'Stay your tongue!' with such a shrill voice that the King's words were
drowned. Katharine Howard ran in between them, but she pushed her aside,
speaking over her shoulder.
'Before God,' she said, 'you gar me forget that you are the King that
begot me illegally.'
Katharine turned upon the King and sought to move him from the room. But
he was still of opinion that he could convince his daughter and stood
his ground, looking over her shoulder as Mary had done.
'Body of God!' Mary said. 'Body of God! That a man could deem me so
base!' She looked, convulsed, into Henry's eyes. 'Can you bring my
mother alive by the truckling and cajoling and setting lying prince
against lying prince? You slew my mother by lies, or your man slew her
by poison. It is all one. And will you come to me that you have decreed
misbegotten, to help you save your soul!'
There was such a violent hatred in her tone that the King could bring no
word out, and she swept on--
'Could even a man be such a dull villain? To creep into heaven by
bribing his daughter! To creep into heaven by strengthening himself with
lies about one prince to another till he be strong enow to be humble!
This is a king! This is even a man! I would be ashamed of such manhood!'
She took a deep breath.
'What can you bribe me with? A marriage with my cousin's son? Why, he
has deserted my mother's cause. I had rather wed a falconer than that
prince. You will have me no longer called bastard? Why, I had rather be
called bastard than the acknowledged child of such a royal King. You
will cover me with brocades and set me on high? By God, the sun in the
heaven has looked upon such basenesses that I seek only a patch of
shade. God help me; you will recall the decree that said my mother was
not a Queen! God help us! God help us all! You will ennoble my mother's
memory. With a decree! Can all the decrees you can make render my mother
more sacred? When you decreed her not a Queen, did a soul believe it? If
now you decree that a Queen she was, who will believe you? I think I had
rather you left it alone, it is such a foul thing to have been thy
wife!'
The saying of these things had pleased her so much that she gained
control of her tongue.
'You cannot bribe me,' she said calmly. 'You have naught to give that I
have need of.'
But the King was so used to his daughter's speeches that, though he had
seldom seen her so mutinous, he could still ignore them.
'Well,' he said, 'I think you are angered with me for having set the
Magister in gaol----'
'And in addition,' the Lady Mary pursued her own speech, for she deemed
that she had thought of a thing to pain both him and the Queen, 'how
might I with a good conscience tell my cousin that you have a true
inclination to him? I do believe you have; it is this lady that has
given it you. But how much longer will this lady sway you? No doubt the
King o' Scots hath a new lady for you--and she will be on the French
side, for the King o' Scots is the French King's man.'
The King opened his mouth convulsively, but Katharine Howard laid her
hand right across it.
'You must be riding soon,' she said. 'I have had a collation set in my
chamber.' She was so used by now to the violent humours of these
Tudors. 'You have still to direct me,' she added, 'what is to be done
with these rived cattle.'
As they went through the door, the little Prince holding his father's
hand and she moving him gently by the shoulder, the child said--
'I thought ye wad ha' little profit speaking to my sister in her then
mood.'
The King, in the gallery, looked with a gentle apprehension at his wife.
'I trow ye think I ha' done wrong,' he said.