had been together, she fed herself on warm memories of each embrace, each passionate caress, living his tender touches over and over until the memories cooled and she burned with desire for new lovemaking with him.

Mary leaned her flushed cheek on the cool pane of the leaded window overlooking the vast stretch of roofs at Hampton abloom with twisted brick chimneys in the early morning rain. This room was not a bad one really—spacious with a fireplace and a tiny sitting room attached. How the Carey living quarters had improved since they had returned from their year-long exile only three months ago! Their bouche too, the daily allotment by rank of candles, bread, wine, and beer sent to the hundreds of courtiers’ rooms, had increased. Probably the result of some comment of her sister to the Great Henry rather than His Grace’s true estimate of the Careys’ worth. But today, the red bricks of Hampton were glazed with chilly rain and a gray fog drifted in from the river with cold, clenching hands to dampen her precious memories.

She heard her maid Nancy come and she turned to see the girl’s arms full of the laundry she had gone to fetch and a bolt of shell-pink satin. “Good news, Lady Mary,” the sweet-faced, brown-haired girl beamed at her mistress as she laid the pile of goods carefully on the table.

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