He is not in love with Archduchess Margaret though she adores him; he tells me he is not in love with her at all, he has no eyes for her. He says he has lost his heart to quite another.
Mary believes that he has been given ducal honors—the greatest honor in the kingdom, short only of royal status—because Harry loves him so much.
Now he is acknowledged as one of the truly great men of England, honored as he should be. He is Harry’s best friend, he loves him like a brother.
This gives me pause. Harry had a brother, a finer young man than Charles Brandon can ever be. Can he have forgotten Arthur? Can Mary have forgotten who Harry’s real brother was? Can she use the word “brother” to me and not know who it means? Have they forgotten Arthur, and me as well?
Without doubt he is the most handsome man at court, everyone admires him. I will tell you a secret, Margaret, but you must not breathe a word of it. He has asked to carry my favor at my wedding joust! It will be the finest joust in Christendom and he is certain to win. He says he will wear it next to his heart and he would happily die with it there!
At the end of her letter she remembers that I am a widow with two babies, fighting to rule a difficult country, and that all her talk of gowns and love affairs may grate on me, so she adopts a more personal note. She has studied to be charming, she knows well enough how to be endearing:
I am so sorry that you cannot be with us. I should have so loved you to be here. I want to show you my jewels and my gowns. I wish you could come. It won’t be the same without you, Katherine says so too.
Brandon is not the only scoundrel dragged into the nobility in this prodigal scattering of titles. Thomas Howard, the victor of Flodden, finally regains the title he lost at Bosworth—he is to be Duke of Norfolk and his son will be named Earl of Surrey as a reward for the billhook that smashed my husband’s crowned head, for the arrow that pierced his anointed side. Perhaps he gets his title for the bloodstained jacket that he sent to France? Perhaps for the corpse in lead, which remains, unburied, somewhere in London?
Apparently, my brother thinks that he should reward a murderer before burying his victim, and Thomas Howard wears ducal strawberry leaves while my husband is stored—half forgotten—uncoffined, waiting for the moment when the Pope says that his poor body, excommunicated at Harry’s request, shall be forgiven and his soul may start its journey to heaven.
Mary does not describe Norfolk’s honors, but I know that his ducal crest is a lion: the lion of Scotland, James’s lion, with an arrow through its jaw to represent the billhook cutting off my husband’s face, the arrow in his side. Noble indeed, a beautiful crest to choose. I hope my brother does not rue the day that he honors a king killer.
I hold Mary’s silly vain letter on my lap and I note her facile regrets that I cannot come to her wedding. But I think: perhaps I could attend? I could take a small court, a small guard in new livery. I could make it a state visit: the queen traveling in grandeur, and then I could visit towns, and people could come out and recite poems to me. I think Ard could ride at my side and make me laugh and see how people in England love me, their first and best Tudor princess. I would like him to see me in England, to see the welcome that they would give me, that I am a great woman in England, a princess in my own right. And on the journey he would lift me down from the saddle and hold me close every day. Nobody would notice that moment. He would stand beside me while I dined every night, and we would dance together. I would have new gowns and my portrait painted, and perhaps I would have him painted beside me, as a favored member of my household. Mary is so spoiled and stupid that she does not invite me, merely assuming that I cannot come; but perhaps I will come—and surprise them all.
It is a daydream—as false and beguiling as Ard’s whispered promises of love. I don’t have the money to make a great trip to London, I don’t have the gowns to outshine my little sister, I don’t have better jewels than the Queen of England, I don’t even have the royal jewels that my father left me—and they have not invited me to attend.
Mary says that Katherine is traveling on the summer progress in a litter and at once I turn the page and read it again. Yes, she clearly says it. I know there can be only one reason that Katherine would be in a litter and not on horseback trying to keep up with Harry: she must be with child and praying with all her heart that this time she can keep the baby.
I put the letter in my empty jewel box, and look out of the small arched window at the rolling hills that go on and on to the horizon beyond. It is so unlike the rich low-lying meadows of the Thames valley. Here there is no succession of beautiful houses and rich abbeys surrounded with bobbing apple trees heavy with new fruit. There are no walled parks, or smooth greens for bowling. There is just the wide arching sky over the climbing hills and the steep ridges and cliffs, the darkness of the ancient mountain forests with the eagles soaring above them.
I have been happy this summer with my boys, reveling in the respectful adoration of Ard, and with the country at peace. But my joy falls away from me at this one piece of news. I imagine Katherine riding in a silk-curtained litter, Queen of England, expecting another baby, and I think: she will be ahead of me forever. Forever she will be at peace when I am troubled. She has a husband who protects her, who is victorious when he goes to war. She has a litter to ride in and a country where she is safe. Now she is with child and if she has a boy then she has an heir to the throne of England and my own prince will only ever inherit Scotland and that is a hard kingdom to hold.
I think: I am always going to be in second place to her. I can’t bear for her to be Queen of England with a Prince of Wales in the cradle, while I endure my life, half forgotten in a distant poor kingdom. And in that minute, I think defiantly: well then! I shall defy her mealymouthed good wishes, her sisterly hints. I shall marry Louis of France and I will have an ally for my country who is strong enough and rich enough to defeat England if it comes to war again. I will be Queen of France and Scotland with two strong boys in Scotland and perhaps more to come, and that is better than being Queen of England, clinging to the sides of a litter and hoping not to miscarry your future.
I write privately to the Scots ambassador in France. I tell him that I have made my choice and he can communicate it to the old king that I called a monster. He can tell him that I am prepared to marry. Louis of France shall make a formal public proposal and I will give him my hand. I will marry him, whatever old beast that he is, and I will be Queen of France, England’s enemy, and Katherine’s superior.
METHVEN CASTLE, PERTH, SCOTLAND, JULY 1514
A terrible thing has happened to me, and I cannot comprehend it. I cannot understand the falseness of my sister, my own sister! I cannot believe the duplicity of my own brother. I feel as if I never knew either of them, as if they have betrayed me in some wicked concordance of their own. It is disreputable, it is to brand themselves publicly as liars. They are beneath contempt. They seek to destroy me and my prospects. First they widowed and now they ruin me.