The Last Boleyn(56)
It was then, with a smile still on her face from the warmth of Henry’s compliment and affection, her clear blue eyes locked with the direct stare of William Stafford. The look was so blatant—so intimate, even across the servants holding the quivers and bows—that it nearly made her knees buckle. Confused, angry, she stared back until his impertinent gaze dropped to go over the whole length of her body like a rough, physical caress. Then he turned away, squinted down at his strung arrow and shot. His bow whanged, his arrow thudded, but she pulled her eyes quickly away to select an arrow for herself.
“That one hit head on, Mary! Did you see it?” the king was saying.
“Yes, it—yes, it was wonderful, Sire,” she replied, trying to steady her voice and her hand. The king was watching her first shot, probably others were too, even Staff. How marvelous he looked today, in darkest brown to match his hair and piercing eyes. She lifted her bow and pulled back the string. Here, the king had sent Will away and just when she was feeling light-hearted Staff, who had forced himself to be somewhat of a gentleman since the night of the masque, took to staring at her out here where anyone could see.
She snapped the bow string free from her gloved fingers, remembering to aim slightly higher than her mark as Will and the king had taught her. Damn that Stafford! she cursed silently, as her arrow thwacked the outer ring of the target.
“My sweet Mary’s face looks like a thundercloud,” the king teased, and she forced a smile. She refused to let Staff ruin this entire day, and she would never, never let him know he could affect her like this. She smiled again up at the king, whose ruddy face watched her, suddenly wary.
“Your Grace, it has been nearly a week since I have shot and I believe I could use another lesson. Sometimes with so many courtiers all about who shoot so very well, I get a little nervous. And after all, you are such a marvelous shot, and there you are looking at me too—” She let her voice trail off, somewhat ashamed of herself for so obviously trying to manipulate him, but she had seen enough ladies handling men over the last seven years to know how to do it when she needed to. Even father would be proud of her now.
“You need another lesson from a master,” the king said, and put his big hand over hers where she held her leather-wrapped bow grip. His smile was not intimate but caressing, and far more comforting than the sharp looks Staff shot at her.
“Yes, a lesson would be lovely, Your Grace, a private lesson without everyone gawking whenever I miss the mark.”
“Oh, well yes, only everyone just got all dressed for shooting at butts and now we can hardly shoo them all away after ten minutes, can we, my sweet lady?”
One of his large hands rested firmly on the small of her back as he bent to select an arrow for her bow. He squinted at it, and flipped it over scrutinizing the cut of the feathers. “A king’s arrow,” he said. “This one will shoot true.”
Reluctantly, she placed it and he helped her sight it, lifting her left elbow slightly as she held the arrow ready. Let them all think her a poor shot, she fumed. Queen Claude’s ladies were never allowed this sort of sport. Let Stafford give her those dark stares of his and the king think he possessed her when no one did. No one! Not Will, not her father, not her past, not even this great king whose bed she had shared almost nightly for a month.
Holding her breath, she released the string and the arrow pierced the heart of the target while the buoyant Henry Tudor laughed loudly. She laughed, joined by several nearby courtiers who hardly realized how close they had come to being banished from the butts range a few moments ago.
The day was back on an even keel for Mary. After all, the day was so lovely and her father had never been more proud of her. Cruel Francois had been replaced by this laughing, affectionate king, Will was not about to frown, and Staff had stalked off somewhere and left her alone. Alone, yes, caught up in the array of all the activities. Alone inside where no one could ever really possess her heart.
She laughed, and impudently gave the great Henry a suggestion when he fielded his next shot.
That night, after feasting and dancing in the great hall of Greenwich, she had bathed, dressed in a flowing golden yellow silk chemise and robe and sat at her mirrored table while her tiring woman, Peg, brushed her long, thick tresses. Mary missed her young maid Nancy, but when Will was away and she slept nightly with the king, she always gave Nancy orders to stay with her sister Megan and used the regular palace servants. And she simply could not stand to have Jane Rochford fussing around her in the evenings to gloat and simper when she left for the king’s rooms. Her hair pulled and crackled now as if alive with some energy of its own in the cool September night as Peg ran the bristles through it.
Mary sat patiently awaiting the king’s summons so she could slip down the side hall to his suite of rooms, close to this lovely little suite he had given her and Will. She stared at her face and form in the candlelit mirror; oval face, the even, balanced features everyone seemed to admire—aristocratic Howard features, father always boasted. Huge blue eyes with dark, thick lashes despite the fairness of her skin and the light wheat-colored hue of her long hair. A slender neck, full breasts which the tight-bodiced fashions of the day could hardly abide, a flat stomach, rounded hips and long legs. And was it all of this, this outside beauty that made people, men, kings want her? Or, like Anne, was there something within that made them seek her out?
Mother loved her for herself, her old governess Semmonet too, but after that she was not certain if people just wanted her—or was that love? Oh, what was the use of all this foolish thinking, she scolded herself. It only spun her around in circles. Here, this very note lying right before her, a note from the King of England, said he “loved her desperately and eternally.” And it had come with her lucky bull’s-eye arrow pierced right through a heart drawn on the note and the huge signature “Henry Rex” as if she would not know what Henry had sent it!