Chapter Twenty-Three
When Lady Rochford and I return to my rooms an hour later, my ladies-in-waiting and maids of honors are noticeably absent.
Time stretches, another hour passes, and they never arrive as they do every morning.
When Lady Rochford eventually goes to look out in the hall, her face is serious but composed when she returns.
She sits down in the chair beside me. “There’s a wall of guards outside the doors. They said no one is permitted in, and we are not permitted to leave.”
I nod my head. I’m not entirely surprised.
“Is this what happened the last time?” I ask her. “Did he do this to your sister-in-law, Anne?”
“Yes,” Lady Rochford answers. “The king has a flair for the dramatic.”
A few moments pass in silence until I speak again. “You’d think he’d try to be original this time around.”
Lady Rochford shrugs. “You’d think so, wouldn’t you? It’s terribly dull to do the same thing every few years.” Then she adds, “Between me and you, the king was never the sharpest chisel in the carpenter’s tool chest.”
“I believe that,” I tell her. “So, what happens next?”
“Well, in a short while, one of the king’s councilors will arrive, and he’ll tell you that you are confined to your rooms. We’ll stay here for a few days or weeks as they investigate your charges or make up ones that strike their fancy.”
I make a meh face as I look over at her. “That’s kind of predictable.”
“Quite so,” she agrees. “Very predictable.”
An hour or so later, it’s the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, who eventually enters my bedchamber, with two royal guards in tow. When he speaks, he doesn’t gloat or try to scare us. He’s indifferent. It’s just another day at the office.
He tells us that I’m confined to my rooms with Lady Rochford and that I will remain here for however long is necessary for my investigation to complete.
I’ve been informally charged with treason, adultery, and various other crimes against the crown.
If I’m found guilty, I’ll be brought to the Tower of London.
If I’m not . . . well, he doesn’t really mention what will happen if I’m not guilty.
When the archbishop leaves and the guards stay at their posts, Lady Rochford places her hand over mine. It feels like I just received a loving embrace from my black cat, who only ever scratched at me, and it’s a nice distraction from the possible fate that could await me.
When I twist my neck to glance over at her, her eyes are unusually vacant. “What’s it like to be going through this again? After what happened to your sister-in-law, Anne.”
Lady Rochford lets go of my wrist and stands, suddenly moving around the room as she looks for a task.
“I loved my sister-in-law,” she says after a while.
“And my husband, George. I know that’s not what the court gossips choose to believe, but it’s true.
I was happy with my life and happy with my family.
But when Anne failed to give the king a son, the tides began to turn.
We could feel ourselves slipping from the king’s favor, and Anne set a dangerous precedent by getting the king to divorce Catherine of Aragon.
Through doing that, queens became disposable, and then she was disposable, too. ”
She picks up a book, opening and shutting it before looking back at me.
“And then she was imprisoned. They did it before the investigation was complete. The trial was hardly a trial at all. It was a farce, at best. Our uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, oversaw all of it. I didn’t know at the time, but I was his puppet.
And because of him, I lost everything I loved the most.”
“What did he do?” I ask.
Lady Rochford moves to the window, opening it a crack to gaze out.
“Our uncle told me that if I spoke against Anne and George during their investigations, I could save them. That if they then confessed it as well, they would be spared. I had no idea that he had already condemned them in his own mind and in the minds of others. He used me to make his plans a reality.”
Placid as she may be, I can hear the shame in her voice. “If he used you, it wasn’t your fault.”
Lady Rochford keeps her eyes trained out the window until she turns back to me.
“I was foolish and weak. I should have stood against him and the disgusting lies he contrived about my husband and sister. Instead, I cowered when they questioned me. I panicked. I betrayed two people I held dear. I can’t undo what I did them, but I made a vow after their deaths.
Whosoever was true and put their trust in me, I would not fail again.
I served Anne of Cleves faithfully, and now I serve you. And I will not let us fail.”
I walk over to her and take her hands, and she shockingly doesn’t pull them away. “I believe you,” I tell her. “We’re going to get out of this.”
“One way or another,” she says quietly.
I take a deep breath and nod. “One way or another.”
We stay shut up in my rooms for over a week.
We’re given three meals a day. Water and ale, and little else.
I end up thinking of Simon most days. I hope he did as I asked.
I hope that he’s staying safe. He should be if things go according to plan.
But it’s so easy for my mind to slip into dark crevasses now, being isolated like I am.
When I give in to those moments, I imagine Simon being tortured into a confession or being starved to death in jail.
It’s strange to think it, but I’m at the point where I’m actually want to be interrogated.
On day nine, we hear footsteps approaching, and it’s the letdown of a lifetime when the Duke of Norfolk joins us in the sitting room. He arrives with a team of guards, and I start to think that maybe isolation wasn’t so bad.
“Take Lady Rochford to another room,” he tells them. “I need to speak privately with the queen.”
Her body tenses beside me. I know she doesn’t want to leave, but the three guards who yank her up and across the room don’t seem to overly care about what we want.
“She can walk on her own! You don’t have to pull her like that.” I’m not sure if the guards hear me through the clatter of their heavy footsteps, but Lady Rochford looks at me over her shoulder, and I know that at least she heard me.
“Have a seat, niece,” the duke says. He gestures to a chair a few feet off, and I slowly move to do as he bids. He sits down across from me and stretches out in his chair, taking up all the space he can.
“Have you been well?” he asks.
I place my hands on the two armrests. “I’ve been better.” I tilt my head to look at him, but I can’t quite gauge his mood. “Where is my dog, Theo? A servant took him out for a walk a few days ago and never brought him back.”
The duke smirks. “Bad queens don’t get puppies.” I seriously consider lunging at him, but he speaks again before I get the chance. “I believe the king gave the animal to a woman named Catherine Parr. She’s a lady-in-waiting to his daughter Princess Mary.”
I disappointed him and so he takes away my dog. Henry is a heartless prick.
“And how is the king?” I ask.
“He is heartbroken, of course.”
“Of course,” I reply, maybe a bit too sarcastically.
The duke straightens his posture at my tone, pushing his shoulders back into the chair. “Perhaps you do not adequately understand the depth of His Majesty’s love for you, Catherine. Or the former depth, as it now stands. Mistress Marshall’s testimony was damning, to say the least.”
“Unfortunately, Mistress Marshall has had a personal vendetta against me since I fell in love with the king. It is my belief that she is in love with the king herself and contrived these lies in the hope of gaining his favor and his heart.”
That’s our story and we’re all sticking to it. At least, that’s part of it.
My uncle’s jaw hardens. He strums his fingers down against his knee, looking over at me like I’m a hand of cards he’s deciding how to play.
“You have always been a little mystery to me, you know,” he says steadily.
“When the king first took an interest in you, I was certain he was to make you his mistress. Yet he did not. Instead, he made you his queen, and I was certain then that it must have been because you were with child. Yet you were not. Still, the king was so besotted with you. For a while, I was sure he must somehow love you for yourself alone. Maybe the power of love exists after all. But then you had to go and ruin everything. Do you know how the king suffers?”
“How does he suffer?” I ask.
“Since hearing news of your alleged treachery, his temper flares without restraint. He cannot sleep. He eats only four full meals a day. The pain in his leg torments him worse than it ever has. Yet when he speaks of you, I still detect a hint of warmth in him. Somehow, he has not yet forgotten you. Why is that, Catherine?”
I wait a beat, then discover that he is actually waiting for me to answer.
“Because true love conquers all?” I venture.
A rigid coldness glazes over the duke’s eyes. “You will admit that you bewitched the king. You poured potions down his throat to make him love you.”
It’s really hard to gasp instead of laugh. “You think that I’m a witch?”
“I think you fed the king potions without his knowledge.”
That’s up for interpretation. “I would never, ever have any form of contact with a potion. I don’t even know what potions are.”
The duke sits back once more. “So you never knowingly distributed ingredients to your women to make them barren? And you never drank them yourself to remain infertile?”
I let my jaw drop. “All I want, all any of us women want, is to be fruitful for our husbands. It is my greatest dream to give His Majesty a son.”
My uncle isn’t buying it. I keep my eyes downcast, remaining firmly in character as a crestfallen queen with baby fever.
“Did you use any of your potions on Simon Gainsford? He is your current lover, is he not?”