‘Went pretty well!’ she shrieked at him. ‘Pretty well! When I have lost the man I love, and my reputation as well? When I am all but ruined and shall be buried in the country until everyone has forgotten about me? Pretty well! When my own father will not stand by me and when my own mother swears that she would rather see me dead? Are you mad, you fool? Are you mad? Or just dumb, blind, God-rotting stupid?’
He held her wrists. She made another slash at his face with her nails. I came from behind and pulled her backwards so that she should not stamp on his feet with her high heels. We reeled, the three of us, like drunkards in a brawl, I was crushed against the foot of the bed as she fought me as well as him, but I clung on around her waist, pulling her backwards as George gripped her hands to save his face. It felt as if we were fighting something worse than Anne, some demon that possessed her, that possessed all of us Boleyns: ambition – the devil that had brought us to this little room and brought my sister to this insane distress, and us to this savage battle.
‘Peace, for God’s sake,’ George shouted at her as he fought to avoid her fingernails.
‘Peace!’ she screamed at him. ‘How can I be at peace?’
‘Because you’ve lost,’ George said simply. ‘Nothing to fight for now, Anne. You’ve lost.’
For a moment she froze quite still, but we were too wary to let her go. She glared into his face as if she were quite demented and then she threw back her head and laughed a wild savage laugh.
‘Peace!’ she cried passionately. ‘My God! I shall die peacefully. They will leave me at Hever until I am peacefully dead. And I will never ever see him again!’
She gave a great heartbroken wail at that, and the fight went out of her and she slumped down. George released her wrists and caught her to him. She flung her arms around his neck and buried her face against his chest. She was sobbing so hard, so inarticulate with grief that I could not hear what she was saying, then I felt my own tears come as I made out what she was crying, over and over. ‘Oh God, I loved him, I loved him, he was my only love, my only love.’
They wasted no time. Anne’s clothes were packed and her horse saddled and George ordered to escort her to Hever that same day. Nobody told Lord Henry Percy that she had gone. He sent a letter to her; and my mother, who was everywhere, opened it and read it calmly before thrusting it on the fire.
‘What did he say?’ I asked quietly.
‘Undying love,’ my mother said with distaste.
‘Should we not tell him that she’s gone?’
My mother shrugged. ‘He’ll know soon enough. His father is seeing him this morning.’
I nodded. Another letter came at midday, Anne’s name scrawled on the front in an unsteady hand. There was a smudge, perhaps a tearstain. My mother opened it, granite-faced, and it went the way of the first.
‘Lord Henry?’ I asked.
She nodded.
I rose from my place at the fireside and sat in the windowseat. ‘I might go out,’ I said.
She turned her head. ‘You’ll stay here,’ she said sharply.
The old habit of obedience and deference to her had a strong hold on me. ‘Of course, my lady mother. But can I not walk in the garden?’
‘No,’ she said shortly. ‘Your father and uncle have ruled that you are to stay indoors, until Northumberland has dealt with Henry Percy.’
‘I’m not likely to stand in the way of that, walking in the garden,’ I protested.
‘You might send a message to him.’
‘I would not!’ I exclaimed. ‘Surely to God you can all see that the one thing, the one thing is that I always, always, do as I am told. You made my marriage at the age of twelve, madam. You ended it just two years later when I was only fourteen. I was in the king’s bed before my fifteenth birthday. Surely you can see that I have always done as I have been told by this family? If I could not fight for my own freedom I am hardly likely to fight for my sister’s!’
She nodded. ‘Good thing too,’ she said. ‘There is no freedom for women in this world, fight or not as you like. See where Anne has brought herself.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘To Hever. Where at least she is free to go out on the land.’
My mother looked surprised. ‘You sound envious.’
‘I love it there,’ I said. ‘Sometimes I think I prefer it even to court. But you will break Anne’s heart.’
‘Her heart has to break and her spirit has to break if she is to be any use to her family,’ my mother said coldly. ‘It should have been done in her childhood. I thought they would teach you both the habits of obedience in the French court but it seems they were remiss. So it has to be done now.’
There was a tap at the door and a man in shabby clothes stood uneasily on the threshold.
‘A letter for Mistress Anne Boleyn,’ he said. ‘For none but her, and the young lord said I was to watch you read it.’
I hesitated, I glanced across at my mother. She gave me a quick nod of her head and I broke the red seal with the Northumberland crest, and unfolded the stiff paper.
My wife,
I will not be forsworn if you will stand by the promises we have made to each other. I will not desert you if you do not desert me. My father is most angry with me, the cardinal too, and I do fear for us. But if we hold to each other then they must let us be together. Send me a note, a word only, that you will stand by me, and I will stand by you.
Henry.
‘He said there should be a reply,’ the man said.
‘Wait outside,’ my mother said to the man, and closed the door in his face. She turned to me. ‘Write a reply.’
‘He’ll know her handwriting,’ I said unhelpfully.
She slid a piece of paper before me, put a pen in my hand and dictated the letter.
Lord Henry,
Mary is writing this for me as I am forbidden to put pen to paper to you. It is no use. They will not let us marry and I have to give you up. Do not stand against the cardinal and your father for my sake for I have told them that I surrender. It was only a betrothal de futuro and is not binding on either one of us. I release you from your half-promise and I am released from mine.
‘You will break both their hearts,’ I observed, scattering sand on the wet ink.
‘Perhaps,’ my mother said coolly. ‘But young hearts mend easily, and hearts that own half of England have something better to do than to beat faster for love.’
