The Sun in Splendour (The Plantagenets Book 6)

by Juliet Dymoke

  Anne scrambled up and would have fled at once but Bess held her for one more moment. ‘Don't fear,’ she said urgently. ‘My lord of Gloucester will make all right.’

  And then as there was nothing else she could do she went down the stair in as dignified a manner as she could summon. At the bottom, however, the Duke of Clarence seized her wrist.

  ‘Do you say so indeed?’ he enquired harshly. ‘You are a foolish woman, Lady Bourchier.’

  ‘Let me go. You are hurting me.’

  ‘I can hurt even more if I am crossed.’ He gave her wrist a twist. She cried out and he released her. ‘Now go,’ he said, ‘and do not come here again, nor interfere in my affairs.’

  Her skin stinging, her wrist in pain, she turned and ran from him, from the house out into the yard where Wat Sable waited with her horse.

  He looked at her in some concern. ‘What's amiss, lady? Has anyone in that house done you harm?’

  She gave him a faint smile. ‘Dear Wat – and if they had you would go to my defence. But I would rather you took me home.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  For a few days Bess heard nothing. Richard was at court, very quiet; Clarence blustering about as usual, smiling on the Queen, on his mother, excelling himself at the joust. When he saw Bess he gave her a look she found hard to assess. She had a feeling it contained a warning and her distrust of him grew. Isabel was at the joust but not Anne, and when Bess inquired for her Isabel explained that her sister had caught her cold. She gave no hint as to whether she had heard the quarrel, and Bess dared press the matter no further for Anne's sake. Gloucester, she was sure, could be trusted to do what needed to be done.

  It was more than a week later that she was at home in the late afternoon when Mark came to her to announce in an awed voice that the Duke of Gloucester himself was below, waiting in the hall to speak with her. She ran down, sure some crisis must have brought him to her.

  He was pacing up and down and gave her only the briefest of greetings. ‘I need your help, Lady Bourchier. We are in desperate trouble.’

  There was no need to question to whom he was coupling his own need. ‘What can I do for your grace? Indeed, ever since that day last week when I was so unfortunate a witness to your words with your brother –’

  ‘You were there?’ he asked in surprise. '

  ‘Yes, my lord. I had been visiting the Lady Anne and we were in the gallery above. We heard it all.’

  ‘I see.’ He began to slap his gloves into the palm of the other hand. ‘I came to you, knowing you for Anne's friend, and I see I may now speak frankly. I approached the King as I said I would and he informed my brother Clarence that he was not the lady's guardian nor was he to interfere with my seeking of her hand. Yet this morning when I called he told me she was not there.’

  ‘Not there? But has he sent her away? How could he do so after the King had given so plain an order?’ Bess was aware she ought to be offering the Duke a seat, some refreshment, but the moment was too tense for that.

  ‘He said,’ Richard told her, ‘that as he was not after all supposed to be responsible for her, he neither knew nor cared where she might be and I was welcome to search the house.’

  ‘And did you?’ she asked, incredulous that such a situation could have arisen.

  ‘I did – every room, though I knew that he would not have suggested it had she been there. Isabel was present but she dared say nothing. God knows how she feels about the whole business. My lady was nowhere to be found. Since then –’ he gave Bess a wearied look – ‘I have searched everywhere I can think of. I have been to my mother at Baynards, to my sisters, to Lady Ferrers, all to no avail. And then it occurred to me that you –’

  ‘She is not here,’ Bess exclaimed. ‘The Duke would never let her come here. Or do you think she ran away herself?’

  ‘I doubt it. He would have had her under lock and key. Think, my lady, did she ever mention anyone, anywhere, that might give us an idea where to look? I confess I am at a loss.’ He looked suddenly so tired that Bess summoned Mark to bring wine, but she had no suggestion to offer.

  ‘Your brother must have many houses, my lord. He may have sent her to any one, out of London.’

  They stared at each other across the table. Bess thought of Anne's misery at their last meeting – what could her days have been like since? She thought too of the visit Anne had made here, and then suddenly she stiffened. ‘My lord, I do recall something. Lady Anne talked of a woman, a laundress who lives in Bow Lane. She said she was one of the Duke's mistresses. Is it possible –?’

  Richard had been leaning against the table but now he sprang up. ‘We can try. Come with me, Lady Bourchier. Then you can vouch for me, that I do nothing that will offend the King or the churchmen. And she will be glad of you – if we find her.’

  It took them barely ten minutes to reach Bow Lane and an obliging passer-by indicated the laundress's house. Richard had some half-dozen men with him including Sir James Tyrell, and it was Tyrell who banged on the door. A slatternly girl opened it and before she could call her mistress Richard stalked in followed by Bess and his men. They all but filled the room and a woman, hearing the commotion and the girl calling for her in a fright, came hurrying from the back of the house. The place was stuffy, smelling of wet clothes and steam although the laundry was outside in the yard.

  The woman wiped her hands. She was comely enough in a blowsy way, the cloth of her dress stretched taut across ample breasts, and she had bold brown eyes. She looked from one to the other in surprise. ‘What can I do for you, my lady, my lords? Surely you are not come yourselves to seek my services?’ She spoke deferentially and yet, Bess thought, there was a tinge of impertinence in her voice.

  ‘We are looking for a lady, my good woman,’ Richard said, ‘a lady from the Duke of Clarence's house. We would like to know if she is here.’

  ‘A lady, sir?’ The woman feigned astonishment. ‘From the Duke of Clarence's establishment? God bless you, sir, why should such a lady be here? And who might you be that asks?’

  ‘This is my lord the Duke of Gloucester,’ Tyrell answered, ‘so mind your tongue, woman.’

  She did a quick bob but she did not look directly at the Duke, even when he came to stand before her. ‘I mean to search for her,’ he said quietly, ‘but you need not be alarmed.’

  She stood awkwardly before the door to the rear of the house. ‘We're very busy, my lord. 'Tis no fit place for the likes of you. And you'll find no one that –’

  With one twist Tyrell caught her shoulder and removed her. The door was flung open. Bess saw a steamy kitchen, a yard beyond, great vats of water and several maids at work, one standing by the spit. It was this girl who gave a sudden sharp cry and then stumbled through the open door and into Richard's arms. For a moment he held her, taking in the plain gown, the apron, the white cap, even as she clung to him, laughing, crying. Then, very gently, though Bess could see he was pale with anger, he said, ‘My love, my love, you are safe now.’

  Anne was gazing at him as if she dared not trust her own eyes. ‘Richard! Richard! I knew you would come. I prayed and prayed. Our Lady heard me – she sent you. Oh, how did you find me?’

  He took the servant's cap from her head and threw it on the floor. ‘It was Lady Bourchier here who thought of this place. We owe it all to her.’ Caring nothing for the staring maids, the now thoroughly frightened laundress, he bent his head and kissed her. Then he put her into Bess's arms and Bess took off her own mantle to lay it about Anne's shoulders.

  To the woman he said sternly, ‘I do not blame you; for you obeyed the Duke my brother, but never dare to show your face in his house or in my sight again.’

  When they were outside Bess said, ‘Where will you take her, my lord? My house is at your disposal and I would be happy to -’

  ‘Thank you, no,’ Gloucester answered. He had his arm about Anne again. ‘I would not put it past my vindictive brother to try to take her from you. She will be safe only in sanctuary
until the whole matter is settled before the King. I will take her to the nuns at St Martin-le-Grand,’ and he looked at the girl beside him, an expression on his face that Bess had never seen there before. Anne's small features glowed in response and Bess found her own eyes misting with tears. She was so glad for them, so relieved and yet deeply envious.

  ‘We shall never forget what we owe you,’ Richard said, ‘never,’ and Anne put her arm about Bess's neck and kissed her.

  Then they were gone down the street and Bess turned back towards her own home, the ever attentive Sable putting his cloak about her shoulders. The house, when she reached it, seemed utterly empty without Humphrey.

  It was some months before the business was finally settled. Anne stayed in sanctuary and wrote to Bess that impatient as she was she was content to wait until she might emerge as Richard's bride. Christmas was spent at Westminster and when the first snowdrops showed their white blooms, the court moved to Sheen Palace where Edward was planning much rebuilding.

  ‘Well, it has hardly been a season of good will,’ Catherine Hastings remarked to Bess, ‘with my lords of Clarence and Gloucester not speaking except to argue. I heard the King say that with so much determination if the three of them were united they would be invincible.’

  ‘Clarence must give in,’ Bess said.

  ‘I suppose so, but the King bestowing the Earl of Oxford's forfeited estates on the Duke of Gloucester has not helped.’

  Bess sighed. ‘I am sorry for Lady Anne. It is a long and weary wait for her while the lawyers argue over Warwick's possessions. She is entitled to her share.’

  ‘It is difficult to be an heiress,’ Catherine agreed and smiled. ‘Do you not find it so? You must needs take another husband yourself some day.’

  ‘Must I? I am content serving the Queen and with my children.’

  ‘Are you? But that is over simple, my dear Bess. There are quite a few gentlemen with their eyes on your rich lands and the King will want someone to have the handling of them. It is a rich sugar plum with which to bind a man to him.’

  ‘I had not thought of it like that. I would not disobey his grace but the thought of a second marriage is distasteful to me.’

  ‘Why?’ Catherine asked bluntly. ‘I took William when Harrington died and I've been much happier than I was with him, God rest him. William may not be faithful but when he is with me, he is –’ she paused, ‘– very pleasing.’

  Bess could not help laughing. ‘You are so sensible, Catherine. If I must marry perhaps I may be as fortunate.’

  Thomas Howard had become a persistent suitor. He brought his horse beside hers when they hunted, superseded Sable or Fitchett in helping her to mount and dismount. He squeezed into a place near hers when they listened to musicians in the evening or to the King's choristers in chapel, and he danced with her. He was not a good dancer but he persevered, ousting other young men who pursued her. She contemplated asking the Queen if she might be spared for the summer to go home to Ashwellthorpe, and yet she did not want to go until she had seen Anne and Richard wed. Nor, at the heart of it, did she want to be from the chance daily sight of Edward.

  It was at dusk one evening after a short afternoon's hawking, when Mark came to her room to say that the King wished to see her. Surprised, she waited while Elysia hastily finished dressing her hair, confining it in a tall hennin held in place by a roll of orange velvet. It became her, she thought, with her orange cotte just revealed beneath the cream-coloured surcoat edged with dark fur. Confident that she looked well, she went to the King's apartment, wondering what he wanted. Some task for Elizabeth, she guessed, some secret gift for the Queen's birthday.

  He was alone but for a clerk to whom he had been dictating letters but whom he immediately dismissed. ‘Well, Bess,’ he gave her his usual smile. ‘Come and sit down. You have not been in this room before, I think? It is where my clerks keep me studying tedious papers, and all under the eyes of my forebears!’

  She smiled back when she rose from her deep curtsey and instead of sitting wandered round looking at the portraits on the walls, recognising one of King Henry V that she had seen copied and another, rather crudely coloured, of Edward's father. Next to it there was a drawing, no more, of the head of a man with large sad eyes, a flattish nose, and a tall hat set on neat bobbed hair.

  ‘Who is that?’ she asked.

  ‘The old Duke of Gloucester, the one they called the Good Duke in the city at least, though he was always at loggerheads with the Beauforts.’

  ‘You told me of him once before, how fond your father was of him.’

  ‘Aye, and believed him murdered by Queen Margaret. She'll do no more evil now, thank God, and the Duke may sleep avenged at last in St Alban's Abbey.’

  Bess was still looking at the sketch. ‘He puts me in mind of – someone.’ She searched in her mind, trying to think where she had seen a similar face, just such an expression, but the King's next words drove all thought of the long dead Duke Humfrey out of her head.

  He led her to a chair but without sitting himself began, ‘It has long been in my mind to find another husband for you. You have been widowed nearly a year now, and –’ He paused, hearing the quick intake of breath, and then went on, ‘My dear, I know how much you mourned Humphrey and no one grieved for him more than I, but such is life that I cannot have great heiresses left without protection.’

  ‘I am well enough as I am,’ Bess said in a small voice. She had not been entirely alone with him since that day at Grafton and she was very much aware of it. I am a widow, she told herself, the mother of three children, not a green girl. I cannot feel as I did then! But her hands were trembling and she clasped them together. ‘Sire, if I must wed again, may I not wait a little longer?’

  ‘Out of deference to you I have waited some time to speak to you,’ he said, ‘but your suitor has been importuning me for some time.’

  ‘My suitor?’

  ‘Why, surely you have realized? Master Thomas Howard would wed you, Bess.’

  She put a hand to her throat. ‘Master – Howard?’

  ‘Do not tell me it had not occurred to you? The man is always at your side.’

  ‘I know,’ Bess murmured. ‘But there are – others.’

  ‘Others?’ he queried. ‘No one else has approached me. Is there another man of birth you wish for?’

  She remembered Thomas Howard's visit and her own words: ‘I shall consult the King's grace.’ How they had rebounded on her now! She shook her head.

  ‘Then let it be Tom Howard. I trust both him and his father to serve me well and this marriage will bind them to me.’

  She felt desperation rising in her. ‘But I have no liking for him. I don't want to wed him.’

  ‘Oh?’ He seemed surprised. ‘He may be a little lacking in the graces of society and he speaks his mind, but he is a sound man and I doubt not will make you a good husband. The Howards need greater substance than they have and though Lord John at one time believed he might inherit from his cousin Norfolk, now that the Duke has a daughter and will in all probability have other children in due course, that hope is gone from him. Your lands are close by Howard property and would make up for that loss. It would be a fine inheritance of any children you may have. Humphrey's son and your girls are well provided for by the Bourchier estates, but an alliance with Tom would give them a step­father to protect their interests too. You see, don't you, how advantageous it would be?’

  ‘No,’ Bess whispered. ‘I mean, yes – yes, I see, but oh don't force me to it, I beg you, your grace. I don't want to be Thomas Howard's wife.’

  He grew a little impatient. ‘I'm afraid wishes seldom come into it. You had no choice when you wed Humphrey yet I think you were happy.’

  ‘I was fortunate for I grew to care for him.’

  ‘As I too was fortunate,’ he said smiling, ‘but most must wed for reasons of land or money, you know that. I'll not coerce you but I wish it. It would serve me well. Don't you wish to serve me, Bess?’<
br />
  She felt as if she were being suffocated by his large presence filling the room with his warmth, his very royalty, his strong will bearing down on her. Of course he would coerce her if he wanted to! At last she said rather faintly, ‘I will always serve you, obey you as long as I live. But let me have a little time, sire.’

  ‘Very well,’ he agreed. ‘Only do not keep poor Tom dangling too long. I shall be generous to you both, Bess.’

  She saw the interview was at an end and curtseyed. He kissed her fingers and when she was out in the passage she put her lips to where his had touched her skin. Nausea rose in her, every nerve taut, and she was forced to sit down on a bench to still the shaking of her knees. To marry Thomas Howard with his dark face, his hooked nose, to have that overbearing Lord John for her father-in-law filled her with foreboding. As for the thought of lying every night beside Thomas, she recoiled from it. Edward would have his way and she saw a lifetime of dreariness stretching before her.

  In utter misery she went to the chapel, lit a candle and knelt before the statue of the Virgin, praying for strength to face what might come. ‘If I have to wed him,’ she whispered, ‘help me not to hate him.’ It would be wicked to hate a husband, and she knelt there a long time, afraid, her hands twisted into an anguished knot.

  She longed to confide in someone but something held her back. The Queen would support Edward, Catherine would only say that was how things were arranged, Lady Scrope was too plain a Yorkshire woman to countenance nonsensical objections, her own Annette was too young, and in the end she said nothing to anyone except Elysia. The girl had become so much a part of her life that she found herself telling her of the King's words a few nights later. Elysia was undressing her and as the flood of words came and with them tears, she put her arms about her mistress.

  ‘My dear lady, don't weep. Surely something can be done?’

  ‘You don't know how it is when the King wishes for something.’

  ‘No,’ Elysia said. ‘I am glad I am not so high­born that I should. It is very unkind in him to make you wed against your will.’