Bloody Mary by Carolly Erickson Page B

while preserving Mary as his heir. This plan called for the princess to marry Fitzroy after a papal dispensation overcame the obstacle of their blood relationship, but though it was suggested more than once no one took steps to implement it. Still another ingenious if unconventional solution, which seems to have originated with Clement VII himself, was that Henry marry Anne without divorcing Katherine, becoming the first bigamous monarch in Western history.
    The longer a definitive resolution was delayed the more impatient Henry grew, and his impatience put unbearable pressure on those who served him. He pressed Wolsey hardest, and the cardinal used every tactic at his command to obtain the divorce. He badgered the pope, he hounded the papal legate, and when Campeggio tried to persuade him to withdraw his support for the king’s cause he found Wolsey “no more moved than if I had spoken to a rock.” 6 Wolsey was in fact being torn in two by the growing rift between Henry and Clement. As a cardinal of the Roman church he was a servant of the pope, and of papal interests, while as chancellor and principal churchman of the realm he owed primary allegiance to the king. As long as English and papal policies coincided, as they did throughout the earlier years of Henry’s reign, Wolsey’s two roles were complementary, but now they had become irreconcilably opposed.
    He blamed Anne for his dilemma. If Henry had to take a second wife,he said to him in private, let her be a princess from the French royal house, not a coquettish woman of the court. It galled him that neither Anne nor her relatives respected his high status; he was accustomed to having his wants attended by dukes and earls, and even those who admired him most admitted in after years that he was “the haughtiest man that then lived.” That Anne had usurped his powers of persuasion over the king he found unforgivable, and he slandered her openly. “I know there is a night crow that possesses the royal ear against me,” he said, “and misrepresents all my actions.” Henry, of course, sided with Anne, and so brought further tensions into a court already divided in its loyalties.
    Henry’s sister Mary, Katherine’s gentlewomen and countless others who admired the queen were outraged that the king should try to put another woman in her place. They found the divorce and everything connected with it morally offensive, and only their fear of Henry and of the growing power of his sweetheart kept them from making spirited complaints. As it was, Anne was the object of open contempt and sarcasm; as Katherine’s position at court declined, Anne became hated.
    Henry’s impatience with Katherine’s resolute determination to remain his wife now led to threats and disgrace. He sent the queen a written message, delivered by two bishops, ordering her to comply with his desire to put her aside or Mary would be taken from her. In a parody of her real conduct, he accused Katherine of tormenting him, and of trying to turn his subjects against him by acknowledging their cheers of support and affection. He warned her that, should “certain ill-disposed persons”—meaning agents of the emperor—try to assassinate Henry or Campeggio, she would bear the full weight of punishment. As before, Katherine was not intimidated, and held her ground. But she saw now the full depth and menace of the king’s own resoluteness. He meant to have his way, and he meant to harm whoever opposed him. If Katherine would not yield, she must be made to comply by force. She was moved away from Greenwich, and Anne Boleyn was installed in her apartments there. The transition from Queen Katherine to Queen Anne was well under way.
    Another step came with the summoning of the long-delayed legatine court in the summer of 1529. Here Katherine made two dramatic gestures. She flung herself at Henry’s feet and begged him to take her back, and when this had no effect she defied him, announcing that she refused