The Devil in Ermine

by Martyn, Isolde

  ‘I am giving you an escort to take you home this day. Some of the King’s informants know about you.’

  ‘Home,’ she echoed bleakly.

  ‘Your children need love.’ Her green eyes pleaded that she too needed love.

  ‘I grew up without love,’ I told her, ‘save for my nurse who loved me dearly, and then I was taken from her and sent to the court. I know now that her mind was a nothingness but she was sweet and kind and I missed her so terribly. You must be there for your children, Meg. Teach them how to love, teach them joy in everyday things, teach them with your passion and wrap your arms about them every day.’

  ‘Harry?’ She touched gentle fingers along my wet cheekbone. I carried her fingers to my lips and then I flung aside the sheets. ‘Don’t go!’ she pleaded. ‘When shall I see you again?’

  ‘I do not know, Meg, but I shall light a candle for you every day of the rest of my life.’

  RICHARD’S coronation should have been a day of triumph for me, for I organised the most glorious ceremony that London had ever seen. All the receipts for who attended, what we wore, what we ate, the names of those who stitched our clothes or sewed our shoes are in the records of the exchequer. Maybe some day hundreds of years from now, some old chronicler may find them and see how civilized, how magnificent we were.

  We practised the cushion-carrying on the Tuesday. Stanley was the worst at keeping pace, partly because he had only just come out of the Tower the night before and still had cobwebs in his brain. The ceremony of knighting the esquires took place on Wednesday morning at the Tower, followed by a banquet. In the afternoon Richard made the traditional journey through the city to Westminster Palace.

  London cleaned up its streets. Garlands of white roses were strung between the gables and looped beneath the eaves. Lavender and scarlet arras rippled beneath the wealthy men’s windows and ribbons of murrey and blue bedecked doorknockers, hung in streamers and coiled in maidens’ loveknots. Some commoners had hewn boughs of hawthorn and cut ropes of ivy and honeysuckle from the hedgerows to decorate their doorways. Bells, trumpets, shawms, drums, taboret pipes, hand-organs, hurdy-gurdies pealed, blared, beat, fluted and sang to the gasping air. But serrating the streets in haphazard armour were the borrowed Yorkshire soldiers, boar badges in their caps, pride in their eyes and halberds in their hands. Poor devils, they were so unwelcome; the Londoners scowled at the vowels they could not understand and debated in glances why this new king must fear for his safety.

  At first sight of his Yorkshire lads, my cousin delivered me a I-told-you-so scowl from beneath his canopy but he could fault naught else. In truth, even to the fickle-minded, he certainly looked as magnificent as his brother always had. Mind, the glory was all based on loans. Just reckon what the long mantle of purple velvet furred with ermine, the doublet of white satin shot with gold, and the Spanish leather knee boots that shone like polished ebony must have cost, let alone the robes for everyone else, but I digress.

  There are plenty of ways to win hearts: seven small pages, shiny-faced and so well brushed that their heads gleamed like oiled wood, marched alongside the King with such precocious dignity (the first time they had behaved well) that the crowd cooed over them like a grandmother. And Anne had some honeyed ladies in her train. Their gorgeous smiles and low-cut bodices sweetened the note of tyranny and had the men all whistling.

  To be honest, I was against the new queen riding in a chariot since it meant the crowds could not see her easily. But Anne stated flatly she was not even risking an ambler so she rode in a litter. Her gown was of white damask (just like her canopy), but shot with tiny threads of gold and edged in ermine. Of course, she did not have tassels (I teased her about that later) but she did have a dainty diadem of beryl and peridot that sparkled wondrously. And there were plenty of esquires to escort her, handsome young masters in murrey doublet and hose. After her came Richard’s sister, followed by all the noble ladies and maids-of-honour in blue velvet gowns purfiled with crimson satin.

  And I? I was clad in a velvet doublet, blue and costly, embroidered with golden wheels of fortune with a diamond sewn into each blazing hub.

  After the exuberant splendour of the day, the evening was as flat as a cake without yeast; Richard and Anne excused themselves early to indulge in bathwater followed by prayers and meditation in St Stephen’s Chapel, while I went over the details for the crowning with Howard and my uncle of Canterbury.

  At seven o’clock next morning the White Hall was jammed with haughty peers tormented by their coronets and burdensome robes as they lined up for the procession. Judging by their belly rumblings, the whoresons were hungry, too. The only creature who did not complain was Richard, who was berthed beneath a canopy of estate on his marble chair in some spiritual world of his own. Perhaps the prospect of the being ladled with holy oil concerned him. God might still hit him with a thunderbolt or the ghost of Dead Ned might materialise in the chancel and spit at him.

  I had been up at dawn to help him put on the special ceremonial garments: the white shirt that was open to the waist for his anointing and over that a crimson shirt of glistening tartaryn with silver and gilt laces. His hose were sarsynett (uncomfortable, I reckon; I had opted for fine wool). It took both Howard and I to fasten the train of purple satin with its weighty lining to his doublet. Just its great hanging hood of miniver and ermine would put a strain on his shoulders. He was muscular but not a broad man.

  Once he was apparelled, I spent my time playing pendulum between the Great Hall and the White Hall to make sure everyone was in the correct order, and that the regalia were being properly guarded. I can definitely say funerals are simpler, a sword, a destrier, tapers and everyone in cheap mourning hoods.

  The clergy were late and the lady most aggravated by the delay was my aunt by her former marriage, Stanley’s wife, Margaret Beaufort. She sent her page several times to plague me. Since she was the mother of Henry Tudor, a vagrant pretender to the crown, the wretched woman was lucky to have been invited let alone have the privilege of carrying Queen Anne’s train. If Richard had not been so insistent on a show of unity, both Margaret and Stanley would have been on bread and water.

  I found Margaret standing apart from the maids-of-honour with her nose in her prayerbook, fanning herself. Oh, she looked sour. I suppose she was seething that God was putting the crown on Richard's head instead of her son’s. When she saw me, she tucked her book under her arm.

  ‘Ah, at last, Buckingham!’ The woman has small eyes that shaft you and a tongue like a poison dart. ‘How much longer do you intend to keep us waiting here?’

  ‘Now, now, Aunt Margaret, just a little more patience. We must not get ourselves hot and upset, must we?’ She sucked in her cheeks at me – a bad habit which always makes her look like an abbess with bellyache. I noticed then her cramp-rings as she nursed her left hand against her breast, rubbing the knuckles with her right palm. Aching, I suppose.

  ‘I have to say it, Aunt. You are looking magnificent in your scarlet.’ That made heads swivel. Mouse-faced, almost forty, she blushed right enough. Lying coxcomb, was I?

  ‘It might be better, Buckingham, if you had stools fetched for the Queen’s ladies instead of dealing out fulsome compliments.’

  A just rebuke. I called out an apology to the pretty creatures, clapping my hands for servants to fetch out benches.

  Anne, however, was very forgiving. ‘You’ve had enough to think about, my lord,’ she exclaimed generously. ‘I should have seen to my ladies’ comfort earlier but everything is rather an effort.’ She looked as anchored as Richard.

  ‘Mea culpa,’ I apologised, trying not to stare at the loose lacings of the red velvet surcote and purple kirtle across her little breasts. With her fair hair loose to her waist and a circlet of gold about her brow, she looked like a young maid from King Arthur’s court. ‘Hope they’ve warmed the oil for you, Anne.’ I gave her a brotherly hug about the shoulders to annoy Margaret.

  ‘Queen to you!’ she tease
d back with mock indignation as I straightened the circlet skewed by my presumption. ‘Yes, I shall survive.’

  I went back and fussed over Margaret as I seated her. ‘The old joints playing up again?’ I asked cheerfully.

  ‘Unhand me, Buckingham!’ Then she added in a mutter over her shoulder, ‘Both your grandfathers would turn in their graves at this day’s enterprise.’

  I leaned down. ‘Perhaps they would, Aunt, but where were you and my uncle when I needed an education in loyalty to the House of Lancaster?’

  ‘I hope you cursed well faint with exhaustion, boy.’ I had seen gentler smiles on she-wolves.

  ‘Are you all right now, Aunt Margaret?’ I boomed loudly in retaliation as though she was seventy. ‘Won’t be much longer.’ But the woman’s bent fingers had snared my billowing sleeve and she whispered: ‘If you had had any wit instead of a turnip for a brain, it would be you wearing the purple and maybe saintly King Harry’s soul would be avenged.’

  I stepped back. The twin arches of her unplucked eyebrows rose in question, but I could not answer nor would she free me. ‘Cat got your tongue at last, Harry Buckingham?’

  I wanted to move away but the small blue eyes had me pinioned like a butterfly stabbed upon a boy’s brooch-pin.

  The words came at last, spun out of bitterness. ‘I did not see you waving a banner behind me, Aunt, or showing me the colour of your money.’

  Her smile was warm as Circe’s. ‘If you do not throw in your cap in the ring, you cannot play. Enjoy walking in his shadow, child of Lancaster, before self-seekers like Catesby poison your name.’

  She loosed me and I stood dazed.

  ‘Your grace!’ A small cough, and an anxious esquire piloted me off like a half-wrecked caravel to rope up at my cousin’s quay. Despairing, a failed sorcerer trapped between reality and illusion, I picked up my white wand of office.

  ‘My Lord of Buckingham, it is time.’ Like a playing card in his stiff, glistening tabard, with his trumpeters at his shining heels, Blanc Sanglier stood before me, while I, like some poor fool tasting the gift of poppies, struggled to breathe and nod.

  So it began like a dream, no, more splendid than any illusion: the anthems and the fanfares, the banners of Our Lady and St Peter, the great processional crosses, the ranks of mitres, the heralds and the great noblemen of the kingdom. Glad that they had taken the time to practise, the lords bearing the Sword of Mercy, the Mace, the Swords of Justice, the Sceptre, the Orb, the Sword of State, one by one began their stately march. It was Howard, the newly minted Duke of Norfolk, who bore in his hands the heavy cap of maintenance with its jewelled arches rising to a golden cross.

  At last my cousin came barefooted down the steps, his pages holding the heavy purple train which it would be my task to carry. As he walked past the bowing courtiers, I forgot his height and saw only the face of a man about to become a king. He halted where I stood waiting for him and I found myself bowing as deeply as the rest.

  He could barely swallow. I could see that he wanted to embrace me and yet the rich robe dragging back his uneven shoulders made it too hard.

  ‘We did it, Harry.’

  My jest tumbled out like a loving nursemaid’s warning: ‘Yes, now mind you do not trip.’

  He waited while I acquired a comfortable grip on his train and we set off awkwardly for I was also carrying the wand. ‘Not so fast, your highness. I have never done this before.’

  ‘Nor have I.’

  Russell and Stillington glided forwards, smelling like a couple of incense holders, to escort him to the door. After the muted light of the palace, the hot glare of the July morning after the muted light of the palace was a shock. I sensed Richard falter. Then it was my turn to be dazzled. The sun scorched me through my heavy silk robes; my hands sweated. I feared to drop his train and lose the sense of unity between us. And then my breathing eased. I set aside Margaret’s shrewish rebuke. Together, my cousin and I had won a kingdom and the roar of the people was glorious. I wanted to laugh exultantly and whoop so loud that Elizabeth would hear me. You underestimated me, you Woodville bitch. Well, World, take note! Here is Buckingham!

  The air in Westminster abbey was rich with incense and holy with plainsong. My cousin was led to pray before St Edward's shrine while Anne made her stately progress from the palace. I knelt behind Richard and then, as Anne joined him, I was startled to find Margaret Beaufort lowering herself creakily onto the cushion next to mine. She ignored me, leaned forward to make a petal shape of Anne’s train and then she clasped her hands to pray. For what? Richard’s death and damnation? A turnip for a brain? Child of Lancaster? Thy kingdom? Morton’s words came to poke my brain with pitchforks as well.

  I tried to pray. The words came. My mind obeyed, yet my heart felt unmoved, like the great stone beneath the coronation throne where Richard would soon be seated.

  I rose mechanically. The royal couple were led to the high altar where, stripped to the waist, their bare skin was anointed with holy oil from the ampulla, the most vital and sacred part of the crowning, then they were clothed in robes of cloth of gold and seated on the thrones.

  I cannot remember the sermon nor all the oaths Richard was required to swear save that they were in English so all men might know what he promised, but I remember the exquisite singing of the anthems and then the fealty.

  ‘I, Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, become your liegeman of life and limb and of earthly worship and faith and truth I shall bear unto you, for to live and die against all manner of folk so God me help.’

  ‘Is it your wish that ye have this man for king?’ asked my great uncle of Canterbury, lifting high the crown.

  ‘Yea!’ cried the abbey.

  Margaret alleged later that I turned my face away when the crown was placed on Richard’s head. I was not aware of doing so, only of the black dog of despair suddenly slavering to sink its fangs into my brain again as I realised that the friendship I had shared with my cousin was over.

  I felt utterly desolate. However much our cameradie had been laced with high ambition, there had been something fine and good about it all: Plantagenets, cousins, dukes, court exiles with common enemies, two men thrown into alliance. Where my irreverence had taken the edge off Gloucester’s piety, so his high purpose and trust had diluted my fear of myself. But now, he was crowned, anointed; now he held God's mandate to rule; now he was master and I, like the rest of his subjects, must always bow to him. Whatever he commanded, it was my duty to perform; whatever I asked of him was his privilege to bestow or withhold.

  Is that friendship? No, that is a fairy tale for children! Harry Stafford was now obliged to do what King Richard ordered and in return he might hope for the gift of offices. He might only hope.

  Sweet Christ, what was it I had dreamed of when I had left Brecknock? Revenge on Elizabeth and the desire to show the world that I was not an impoverished milksop, that I could snap a Woodville king in two and be another kingmaker? But, like every beggar, I always had the fantasy to wake up and find myself the king!

  Was Margaret right? Had I abused my birthright, dishonoured my ancestors? Terrible thoughts possessed me. Thoughts that should have been bound with iron and buried deep. If God’s Will had compelled me to push Gloucester up the wheel of destiny, I could likewise give that wheel an extra shove and send him on a downward path once more. I, who had undermined all in setting my cousin on the throne, might now take to myself the crown, for the friendship that had redeemed me was broken now. I had lost the only hand upon my rein.

  The fanfare crashed into my thoughts and I mechanically raised my coronet and lowered it again. A great shout broke and hundreds of voices chanted:

  Verus rex, Rex Ricardus!

  Rectus rex, Rex Ricardus!

  Iustus, juridicus et legitimus rex, Rex Ricardus!

  Cui omnes nos subjicio volumus.

  Suaeque humillime iugum, admittere guernationis!

  There! It was done. I could neither speak nor think, nor did I want to.


  Anne’s crowning followed and then I had to bear Richard’s train as we returned to Westminster Hall. Now it was he who smiled at the crowds and I who appeared moved and introspective. The commoners surged forward as the last of the company reached the Westminster Hall and flooded in behind to gape as the ceremonial ranks broke with a unison sigh of relief. Our anointed king and queen retired to strip off the stifling gowns, the noble guests withdrew and I found myself left on the dais staring unseeing at the garlands looping the white cloths, and the great salt and platters borrowed from Crosby Place.

  A friendly hand shoved a jack of ale at me. ‘You look weary, Harry. Take an hour’s respite.’ It was decent of Lovell but I shook my head. What he mistook for integrity was my desperation to escape the Devil’s whispering. ‘You made a magnificent job of things,’ he added. ‘I think our foreign guests’ jaws nearly hit the ground.’

  ‘Ah, so that was what the noise was.’

  ‘No, seriously, it will be hard to keep things up to your standard. As to where the money will come from…’

  ‘That’s for tomorrow, Francis. You will make a fine chamberlain. Go and see if there’s aught the King needs. I’ll hold the keep here.’

  Nursing my ale, I sat down on the corner of a bench beside one of the marble trestles and watched the cutler arranging his knives on the nearest side-board. At the other end of the hall a sergeant-at-arms and the hall steward were trying to persuade the rabble to leave. The servants were growing angry, beseeching me to order the pikemen in and the situation was becoming ugly. I was just about to summon the guard when Howard returned.

  ‘Not having a rest, Harry? You looked a bit strained back there in the abbey.’

  ‘Yes, Jock, I nearly dropped the plaguey train a few times. Why did I have to carry that daft wand too? Didn’t know whether I was a sorcerer or a pageboy.’

  ‘Try carrying the crown. Almost smashed the blessed thing. You’ve done a grand job, Harry.’ That was generous. As Earl Marshall, these ceremonies were actually his responsibility save that Richard had given the task to me. ‘Yes, indeed, even old Hastings with his flair for such things couldn’t have bettered you, and young Lovell just wouldn’t have had the experience. Now, is there anything I can do?’ Tactful of him mentioning Hastings.