Katherine

by Anya Seton

  Here he lit a candle to the Virgin and knelt down to pray, hoping as he had each day since Berwick to lift thereby the oppression in his heart. He would whisper the Ave over and over like an incantation and often found comfort in it, but the painted wooden features of this Virgin had in them something of Katherine in the demure lowered lids, the faintly cleft chin, the high rounded forehead, and he turned away from Her in sharp pain.

  There was no image of St. Catherine in this chapel so he could not properly renew the vow he had already made, but he repeated it at the end of his prayers. “If I find my Katrine safe and unharmed, I vow to build a chapel to Saint Catherine on any place in my lands that the Blessed Saint shall designate.” He kissed the crucifix on his beads and rose.

  He went restlessly upstairs to the Hall, where his knights had gathered, some drinking, some dicing, while de la Pole and Neville were engaged in an acrimonious game of chess. The Hall was fetid and smoky from the old-fashioned fire over which the varlets were roasting a bullock; John, glancing in, changed his mind and continued up the stairs to the leaded roof of the keep. The watch, a burly man-at-arms with pike and longbow, was circling it slowly, but John dismissed him. He wanted to be alone.

  He leaned his elbows on the parapet in one of the square towers, breathed deeply of the fresh summer air and let his disconsolate gaze wander from the golden furze-covered moors to the north, to the shipping below in the harbour, and on down the pewter-coloured ribbon of the Tyne as it wound into distance towards the sea. He turned slowly to the west where he could see the straight grassy ditch, the mounds and scattered stones of the Roman wall, and he thought of the ages that had streamed by since it was built, and wondered with drear melancholy what had become of the men who built it. Where were their plans and hopes now, what difference had their joys or sufferings made to England? He thought of those of his own blood who had gazed at this ancient wall, his father - all the Plantagenets, and far back to the days of King Arthur himself. In Arthur’s reign there had been love-longing and wanhope too and there had been evil to be conquered. But the old tales told of glorious battle against these evils, for there were dragons and giants to be fought in those days, not creeping little jealousies and darting slanders that scurried like spiders into cover when one tried to confront them. He thought with great bitterness of the humiliating, ludicrous outcome of his challenge to Percy, and there rose in him a loathing of Fate that constantly blocked him and denied his deepest wishes.

  The sun turned red as blood above the Roman wall and sank down towards the wild desolate moors behind, leaving a sudden chill that struck through John. He turned away and looked down into the castle ward, where his eye was caught by something familiar in a figure that was mounting the long flight of outstairs into the keep beneath. He leaned over the parapet and stared again, then shouted in amazement, “Ho there! You in the brown hood and cloak, look up!”

  The man paused on a step, stared around to find the voice until finally, raising his head, he saw the Duke and waved. It was indeed Geoffrey Chaucer, and John’s heart beat faster. “Come up here to me!” he called. Geoffrey nodded and disappeared into the keep, and presently came out on to the tiles through a tower door.

  The Duke’s hand trembled as he held it out: Geoffrey kissed it while he bent his knee, saying with a faint smile, “Your Grace, I’ve been a long time a-finding you.”

  “Indeed?” said John, afraid now to ask the question that beat against his lips.

  “Ay, my lord. A fortnight ago when you were - ah - detained in Scotland I tried to pass into Northumberland, but was turned back. I waited at Knaresborough until word came that you were at last on your way south.”

  “Knaresborough,” John repeated, and could not hide his bitter disappointment. “To be sure,” he said dully. “Your wife is there, I suppose, in the Duchess’ train.”

  “She is, and I’ve spent some time with Philippa, but ‘twas not for that I came north. My lord,” said Geoffrey slowly, touching the pouch that hung from his waist, “I bring you a letter from Lady Katherine.”

  The Duke’s indrawn breath was sharp as tearing silk. He grabbed Geoffrey by the shoulders. “She’s well then? And unharmed?”

  Geoffrey nodded, but looked away because he could not bear the leap of joy and sudden glistening in the blue eyes.

  “Thank God!” the Duke whispered. “Thank God! Thank God and the Blessed Saint Catherine!” He seized Geoffrey’s hand, “Oh, Chaucer, you shall be well rewarded for this news. Name what you like. Never did I know how dear she was to me till these last days. In fear and suffering I’ve longed for her - longed-” He broke off. “And where is she now?”

  “I don’t know, my lord,” said Geoffrey, looking down at the leaded tiles. He unbuckled his pouch and drew out a folded parchment. “You would better be alone when you read this,” he said quickly. “I’ll wait in the little wall chamber in case you should want me.”

  The happy flush died on the Duke’s lean cheeks as Geoffrey disappeared into the tower. He broke the seal on Katherine’s letter and read it by the light of the dying sun.

  Geoffrey waited in the wall chamber until Newcastle’s bells rang out for curfew and the sky through the arrow-slit window showed amethyst. He heard his name called at last and went back up to the tiles.

  In the evening light the Duke’s face now loomed white as ashes, his voice was thick and halting as he said, “Do you know what’s in this letter?”

  “Ay, my lord. But no one else does, nor ever shall.”

  “She cannot mean to give me up like this. She cannot! I don’t believe it. She says farewell - that we must never meet again. This coldness, these incredible commands! She who was so warm and soft, who has lain so often in my arms, who has borne my children!” The hollow voice faltered, after a moment went on with a sharper edge. “She speaks of Blanchette. You’d think she had no child but Blanchette!”

  “‘Tis I think, my lord,” Geoffrey ventured, “because of the terror she feels for the little maid, who may be dead. She has not forgot her other children, but they are in no need.”

  “I am in need,” cried the Duke. “She thinks not of that!”

  Geoffrey, profoundly disliking this whole coil and his unwilling part in it, yet forced himself to go on. “It is because she loves you that she must give you up. Brother William told her this before he was killed. She believes it. And I, my lord, have come to believe it too. The load of sin, and now the knowledge of murder done would crush you both in the end.”

  John turned away from Geoffrey and looked out over the parapet into the night of shadows. So it was Swynford’s murder that the martyred Grey Friar had meant in all those strange allusions through the years. Nirac, poor little rat - a monstrous sneaking crime in truth - poison - the coward weapon. Sickening. And yet - so long ago, and Nirac had been shriven of his crime by the Grey Friar. The little Gascon’s soul was not imperilled. It was Katherine’s and his souls that were in danger - so Katherine believed.

  “By God,” he said roughly, crumpling up her letter, “if fate wills it that we are to be damned, then we shall be damned. I’ll not give Katherine up. Where is she, Chaucer?”

  “Gone on pilgrimage, my lord.”

  “Ay - but to where?”

  “I don’t know, upon my honour. She would not tell. She doesn’t wish you to find her.”

  “Then God help me, she may have set out for Rome - for Jerusalem even!”

  Geoffrey was silent. He thought it possible that Katherine had set forth on the longest and harshest pilgrimage of all. He cleared his throat unhappily, for he had not yet discharged all of Katherine’s anguished message. “Your Grace - one more thing she bade me tell you. It is not in the letter because she could not bring herself to write it.” He stopped, remembering how her control had broken down at last after she had given him the letter to the Duke, how she had covered her face while the tears coursed down between her fingers.

  “What is that one more thing?” said the Duke’s vo
ice from the shadows.

  “She prays you, my lord - by the love you have borne her - to - to ask the Duchess to forgive her. Yes - I know, my lord,” said Chaucer quickly as he heard a sharp exclamation, “but this is what she said. Matters have gone badly with you for a long time, and that is the earthly punishment for murder and adultery. The murder cannot be undone but the adultery must cease. She says that you both have wronged the Duchess - who she thinks loves you in her fashion, as truly as Hugh Swynford was wronged who loved Katherine too - as best he could.”

  “Blessed Jesu! Now I know you lie! Before God, Chaucer, ‘tis not for naught you are a spinner of tales!”

  Geoffrey stepped back quickly, the Duke had turned on him as though he would strike.

  “I’ve not invented her letter, my lord,” Geoffrey cried.

  “Her letter!” The Duke’s voice shook with fury, he crushed the parchment between his hands and flung the ball violently away from him over the parapet. “That I should live to see Katherine treat me like this! Dismiss me like a thieving scullion, with rantings about morality! She dares send you to prate of love that Swynford bore her! By God, ‘tis late times to think of that. What has she been doing there in the south when I thought her tending to her child? She found some pretty youth like Robin Beyvill maybe to while the time away. ‘Tis because of him she can turn me off so lightly!”

  “My lord, my lord,” whispered Chaucer, retreating farther along the roof while his palms began to sweat. “You do her terrible wrong.”

  “Wrong, wrong!” shouted the Duke. “All this babbling of wrong. She vowed she’d never leave me - she has broke it - as did Isolda - lies! She cozened me all these years with lies. It’s plain now to see she never loved me. Ah,” he said with a laugh like the crackle of burning briars, “Katherine Swynford has no need to hide from me, no need at all, for I shall never forgive this, nor try to find her.”

  The next morning the Duke and his retinue left Newcastle. Chaucer rode at the end of the line and kept far out of the Duke’s way, knowing that it would be long, if ever, before he was pardoned for bringing Katherine’s message. Geoffrey bore no ill will. It was natural that a man like Lancaster should convert the blow to his love and pride into rage, but Geoffrey had not expected so dreadful a rage and he pondered on what could lie behind it, and at the reference to Isolda that the Duke had let fall. There was no woman of that name had ever been mentioned in regard to the Duke whose fidelity, indeed, to Katherine had been remarkable. There was no doubt that he deeply loved her, the very violence of his actions proved it. And what a miserable quick-march these two ill-starred lovers had plunged into.

  When they had reached central Yorkshire and the Duke’s own lands, at last they approached Knaresborough, and saw the castle high on its crag above the river Nidd. While they wound through the limestone gorge with its honeycomb of caves, towards the ford, Chaucer looked up and saw a procession of eight women, amongst whom he recognised the Duchess and his Philippa, slowly wending down the twisting cliffside from the castle. The Duchess was dressed in garnet satin embroidered with flashing gold, and she wore her jewelled coronet above a flowing gold veil.

  The Duke and his retinue forded the river and when they all reached the grassy bank, the Duchess came walking slowly forward, a tentative beseeching look in her dark eyes and a faint flush on her ivory face. She waited trembling while the Duke dismounted, but as he came towards her the Duchess threw herself headlong on the grass and began to sob convulsively.

  The Duke leaned over and lifted her up, and she seized his hands and covered them with kisses. “Mi Corazon - -” she cried and went on in gasping Spanish, “I have been so frightened, and I thought never to see you again!”

  A peculiar shuttered expression dimmed the Duke’s eyes, a muscle by his mouth quivered. He bent and kissed her on the forehead. “Well, now we are together and all will be well,” he answered in Spanish. “Where is our little Catalina?”

  “At the castle. I kept her back, my lord. Sometimes you do not wish to see her.”

  The Duke bent his head, beneath his richly embroidered cote his broad shoulders sagged. “I am eager to see her.”

  “We may stay here a few days, may we not?” she said timidly. “But indeed where can I go now? Hertford is destroyed - ah, Sant’ Iago - it was terrible - you do not know how frightened we were.”

  “Pobrecita,” said the Duke. “Poor Costanza - -” He pulled her hand through his arm and they walked off together up the path to the castle.

  Chaucer too dismounted and went over to his own wife. “God’s greeting, Pica,” he said, pinching Philippa on the cheek. “Here I am again. I vow we ne’er saw so much of each other in the south.”’

  Philippa nodded and gave him a brief preoccupied smile. “Did you give His Grace Katherine’s stupid letter?” she asked quickly. Philippa did not of course know what was in the letter except that her sister had gone off on pilgrimage and would tell nobody where.

  “Ay. And he was much angered.”

  “Small wonder,” said Philippa twitching. “She’s no more sense than a sheep. I’ve always said it. She’ll lose him with this monstrous behaviour and then where will we all be! What if she was frightened at the Savoy! Now that one” - she jerked her head towards the disappearing figure of the Duchess - “she was frightened too, but it’s made her softer, gentler. She’s taken pains to please him again. Bathes each morning, has us rub her with scented oils, and put on silk shifts instead of that hair shirt she used to wear. I tell you, Geoffrey, since the Castilian king who murdered her father is dead, she’s been changing. She thinks more about the Duke. Katherine had better not play fast and loose or she’ll lose out.”

  “Yes, my Pica, she may,” said Geoffrey in the quiet edged tone that always daunted her. “I think you must make up your mind to it. We are all out of favour with the Duke.”

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  On the twenty-third of June, while the Duke was yet in Scotland, Katherine was housed in the pilgrim hostel at Waltham Abbey where she had limped in, sore-footed and deadly tired, two days ago. It was not for the luxury of rest that Katherine lingered these two days, but because Waltham was part of her penance. She spent hours in the abbey praying for the repose of Hugh’s soul and asking his forgiveness, while she knelt on the exact spot where his sword had clattered down before the black cross. She went to the inn, The Pelican, where she had passed her wedding night, and forced herself to relive the degradation and the hatred she had felt. Worse than hatred, Katherine thought now - a smouldering secret contempt that had shrivelled in time Hugh’s self-respect, and his manhood.

  Remorse, guilt and punishment - Katherine steeped herself in these by day, and at night her dreams were of spurting blood.

  There were no other pilgrims at the hostel; though June was usually prime month for journeying to shrines throughout the country, the revolt and its consequent dangers had quenched most folks’ wish for the open road.

  Instead, the hostel housed several of the homeward-bound peasants. In the dingy low-raftered hall where all travellers might buy ale and brown bread for a penny a day, Katherine heard much anxious talk.

  A penitential pilgrim in widow’s weeds was a common sight along the various Palmers’ Ways and drew only respectfully indifferent glances, while she was plunged so deep into her own misery that she noticed nothing. But when after Mass she broke her fast on the Sunday morning when she intended to set forth again towards Walsingham, the loud troubled voices of the men around the trestle tables aroused her attention. She heard them repeatedly mentioning the King. There had been a proclamation. The King was coming here today, to Waltham.

  What was he coming for? cried a blacksmith. Why, to hand out the rest of the charters of freedom, of course, answered someone against a chorus of uneasy assent. It was known that in London the King’s men had punished some of the rebels: Jack Strawe had been caught, tortured and beheaded - still, that was natural, for they said he had confessed to treason. Jack Strawe�
��s end could not affect the freedom from bondage and general pardon that the King had granted at Mile End.

  “Nay,” cried the blacksmith in hearty reassurance, “by this Holy Cross of Waltham here, we must ne’er forget how true a friend our little King did prove himself. He gave us his royal word: ‘tis as good as Holy God’s.”

  Katherine listened for some time without attending. She had no interest in the rebels now, though she had put to them one question on her arrival here. Had any of them taken part in the burning of the Savoy? They all said “Nay” except one Suffolk lad who proudly said that he had, and a rare fine sight it had been, too.

  “Did you see anything of a little maid with close-cropped hair, a lass of fourteen in a grey chamber robe?” Katherine asked, as she had asked this so many times already.

  But the Suffolk lad said “Nay” again, though there was such a mort of people running about he wouldn’t know one from t’other. The maid she asked about would be one of the house carls, no doubt? ‘Twas certain they had all fled long before the place was fired.

  Katherine had thanked him with weary patience.

  Suddenly now, at mention of the King’s name, her detachment was pierced by a forlorn hope. Might it be that Richard had heard something of Blanchette? True, he had seen the girl but once, at Leicester Castle, yet there was a chance.

  When the band of peasants surged from the hostel towards an open heath in Waltham forest, Katherine followed, as did a crowd of villagers. The open heath was shaded by the close-pressing greenwood with its lofty hornbeams and beeches, and the people had need of shade from the broiling sun, for they waited long, before they heard the royal trumpets and the pound of galloping hooves approaching down the forest road.