The Taming of the Queen Read Online Free PDF

Now they have arrested half a dozen men at Windsor, the choirmaster among them, and they will burn them in the marshland below the castle. For nothing more than wanting to read a Bible in English!’
    ‘Nan, I can’t save them! I was not sent by God to save them.’
    ‘You have to save the reformed church, and save the king, and save us all. This is godly work that we think you can do. The reformers want you to advise the king in his private moments. Only you can do it. You have to rise to it, Kat. God will guide you.’
    ‘It’s easy for you to say. Doesn’t your husband understand that I don’t know what people are talking about? I don’t know who’s on which side? I am not the person for this. I know nothing about it, and I have little interest.’
    ‘God has chosen you. And it’s easy enough to understand. The court is divided into two parties, each of them convinced that they are in the right, guided by God. On the one hand are those who would have the king make an agreement with Rome and restore the monasteries, the abbeys and all the ritual of the papist church. Bishop Stephen Gardiner and the men who work with him: Bishop Bonner, Sir Richard Rich, Sir Thomas Wriothesley, men like that. The Howards are papists and would have the church restored if they could, but they’ll always do the king’s bidding, whatever it is. Then there’s us, who would see the church go onwards with reform, leave the superstition of the Roman practices, read the Bible in English, pray in English, worship in English, and never take another penny from a poor man for promising him remission of his sin, never cheat another poor man with a statue that bleeds on command, never order another poor man on a costly pilgrimage. We’re for the truth in the Word of God – nothing else.’
    ‘Of course you think you’re in the right,’ I remark. ‘You always did. And who speaks for you?’
    ‘Nobody. That’s the problem. There are more and more people in the country, more and more people at court who think as we do. Almost all of London. But we have no-one of importance on our side but Thomas Cranmer. None of us has the king’s ear. That’s why it has to be you.’
    ‘To hold the king to reform?’
    ‘Only that. Nothing more. Just to hold him to the reforms that he himself started. Our brother, William, is sure of it too. This is the greatest work that could be done, not just in England but in the world. This is a great opportunity for you, Kat. It is your chance to be a great woman, a leader.’
    ‘I don’t want it. I want to be rich and comfortable and safe. Like any woman of any sense. All the rest is too much for me. It’s beyond me.’
    ‘It’s too much for you unless God holds you up,’ she says. ‘Then you will be triumphant. I will pray for that. We’re all praying for that.’

    The king comes to Lady Mary’s rooms and greets her first, as he will do until our wedding day, when I shall become the first lady of the kingdom and have my own rooms. Then he will greet me first, and she and every woman in the kingdom will follow in my train. When I review the ladies who looked down their noses at mere Kateryn Parr but will have to bow to the floor to Queen Kateryn, I have to hide my smug delight. He takes a seat between the two of us, which creaks under his weight as two squires lower him down. They bring him a footstool, and a page bends over, and gently lifts the heavy leg on to it. The king wipes the grimace of pain from his face and turns to me with a smile.
    ‘Sir Thomas Seymour has left us. He would not stay even a day, not even for the wedding. Why d’you think that is?’
    I raise my eyebrows in calm surprise. ‘I don’t know, Your Majesty. Where has he gone?’
    ‘Don’t you know? Have you not heard?’
    ‘No, Your Majesty.’
    ‘Why, he’s gone to do my bidding,’ he says. ‘He is my brother-in-law and my servant. He does just what I command him, whatever I command him. He is my dog and my slave.’