Command Of The King

by Mary Lide

  ‘But what does he want of me?’ Philippa asked, almost exasperated into speech. ‘Why should you speak for him? Why does he not speak for himself?’

  The Nun Elizabeth was in two minds, to be affronted at not being recognized, or gratified at the chance to reveal her fame. ‘My master be the greatest man in Christendom,’ at last she said, coming closer to Philippa and turning her back to the hidden grille so she could indicate it with winks and nods. ‘One day he will be Cardurnel.’ (She mispronounced the word.) ‘One day he will be Pope, the first English Pope in four hundred years. A Pope be greater than a king by long chalk,’ she added naively. ‘Think of it. I’ve told a king what to do; this French marriage be my work and doing. But one day I’ll be a-giving advice to an English Pope, me, the Nun of Kent.’

  Behind the tapestry a chair scraped as if overturned. There was the sound of a rapid stride, the grate of a key in the grille’s lock. ‘Lord-a-mercy,’ the Nun Elizabeth’s face creased with fright and she crossed herself. ‘He told me to keep that quiet. Drat you, mistress, for making me talk too long. He’s warned me afore not to say too much.’ She tiptoed rapidly to the outside door and eased it open, her feet that were made for country walking too broad and flat for treading quietly down cold corridors. ‘Just you stay there and listen,’ she whispered. ‘He’s got ways and means of making you, so best give in before he uses them. As I found out. And God comfort you.’

  She was gone in a flutter of skirts, her last prayer at least heartfelt. The grille swung wide; the tapestry was drawn back, a man strode into the room, his clerical robes flapping about his tall lank frame like crow’s wings. A look of distaste had curled his thin lips and his eyes were dark and penetrating, just as the Princess Mary had described. He fixed his gaze on Philippa. ‘Philippa de Verne,’ he cried, his voice oiled with old cunning, like an altar lamp. ‘You have wondered who I am. Seeing me, are you convinced? Do not underestimate me. Nor underestimate the Nun of Kent. She still knows more about the secrets of the world than most men, revealed to her by God. If she says “repent” then “repent” you must.’

  CHAPTER 10

  ——

  Philippa had only seen Thomas Wolsey once, during the proxy marriage at which he had pontificated. From a distance, clothed all in white, with his glittering gold vestments, he had seemed like a statue on a church wall, reminding her of the one in Vernson to which people prayed. Now, appearing in wrath, all in black, his long face seamed with lines, his face pendulant, he was so like a figure of death that she almost fell on her knees to him.

  But Wolsey was not as angry as he seemed. A master of deception, neither age nor advancement had quenched the fire of ambition which had burned in him since student days. He could still out-think most men, and he still could be boisterous, as he had been when he was put into the stocks for levity. He had been enjoying what he saw and heard behind the grille, despite the Nun Elizabeth’s lapses of memory, and had she been successful in making Philippa more penitent, he would have enjoyed himself even more. However, he judged that things were progressing well, and his ‘Repent’ was more to amuse himself than to frighten.

  He watched her dispassionately. He knew all about her, all that Henry knew and more. He had seen the skimpy proofs upon which the king had built his case. But he had other holds on her that Henry had overlooked, and these were the ones he meant to use; hence his interest in her.

  Seating himself upon the stool, and drawing the folds of his robes about him, he prepared to interrogate her. He was good at questioning, having all the Inquisitorial skills. He knew when to be silent, when to probe, when to let the victim damn herself. He meant for Philippa to submit, and although the Nun of Kent had failed to break her will, he intended to do so himself. And then, he would tell her what was expected of her.

  ‘Since the day you wormed your way into Henry’s court,’ he began, ‘I have had my eye on you.’ (Not true, he had only thought of her in the past few days.) ‘Despite the storm, the marriage has taken place, and Mary Tudor and Louis of France are now made man and wife. So you have failed to keep them apart.’ (Again, something he knew untrue.) ‘King Louis swears that he is so in love that he wants his bride all to himself. He has a strange way of showing it! On the day after, he dismissed his wife’s retinue, sending all the ladies back to Calais to cool their heels. In their place he has surrounded the queen with ones from his court who will tell him all she does and thinks.’

  He watched Philippa from beneath his thick eyebrows with his churchman’s stare. When he noted how her expression did not change, he said more sharply, ‘But we in England need someone who knows the queen well and is liked by her, who can listen to her and pick out what is important. Louis claims his purpose is to find if he pleases his queen; his real intent is to be assured that the young men of the court do not flirt with her, and that his nephew and heir does not cuckold him. For my part, I am not interested in personal things. I want to know Louis’s views on war and peace and what he really thinks about the treaty we have made, and what his future plans are. Now what could be simpler. The queen needs a friend and so do I. So I have chosen you to keep her company, and help me at the same time.’

  ‘To spy you mean,’ she said, breaking in upon his rhetoric.

  Her bluntness did not displease him. He had already surmised that she was quick and in his eyes intelligence was not a crime, as it had been for his king. ‘If not,’ he said, ‘then you stay here. And if I put the mark of heretic on you, you will be lucky to remain alive.’

  And when she still shook her head. ‘There are worse things than nunneries,’ he said. He fixed his gaze upon her, boring through into the soul. ‘A king’s prison for one, where Henry meant to keep you.’ He paused again. ‘Henry’s men are hunting for you,’ he said, ‘Perhaps you should be relieved my men found you first. Perhaps then you would not be so squeamish.

  ‘Loyalty is a fine thing,’ he added more persuasively, ‘but it does not help you or your friends. But if you were to work for me, why, I would swear that the king would reward anyone who helped promote the peace that he expects from this marriage. Henry needs it to succeed and so do I. Work for me, I guarantee he will pardon you.’

  He turned to her, in an instant changing from priest to something else, his lips curling and his eyes glittering. His whisper was almost a snarl. ‘But refuse, I will tell him where you are. And I will tell my men where to find Richard Montacune.’

  And he watched even more carefully to see which way his catch would jump.

  When she asked, ‘And what if I refuse?’ he knew he had her fast. No one questions unless full of doubt. ‘You choose,’ he told her brutally, ‘your life and his. Or death for both.’ And he made a movement as if to rise, pulling at the fastenings of his cloak. Then, fast as a whip he shot another look at her. ‘But if you agree, like the sensible wench you are, why then you shall travel in fine style, with my men as escort, as becomes a lady of high degree. The French court will welcome you as the queen’s special friend. And when your task is done, you can expect King Henry to award you as is just. Money, titles, lands, all those lands you wanted back, those would be the least he’ll give.’ He lied again. He never meant Henry to know his plan, and when it was accomplished, and he had no further use for her, he would turn her loose and let Henry’s men get hold of her.

  He had never learned that more is less: that the more he claimed the more she distrusted him; that the more he pretended friendship, the more he seemed an enemy. But that was a weakness in him.

  Philippa realized that she was in a vice that was slowly closing in on her. It had been closing for a long while, since Henry had recognized her. Betrayal of her mistress on the one hand, betrayal of the man she loved on the other, what choice was that? ‘And if I do,’ she said at last, ‘what proof do I have of your good faith?’

  He almost grinned, not sensing in her words her disgust at him. ‘Why,’ he said blithely, ‘I will send my sergeant with you, you remember him. He will keep
you safe, as safe as I myself. And if you do not like his company, you are at liberty to fend him off as you did today.’

  Her startled look amused him. ‘I told you Mistress Philippa, few things escape me,’ he said, growing more expansive now he had his way. ‘Do you know why? I dig at the small details which impatient men ignore; I work at them, sift them through, come to the greater events by slow degrees. And I believe in what I do. For there is always some truth even in lies. And what the Nun of Kent says one day will come true. England is on the verge of being great. If I make its king famous that power will also serve me. When I am Pope, as the Nun of Kent has prophesied, no country will be stronger than ours; no people more receptive to my work. And you will be my helper as the Nun herself is.’

  God does not need bullies, Philippa thought. He does not need bribes and threats to achieve His will. This man is not the man of God that he claims he is. But, she also thought, if he wants details, I can invent ones that mislead; I can tell him only what is already known, no harm in that. And when I see Mary Tudor again, when I find Richard Montacune, then they can help me break free of him. It did not occur to her that if and when she saw Richard she might endanger him. And before she was to meet him or the queen again, fate had played another trick.

  The way she was hurried back to the coast and brought on board one of Wolsey’s ships passed as in a nightmare. But while Wolsey’s sergeant watched her with his secret grin, and rehearsed her what to do and say so she could pass her secret news on in a simple way; before she reached France by secret means, and, as secretly, began the ride to the French capital, the Yuletide came upon them with a fresh load of misery.

  The pace and gaiety of the bride, the games, the rich food, the late nights and early hunts, finally were too much for Louis’s age. He took to his bed and stayed there. The first day of the New Year saw his death which the princess said she would pray for. She might have saved her prayers. For King Louis’s heir, his nephew Francis, Count of Angoulême, came hastening now to take the crown, prepared to make a bid to marry her. Meanwhile from Lille, the exiled English duke hurried to Paris himself, with perhaps some thought of rescue, although he did not say so.

  The duke was not the only one with rescue in mind. Hot on his heels, although he journeyed independently, Richard Montacune came spurring back on a rescue mission of his own.

  Richard was not exactly surprised at the turn of events. He had come to know the French court and King Louis well. If anything, he preferred the French king to the English one; Louis at least was a gentleman, and King Louis had grown fond of him, praising his part in this tortuous bickering. But Richard had had enough of courts, and seeing his duty almost done, he had begun to look forward to home again. And to finding Philippa.

  The last of his missions had been to the duke at Lille, with Henry’s letter. The duke’s relief at being recalled almost cancelled signs of his ageing, such as grey threads in his hair and beard, and a kind of hesitation in his voice, a weakness, that was new. During all this time, amid all these hundreds of reports, these detailed envoys, the duke had largely been ignored. Now like a schoolboy let out on holiday he rejoiced at deliverance. And, in his excitement, he revealed what Henry’s message had contained.

  ‘They want me back, boy,’ he had cried, ‘at the games.’ (For when he spoke, Louis’s death had not yet taken place.) ‘They need me to joust for them, as England’s champion. We fight the French king’s heir, who thinks that he is God’s gift to war as he is to love.’ He had guffawed and slapped Richard on the back, as if he were a boy himself, not a man on the verge of middle age. In a trice all coldness was gone; he was as affable as he had ever been. ‘We’ll best him in both before the year is out,’ he cried and winked. ‘And there’s need for you too, lad.’ In a few careless words he had told the gist of what Henry planned for the girl who had been the original cause of their estrangement. He did not tell (because he did not know) what Wolsey had done, but he did tell Richard that he thought the girl not good for him. ‘Leave her alone, lad,’ was his advice. ‘She’s caused you enough fret as it is. If the king’s got his hooks into her, better not to interfere.’ Advice that came not from kindness so much as from well-honed sense that had long stood him in good stead. But he said nothing of his own hopes or plans for Mary Tudor.

  During all these months Richard had had scant news of Philippa; a few personal messages delivered by Edmund Bryce, who seemed to enjoy the role of go-between. That did not mean he did not think of her. In fact he had come to think of her more and more. But fear that Henry would turn against her had lessened as time passed and the king’s cynicism now horrified and enraged him. Leaving the duke without ceremony, ignoring his advice, he had made straight for Paris in the hope of learning news from the new queen. The last thing he expected was to find Philippa on the same Paris road, with the same destination in mind. It was fate’s last trick, that he and Philippa should meet again, just as his feelings were overwhelming him, and just when her love for him would force her to deny hers.

  They met under the archway of the great main Paris gates, where all of France seemed trying to squeeze past, the news of the king’s death shocking everyone. Already the first few flakes of snow had begun to fall, harbingers of the cruel months to come, the worst winter in years. Wolsey’s men, in their usual insolent style, had begun to shoulder through the crowds, their sergeant using the flat of his sword to clear a path. Slightly ahead of them, Richard had paused to acknowledge the salute of friends, and was leaning down from the saddle to glean news, any whisper perhaps alive with clues. He was travel-stained and weary from his long ride. One look back and his spirit soared.

  Framed in the torchlights under the high arch, mounted on a small palfrey, her hair and cloak powdered white, Philippa already was the object of attention, the epitome of a great lady riding in with her escort of men. But Richard noted their red coats at once, and that made him pause.

  She knew him too. For her there could be only one man who rode with such easy grace, who turned with a smile as if to say, ‘There you are, jumped up like some half grown weed. What mischief are you about today?’ Mischief. That word was too slight for what Wolsey had thrust on her. But even if she had not seen him at once, someone would have pointed him out, the young English milord who had won such favour with the French, the English king’s envoy. Dressed in Tudor colours with the Tudor emblem stitched upon his cloak, despite the fatigue and cold, he looked what he was. But he was also something else, a man riding in from some long journey, searching for someone, something, some dream perhaps. And finding it now, here, unexpectedly, he fastened a look on her so intense that those nearby commented on it. While she, still moving slowly under the arch, watched him as intently, her eyes like stars. The spark between them, thus ignited, should have burnt to flame, had she not forced herself to look away.

  Wolsey’s men were still trying to hurry, pushing aside anyone who blocked their progress. Their French was not adequate to express their haste, but they showed all the signs of alarm. They too had heard of King Louis’s death and were uncertain what it meant. Their orders had been to find the queen and leave Philippa with her; following that, Philippa’s responsibility was to report to them. Unfortunately Wolsey had not taken the king’s death into account. There seemed little value to spying on a queen who was herself no longer queen. But where else should they now take their prisoner (for that was what Philippa was, their prisoner, held in Wolsey’s name)? What should they do with her? Richard, who knew the French court better than they did, and who guessed at least part of their purpose, forestalled them.

  Before they could move again, he had heeled his horse around to bar the way. He did not greet Philippa directly, still wary of what the escort meant, but he did greet them.

  ‘You go the wrong way,’ he told them drawlingly, at his most courtly. ‘If it is the former queen you seek, her residence has changed, and she is lodged under the care of the mother of the new king. You bring this lady to the wro
ng gate.’

  ‘Pretend you do not know him,’ Philippa was telling herself. ‘Say nothing to give him away.’ She stared straight in front of her as haughtily as a princess herself, while Richard discussed protocol with Wolsey’s sergeant, a man who had sworn to kill him, had he known who Richard was. ‘Do not let Richard speak to me,’ she prayed. ‘Do not let him smile.’

  Suddenly she felt his arms about her waist. Before she could protest, he had swung out of his saddle and lifted her out of hers at the same time, deftly turning so that the horse was between her and Wolsey’s guard, keeping his arm about her. ‘Step aside,’ he said brusquely, no longer smiling, ‘I will take responsibility for her.’ And he prepared to defend himself, making sure Philippa was safe behind him.

  The sergeant had swung off as readily, sword still in hand. He stiffened warily, his hackles rising, his grey eyes menacing. ‘Wolsey’s orders are—,’ he began, when Richard broke in, ‘And mine outrank them. My authority is in the king’s name.’

  It was a risky claim and he waited to be challenged. Caught between both men, each with a hand on her, Philippa felt pulled apart. Already people were stopping to stare. Always on the lookout for entertainment, in these gloomy times they welcomed it. She knew enough of etiquette to sense a new scandal brewing, but did not know how to prevent it. Nor did she know any way to keep Richard quiet, every word he said likely to reveal his identity and his past encounters with these men.

  The sergeant hid his confusion as best he could, wiping his mouth nervously. He knew what his duty was but the king’s death had changed the order of priority. Presumably he did not recognize Lord Montacune but he did recognize a king’s envoy. He might hesitate to pick an open quarrel, certainly not in such an obvious place, but Richard had no such inhibitions. If anything he had old scores to settle and he was determined to ensure that Philippa was safe. So when the sergeant began to explain their business with the queen, now that the queen was left bereft, ‘The Dowager Queen,’ Richard corrected him, ‘and you are a fool if you think to walk in upon her unannounced.’ He moved so that the sword on his hip swung dangerously. ‘The Dowager Queen is already removed from power and is immured in the House of Cluny close to the Seine. As perhaps you do not know, according to French custom she will remain in seclusion for six weeks, seeing no one, until the days of mourning are done. Or until it is clear she is not with child, which would make a mockery of this new coronation. So your haste is unnecessary. Nevertheless, for old time’s sake, I will take this lady there myself. Not you.’