Chapter 3
Kate was relieved when Father Thirlwall, the Queen’s confessor, came that evening to offer her spiritual comfort in her last hours, for they had all been sitting desolately, trying to make conversation, but horribly aware of what was to happen in the morning.
That had been brought home to them by the distant hammering and sawing of wood, echoing across the silent spaces of the Tower.
They were building the scaffold on which Anne was to die.
Kate could not sleep that night. By the time morning came, she felt deathly, yet made herself get up and put on her good black gown and the hood that matched it.
None of the other young ladies spoke as they readied themselves.
They all looked terrified. And they were only to be onlookers.
Anne was going to have her head cut off.
How much more terrified must she be feeling?
“She’s at prayer,” said Lady Kingston, when they entered the dining chamber.
Bread, cheese, ale, and cold cuts of meat had been laid out on the table, but no one wanted to eat anything.
“She’s been up all night,” she added. “The Archbishop has been and gone. He heard her last confession and said Mass. She asked my husband to be present when she took the Sacrament. She wanted him to hear her declare her innocence before God. She swore, on the damnation of her soul, that she has never offended against the King.”
A brief surge of hope fluttered in Kate’s breast. It was unthinkable that anyone would lie when they were facing death and the divine judgment to follow.
If the Archbishop repeated Anne’s words to the King, would his Grace realize that it had all been a dreadful mistake and send a reprieve?
She asked Lady Kingston what she thought.
“No,” she said. “Put that notion away. Twenty-seven peers judged her guilty. There will be no reprieve.”
At half past eight, the ladies were all summoned to the Queen’s bedchamber to make her ready for her last public appearance. They found her pale but composed.
“I am determined to make a good death,” she told them. “No one shall say that I faltered at the end. It will be over in an instant, and then I will be lifted up out of this miserable world and know eternal joy.”
Kate’s hands were trembling as she laced up her aunt’s gown. She could not see for tears, so Lady Boleyn had to help her before taking her aside. “Pull yourself together, Niece,” she muttered. “We must all be strong for her.”
Kingston had gone to see to the final preparations for the execution, but at nine o’clock, the appointed hour, it was Lady Kingston who opened the door.
“I am sorry, Madam, but your execution has had to be postponed until noon.”
“No!” Anne gasped. “It cannot be! Why?”
“My husband has just received orders to have foreigners conveyed out of the Tower, and he has had to send for the Sheriff of London to see that this is done. He cannot help it, Madam. He knows you will be upset by the delay.”
“Indeed, I am! Pray send him to me when he has a moment free.”
Kingston came soon afterward. At the sight of him, Anne became agitated and panicky.
“Master Kingston, I hear that I shall not die before noon, and I am very sorry for it, for I thought then to be dead and past my pain.”
“There should be no pain, Madam,” he reassured her. “It is so subtle a blow.”
Kate shuddered. No pain? Who was he trying to fool? And how did he know?
“I have heard you say that the executioner is very good, and I have a little neck,” Anne said. She put her hands around it and laughed nervously.
“I have seen many men and women executed,” he told her, “and they have all been in great sorrow, but this method of execution is instantaneous, and I can see that your Grace has much joy and pleasure in death.”
“There is nothing left for me in this world,” she told him. “I do long to die, but my poor flesh shrinks from it, so I am heartily glad it will be over quickly.”
“It will be,” he said, and reached out to squeeze her hand.
Kate saw her eyes fill with tears and felt like crying herself.
“I should be grateful if no one would trouble me when I make my devotions this morning,” Anne said, blinking the tears back furiously.
She summoned her confessor and disappeared with him into the closet she used as an oratory. Kate and the others exchanged anguished looks. The delay, they knew, would be torture for Anne. She would need to sustain her fragile courage for a little longer. It was dreadful for them all.
Anne was calm when she emerged, and summoned the ladies to attend her, but no sooner were they seated than Kingston arrived. “I am so very sorry, Madam. Your execution has now had to be postponed until nine o’clock tomorrow morning.”
Kate could barely believe her ears. They couldn’t do this to her, they couldn’t!
“Oh, Master Kingston, I am deeply sorry to hear that,” Anne lamented.
“I beg of you, for the honor of God, to make urgent suit to the King that, since I am in a good state and disposed for death, I might be dispatched immediately. I was prepared to die, and I fear that the delay might weaken my resolve.”
Kingston looked deeply distressed. “Madam, I am powerless to change the arrangements. I can only exhort you to pray for the strength to endure longer.”
—
Kate marveled at her aunt’s strong will and her deep faith, which sustained her through those terrible final hours. Repeatedly, she sought fortitude in prayer. Her maids found it impossible to stop bursting into tears, and it was Anne who ended up consoling them.
“Death is not a thing to be regretted by Christians,” she reminded them. “Remember, I shall be quit of all unhappiness.”
It seemed strange to be doing all the normal things—taking meals, or picking at them, going to the stool chamber, sipping wine—when the dread and momentous event of the morrow approached ever nearer.
Kate spent much of her time trying to comfort Mary Norris, yet it was hard to find means of consoling her, for the loss of a beloved father in such a horrible way was a dreadful thing.
She did not know whether she should be mournful or try to stay cheerful to keep everyone’s spirits up; and it was almost impossible to be cheerful when you were dying inside.
But after dinner, as they all sat together around the table sewing, Anne did her best to make witty conversation. She even attempted a jest.
“Those bragging, clever people who invent names for kings and queens will not be hard put to it to invent one for me! They will call me Queen Anne Lackhead!” She laughed heartily, and they tried to join in.
Somehow, they got through the evening. As darkness fell, Anne sat down at the table, read her prayer book for a while, then began scribbling. Kate wondered what she was writing, for her farewell letters had been completed and sealed two nights before.
At length, Anne looked up. “I have decided that it is best to be at peace with the world before I die. I have written to your mother and begged her forgiveness for my harshness toward her,” she told Kate.
“Madam, she will be deeply touched,” Kate said. “I know that she would be here with you if she could.”
“Alas, by the time she would get here…” Anne left the sentence unfinished.
—
In the morning, they dressed her in a beautiful robe of gray damask. Beneath it, she was wearing a low-necked red kirtle she had worn on the night before her arrest. Lady Boleyn placed a short white ermine cape around her shoulders.
“In case it is chilly outside,” she said, looking emotional. “Lady Kingston and I will not be attending you. The young ladies are to have that honor.”
Kate knew real terror then. It was really going to happen. Nothing in her short life had prepared her for this.
It was as well that Lady Boleyn was binding up Anne’s hair, piling the plaits high above her neck, and placing a gable hood on her head, as Kate could not have done it; she was so paralyzed by fear.
“Do I look presentable?” Anne asked. “I am told that the people are being allowed into the Tower to watch.”
“You look every inch the Queen!” Lady Boleyn told her.
After receiving the Sacrament, Anne toyed with her breakfast, nibbling on a piece of manchet bread to please her ladies, but it was clear that she had no appetite. Kate noticed that she kept having to visit the privy.
At eight o’clock, Kingston appeared at the door.
“Madam, the hour approaches,” he said. “You should make ready.”
“Acquit yourself of your charge,” Anne told him, “for I have long been prepared.”
He cleared his throat. “Madam, a word of advice. When you are asked to kneel, you must stay upright and not move at all, for your own sake. Do you understand me? The executioner is skilled, but if you move, the stroke may go awry.”
Kate felt sick. The other young ladies had turned pale.
“I will stay still,” Anne said. She sounded as if she was struggling to control herself.
“We must go now,” he told her.
Lady Boleyn hugged her tightly. “God be with you!” she said fervently.
As Kate, Nan, and the two Marys followed Anne and Kingston down the stairs, all four of them were crying. Kate felt a surge of bitter anger against the King who had condemned her aunt to this terrible death.
“Your Grace does not deserve this!” she blurted out.
Anne neither turned around nor answered.
They had reached the door that opened to the Inmost Ward, and she was staring at the two hundred Yeomen of the King’s Guard, who were waiting there to escort her to her execution.
Kate had not anticipated that the proceedings would be conducted with such ceremony.
She and her companions, still struggling to control their emotions, walked behind Anne and Kingston as the mournful procession began its slow march toward the Coldharbour Gate.
As they passed through its massive twin towers, a huge crowd came into view and a great murmur rose from the people when they saw Anne coming toward them.