romwell.

Anne, then, must be destroyed at any cost, and the King be won to the side
of the man who would devise a means of doing it. But how? A repudiation or
formal divorce on the ground of invalidity would, of course, have been
easy; but it would have been too scandalous. It would also have convicted
the King of levity, and above all have bastardised his second daughter,
leaving him with no child that the law of the realm regarded as
legitimate. Henry himself, as we have seen, talked about his having been
drawn into the marriage by sorcery, and ardently desired to get rid of his
wife. His intercourse with Jane Seymour, who was being cleverly coached by
Anne's enemies and Mary's friends, plainly indicated that marriage was
intended; but it was the intriguing brain of Cromwell that devised the
only satisfactory way in which the King's caprice and his own interests
could be served in the treatment of Anne. Appearances must, at any cost,
be saved for Henry. He must not appear to blame, whatever happened.
Cromwell must be able, for his own safety, to drag down Anne's family and
friends at the same time that she was ruined, and the affair must be so
managed that some sort of reconciliation could be patched up with the
Emperor, whilst Norfolk and the French adherents were thrust into the
background. Cromwell pondered well on the problem as he lay in bed, sick
with annoyance at Henry's rough answer to the Emperor's terms, and thus he
hit upon the scheme that alone would serve the aims he had in view.[147]

The idea gave him health and boldness again, and just as Henry under
Norfolk's influence was smiling upon the French ambassador, Cromwell
appeared once more before his master after his five days' absence. What
passed at their interview can only be guessed by the light of the events
that followed. It is quite possible that Cromwell did not tell the King of
his designs against Anne, but only that he had discovered a practice of
treason against him. But whether the actual words were pronounced or not,
Henry must have understood, before he signed and gave to Cromwell the
secret instrument demanded of him, that evil was intended to the woman of
whom he had grown tired. It was a patent dated the 24th April, appointing
the Lord Chancellor Audley and a number of nobles, including the Duke of
Norfolk and Anne's father, the Earl of Wiltshire, together with the
judges, a Commission to inquire into any intended treasonable action, no