VIII

unfathomable how I have got to this point. How you have got me to this point. Empire and sons? What a joke. The eleventh year of my glorious reign and what do I have? A treaty with France and a daughter.”
    “Perhaps God gives you what you want, but not in the way you expect.”
    “Christ, don’t give me a priest’s answer! I am looking over the brink into…”
    “Into what?”
    “A void. Absolute nothingness.”
    “Your Grace. May I tell you my idea?”
    “If it’s quick.”
    “The Emperor is in trouble. He needs help – quite desperately, I believe – to crush the rebellions in Spain. He has no money left.”
    The man carrying the title of ‘Emperor’ these days is no longer Maximilian, the most unreliable man in Christendom, as Fox once called him. He sleeps – reliably dead – in his grave, while the young kings of France and Spain have fought a crippling financial war to win his imperial crown. It came down, in the end, to threats and bribes. And, at the cost of one million gold florins, King Charles of Spain won.
    So, Charles now has to his name Spain, Burgundy, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, some Italian states, parts of the New World… and no money. Perhaps God gives you what you want, but not in the way you expect .
    Wolsey says, “It occurs to me there is a prize to be won here. Greater than we could ever have anticipated.”
    “Don’t pause for dramatic effect. I’m not a congregation. Get on with it.”
    “You give Charles the ships and money he needs for Spain. In return, you demand a joint invasion of France, and his hand in marriage for your daughter.”
    I stop. I am at the far end of the room. Absently, I reach out and touch the tapestry-covered wall in front of me: David’s crown, rendered in gold thread, glinting in the candlelight.
    Behind me, Wolsey rises from his chair. “See: you conquer France. Princess Mary, as Charles’s wife, becomes an empress. She will have a son, your grandson – shall we say he is called Henry? This grandson will rule not only all the lands Charles rules now – numerous as they are – but France and England too. His empire will be on a scale unknown since Caesar’s time.”
    I lean my forehead on the wall.
    “It makes sense of what has happened,” says Wolsey. “If you had a son, the empire could never be so vast. This way, your grandson will establish a new world order. There will be no one to challenge him.”
    My eyes are shut; I take a deep breath. Some terrible creature releases its coils from my heart and slinks away.
    “Who knows?” says Wolsey, at my shoulder now. “Charles may die young. Then you will rule this new empire as regent until your grandson comes of age.”
    The greatest empire in the world.
    Yes. This makes sense of it all. Doesn’t it?

 
♦  ♦  ♦  XVIII   ♦  ♦  ♦
     
     
    The most powerful young man in Christendom has not waited in his chambers – he bounds down the grand stairs to greet us, passing lines of guards in their best new liveries, passing trumpeters at the great doorway, who are now confused about whether or when to play. He is a vision in gold damask and red satin – with spindly limbs, all knees and elbows, and such an outsized jaw it could do service as a spade.
    I cross the courtyard, arms extended. My bear hug closes on air – Emperor Charles V has dropped onto one knee on the flagstones and snatched off his bonnet.
    “Honoured Father,” he says in French, and I look down at his dark head, as his neatly cut hair swings forward, momentarily concealing the colossal jaw.
    Through Catherine I am his uncle, but I’m not old enough to be his father – still, this is like a pack dog deferring to its leader. All at once, I am in a marvellous mood. I raise the youth by the shoulders, embrace him and pound him on the back. Winded, he smiles at me awkwardly. But he is not long on his large, narrow feet. He and Catherine kneel to one another at the same moment – and laugh, and embrace where they are. “I can see my sister in your eyes,” she says. As she clasps his hands, an embroidered loop on her sleeve catches on a cluster of his doublet’s pearls; laughing again, they disentangle themselves. He helps her up. Tears are coursing down her face; she is smiling and smiling.
    The trumpeters take a decision: a blast echoes round the courtyard as I lead him inside. Through the padding at his shoulder, I feel him start.
    We are at Dover Castle, my grey-stone fortress