Of course that master knew nothing of the plans forming themselves in the mind of his minister. He was content to live a day at a time, and get as much enjoyment out of it as he could. He liked to be popular with his subjects as well as with his Court, and loved to display his skill in feats of arms, tournaments, and manly sports, that the people were free to witness in Greenwich Park.
Wolsey too—a handsome man—if he did not actually take part in the spectacles, was not averse to showing off his magnificence as well as his master; and Henry was ready to welcome him at every frolic, for snatches of graver business could be settled in the tournament ground between the two, and save the trouble of discussion at the Council Board.
Between the rush of some great feats of arms, Henry would say to his minister, while the people were applauding his prowess, "Now, I want ten thousand crowns, and you must get it out of the pockets of these varlets." And the Chancellor knew that these light words meant a tax of some kind; and he had to rack his brains as to what he should put the tax upon, after the unheard-of rebuff he had received from the House of Commons in the summer.
Never before had such a thing occurred to a Chancellor of England, and the thought of it rankled in Wolsey's mind still, and he was not likely to forget it. Doubtless the revenue of bishoprics, held by Wolsey, often went to make up the deficit in the King's Exchequer. After this rebuff from the Commons, Henry was lavish and extravagant, and would squander money like water.
Not that he was a fool by any means. He was a keen-witted, capable man, and, if he had only been compelled to use the faculties with which he was endowed, would have made a better King in later life. But he was flattered to the top of his bent, and his chief minister was only too willing to take all the trouble of governing off his hands, that he might enjoy the pleasure of its shadow.
It was for a taste of this shadowy glory that he had declared war with France, but which he had small chance of carrying very far; and Wolsey foresaw that he would soon be called upon to patch up a peace.
Then would be his time to moot the affair of the Princess Margaret of Valois, and by this master stroke secure at once a lasting peace with France, an heir to the throne of England, and a possible right to the throne of France as well.
Secure of this, he could give his undivided attention to the reform of the Church, which should forestall any such tampering with the power of the Pope, as had occurred in the case of Germany.
He had not heard of the little room at "The Sign of the Golden Fleece," and the work going on there. Possibly, if he had heard that a thunderbolt was being forged there that should split the Papacy from root to crown, he would have shaken his head, and smiled at the credulity that could imagine any power great enough to effect this. And yet it was silently being brought to perfection, almost within sound of the Cardinal's chapel-bell, and no man was the wiser yet, or dreamed that such a thing could be!