“Course I do. I saw each one’s initials carved on every wooden beam and every stone boss in every palace. And then I saw them chipped off stone and adzed off wood and new initials put on again. I sewed every motto into flags for their weddings. I saw every emblem freshly painted. I saw their shields carved on and then burned off the royal barge. Of course I remember each one. Why wouldn’t I? I was there when each one was announced, I was there when she was taken away. Mother put me into service to the Queen of England, Katherine of Aragon, and made me promise to always be loyal to the queen. She never dreamed there would be six of them. She never dreamed one of them would be you. Ask me any one’s motto. I know them all!”

“Anne Boleyn,” I say at random.

“The Most Happy,” Nan says with a harsh laugh.

“Anne of Cleves?”

“God Send Me Well to Keep.”

“Katherine Howard?”

Nan makes a face as if the memory is a bitter one: “No Other Will but His, poor little liar,” she says.

“Katherine of Aragon?” We both know this one. Katherine was my mother’s beloved friend, a martyr to her faith and to her husband’s terrible infidelity.

“Humble and Loyal, God bless her. Never was a woman more humbled. Never was one more loyal.”

“What was Jane’s?” Jane Seymour will always be the favorite wife, whatever I say or do. She gave him his son and she died before he tired of her. Now he remembers a perfect woman, more saint than wife, and even manages to squeeze out a few hot little tears for her. But my sister, Nan, remembers that Jane died terrified and alone, asking for her husband, and nobody had the courage to tell her that he had ridden away.

“Bound to Obey and Serve,” Nan says. “Bound hand and foot, if the truth be told.”

“Bound? Who bound her?”

“Like a dog, like a slave. Those brothers of hers sold her to him as if she were a trussed chicken. Drove her to market, put her on sale right under Queen Anne’s nose. Trussed her and stuffed her and put her into the oven heat of the queen’s rooms, certain that the king would want a taste.”

“Don’t.”