Innogen noticed, of course, and as soon as the meal was cleared she said, ‘This is difficult for both of us. Go now, Martin.’
Half relieved, half resentful, I said, ‘I should. You don’t mind?’
‘No, I think it is better if you do. Besides, I’ll be asleep again soon.’ Her wry little smile lit her face. ‘That’s about all I do: sleep. Twelve hours of a night, then again in the day. Will you come again?’
‘I cannot. Welsh delights for Richard and me. Windsor first – Garter meeting – then west. Jenny, are you well? Healthy? Do you have good people? Midwives, nurses?’
‘I’m very well, just tired. Yes, good people. It would be healthier, I daresay, in the country, but my Kent lands were my father’s and the northern ones my husband’s, and I don’t care to dishonour them by going there unwed and pregnant. Later it will be different – if I choose to foster a child, well, who’s to make gossip of that? People will, of course, but it’s different. I think I might go abroad, perhaps to France or Burgundy, it’s time I cast an eye over the wool business there.’
‘And if you’re in need, if I can be of help, you will tell me? And tell me when the child’s born, even if it looks like another little Plantagenet?’
‘Of course. And if it does, I suppose I should tell Richard.’
‘He doesn’t know?’
‘No of course not.’
‘Oh. I see. Shall I tell him? Because he’ll be anxious to do the proper things, acknowledge it, provide for it and you. He will want to know.’
‘Tell him, yes. Thank you.’ She came gladly into my embrace. I felt the child moving, something I had of course heard of but hadn’t quite believed in, and quite savagely, desolately, hoped it was mine.
~~~
On the way to Windsor I planned the sensible, adult talk Richard and I would have about Innogen; friends could discuss anything, and of course nobody was actually at fault. But when I went into his rooms he was singing to himself as he studied a map of Wales. Singing. And looking like a dog with two tails. Pleased to see me, of course.
‘Martin, what fettle?’ Yorkshire idiom always meant he was on top of the world.
‘I’ve been to see Innogen Shaxper. You remember her.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Was that a faint blush under the remnants of the summer tan?
‘Yes, I just bet you do. She’s pregnant.’
His lashes flickered. Surprise, shame, guilt, wonder, all crossed his face, but the expression that came back and set up camp with banners flying was wary guilt.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I love her and you knew it – yet you fucked her.’
Probably it’s treason to hit the King’s brother, but I would have gone to the block for the pleasure of that first blow. He reeled back, blood trickling from his mouth, then launched himself on me. He was smaller than me, but just as strong and well-trained, and I’d got his temper up. I only got in that one blow before we were grappling together, punching, gouging, kicking. We rolled, fighting, neither winning, until suddenly my anger fled and I was clutching at him more for comfort than to overcome him. At once he rolled off me, and we struggled up to sit panting against the wall. To my shame I was crying. He put his arm around me.
‘Oh Martin, I’m sorry.’ He gave me his handkerchief, and I honked and spluttered for a while.
‘Sorry,’ I said at last, one word for many offences, his and mine.
‘So am I. I didn’t know you loved her.’
‘She said, Jenny said, that men value their friendships.’
‘She’s right. I do. I value yours. I love you. If I’ve lost you over this I can’t bear it.’ He stood up and held out his hand. I took it and let myself be hauled to my feet. ‘I truly didn’t know you loved her. I know it’s no excuse, but...’
‘You did know.’
‘No,’ he said gently. ‘Martin, you’ve had so many girls, and although you talked a lot about being in love... Anyway, I thought you always knew that Innogen and I... ’
‘You were first, weren’t you. While I was away with Lord Hastings.’ He nodded. ‘And later?’
‘Not once I realised you and she... Except once.’
‘She told me. We’d quarrelled.’ He looked hopelessly at me. ‘Oh, never mind. She told me how it happened. She was angry with me – and with you – angry that we decided the matter. I’m not sure I quite understand it. She wanted to choose between us.’
‘She would have chosen you. She did. She loved you, I think.’
‘Not enough, at the time.’
He had the habit of fiddling with the rings on his right hand when he was worried or unhappy. ‘I did think it was over between you; that’s all I can say. Martin, if this makes such a difference that you no longer want to stay in my service, then it is your choice. You could go into the King’s service, or Hastings’, or Norfolk’s – anyone like that would be honoured to have you. Or you could be independent, you’ve your lands, a good income, you can be an independent gentleman with your own squires. But I hope you will stay with me, for you are my best and dearest friend; always have been, since we were born.’
When it comes to it, Innogen was right, men do value their friendships. And why not, friendship is a rare and precious thing. So I said, ‘No. I’ll stay with you. After all, I’ve just got you trained to my way of doing things.’ It wasn’t much of a joke, but he took the will for the deed.
‘I’m glad, Martin.’
‘So am I. Well, how was little Katherine?’
‘Pretty, healthy, looks exactly like my father.’
‘Jenny said her child could be yours or mine. Not knowing, she refused to marry me.’
‘Then she is an honourable lady.’ His highest compliment, for he always valued honour.
‘And you’re a randy devil,’ I said without animosity.
‘Mea culpa. Are we friends?’
‘Always.’
Six
1470–1471
So much happened in the following year or so that it is hard now for me to put each incident in its place. Suffice it to say that in the early months of 1470 there seemed to be unrest and actual uprisings all over England. Warwick and Clarence busily protested their loyalty to the King, but there was no doubt they were behind the trouble. We were rather out of it over in the west, but without our military presence Wales and the western counties would have risen too. By March there was trouble in the Midlands, in Lincolnshire and in Yorkshire. Gathering an army at Grantham, the King routed the rebel forces so fast and thoroughly that the battlefield became known as Lose-Coat Field – and the badges on the jettisoned coats were those of Warwick and Clarence. It was out in the open now, even before the rebel leaders confessed. Time to settle the issue. The King sent an ultimatum to his cousin and brother: join him, or take the consequences. Choosing the latter, they fled west, and the King sent for Richard, both to bring in more men and in his capacity as Constable.
And so you see us late in March, heading north through Cheshire, hoping we won’t collide with the rebel armies. It was one of those miserable nights that make you wonder if you’ve died without noticing it. I say ‘night’ but it was really no more than dusk. All day snow had threatened; now it was raining in a spiteful sort of way, and cold as a witch’s tit. We were seasoned campaigners by then, and knew the soldier’s tricks of husbanding our strength, but we were a wretched, wet, tired troop, without the spirit to grumble.
We were still some distance from Manchester when Rob Percy lifted his head and said, ‘There’s a large force on the road ahead.’ No one else could hear anything, but Rob had the keenest ears of any man I knew. A few moments later we could all hear the sounds. A large force indeed. Richard gave the order to halt. Warwick and Clarence were in this area, each with a big army. If we had run into one of them... Battle? Flight? Death or imprisonment... Richard taken, and used as a bargaining counter against the King...
The other force rounded a bend in the road, saw us, and stopped. Rob Percy and I rode forward. Two
men from the other troop did the same. We halted a wary four paces apart, and began the who-goes-there routine. They were cagey, but so were we, and peer though I might I could make out no badges or banners. I kept my hand on my sword’s hilt (sometimes it’s useful being left-handed; people watch your right hand, giving you a tiny, vital advantage). Whoever this was, moving troops so late in the day, he had more men than us. And, heading south, they certainly weren’t going to the King.
‘Whose men are you?’ Rob called. ‘Please clear the way.’
I heard a sword being drawn, and the nock of a crossbow. Oh, marvellous. I was going to die in a roadside scuffle over right-of-way. A third man rode forward from the other troop. I recognised him, and my heart sank. Lord Stanley was Warwick’s brother-in-law. Famous turncoats, the Stanleys; it would be a fool who trusted them.
‘I demand to know who you are,’ he called.
‘We are the Duke of Gloucester’s men, on the King’s business.’
‘Gloucester – that young pup! Clear the way.’
But Richard too had ridden forward. ‘Lord Stanley!’ Thick with cold, his voice came out rasping with menace. ‘Young pup I may be, but it’s an old dog who can’t be taught new tricks. Which new trick are you having trouble learning, my lord, treachery or loyalty? Because I ride to the King, on the King’s business, and I doubt you can say the same. Be wise, Tom Stanley, and go home. Now move your men by the time I count ten, because I don’t care if I ride through you or over you, but pass down this road I will.’ He held up his hand, folding down the fingers one by one. Stanley stood his ground for five counts, then shouted an order and his troop gave way. Richard led us straight on as if they didn’t exist.
He made an enemy of Stanley, doing that, and fifteen years later he paid for it.
Stanley had in fact, we learnt, been taking that army to Warwick, but he heeded Richard’s warning and slunk off home. (And he had the brass neck to complain to the King that, peacefully going about his innocent business, he had been rudely set upon and abused by the Duke of Gloucester.)
Warwick and Clarence had been counting on Stanley. Without him they hadn’t enough men to come to battle with the King, and they fled southward.
Time, now, to pursue them.
~~~
It was in Gloucester, waiting to join with the King’s army, that I had Innogen’s letter. It came with a bundle of others, personal and official, that were handed around during a staff officers’ conference. Recognising Innogen’s arms on the seal, I took it over to the window to read it.
Briefly she wrote that she had borne a son on the sixteenth day of February. The child was baptised John after her father, had red hair, was healthy and strong. She too was well. Then followed: ‘While I cannot yet be certain about the particular matter we discussed, I believe you are not after all concerned.’ Then on a separate line came, ‘Please give my good greetings to His Grace of Gloucester.’ She had signed it, baldly, with her name; no greetings to me, no word of fondness.
Richard was droning through a report on troop numbers and supplies. I crossed the room and threw the letter into his lap. This was familiarity beyond the line in public, and I got some odd looks. But Richard had learnt in his first week at Court to school his expression; he read through the letter and handed it casually back. ‘Yes, thank you, Martin, I was waiting to hear. If you are writing, please say I am grateful for the information and send my good wishes.’ Only if you knew him very well could you see the muscle pulling in his cheek.
Finished with the report, he took up another letter. Glancing at the seal he said, ‘From John Neville.’ A moment later he yelled ‘Fucking hellfire!’ so violently his startled secretary spilt the ink.
‘Richard, what is it?’
‘The King has taken the Northumberland earldom from John Neville and restored it to Henry Percy.’
‘What!’ cried Rob Percy, whose opinion of his cousin was unrepeatable. ‘That backstabbing swine? Why, he was in prison for years for supporting the Lancastrians! The King must be off his – er, I forgot what I was going to say.’
‘Off his head,’ said Richard. ‘Harry Percy’s my cousin too, remember, and among us, gentlemen, I agree. But the thing is, while John Neville’s loyalty is not in doubt, Harry Percy’s has to be bought. Christ, think of the men Percy can raise – if he turned against us... It’s blackmail, of course – give me back my earldom or else.’
‘But what an insult to John Neville,’ Rob persisted. ‘He has been the King’s most loyal supporter, his best general – he’s just put down that Yorkshire rising, yet this is the thanks he gets. And it’s not only that – think of the lands and money that go with the Northumberland title; the rent roll alone is worth thousands. I’m sorry, Richard, but with respect I think the King has made a bad mistake. Apart from hurting a loyal man he has told others he can be bought.’
Bought by a Percy, too, I thought. For generations the Nevilles and the Percys had been rivals for power in the north; ancient enemies. And, never forget, John Neville was Warwick’s brother. Another insult. Back at Christmas the King had made John’s son Duke of Bedford and betrothed him to Lady Bess; a suitable reward, we had all thought, for a loyal man. Now I wondered if the King had always intended to do this – first the honey, then the medicine. Do you know, I felt a twinge of sympathy for Warwick? Of course I saw the difficulty for the King trying to balance all the conflicting claims and demands, but if this was a sample of his judgement – and think of his foolish marriage! – then perhaps Warwick had rebelled less from hurt pride than from real care for his country in this King’s heedless hands.
Richard said defensively, ‘Of course John Neville’s loyalty can never be doubted; the King is trying to show he knows that. People like Harry Percy have to be bought – a Neville does not. And he has made John Marquis of Montagu. But,’ he added miserably, ‘I’m afraid John is furious and hurt, in fact his letter was to beg me to make the King reverse the decision. I can’t, of course. And you’re right about the Northumberland income, Rob, because poor John says that he has been given forty pounds a year – a magpie’s nest, he calls it. Well, I’m sure it’s more than that, but still...’
And, as John Milwater said later, as we polished our armour together, the King seemed neither to know nor care what strain he put on people’s loyalty. ‘Richard wouldn’t turn against the King even if he found him eating children’s flesh – but they are brothers. It’s different for other people. And John Neville is already torn between his brother and the King. It’s all very well saying he doesn’t have to be bought, but people expect loyalty to be rewarded, it’s the way of the world. If the King goes on like this he’ll find himself with no one but Richard. Bad judgement is the same as bad luck, and people will start to wonder if Edward is any better than King Henry.’
Curiously, because he too had grown up at Middleham, I asked, ‘Would you ever turn against the King?’
Milwater brushed the blond fringe out of his eyes, thinking. Of course we were friends, but this was the most intimate conversation we had ever had. At last he said, ‘I’m loyal to Richard of Gloucester.’
‘Begging the question.’
‘Is it? Look, Martin, I used to admire Warwick beyond all other men, I loved him in fact. But I believe one must be loyal to one’s king, so I hate Warwick’s treachery. I would never go over to him or that fool Clarence, and I would certainly never turn Lancastrian; like yours, my father died with the old Duke of York. But my personal loyalty to Edward is wearing rather thin, and if the worst happened I suppose I would settle down quietly under King George. So I’ve decided that my loyalty goes with my friendship. After all the campaigning of the last six months I see that frigging White Boar banner in my sleep, but I shall go on following it while I or its owner live. Does that answer your question?’
‘Yes. And you’ve got metal polish on your face.’ I wiped it for him. ‘I feel the same way.’
‘Let’s hope the new Marquis does too,’ said John
.
~~~
If only. If only we’d been in time to stop Warwick and Clarence escaping. If only Edward had stopped the ports so they couldn’t get away to France. If only.
But they were a half-day ahead of us, and at sea by the time our army pelted into Exeter. Warwick tried to land at Southampton, but was beaten off by Anthony Woodville’s fleet. He tried Calais, but the garrison under Lord Wenlock shelled him back out to sea. Finally, late in April, he landed at Honfleur, where King Louis’s messengers were waiting to conduct them as honoured guests to the King.
Later we learnt that poor Isabel went into labour aboard the ship off Calais. Her child, a son, was born dead.
In no hurry now, Edward moved his army north. We were at York the day the King’s squire burst into our room crying for us to go to the King. Rob and I were lolling half asleep by the window, our feet up, cold ale to hand, and it took us a moment to understand what the man was saying. ‘Please – there’s trouble – it’s a matter for friends, it’s Gloucester – ’ That had us on our feet. Running after us the squire said, ‘A messenger came with letters from London, and the King read one then sent for Gloucester, and when he came the King kicked everyone else out and you can hear him shouting like he’s run mad. No one dares go in, but it is bad.’
Upstairs we had heard nothing, but down here it sounded as if the King was taking an axe to his audience chamber. He was bellowing at the top of his voice, and the few discernible words were obscenities. Rob and I shouldered through the crowd of servants and men-at-arms and knocked on the door. The King gave a yell of rage, and we heard a splintering crash. If Richard was in there, he was silent. I knocked again and this time lifted the latch. The door wasn’t bolted, and we slipped inside.
I had heard of Edward’s temper but never seen it. I hoped I never would again. The table was overturned, its contents trampled. A window was broken. A lute was smashed to firewood. A lovely old book of French songs had been ripped apart. All the plate from the sideboard was strewn on the floor, dented or broken. The hangings were in ribbons. The room stank of wine from the priceless carafe lying splintered in the hearth. At the end of the room the King rampaged, purple in the face, weeping, shouting. In his hand was a length of wood – the leg of his fine carved chair, and that chair was two-inch oak.
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