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334 learn the Emperor's decision from his own lips. If the answer was unfavourable he would tell his friends, that they might not be deceived in their expectations. They would then act for themselves.

It is likely that Chapuys had been instructed to reserve the concessions which Charles was prepared to make till it was certain that, without them, the treaty would fail. France meanwhile was outbidding the Emperor, and the King was using, without disguise, the offers of each Power to alarm the other. Cromwell at the next meeting told Chapuys that Francis was ready to support the divorce unreservedly if Henry would assist him in taking Milan. The French, he said, should have a sharp answer, could confidence be felt in the Emperor's overtures. A sharp struggle was going on in the Council between the French and Imperial factions. Himself sincerely anxious for the success of the negotiation in which he was engaged, Cromwell said he had fallen into worse disgrace with Anne Boleyn than he had ever been. Anne had never liked him. She had told him recently "she would like to see his head off his shoulders." She was equally angry with the Duke of Norfolk, who had been too frank in the terms in which he had spoken of her. If she discovered his interviews with Chapuys she would do them both some ill turn.

The King himself agreed with Cromwell in preferring the Emperor to Francis, but he would not part company with France till he was assured that Charles no longer meant his harm. Charles, it will be remembered, had himself written to Henry, and the letter had by this time arrived. Chapuys feared that,