VIII

belongs to his one-year-old nephew.”
    “Interesting…”
    “Indeed.” His eyes flick up to me. “But there is something further you should know. It has been reported that your sister, the Queen of Scots, will agree to this, because she expects her son to inherit England in due course.”
    I stare at Wolsey. He is talking about my sister Meg; she married the King of Scotland soon after our mother died. I say, “She expects what ?”
    “I quote: ‘Since the King of England has no children, his nephew will be next in line to succeed.’”
    “ Yet . I have no children yet , Meg. Give me that.”
    I read the dispatch. It reports that the general view is that this latest miscarriage proves that Catherine is unable to carry a healthy child who will live, so there is no prospect of an heir.
    The room is still, as I scan the paper a second time; next door the priest’s voice drones on.
    I take a breath – shake my head. I feel winded. “This is ridiculous. There is time.”
    “Of course there is.”
    The paper crumples in my hand; I throw it to the floor. “There is time.”

 
♦  ♦  ♦  XIII   ♦  ♦  ♦
     
     
    Of course there’s time. A new year has begun: it is spring, again, and Catherine is pregnant – again. This is the year I will conquer France; this is the year I will have a son.
    Surely.
    A fresh-scented morning: everything outside is unfurling, new-green and dewy. I’m just back from hunting; I stink of horse sweat and my sweat; I’m smeared with animal blood and comprehensively mud-splashed. I am also happy. My thoughts are still with the chase: the hard riding, the perilous jumps, the horn blasts, the howling and barking and the wonderful sight of the bucks going down – lurching, torn, glassy-eyed.
    As the grooms of the wardrobe deliver the clothes I want to the door of my bedchamber (only a select group of people, of course, are allowed to touch my sanctified flesh), a letter arrives. It is from Wolsey, who is deep in business – papers and ink, seals and figures – in his rooms at Westminster.
    Reading, I swat away the men who are trying to unlace my sleeves, take a step back and lean against the wall. My heart has done a flip, my hands are shaking, my pulse seems to be thumping in my stomach. I read the letter twice, get blood on it from my gloves and then leave the room at speed, pounding along the gallery in my riding boots and muddying the new rush-matting.
    Guards twitch aside their halberds as I reach the entrance to a chamber; I slam open the door.
    “Did you know he was going to do this?”
    I’ve caught a glimpse of a tableau: ladies sitting in well-bred poses in a sunlit bay window, gable headdresses bent over their sewing; a scene of industry and quiet conversation. Now all heads turn to me. Seeing my expression, the faces suddenly blank; each lady gets up from her stool and sinks immediately into a deep curtsey. Some of the sewing – some of it my own shirts, halfway through being embroidered – has slipped down the sides of skirts to the floor.
    The ladies remain in their curtsies; the figure in the centre rises again – very upright – and says, “My lord?” Catherine is studiedly formal; she is signalling as strongly as if she were waving her arms: Wait. We are in public .
    I don’t give a damn where we are. I shout, “Did. You. Know?”
    A small movement of her hand to her ladies: go. The ladies straighten and file out, almost stumbling in their eagerness to get away. The last shuts the door carefully behind her.
    Once they’ve gone Catherine moves forward, her hands reaching out to take mine. “Hal, what’s happened? What’s the matter?”
    I sidestep to keep my distance. “He’s pulled out of the agreement.”
    “Who?”
    “Your father!” I throw the letter at her. She makes a swipe to catch it, but it zig-zags through the air. She stands looking at me. I shout, “Your bastard, pox-ridden father! Not only that, he’s persuaded the Emperor out of it too. They’ve made sodding terms with the French. There will be no invasion.” I walk up the room and back again, take a glass dish from a table and smash it into the hearth.
    For several moments Catherine hasn’t moved. Now she stoops, with difficulty in her boned dress, to pick up the letter from the floor – I don’t help.
    She scans the paper, looks up at me. “Hal, he’s done this before. Can’t you still—”
    “Yes, he’s done this before,” I say in a singsong