The Silken Rose

by Carol McGrath

  Glancing from Dame Mildred to Papa, who was slowly moving another spoonful of gravy towards his mouth, Rosalind lifted her napkin and pointedly dabbed at her chin. Dame Mildred caught her eye. Amusement twitching about Dame Mildred’s mouth, she lifted her napkin emphatically from her shoulder. Alfred moved another overfilled spoon, spilling the mutton gravy towards his mouth.

  ‘Rosalind, we are decided on a Christmastide wedding. We’ll celebrate throughout the twelve days.’

  Another dribble of gravy oozed into his pointed beard.

  Mildred leaned over and dabbed at Alfred’s offending chin with her napkin. ‘As you wish, my dear. Plenty of time. It is only October, after all.’ She turned to Rosalind. ‘What think you, Rosalind?’

  ‘Cook will want to begin planning for a wedding straight away.’ She must, thought Rosalind to herself. Ingredients for the feasting must be ordered now and baking begun. Aloud she added, ‘The apprentices will be happy too. They enjoy festivals.’

  Rosalind breathed evenly again. The Dame could have attracted any number of suitors but she’d chosen her plain-spoken papa. Now Rosalind would be free to take up the offer the Queen had made to her, an embroidery workshop of her own at Westminster. Once Papa and Dame Mildred were wed, she would be free to accept the Queen’s proposal. The palace beckoned and with her father settled there could be no reason why she could not accept. The King, the Queen had confided, was so impressed with Rosalind’s fine gold embroidery, he might even request a new altar cloth for one of his castle chapels.

  ‘Windsor, I think,’ the Queen had said. ‘And I shall need you to stitch gold and silver thread and jewels, mostly pearls, onto my gowns.’

  Rosalind pushed away her platter. She must tell them her news at once.

  ‘My apprentices will be delighted if we marry at Christmas,’ Dame Mildred was saying. ‘I can see our union will be a large and joyful occasion for all of us, both our households.’ Then, to her horror, just as she opened her mouth to reveal the Queen’s proposition, Dame Mildred said, ‘And, we must think about you, Rosalind.’

  Papa nodded. ‘Indeed. The de Basings. . .’

  ‘No, I cannot.’ Rosalind bit her lip so hard, she tasted blood. She studied Dame Mildred’s face. Was the kindly widow trying to rid herself of her - but Mildred’s face was innocent. ‘No, Papa,’ Rosalind said firmly glaring at her papa. ‘The Queen needs me. It is an honour to please her. She liked the embroidered cushions last year. She is pleased with the bed-cover for the King’s sister. She has commissioned more hangings for her bedchamber at Windsor.’ She turned back to Mildred willing her support. ‘Dame Mildred, I am too busy to be betrothed.’

  Mildred reached over and patted her hand. ‘No one should rush you. I only meant. . .’ Rosalind breathed steadily again. Mildred’s face was filled with concern. ‘I was thoughtless. With my threads and trims added to your tailoring; with Rosalind’s commissions, never mind all the other work you have, Alfred, why would you rush her to the church?’ Rosalind breathed more easily. She smiled over at Mildred and nodded.

  ‘Papa, I must accept the Queen’s commissions.’

  Papa shook his head at her. ‘Rosalind, tell the maid to bring in the pies, cheese, and the preserved peaches. We’ll say no more about it.’

  Rosalind rose from the bench and sped with a lighter heart into the kitchen annex off the Hall. There was more to say because it was not over yet. She must tell them her latest news.

  The maidservant served up a platter of cheese, figs, raisins, and the peaches and they began to eat again.

  Rosalind drew a deep breath. ‘There is something else, Papa.’

  ‘Oh, and what is that, pray?’

  ‘I have been offered a great honour by the Queen.’ Two pairs of inquisitive eyes darted up from the figs.

  She nervously twisted a ring - her mother’s – a ring with a tiny amber stone. She stopped turning it and said, ‘The Queen wants me to take charge of her embroidery workshop at Westminster. I shall have a dozen embroiderers.’ This information was an exaggeration. ‘We are to create altar cloths and other church items.’ A further exaggeration. This additional detail only had a passing mention from the Queen. ‘The King himself has commended my work. I shall be doing God’s work.’

  ‘You wish to accept?’ Mildred asked gently.

  Alfred frowned. ‘Altar cloths are nun’s work. I need Rosalind here.’

  ‘No you don’t. She could lose the Queen’s goodwill if she declines. After all, Rosalind will have embroiderers under her own supervision, an accomplishment for one so young. The King and Queen will desire more church embroideries than the church embroiderers can possibly work with all the new chapels the King is building.’ Mildred dished out the peaches. ‘You could lose trade from Earl Richard if you displease the Queen, you know. Earl Richard is a hard man. Counts his groats, I hear.’ She reached over the table and took Alfred’s large hand in her own little hand. ‘I can provide you with two apprentices who show great promise as embroiderers. Let Rosalind go to Westminster if she wishes.’

  Alfred closed his eyes. ‘I shall miss her.’

  ‘But you were going to betroth me. You would miss me if I married.’

  ‘Go to the Queen. I can see you are set on it. Well, I suppose it may bring more work my way. You have my blessing.’

  ‘The workshop won’t be ready until after Christmas but the Queen wants me to select embroiderers soon.’

  ‘Don’t tempt any of my workers away from Paternoster Lane,’ Alfred said, his grey eyes smiling again. This time his smile was open-hearted.

  ‘Nor mine, my dear, though I would be hard-pressed to deny any one such a great placement.’ Mildred was laughing. ‘What a celebration tonight has become.’

  ‘I may have to live at Westminster but I hope to be here often too,’ Rosalind said quickly, anxious not to lose her beloved attic bedroom.

  ‘And welcome you ever will be,’ Alfred said, tears welling in his eyes.

  It was time to distract Papa before he became too maudlin or mentioned the de Basings again. She poured him a cup of ale. ‘Let us plan the wedding by the hearth,’ she suggested.

  ‘Thank you, Dame Mildred,’ she whispered as they moved away from the table.

  ‘Good luck, my child,’ Mildred whispered back.

  Rosalind breathed her relief. Adam de Basing will soon find his son another wife. For a heartbeat she thought of a fair-headed squire who was often at Westminster.

  5

  Ailenor

  Westminster, Christmas 1237

  ‘Welcome,’ Ailenor said as Nell curtsied to her. The wassail log glowed, throwing out warmth and Christmas cheer. ‘It is good to see you at court again,’ Ailenor was unable to conceal her joy. ‘I hoped you would come.’ She studied her friend for a moment, looking for change in Nell’s once-sad demeanour. There was a somewhat mysterious glow about her. Odiham suited her.

  The grey cuckoo had altered into a bird of paradise, one of those exotic creatures knights carried back from journeys to foreign lands. Nell was wearing a rich velvet gown trimmed with fur. ‘You suit colours, especially burgundy.’ She reached out for Nell’s hands and whispered, ‘Dearest Nell, I have missed you.’

  They clasped hands and kissed. The ring that bound Nell to Christ had moved position from her right hand to her left.

  ‘Be seated,’ Henry said to his sister.

  ‘Between us.’ Ailenor patted a comfortable padded stool.

  Their page poured cups of wine and Henry, smiling, no doubt, mused Ailenor, thinking of a lucrative match for Nell to a Castilian lord, looked approvingly at his sister’s rich clothing.

  Ailenor found herself smoothing her hand along the folds of her new samite tunic. She patted her hair, neatly plaited at her ears, secured in intricately worked silver crispinettes below a newly fashionable pert pill-box hat. It held her crispinettes in place by a strap fastened under her chin, a recent fashion, a change from heavier veils. It represented a freedom with dress, gen
erally denied a woman. Men never wore veils.

  Henry took a plate of sweetmeats from his page, sent him away, and laid the dish on the low table by his side. Ailenor felt him smiling at her as she caressed the opals on the hilt of her little belt dagger, enjoying the velvet smoothness of the stones. He said, ‘As you see, Nell, my wife likes to protect herself. As well she does not wear that in the bedchamber or I should never have conquered her.’

  ‘My lord, I would not care to displease you there.’ Ailenor laughed lightly.

  Nell laid down her cup. ‘I have something to say, Henry.’

  ‘It must wait. I see Sir Simon coming this way.’ Henry lowered his voice. ‘I have decided on a New Year gift for him. He is to be my Earl of Leicester. Say nothing.’

  ‘A good decision,’ Ailenor said.

  ‘It is to be a surprise. It’s a secret. My barons are indifferent towards him. Can you keep a secret, Nell?’ His eyes seemed to narrow as he studied his sister.

  Ailenor noticed how Nell started. It was as if one of the puppies tumbling around their feet had bitten her friend with its sharp little teeth. Nell’s hand shook as she picked up her cup. She tilted it, spilling a little wine on her gown. Dashing it away with a napkin, she said, ‘It’s only a drop.’ Her cheeks were stained crimson like the wine.

  Sir Simon paused by a pillar to speak with the nobleman who had been Henry’s advisor for years, the powerful Hubert de Burgh who had married a Scottish princess when Henry’s sister Joan had married the Scottish King. Henry’s eyelid began to droop, a sure sign of discontent. The wealthiest earl in the land, Hubert was in and out of favour. At one time he had been accused of thieving from the treasury. He had endured sanctuary, hiding from those who were determined to arrest him, destroy him, and bring him to account.

  To distract Henry, Ailenor, who had heard all about Earl Hubert’s fascinating story, leaned closer to her husband. She thought she knew what Nell wanted to say to him. Nell wanted to marry Sir Simon, and Ailenor hoped that Henry would be generous-hearted towards his sister. After all, Nell had created a bower for Henry and Ailenor in the bedchambers of her castle at Odiham.

  At last it had happened, it being seduction. That September, all she had long desired occured. Her happiness was complete. They had retreated to the countryside during the months of July and August to hide away at Marlborough. Ailenor came to love the old rambling castle and the town’s twisting streets. They hunted in the Savernake Forest, a royal forest, with their small band of courtiers.

  The weather had been warm again that summer, the harvest had been bountiful, and the people of England seemed content. The court often dined outdoors. Some evenings she and Henry shared her bed for a little kissing and fondling whilst reclining with a book of hours on top of the coverlet. The book would on occasion slip to the floor and they lost themselves in love, arms and legs entwined, hearts beating fast. Yet, as they grew passionate Henry always held back at the last, saying they must wait. She was too young. She was only fifteen and he was past thirty.

  She longed for him, but just as she coaxed her hawk to obey her, she applied the same patient tactic with Henry, wondering if he was embracing celibacy like Edward Confessor. At fifteen she did not consider herself too young to carry a child. She sensed that, though Henry tried to deny her, he was feeling the same sense of longing as she. She desperately wanted to give him a son or daughter.

  On their return to London they had taken a detour to Odiham. Henry sent their courtiers on to Windsor, only retaining a guard of a dozen able soldiers and three personal attendants. They would proceed to Windsor as if they were in disguise, not a king and queen but simple nobility. They would not fly pennants displaying English lions. It would be a novelty not to be recognised.

  ‘Where can we sleep, not, I hope, in tents or in the hedgerows like peasants,’ she’d said.

  ‘There’s an inn. It’s called The White Cross. The landlord knows not to make a fuss.’ She let out a sigh of relief on hearing this. Fortunately Henry, for all his scattering of alms amongst beggars and the poor, enjoyed his own comfort too much to embrace a peasant lifestyle. She would not have to camp in a field like a soldier’s woman.

  Nell met them in Odiham’s courtyard. She had prepared, she said, for a greater court. ‘You can be unpredictable, Henry. Where is your court?’

  ‘I sent them on to their own castles,’ Henry had said, taking Nell’s hands in his.

  Like an accomplished chatelaine, Nell knelt and washed her brother’s feet before they entered her castle. ‘It’s a relief to be rid of them - bishops, earls, barons, the whole pack of them,’ - he laughed at Nell’s shocked face - ‘just to be with my favourite sister.’ He turned to Ailenor. ‘And my wife.’

  ‘I am honoured.’ Nell faltered momentarily, it seemed, and said, ‘I expect you would like to rest before supper. Your guard will be comfortable in the West Tower when they have unpacked your sumpter carts.’

  ‘We only have one cart,’ Ailenor said, unable to repress a giggle, delighted at the deception and at Nell’s surprise. ‘Nell, you see, we are concealing who we really are. You must keep our visit secret.’ She looked at Henry. ‘That is what you said.’

  ‘As silent as our father’s tomb, Nell.’

  Ailenor accepted the rose water proffered her by Nell. She was to be happy here and this simplicity was not unlike her childhood in Provence.

  ‘I have given you connecting chambers, Henry,’ Nell was saying. ‘Odiham is not a large castle.’

  Ailenor slid her arm into Henry’s as they followed Nell into her great hall.

  They shared a cup of wine with Nell seated by the long arched window that overlooked yellow meadows beyond her castle. For a while they talked about the summer and the harvesting they had observed as they rode to Odiham.

  ‘Our people are happy,’ Henry said. ‘This winter they will have enough to eat. That makes me happy too.’

  ‘I’m told the harvest has been the best for years,’ Nell remarked. ‘I love my demesne. Thank you for it, Henry.’

  Ailenor had noted then that Nell still wore grey and the ring binding her to Christ was firmly on her finger that September.

  At length Nell set her cup down and said, ‘The maids are carrying water up the stairway to your chambers so you can bathe before supper.’ A smile played about Nell’s mouth. ‘Two bath tubs and curtains. Do you wish my maids to stay?’

  ‘No,’ Ailenor said quickly. ‘I have Willelma and I don’t -’

  ‘One bath tub is enough,’ Henry said quickly. ‘It’s a long way up those stairways. Just make sure we have plenty of water, Nell.’

  Ailenor felt her eyes widen as she realised what was about to occur. Was Henry planning to make a whore of her, like those who lived in the stews over the river where bathing was a prelude to intimacy? Had Henry personal experience of what lay over the river? Was her husband accustomed to taking on disguise without her knowledge? It was nothing to do with celibacy, she decided. She would wait and see what his intent was. She loved Henry and knew he loved her back. Their companionship over the past year and a half had caused them to grow close, very close. They shared a love of music, poetry, and beauty. She learned to understand his adoration of Edward Confessor and appreciate the extravagant gold tomb he was planning for the English saint in Westminster’s Abbey Church. Henry would create Jerusalem in his own abbey in England. Their first son would be named for Saint Edward, a truly English name.

  Followed by her Domina, Nell leading, Ailenor climbed the winding staircase at Odiham with a beating heart, with longing and trepidation, wondering if the suggestion of shared bathing was to be a prelude to seduction.

  She hastened into the bedchamber, tripping over her long-toed shoes. One almost slipped off. ‘You have made it beautiful, dear Nell,’ she exclaimed, utterly enchanted, as she grasped the doorpost and slipped the errant shoe back onto her foot.

  ‘Ailenor, are you steady?’ Nell asked.

  ‘Perfectly. It’s just wine
and heat, nothing a bath won’t help.’

  Maids were filling an enormous wooden tub with pitchers of warmed water. They finished their task, curtsied and fled from the room. The tub sat in the middle of the rush-matted floor draped with linen sheets. Ailenor could hardly wait to sink into its soothing depths. A bathing gown so thin and fragile it was surely luminous lay on the bed. Her eye was drawn from the gown to the bed cover itself, which was embroidered with marigolds and daisies with golden hearts. She ran over to it and exclaimed, ‘You have placed the coverlet I asked Rosalind to embroider as a gift for you over my bed.’ She hugged Nell. ‘You are too kind to me.’

  ‘Henry is waiting through that low door.’ Ailenor noticed an arched door set into the wall by the clothing rail. Nell turned to Willelma. ‘There is a small chamber opposite for you, Lady Willelma.’ Since Ailenor’s baggage was already in the chamber, Willelma had begun unpacking as soon as the maids’ clogs clattered down the staircase. Nell added, ‘I shall leave you now.’ She hesitated. ‘Do you need help to undress? I can call for my maids.’

  ‘No, we’ll manage,’ Ailenor said quickly. She wanted no one with her, no one other than her Henry.

  Nell raised her hand. ‘Come, Lady Willelma. Let me show you around my castle.’ Willelma quickly laid a lovely blue tunic of light silk and matching under-gown on the bed and smiling a conspiratorial smile followed Nell from the chamber.

  They were gone. All Ailenor could hear was the cawing of birds crossing the sky above the window casement and chapel bells ringing from the distance. She was alone with a large tub of hot water and her baggage half-unpacked. She deftly unlaced her own dress, undid her belt, and stepped from her under-gown. She kicked off her shoes and drew the thin cotton bathing robe over her head. She loosened her dark hair and feeling it tumbling down her back climbed two steps placed beside the tub and eased herself down into the bath. Water lapped about her, smelling of roses. A pot of soft Spanish soap sat on the tub’s rim. She inhaled its aromatic scent and felt dizzy with delight. Her eyes closed and she did not realise Henry was beside her until she felt a splash of water on her face. Her eyes flicked open again.