“What do you say, sire? Anne Boleyn!” cried Wolsey.
“Yes, Anne Boleyn!” replied the king, regarding Wolsey with his usual haughty and contemptuous expression. “You know her well. She is attached to the service of Catherine.”
“Lady Anne Boleyn!” again cried Wolsey after a moment’s silence, for astonishment had almost for the time rendered him speechless and breathless. “Lady Anne Boleyn! The King of England, the great Henry, wishes, then, to marry Anne Boleyn! Why, if contemplating such a marriage as that, did you send me to seek the alliance of France, and to offer the hand of your daughter in marriage to the Duke of Orleans? And why did you instruct me to declare to Francis I. that your desire was to place on the throne of England a princess of his blood? It was only by these representations and promises that I succeeded in inducing him to sign the treaty which deprived Catherine of all assistance. You have assured me of your entire approval of these negotiations. This alliance with France was the only means by which to secure for yourself any real defence against the Pope and the Emperor. Do you suppose that Charles V. will quietly permit you to deprive his aunt of her position and title as queen of England?” Here Wolsey paused, wholly transported with indignation.
“Charles!” replied the king, “Charles? I can easily manage and pacify him by fine promises and long negotiations. As to our Holy Father, I will stir up strife enough to fill his hands so full that he will not be able to attend to anything else. The quarrels of Austria and France always end by recoiling on his head, and I imagine he will not soon forget the sacking Rome and his former imprisonment.”
“Yes, but you forget,” said Wolsey, “that the King of France will accuse you of flagrant bad faith: and will you bring on yourself their abhorrence in order to espouse Anne Boleyn?”
The minister pronounced these last words with an expression and in a tone of such contemptuous scorn as to arouse in a fearful degree the indignation of the king, accustomed only to the flattery and servile adulation of his courtiers. At the same time, he was compelled to feel the force of the cardinal’s reasoning, although the truth only served still more to irritate and enrage him.