Anne O'Brien

by Virgin Widow (epub)

  And then there was a commotion on the threshold with a cursing Francis Lovell and two soldiers struggling with a large chest between them that they placed just inside the door.

  ‘There! Your clothes and possessions, as I said.’ Back in her element, Margery moved to throw back the lid and inspect the contents, clicking her tongue over the layers of gowns and underskirts, bodices and shifts. ‘The Duchess tried to keep them, but I was having none of that. They’re yours and she’s no right to them.’ She took the time to scowl at my strange attire and bare feet. ‘I’ll unpack them for you. You need some suitable clothes if you’re to receive guests.’ Her scowl was turned on Francis, who merely grinned back. ‘I think we might be here some time until all this mess is sorted out. And I won’t answer for my actions if his Grace of Clarence tries to set even one foot into these rooms.’ She looked round with pursed lips. ‘Could be worse, I suppose…’ I heard her grumbling mildly as she bustled about and into the adjoining bedchamber.

  ‘Francis! How can I thank you? You don’t know what it means to have Margery with me. I admit to beginning to feel melancholy.’

  He shook his head, denying his role with typical self-deprecation. ‘That won’t do. But it was Gloucester’s decision. He didn’t like to leave you alone here.’

  ‘I was feeling abandoned…’ I paused. ‘I thought he might return.’

  ‘Urgent matters of state. But he thought you were sad and very alone and that Margery would do the trick. She was more than willing to come, as you’ll be aware.’ His eyes might twinkle, but I thought he was stepping warily around the urgent matters.

  ‘I suppose Richard is very busy.’

  ‘Yes. He holds the reins. The King’s travelled west to the Marches.’

  ‘Francis…I know he wants the marriage…’ I stated carefully. ‘But do you think he cares for me?’

  ‘Do you think he doesn’t?’ Francis’s brows rose in quizzical disbelief.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Then you don’t know him very well. If you’d had to live with him, as I had, since you went missing, you wouldn’t doubt it.’

  ‘No?’ I pounced immediately. ‘Then tell me, Francis.’ Here was a chance to discover what lay behind the enigmatic exterior that Richard had cultivated with such success.

  ‘Nothing much to tell. Except that he was beside himself with worry. He didn’t spell it out, but he knew what Clarence was capable of. If Clarence could accuse his own mother of prostituting herself, and his brother of bastardy, to strengthen his own claim to the throne…If he could do that…Richard feared the worst. And when he got your letter—we were at Middleham in the throes of a land dispute—he swept aside the two protagonists who were squabbling over a strip of woodland without a word beyond that he would be back—some time—and rode with barely a stop and the horses all but foundering. And then when he couldn’t find you here…I thought he would ride immediately for Tewkesbury, staying for nothing but a snatched meal and a fresh mount. But Isabel told him you had changed your mind about the marriage and chosen to take the veil and so all was cast into disorder.’

  ‘Did he believe her?’

  ‘No. Not for a minute. He blamed Clarence.’

  So, I thought, Francis’s summing up had put me firmly in my place. I might doubt Richard, but he had never doubted me. I felt my cheeks flush uncomfortably, a justifiable twinge of shame.

  ‘And then he was given the gloves,’ Francis continued, obviously unaware of my discomfort. ‘A servant stopped us just as we had ridden out through the gates. I thought he would turn about immediately and demand to search Cold Harbour from cellar to turret. But good sense prevailed. And me whispering in his ear.’ He chuckled reminiscently. ‘It would have given satisfaction to ruffle his Grace of bloody Clarence’s fine feathers, but far better to do it when we were better prepared. So we came back this morning with a proper force and did the job well. Richard spent last night prowling his rooms like old King Henry’s caged lion at the Tower. And with a temper to match. I left him to it in the end.’

  ‘So he cared.’

  ‘Yes, foolish girl,’ he replied as he would when I was a child, not an adult and a Princess. ‘He cared.’ Francis hesitated with his hand on the latch. ‘He says to look in the chest. Then you will see what he can see. He says it will put your mind at rest—unless you’re determined to be churlish!’

  I rummaged in the chest.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ Margery huffed impatiently at my side as I got under her feet.

  ‘I don’t know. Something from Richard…’

  Then I found it, wrapped in its covering of linen. It had slid down the side, and I knew what it was as soon as I put my hand to it. A mirror, a polished silver disk as I discovered when I unwrapped it, its handle engraved with curls of leaves and vines. I purred with pleasure. Where had he got such a lovely thing? I held it before me. It did not reflect a true image, but was good enough for its purpose.

  He said I would see what he saw.

  I realised that it was a long time since I had last looked in a mirror. At Middleham, when Richard had kissed Maude and I had been heartbroken at what I saw, at my lack of attraction, I had studied my reflection with displeasure. What a child I had been then. But not now. Carrying the mirror to the light from the window, I looked. Astonished. I had changed through these recent months of exile and marriage, of battle and sorrow and guarded freedom. Always dark and sallow-skinned and slight of stature, that would never change, but I had to admit to an improvement. Maturity had laid its kind hand on me at last. I pursed my lips in sharp appraisal. My hair shone after Meggie’s ministrations. My cheekbones were high and almost elegant beneath smooth skin. Broad brow, a straight nose, firm lips. I touched them, outlined them. My eyes, I thought, were my best feature, of darkest blue, offset by dark lashes, even if uncomfortably forthright and direct. Perhaps I had grown into my looks, whereas I swear Isabel’s had been evident from the day of her birth. Beautiful? I would not have said so. But not so bad…if a man had a taste for slim, dark-haired, dark-eyed women.

  Perhaps what Richard saw pleased him after all.

  ‘He sees the spirit. The courage.’ Margery smiled as she read my thoughts with uncanny accuracy. ‘It makes you glow, lady.’

  I allowed myself to enjoy the moment, with a warm complacence.

  By the time Richard returned, and not so many hours later, if truth be told, however inclined I was to be scathing of his absence, I was well scrubbed, sweet-smelling. Clad in my own garments, cosseted by Margery, my confidence restored and my sour mood lightened by Francis’s visit, yet I was circumspect. I might long to see Richard, to have plain speaking between us at last, imagining that he could smooth out the golden path to future happiness, but I was not so naïve as to believe that he could do so. Francis had painted a clearer picture of matters at Court by what he said and even more by what he did not say. It was not as simple as whether Richard might or might not love me. All manner of separate strands existed to complicate, of power and politics and double-dealing woven into the whole. Not least the rift between him and Clarence.

  So I waited for him with some apprehension, although my smile of welcome was heartfelt and I prayed that it masked my doubts. For her part, Margery all but fell at his feet in gratitude. She was a lost cause, I realised, her loyalty completely won over. I would never get a balanced view of Gloucester’s faults and failings from her.

  Richard took Margery’s hands when she curtsied and lifted her bulk to her short height, kissing her knuckles with a gleam of humour. ‘Do you approve of your new quarters, then?’ He was of a mind for jesting, I decided, so I would go along with it.

  ‘No, your Grace. I don’t.’ Margery was never one to hold back, although her face flushed with pleasure at his concern. ‘They’re not suitable for the Lady Anne. But in the circumstances…When I think of her in that kitchen, it’s enough to make my blood boil.’

  ‘It won’t be for long. The sanctuary is the best
I can do and Archbishop Neville’s name is enough to deter most men.’

  ‘So I should think, your Grace. But where we can go for the lady to make a permanent home, I don’t know.’ Her grumbles would continue for ever. ‘It’s not suitable that—’

  ‘Margery! Enough!’ With a laugh I waved her to silence before she could get into full flow as Richard turned his considering gaze on me.

  ‘You look rested, lady.’

  ‘I am.’ His stare encompassed me as if he would detect any weakness in me. I straightened my shoulders against any such intrusion.

  ‘And you have survived your ordeal well.’

  ‘Undeniably. I can gut a pike and pluck and stuff a capon with great skill.’

  ‘I’m relieved to hear it.’ The gleam intensified. ‘If ever I fall on hard times, I can rest assured my wife will rise to the occasion.’

  His wife! I swallowed hard, but clung to the light banter. Better than the dangerous waters to come. ‘Master Hough praised my lack of squeamishness when the capon escaped its basket and ran around the kitchen and I had to take an axe to the creature’s neck.’

  ‘And who might Master Hough be?’

  ‘Clarence’s Cook, of course. A most skilled man whose praise was in scant supply. He wouldn’t let me near the venison!’

  ‘I’m sure you managed admirably, with or without the venison.’

  I could no longer control the smile. ‘Yes, I did. I thought of Clarence with every chop of the capon’s neck!’ And I brought the edge of my hand down with relish.

  ‘Ah! Bloodthirsty too.’

  But we were deliberately skirting round a mess of problems here. I knew it, as did he. Margery left us at a sign from me, not unwillingly, but with a stern glance in my direction. It said, quite plainly, watch your words, remember your manners. She would always have a care for me and I would trust her to my grave, but I needed no chaperon for what I would say. As soon as the door closed behind her, all the wit and good humour fell away, quick as a snuffed candle.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked softly, cautiously. He came to me, took my hands.

  So I had failed to hide the fear. ‘It’s just that…’ I closed my eyes, took a breath, whilst Richard waited with such patience as I untangled my worries. There were so many questions, so many barriers still seemingly between us. Francis had told me Richard cared. But there was that other, vaster obstacle that I had refused to face for too long. I could do so no longer.

  ‘What troubles you, Anne? I can resolve it, whatever it is.’

  He was so confident. His belief that he could erase my fears and my grief brought me to the edge of tears. But I must not. I stripped my terrible fear bare, without finesse.

  ‘Did you kill the Prince, Richard? Did you kill Prince Edward?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh!’ It took my breath away completely. I had been hoping that he would deny it, make some excuse. That my dream had been only a vicious twisting of the truth or that the priest at Tewkesbury had mistaken the dreadful event. Perhaps it had been King Edward all along who dispatched his intemperate enemy. But Richard had claimed the deed without hesitation. ‘Oh…!’ My mind seemed frozen into the horror of it, unable to move from that scene of Richard with the bloody blade in his hand.

  ‘It’s no secret. I don’t…’ And I saw the exact moment, when his eyes snapped to mine, searched my face, that understanding dawned on him. Brows drawing together, his hands fell from me as if the touch scorched him. ‘You thought I murdered him in cold blood. Is that it?’

  ‘I don’t know. But I think you might.’

  ‘That I would murder him?’

  ‘It is what I was told.’

  ‘Then hear the truth. It was no murder. I’ll swear it if you wish, but I’ll make no easy justification for my actions.’ His eyes, bright with furious conviction, fixed on mine. ‘I killed him when he was brought before us in Tewkesbury Abbey. Even as a prisoner, defeated and disarmed, with nothing between him and death but Edward’s mercy, he remained intransigent. By what right, he dared ask the King, do you take what is mine? I am King of England, not you.’ Richard gave a bark of laughter. ‘I don’t know whether it was courage or rash stupidity. It was certainly outrageously foolhardy.’ Although his eyes remained on my face, I thought he did not see me, as if he were focused on that memory of more than six months ago. ‘I remember Clarence approached Lancaster with soft words, to quiet his temper. If anything, he saw it as a further betrayal and it lit the flame. Even though he was surrounded, hemmed in with guards, Lancaster tried to snatch Clarence’s dagger from his belt. He got it, too—I admit to being careless with the King’s person. I had no thought that Lancaster would go to such lengths. Next thing we knew, before we could restrain him, he was lunging towards the King.’

  So like my dream. Same actions, same outcome, but how different was the interpretation. And it was so much in character that I could imagine the Prince wagering all on that final throw of the dice, a foolish and hopeless attempt to cut down his enemy with Clarence’s dagger, even when surrounded by men who would have no compunction in killing him if provoked. The Prince would never accept defeat. Never this side of the grave.

  I sighed, a slow acceptance. Yes, that was undoubtedly what would have happened. ‘Richard…’

  ‘For that reason I killed him,’ Richard continued as if I had not spoken. ‘As Constable of England the personal security of the King and of the realm is given into my keeping. Would you have me stand back and allow Lancaster to stab Edward to the heart?’

  ‘No. I would not.’ I knew it for the truth.

  ‘Anne…did you care for him?’ In one stride Richard stood close before me, had reclaimed my hands, forcefully now, and I saw the lines of anger in his face. I knew I had hurt him, questioning his integrity. His eyes were all darkness on mine so that a flutter of trepidation, not unpleasant, caught in my throat. ‘Did he have a place in your heart?’ he demanded, harshly. ‘You were with him, wed to him for nigh on six months. Did he kiss you like this?’ His lips were hard and sure on mine, leaving me breathless. ‘Did he touch you like this?’ His hands swept down from shoulder to hip, a deliberate, almost insolent act of possession that set up a tremor in my limbs.

  ‘No. Nothing like that.’ Startled by this sudden slip of control in a man who governed every emotion, every action, I was even more shocked by my own delight that I could move him to such emotion. Yet I could not tell him the truth, not all of it. Shame held me silent, as if the blame was mine.

  ‘You were mine before you were ever his.’ Desire, rich and ripe, flowed over me from his words.

  ‘I always was. But you had left me…’

  ‘Not of my own volition.’ Then, with difficulty and a bid for softness, ‘Did you love him, Anne?’

  So that was it. I had not realised the depths of his jealousy. It might be difficult for Richard to ask it, but there was no hesitation in my answering. My assurance came directly, fiercely even. ‘No. I did not love him. I pitied him—at first. As I grew to know him—I feared him. Even hated him.’ I would not explain how he had struck me when he had found Richard’s letter, how he had exulted in my humiliation when my father was dead. The vicious accusations without foundation. ‘I did not love him. And without doubt he despised me, unless he needed someone to impress with his skills and his glorious ambition.’

  ‘He was handsome enough.’ Richard was still not convinced. ‘He had the measure of me there.’

  And I laughed softly. So my love was as susceptible to vanity as I. ‘He was handsome. But there was a darkness in him that repelled me.’ In a strange reversal, I felt in that moment unutterably sad, for the Prince, slain for his intemperate ambitions, for the grief and humiliation he had wilfully heaped on me, for all of us caught up in this conflict. When I blinked and tried to focus on the jewels in Richard’s collar my eyes blurred with tears.

  ‘Look up,’ Richard murmured, gentle in response to my grief, hands now loosely around my wrists. ‘I would
not distress you. Then there are no secrets between us?’

  ‘No. There are none.’

  Yet I saw the shine of doubt in his eyes. He hesitated as if the thoughts were difficult to express for a man who leaned towards reticence. Then plunged. ‘You raised the matter and I answered. I need to know that you accept what I did. Oh, I admit readily to jealousy. I hated that he should have you when I could not. But that had no part in Lancaster’s death. My killing of the Prince was an act of sheer necessity. If you cannot accept what I did, Anne, it will always lie between us. In its shadow there can be no trust. Sometimes duty and the needs of the hour demand a course of action. I am not always proud of what I have done, but I have never acted in cruelty or self-interest. You should know me well enough to know that I would not.’ He hesitated the length of a heartbeat. ‘I know you never gave your consent to this marriage—even though Edward presumed that you would. You said only that you would consider it. I need you to consider it now. Can you accept me, as I am, blemishes and all? Sins and all? If you take the good parts you have to take the less than good. Can you accept that? Otherwise I see no happiness between us.’

  I let his words, this amazing stripping of his soul, lie on my heart, as I searched his face, seeking the thoughts behind the stern set of his features. When had he become so difficult to read? When had he decided that it was better to hide his emotions from everyone as if they did not exist? Life at Court, I supposed, where enemies masqueraded as friends, where it was necessary to guard one’s political back from the assassin’s knife. Once I would have pried and poked until I cracked the smooth face of the surface, regardless of his feelings. I could no longer do that, unless he allowed it.