Fortune's Wheel

by Rhoda Edwards

  ‘Then all three of us, and the girl, are lucky. Try to handle George with as much tact as you can muster, Richard, to make my life easier.’

  ‘He meant to cause you more trouble than he is doing now.’ Richard had not yet reached a stage where tact could override his anger.

  ‘Hmm. Do you see yourself as a peerless knight rescuing the lady from among the pie dishes?’

  ‘She doesn’t see me in that role.’ Richard coloured a little.

  ‘I’ve no doubt not. A little tarnished and blood-stained and too much of my henchman?’

  ‘Yes.’

  *

  Despite this undoubted coldness on her part, Richard felt that he should go to see Anne again that day, in the hope that she might be willing to tell him a little of what had happened to her.

  Anne had found herself the centre of attention at St Martin’s. The canons could not do enough for her — because Gloucester had spoken for her, and because the Dean, Bishop Stillington, was the King’s Chancellor. That afternoon men came with bolts of cloth, and sewing women expecting orders. Furniture mysteriously arrived, plate and linen, and a rather unwise combination of a singing bird in a cage and a tiny kitten. Last, but best of all, came Alice. Alice, who had been to Anne both ruler and devoted slave in her nursery days, and whom she had never expected to find again in London. Alice had in recent years gone to the household of the Duchess of York, where Richard had found her. Anne did not give much thought to how or why he had thought of this — it was enough to see Alice, who had been the real mother of her childhood.

  Late in the afternoon, when darkness had fallen, Richard came again to see her. She felt a little resentful at the sight of him, knowing that he would ask questions, and report what he had heard to the King. By this time, after all the hubbub of the afternoon, she was feeling tired and unwell, as if she were going to have a bad cold.

  ‘I came to see if you had everything you wanted.’

  ‘Oh, yes, everything.’

  There was a silence. Richard perched on the arm of a chair and swung his foot. The kitten pounced for the toe. He scooped it up and put it on his knee, where it sat, blinking at both of them.

  ‘You’ve lived for five months under the very walls of St Martin’s, why in Heaven’s name didn’t you seek sanctuary there in the first place?’

  ‘What happened to the Duke of Exeter, who was carried to Westminster sanctuary after Barnet?’ came very tartly.

  It made Richard both angry and uneasy to admit that Exeter had been removed to the Tower and sanctuary broken, on the King’s orders. ‘Your case is scarcely to be compared with Exeter’s. You are a completely innocent party.’

  ‘What is innocent? What crime had King Henry of Lancaster committed?’ Her words, and her eyes, her father’s eyes, pierced Richard like swords. He felt all the blood drain out of his face. If she really knew, had seen himself that night, giving the order for the quick crack over the skull, climbing the stair, kneeling by the body… No one but his brother could have got him to do such a thing, and he had accepted the cold-blooded logic of it without a murmur.

  There was a long, wretched silence, in which Anne would not look at him, and he dared not look at her.

  ‘Surely you didn’t think you could stay in a cook shop for the rest of your life?’ he asked at length.

  ‘I couldn’t think beyond the hour.’

  ‘You must have thought of some things you risked happening to you.’

  ‘Some of them.’

  ‘Yet you were still brave enough to take that way out?’

  ‘Not brave.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Richard looked at her. She did not look brave, or remarkable in any way, more like a wilting flower than anything else. She made him feel ashamed, though he kept telling himself he had nothing to be guilty about — at least, not as far as she was concerned. She had been so easily cast aside and injured in the game of war, yet was so resistant to his own efforts to make reparation. Filled with sudden gloom, he wondered why he was contemplating marriage to her; it would be a mistake to bring up the subject now.

  ‘Why didn’t you send to me, or to my mother?’

  ‘You?’ She looked at him in astonishment, as if he were the last person she would have turned to. ‘Because I thought you did the King’s bidding in everything.’

  This was the first barbed remark she had ever made to him, and it struck home.

  ‘You think I’d be better for not doing it — like Clarence?’ he said angrily.

  She withdrew visibly at the change in his tone of voice. ‘No-o. You are the King’s brother.’ There was a pause. He got up to go, tipping the cat off ungently onto the floor. Then she said, ‘I was wrong to say that, when you stood by him.’ She sounded so miserable, putting down her defences like that.

  ‘Was there no one to turn to?’ he said, very gently, this time.

  ‘All my Neville relatives are beholden to the King now.’

  The bleakness of this statement killed any further conversation.

  ‘I’m tired,’ Anne said wearily.

  ‘I’ll go.’

  Anne said nothing. She did not want to talk to him, to anyone. She let him go without thanking him for sending Alice to her, which she had meant to do.

  Richard found that he had even less interest than usual in the next eleven days’ feasting. He was not normally ill-tempered or morose, but now the sight of his brother Clarence, peacocking about as if he had nothing to be ashamed of, reduced him to a state of surliness which, of course, gave George every opportunity for baiting him.

  ‘Brother long-face!’ Clarence jibed when they met.

  Richard ignored him, and turned his back to hide his fury.

  ‘So she sent you off with a flea in your ear!’ crowed George, who could never make do with one remark when he had two on his tongue.

  ‘Thanks to you!’ Richard snarled and walked quickly away before he could do Clarence some physical damage. George was well able to provoke a saint to madness.

  ‘It serves you right, for being greedy for her lands!’ was his parting shot.

  The story of how Lady Anne Neville, the Prince of Lancaster’s widow, had been found in the disguise of a maid in a London cook shop, provided the court with a Christmas feast of gossip. Bets were made on whether the King would favour his brother Clarence or Gloucester in the matter, though not many were willing to venture money on Clarence. Richard knew all eyes were upon them, waiting to be scandalized by some misbehaviour on their part.

  The hard task of peacemaker fell to King Edward, to his great annoyance. He waited until after Epiphany, wishing to enjoy the first Christmas after his homecoming in peace before tackling the quarrel between his brothers.

  Meanwhile Anne Neville fell ill, and was unable to see anyone, or to put forward any wishes of her own. Richard was forced to admit that he had not mentioned the subject of marriage to her, and that he could not visit her at present to do so. Clarence laughed in his face and told him the whole project was impossible. What the girl wanted was immaterial. It was clear that Richard was only determined to have her in order to grab what he could of George’s, or Isabel’s property. In any case, it would take a king’s ransom to persuade the Papal Curia to grant a dispensation for such a marriage, which Richard was in no position to provide. Why, it would be trebly within the proscribed degrees of consanguinity. It would be illegal under canon law.

  ‘Since you got a dispensation by bribing our Papal legate…’ Richard reminded his brother.

  ‘Only after months of trying,’ George shrugged. ‘And it was the same with Lady Anne’s marriage to Lancaster. King Louis had to borrow money to pay for that one. You’ve got both difficulties to contend with.’

  ‘Hang the dispensation!’

  ‘What?! You want a clandestine marriage — children who cannot inherit? You’ve got enough bastards — another on the way, I hear!’

  ‘Damn your prying!’ How could George have found that out? Richard had thought his misdeeds
sufficiently distant from London to be concealed.

  ‘The dispensation is irrelevant at present,’ King Edward said, silencing them. ‘What I want is to see that Richard is not denied a reasonable request by your covetousness, George. This time I am not deceived. You want to bully Lady Anne into entering a convent, so that she may relinquish all her worldly goods to Isabel. All the inheritance for you and your wife. Well, I’m not having it. If Richard wants the girl, he has my consent. I want you to come to some agreement with him.’

  It was a month before Clarence would concede anything, even grudgingly. After Shrovetide, the court moved to Sheen where the Queen could quietly await her lying-in, and with the benefit of the general absolution of sins at the beginning of Lent, George and Richard might patch together some agreement. The King called a council meeting, and made his brothers explain themselves, saying afterwards that they were as full of wily agreements as a couple of attorneys, and that it was a pity their talents were not better employed. At the end of it all, Clarence, making as much show about it as if he were conceding England to France, said, ‘My brother may have the lady my sister-in-law, for all I care, but don’t expect me to divide the inheritance with him!’

  This was not enough. At length, driven by exasperation, the King forced a makeshift settlement upon the unwilling Clarence. Even then, George did better than Richard who, in an attempt to pacify him, surrendered to him the Great Chamberlainship.

  By Easter, Richard was obliged to go north again. Before he left, Anne Neville was enough recovered from her illness to see him, though he found her so white and wilting and listless of speech that he wondered if he had chosen an opportune moment to make a proposal of marriage. He found Anne sitting close by the fireside, her feet on a hot brick wrapped in flannel, a book and the kitten on her lap. She was reading, and he came into the room quietly, so she did not look up.

  ‘What are you reading?’ he said, for want of anything else.

  Anne looked up quickly, like a creature frightened by the sound of a human voice. Then the expression of wary surprise on her face was replaced by even warier, and chilly, politeness.

  ‘The Visions of St Matilda,’ she replied, like a child answering a schoolmaster. She had been thinking, recently, that it might after all be best if she did enter a convent.

  ‘I have the King’s permission for… I… If you are agreeable… Lady Anne, would you consider becoming my wife?’

  Anne was so startled that she lost her place in the book and almost let it slide off her knees. ‘You?’ she said, in just the same way that she had when he had suggested that she might turn to him for help — as if the mere suggestion were preposterous.

  ‘I don’t want to press you for an answer now,’ he said hurriedly, then paused. ‘Will you consider it, Anne?’

  ‘Oh yes, yes, of course,’ Anne said faintly. She could think of nothing further to say. She still felt weak, her legs made of paper and her mind unequal to the task of thinking about the future. Marriage was the last thing she wanted, yet without marriage a woman had no status in the world. She longed to go out of the world, longed for a refuge. A convent — Syon, maybe — the King would have no objection to paying her corrody, if he saw it as a means to be quietly rid of her. Such high walls enclosed the life of the religious…

  ‘I had thought of being professed…’ she said lamely, then realized that this was a churlish thing to say after receiving an offer of marriage. But Richard had very little to lose; he would probably get most of her property anyway. If only she could be certain of what he really wanted; she did not dare hope that it was herself.

  ‘You must do as you please, of course,’ he said stiffly. Then, ‘I am leaving London soon, to go north. I intend to make my home at Middleham whenever possible. I’ve always liked the place more than anywhere else. Probably I shall come back to London during the summer. May I see you again then, Anne?’

  ‘Yes.’

  When he had gone, Alice appeared, and it was clear that she had heard every word. She brought another hot brick for Anne’s feet.

  ‘Not that I couldn’t see that coming months ago, when he first asked me to come to you,’ she said smugly, as if granted some divine foreknowledge.

  Anne glared at her. Elderly women often talked like this to young girls. ‘I am nothing but a chattel to be haggled over by the King and his brothers. That trio! They are dividing the spoils after my father’s fall. My mother is to be treated as if she were dead, and all the Beauchamp and Warwick lands taken by the King to provide for his brothers. If I were to marry one of them, I’d be living off what my mother has lost. And my sister of Clarence is as greedy as any of them. I hate them all!’

  ‘The ways of men and Kings and power are not designed to take account of us women. He’s not so bad; better than many I’d say. Your mother won’t die a pauper. You may say no now, my lady my pet, but you wait a little while… By the summer you’ll feel differently. You see, by Christmas there’ll be a wedding.’

  ‘There will not! Alice, you’re a wicked old match-maker. I won’t marry Gloucester, I tell you. They all caused my father’s death, all of them. I won’t have him!’

  Anne seemed so provoked to anger that Alice smiled. It was the best sign of recovery that she had seen so far.

  ‘Oh yes, you will, my love,’ she said infuriatingly. ‘You’ve just had the best offer a young lady could have, short of the King himself. He will be the wealthiest young man in the realm after your sister’s husband, and twice as powerful. Think what he can offer you before you refuse him. If it wasn’t for him you might have ended up marrying a greasy cook. Why, he wants to take you home to the north, where you were children together. I’d say he was more honest than most — didn’t he stand by his brother the King as a brother should do — unlike some we could mention! And there was a time when he thought as much of your father as you did — and a time when you would have liked to marry him — I know!’

  ‘Go away, Alice,’ Anne snapped. She did not wish to hear a catalogue of Richard’s virtues. She did not want to think about him at all; it hurt. Alice, apart from her remarks about his wealth, was being romantic. There was nothing romantic in the affair, nothing at all.

  ‘He’s been paying the rent of this house for the last nine months!’ Alice said, round the door. Anne kicked the hot brick out from under her feet, and began to cry.

  Richard, as he rode north, thought with gloom of the problem which he left in London, and with guilt of the one which awaited him at Pontefract. In the castle of Pontefract the steward’s daughter was eight months gone, with his child. It had happened at some village festival the previous August, when he had first gone north with Fauconberg. He had been rather drunk, and highly irresponsible. The girl professed to love him, but he thought it was his rank and repute which entranced her. A suitable marriage would have to be arranged. That was easy. But his guilt was aroused because he found it uncomfortable to cast off a woman, especially if he had misused his privilege in the first place. If Anne were told of it, she would be sure to refuse his offer. He would have to wait for her answer now, until he returned to London at Michaelmas.

  *

  On the morning after his arrival back in London, he went to St Martin’s, unable to wait any longer. Anne got up late, these days. She slept a great deal because there was nothing else to do.

  Richard, seeing the windows of her rooms open, called her gently. She came to the window. She still held a comb in her hand, surprised in using it by his call. The window was small; a vine grew up the surrounding wall and over the lintel, pinned onto a wooden trellis. Long, dry, trailing stems dangled down, brushing the girl’s hair. The vine held bunches of grapes, small green ones which would not make wine.

  They stood looking at each other seriously, she a little downwards, because the garden was at a lower level.

  ‘I came to London for your answer.’

  ‘Where from?’

  ‘Carlisle.’ He was aware that this sounded impressi
ve.

  It was a very long way to come for an answer. A messenger riding post night and day took four days. Richard must have been on the road a week. Perhaps he had come to see to some business also. He was very brown from the sun. Anne suddenly envied him his summer in the north. She hated London. He did not seem to have a great deal to say, but then he had never been a babbler. He had eyes that looked straight at one, though it was hard to read what thoughts lay behind the look. If they had known it, their serious expressions reflected one another.

  A strand of her hair flopped over the window sill and swung like a silk tassel, tickling his hand, which he moved away instantly. He had never tried to touch her in any way, the usual ploy of a wooer. This had been a great relief to her. The reason, of course, had been that he did not want her to see how the most casual touch could explode desire in him like gunpowder and perhaps frighten her again. By now, and especially now, it was becoming unbearable to want someone so much. No one else would do.

  Anne watched the man who had asked her to marry him with a new curiosity. His hand resting on the window sill was even browner than his face. The fingers were thin, and on one was a ring he must wear all the time because there was a band of untanned skin under it. Nice hands — she disliked podgy paws and hairy fingers. Looking at him closely for the first time in several years, she realized that he had grown. Absurd thought! She had begun to think of him as being years older than he was.

  He ducked away suddenly, and if he had not been the self-assured young man who had replaced the boy she used to know, she would have thought him seized by shyness. It was a novel experience, to have this effect upon someone, when usually afflicted oneself. He bobbed up again, closer this time. He had picked a sprig of rosemary from a bush growing under the window. He handed it to her.

  ‘Rosemary for remembrance,’ he said, looking at her without smiling, but then, he was not one for smiling every few moments for no special reason.

  Anne fingered the green needles of leaves, releasing their aromatic scent. She sniffed it with pleasure, loving the herb’s pungency. ‘Remembrance of what?’ she said soberly, thinking of her father, of all the things which were past, which Richard had helped to take from her.