The Scandalous Duchess

by Anne O'Brien

  He could turn to me, and I would answer all his needs.

  It had its repercussions, our reconciliation at The Savoy. When the Duke left Tutbury, en route to London in August to commemorate the sixth anniversary of Duchess Blanche’s death, he held me close in a final embrace, for I was not to accompany him. His arms were firm, his lips soft, then he raised his head and looked at me. And looked again, trailing the palm of his hand over the panels of my close-cut gown.

  I drew in and held my breath, perhaps still a little nervous.

  ‘Are you breeding?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘At the start of the new year.’

  ‘Does it please you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It pleases me too.’

  He kissed me, lingeringly gentle but with the underlying passion that was now part of my life. I smiled. I would never again need to flee in fear that the Duke would reject me and this new child. Our love would stand firm against everything.

  Chapter Twelve

  July 1376: The Savoy Palace, London

  I sat at Blanche’s bedside. How had I not realised how small she was despite the passage of years? Philippa and Elizabeth, particularly Philippa, were now grown to be young women, but Blanche was still my little girl. She was twelve years old. The hangings of the bed dwarfed her, the pillows seemed far too large to support her frail neck.

  She had the dreaded sweating sickness.

  I remembered Henry with similar symptoms, here at The Savoy as we were now, how he had responded with all the vigour of youth to the powerful mix of leaves and potions I had administered. It should have soothed me to recall his fast recovery, but anxiety over my daughter’s health built, stone upon stone, until it presented a rampart against any comfort. I had been here at her side for five days now but saw no improvement in her condition as she lurched from frenzied delirium to fractious mutterings, the bed linens soaked with the heat of her poor body.

  Administering another dose, I settled a little as Blanche fell into a more restful sleep. Perhaps this time the fever would not return. Her forehead was cooler, her breathing less laboured. I thought it was evening, but I could not tell. Nor did it matter. Nothing mattered but Blanche’s ability to recognise me again. To sit up and laugh and demand her singing finches to keep her company.

  Brother William Appleton, the Duke’s own physician, entered quietly, hands tucked in his sleeves, to stand at my shoulder.

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Better, I think.’

  ‘I’ll watch her for you. You need to rest.’

  ‘I cannot.’

  ‘You can. You will, if you desire to bear this child safely, my lady.’

  For I was breeding again. My ankles were swollen and my back ached. Very near my time, I was burdened with this third Beaufort child as I had been burdened with no other.

  I went to my room but I could not rest, and was back at Blanche’s side within the hour.

  ‘I will sit,’ I promised. ‘I won’t exert myself.’

  ‘Only worry yourself to death.’ Brother William pressed a hand lightly on my shoulder. ‘You are exhausted. The Duke will not thank me if I do not take care of you too.’

  I tried to smile. ‘I’ll take no harm. Pray for me. Pray for Blanche.’

  ‘I will, of course.’

  He brought me a cup of wine and left me, with dire warnings, to my night watch.

  Where are you, John?

  It was a silent cry from my heart.

  I knew where he was, dealing with a recalcitrant Parliament and a failing King. Despite the much-vaunted peace policy between England and France, unsteady as it was, England had once more a need for an army, and Parliament, faced with a demand to consent to high taxes, was flexing its muscles under its ambitious new Speaker. This man, Peter de la Mare, had the Duke in his sights for all the ills of England. A scapegoat was needed and who better to target? The Duke was considered to be too high-handed, too powerful, too intolerant, usurping the royal power that should have been wielded by the King, even though King Edward, his mind afflicted, was incapable of wielding any such power.

  So the Duke would be striving to keep his temper, or perhaps not even striving at all in the face of such outspoken opposition. A man renowned for his ability to negotiate between hostile parties, he would not always choose his words with discretion. All I knew for certain was that he was not here with me, when I most had need of him.

  Never had I felt so alone, for Agnes was at Kettlethorpe and the Duke so terribly preoccupied. He had not returned to The Savoy since the day before Blanche had slid from her knees in the chapel into a miserable little heap of flushed face, aching limbs and raging fever.

  ‘Hush now.’

  The effect of the henbane, to cool a fever, was beginning to wear off, so that Blanche became restless again, struggling against the bed linen. My holding her hand and speaking to her, trying to calm her, had no effect. Although her eyes were open, they held no recognition for either my face or my voice.

  ‘Hush now. Drink this. You will be well. Philippa and Elizabeth miss you and ask for you. They are waiting for you to be well.’

  She drank the potion but her expression was wild, her face and chest mottled with heat as I bathed her tortured limbs, the cool, sharp scent of lavender pervading the room.

  ‘Sleep now.’

  It calmed her, but Blanche seemed to be fading away before my eyes, her skin translucent in the light of the single candle beside the bed. My fingers moved over the coral beads of my rosary as I petitioned the compassion of the Blessed Virgin who knew all the travails of motherhood.

  In the end I fell asleep, my body awkward, my cheek turned on the coverlet beside her. My rosary fell to the floor.

  Hours later I woke in a state of confusion, unsure of my surroundings, before it all swept back to squeeze my heart dry. I looked around, thinking that the physician had returned. And then at the bed.

  Blanche lay still. Impossibly still.

  I stood, abruptly, clumsily, my hands in the small of my back where my muscles were taut and stiff. Had the fever broken at last?

  And then the absolute breathless silence pressed down on me, filling the room, filling me. Blanche lay unmoving, all the heated anguish of past days now gone, her face pale, eyelids closed, her lashes spiked and fragile on her cheeks. She might have been asleep, so perfect, so beautiful her features. I touched her cheek with the back of my fingers to prove my fears.

  She was not asleep.

  I had lost her. I had lost my daughter.

  Holy Mother. What do I do now?

  My mind cried out with the agony of any woman losing her first-born child. There was nothing I could do. I sat on the bed so that I could lift her gently into my arms, as if she might still wake and fling her arms around me, telling me what she had done that day that had given her joy. She did not stir. How light she was after the days of fever. What a beautiful young woman she would have been. Blanche Swynford, much-loved damsel to the ducal daughters. Incomparable daughter of Hugh and Katherine de Swynford.

  ‘I am so very sorry, Hugh,’ I murmured against her hair. ‘I could do nothing for her. I could not save her.’

  My Blanche, my lovely Blanche was dead.

  I laid her back on her pillows, combing her hair, straightening the neck of her shift so that it lay in a seemly fashion on her chest. And then I sat, my hands clasped, my eyes fixed on Blanche’s face. I could not weep. It was as if all my tears were frozen in an endless sea of ice. If I had stayed awake, could I have saved her? Could I have anchored her to this life, until the fever had worn itself out? But I had not, and she had been taken from me when I had been unaware.

  The hours stretched emptily, wearily before me. I had lost my daughter and the man I needed could not be with me, and therefore I must bear my grief alone. Was I not capable of that? I dried my tears and went to arrange for my daughter’s body to be carried to the chapel.

&nb
sp; I was desolate. I was beyond desolation. I would carry my grief with fortitude.

  It was two days before the Duke returned to The Savoy.

  ‘Before God, I’ll not have it! Do they think I’ll bow the knee to their demands?’ he blazed, exhibiting a royal temper in vituperative flow. ‘Do they think they are kings of this realm, in their pride and arrogance?’

  He flourished a document like a war banner.

  He did not know about Blanche. No one had told him.

  ‘Do they not know my lineage?’ he continued, casting the offending missive into the fire. ‘Would they dare to take it into their heads to curb royal power? The effrontery of it. I’ll have de la Mare’s balls stuffed with rosemary on a platter. Our Parliament complains when our army fails, yet will not grant the funds to make a campaign across the sea viable. You can’t have one without the other, as they well know. It’s merely a damned ruse to attack me and bolster their own authority.’

  The Duke had entered one of his private chambers at The Savoy—where I was sitting in discomfort, in spite of cushions and a footstool—with the force of a winter storm. Now he prowled the length of the room, much like one of his hunting dogs, out for blood. This was not the man who had wooed and beguiled me. This was the Duke, hard-eyed and driven, plotting revenge against those who questioned his right to use the power invested in him with the decline of the King. I remained silent for he was in no mood to accept advice.

  ‘Those mealy-mouthed members of Parliament have no authority other than that given to them. God rot the lot of them!’

  I abandoned the embroidered panel on my cumbersome lap. What matter that the girdle was incomplete? I would not be wearing it for some weeks yet.

  ‘They dare to accuse me of corruption! Parliament is dissolved. I’ll have no more of it. And God save us from sanctimonious prating priests,’ the Duke continued, with no apparent recognition of my silence.

  And I knew all about this too. Thomas Walsingham, a priest with a gimlet eye and a vicious pen. A man seeing himself as an upholder of God’s morality on earth, intent on bringing the Duke down. Were not England’s losses in France to be piled at the Duke’s door? Walsingham did not mince his words either.

  Setting aside my embroidery, I reached to the coffer at my side and poured a cup of ale and held it out.

  ‘John…’

  Without thanks the Duke took it as he strode past me and continued to prowl. ‘Do you know what he’s done?’ The Duke’s eyes were alight with fury. ‘He’s stirred up the old slander all over again.’

  I had not the energy to ask which one, but listlessly picked up my stitchery again. He told me anyway.

  ‘I only arranged the murder of Blanche’s sister Matilda. I poisoned Matilda of Lancaster, by the Rood. So that the whole of the Lancaster lands fell to Blanche and so to me. Would I do that?’ he growled, coming at last to a halt in front of me. ‘Would Blanche have agreed to wed me if I had done away with her sister?’ he demanded.

  It was all too much.

  I took a deep breath and, tossed the fine cloth to the floor at my side.

  ‘John, I need to tell you—’

  ‘They are saying that I already have my eye on the throne since my father is sinking fast by the day,’ he stated, full of ire. ‘When the King dies I’ll snatch it from my nephew, they say. Did I not give my solemn oath to my dying brother that I would be loyal to his son as king? That I would serve Richard as his friend and counsellor?’

  I was so weary. ‘Richard is only nine years old,’ I observed. ‘No older than Henry. Is it surprising that they will suspect you of naked ambition if you stand beside him?’

  ‘Richard is the heir. Would I oust him?’ Heated emotion had him in its thrall again. ‘Do you of all people believe such rumours too?’

  And it was as if the emotion poured over me as well. ‘No! I of all people do not. I of all people at this precise moment do not care overmuch!’

  He stared at me. ‘I would like to think that I had your support.’

  I could not force Blanche’s name past my teeth. ‘You don’t need my support,’ I snapped back. ‘You have enough confidence for both of us!’

  Uncontrollable tears welled up again in my throat from what seemed a bottomless source. My mind was too sore to be compassionate. My bright, loving Blanche was dead, and all the Duke could think about was Parliamentary disobedience. My breath caught. Blanche, my darling Blanche, lost to me. All that sparkling promise wiped out by some nameless fever that would not respond to common henbane or doses of wood sorrel. There was no room in my mind for politics and power-brokering when my daughter lay cold and still in the chapel. I stood in the middle of the room, my mind in turmoil, any pleasure I might expect to feel that he had at last come to me refusing to settle, flitting round the edges of my thoughts so that I could not grasp it.

  I knew that I must be strong enough to contain my grief, not allowing it to encroach on this moment, but I could not. It threatened to overwhelm me. Perhaps it was due punishment for my great sin. Had Blanche been taken in penance for my immorality? I shivered in the upheaval of my despair.

  ‘And of course, our august members of Parliament claim to believe every word if it,’ he continued. ‘And that I wed Blanche only for her inheritance. Next they’ll be arguing over that old dispute that I am not my father’s son. A changeling, by God! Who would dare accuse my lady mother of infidelity! Do I not have more than a resemblance to the King? But it has its uses as an arrow to loose at me. As a royal bastard, was I not doubly disloyal to Blanche, not fit to wed her? So I duped Blanche into…’

  Blanche…

  I burst into tears.

  ‘Katherine…?’ For the first time I thought that he truly noticed me.

  ‘Blanche is dead. My daughter is gone from me and nothing will bring her back.’

  Pressing my fingers against my lips I ran as well as I was able from the room.

  I took refuge on the wall-walk, even though the effort to climb the steps took my breath, where the wind from the Thames would cool my cheeks. Could such a loss ever be overcome? I knew that I must learn to be thankful for her life, and not weep whenever the name Blanche was mentioned. When I heard footsteps loping after me and recognised the ownership, I braced my shoulders but did not turn.

  ‘Forgive me, Katherine. I did not know.’

  His voice was even, with none of his earlier anger.

  ‘There is nothing to forgive. You have your own loss to mourn,’ I sniffed.

  For Prince Edward had succumbed at last to his endless sufferings. We had all been in mourning robes in that year. Even worse, the Duke going to Bruges to attend peace negotiations had taken Constanza with him where she had given birth to their much-longed-for and prayed-over son, only to have him die within a few short weeks.

  A unbearable time of death and loss, but for me Blanche outweighed all.

  The Duke kept a discreet distance at my side in so public a place.

  ‘I can’t comfort you. Not with every eye on us.’

  ‘I don’t expect you to,’ I replied, drying my tears. My mood was as fragile as my waist was thick.

  ‘I am so very sorry, my dearest love.’ And abandoning all decorum, he pulled me into the corner of the wall-walk where the steps led down, pushing me to sit on the top one. Disturbingly, he chose to sit below, his back against the wall, holding my hands. If any of his household saw us, he ignored it as his eyes searched my face.

  ‘I feel your anguish, and I am so sorry. For the death of your daughter. For my own concerns that I cannot push aside,’ he said with some difficulty, before lowering his forehead to rest against our clasped hands. His face might be hidden from me, but his compassion was as soft as a new snowfall, wrapping around me. ‘I regret the comfort I can’t give you. I regret my own anger that drives me, even when I know that your loss is even greater than mine in that it is new and raw. I knew my brother Edward was dying. Forgive me, Katherine.’

  I rested my cheek against
his hair. How complex was this man I was privileged to love. From hot temper to infinite tenderness; from stormy pride to deliberate abasement.

  ‘Blanche was my godchild, and I mourn her with you.’

  The Duke stood and lifted me, his lips warm against my forehead, his gaze full of all the grief that lay as hard as granite within me. When I began to weep again, he drew me into his arms and at last I rested there for they were a defence against the world. I luxuriated in them. He was mine again, for those few moments, and he gave me the comfort I needed. The rock inside me began to melt.

  ‘I am afraid,’ I said, ‘of your enemies who use every means to attack you.’ I had never admitted it before, even to myself. ‘Of the wedge it drives between us, because you are taken up with Peter de la Mare and I am too irritable to accept that…’ My breath hitched.

  And so he finished the thought for me. ‘That private grief must step back in the face of England’s demands. We mourn the ones we love, but sometimes we cannot choose the time or place.’

  ‘Yes. That’s it.’ It was a heavy burden. ‘I am afraid I will forget my daughter. That I will not mourn her as I should.’

  Which made him kiss away the tears. ‘You will never forget Blanche. Nor need you be afraid for me. I will win the day against de la Mare.’ He pressed my head gently against his shoulder. ‘You are too tired for this, my dear love. What you need to do is to rest.’

  ‘But what if…?’

  ‘We will not talk of it. I will deal with Walsingham and de la Mare. I’ve a mind to show de la Mare the interior of one of my dungeons.’ He smiled fiercely as if enjoying the prospect of a lengthy incarceration until, when I sighed, he fixed his mellowing eye on me once more. ‘You will go to your chamber. You will order your maid to pack what you need.’ And when I shook my head against his restraining hand: ‘It will be better if I don’t have to worry about you too. Sometimes, my love, we both know that it is better if we are apart. This is one of those times.’