The Sixth Wife_ The Story of Katherine P - By Jean Plaidy Page 0,5

would like to see it.

That was why he needed more sons to grow up with his little Edward … sons, sons…Tudor sons to live after him and keep the throne for his house.

Marriage! That was the answer. Marriage was in the air because it was springtime. Young Seymour wanted to marry, so it was said, and he had cast his insolent eyes on the King’s own daughter, on the young Elizabeth—Anne Boleyn’s bastard. For all that she was her mother’s daughter, he could not help having a certain feeling for her. He detected some fire within her, something she had inherited from him. He pretended to doubt that she was really his daughter. He had tried to believe she was like his old friend, poor Norris, who had gone to the block with Anne. He could feel the hot jealousy swelling in his head now when he thought of that May day when Anne had sat beside him in the tiltyard and Norris had ridden there. Although that was seven years ago he could remember it vividly. Seven years since the executioner’s sword, specially procured from Calais, had slashed Anne’s lovely head from her graceful body, yet whenever he saw the girl Elizabeth he remembered. She lacked her mother’s beauty and inimitable charm, but there was something of Anne in Elizabeth—something of Anne and something of himself. And now that rake Seymour had cast his eyes upon her.

The King had learned from his spies that if Thomas could not get the lady Elizabeth he would take the Lady Jane Grey, grand-daughter of Henry’s sister Mary, whom—so long ago now—he had sent to France to marry old Louis, and who, after leading that poor old monarch such a dance that in a few months he died, had secretly married Charles Brandon before returning to England. The fruit of that marriage had been Frances Brandon, who had borne Jane.

“Elizabeth for preference then,” said young Seymour. “But if I can’t get the King’s daughter, I’ll have his kinswoman.”

Henry considered them as he could not help considering all women. Elizabeth would be the more suitable. She was ten years old; Jane was only five.

But did it matter what plans Seymour made, since they would come to nothing unless the King willed otherwise? The important factor was the King’s marriage.

Whom should he choose? Who could be compared with the dainty Catharine Howard? The lady must have all that fair wanton’s charm and none of her wickedness.

He was aware that the ladies of the court were not eager for the honor he would bestow on one of them. That was a little disturbing. He could force the woman of his choice to marry him; but he could not force her delight in doing so. When Catharine Howard had died, he had made it a capital offense for any woman to marry a King of England if she were not a virgin. Surely there were some virtuous women in his court. Yet if any caught his eye upon her, she would seem overcome by embarrassment, and when he looked for her again he would find her absent; should he inquire of her, he would doubtless be told that she had fallen sick and was keeping to her apartments.

He shook his head sadly.

It was said—though he pretended not to know this—that no unmarried woman would care to risk marriage with him because she knew that when he was tired of her he could trump up a charge against her virtue. He preferred not to know of such talk. There was his giant conscience to be appeased. The King must always be right; his motives must always be of the highest. The conscience demanded that it should be so, and the conscience, if necessary, was monster enough to stamp out the truth.

Could they say that Catharine Howard was not a slut, not a wanton? Could they say that he had trumped up charges against her? Surely those charges had been proved.

But Anne Boleyn: only young Smeaton had “confessed” to adultery with her, and that under dire torture.

But he was tormenting himself. The past was done with. Forget it he must, and remember the need of the present. He needed a wife. Yet he could not think of one he would care to honor. He wanted a Queen. He was growing tired of the hunt—both in the forest and the women’s apartments at the palace. He wanted comfort now; he wanted a peaceful old age. He wanted a woman—not too