‘I’d say it was possible,’ said Mark, pressing the start button on the photocopier. ‘We’ll have to read it and see if the author mentions it in the tale.’
‘Could you do ten copies of the document, please?’ Tabitha asked.
‘I planned to do at least that many, then ask Edith’s permission to read it and to send one to Perdita,’ he said.
Perdita Mackensie, Briony’s sister-in-law through their husbands, was a respected historian, as well as the one of the joint owners of Marquess House along with her sister, Piper.
‘Edith was most excited about the Chaucer; do you think the other tale could be as valuable?’ said Tabitha.
‘Yes, and if we can date and authenticate the paper it’s written on, it’ll help. If it turns out to be a version of Elizabeth Boleyn’s life, it could change all we know about the Boleyn story.It would be priceless because there is hardly any information directly about Elizabeth remaining in the archives. She appears in other people’s lives but her voice has been lost.’
For reasons she could not explain, Tabitha felt a shiver of fear run down her spine.
34
GREENWICH PALACE, LONDON – FEBRUARY 1520
‘Do you think the king sent Papa to France on purpose?’ demanded Mary, her eyes filling with tears.
‘Why would he do such a thing?’ asked Elizabeth, looking up from the trunk of Mary’s belongings, which she had been inspecting.
‘He is jealous of Papa,’ she said. ‘One day, when William and I were watching Papa in the lists, the king was nearby with the Duke of Suffolk and we overheard him stating that Papa had everything the king wanted.’
Elizabeth shuddered. ‘Did he say anything else?’
‘The duke laughed and the king looked irritated, then he said, “One day, I shall have all he has; in the meantime, it’s time he went abroad again”.’
‘You must have misheard,’ said Elizabeth, hiding her trembling hands in the folds of one of Mary’s dresses.
The king’s pressure on Elizabeth to grace his bed had intensified in recent months. Whenever she was at court, he singled her out,walking with her, sending her poetry, flirting outrageously and dancing with her more than any other courtier, which was why she absented herself whenever possible. Even her husband had finally realised the attention given to her by the monarch was more than the usual game of courtly love.
‘His eyes watch you whenever you are in the room,’ Thomas had said one night when they were wrapped in each other’s arms. ‘There is a hunger about his gaze which concerns me, Lizzie.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Henny might be king, but, at heart, he is a spoiled child. He has been pampered all his life, given his every desire, and you refuse his advances again and again. It worries me that one day, his obsessive love might turn to hatred.’
‘What concerns you most? My safety or the loss of your status?’ she had asked.
‘Lizzie, how can you even ask? You are my sun and my moon, the stars in my sky, without you, my life is nothing. I fear for you and your reputation first, but we would be naïve to ignore the havoc he could wreak in all our lives.’
‘Would he be so cruel?’ she had asked, shivering, despite the warmth and strength of Thomas’s arms.
‘Yes,’ her husband had replied simply. ‘He has destroyed others for less. For your safety, Lizzie, we must hide you away as much as possible.’
The following day, Elizabeth had travelled to Cerensthorpe Abbey on the pretext of finalising the building works and supervising the decoration of the rooms her family would use in their visits. In reality, she wished to capture Thomas’s words and his fears concerning the king in her growing tale. Mistress Ellyn Goodwin had taught her the art of using a page to its best advantage, leaving space for marginalia and illumination,should she wish illustrations to be added when her story was complete.
As her words unfurled across the parchment, Elizabeth had shared her fears for her family, particularly her daughters, and her concerns about Henry’s deepening obsession with her. This was the only place she felt safe divulging her suspicions that the king was being encouraged by her father and eldest brother. On the day after she and Thomas had spoken, Elizabeth wrote:
What will happen if there comes a day when my husband buckles to pressure from the king? Will he be brave enough to resist forever or, one day, will he join my traitorous father and brother by leading me to the king’s bedchamber himself. Worse, will he sell our daughters’ virtues to protect himself?
Now, to hear Mary’s words, Elizabeth was sickened, wondering if the king meant to use other ways to dispose of the obstacle he perceived Thomas to be: a jousting accident? A stumble aboard a ship during one of his foreign trips, her husband disappearing forever below the waves? A lethal dose of poison slipped into his wine by an untraceable foreign assassin? She tried to hide her shock as her daughter shrugged and returned her miserable gaze to the window. Elizabeth felt helpless. The king held them all in his power, what choice did they have but to submit to his whims? Would she have to bed the king to protect her family? Should she? But where would a submission such as this lead – to more power or less?
Her daughter gave a long sigh and Elizabeth’s heart contracted with sorrow when she saw the tears in Mary’s eyes. She was to be married the following day and her belongingswould be moved from the maids’ chambers, where they were currently, to the new married quarters she would share with her husband, Sir William Carey. Mary would become Lady Carey, a position of high status, but Elizabeth understood, it did not matter how important a man, if he repulsed you, no title would ease the pain of the marriage bed.
‘Mary, do you not wish to marry William tomorrow?’ Elizabeth asked, rising elegantly to her feet and joining her daughter on the window seat.
‘Of course I want to marry him,’ Mary said as Elizabeth took her ice-cold hands, ‘but with Papa and Anne both in France, only you and George will be there, especially as Grandmother is…’ she hesitated, then finished, ‘absent.’
