The King's Grey Mare

by Jarman, Rosemary Hawley

  Laughing at this new interest in policy, he caressed her. ‘Have you, my love? Come, you shall choose. A worthy supporter of all my causes to rule over those blackthorn bogs. Give me your vote.’

  Like a wild vision the ruthless, deathshead countenance of her most faithful servant came to mind.

  ‘Tiptoft is loyal,’ she said.

  He roared. ‘Why, sweeting, a fierce choice. And yet …’ He mused, subtly enlightened, stroking his fair strong chin.

  ‘He would serve you well,’ she said almost inaudibly.

  For a moment he studied her. She was pale today, her long throat like a windflower stem, her lips like two red petals folded firm. And John of Worcester would and could hold down the chanting peat-bards royally.

  ‘So be it, lady,’ he said. ‘Tiptoft is our choice. Desmond shall be relieved; he can make merry in his Irish castle until I return.’

  She pressed close. ‘Return soon,’ she said. She yielded her mouth, feeling his hard kiss, warm, insensitive, tasting the salt of his passion on her lips.

  At Westminster, she held in her hands the Great Seal. It was heavy, with a solemn dark glow about it, and the arms and images were deeply ingrained like the runes on some mysterious talisman. The Seal! the emblem of omnipotence. The child moved fiercely within her; she saw her pearl-trimmed girdle flutter and rise slightly as if to touch the Seal in approval. About her stood a small and silent assembly: her father, Sir Richard Woodville, new-made Earl Rivers and Treasurer of England; Lady Margaret Beaufort; Doctor Morton; and Jacquetta, with her devil-virgin’s smile. Elizabeth looked down. As if at the touch of her eyes the man kneeling before her raised his head and fixed her with that dreadful, thrusting, competent glance.

  ‘Sir John Tiptoft.’

  ‘Your Grace.’ He would not release her from that look, or from culmination of a plan that had moved too quickly, burned too savagely. ‘All is ready, highness.’

  The clerk, familiar, whey-faced Reynold Bray, stepped forward with a long roll of parchment. She cast her eye over it; the word treason leaped black and plain to see. It was a most unconstitutional document; but in this she was her own parliament and court of law; vanity was the judge and rage the executioner. And for this end she must know more, hear more. She must feel the spark that lit her tinder. Tell me, Sir Clerk, the words my lord of Desmond lately used to shame us. She must have those words, to counter the Seal’s dreadful coolness under her hands.

  ‘My friend (who must be nameless) heard them clearly. They were riding for boar. The beast was grounded in a thicket, and the chase halted. The King was thirsty; he asked Desmond for wine, and they spoke together, merrily.’

  She could envisage them: Desmond, handsome, chaffing the King for his want of drink; the white teeth, the laughter.

  ‘His Grace asked Desmond, straight, without dissembling, what he thought of the royal marriage. Desmond answered with a jest, but the King pressed him: “Come, man to man!” Then Desmond said: “Twould have been better had your Grace wed a foreign princess. The barons are wroth at your choice.” ’

  Bray faltered. Elizabeth gripped the Seal’s warming roundness.

  ‘It’s disrespect to you, my liege.’

  ‘We must hear all,’ said Tiptoft commandingly. The whites of his protruding eyes were tinged with red. Bray cleared his throat and continued.

  ‘Desmond said: “Your Grace has laid yourself open to some raillery. The common people speak of the Queen thus: they raise their vessels and drink to the princely stables …” ’

  ‘And?’ The Seal seemed alive; it was beginning to burn her hands.

  ‘And … the King’s Grey Mare! It is a jest,’ Bray said seriously. ‘Rooted in your Grace’s first marriage to Lord Grey … the King’s grey mare–’ as if explaining to children – ‘Mare, hard ridden, nightly.’

  Warily he looked at the Queen’s face. What he saw there put him swiftly on his knees.

  ‘God’s pardon, your Grace,’ he whispered. ‘You did ask me, and I told all.’

  The parchment cracked beneath her fingers. The room spun, and there was a bitter taste in her mouth, shreds of blinding light before her eyes. Through all this her wit told her that it was not so much Desmond’s seeking to alienate Edward from her – it was Desmond’s laughter. Now he should laugh himself on to a scaffold. Tiptoft was watching her closely. The commission was his; he was ready to leave for Ireland within the hour. She smelled burning wax and watched the gobbet of red fall at the foot of Desmond’s death warrant. She firmed the Seal carefully in the red; it spread and hardened, the devices showing plain and unassailable. Tiptoft’s bulging eyes sought hers.

  ‘I charge you, Constable, to see this carried out.’

  ‘Within the week, your Grace.’

  ‘Let no more treason such as this come from the lips of his family.’

  ‘He has two sons, my liege. Shall they be punished also?’

  She nodded, as the hideous face tipped upwards and the wet lip fastened on her shaking fingers. Then he was gone, swiftly, leaving the chamber still spinning and heaving about her. Heat seared her loins. She felt her mother’s arm supporting her. So her time was now, in hot summer. She would soon be rid of her burden, and Desmond, in some lonely Irish cell of execution, of his head. And his two sons punished… but they would be only little boys, younger even that Thomas and Dick! She looked uncertainly towards the door now closed behind the Butcher. Then pain stabbed again, lancing through her groin and stomach. She gasped. The King’s Grey Mare! May they all suffer, the pain told her. It is legitimate and right …

  Sir Thomas Cooke, one-time Mayor of London, was an avid patron of beauty. His mansion was crammed with bright manuscripts, rich rugs and furnishings, painstakingly collected over his years in King Edward’s favour. He was not a young man, and when Earl Rivers with a score of armed men burst in upon him he was afraid, but he was calm. They came upon him writing at a carved oak table in the solar where slatted sunshine beat through the oriel and danced upon the polished floor. For the sake of his wife and children, huddled terrified behind him, he clung to composure. He had heard enough of the Woodvilles, and of the Queen, to know himself powerless before them, and however guiltless, already guilty. So he laid down his quill gently, and confronted Earl Rivers, father of the Queen. Sir John Fogge, tall and blustering, had a deposition in his hand; impotent as a tossed leaf, Cooke listened to the gale of words.

  ‘And so, sir,’ finished Fogge, ‘we come to arrest you for your treason:

  Behind his chair Cooke’s wife began to weep softly.

  ‘I have always been loyal to King Edward,’ said Cooke. ‘His Grace will remember, if I am permitted audience.’

  Sir Richard Woodville said disdainfully: ‘The King is unlikely to visit you in prison. I have warned him on occasion of your Lancastrian sympathies. Now we have evidence of it.’

  Sir Thomas smiled palely, wondering who had been bribed to lie against him.

  ‘When may I petition the King?’

  ‘The King is from London.’

  Cooke’s spirit dived. So this was truly the Queen’s doing, and all hope lost. He asked Sir Richard mildly:

  ‘Why is the Queen’s Grace so full of hatred?’

  Outraged, they thrust him to his feet, and bade him keep his treasonous tongue from the Queen. They forced him down the narrow oak stairs and the sunlight followed sadly, licking the rich carvings, down into the bright Hall. Upon the wall there, the Jerusalem tapestry sprang and glittered. The besieged city of gold shone with an almost holy splendour; the bright knights battled upon it in fierce silence. Sir Thomas thought: fair knights, come to my aid! Against slander and ruin, and the Queen’s cruel whim. Sir Richard Woodville also drank in the tapestry, all eight hundred pounds’ worth of it. Mentally he set Cooke’s trial for the day after tomorrow. There were enough perquisites in this mansion to grease the lawyers. Edward would know nothing but admiration for his ministers’ zeal. And Elizabeth! He thought: it will give pleasure to her wh
o has helped us to our height. Turning to the guard, he asked: ‘Are the wagons ready?’

  The men nodded, and he gestured about him. ‘Leave naught. Load up.’

  ‘Where for, my lord?’

  ‘The Jerusalem arras for my lady wife’s apartment. All else to the Queen.’

  And he smiled at the remembrance of Jacquetta’s recent inspiration.

  ‘Queen’s Gold,’ the Duchess had said. ‘An ancient due of princes, seldom used these days. See that Cooke is fined and that my daughter profits thereby.’

  He had kissed her, marvelling.

  ‘But the tapestry is mine,’ she said.

  Sir Richard rode back to Westminster, where the Queen was lying-in. The child was another girl, to be named Mary in honour of the Virgin. Outriders were within the Palace with news of the King only a few days’ ride away. Alone with her parents, Elizabeth listened from her couch to the tale of Cooke’s arrest.

  ‘He, too, clung close to Warwick as well as to the King,’ said Earl Rivers. ‘Men say he sent messages to France; privy plots. Heads have been lost for less.’

  The name of Warwick salved the last infinitesimal pangs of conscience she might have owned over Cooke. She closed her eyes.

  ‘Fine him heavily,’ she said.

  Two days later, Cooke was committed to King’s Bench prison. The sum exacted was eight thousand pounds. And, under the archaic right of England, Elizabeth claimed one hundred marks per every thousand pounds. Queen’s Gold.

  Every time she passed the costly arras, swaying and shimmering in Jacquetta’s apartments, an old sore healed a little. The old, jewelled dreams were crystallized, and the nightmares, together with that day at Bradgate, fled. Even Melusine seemed to be part of the past; as if she had stamped their lives with success and left them, knowing that all would be well. That even Warwick would soon fall. Elizabeth went in daily duty to the Christian offices, and thought no more of Melusine, other than as a thing of improbable mist. On the day of Edward’s return she was shaken from this complacency.

  He came to her bower like a boisterous warm wind. Among cushions she sat, glowing with the peculiar freshness that follows childbirth. Her long hair fell in two thick braids to her knees, and her gown was a cunning weave of azure and green. Near by the Princess Elizabeth occupied the knee of her nurse, Lady Berners, and the baby Mary mewed softly in her cradle. A trapped bee buzzed drowsily against the oriel and somewhere near a minstrel plucked a gittern. Elizabeth held out her arms.

  ‘Welcome, my lord,’ she said softly. Edward looked well, brown from the summer riding, and leaner. He strode to the cradle and surveyed its contents. News of the birth had reached him on the road, and his brief disappointment at another female child was past and over. He tickled the infant, kissed the small Elizabeth, and threw himself down beside the Queen.

  ‘A good sortie! Fine hunting we had,’ he told her. ‘God’s Lady, Bessy; there was a deer as high as a house, and I shot her through the lungs with my first quill. It reminded me of our meeting, sweet heart!’

  ‘And the oyer and terminer?’ She twisted her fingers in his long dagged sleeve. ‘Did you find unrest in your shires?’

  ‘Naught to complain of,’ he replied. ‘I hanged a few, pardoned a score, and lightened the purse of many.’ His face was suddenly sober.

  ‘You are sad?’ she murmured.

  ‘I heard today about Tom Cooke,’ said Edward. ‘I’d have staked all on his loyalty; yet your father says …’

  She said quickly: ‘My father and his knights have proof, Sire. Cooke was untrue to your cause.’ She lowered her lids. ‘It’s hard to be betrayed, my lord. I feel for you.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said heavily. After a moment his humour brightened again. He tipped up her chin; chaffing her, said: ‘Feel for me, do you? My cunning, lovely lady!’

  ‘Sire?’ (sharply).

  ‘Minx, jade, witty wanton Bess!’ He pulled her into his arms, laughing. ‘In what law book did you read of that ancient right? Queen’s Gold! You mulcted poor Cooke right well – what will you do with all this gold, eh? Buy folderols to send your lord love-crazed … silk atop, and silk below …’

  His fingers strayed. Lady Berners coughed.

  ‘You are not angry,’ Elizabeth murmured, relieved.

  ‘Nay, sweet,’ said Edward with a kiss. ‘It’s fitting; Queen’s Gold for a queen. My Queen. My love. My fate.’

  ‘Shall I withdraw, your Grace?’ ventured Lady Berners, who had been discreetly watching.

  Edward sprang easily up from the cushions. ‘Nay, madam, I go myself to find my tardy ministers and see what trials await me in the Council Chamber, what arguments have been afoot in my absence. I’ll see you anon, love.’

  ‘Soon?’ Her hand detained him.

  ‘Tonight,’ he promised. ‘We’ll have supper together here, to celebrate my safe return. Lord, I’ve missed you, Bessy.’

  ‘Tonight!’ she cried. ‘I’ll order your favourite dishes – goose patty, heron …’

  ‘Syllabub! And you!’ He kissed her fingers and left. The bee rattled and whined against the window-pane. Elizabeth motioned to Lady Berners to kill it. Then there was a tremulous silence, heavy as the thick sunshine beating in, almost as if the day were waiting upon a judgment. She dismissed a vague unease and summoned her women to make her ready for the King’s next visit. Sometimes her toilette took as long as four hours. The long white-gold hair must be combed sleek as a fountain; then there was the skilled application of litharge of lead to combat any rough skin, and the rose water rubbed into every inch of her white body. The small blunt hennin with its gauzy veil must be fitted tightly so that no vestige of hair showed above the domed forehead. In this way, when the King’s hands finally loosed that spun silver fall, the effect would be even more startling. This day the Queen had a small eruption on her neck. It filled her with anguish. She bade her sister Catherine fetch a bloom of periwinkle, the Sorcerer’s Violet, with which to heal the blemish. She bent to stare into the burnished mirror, satisfied and yet unsatisfied with her image, the mouth like a flower, the cloudless blue eyes. Her breasts, heavy with milk, swelled above the loose gown. The King would be intent on love. She hoped his passion would spend itself swiftly; she needed to talk to him, to learn more of policy, of who was her enemy, who her friend. Especially she needed news of Warwick, so seldom seen at court. She was anxious to know his whereabouts and, if any, his plans.

  The tiny pimple worried her, and the feeling of unease returned. Lady Berners brought the swaddled infant for her to bless good night. Then the women dispersed, leaving her within a silken frame of candles that gleamed upon the massed white roses round her couch.

  Westminster Clock struck seven, followed fractionally later by other, distant sounds, for Westminster, fittingly, was always first. Sweet chimes, deep voices all over London, tongued the hour. The Council meeting would be ended; in truth, it would have been over for some time. She rose and walked about to calm a ridiculous apprehension. Edward would be here soon; possibly one of his more garrulous ministers, Hastings perhaps, had kept him. Then she heard voices, coming faintly from outside the thick oak door.

  ‘For the love of God, let me pass!’

  She clenched her hands. That was Anthony, sounding full of frenzy. She heard the guard telling her brother, with firm reverence, that the Queen had retired. A halberd, struck aside, clanged against the door. She went, opened, and confronted the two pikemen and her brother. All three knelt.

  ‘Let Lord Scales enter,’ she said.

  He came in swiftly, white-faced. ‘Your Grace,’ he gasped.

  ‘Anthony. What’s amiss?’

  His hands were trembling as he caught her sleeve. A little hound, sharing his fear, slunk at his side.

  ‘Your Grace … Bess. I had to warn you. The King is angry.’

  Her mouth suddenly dry, she said: ‘What have you done?’ thinking: how can he have offended Edward? Only last month he was made Governor of the Isle of Wight, and Knight of the Ga
rter … Edward loves him.

  His eyes darted about. ‘Nay, madam. ’Tis none of my doing – but yours.’

  ‘Mine!’

  Then she heard the King’s steps in the corridor, felt them too, for they shook the oak. Also another noise, a queer buzzing drone of fury. Outside, the halberds slithered apart, and the King, muttering in his throat like a madman, burst into the room. His face was crimson and stained with tears. He took two paces towards Elizabeth, saw Anthony, and flung out a pointing arm towards the door.

  ‘Leave us, my lord,’ he said. But Anthony hesitated, his face more ashen than before.

  ‘Leave us!’ cried Edward, choking. The hound crept near his boots and he kicked it viciously. Anthony gave a low obeisance, caught up the dog and backed out of the chamber. Elizabeth felt her heart pounding, the milk pulsing in her breasts. There will be a sick baby tomorrow, I must appoint a wetnurse, she thought with wild irrelevance.

  Edward was looking at her with a terrible expression, of contempt and even hatred. Above all, with the look of a small boy whose favourite toy has been wantonly smashed.

  ‘My lord, Edward, my lord,’ she whispered.

  He made a harsh muffled sound, half oath, half sob. He picked up the first object to hand, a crystal vase containing a single rose, and threw it violently so that it smashed into a million slivers. Then he walked blindly away and buried his face in the bedcurtains. Timidly she approached him and he wheeled to face her, eyes blinded by more tears. To him she was a blur of blue and green and silver. A red thread coursed down her cheek where a flying splinter had struck it. He raised his hand to destroy the blue, the green, the silver and the red, and heard her faint voice.

  ‘Your Grace I am but lately up from child.’

  The hand dropped. She thought it prudent to kneel, laying her hand upon his embroidered shoe.

  ‘My lord,’ she said softly and quickly. ‘I do not know my fault; tell me, so that I may amend it.’

  He was like the Edward of Grafton, babbling witlessly, laughing and crying low. He swore on the saints, on God’s Body, God’s Mother. The storm gave way to his dreadful accusing voice.