“Not yet,” Father said, as they strolled along the gallery.
Fortunately, Mary, as the elder daughter, must be married first. She was relieved to know that she had some respite, having wondered what plans Father might have for her once he had seen how she had become the accomplished, virtuous, and eminently marriageable daughter he had wanted her to be.
“How does His Grace the King?” she asked, quickly changing the subject.
“Never better,” Father replied, “and in hopes of a son, for Queen Katherine is again with child. It’s her sixth. All lost save for the Princess Mary.” He sighed.
“I will pray for her,” Anne said.
She saw him several times after that, when her duties permitted, and found herself growing easier in his company. It seemed that they were seeing each other with new eyes after their long separation; it was almost as if Father was now treating her as an equal.
—
Sir Thomas had spoken truth when he said that Anne had grown sophisticated. No longer was she overwhelmed by the splendor of the French court, the extravagant, beautiful palaces that Fran?ois was building, or the open dalliance and debauchery that had once shocked her. These days, if presented with that erotically chased gold cup, she would merely have smiled. She had grown used to seeing lewd books portraying men and women pleasuring each other in different positions—they were common currency at court. And when one lascivious young man informed her that the King’s own almoner had felt obliged to apologize to his mistress for having satisfied her only twelve times in one night, she had merely shrugged and endeavored to look bored. No man would be permitted a prurient thrill at the sight of her shocked reaction to such things. She knew it was said that rarely did any maid or wife leave this court chaste, but no one was going to say it of her!
She was never short of suitors these days. They all told her that she was the fairest and most bewitching of all the lovely women at court, or that she sang like a second Orpheus. She prided herself that there was some truth in it. When she played on the harp, the lute, or the rebec, people stopped to listen. She danced, too—how she danced with the hopeful gallants who flocked around her—leaping and gliding with infinite grace and agility, and inventing many new figures and steps. It thrilled her to see them copied, like her clothes, or to hear them named after her.
At eighteen she was a different person from the na?ve girl who had come to the French court. Her mirror showed her the same dark-haired woman with the same high cheekbones and pointed chin as the girl in Master Leonardo’s portrait, which she had proudly hung above her bed, and yet there was a knowing quality to her gaze these days, for she had learned that the way a woman used her eyes, to invite conversation or convey a promise of hidden passion, had the power to command the allegiance of many a man.
These days she played the game of love well, taking care to be a vivacious and witty companion, and exercising her charm to the full—but keeping her suitors at arm’s length. The protective carapace was still in place. Never would she allow a man to make a fool of her. When she gave her heart, it would be to the man she married, but that was hopefully far in the future. In the meantime, she would enjoy flirting, making jests, sparring with repartee over a glass of wine, and playing cards and dice with her admirers for high stakes. Or she might compete with them at bowls or in the chase. Father could reproach her for nothing.
She was not always at court. Claude still preferred the peace and tranquillity of Amboise and Blois, and retreated there whenever she could. She had a son now, the long-awaited Dauphin Fran?ois, and a daughter, Charlotte, but her eldest, little Madame Louise, had died aged only two, much mourned by all the ladies.
Anne would have preferred to be at court more, but Amboise had its pleasures. The King had given his beloved Master Leonardo a house and workshop, Le Clos Lucé, near the chateau, and when the great man was in residence, which was increasingly often, for he was growing old and infirm, he welcomed visits from the Queen’s entourage, and took delight in demonstrating his many curiosities to them. There was nothing that did not interest him: he was not just an artist, but a man of science, an anatomist, and an engineer, and he was endlessly inventive. Anne was amazed to hear him describe a machine that could fly men through the air.
“It is not possible!” she exclaimed.
Leonardo smiled at her. There was an ageless wisdom in the blue eyes under the beetled brows. “Time will prove you wrong, Madonna,” he twinkled.
He was painting a masterpiece for the King. It was of an Italian woman with a mysterious sideways glance and a half smile. He had been working on it for months, and was always retouching it or changing details.
“She is beautiful,” Anne told him.
“What is her name?” Isabeau asked.
“She is Monna Lisa Gherardini, a beautiful lady I knew in Italy,” Leonardo said. “But she is not yet finished.”
On a warm May day in 1519, Anne and three other ladies walked from the chateau of Amboise to Le Clos Lucé, hoping that Leonardo would show them some more of his inventions. But at the door they were met by his servant, who looked at them mournfully.
“Alas, mesdemoiselles, Master Leonardo died yesterday, in the King’s own arms,” he told them, a tear trickling down his gnarled cheek.
“No!” Anne cried, stunned. She had known that the old man was failing, but had convinced herself that, with his genius, he would go on forever. She had grown fond of him, and—she thought—he of her. He had been someone apart from the usual run of mortals, and the world would not see his like again. At that realization, she wept.
1520
Anne stood with the other maids and ladies behind the Queen in a vast field in the Vale of Ardres. She was sumptuously dressed in the French fashion, in a low-cut black velvet gown with great slashed sleeves and strings of pearls draped from shoulder to shoulder and looped across her bodice. On her head was a gold-braided French hood, from which hung a black veil. Her pose was demure, but as she stood there in the breeze, tucking a stray tress back under her hood, her avid eyes darted everywhere, taking in the massed crowds of courtiers and the ranks of men-at-arms, all waiting expectantly against a backdrop of colorful silken pavilions.