“Is his neck broken?” my little sister asks anxiously.
“No,” I say, as I always used to say to her when she was a little princess, afraid for every horse, for every knight. “He’s probably just shaken.”
The physician comes running, and the barber surgeon. The hurdle comes, carried by four squires. Carefully they lift the knight on. Harry, down from his horse, his helmet under his arms, goes stiff-legged in his armor to see his opponent. Smiling, he says a few words to the fallen knight. We see them touch gauntlets as if shaking hands.
“There,” I tell Mary. “He’s fine.”
There is a roar as they carry him out of the arena and Harry turns all around the circle, taking in the applause, his bright smile gleaming, his red hair dark with sweat. He puts his mailed fist to his breastplate as he bows to Katherine and then he walks off. He passes Charles Brandon, high on a bay charger, who acknowledges his king with a comradely salute and a bow of his head as he trots around the arena and stops before our box to salute his queen, me, and then his wife.
“Does he not have your glove?” I ask Mary, seeing that she is wearing a pair.
She makes a little face. “He forgot,” she says. “And I didn’t feel like running after him to remind him.”
“He doesn’t carry your favor?”
“I can’t afford to throw away a pair of gloves every time he jousts,” she says in an irritable undertone. “The king pays for his armor and trappings, the wardrobe gives me a gown. But my gloves and my linen I have to find myself, and we are as poor as mice, Maggie. Really we are.”
I don’t say anything but I squeeze her hand. That a Tudor princess should be brought so low as to worry about the price of a pair of gloves is quite shocking. Harry should be generous to Mary; he should be generous to me. Our father would have paid my debts earlier; he would not have fined Mary for marrying the man of her choice. Harry should remember that we are all Tudors, even though he is the only surviving boy. We are all heirs of England.
All day fresh incomers ride against the challengers, and the sand is churned and dirty, and the beautiful harness and livery are torn and dulled by the time the sun starts to set over the arena and the king’s team are declared the victors, and the greatest of them is Harry.
Katherine stands in the box as he comes and bows before her, and I think that she looks like our mother did when she was weary but making the effort to respond to Harry’s constant need for praise. She smiles as warmly as our mother did, handing down the prize of a gold belt of sapphires, giving a fortune to the young man who already owns everything. She clasps her hands together as if she is overwhelmed by joy at his victory, and then, when she has done everything he could hope for, she turns and we follow her back into the palace for the lengthy tournament dinner. There will be speeches, there will be masques, there will be dancing late into the night. I see her sideways glance at her baby, Mary, who has been brought to the box to witness her father’s triumph and to be shown to the cheering crowd, and I know that she would far rather be in the nursery watching her baby feed, and then going to bed herself.
I have no sympathy for her. She is Queen of England, the wealthiest woman in England, the greatest woman in the kingdom. Her husband has just beaten all comers. I would expect her to be beside herself with joy. Lord knows, if I were in her place, I would be.
I am to meet with the Scots lords who have come to England to persuade Harry to peace. They will ask him to keep me in exile, they will ask him to allow the Duke of Albany to rule my country, they will remind him that my husband is an outlaw and suggest that he should stay that way, to be hunted like a beast till they catch and kill him. They must be sick with anxiety, for I am a Tudor princess again, in prime place in my brother’s fickle attention. He will not even see them.
“They shall attend you before me,” Harry promises me at dinner at Greenwich Palace. I am seated on his left side, Katherine is on his right, my sister is beside me, exquisite in a gown of the palest yellow, her thick blond hair hidden by a pale yellow hood studded with diamonds, undoubtedly the most beautiful of the three of us—but she is two seats away from the throne, not adjacent as I am. “You shall state your demands. They shall make their explanations to you.”
“And will you see them after?” I ask.
He nods. “You can tell me what they have said to you. We’ll talk with Wolsey. We’ll bring them to heel, Margaret, never doubt it.”
“When will they come?” I am not nervous; I know that I can persuade them. I know that I can be a good queen regent. Scotland is a mass of warring loyalties; but so is England, so is France. Any throne attracts rivals—James taught me that—and now I am ready to learn his lessons and be the great Queen of Scotland that he said I should be.
“In a few days” time. But I want you to move house. Guess where.”
For a moment I wonder if I am to go into one of the royal palaces, and for a moment I hope for Richmond. But then I know where I should be. “The Palace of Scotland,” I say.
Harry laughs at my quickness and clinks his golden goblet against mine. “You’re right,” he says. “I want them to see you in the London palace of the kings of Scotland. It can remind them that you own it as much as Edinburgh Castle.”
THE PALACE OF SCOTLAND, LONDON, ENGLAND, AUTUMN 1516
They have sent the Bishop of Galloway and the Commendator of Dryburgh. Monsieur du Plains comes too, to represent the French interest and to persuade us all to a compromise that leaves the duke as regent. They have half a dozen clerks as well and a couple of minor lords. I receive them in the throne room. The palace is terribly dilapidated; nobody has used it since the visit of the Scottish lords for my proxy wedding and that was thirteen years ago. But the fresh rushes hide the worn stones and the old floorboards, and Katherine has loaned tapestries to keep out the draughts from the doors where the timbers have shrunk. The building itself is imposing and Harry’s groom of the household has given me massive oak furniture, including a throne inlaid with silver. As always, the appearance of royalty matters more than the reality. Nobody approaching the throne room of the Palace of Scotland could doubt for a moment that I am a great queen.
I sit on my throne beneath a cloth of estate as they come in, as still as if I were the Spanish princess, on her best, most formal manners, all those years ago, and I let them bow to me, without rising from my chair.
I speak with a balance of majesty and diplomacy. I have thought long and hard what agreement I will make. I cannot be impulsive and angry about my son James, my husband, or the deep terrible loss of Alexander. I have to win them over. I have to make them want me to return.
I see them warm to me. I have the Tudor charm—we all have it, Mary and Harry and I—we all know that we do—and I am patronizingly pleasant as I listen to them, and pretend an interest in their views. I play them, as my lady grandmother used to play the great men of England: asking them for their opinions, consulting them as experts, feigning deference, while all the time she had her own plan. And all the while, they are standing before me, and I am seated under a cloth of gold, the cloth of estate of majesty. The duke that they call regent may rule them but he does not sit under cloth of gold, his sleeves are not trimmed with the white ermine of royalty.