“’Tis true, I fear,” agreed Mary. “Oh Henry, have done. Charles and I are married.”
“You have not been married in England.”
“But you cannot say we are not married. What if I should be with child—which I can tell you may well be the case. Now I have shocked Katharine again. But I am blatant, Katharine.” She went to Charles and put her arms about him. She sighed. “You must send us to the Tower if you will, Henry, but one boon I ask of you. Let us share a cell, for I never want to be parted from this man as long as I shall live.”
Watching them, Henry’s face softened. They were such a handsome pair and there was much love between them. Henry felt a little envious. Katharine would never be a wife as Mary was. Mary was a woman of passion and he felt more alive since she had come back. Let them pay him vast sums. That should suffice.
He laughed suddenly. “Well, you will have to be married in my presence,” he said. “It shall take place soon and we’ll have a tourney to celebrate it. Charles, I’ll challenge you. Perhaps we’ll ride into the arena disguised as knights from a foreign land. …”
Mary threw herself into her brother’s arms.
“Oh, it is wonderful to be home,” she said.
Henry was constantly in the company of his sister and brother-in-law; and it was useless for Norfolk and his supporters to attempt to poison the King’s mind against them—they were home and he was happy. Moreover he had gained financially from their exploit, and if they were now not as wealthy as might befit their rank, Henry was secretly pleased at that because his sister would be all the more delighted with the gifts he intended to bestow on her.
Mary was his beloved sister, the person whom, at heart, he loved best in the world; Charles Brandon was his greatest friend. At the joust Charles was his most worthy opponent, brilliant enough to arouse the applause of the spectators, but never quite equaling the King. Mary’s laughter was more frequent even than in the days of her childhood. Never before had she been so merry; never before had she been so contented.
He took them Maying with him and Katharine on Shooters Hill, where they were intercepted by men disguised as outlaws who turned out to be gentlemen of the Court, and who had prepared a magnificent picnic for them in the woods—an entertainment after Henry’s own heart, made more amusing, more hilariously gay, because his sister and her husband were present.
Out of love for her he decided that she should launch the latest ship he was having built. Wherever she went, the people cheered her; they said she looked more like the King than ever, and there was not a more beautiful girl in England than Mary Tudor, Dowager Queen of France, nor a more handsome man than Henry VIII of England.
Glowing health and glowing spirits added to their natural beauty, and Henry, making merry in the new vessel which would hold a thousand men, dressed in cloth of gold, his great golden whistle hanging round his neck, was an expansive host; and his sister Mary in green velvet, cut away in the front to show an amber satin petticoat, her golden hair flowing freely about her shoulders, gave the ship the name
Those were happy days. There was no longer any fear of the King’s displeasure.
When they returned to Greenwich after the launching of the ship, Mary noticed that Charles was thoughtful, and because she was susceptible to all his moods was certain that something was disturbing him.
As soon as they were alone in their apartments she asked him what ailed him. “For it is no use your trying to keep secrets from me, Charles.”
He sighed. “I preceive that to be so,” he answered, and went on: “Now that the King demands such payments from us we are much poorer than others at Court. I have been wondering whether Court life is too expensive for our pockets.”
Mary smiled. “Well, then, Charles, if we cannot afford to live at Court we must perforce live elsewhere.”
“But you are a king’s daughter.”
“King’s daughter second. First I am the wife of a country gentleman with estates in Suffolk who cannot afford to live at Court.”
“How would you like to live in the country?”
“The country … the Court … what care I? If we are together one place will suit me as well as the other.”
“You have never lived away from a Court.”
“Then it will be interesting to do so. Charles, I have been thinking that perhaps I should enjoy life in the country. They say Suffolk is very beautiful.”
“You would find it very dull, I fear.”
“I have a craving for a quiet life. I did not mean to tell you … until I was sure.”
“Mary!”
“I think it may well be so. Oh Charles, I thought my happiness was complete, but when I hold our child in my arms I shall have reached the peak of content.”
“If it is a boy …”
“Nay.” She shook her head. “I shall not pray for a boy, Charles. I think of poor Katharine who constantly asks for a boy, and I am saddened by her disappointments. If my child is a girl I shall be quite happy. Yours and mine Charles—that is all I ask the child to be.”
He took her face in his hands. “You are an extraordinary woman,” he said.
“I am a woman in love. Is there anything so extraordinary in that?”
They sat on the window seat; his arm was about her as they talked of the future. Perhaps, when she was certain, he suggested, it would be advisable to retire to the country, where they could live without great cost in his mansion of Westhorpe. There she would be the Lady of the Manor and the people would love her.
“I should like the child to be brought up there,” she reflected.
