The Autobiography of Henry VIII_ With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers - Margaret George [187]
I fell back into bed, ashamed of my weakness. I was no saint, although I had felt like one in the early dawn. Real saints remained saints
How many times had I, in fantasy, made love to a stranger? I imagined it as a circus of voluptuousness, where all impulses might have free reign, because this unknown female would be willing for all, unable to censure or pass judgment. Now I was faced with the reality: a large shadow behind a silken screen, as Anne moved about, undressing. Was it my imagination, or did she deliberately delay? Was she as un-eager, as frightened as I?
The candles burned noticeably lower. I had thought by this time to have it all done with, finished. What was taking her so long? I poured out one cup of wine, then another. I wished to find, and maintain, a state in which I could perform mindlessly. I wanted enough wine in me to dull my trepidations, yet not enough to incapacitate me—a balance not easily achieved.
She emerged, moving slowly out from the screen, walking toward the bed. I approached from the opposite side. The candlelight blurred her features, and I took care only to gaze upon her hair, which was long and golden and shining where she had combed it out over her shoulders.
She climbed clumsily into bed. I followed. Then we sat, side by side upon the slippery sheets, staring ahead, not daring to look at one another.
She is a foreigner, I told myself, far from her homeland, married to a stranger. A virgin in bed with a man, sold into a marriage on the basis of a portrait. How frightened she must be! I at least had had some semblance of choice in the matter; she had had none. My heart went out to her, and in that moment I reached out for her, for the gentle virgin bride....
I kissed her and, shutting my eyes, began to caress her. It was cold in the room, and her natural modesty would cry out to be uncovered only in darkness and under the bed-wraps. I blew out the candles on our nightstand, leaving only the red, jumping flames of the fireplace to light the room. The fire crackled and sighed; Anne sighed, too, relaxing in my arms.
How soft and warm her gown was, how thick and sensuous her hair! Truth to tell, how good it felt to hold a woman, a maiden, in my arms again. I put my hand on her breast, under her gown.
Instead of the firm, high breast of a maiden, I felt the slack dugs of a woman long past her prime. I was so shocked I snatched my hand away with a startled cry. Anne jumped, and I felt her pull away.
It couldn’t be true! I couldn’t believe my own hand, surely I must have touched a pillow instead. I reached out with my other hand, trying to pull her back toward me, and my hand landed on a soft, quivering, wrinkly mass—her abdomen!
“You lied!” I cried. “You are older than you claim, you are withered, dried up! I have been cheated!”
She leapt out of bed, terrified of my ranting in English. The fraud! I vaulted off the bed and snatched the covers she clutched to herself, revealing her body in all its horror. Her breasts were hanging and shrivelled, her abdomen so paunchy and bloated—
“Pfah!” I cried in revulsion.
She looked at me and her eyes narrowed. “Pfah!” she spat in return, pointing at my member, which was hanging exposed outside my nightshirt. “Pfah!” she repeated, then made a diminutive sign and began laughing. A long stream of that repulsive German followed, as she continued to revile me and I reached flection on myself. She looked like a witch as she cackled there in the firelight. I began to imitate her, sticking a pillow under my nightshirt to capture her grotesquely ugly belly, but she only laughed all the louder. I began laughing, too. Suddenly I realized that this strange woman had not embarrassed me, but only amused me, and that I felt freer in her presence than in anyone else’s I had ever met. Our laughter mounted higher and higher, until we were convulsed