Margery let out a slow breath. Next time she would make sure they all heard her.
Anne at least shared her opinion. "I wonder she did not expect Father to prostrate himself at her feet," she exclaimed some time later, flouncing into the chamber set aside for her. "How dared that woman embarrass him like that!" She unpinned her pearl cap and tossed it onto the back of the settle. "Where have you been, by the way? I sent pages to look for you."
"In the garden up within the ramparts. I am not sure whether it is merely for the use of royalty but there was no one around so I—"
"Avoiding your husband?"
"—trespassed," she finished. "Yes, something like that." Margery raised her head, abandoning the misbehaving link on Anne's platelet belt. It was necessary to turn the conversation. "How is our lord father? Is his pride still being massaged back into place by the French?"
"Yes, vigorously, but he was still glowering and morose when I came away. Mother kept saying not to mind and that made matters worse." She gloomily dumped herself on the window seat beside Margery. '"I begin to realize how much King Louis wants this alliance. I do not think he will let the Queen or Father out of here until they agree, which means that we are pilloried here as well." She gave Margery a shrewd look. "What is going wrong between you and Richard—and do not tell me I am too young to understand!"
"I… I will be honest with you. I have told the King of France that I wish to return to England and that I will try and become Ned's mistress and report back what he says to me."
"Margery!"
"No, it will not be like that. I will go to England and I will tell Ned to be resolute. I want to make sure this alliance, if it happens, comes to nothing. And I have to leave Master Huddleston. It is the only way I can think of doing it."
"I think you are a fool, Margery, and it is quite unnecessary. We all know Ned will be on his guard."
"Will he? He is very reckless sometimes. Remember when our father held him prisoner?"
"Yes, that's true, but surely even he would not be so stupid. What will Father think if you run away to Ned?"
"You may tell him what I told King Louis. Oh, Anne, did you see the way that woman looked at our father? Such loathing. Suppose he does restore old King Harry. How long before she beheads him on some false charge?"
Anne closed her eyes painfully. "If I am forced into this marriage and the enterprise succeeds, I will be the future queen. You think she would destroy my father?"
"Of course she would." Margery flung herself on her knees before Anne and caught her hands. "Do you believe she will love you?"
"Oh, by Our Lady, of course not, but at least she cannot destroy me."
"Maybe not, but she can make your life barely endurable. They say she never allows the Prince to be away from her side. Do you imagine he will take your side against her? Oh, Anne, I cannot stand by and let any of this happen. If Ned will not believe there is danger, perhaps Dickon will listen."
Anne tugged her hands away at the mention of the Duke of Gloucester, her face pained. "But there will be no alliance, you heard her."
"Do you think she would make it that easy for our father? Allow her a little pettiness, Anne, before she truly starts the bargaining."
"Oh, Margery, no. I was hoping my prayers were answered. I do so pray you are wrong."
"I hope so too." She crossed to the door and checked there were no eavesdroppers. "In the next few days, do not be surprised at anything. I am considering voicing my loyalty to Ned."
Anne's eyes narrowed. "But that is dangerous. Even if King Louis and Father believe you are willing to spy for them, what will the Lancastrians think? And surely Richard will prevent you going?"
"Oh, he suggested the idea. It is clear he means to throw his lot in with Lancaster. He thinks the Queen is a goddess. He will be very glad to be rid of me, I assure you."
"I cannot believe how terrible this all is. The Nevilles used to be so happy and united but look at us now."
"Blame our father. First he crowns Ned king, then he wants to make George king, then he considers putting old Harry back. He uses us as pawns, Anne. Does he ever ask us what we want? Does he care?"
"You blame him for your marriage to Huddleston but he did it for the best reasons."
"Oh, yes, for the best. He sold me with some manors to gain a few men-at-arms. And he is selling you to found a Neville dynasty."
"Margery, listen, are you so sure that Richard does not care for you? I find no ill in him. He has been very kind."
"You are his future queen. He is an adventurer and openly admits it. I tell you, I can take no more of being baited, bedded, and scolded." Tears of rage sparkled in her eyes. Anne opened her arms and cradled her as if Margery were the younger sister.
"Promise me, Anne, that you will trust me, however I behave."
"Have I not always?"
"Yes, you alone. I do not deserve such a noble sister." She sat back on her heels grateful. "If I manage to set foot in England, I will seek out Dickon."
Anne smiled wearily. "Yes." Her tone was resigned. "Yes, but I think it will be too late."
Warwick's comments on Margaret d'Anjou as they sat in their chamber at private supper would have made a monkish chronicler blush and were certainly not to be repeated. He was too angry to put a rein on his tongue even in front of his unmarried daughter, despite the Countess's disapproval. If the Queen had not made up her mind in his favor within two day, he declared, then he was returning to Honfleur and everyone at Angers could go to Hell.
Next day, a dripping Saturday when the gargoyles dribbled incessantly into the moat, the Earl kept to his rooms but his martyred sulks were broken by the arrival of a charming, apologetic nobleman who stood grinning sheepishly on the threshold of the Nevilles' apartments.
Warwick rose frowning.
"How now, Dick? I am sorry," exclaimed John de Vere, Earl of Oxford, advancing into the room and tossing the droplets off his cloak like a great sheepdog. "I have just heard what happened yesterday and it is probably all my fault." He flung his arms around the astonished Earl and gave him a crushing hug. "But I shall make amends, I promise. Madam, your servant, and my sweet lady niece, Anne, is it not? You have grown since last I saw you."
One could argue that he was just saying what was polite, thought Margery, but his easy charm was hard to withstand. Within minutes he had a cup of rose wine in his hand and was standing talking to her father by the hearth as if they were old campaigners. Of course if one thought about it, they were, but on opposite sides. And long ago, he had married one of her father's many sisters, which made him a sort of uncle.
By the end of the afternoon, Oxford's breezy optimism had blown around all the crevices of Angers. It had been Jasper Tudor whom he had singled out first and Warwick found that he had yet another caller.
"Listen to that wonderful Welsh accent, look you," murmured Anne as Jasper Tudor, Earl of Pembroke, made himself at home upon the settle.
"Little wonder that his father Owen managed to bed Henry V's widow," whispered Margery. "With those looks too, I will warrant. How strange that he has never married. Ankarette told me he is desperately in love with a wild Welsh shepherdess."
"Truly?" Anne regarded him with fresh eyes.
By suppertime, Warwick had entertained several more Lancastrian lords and afterward King Louis himself and his brother came. Warwick even laughed at one of Guienne's jokes—and they were as rare as hens' teeth—before the three of them disappeared downstairs arm in arm.
The women were sleepy and bored by the time the Earl returned.
"I think she's coming to heel," he declared.
The news was announced at a reception before dinner the next day. The French were smirking jubilantly as the Prince and Anne Neville were formally introduced, each frigid with etiquette. The boy was polite but looked caught in that uncomfortable hiatus between the youthful wish not to draw attention to himself and the growing confidence of who he was and what he deserved. His face had start
ed to strengthen into manliness, but his spasms of confidence sounded gauche.
Margery found it hard not to pass judgment. Her earlier observation that he never seemed to say anything without exchanging glances with his mother was confirmed. What the Prince needed was to taste a man's world for a while, away from Queen Margaret's intimidating control.
The banquet loosened the belts of formality somewhat and the air began to reek with premature celebration. How many Englishmen would have to die to satisfy these players? Men said that nigh on thirty thousand had been slain at Towton Field, the bloodiest of the battles between York and Lancaster. Just thinking about it nauseated Margery and her humor was not improved when she was led reluctantly to kneel before Queen Margaret. She had just seen her husband set his lips upon the Bitch's hand, his smile boiling with so much charm that her palm itched to slap him.
"We rejoice that you wear our badge about your neck, Marguerite Neville."
Was it the coincidence of the name "Margaret" or had Huddleston even calculated this? Margery wanted to rip the golden daisy from her throat. The Countess, to the left of the Queen, signaled a sympathetic caution. The Bitch d'Anjou smirked. "Fidelity is obviously not one of your husband's attributes in politics or the bedchamber, Lady Warwick." It was not queenly.
"Pardon, madame, I am my father's eldest daughter." Margery could not resist answering. With some calculation, it was possible to argue that her father and the Countess must have been wed as children, and she had never heard of her father straying since Isabella had been born.
Richard, watching in dismay, noted how the Queen's eyes whipped across Margery's face. Unfortunately she caught the Countess smiling. "Indeed?"
"That is quite true, your highness." The Countess nodded serenely. "My lord has always been sane enough to know where his best interests lie. Perhaps his highness the Prince would like to walk with us in the gardens?" Richard awarded the Countess the winning point but the Queen gave Warwick's wife a contemptuous look.
"By St. Denis, we have not time for such vanities, Lady Warwick. My son and I cannot be dallying when there is a campaign to be planned. Come, Edouard, John." She took Lord Oxford's arm. He bent his head to her ear. "Ah yes," the Queen's French carried clearly. "Did not someone tell me she had carnal knowledge with the usurper as a child?"
To have corrected the foul lie would have been useless. Richard saw the fury lash across Margery's face and within seconds he had her by the shoulders and drew her to her feet. She was shaking within the harness of his restraining hands.
"Thank you, Margery," muttered the Countess tersely, albeit with a smug look, as the last of the Angevin entourage drifted off after the Queen, "but your father's honor needed no defense from you."
"Mother!" Anne set a comforting hand on Margery's arm. "That woman had no right to speak like that even if she is a queen, which she is not since Father took her crown from her."
The Countess gave her child an exasperated glance, flung her hands angrily in the air, and swept away.
Gripping her arm, Richard walked his wife swiftly to the side of the hall. "I thought I warned you to be circumspect. If your father's plans succeed, Margaret d'Anjou will be Queen of England again and you have just corrected her. What is more, you put Lady Warwick in an embarrassing situation."
"My lady does not like her any more than I do. She chose to be discourteous."
"That was her decision. But for the love of Heaven, Margery, see sense from now on. There is no point in offending the Queen."
"There is little point in mollifying her either. She looked at me with loathing. Did you not see? She knew I was the usurper's mistress." Her tone was scathing enough to make him wince.
"Only in your mind. I doubt she can do you any real harm unless there is good reason and you behave foolishly. Your father has more sense than to topple King Edward for the sake of a woman with that sort of vindictiveness. There is more on her mind than bothering with you. If these negotiations succeed, she will be Queen of England again and you will please her."
She flinched but retaliated angrily. "I am sorry if I am thwarting your ambitions, Master Huddleston. Are you planning to give the Queen's worn shoes a daily rub?"
His face froze. "By Heaven, if we were private I would be tempted to throw you over my knee."
"And, here, have your collar back!" She struggled to open the catch but Richard gave her a contemptuous look and strode away.
The golden marguerite burned her flesh. It was needful to wait until the hurt and anger abated, necessary to find a refuge in the nearest beckoning side chamber. Tears flowing, her arms crisscrossed defensively, fingers clutching at her bare shoulders, Margery waited miserably for the mistiness and the sniffles to clear, only to find her gaze drawn by a tapestry that hung above the doorway. The latent carnality in it penetrated her senses, astonishing her, momentarily driving away her sorrow. Men with the faces of satyrs hovered behind the fully clad noble ladies. When she looked hard, she could see the empty buttonholes, the nipples rising like suns from horizons of untidy bodices.
"You like it?" asked a voice in careful English. She realized with astonishment that King Rene stood behind her.
"Or is it too secular for you, Margery Neville? Did you observe the Apocalypse tapestry in St. Maurice's?" Louis of France materialized like a black wraith from a carved chair by the window.
She curtsied in panic at disturbing their intimacy. "B-beau sire, yes, I saw it, but it was almost too rich, too… powerful for me. I—I felt very small beside such a masterpiece." She could feel the betraying salt upon her cheeks; the swollen telltale rims left from weeping.
It was her host who answered. "It is good that you feel this. I am jealous, young woman. To see such workmanship, such beauty for the first time, ahh." He nodded. "I wish it was like that for me again. When I go there to mass, sometimes I do not look anymore. I think I know every thread of it and then I loathe myself for such complacency." He looked hard at her. Perhaps he was myopic. "You like it in Angers, madame?"
"Oui, beau sire, c'est…" She searched for a word that sounded French. "C'est impressif."
The King of France came across to them. "Did you know that for over seven hundred years the Holy Church denied that women had souls? Now they can be damned and redeemed like the rest of us. She reads, uncle. She shall have use of our library at Amboise if she has time." Jesu, this man terrified her. "And it is almost time for you to leave, I think, Margaret Neville," he concluded softly, his smile ambiguous.
"Yes, beau sire," she asserted, lifting her chin with a tight smile.
King Rene, misunderstanding, gestured her through the doorway.
The ceremony in the cathedral was an outward manifestation of the results of the peacemaking, but it was velvet and silk stretched taut across the cracks in the pasted alliance. It was only during the service that the Neville womenfolk became aware that Warwick had agreed to swear his loyalty to Margaret d'Anjou on the bones of St. Laud. And it was common belief that anyone who perjured themselves on those bones would be dead within the twelve month. The Bitch was taking no chances with her old enemy, even to ensuring him a bed in Hell if he betrayed her. Her only concession was to permit the announcement that her son and Anne Neville were to be betrothed.
The tension between the Neville supporters and the exiled lords of Lancaster as they walked down the nave together was still sufficient to embarrass. Margery, too, uncomfortably forced into proximity with her personal treaty partner, resorted to whispered assertiveness. "If a papal blessing is received for the betrothal, as I am sure it will be, you will be a brother-in-law, more or less, to the future Queen of England," she observed witheringly as she and Richard Huddleston were obliged to walk together down the nave at a discreet distance behind Anne and the Prince. Her husband's smile was sardonic, she observed under her lashes.
He ignored the thrust. "But at last the web is fully cast and your father and the Queen can cease the obligatory twitches of distaste. What, of course, ha
s not been mentioned among all the holy oaths is that if this campaign is successful, your father will be committed to war with Burgundy. This is not about England's good but the expansion of France."
"Yes." Her tone was bitter.
"You might be interested to know that Sir John Fortescue and my lord of Oxford have been trying to talk the Queen into this betrothal for some time." Richard noted the flicker of interest. "Apparently they broached the matter with your father a few years ago at secret talks outside Calais but then, of course, he was not ready for rebellion. Perhaps he was waiting for the Duke of Clarence to come of age. Or Lady Anne."
Margery groaned with disgust. Her disillusionment with her father was growing daily. "Ha, it is easy to interpret with hindsight."
"I would wager your father has been considering a Neville dynasty ever since he crowned your wonderful Ned. Either Isabella or Anne has to become a queen. Had Isabella been older and had your looks, your father might have contrived that she encountered the King in the midst of the forest. I believe that is now the known procedure for would-be queens these days. Unfortunately you were disqualified from the start. A pity old Ned ignored little Isabella, he will be quaking in his Spanish leather boots quite soon."
"I doubt it." They had reached the portal. She gracefully lifted her fingers from his gloved wrist as Matthew Long approached with Comet. Displeased, she looked about her for the chariot that had brought the ladies-in-waiting. Huddleston's eyes held dangerous green flames. She nearly squealed as he put two adroit hands unexpectedly around her waist and tossed her into the saddle. She landed with a thud that bruised. "Was the trundle bed comfortable?" he asked.
Forced to hang on to his belt, she gritted her teeth as he settled before her and heeled Comet into place in the procession. At another time, she would have enfolded his waist right willingly. "I have observed, Richard Huddleston, that when you cannot browbeat me with words, you fall back on your physical superiority which is extremely lily-livered of you."
The Maiden and the Unicorn Page 35