Anne Boleyn, a King's Obsession

Her wardrobe was now packed with sumptuous gowns, her caskets brimming with jewels worth a royal ransom. Petitioners flocked to her door. Save for the crown, she was a queen already. And the best thing was that Katherine was not here to overshadow her—she was at Greenwich, and would soon, God willing, be leaving court for good.

A queen, Anne had always been told, should be the model of virtue. It was bitterly unfair, she felt, that, having zealously guarded her virtue for years, she should be the butt of so much slanderous gossip. But she would confound her critics. She would openly pursue the cause of religious reform, make her views known, and be an instrument for change. She spent a lot of time these days reading devotional books, and had taken to carrying with her always a copy of the letters of St. Paul, so that all might see how righteously and virtuously she lived.

She was furious to hear Henry say that he had interceded with his justices for a priest who had been sentenced to death for clipping coins.

“You do wrong to speak for a priest!” she reproved him later. “There are too many already, and all of them supporting the Queen!”

“Calm down, sweetheart,” he countered. “All this will soon be behind us.”

She could not help being on edge and lashing out on occasion. The endless delays were unbearably frustrating, and the self-control she had struggled to maintain for so long was beginning to fray. It was Henry who was increasingly on the receiving end, and he showed remarkable patience as matters continued to progress at a snail’s pace. Even Cranmer was taking a long time to finish his treatise. He had to get it absolutely right, he kept saying. Anne just wanted her future settled. She hated the person she was becoming. It was hard to remain alluring and detached when she was screaming inside. She did not want to feel vindictive toward those—Katherine and Wolsey and Clement—who were the cause of her present untenable situation, but she did. Sometimes she wished them dead. She feared their power to thwart her and wreck her plans.

Time, she felt, was passing her by.

“How long will you keep me waiting?” she would wail at Henry during one of her unreasonable moods. “I might have contracted some advantageous marriage, and had children!” That, of course, was guaranteed to galvanize him. He would prod Cranmer to hurry up, harry Katherine, and snarl at his Council for not doing enough to relieve his situation. He came, contrite, to Anne with gifts—a length of purple velvet for a gown, a French saddle of black velvet fringed with silk and gold, a matching footstool to use as a mounting block, a white pillion saddle for when they shared a horse. He spent hundreds of pounds on keeping her sweet.

What he could not give her was security. She remained intolerably aware that everything she was and everything she hoped for depended entirely on his great love for her. Without it, the wolves would be at her door. Yet, for all that, she was often ill-tempered with him. Take the matter of the shirts.

Anne could sew, and she could embroider. Her needlework, in which she took great pride, was exquisite. So when Henry casually mentioned that he had ripped his shirt playing tennis, and sent it to the Queen for mending, she exploded with rage.

“If she is not your wife, she has no business to be mending your shirts!”

He looked at her, puzzled. “But she’s always mended them, and embroidered them.”

How could he be so dense? Almost she could have killed him. “That’s beside the point, you fool! You shouldn’t encourage her by acting as if you were her husband! In future, you can send your shirts to me. I will mend them—and embroider them.”

Anyone else who’d dared speak to the King like that would doubtless have ended up in the Tower, but at that moment Anne was past caring. And Henry just stood there, shamefaced.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart, no slight was intended. You’re right. I will send the shirts to you.”

It galled her that Henry was still at pains to convince everyone that he and the Queen remained on good terms, and kept Katherine constantly with him when they were in public. In fact, they were displaying so much courtesy to each other that anyone aware of the true situation would have considered their conduct heroic. But Henry assured Anne that, whatever happened in public, in private he left Katherine to her own devices.

She soon found out that that was not always the case, for one cold, dark night late in November, a downcast Henry arrived at Whitehall and slumped in a chair in her apartment.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, concerned to see him so dejected.

“Katherine!” he barked. “I dined with her—for form’s sake, so please don’t look like that—but I wish I hadn’t bothered. She did nothing but complain about how she was suffering the pangs of purgatory on earth, and that I was treating her badly by refusing to visit her privately. I told her she had no cause to complain. I said I hadn’t dined with her as I was busy, the Cardinal having left the affairs of government in great confusion. And as to visiting her in her apartments, and sharing her bed, I told her she ought to know that I am not her husband, and reminded her that I had been assured of this by many learned doctors.”

“I can imagine her response,” Anne said wearily.

“She insisted that my case has no foundation. So I told her that I was canvassing the universities, and would not fail to have their opinions forwarded to Rome. And if the Pope did not declare our marriage null and void, I would denounce him as a heretic and marry whom I please.”

“And did that shut her up?”

Henry looked defeated, as he often did after confronting Katherine. She always remained calm and resolute, while he just lost his temper and uttered threats.

“She said that, for every doctor or lawyer of mine, she could find a thousand to hold our marriage good.”

Anne shook her head. “Did I not tell you that whenever you argue with the Queen, she is sure to have the upper hand?” She sighed bitterly. “I see that some fine morning you will succumb to her reasoning, and cast me off! And alas! Farewell to my time and youth, spent to no purpose at all!”

“By God, Anne, you are cruel!” Henry protested. “You know I will never forsake you. You are my whole life! And you should know that I keep my promises!”

He got up and strode to the door. Raised as royalty, and with two decades of kingship behind him, he would never understand how insecure she felt.

“Farewell,” he said, and he did not even try to kiss her. “I’m going back to Greenwich to seek some peace and quiet.”



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