“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—eating meals, or rather, picking at them, going to the stool chamber, sipping wine—when the dread and horribly final event of the morrow approached ever nearer. After dinner, as they all sat together around the table sewing, Anne finished her embroidery, the last she would ever complete, laid it down, and did her best to make cheerful conversation with her attendants. She even attempted a jest.
“Those 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 nervously, and the ladies gave a weak response.
“You know,” she told them, “I never wanted the King. It was he who pursued me all along.”
They did not answer—it was too dangerous a subject for them.
“There is one thing I really do regret,” she said. “I do not consider that I have been condemned by Divine Judgment, except for having caused the ill-treatment of the Lady Mary and having conspired her death. I would make my peace with her. Lady Kingston, would you carry a message for me?”
“Yes, I can do that,” Lady Kingston agreed.
“Then come with me into my great chamber,” Anne bade her. “I would unburden myself in private.”
She led Lady Kingston into the next room and locked the door behind them. Her chair of estate was still there, under the canopy. Neither had been removed.
“Please sit there.” Anne indicated the chair.
Lady Kingston looked shocked. “Madam, it is my duty to stand, and not to sit in your presence, especially upon the Queen’s seat of estate.”
“I am a condemned person,” Anne said, “and by law have no estate left me in this life, but for the clearing of my conscience. I pray you sit down.”
“Well,” Lady Kingston replied, “I have often played the fool in my youth, and to fulfill your command I will do it once more in my age.” And she sat down.
Anne knelt humbly before her and held up her hands in supplication, as the good lady looked down at her, astonished. “I beseech you, Lady Kingston, as you will answer to me before God and His angels when you appear at His judgment seat, that you will fall down in my place before the Lady Mary’s Grace and, in like manner, ask her forgiveness for the wrongs I have done her, for until that is accomplished, my conscience cannot be quiet.”
“Be assured, madam, I will do it,” Lady Kingston promised. “Now, madam, please get up and let us join the others.”
—
As darkness fell, Anne sat at table, writing farewell letters to Mother and Mary, begging forgiveness from the latter.
She laid down her pen and thought back over all she had achieved in her time. What would posterity say about her? Future generations should say that she had influenced monumental change, and for the better. She had helped to free England from the chains and corruption of Rome, and to make the Bible available to ordinary Englishmen in their own tongue—no mean achievement, that. Without her, none of it might ever have happened.
But few would acknowledge that debt to her now. All her achievements had been eclipsed by her disgrace, and no doubt she would be remembered more for that, and a bloody scene on a scaffold. Her daughter would grow up living with that horror, thinking ill of her.
She shuddered. In a few short hours…
To take her mind off her fate, she set herself to composing a poem. It helped to get her thoughts down on paper. The words flowed.
O Death, rock me asleep,
Bring me to quiet rest,
Let pass my weary, guiltless ghost
Out of my woeful breast.
Toll on, thou passing bell,
Ring out my doleful knell,
For the sound my death doth tell.
Death doth draw nigh,
There is no remedy.
Farewell, my pleasures past,
Welcome, my present pain,
I feel my torments so increase
That life cannot remain.
Cease now, thou passing bell,
Rung is my doleful knell,
For the sound my death doth tell.
Death doth draw nigh;
Sound the knell dolefully,
For now I die.
—
That night, sleep was impossible, so she got up, tiptoed through the dark chambers to her closet, and tried to focus on God and the hereafter. “Give me strength to bear my ordeal!” she beseeched Him.
The first golden streaks of a May dawn were lightening the sky when she rose and returned to her bedchamber. She sat down on the bed and waited. God had been merciful. She was calm and composed, her courage high. She was ready.
FRIDAY 19, MAY 1536
Her maids dressed her in a beautiful night robe of gray damask. Beneath it was the low-necked red kirtle she had worn on the night before her arrest. Then Aunt Boleyn placed a short white ermine cape around her shoulders.
“In case it is chilly outside,” she said. A change had come over Aunt Boleyn since Anne’s condemnation. She had become kinder, more respectful, and now she looked quite emotional.
“Lady Kingston and I will not be attending you,” she said. “The young ladies are to have that honor.” They looked terrified.
She bound up Anne’s hair, piling the plaits high above her neck, and placed a gable hood on her head. Then she handed a white linen coif to Nan Saville. “Put it in your pocket,” she said. “You know what it is for.”
“Do I look presentable?” Anne asked. “I am told that the people are being allowed in to watch.”
“You look every inch the Queen!” Aunt Boleyn told her.
Father Skip came soon afterward to celebrate Mass. After receiving the sacrament, Anne toyed with her breakfast, nibbling on a piece of manchet bread to please her ladies, but she had no appetite. She kept having to visit the stool chamber. Nerves had made her bowels run to water. She felt light-headed after having had so little sleep.
At eight o’clock, Kingston appeared at the door.
“Madam, the hour approaches,” he said, his voice hoarse with emotion. “You should make ready.”
“Acquit yourself of your charge,” she told him, “for I have long been prepared.”
He gave her a purse. “It contains twenty pounds for you to give in alms.” It would be her last queenly act.
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.”
“I will stay still,” she vowed, trying desperately not to think about it.
“We must go now,” he said.
Lady Boleyn hugged her tightly. “God be with you,” she said fervently.