by Sandra Worth
“Strange, isn’t it, how the hilt of a sword resembles a crucifix?” John marvelled.
The men exchanged glances. Thomas Harrington said, “My lord, you’ve seen far too many battlefields of late. Go to Alnwick. Your lady-wife would be happy for a visit and will dispel your gloomy thoughts.”
John laid down his sword with a heavy sigh. “You speak truth, Tom. I haven’t seen Isobel, my sweet daughters, or little George for months now, so busy I’ve been quelling risings for the King.”
Lord Cromwell nodded his white-bearded countenance, eyes bright in his rosy face. “But remember, John, while the cost of victory’s been high, there’s comfort knowing the King will be well-pleased with you.”
Shouts, galloping hoofs, and the whinny of horses interrupted their conversation. Rufus struggled to his feet. John’s squire thrust back the flap.
“A messenger from the King, my lord!” George Gower cried, spying the Sun-and-Roses insignia on the crimson tunic.
The tight expressions in the tent relaxed into smiles of anticipation. The messenger entered, went to John and knelt. Opening his pouch, the man extracted a folded parchment tied with a white ribbon and impressed with the bright red royal seal. “My lord, for you, from the King.”
John took the letter, glancing uneasily at the messenger. The man had avoided his eyes, strange for a bearer of good news. Had not the King received his tidings of victory? He had sent it with his most trustworthy servant, a canny lad who could worm his way through the thick of a rebel uprising. Cutting the ribbon with the tip of his dagger, he broke open the seal and began to read.
He looked at his friends in puzzlement. “The King is in York and summons me there on a matter of great urgency—nay, not the Conyers pardon. Another matter, unrelated. I’m to make haste to go to him.” John spoke the words absently. He was lost in thought, for at the back of his mind old fears and terrible uncertainties had begun to stir.
It was the fog, he told himself. The fog, with its secret terrors; the fog, creeping in under the tent. He gave a shudder. How he hated fog!
~ * * * ~
Chapter 25
“But help me, Heaven…
I have sworn never to see him more,
To see him more.”
On the eleventh day of April in the year 1470, the Earl of Warwick’s vessel, the Mary Grace, hit rough seas while fleeing England for Calais. Drenched to the skin, Warwick stood at the helm of his tossing ship as one steep wave after another washed over the deck. Even his expertise could not stop the ship from listing so far to its side that it almost failed to make it back up.
“God’s curse, we’ve no choice but to ride out the storm!” he shouted to the captain against the wind. “Put out the anchor!”
Below the poop at the stern of the vessel, in a small wainscoted cabin, Bella lay on her bunk, clutching her mother’s hand and groaning in misery. Occasionally she lifted her yellow face to vomit into a basin that Anne held. The stench mingled with the dank smell of saltwater and fumes from a bucket of waste in the corner of the cabin. Anne’s frightened eyes moved from her sixteen-year-old sister to the Countess mopping Bella’s brow. She had always been able to find comfort in her mother’s quiet strength, but now those gentle eyes were filled with tears and her mouth quivered as she gazed at her suffering child. Bella lifted herself on an elbow, retched again, and dropped back, exhausted. Anne passed the basin to the midwife who staggered to the corner and emptied it into a bucket secured to the wall by a chain. Like everyone else, Bella had ridden like the wind from Warwick Castle to the ship at Exeter. Bella, who was seven months with child.
Blessed Virgin, Anne cried inwardly, help Bella, I beg you! Aloud she said, “There, dear Bella, it will be better soon, we shall be in Calais soon, and then you shall have every comfort, my dear sister…”
A wave hit the ship. With a hideous creak, it lurched, then plunged downward so fiercely that Anne was thrown across the cabin floor and thrust against the hull. The horn lanterns suspended from a beam in the ceiling swung wildly, flickered, and went out, and the small wooden coffer carrying their belongings slammed into walls as it skidded along the floor. In the corner, the bucket of waste rattled against its hook. Bella screamed and the midwife cried to Holy Martyred St. Peter and St. Christopher to save them.
Anne dragged her aching body across the plank floor back to Bella, catching a splinter of wood in her finger and touching something slimy and malodorous with her outstretched hand. She realised with horror that waste had leaked from the bucket despite its tight lid. She bit down against the revulsion that heaved her stomach and wiped her palm frantically against her skirt.
Bella moaned in a frenzy of pain. Anne reached her sister, took her hand, and didn’t cry out when Bella squeezed her sore finger. The ship heaved again with the shock of the great sea that broke over her. There followed another angry roar of water and a faint shouting for all hands on deck. Anne screwed her eyes shut and tried to stem her growing panic with prayer. All was hauntingly familiar. Long ago, when she was a child, she’d fled from Marguerite d’Anjou on a cold stormy night. The seas had been violent then, and she had experienced the same terror, but the years between had added a cruel dimension. A pregnancy for Bella. A broken heart for her.
A stream of Aves and Paternosters streamed from her lips while her thoughts ran on in confused images of home and the day in March when a kinsman had galloped to Middleham with the evil tidings that Edward had proclaimed her father and George traitors. There was no time to lose. They had to flee to Calais with all speed. Her anguish had been shattering as she hastily wrote Richard a last letter and ran to the chestnut in the woods.
“Blessed holy Virgin, Mother of God, grant us your abiding mercy,” Anne prayed, raising her voice to drown out the image of Richard as she had last seen him, riding away from Middleham. “Have pity on us sinners, unworthy as we are…” In her mind’s eye, she saw Richard turn, raise his gauntleted hand in farewell. Her voice faltered.
Her mother picked up the prayer. “And deliver us from peril, Holy Blessed Mother of Christ, who is our God and Lord, our redeemer and our reward, the promiser and the prize…”
Even Bella joined in now, though all she could manage were halting whispers. Anne forced Richard from her thoughts, found her voice again, and let the words tumble from her lips. All at once there was a shattering clang. The cabin door burst open and cold salt spray blasted the room. Her father stood at the threshold, wind and rain howling about him. She shrank back. At this moment, in his soaking robes, with his eyes dark and sparkling and his hair matted to his head, he looked not like the father she knew, but an apparition. Struggling against the wind, he forced the door shut. Her mother rose.
“See to what pass you’ve brought your daughter! See…” the Countess cried, her voice trembling. In the throes of labour, Bella writhed on the bed while the midwife hastily adjusted the soiled bed sheets. “I never let the meanest village women go without clean linens and warm water! At night, I tended to them myself, to lessen their pain, to ensure they had every comfort! Now my own daughter—my own daughter…” Her face crumpled.
Warwick turned his stricken eyes from his daughter back to his wife. He tried to speak but no words came. He opened his arms wide, a pathetic gesture begging forgiveness. His Countess went into them. Cradling one another, they stood sobbing softly. Anne averted her face. She had never seen her father weep before.
After a time, Warwick held his wife out at arm’s length. “The storm is easing,” he said. “The wind should shift easterly soon. We’ll be in Calais by dawn, God willing.”
“Calais,” her mother whispered reverently, dabbing a handkerchief to her eyes. “Thanks be to Him and to the Blessed Virgin both.”
Aye, Anne thought, Calais was salvation. Calais was refuge, comfort, safety, and blankets, warm water, and potions for Bella. Calais was sleep. Oh, to sleep, to lie still, and close one’s eyes, and drift away into blessed, blessed sleep! Her father had been Captai
n of Calais since before she was born. They loved him there. His friend, Lord Wenlock, whom he had left in charge of Calais, would give them joyous welcome.
Her father turned to leave. His eye fell on the bucket of slop in the corner. “I’ll send someone for that.”
Anne closed her weary lids. Oh, to sleep, to sleep… A loud knock jolted her out of the languor into which she was sinking. She extracted her hand from Bella, and went to the door. A yellow-toothed, long-haired, half-naked sailor grinned at her. “Coom for the pail, lady,” he said, lisping through gaped teeth. She held her breath, thinking he smelled worse than the waste he’d come to remove. He limped over to the pail, loosened it from its chain, and hoisted it up. He was staggering back to the door when his legs buckled and he dropped his load, seized by a violent spasm. Coughing and heaving for air, he fell against Anne, enfolding her in a stench so vile it knocked the breath from her body. She shrieked, flung him from her, and fled to a corner of the cabin. Her hand shaking, she tore a strip from the cambric shift beneath her gown and wildly, desperately, wiped at her face. She didn’t need a physician to tell her infections and deadly sicknesses lived in bloody phlegm and offal.
The sailor collapsed against Bella’s bunk, clinging to the wooden post like a drowning man and coughing as though his chest would split, while the midwife cowered against the wall and the Countess shielded Bella with her body. The spell subsided at last. The sailor cleared his throat with a rough gurgling sound, forced open the lid on the bucket, and spat out a wad of bloody slime. “Forgive me, m’ladies,” he said, shamefaced. “I did’na mean no harm. A fit it is that comes on me chest at times. Nothing ta concern ye about.” He secured the lid back on. “Aye—I’ll be off, thank ’e, ladies.”’
Anne ran to the door, barred it behind him and leaned against it, trembling. No matter what he said, the man was dying. She prayed she hadn’t caught his fearful condition, whatever it was.
~*~
Throughout the night Anne and her mother kept vigil at Bella’s side. She quieted somewhat and managed to fall into an exhausted sleep, but as the grey light of dawn filtered into the cabin, her pains began anew, with violence. Anne’s heart nearly burst with joy at the welcome cry, “Land Ahoy!”
“Bella!” Anne cried. “We’re safe! We’ve reached Calais! All will be well, dear Bella!”
The Countess sank to her knees in prayer to the Blessed Queen of the Sea, the words spilling from her grateful heart.
All at once a thunderous, earth-shattering explosion shattered the tranquillity of the April morning. The vessel shivered. Shouts and clamouring broke out above deck and there was much running to and fro. Someone beat on the door. Bella groaned.
“’Tis nothing, don’t fret child, all’s well. We’re in Calais,” the Countess murmured.
Anne rushed to unbar the door. It was flung back with a resounding bang. George stood at the threshold, his blond curls dishevelled, his rich brocaded azure cote ripped. But it was his expression that made her recoil. His nostrils flared like a lathered stallion’s and his brilliant blue eyes burned with a hatred that twisted his fine features into a demonic mask. He looked like a madman.
“He’ll pay for this!” he roared. “He’ll pay, I swear it!”
The Countess rushed to grab George’s elbow. “Hush, my lord, I pray you—think of Bella!”
Bella tried to rise. “George!” she panted. “Oh, George…”
George’s expression changed to horror at the mass of tangled hair and the two wild eyes glistening in Bella’s yellow face. The eyes were encircled in purple, the lips cracked, and the frail white body with the huge swollen belly was covered with bloody sheets. “Bella,” he murmured. “Oh, my poor Bella…”
Warwick appeared at the door, a dazed expression on his face. The Countess’s hand went to her breast. “My lord, what has happened?”
He stumbled into the room, collapsed on a stool. He looked up at his Countess with blank eyes. “We cannot land. They are shooting at us.”
She shrank back with a cry and reached out for support to the wall. “But Lord Wenlock…” she managed.
“The garrison’s orders are to turn us away. The Merchants of the Staple pay the troops’ wages, and they favour Burgundy. Wenlock has sent us a secret message. Calais is a trap. If we enter, Charles of Burgundy will attack by land, and Edward by sea. We’ve no choice. We must go to France.”
“Bella,” she cried. “Do they know…?”
“They know. Lord Wenlock is sending wine.”
She looked at him dumbfounded.
“’Tis all he can do, lady,” Warwick said. He dropped his head into his hands.
~*~
The baby was a boy, and he was born dead. They wrapped his little body in a shroud and buried him in the sea. It was a beautiful spring day; a soft wind blew and the sky was as clear as if angels had washed it that morning. In the distance stretched Calais with white sandy beaches and a long line of defensive wall studded with gun-holes. The red tiled roofs of merchants’ houses glittered in the sun, reflecting purple shadows onto the Beauchamp Tower and the massive Woolstaplers’ Hall. Across the water, the bells of two church towers tinkled sweetly.
Anne lifted her eyes to her father’s face, bleak with sorrow, and to her mother, standing silent and immobile as a waxen image. She turned away, overwhelmed by a raw, primitive grief. She didn’t look at George, who stood beside her, but she heard his words.
“Edward,” he hissed between his teeth, “you’ll pay. I vow it on our father’s soul.”
He reeked of wine.
~*~
All was quiet in the little cabin as they sailed to France. Even the seas, Anne thought, staring out the window whose wooden shutters stood open to the warm breeze. She let her gaze rest on Bella. Her sister lay on her bunk, eyes open, staring at the ceiling, as she had during the past four days since the babe’s death. Beside her knelt the Countess, a drab figure in darkest grey, lips moving in silent prayer, fingers busily working her rosary beads.
Anne looked at the shining blue sea. She had no interest in France, which was the future, and she didn’t allow herself to think of England, which was the past.
The waves are so gentle, she thought. Like a blue silk banner blowing in the breeze. She felt strangely calm. Maybe one day she’d be able to sleep.
~ * * * ~
Chapter 26
“‘Yea, lord’ she said, ‘Thy hopes are mine,’
and saying that, she choked,
And sharply turned about to hide her face.”
On May Day the passengers aboard the Mary Grace awakened to glorious sunshine and cries of Land Ahoy! The Countess looked up from her rosary, and Bella turned her head, but the sound came to Anne only dimly, as though it travelled across a vast distance. She rose to prepare for landing, barely conscious that she moved at all and oblivious to the church bells along the river banks clanging the commencement of the festival of love.
Louis of France had arranged a warm reception in Honfleur, a sunny town with half-timbered houses and cobbled streets where the scent of lime blossoms perfumed the air. The streets were filled with people celebrating the spring. Minstrels played merry tunes and pretty girls danced around the gilded Maypole. Wine flowed, and mummers and men on stilts tried to make them laugh. But the wine made Anne’s head ache, the glaring sunlight hurt her eyes, and the song and laughter that echoed long into the night kept her awake.
From Honfleur they were conducted through Bayeux to an abbey in Caen. Set in flowery meadows that sloped to the River Orne, and surrounded by blossoming apple trees, the limestone abbey was serene, the cloistered gardens fragrant with violets and roses. At night the nightingale’s song mingled with the tinkling of the fountain, and in the early morning the cooing of turtledoves filled the dewy air. Punctually at Prime, Laud, Vespers, and Matins, church bells tolled and voices sang praises to Heaven. The soothing chants spread balm over Anne’s dark, sleepless nights. For the first time since leaving home, she f
ound a measure of peace.
Soon after their arrival, they were joined by Warwick’s cousin, the daring Bastard of Fauconberg, bastard son of the Kingmaker’s uncle, the Earl of Kent. There was much jubilation since Fauconberg, an admiral of Edward’s fleet, had brought many of Edward’s ships, and also several Burgundian vessels he’d seized on the high seas. Sorely in need of money, Warwick accepted the plunder gratefully.
Many conferences followed behind closed doors.
In June, Warwick and George journeyed to Amboise expressly to meet the King of France. In their absence, the Countess spent much of the day in the chapel, and Bella remained secluded in her room. Anne strolled the gardens, perused books in the vaulted library, and helped the nuns make an apple drink they called “cider.” Often she assisted with their charitable deeds— feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, sewing for the poor. The nuns were kind and called her “petite angel.” She welcomed their friendship, which helped allay her loneliness, and she was reluctant to leave them, even at Compline, when they prayed in the gloomy pillared crypt of the abbey church of La Trinite.
Nearly five hundred years had passed since William the Conqueror’s wife Mathilde built the abbey in hope of saving her soul after committing the godless sin of marrying her cousin without a dispensation. Anne found herself drawn to Mathilde’s stark black marble slab tomb in the chancel. Wondering what had driven the queen to take such a risk, she would murmur prayers for her soul.
On June 11, her fifteenth birthday, Anne sat quietly by the window in the empty warming room, watching the nuns pass below in the open arcaded court. The foliage glittered in the afternoon sunlight; squirrels chased one another across the emerald grass; and birds bathed in the fountains and twittered in the trees. Almost from the day she was born the world had proved a dread place, but in this house of God, she’d found refuge. When her father returned from Amboise, she would request permission to take her vows. If she couldn’t have Richard, then she would have God.