♪ ♪ HENRY: It is a long time now since I first saw you, Tom.

♪ ♪ You have worked beyond the capacities of ten ordinary men.

How often do you get the chance to change the map of the world?

This was your gamble.

WRIOTHESLEY: The alliance is melting away.

HENRY: You have few friends, Cromwell.

No one could keep their secrets from me.

(grunting) My Lord, you must come with me.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (grunting) (panting, grunting) (bell tolling) (water lapping) (woman vocalizing) (woman vocalizing) (woman vocalizing) (woman vocalizing) (inhales sharply, breath trembling) ♪ ♪ (woman vocalizing) (crows cawing) (woman vocalizing) CROMWELL: If I'd known, I would have come.

(woman vocalizing) Then come with me now, Father.

To Antwerpen, that you were homesick for.

(woman vocalizing) But you will not.

(door unlocks, opens) ♪ ♪ (door closes) Come here.

♪ ♪ (exhales) I did not know myself what was happening.

If I had known, I...

I would have got warning to you somehow.

Hm.

As we were going in, Wriothesley called me back for some footling piece of business.

(people talking in background) And then, as I approached the council chamber... Sadler?

Your master is arrested.

I'm going to Parliament House to announce it.

(people talking in background) CROMWELL: How did Parliament take it?

In silence.

No doubt astonished.

A man made earl in the morning and kicked out by afternoon.

Edward Seymour went at once to the King to speak for Gregory.

Did he speak for me?

No, sir.

Did anyone speak for me?

Yes, but I was not heard.

Not Cranmer.

He's writing the King a letter.

Try and get me the contents.

Richard is enraged.

Hm.

He wanted to go straight to the King and break in on him.

Tell him he must not do that.

He must rest quiet, and he must keep away from Gregory.

Both of them must keep away from you.

You must do nothing that could be thought of as conspiracy.

I know how Henry's mind works.

Well... (chuckles): Obviously, that's, that's not true, or I wouldn't be here, would I?

(laughing) ♪ ♪ They will both wish to visit here, if the King permits.

No.

They must not.

They must stay away.

♪ ♪ Good-- keep it level.

Down, down.

CROMWELL: You know, I never knew you two to be such great comrades till lately.

More likely to abuse each other roundly than sit together as friends.

We might not always have seen eye to eye, but one thing we have in common: when we scent the truth, we stick on the trail.

So beware, Cromwell.

Whatever we suspect, we will have out of you.

One way or the other.

It is as crude a threat as I've heard, my lord, but you have no need for it.

I will tell you the truth as I know it and believe it, and beyond that, there's nothing for you.

(door closes) (Riche clears throat) RICHE: We might begin with the purple doublet.

You understand, sir, that it is my duty to put these questions to you, and that I bear you no ill will in the doing of it.

I know a disclaimer when I hear it, Riche.

May I see the King?

No, by God!

What on Earth gave your lordship that idea?

The King of France once gave me this.

And when he did, I took it to our King, who, after a time, was pleased to return it to me, saying it might be a token between us, and if I sent it to him, even if I did not have my seal, he would know it came from me.

So...

I send it to him now.

Master Secretary.

GARDINER: But what's the point?

The King knows where you are.

He put you here.

Yes, I know.

But it will remind him of how I have served him, to the best of my capacities and the utmost of my strength, as I hope to do for many years yet.

Yes, well, that is what we are here to determine, whether you have served him or no-- whether you have abused his confidence, as he believes, and plotted against his throne.

How plotted?

You... GARDINER: Letters have been discovered at Austin Friars, highly prejudicial to your claims to be a loyal and quiet subject.

Clear proof of treason.

There are no such letters-- they never existed, and even if they did... Lawyer's logic!

And even if they did, even if they contained seditious matter, would I really leave them about the house for you to find?

Would I, Call-Me?

Did we do such things?

I, um... Shall we pass on?

Would you like me to set the agenda and run the meeting?

I believe you wanted to know about my wardrobe.

Yes, the doublet-- uh, in the Cardinal's day, you owned and were seen to wear a doublet of purple satin.

NORFOLK: What gave you the right to wear such a color, hm?

It's the preserve of royal persons.

Or high dignitaries of the church.

Yes, I saw it myself.

And moreover, you had sables.

I feel the cold.

Do you know, it was a gift.

A gift from a foreign client of mine who did not know our rules.

But if...

If your client did not know the rules, you knew them.

NORFOLK: It was above your rank and station to dress as if you were an earl already.

That's true, but why would your lordship object if the King did not?

His Majesty would not like his ministers to go about in homespun.

Christ, Riche, is this the best you could do?

The doublet is just a single example of your insensate and ungodly pride!

It's not just your attire that offends.

It's the way you talk.

The way you put yourself forward, interrupt the King's discourse.

Interrupt me, for Christ's sake!

Scorn ambassadors-- the envoys of great princes.

Yes, and speaking of ambassadors, you and Monsieur Chapuys are regularly... Not yet.

(crows cawing outside) (papers shuffling) RICHE: You made a great deal of money in the Cardinal's day.

Not so much from Wolsey, but from my legal practice, yes.

How did you do that?

Long hours.

Wolsey commonly enriched his servants.

CROMWELL: He did, as Stephen here can testify.

But the Cardinal fell from grace before his debts could be paid-- as you well know, my lord.

His enemies laid hold of his assets.

Bless him, he cost me money, in the end.

When you say his enemies, you mean the King?

(chuckles) Give me credit, Gardiner.

You, you don't think I'll gratify you by calling the King a thief?

Wolsey had enemies enough in this very room.

But you adhered to him, even when he was a proven traitor.

What you call adherence the King calls loyalty.

'Tis true, I have...

I've heard His Majesty say it.

The King regrets the Cardinal-- he told me so.

He misses him to this very day.

You wear a ring the Cardinal gave you.

It possesses certain properties.

Do you covet it, Ricardo?

I'll give it to you.

It will save you from drowning.

NORFOLK: You see?

He admits it!

It also preserves the wearer from wild beasts and secures a prince's favor.

It doesn't seem to be working very well, though, does it?

RICHE: It also allegedly makes princesses fall in love with you.

CROMWELL: I'm turning them away daily.

Well, you didn't turn away Lady Mary, did you?

You presumed, and the King knows it, to insinuate yourself with her, to ingratiate yourself, so that she referred to you as "my only friend."

I was her only friend-- Mary would be dead if I hadn't persuaded her to obey her father.

And why were you so interested in saving her life?

Perhaps because I am a Christian man?

Perhaps because you thought she would reward you.

She was a powerless girl-- how would she reward me?

NORFOLK: It was your dreadful presumption, offensive to Almighty God, to attempt to marry her!

Yes, and for instance, upon a certain occasion, you were her Valentine and you gave her a gift.

You know how this works, Riche-- we draw lots for Valentines.

You gave Mary a ring in the summer of 1536.

CROMWELL: It was not a lover's ring.

It was, it was a piece for her to wear around her neck.

Why?

Why what?

Why did she wear it around her neck, and not on her finger?

Because it was too heavy-- there were too many words.

What words?

Words enjoining obedience.

You thought she should obey you?

I thought she should obey her father.

And I showed it to His Majesty.

He liked it so well, he took it for himself to give to her.

WRIOTHESLEY: It's true, my lord, I was there.

RICHE: Well, all the same, your...

The volume of the correspondence with the lady, your manifest influence with her, the nature of the information she confided in you, information that related to her bodily matters... You mean she told me she had a toothache?

Yes, headaches.

She confided information proper for a physician to know, not a stranger.

I was hardly a stranger.

"I do thank you with all my heart "for the great pains you have had for me.

"I think myself very much bound to you.

"Your assured, bound, and loving friend throughout my life, Mary."

That's right, "friend."

And, in fact, she gave you gifts, didn't she?

She gave you a pair of gloves.

That signifies "hand-in-glove."

That signifies alliance.

That signifies matrimony.

The King of France gave me gloves.

He didn't want to marry me.

NORFOLK: It disgusts me that a woman of noble blood should lower herself.

GARDINER: Do not blame the lady.

Cromwell made her believe only his own person stood between herself and death.

(chuckles): There you have it.

My person.

It was my purple doublet-- she couldn't resist it.

Could a woman rule?

Do you remember the conversation?

NORFOLK: Yes!

Yes, and you bursting in!

"It depends who she marries."

RICHE: And since that time, you have ensured the Lady Mary never makes a marriage.

All of her suitors have been sent away.

NORFOLK: And I remember, when the King took his fall at the joust.

The 24th of January 1536.

NORFOLK: And he, he was carried to a tent and lay on a bier either dead or dying, and all your concern was, "Where is Mary?"

I wanted to protect her.

From whom?

From you, my lord Norfolk, and from your niece.

And if you had laid hands on her, what would you have done?

You tell me-- what makes the best story?

Did I seduce her?

Did I enforce her?

Come on, Stephen.

I no more meant to marry her than you did.

You kindly address me as what I am.

I beg your pardon, my lord Bishop.

Leave aside marriage-- there are other means of control.

The King believed you meant to place Mary on the throne and to rule through her.

And to this end, you cultivated your friendship with Chapuys, the Emperor's man.

Yes, he dined with you twice in the same week.

Well, you should know, you were at the table.

He was your confidante and your friend.

I don't have any confidantes, and few friends.

Till yesterday, I counted you amongst them.

GARDINER: At your house at Austin Friars, you conferred with Chapuys in the tower.

You made him certain promises about Mary-- her future estate.

I made no promises.

Chapuys thought you did.

Mary thought you did.

How would you know?

You weren't even in the realm at the time.

Well, well, you strain my charity, Wriothesley.

When I'm set at large, I'll try not to hold these things against you.

GARDINER: Let us pursue the matter of your marriage further.

The Lady Mary was not your only prospect.

You took care that Lady Margaret Douglas was preserved, though guilty of willful disobedience to the King.

WRIOTHESLEY: Yes, I uncovered that whole affair, and you, you talked it away as if it were nothing.

No, not nothing-- her sweetheart, Tom Truth, was executed, your brother.

I'm sorry I could not save them both.

You put her under a debt of gratitude.

The King's niece.

And what was she to you, but another path to the throne?

"If I were king" is a phrase often in your mouth.

You, a manifest traitor, who offered to meet the King in battle.

(laughs): What?

RICHE: Let me remind you that you were heard by a witness here, at the Tower, to utter certain treasonable words.

That you would maintain your own opinion in religion, that you would never allow the King to return to Rome, and these are the words alleged, that, "If he would turn, yet I would not turn, "and I would take the field against him, my sword in my hand."

And you accompanied these words with certain, certain belligerent gestures.

Is this likely?

That I, even if I had such thoughts, that I would speak this out in public?

And where has this witness been since last year?

If I spoke treason, is he not culpable for concealing it?

I look forward to seeing them in chains.

NORFOLK: You admit it is treason?

Yes, my lord, but I do not admit to saying it.

How would I make good such a threat?

How could I possibly overthrow the King?

Perhaps with the help of the Emperor.

You still have contact with his man Chapuys, do you not?

I hear he plans to return.

Oh, dear, he'll have to find somewhere else to have his dinner.

RICHE: Why do we concern ourselves with Chapuys?

It is much worse than that, as all will attest who were in your garden at Austin Friars the day the King met his daughter.

You had secret dealings with Katherine, dealings to do with Mary, and that evening, you confessed as much to all present.

Even if I did, my, you've known about this a long time, Riche.

What stopped you from speaking out?

I'll tell you what: advantage.

Your own advantage kept you mute.

Until advantage was greater on the other side.

What promise have I ma... Look at me!

What promise have I made to you, Riche, that I have not kept?

And what promises have you made to me?

NORFOLK: You should not speak of promises.

The King hates a man who breaks his word.

You said you would kill the pretender Reginald Pole.

GARDINER: Yes.

And not a drop of his blood is shed.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ GARDINER: The King's so-called marriage.

His Majesty says you know more of the matter than any man except himself.

You are to give a full account.

Leave it with me, my lord Bishop.

Now kick yourself out.

Sir... Save your breath.

Norfolk wants to hang you at Tyburn like a common thief.

To pull your bowels out.

He wants you to suffer the most painful death the law affords-- he is set on it.

You seem set on it yourself.

No, in, in no way, sir.

In no way.

I can do no other than I do.

I assure you.

But I want to see you treated with honor.

If needs be, I shall petition the King... Christ, Call-Me, stand up straight.

How do you think you'll fare with Henry these next few years if you're cringing and whining in the presence of a man whom you yourself say is doomed?

Well, I trust not, sir.

The King tells me that you could write to him.

Do it tonight.

(woman vocalizing) (pen scratching) ♪ ♪ (woman vocalizing) (pen scratching) (woman vocalizing) WOLSEY: The King wants me gone.

Wants to humiliate me.

(crows cawing) I feel cast off.

(woman vocalizing) But still I love him.

(woman vocalizing) (woman vocalizing) (woman vocalizing) (exhales softly) (thunder rumbling) (voices whispering) EXECUTIONER: A porter l'épée!

(Anne gasps) (sword lands, crowd gasps) (panting) (exhales) ♪ ♪ (panting) ♪ ♪ (door opens) I have no new instructions, sir.

But yet he permits you to visit me still.

That's a hopeful sign.

(paper sliding) It's Cranmer's letter to the King.

(clears throat) "He that was so advanced by Your Majesty; "he who, who so loved Your Majesty, "as I ever thought, no less than God; "he that cared for no man's displeasure "to serve Your Majesty; "he that was such a servant, in my judgment, in wisdom... (paper shifts) "diligence, faithfulness, and experience "as no prince in this realm ever had, "I loved him as my friend, for so I took him to be.

But now..." Here it comes-- "on the one hand, on the other."

"But now, if he be a traitor, I am sorry that I ever loved or trusted him."

Huh.

"But, yet again, I am very sorrowful.

"Who will Your Majesty trust hereafter, if you cannot trust him?"

Well, it's better than I expected.

He should have got himself to the King's presence.

If the Archbishop were in peril of his life, would you have stood by?

I don't think you would have.

The King has permitted me to write to him, which is another hopeful sign.

Will you make sure that gets to him?

Call-Me has moved into Austin Friars.

The King has ordered him to dissolve the household.

Don't give up, Rafe.

Don't give up.

We do not yield.

We hold on.

We hold on.

Hmm?

RICHE: Your household falls a little short of 3,000 persons, does it not?

It's the household of a prince.

3,000-- in that number, I'd be bankrupt.

Every man in England has applied to me these last seven years to take his son into my service.

I take who I can.

For the most part, their fathers pay their keep, so you cannot say that I employ them.

You talk as if they were all meek scribblers.

But it is well known that you take in runaway apprentices, roisterers, ruffians.

Roaring boys, such as Richard Riche here was once, in days he'd rather forget.

Yeah, I don't deny.

I give a second life to those who have the enterprise to knock upon my gates.

Any chancer has a chance with me.

(Norfolk laughs) You owned some, um, some 300 handguns.

I have the inventories for Austin Friars here.

300 handguns, 400 pikes.

Near 800 bows-- I mean, it's...

It's enough for an army.

And, uh, and I have heard you say, and, and, and... (pronouncing phonetically): ...Wriothesley will bear me out, that you had a bodyguard of 300 that would come to your whistle day or night.

GARDINER: Wriothesley?

It is, um, true, I have heard you say it.

When the Northern rebels were up, I felt ashamed that I could not turn out enough men of mine own.

So like any loyal subject who has means, I augmented my resources.

(Norfolk groans) You prate of loyalty.

You?

A manifest traitor?

Who would have sold the King to heretics?

I a traitor.

Look to the Poles and Courtenays for treason, my lord, not to me, who owe everything I have to the King.

Look to those who think it's their natural right to sweep him aside.

To those who think that his family's rule is a mere interruption to their own.

(bell ringing in distance) You people.

What will you do without me?

(bell continues) You will read the lines as written, but you will never read between them.

The French Ambassador will make fools of you, and Chapuys, too, if he returns.

Within a year, the King will be fighting the Scots, or the French, or likely both, and he'll bankrupt us.

(bell continues) None of you-- none of you-- can manage matters like I can.

(bell stops) The King will quarrel with you-- all of you.

You'll quarrel with each other.

In a year's time, if you sacrifice me, you'll have neither honest coin or honest minister.

But when the hour strikes and the bell rings... ...you've had the best of it, haven't you?

What's left is like a... ...a sucked plum stone on the side of a plate.

Lord Cromwell is not well.

We should perhaps pause.

NORFOLK: Oh, I think he's fit enough.

It's not as if he's endured any pains, which are spared him at the King's direction, even though he's not of noble blood and deserves no such consideration.

(chair slides) (footsteps retreating) What will we do without you?

What will we do without your wisdom?

Oh, wash your eyes clean, Cromwell.

Do you think the King ever loved you?

No.

To him, you were an instrument.

A device.

We are no more to him than an engine of war, or a dog.

A dog that has served him through the hunting season.

And what do you do with a dog at the end of the season?

You hang it.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ What's happened to the Queen?

Uh, the lady of Cleves has already left the court.

The King has sent her to Richmond, and he's promised to join her there.

But of course, he will not.

Hmm.

No.

When he turns his face from you, he rarely turns back.

Mm.

Getting the wife used to be one of my tasks.

It falls to you now, does it?

I suppose it will be Norfolk's niece.

Giddy little creature.

Very pleased with her great fortune.

Still, it's not for me to question the King's choice.

Well, you bear that in mind, you'll go far.

Of course she's giddy-- at that age?

You wouldn't want her to think too much.

History is against her.

I fear it's against us all.

♪ ♪ (audio softened) ♪ ♪ CROMWELL: I'm a man of honor.

I mean, I'm a man of my word.

GREGORY: So many words.

You do everything.

You have everything.

You are everything.

♪ ♪ So I beg you, Father, grant me an inch of your broad earth and leave my wife to me.

♪ ♪ HENRY: Read it again, Sadler.

The whole, sir?

No.

You may omit the accounting of the Cleves marriage.

Read from where he begins his pleas.

"Most gracious and most merciful sovereign lord, "beseeching Almighty God to counsel you, preserve you, "maintain you, remedy you, and defend you, "as may be most to the comfort of your heart's desires.

"God so help me in this, mine adversity, and confound me if ever I thought the contrary."

It takes but one word, sir.

Yes, I could free Cromwell, could I not?

I could restore him tomorrow.

The French would be amazed, sir.

But, you know, he never forgave me for Wolsey.

And I have long wondered to what extremity his sorrow will lead him.

Bishop Gardiner says the Cardinal himself might forgive, but the Cardinal's man never will.

The Earl is reconciled-- he has let the Cardinal go.

Read the part where he says he would make me live ever young.

(clears throat) Uh, "For if it were in my power, as it is in God's, "to make Your Majesty to live ever young and prosperous, God knoweth I would."

But he cannot.

Can he?

Go on.

"Beseeching, most humbly, Your Majesty, to pardon this, "my rude writing, "and to consider that I am a most woeful prisoner, "ready to take the death when it shall please God "and Your Majesty.

"Yet the frail flesh incites me continually "to call to Your Majesty to pardon my offenses.

"Written the Tower, "this Wednesday, the last of June.

"With the heavy heart and trembling hand "of Your Highness's most miserable prisoner "and poor slave, I cry for mercy, mercy, mercy."

Thank you for your patience, Sadler.

I was well trained, sir.

By a patient man.

RAFE: Then for a moment, just a moment, I thought, perhaps...

But then he just said... You may leave me now.

CROMWELL: You did well, Rafe.

You did more than I had any right to expect.

(voice trembling): When I was a young child... ...you came for me.

Brought me on a journey.

You set me down by the fire.

And you said, "This is where you live now, Rafe.

"We will be your family now.

"We will be good to you.

Never fear."

I had just left my mother that day, and I did not know where I was.

And I had never been to London, either, still less, your house.

But I never cried.

Did I?

I never cried.

(crying softly) (breathes deeply) (whimpers softly) It's time that Gregory wrote a letter repudiating me.

He should speak ill of me.

Say he doesn't know how he came to be related to such a traitor.

He should plead for a chance to redeem my errors and crimes by serving His Majesty in the years to come.

♪ ♪ I couldn't do it again, you know, Rafe.

I couldn't.

The sleepless toil, the axe-work.

When Henry dies and comes to judgment, he will answer for me.

And he will have to account for what he did to Cromwell.

♪ ♪ Now... (chuckles) ...it's time for you to go.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (door opens) (door closes) ♪ ♪ (door opens) Sir, the King grants you mercy as to the manner of your death.

It's to be the axe.

And may I say I rejoiced when I... (clears throat) I beg your lordship's pardon.

I mean to say, your lordship has often sought such mercy for others and seldom failed.

Will it be tomorrow?

If your lordship were to say his prayers tonight, it would be well.

(clears throat) The Duke of Norfolk has asked your lordship be informed the King marries Catherine Howard tomorrow.

♪ ♪ (door closes) (exhales) ♪ ♪ Where have you been?

WOLSEY: I don't know, Thomas.

I'd tell you if I could.

♪ ♪ KINGSTON: This is where I leave you, my lord.

Godspeed.

♪ ♪ CHRISTOPHE: Master!

I have a medal.

It is a holy medal-- my mother gave it to me.

Take it, for the love of Christ.

I do not need an image.

I shall see God's face.

Sir, she is waiting for it.

Take it back to her.

Thank you, Master.

Now follow on behind.

No fighting.

No fighting!

♪ ♪ Your daughter thinks I betrayed you.

I did not.

I hope I did not.

WOLSEY: Well, I daresay daughters sometimes get things wrong.

(woman vocalizing) (no scene audio) (woman vocalizing) (woman vocalizing, no scene audio) (woman vocalizing) (footsteps fade in) (wind blowing) (woman vocalizing) (crowd shouting) ♪ ♪ (woman vocalizing) (sniffs) (woman vocalizing) (crowd shouting) (woman vocalizing) (no scene audio) (no scene audio, woman vocalizing) ♪ ♪ (scene audio resumes) (crowd shouting in background) ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (sobbing) ♪ ♪ You all right?

(woman vocalizing) Don't be afraid to strike.

You won't help me, or yourself, by hesitating.

(woman vocalizing) (coins clink) (wind whipping) ♪ ♪ (woman vocalizing) I come here to die.

Not to excuse myself.

I have lived a sinner and offended my Lord God, for the which I heartily ask for His pardon.

Many of you will know that I have been a great traveler in this world.

And, being but of base degree, have been called to high estate.

Since that time... (woman vocalizing) Since that time, I have injured and offended my master... ...for the which I ask heartily for his forgiveness, and beseech you all to pray to God with me that he will forgive me.

(woman vocalizing) Oh, Father, forgive me.

(woman vocalizing) (crowd murmuring) (sniffs) ♪ ♪ (woman vocalizing) (wind whipping) (bee buzzing) (woman vocalizing) (bee buzzing) CROMWELL: There is an abbey, Launde... (bees buzzing) ...in the heart of England.

(woman vocalizing) The air is always sweet there.

(woman vocalizing, bees buzzing) And it's quiet.

(bees buzzing) (woman vocalizing) A little heaven here on Earth.

(bees buzzing) (wind whipping) (woman vocalizing) And I'd think to myself... (woman vocalizing) ..."I'll live here one day, when all my work is done."

(woman vocalizing) ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ANNOUNCER: Visit our website for videos, newsletters, podcasts, and more.

And join us on social media.

The DVD version of this program is available online and in stores.

This program is also available with PBS Passport and on Amazon Prime Video.

♪ ♪