“No, queen,” said John Heywood, seriously, “I have made no bold hit, nor do I bring a message from the king. I bring nothing but myself. Ah, queen, I see you want to laugh, but I pray you forget for a moment that John Heywood is the king’s fool, and that it does not become him to wear a serious face and indulge sad thoughts like other men.”
“Oh, I know that you are not merely the king’s fool, but a poet also,” said Catharine, with a gracious smile.
“Yes,” said he, “I am a poet, and therefore it is altogether proper for me to wear this fool’s cap, for poets are all fools, and it were better for them to be hung on the nearest tree instead of being permitted to run about in their crazy enthusiasm, and babble things on account of which people of sense despise and ridicule them. I am a poet, and therefore, queen, I have put on this fool’s dress, which places me under the king’s protection, and allows me to say to him all sorts of things which nobody else has the courage to speak out. But to-day, queen, I come to you neither as a fool nor as a poet, but I come to you because I wish to cling to your knees and kiss your feet. I come because I wish to tell you that you have made John Heywood forever your slave. He will from this time forth lie like a dog before your threshold and guard you from every enemy and every evil which may press upon you. Night and day he will be ready for your service, and know neither repose nor rest, if it is necessary to fulfil your command or your wish.”
As he thus spoke, with trembling voice and eyes dimmed with tears, he knelt down and bowed his head at Catharine’s feet.
“But what have I done to inspire you with such a feeling of thankfulness?” asked Catharine with astonishment. “How have I deserved that you, the powerful and universally dreaded favorite of the king, should dedicate yourself to my service?”
“What have you done?” said he. “My lady, you have saved my son from the stake! They had condemned him—that handsome noble youth—condemned him, because he had spoken respectfully of Thomas More; because he said this great and noble man did right to die, rather than be false to his convictions. Ah, nowadays, it requires such a trifle to condemn a man to death! a couple of thoughtless words are sufficient! And this miserable, lick-spittle Parliament, in its dastardliness and worthlessness, always condemns and sentences, because it knows that the king is always thirsty for blood, and always wants the fires of the stake to keep him warm. So they had condemned my son likewise, and they would have executed him, but for you. But you, whom God has sent as an angel of reconciliation on this regal throne reeking with blood; you who daily risk your life and your crown to save the life of some one of those unfortunates whom fanaticism and thirst for blood have sentenced, and to procure their pardon, you have save my son also.”
“How! that young man who was to be burned yesterday, was your son?”
“Yes, he was my son.”
“And you did not tell the king so? and you did not intercede for him?”
“Had I done so, he would have been irretrievably lost! For you well know the king is so proud of his impartiality and his virtue! Oh, had he known that Thomas is my son he would have condemned him to death, to show the people that Henry the Eighth everywhere strikes the guilty and punishes the sinner, whatever name he may bear, and whoever may intercede for him. Ah, even your supplication would not have softened him, for the high-priest of the English Church could never have pardoned this young man for not being the legitimate son of his father, for not having the right to bear his name, because his mother was the spouse of another man whom Thomas must call father.”