‘Perhaps your Grace should examine the titles,’ she said, ‘in case any are missing. Alas! your lady and the Queen Dowager have scant interest in books these days. Both are so triste …’ And the fur-grey eyes darkened further in what could have been satisfaction or sympathy or merely the patterns of the reflected rain. His fingers brushed hers as he took the manuscripts. Never in his life could he remember a woman who had stirred him so. He had, just once, possessed her cool body, in joy, in uncharacteristic gratitude, yet she still seemed untouched by him. Cursing Jacqueline, the Council, and the way the world used him, he began to wish she had not come, bringing this new torment. Sighing, he glanced at the books. Several were the late King’s property and had found their way into Humphrey’s own library during the chaos of the early funereal days. Chaucer’s Troilus was stamped with the arms of the Prince of Wales, and should by rights be with with the infant Henry. There was Hoccleve—De Regimine Principum—a vast tome, and Lydgate—The Life of Our Lady. Well, both these scholars were his protégés; he was entitled to enjoy them. But hiding beneath The Cuckoo and the Nightingale was a slim black book which, aghast, he nearly dropped.
‘Sweet Christ, Eleanor! Has this been in the Queen’s apartments?’
She took the book from him.
‘A mistake,’ she said simply. ‘None has seen it, save you and I. I promised its safe return, and here it is.’
He sat down slowly. His face felt very cold.
‘For safety it should be burned, I’ve often thought so,’ he whispered. ‘As you and I could burn for touching it even in ignorance.’
‘I tried the Egyptian spell,’ she said, so calmly that his skin crept. ‘I bled three mice to death and named them Beaufort.’ (And one other, which I named Jacqueline, she thought.)
‘You risked that? For me?’
‘For you. Only a beginning. In time, I’ll get you kingdoms, fair kingdoms by foul means. No fouler means than kingdoms often fall to,’ she added.
It came to him forcibly that she was a blood relative of Sir John Oldcastle who had burned for heresy of a different colour, Lollardy, which compared to this seemed an innocent pastime. ‘You must lend me the others, the demonology books,’ she was saying. She knew his every possession, every cranny of his mind, his prickly, tortuous secrets. ‘These—’ tapping the black book—‘are elementary matters. I taught Joanna of Navarre all she wished to know …’
‘But she was discovered,’ he said uncertainly.
‘She was very careless. My lord, you can be a great wizard.’ The amorous, small-toothed smile came again. ‘And I will be your familiar, your black Eleanor, your Nell-cat!’
He rose up and embraced her then, spilling the precious illuminations to the floor. Even in his arms she seemed illusory, a supple shadow, a puff of scented smoke, a tingling ghost-mist. He thought of Jacqueline, grown plump and indolent and whining, he thought of the torments of the Council meeting, and clutched at Eleanor Cobham as at salvation, with Hell-fire a reasonable tithe for the riches of the world. She drew away too soon, leaving him hapless, hungry. The grey eyes unflickeringly probed him, old eyes in a young face, eyes that had known everything from the remotest times, had opened on the world fast in their knowledge. Humphrey, loving his first great love, was robbed of the courtliness, the rehearsed excitations of poetry previously his tools. Anyway he would never again quote Chaucer to a woman. He was against all the Chaucer family, since the Council meeting.
He watched her shining nape as she knelt to retrieve the manuscripts. Straightening a crumpled leaf, she said: ‘Will you be at Windsor long?’ and he remembered the purpose of his visit.
‘As long as it takes to discover what, if anything, is exercising the Queen-Dowager’s mind,’ he said grimly.
‘She’s had a letter—’ Eleanor rose—‘from Bedford at Rouen.’
‘Congratulating her no doubt on her skill in averting the duel,’ he said.
‘And she has written two. But I was unable to discover their contents.’
‘She writes too many letters.’ Humphrey sucked in his lip.
‘One to James of Scotland. I think she plans to visit him at Hertford; she lent him her manor there.’
Humphrey made a disgusted noise. ‘There’s yet another foothold for the Beaufort brood! I would have prevented that marriage, but Harry approved it. So Joan Beaufort joins the climbing ranks. She’ll have a kingdom, now that James is restored.’
‘I dreamed last night,’ said Eleanor, ‘of Beaufort, lying on his bed. A spider, as big as a hound, hung above him. It lowered itself and forced into his mouth. He was screaming …’ Then she said, dispassionately: ‘Beaufort is very deferential to the Queen-Dowager.’
The room had grown very cold. Humphrey said: ‘She’s a thorn in my flesh, that widow of Harry’s. Who are her clerks? Are they corruptible?’
‘Perhaps. Louis de Robsart guards her affairs, but I will discover all, to my power. And, my dear lord, remember. You still have wardship over the prince!’
Within the Upper Ward, traditional lodging of royalty, reached by angled stairways and galleries from tower to tower, the Queen-Dowager, not quite twenty-three years old, kept close within herself. Now and then she coughed her brittle cough. Jacqueline hung close, talking incessantly, unheard, unanswered. Katherine’s maids, Belknap, Troutbeck and Coucy, waited for commands that never came. And, standing with her back against the wall, little Guillemot, the bedchamber maid, watched her adored mistress with great sadness. The two harps, bought by Henry, stood still unplayed, their strings furred with dust. This is one of the bad days, the women thought. A bad month; naturally, the anniversary. It had been the same last August. Her Grace was born under Scorpio, thought Troutbeck. Such are prey to great passions, joy and sorrow cuts deeper than most. There was a wine stain on the Queen’s grey gown. She drinks rather a lot, thought Troutbeck, but she’s out of her black at least. In the beginning she wanted to wear white, saying it was the custom of mourning Queens in France.
UNE SANS PLUS! What tragic irony the raison held now. It had been limned in radiance on the gorgeous funeral canopy as the long procession wound from Vincennes to Abbeville, Hesdin, Montreuil, Boulogne and Calais, then overseas to where the weepers waited, inconsolate, at Dover. UNE SANS PLUS! Yes, she was the one alone, in this secret private place that she had drawn about herself against shock and fear that would otherwise have engulfed her. Wine helped: some days she could pretend that Harry was only on campaign.
They had boiled the flesh from the King’s bones and placed them in the casket, first moulding a complete death-mask of head and face and body, and fixing this effigy on top of the canopied bier. The mask was crowned with an imperial diadem of gold and rubies, and clothed in the purple, trimmed with ermines. The right hand held a sceptre and the left an orb. Louis de Robsart, the Duke of Exeter, and March had overseen the tributes and smoothed the passage home. Masses were sung at every town through which they passed. She had not wept until Dover, not even at the abbey of St Ostian where the monks sang so sweetly that everyone was in tears. It was on England’s shore that the pain flung itself over her. When she had been glad of James, dear James, giving comfort where there was no comfort, repaying whatever kindness she may have shown him. James of Scotland, ceaselessly at her side. Unlike Bedford, who, although bidden to look after her, had been forced to remain in France.
And then she was in a foreign country, an embarrassment to the crowds who had cheered her once. Perhaps this was why James took her suffering upon him; having once been as displaced as she. He was not far from her now, a mere two days’ ride, but she wished he were here at Windsor. He might even know what to advise about the little King. And at the thought of the baby Henry a tremor broke through her detachment; and her mind raced. None would harm him at Kennington Palace, where he now lay; he was the King. But he was so small! She had seen Dame Alice Boteler slap him once. In answer to Katherine’s protest the woman had primly quoted the Privy Council’s edict, written as
from the infant himself:
‘We request Dame Alice from time to time reasonably to chastise us, as the case may require, without being held accountable or molested for the same at any future time. The well beloved Dame Alice is to teach us courtesy and nurture and many things convenient for our royal person to learn.’
She had not seen him for two months. The Protector had impressed upon her that the teaching of courtesy and nurture could only be effective away from all frivolous influence. Like training a dog, he had explained; the fewer the masters the swifter the obedience. Well, she had seen the way Humphrey trained his dogs; the analogy sickened her. Eight weeks since she had seen her son, and twice as long before that, when she had taken him to an opening of Parliament. Then it had been a day almost of happiness.
They were to pass the Saturday night at Staines before going on to Westminster the following day. Somehow the question of their lodging had been overlooked, their host indisposed, she had forgotten which. They had come finally to a common tavern, whose name she had also forgotten. She remembered a roaring fire, mulled ale in which slices of pippin floated, a delicious duckling roasted with chestnuts. A distinct lack of ceremony! The tap-wench, round as a cask with three teeth missing in her merry pink face, had been called Betty—Bet. Bet had snatched the King of England from his nurse’s arms and settled him on the soft rollicking terrain of her lap. Jigging him, singing him an inexhaustible stream of ditties, spooning broth into his unprotesting mouth. Sending her own children to fetch their crude toys for his pleasure. His eyes had rolled with amazement, he had begun to chuckle and then to laugh. None had ever heard him laugh like that before or since. When he had begun to drowse before the great fire, Bet had covered his hands and feet with kisses; the whole scene had scandalized nurses and physicians and warmed Katherine’s heart.
The following morning when they were due to leave for Westminster, Henry had other ideas. Whether it was the duckling broth, so exotic after his wetnurse’s milk, or Bet’s riotous lap, or the little wooden horse of which he would not let go, no one could say. However, when lifted into the chariot he began to scream, and went black in the face. See! the attendants said, awed: how holy he is! he refuses to travel on the Lord’s Day! So he was lifted down and restored to the arms of Bet, for several further hours of lovely play …
And would to God I had left him there, Katherine thought. There was love there, kindness. Sweet St Nicholas, protect my little prince. Dear Harry! if you have time, look down from beyond the stars and keep him safe. Distressed, she forced her mind to other things. When had the silversmiths called on her? Half a year ago? Time was tangled, inconsequential. But the work was finished, Harry now had a fitting memorial in St Edward’s Chapel, beneath the H-shaped chantry in fine Caen stone. She had designed the memorial herself; a life-size effigy in oak plated with silver-gilt, the head in its jousting helm made of solid silver, his sword and armour and his achievements fittingly displayed. The arms of France and England. France and England he would have been truly, had he but outlived her father by another two months! Would poor mad Charles be sane again in Heaven? while Isabeau pursued her ageless career of debauchery and the Dauphin, the ‘King of Bourges’, claimed a larger kingdom and sought annulment of the Treaty of Troyes. She had written to her brother, congratulating him on the birth of his son, Louis. She had been moved by a desperate family feeling, a longing for future peace. It was useless; both the Dauphin and Bedford were adamant—the campaigns would continue. The wastefulness appalled her—the fighting, killing, the crushed crawling ants of armies. All so vainglorious compared to the power of those few words to her after the entry into Paris: ‘You were the prize I sought … but never did I dream that I would love you so …’
Harry had come to her bed that night, the night of those words … so tender, filling her, completing her. She shivered. She drank some wine from the cup that stood beside her chair. She thought again of the prince, her baby, under Duke Humphrey’s tutelage. This strange weather would not suit him; he easily took cold. Her unease became agony. He was paler than ever last time she saw him, in his white velvet doublet, standing on thin black-hosed legs, addressing her formally as ‘Ma Reine’. He has very long lashes, a bony unchildlike face … they cannot harm or neglect him. He is the King. Nicholas, Nicholas, with your crook and your little lamb, leave all your other charges and guard my son! Be mother and father to him. His mother is void, a shell of barren wanhope. His father has gone before his time into that other world. Harry, you took my safety and my peace. Your face is hard to remember. The lack of you remains, the dreadful lack, so ominous. I fear the future. So much an end to everything. How could you leave me so alone?
But where there’s an end there must be a beginning. Life is an unending circle.
The strange little secret voice was so confident that, startled, she looked about her. The women still stood there, silent. Jacqueline was stabbing her tapestry, quiet at last. The two harps were like elegant watchers with their dusty gilded shanks. Eleanor Cobham had just slipped back into the room. Katherine rose, and Guillemot hurried to serve her, but Eleanor was there first.
‘Dear Madame—you look chilled. May I pour you more wine, send for your furs?’
Katherine felt a pressure on her shoulder, looked to see Jacqueline, glaring, bright with rouge over a sickly pallor.
‘I will attend her Grace,’ she said. ‘Kéti, may we walk together in the pleasaunce? This inactivity makes me ill.’
Katherine felt jealousy, venom, pass between Jacqueline and Eleanor. She could not be troubled to assess its cause. ‘It’s too cold,’ she said.
‘His Grace the Duke of Gloucester begs audience,’ said Louis de Robsart in the doorway.
Humphrey entered in yellow cloth of gold, on a gust of bonhomie. Danger and brightness came with him. Jacqueline grew paler and more starkly rouged: Eleanor Cobham withdrew into a shadow created by herself.
‘Ma chère soeur!’ said Humphrey. ‘How fair you are today!’ He kissed Katherine’s hand.
And there’s today’s first lie, she thought. Whenever I trouble to look in the mirror I see a face so withdrawn it is almost featureless. It did not worry her, unlike Jacqueline, who, beset by a storm of troubles, still sought comeliness with lead pastes and the juice of crushed insects. In vain: her husband’s eyes encompassed all the women, and he smiled more sweetly at little Guillemot than at his wife. It was a sharp smile, and finally lodged in Katherine.
‘But your Grace seems sad,’ and his eyes took in the wine-stain on her gown. ‘Permit me … why does your Grace not wear more jewels? It troubles me that you should sit so lifeless, when all know how you can shine!’
How formal he was! Gone the soft touch, the concern that had eased her when Harry was in France. Oh, many-coated Humphrey! with the answer known so well!
‘Most of my jewels I pawned,’ she said steadily ‘to pay for my husband’s memorial.’
The dower to which she was entitled as the King’s widow had to stretch a long way. There were palaces which she scarcely saw to maintain, and a mystery of servants. One small manor, she often thought, would have been enough.
‘I passed your stable,’ said Humphrey. ‘Do you no longer have the eight white horses?’
She studied her own frail fingernails, minutely. The pearly team had been more to her than any jewels. Watching them go, brave and gay and rippling like the top of a wave, had been like a second farewell to Harry. Humphrey knew this. Sainte Vierge! he was so cruel. How could she ever have been otherwise deluded?
‘My lord,’ she said. ‘How is my son, the King’s Grace?’ Humphrey cried in delight: ‘Madame! So holy! he astounds his tutors. Yesterday he lisped a psalm, I forget which—’
‘Yes,’ she said, looking up, ‘but is he well?’
‘Just a little cold he had. His Grace has forty servants to wait on him and the best doctors in England.’
‘I wish to see him,’ said Katherine.‘La grippe is dangerous in the young.’ The s
harp smile seemed to bruise her eyes.
‘It was only a little cold,’ Humphrey said gently. ‘He is again at his lessons.’
‘I wish to see him.’ She was twisting and turning the ring on her finger. ‘I wish to come with you to Kennington Palace.’
‘I shall be honoured. But his Grace is not at Kennington. He’s at King’s Langley for now.’
She said sharply: ‘With Queen Joanna?’ Joanna, who once had Harry bewitched. Ah, no.
‘Joanna is being removed to Havering. I thought it fitting that his Grace had a change of scene.’
She thought wildly: they are at liberty to bear my little son to the further ends of this strange country! I am powerless.
It’s my own childhood over again. Isabeau … Tonnerre, the storm, the sickness … coughing seized her, sweat sprang out on her face. Eleanor Cobham knelt beside her, offering a warm and bitter brew, one of the herbal concoctions for which she was famed. Humphrey said: ‘Your Grace is weary. She should take to her bed … Queen Joanna spends most of her time in bed. Bed is beneficial to ladies …’ and without warning, Jacqueline burst into a sobbing roar, and fled from the room.
‘I will have the King’s physician visit you,’ said Humphrey, when there was quiet again. ‘With that chest-cough, it would be unwise for you to come near the sovereign. We’ll have you well again …’ He went on and on. Katherine, exhausted, thought: I can’t fight him, he is a chimera, he attacks from below, behind, before … St Nicholas. Protect my son.
Humphrey was looking at the gilded harps. ‘These are beautiful, If your Grace is temporarily embarrassed for funds, I will pay a good price.’
She said hoarsely: ‘They’re not for sale.’
Not the harps, upon which she and Harry were to have made music into their old age. Gloucester stroked a dusty arpeggio from one with the back of his fingers. Instantly two strings broke in a cloud of resinous gold.
‘The weather,’ he said knowledgeably. ‘The gut expands in sunshine and sudden cold shrinks it beyond endurance.’
Crown in Candlelight Page 35