Jean Plaidy (14 page)

But there was a hint of kindliness in her stern manner now and I began to look forward to these sessions with her. Oddly enough, I began to realize that she did also.

And so I grew to know my mother-in-law-to-be and, in place of the fear and revulsion that she had at first aroused in me, there was an admiration that was tinged with affection.

I liked to hear her talk of the past and she seemed to take a certain pleasure in doing so. Perhaps she thought it was good for me to know what had happened to others so that I might become less concerned with my own fate. I think she also wanted to stop herself starting at every sound…to forget, even for half an hour, the desperate need to hear good news from England.

She made me see and feel her departure for England. I could picture her as a beautiful child, for she must have been beautiful. There were still remains of beauty to be seen and sometimes when she talked of the past and her eyes would soften in reminiscence and her lips would curl into a smile of remembering happiness, I would be struck by it.

Through her eyes I saw the brilliant cavalcade. It was a match desired by the French as well as the English.

She said, “The King of France took me into his arms and kissed me. That was when I was formally handed over to the Duke of Suffolk who had come to collect me. My parents were there and they rode with us to Bar where I had to say good-bye to them.”

“How very sad you must have been. How frightened.”

“I was sad,” she said. “I loved my parents dearly, but I knew it must be. We went to Paris. The people expressed their pleasure with enthusiasm. They love these marriages. They are a chance for revelry and they always think they will bring peace to the country. They called me the little Daisy.” She gave a short, ironic laugh. “Daisy! They do not call me that in England. Little Daisy! In England, I am the hated Jezebel. And then I met the man who…next to your father…was to be my greatest enemy.”

“Do you mean the Duke of York?”

“I do indeed, and as I talk to you now I can see his head in its paper crown on the walls of the city of York.” She had changed. She was the vindictive, hating woman when she talked of the Duke of York, father of Edward who soon, she hoped, would be replaced by her husband.

“He was a rogue, though I did not know it then. And his wife…she was worse. She gave herself airs even then.”

“They called her Proud Cis,” I said.

“Cecily, Duchess of York, would be mother of kings,” she said bitterly.

I might have reminded her that she was indeed the mother of a king, for Edward had reigned for nearly ten years.

“I had no notion then what to expect from that family,” she said. “Nor from your father. That cursed war…the War of the Roses. Roses should be beautiful ornaments. And they betrayed their king and went to war. They are going to regret it. Edward will go the way of his father.”

“Please tell me how you felt when you first saw England.”

Her eyes went hazy and a smile touched her lips, softening her face miraculously.

“The crossing! I thought I should die! And I was not the only one. I thought, I shall never see England. I forgot all my fears for the future. I thought, this is the end. This is death. They told me that as soon as my feet touched dry land the sickness would pass. It did…for some of them. But not for me. It was horrific. My face and body were covered in spots. They thought I was suffering from the small pox. I pictured myself disfigured forever. I thought, this is how my husband will see me for the first time. I was vain about my appearance. I knew that I had some beauty. Beauty is one of God's gifts. It is so useful. It wins special privileges. It is admired and treated with gentleness wherever it is. And I thought I should lose that. Beautiful people learn what a precious gift they have and once a woman has possessed it she will cling to it and cannot easily let it go. Imagine my feeling—a young girl about to lose her beauty!”

“But you did not.”

“It was not the small pox. I began to recover. My spots went as quickly as they had come, and I was myself again. I cannot explain to you the relief, not only to me but to everyone. We disembarked at Southampton and there I was told that the king's squire had brought a letter of welcome from the king. Would I receive him, they asked? How could I not receive the king's squire? He came in so respectfully. He knelt before me. I was still feeling very weak, I remember. I was seated in a chair with rugs about me.

“He was a very gentle young man with a soft, sweet expression; he was most humble. He handed me the letter and I told him that when I read it I would write to the king. They said to me afterward, ‘Did you like the squire?' and I said, ‘He seemed a most modest and worthy young man.' Then they laughed. The squire, they told me, was the king.”

“Why did he come to you thus?”

“He told me afterward that he had feared I might be scarred by the small pox and he wanted to see me first to realize how badly I was marked. He wanted to be prepared in case he was going to be very shocked, and he did not want to betray his feeling on first sight of me. Oh, he is a very gentle, kindly man, but…”

She was silent and for a long time sat staring into space, reliving it all, I supposed.

At length she said, “Alas, he was not of the nature to be a king when there were others fighting for the crown.”

The softness vanished. She was thinking of those hated men: the Duke of York, his son Edward, and most of all my father. Suddenly she seemed to remember who I was. She peered at me, frowning. “Why do I talk to you, Warwick's daughter? I hate Warwick. I hate him more than I hate the Duke of York. York is dead now. Never shall I forget the head. Have you ever seen a head without a body?”

I shuddered and shrank from her.

“It is a good sight when it is the head of one you hate. And the paper crown…that was amusing. He had so longed for our crown…Henry's crown…and it was meet and fitting that he should die ignobly wearing a crown made of paper. I see you turn from me. I am in truth a hard, cruel, wicked woman. What did they tell you of me?”

I was silent, amazed by this sudden change in her. She was a wild and passionate woman and I did not always understand her.

There was another time when she said to me, “Why do I talk to you as I do, Lady Anne? I do talk to you, do I not? Let me tell you this. You do not understand. To talk to a child is like talking to oneself. Perhaps that is it. Warwick's daughter! Daughter of the man who ruined my life. Oh, I had forgotten. He is my friend now.” Then she fell to laughing. “Oh, if only Henry were strong! I should have married a strong man…a man like Edward who calls himself King of England. A man like Warwick. What a pair we should have made! But they married me to Henry. He knows nothing of the evil ways of men. He is a stranger to evil. For him it does not exist because he does not possess it himself. He would be every man's friend, so he believes every man to be his friend. He shrinks from punishing his enemies. Oh, why am I talking to this child of matters she cannot understand?”

“I am understanding now,” I said. “You have told me so much.”

She was looking at me, but I was sure she did not see me. Her thoughts were far away.

A little later she told me about the scene in the Temple among the roses. “There was a meeting in the Temple,” she said. “It was all about the losses in France. Henry's father was the great victor. He strode through France, subduing the French. Harfleur, Agincourt, Orleans, Paris. It was all his. He would have been crowned King of France if he had not died. My Henry was in fact crowned there. And all that has been lost. They blamed it on Somerset. There will always be scapegoats. But the English were beaten because of divine intervention. It was Joan of Arc, with God's guidance, who turned the English out of France and made the poor weak dauphin a wise king. But Warwick, your father, wanted to turn my Henry from the throne and put his own king there. He wanted to show the world that he was the Kingmaker. It is your father I speak of. Do you hear me, child!”

“Yes, I know,” I said.

She looked at me and smiled suddenly, her mood changing. “And you are his daughter, a meek, fragile child. Life plays tricks. King René, my father, was a lover of peace and poetry, and he sired me. I should be more fitting to be Warwick's daughter. Is that not odd of fate, child?”

“Yes,” I said. “It is very odd.”

“I was telling you. They were at the Temple. The whole company was aware of the enmity between Somerset and your father. Warwick was blaming Somerset for the losses in France, which was nonsense. Warwick was blaming him because he knew he was my man; and Warwick was laying his plans then. I do believe that your father longed above all things to be king. He could not be, so he had to be content by making them. Somerset was a Beaufort…grandson of John of Gaunt, who was a son of Edward the Third. 'Tis true that he was born out of wedlock to Katherine Swynford, but she afterward married John of Gaunt and the children were legitimized. So you see why the Beauforts are a proud race.”

“Yes,” I said. “I have heard that.”

“They make their presence felt. Somerset despised Warwick. Where would he have been but for his marriage to Anne Beauchamp and through her getting the Warwick title and estates? To come to wealth and power in such a way does something to a man. He must forever be putting himself forward so that none may doubt that he came to greatness through his own endeavors. You may have heard the story how they walked in the gardens after the meeting, to cool their tempers perhaps, and then Warwick picked the famous quarrel with Somerset, accusing him of ambitions that I believe Somerset had never dreamed of. I knew Somerset well. They said he was my man. That was why Warwick hated him. His hatred was really directed at me.”

“Why should he have hated you, my lady?”

“Because he wanted to guide the king and I had shown that it was my place to do that. He hated me because I was strong and saw through his schemes. So he struck at Somerset…my best friend…but he meant the blow for me. There in the gardens he accused Somerset of bringing defeat and humiliation to the country. He talked of the great victories of the king's father, which had been brought to nothing.”

I shivered. I had heard so many times of the encounter in the rose gardens. But always from the other side. It was Somerset who was the enemy: Somerset who had lost the territories in France, who was the tool of that virago, the queen—who was now our friend.

“It is clear why Warwick was for York. There are blood ties between them. He wanted to set a king of his choosing on the throne because he knew I would never allow him to govern Henry.

“It became clear in the gardens that day that Warwick was planning the destruction of the House of Lancaster, and wanted to set up York in its place. Somerset, on sudden impulse, plucked one of the red roses and held it high. The red rose is the symbol of our House of Lancaster, just as the white is that of York. Somerset said, ‘I pluck this red rose, the symbol of the House of Lancaster, which I serve with my life.'”

“I know,” I said. “And then my father picked a white rose and said, ‘This is the white rose of York. Let every man take the rose of his choice. Then we shall know who is with us and who against us.'”

“Ah. You have heard the story. Who in this kingdom has not? And that was it. The stage was set. The War of the Roses had begun.”

“Madam,” I said. “Are you well?”

I thought she looked as though she were going to faint. She was lying back in her chair, exhausted. I knelt beside her and she put out a hand and touched my hair. That was unusual, for she was not given to affectionate gestures.

“Warwick's girl,” she murmured. “Why do I talk thus to Warwick's girl?”

We sat in silence for some minutes and then I knew that, although I was Warwick's daughter, she no longer hated me.

         

Although I could not cast off my terrible fears of the future, my strange relationship with Queen Margaret did help to make the days more tolerable. We were all wondering what was happening. How was my father faring? Where, I asked myself, were Isabel and my mother?

I often thought about Richard. What was he doing now? What was he thinking? He would be a staunch supporter of his brother and therefore my father's bitter enemy. It was all so unexpected. My father had been one of the heroes of his youth. He had often betrayed his admiration for him and I think he had ranked only second, after his brother of course, in his estimation. And did he ever spare a thought for me?

It seemed incredible that everything should have changed so suddenly and in such a manner.

Queen Margaret was growing more and more impatient for news.

“So many things have gone wrong in my life,” she said. “Sometimes I fear that nothing will ever come right.”

I did not know what to think. I must be loyal to my father, but if he were victorious Richard must be defeated; and the outcome of my father's victory must be the marriage I dreaded.

As the days passed I thought more and more of the ordeal before me. I could not like what I had seen of the prince. Moreover, I could not forget that I had heard of his asking for those executions and his sitting watching with apparent satisfaction while heads were severed. It was terrifying.

He had been only young. Eight, they said. And he would have been brought up to hate his enemies. But at the same time I was deeply disturbed.

I wanted to find out more about him and it was not difficult to lure the queen into talking of him, for he was her favorite topic of conversation. I was realizing more and more what a sad and frustrating life she had led. She cared more deeply for her son than she ever had for anyone else. All her hopes were in him. She was prepared to make any sacrifice for him, and while she hated her enemies so fiercely, even more intensely did she love him.

I was developing a fondness for the queen. True, I was greatly in awe of her and at times the fierceness in her eyes repelled me, but now that she was talking to me with a certain frankness and making me see the sadness of her life, I realized how events had affected her, and I began to make excuses for her.