The House of Tudor (19 page)

On the eve of Suffolk’s arrival, François decided it was time to stop playing games. Since Mary stubbornly rejected all his proposals for her future, he wanted to know if this meant that her affections were already engaged. Had she, in fact, ever made a promise of marriage to anyone? If she would only be frank with him, he would do his best to help her. This was just the sort of eventuality Wolsey had tried to warn her against, but by now Mary was past caring. Forgetting all caution, she proceeded to disclose ‘the secret of her heart’ and her fixed intention to marry Charles Brandon or no one. To her surprise and relief François proved wonderfully sympathetic. He quite understood how she felt and, of course, now that he knew the circumstances, he would not dream of teasing her any further. More than that, he promised on his faith as a true prince, that he would do everything in his power to promote the match. As well he might. Married to her English duke, Mary would present no danger to France and her confession had also given him a valuable bargaining counter in the forthcoming negotiations with her unsuspecting sweetheart.

Suffolk and his colleagues. Sir Richard Wingfield and Dr. Nicholas West, arrived on 27 January and had their first audience with François at Senlis on the following Thursday. After the formal public exchange of compliments, Suffolk was summoned to a private interview with the King who wasted no time in coming to the point. He had been informed, he said, that the Duke had come to France to marry the Queen, his master’s sister. Much disconcerted, Suffolk broke into vehement denials that he was contemplating any such breach of etiquette. But, with a sly smile on his big foxy face, François went on to reveal the full extent of Mary’s indiscretion, even down to a certain ‘ware word’ - that is, some secret term of endearment used between the lovers - which Suffolk knew ‘no man alive but she’ could have betrayed.

Having thus neatly pulled the rug from under him and reduced him to a state of floundering dismay, François was ready to reassure his victim. He had promised Mary that he would help her to attain her heart’s desire and Suffolk, too, would find him a kind and loving friend. ‘I give you in your hand my faith and troth, by the word of a king’, he declared impressively, ‘that I shall never fail her or you but to help and advance this matter betwixt her and you with as good will as I would for mine own self.’

There was really no more to be said, and Suffolk emerged from this unnerving encounter uncertain whether to be more relieved or alarmed. He took the precaution of sending his own version of what had passed off to Wolsey post haste, but the acquisition of so influential a champion as the King of France could surely be counted as a favourable omen. It was not until some ten days later, when he saw Mary in private for the first time, that the real nature of his predicament was brought home to him.

The moment they were alone together the distracted widow unloosed all the pent up emotional strain of the past few weeks. The more she had thought about it, the more convinced Mary had become that François was right and that Suffolk’s mission was nothing less than a trap to entice her back to England to be forced into another political alliance, and she would rather be torn in pieces she cried. Either that, or Suffolk’s enemies on the Council would find some way of preventing their marriage. Nothing her harassed lover could say would pacify her, and in floods of tears - according to the Duke, he had never seen a woman so weep - she presented him with an ultimatum: cither he married her now, at once, while they had the chance, or he ‘might never look to have the same proffer again’. With his promise to Henry weighing heavily on his conscience, Suffolk tried to hedge but his expostulations were impatiently swept aside. Mary reminded him that she had her brother’s promise that this time she could marry as she pleased; François was ready to help them; such an opportunity might never come again.

All this put Charles Brandon in a quite appalling quandary. His whole career had been founded on his total commitment to the Tudor family and now he was caught between the upper and nether millstones of Tudor passion and Tudor absolutism. The Duke was genuinely devoted to Henry and stood in very healthy awe of him but, on the other hand, it is not easy for a man to stand like a stone while the loveliest and most desirable princess in Europe is literally begging and praying him to marry her.

Personal feeling apart, Mary was too rich a prize to be surrendered lightly. Although it was not tactful to mention it, the fact that the King still had no living child could not be ignored. It was by no means impossible that his younger sister might found a new royal line and dreams of fathering a future king of England must at least have crossed Suffolk’s mind. The temptation and Mary’s tears were too much for him. He hesitated, wavered and was lost, and sometime in February 1515 the Queen Dowager of France married Charles Brandon in the chapel at Cluny with a handful of her personal attendants as witnesses.

Francois had kept his promise to write to Henry in favour of the match (though he does not seem to have known it had already taken place) and was now beginning to raise the question of the restitution of Tournai. The town was still occupied by an English garrison and was, as François pointed out, only an expensive liability to Henry. He was ready to pay handsomely for its return and wanted Suffolk’s help in arranging the deal. There was also the highly complicated business of Mary’s finances. Her jointure, together with the plate and jewels she had brought from England, were secured to her; but a dispute was blowing up over the jewels showered on her by King Louis and the gold plate and furniture she had used as Queen of France. Both Henry and Mary contended that these should be regarded as her personal property, but François said it was unreasonable for her to expect to keep them after she had left the country.

In a letter to Suffolk, Thomas Wolsey made it clear that this was a matter of fundamental importance. He wrote:

Inasmuch as the King’s grace hath great mind to the French King’s plate of gold and jewels, I require and advise you substantially to handle that matter and to stick thereunto. For I assure you that the hope the King hath to obtain the said plate and jewels is the thing that most constantly stayeth his grace to assent that you should marry his sister. The lack whereof I fear me might make him cold and remiss and cause some alteration.

In the circumstances this was not reassuring. By the beginning of March rumours of the Cluny wedding were going round Paris and Mary thought she might be pregnant. Confession could no longer be postponed and on the fifth Charles Brandon sat down to write a difficult letter to Wolsey.

My lord of York, I commend me unto you. I know well that you have been the chief man that has been my friend, and therefore I will hide nothing from you, trusting that you will help me now as you have always done. My lord, so it was that when I came to Paris I heard many things which put me in great fear, and so did the Queen both; and the Queen would never let me be in rest till I had granted her to be married; and so to be plain with you, I have married her heartily and have lain with her, insomuch as I fear me lest she be with child.

My lord, I am not in a little sorrow lest the King should know of it and be displeased with me; for I assure you I had rather have died than he should be miscontent. And therefore, my own good lord, since you have brought me hither, let me not be undone now, the which I fear mc I shall be without your especial help...Beseeching you that I may have answer from you as shortly as it may be possible, for I assure you I have as heavy a heart as any man living and shall have till I may hear good tidings from you...

There followed a fortnight’s painful suspense. The newly-weds, who had begun rather late in the day to count the possible cost of their defiance, knew that everything would depend on how Henry took the news and waited with mounting anxiety for Wolsey’s reply. ‘My lord, with sorrowful heart I write unto you’, it began ominously and went on to inform the Duke that the King’s first reaction had been one of disbelief that his friend, the man in all the world he had loved and trusted best, could have so wantonly betrayed his confidence. Wolsey had had to show him Suffolk’s letter before he would give it credence and now he was bitterly hurt and angry, ‘for he doth well understand that he is deceived of the assured trust he thought to have found in you...Cursed be the blind affection and counsel that hath brought you hereunto’, the Archbishop of York went on grimly, ‘fearing that such sudden and unadvised dealing shall have sudden repentance.’ Let Charles Brandon make no mistake, by his acts and doings he had put himself ‘in the greatest danger that ever man was in’.

Wolsey could see only one possible way out of ‘this great perplexity’ and he was by no means certain whether it would answer. First, Suffolk and Mary must beg Henry’s forgiveness, that went without saying. More important, they must bind themselves to repay the whole of Mary’s marriage portion in annual instalments of £4,ooo, leaving her only £6,000 a year to live on. They must also give back all the plate and jewels she had taken to France, which were considered part of her dowry, and surrender the plate and jewellery King Louis had given her. ‘This is the way to make your peace’, wrote Wolsey; ‘whereat if ye deeply consider what danger ye be in and shall be in, having the King’s displeasure, I doubt not both the Queen and you will not stick.’

The effect of this letter was devastating. Shivering in their shoes, the culprits hastened to take Wolsey’s advice. They were ready to strip themselves of every penny they possessed if it would appease the King, and now Suffolk cast himself at Henry’s feet.

Most dread sovereign lord, with the most sorrowful heart, I, your most poor subject, beseech forgiveness of mine offences and for this marriage in which I have done greatly amiss. Sir, for the passion of God, let it not be in your heart against me, and rather than you should hold me in mistrust, strike off my head and let me not live...If ever I thought or did anything, saving the love and marriage of the Queen, that should be to your displeasure, I pray God let me die as shameful a death as ever did man. But truly there was never master had a truer servant than your grace has had in me and ever shall have, whatsoever you or any man else shall think of me.

In her own letter, Mary tried hard to shield her husband and take the blame on herself ‘I will not in any wise deny that I have offended your highness’, she wrote, ‘for the which I do put myself most humbly in your clemency and mercy.’ All the same, she assured her brother, she had not acted from ‘sensual appetite’ or because she had no regard for his displeasure. It was just that she had been in such terrible ‘consternation, fear and doubt’ that his Council would somehow manage to prevent her marriage - the one thing she wanted most in all the world. ‘Whereupon, sir, I put my lord of Suffolk in choice whether he would accomplish the marriage within four days, or else that he should never have enjoyed me; whereby I know well that I constrained him to break such promises as he made your grace...’

Knowing her brother as she did, Mary had already taken steps to provide him with a tangible token of her repentance, sacrificing the most sumptuous of all Louis’ gifts - the Mirror of Naples itself. But since this particular bauble unquestionably formed part of the French crown jewels, the King of France was justifiably irritated when he discovered its loss and acrimonious (and perfectly fruitless) demands for its return played a considerable part in delaying and generally snarling up the final settlement of Mary’s financial affairs.

It was April before the negotiations were completed and both Mary and Suffolk were longing to go home, but so far all their pleas for forgiveness had been ignored. They set out on their journey to the coast on 16 April and Charles Brandon addressed one more appeal to Henry from Montreuil. He had been told that his rivals on the Council were working on the King to have him put to death or at least thrown into prison. ‘But, sir, your grace is he that is my sovereign lord and master who has brought me up out of nothing and to you, with most humble heart, I yield myself to do with my poor body your most gracious pleasure, not fearing the malice of others; for I know your grace to be of such nature that it cannot lie in their powers to cause you to destroy me...’

The couple reached Calais still without any word from England and Mary wrote this time, to inform her brother that she had put herself within his jurisdiction. She reminded him yet again of his famous waterside promise, begging him, ‘for the great and tender love’ which had always been between them, to let bygones be bygones and to certify her ‘by your most loving letters of the same’. In the meantime, she and her husband would stay where they were. May was reasonably confident that Henry would come round, but she was not taking any unnecessary risks.

In fact, permission to cross the Channel and with it some hint of a break in the clouds was not long delayed, and the Suffolks sailed for Dover at the beginning of May. Their arrival was unmarked by any special ceremony and their first meeting with Henry took place in private at the manor of Barking on the eastern outskirts of London, but these were the only overt signs that they were still in disgrace.

Although the reunion may have had its awkward moments, it was apparently quite cordial, the King, according to one contemporary observer, rejoicing greatly in his sister’s honourable return.

All the accounts of his dire displeasure had, of course, been filtered through Wolsey in his role as intermediary and it is quite possible that they were somewhat exaggerated. Wolsey and Charles Brandon were natural allies in the running feud with the reactionary Duke of Norfolk and it would have suited the devious Archbishop to impress his friend with a proper sense of indebtedness. No doubt Henry had been both hurt and angry, but it is clear throughout that it was the breach of faith more than the actual marriage which had enraged him. It is equally clear that he had never intended to proceed to extremes against his old playmate and his favourite sister. He was genuinely fond of them both - though not fond enough to let them off paying reparations. Mary surrendered all the plate and jewels salvaged from France, which were later valued at just over sixteen hundred pounds, and as well as repaying her dowry she signed a deed undertaking to repay in annual instalments the £24,ooo which had been laid out on her trousseau and the other expenses of her first marriage. It was a formidable sum and the debt was to hang round the Suffolks’ necks for years, but by the standards of the time and considering the enormity of their offence, they had escaped pretty lightly. The Duke was allowed to keep all his offices and estates, and he and Mary were soon fully restored to the life-giving sunshine of royal favour.