Three Sisters, Three Queens

STIRLING CASTLE, SCOTLAND, AUTUMN 1523

The Duke of Albany is defeated thanks to my advice, and he and the Earl of Surrey negotiate an uneasy peace without consulting me. Neither of them trusts me with his confidence. There is not another word about me going to England, there is not another word about James taking the throne next year, not another word about him being named as the English heir. Instead Harry cuts my English allowance and throws me into debt with the French. I cannot understand why he should suddenly turn so cold, when only a few months ago I was his spy and confidante. I cannot think what I have done to offend him, I cannot imagine what is wrong; surely I have served him as no fellow monarch or sister has ever done? And then I receive a letter from my sister Mary:

My dear Sister,

Katherine—our sister and queen—has asked me to tell you that your husband, Archibald, Earl of Angus, has come to us from France to be welcomed by the whole court as a friend to the cardinal and a brother to the king. He intends to return to Scotland at once and Katherine and I join together in urging you to receive him kindly and live together as man and wife. He speaks so sweetly of you and his hopes for a reconciliation.

I am sorry to say that our brother is clearly very much in love with Mary Carey (that was Mary Boleyn) and she with him. If she were free and he were free I think he would marry her. But neither of them has that choice. The marriage vow is indissoluble. If a man can set aside his wife because he loves another woman then what would become of us all? What marriage would last beyond the first year? What does an oath before the altar mean if it can be put aside? How could anyone trust an oath of loyalty between king and subject, between master and man, if the oath of marriage is temporary? If marriage is uncertain then everything is uncertain. You cannot be the only Tudor who shows the world that our word is unreliable.

You have to play your part in this, you have to take your husband back and tolerate him as best you can. I beg you. We cannot live in a family in which annulment or divorce is even mentioned. We are too new to the throne for our behavior to be questioned, for our heirs to be made bastards. Please, Margaret, take your husband back for all of our sakes and write at once and tell me that you will do so.

Your loving sister, Mary, Dowager Queen of France

I take her letter with me and I walk across the steep slope of the castle yard and out through the thick gates that stand open, two French guardsmen watching the people who come and go out of the castle. I take the winding footpath through the woods, and then follow the stream as it falls down towards the village that clusters at the foot of the hill around the market cross. No one comes with me. I am alone under the leafless branches of the trees and I scuff my boots in the dusty-smelling autumn leaves. It is a sharp, clear day, the sky as blue as the shell on a duck egg, the air cold and the sunshine bright. I think of Mary, taking her courage to the sticking point to write me a letter that she knows I will not like, I think of Katherine, bleakly cautioning her that if Harry sets his wife aside, then no woman in England is safe. I know this is true. Women in this world have no power: own nothing, not even their own bodies; hold nothing, not even their own children. A wife must live with her husband and be treated as he wishes, eat at his table, sleep in his bed. A daughter is the property of her father. A wife outside marriage is in the care of no one. Legally she owns nothing and no one will protect her. If a woman cannot marry knowing that she will be a wife till her dying day, then where can she find safety? If a man can put his wife aside on a whim then no woman can count on her fortune, her life, her future. If the king shows that marriage vows mean nothing, then all vows mean nothing, then all laws are nothing—we will live in a world of nothingness as if there is no law and no God.

I walk home up the steep hill with dragging feet. Even knowing all this—I cannot live with Archibald again, I cannot bear to be with the man I married for love, that I gifted with everything I owned, and who preferred someone else. I cannot return to a man with blood on his hands. But I do see what Katherine and Mary are saying—marriage vows must last forever. A royal marriage is indissoluble.

I don’t reply to Mary, but I write a painful letter to Cardinal Wolsey, knowing that he will write an accurate synopsis and set it before Harry, when Harry can take the time from his love affair to listen.

I must tell you that the French have promised me a safe haven in Paris if ever Archibald returns to Scotland. I solemnly swear that I will never live with him again, but I understand that I should not pursue my divorce. I beg you to make sure that Archibald never comes back to Scotland, that the king my brother does not grant him safe conduct, that he is advised to live in exile. The Duke of Albany is going to France soon, before the winter storms make the seas too dangerous, and in his absence I will try to see my son safely on the throne. I hope to take James away from Stirling Castle and the guards who are paid by the French. I hope to take him to Edinburgh and make him king. I believe I can do this with the lords of the council and with the help of James Hamilton, as long as the Douglas clan remain quiet and Archibald in exile. For I am not fickle, and I am not faithless, and your great friend Archibald Douglas, the Earl of Angus, is both.

God and Scotland would be best served if he stayed away forever. I too.