And while Hoby is across the sea, he might call on the Duke of Lorraine’s daughter. Don’t fret, he tells his clerks, you don’t need to remember all these ladies individually: not till the king chooses one, and changes her fate. They are all cousins, mostly papists, and mostly called Marie or Anne.
The Duchess Christina is at the court in Brussels, with her aunt, who is regent in those parts for her brother the Emperor. Early in March, he commissions Hans to go out with Hoby and paint her. On 12 March, Hans is granted a three-hour sitting.
‘I think,’ Henry says, when he sees the drawing, ‘that we might have a little music tonight.’
Christina is straight and tall, clear-eyed. When I have made the painting, Hans says, you will see she is so young she has dew on her. She is grave, she is poised: but there is a hint of a smile. You imagine she might put down the gloves that she twists in her fingers, and slide a warm palm against yours. Our envoy Hutton says she has three languages besides Latin. She speaks softly, gently, in all of them, and lisps a little.
The king craves her, the privy chamber gentlemen tell him. He says we should remember her in our prayers, as if she is our queen already.
But also he says, ‘Madame de Longueville has red hair. So I would feel I knew her, as if she were my family. And she has a tried and tested womb.’ He looks at Christina’s drawing again. ‘Now I do not know which lady to love.’
‘Yon Christina has a look of my niece Mary Shelton,’ Norfolk says.
‘I think he has had enough of your nieces,’ Charles Brandon says.
But Shelton is still free. Henry always liked her. He could wed her right away. Thomas Boleyn is soon back at court, perhaps to press the case: they are very close, these families, very greedy. Boleyn is still Earl of Wiltshire despite all. He is grey, drawn, less flesh on him than doctors like to see. He wears his Garter badge and a gold chain, but he wears them against the subdued garments of a private gentleman, and neither he nor his small entourage boast nor strut nor pick fights with the servants of the Seymours. He speaks to my lord Privy Seal in a low confidential tone, as if they were old friends. ‘We have seen such times, Lord Cromwell,’ he says, ‘if I consider what has befallen in England, since my late daughter came up – we have seen events crowded into a week, that in ordinary times would have sustained the chroniclers for a decade.’
Rather than waste time he, Lord Cromwell, decides to force the point: ‘Majesty, you are thinking of Mistress Shelton?’
Henry smiles. ‘Perhaps it is time she was married. Though not necessarily to me.’
He bows himself out. The king is not in a mood to confirm or deny. He thinks, the late Harry Norris had a daughter, did he not? She must be of age now to come to court. Useless to say to her, stay away; stay in the country, keep yourself intact. Brides frisk like silly sheep to the slaughter; like martyrs to the circus, when they hear the lion roar.
The new French ambassador, Castillon, presents himself. He is one of those good fellows who parade their honesty, always showing you the palms of his hands.
He looks him up and down. ‘Monsieur, I think your accord with the Emperor, it is only a winter truce?’
Monsieur Castillon sighs. ‘We must try to settle a permanent peace, when the chance offers. My master is keen to show the world he is a Christian king.’
‘Mine too,’ he says. ‘But I wish François would show a little more warmth about our marrying a Frenchwoman.’
‘You are not set against it? Personally?’
‘I only want to make my king happy.’
Castillon says, ‘Your king must be very clear what he offers.’
‘You can talk to me about that. I do the money.’
‘But I am speaking of a pact, a military alliance –’
‘Talk to Norfolk. He does the soldiers.’
‘Norferk is far more friendly to us than you.’
‘Perhaps because you pay him more, ambassador.’
In dealing with the French he always feels he wants Wolsey’s advice. The French were terrified of the cardinal. They called him
Since new year, the rich and fertile county of Kent has been swept by rumours of the king’s death, which are passed between the patrons of the Checkers in Canterbury, and carried by fish-sellers door to door. They say he is dead of a flux, a fever, a cough, and that it is a pity he did not die seven years back. They also say that a tax will be placed on every horned beast, as well as a poll tax on their owners, and it will be set high so as to enrich Thomas Cromwell, and bring honest farmers to their knees.
