Jean Plaidy (23 page)

Isabel did say, “Anne, I think you are beginning to realize that George is right.”

I nodded and hung my head.

“He is, when all is said, only trying to do what is best for you. He has your welfare at heart.”

Still I did not answer. I was amazed at my duplicity, but I did have to keep reminding myself that I must not betray by the slightest word or gesture that I was contemplating flight.

There was a great deal of revelry in the hall that night, as was the custom when the Duke of Clarence was present. The long tables were filled with retainers—and there were all the squires and pages who were considered necessary to the comfort of the diners.

The minstrels were playing in the gallery as the scullions and serving men and women hurried back and forth to the kitchens.

The duke was seated at the center of the table on the dais and Isabel was on his right hand, I on his left.

He was very merry and I noticed that now and then he put out a hand to caress Isabel. She was smiling and happy. My heart was pounding. I longed to be free to go to my chamber and be conducted to the waiting carriage.

Clarence was particularly affable to me. I think Isabel must have told him that I had come to my senses and that I understood I should be wise to obey my guardian and be a docile ward in the future.

He was drinking heavily, I noticed, but he frequently did. He called for a song. It was about love and he listened with a sentimental gleam in his eyes.

He patted my hand. “Anne,” he said. “My dear little sister. I am going to see that all is well for you. Your welfare is one of my greatest concerns. You know that, do you not?”

He put his face close to mine and I said, “I know that you think of my future, my lord.”

“You are my dear wife's sister, and everything concerning her is dear to my heart. Come. Drink with me…to our happy future. Wine…wine…good Malmsey wine for the Lady Anne.”

One of the men filled my goblet.

“To the future,” said Clarence. “Our friendship, Anne, yours and mine. It is as steady as a rock and always will be. Come, you are not drinking. I want to see the contents of that goblet go down. Otherwise I shall think you are not sincere with me.”

I forced myself to drink.

“There. Now we are friends. Did you see that, Isabel? Anne and I understand each other. So no more anxiety, my dear, on our account.”

“Anne knows that you are concerned for her good,” said Isabel, “do you not, Anne?”

“I know that my lord duke is concerned for my future,” I said ambiguously.

“Well,” said Clarence, “let us have another song. Tell those minstrels. This time a merry roundalay.”

So they sang and some danced and it seemed a long time before I could escape to my chamber.

Once I was there, I put on a cloak and waited, but not for long. There was a gentle rap on the door.

“Are you ready, my lady?” She spoke in a whisper. “Bring nothing. Those are my lord's orders.”

“I am ready.”

“Then come.”

I followed her down the spiral staircase. Quietly we went. I was praying that we should meet no one on the way.

We were fortunate and reached the courtyard unseen. We sped across it…out through the gate…and there was the carriage waiting.

She opened the door and I stepped in.

“God's speed, my lady,” she said, and ran back through the courtyard. And I was jolting along, away from captivity…away from the Duke of Clarence.

A drowsiness began to creep over me. I could scarcely keep my eyes open. So listless did I feel that I did not even begin to wonder why, when at a time like this I should expect to be particularly alert.

The carriage had stopped. The driver descended and looked in.

“Are you comfortable, my lady?” he asked.

“Yes. Have we arrived?”

“Not yet. We've a little way to go.”

“Where are we going?”

“Can't say. Waiting for instructions. All's well. Take a little nap. You'll soon be there…where they will be waiting to welcome you.

I closed my eyes. It was so easy to slip into sleep.

         

I awoke suddenly. I could not remember for the moment what had happened. Then my mind cleared. I was in the carriage going to the sanctuary where I should meet Richard.

I sat up. I was not in the carriage. I was in a small room…an attic room. There were rushes on the floor and I was lying on a pallet. There was an unusual smell. Later I recognized it as rancid grease and other unpleasant ingredients.

I put my hand to my throat and touched the coarse material of my gown. But when I had left I had been wearing a velvet dress and cloak. I was supposed to be meeting Richard. I must be dreaming. I tried to shake off the dream but it was becoming like a nightmare.

The unfamiliar room…the unfamiliar dress…I could hear the sound of voices below…shouting, raucous voices…and horses' hoofs. I was in a street.

I called out, “Who's there? Where am I?”

A woman who had been sitting in the shadows stood up and came over to me.

“You all right, Nan?” she asked.

“Nan?” I asked.

“You had one of your turns.”

“I'm not Nan.”

“No,” she said. “Not that again. We're getting tired of your fancies, Nan. Let's stop it, eh?”

“I cannot understand what you are talking about. What am I doing here? I was in the carriage going to sanctuary.”

She laughed.

“Anything to get away from the pots and pans, I see. And don't give yourself such airs. Talk proper like the rest of us. We've just about had enough of you showing off, just because you was once a lady's maid to some grand lady…and ever since you've been aping her. We don't swallow that, Nan. We never did. You're just Nan. Now get up and down to that kitchen. If you're quick, you might be in time for a crust of bread and a sup of ale.”

A terrible fear was creeping over me. I said, “Do you know that I'm the Lady Anne Neville?”

“Yes,” she said. “And I'm His Grace of Canterbury. Come on, up with you.”

I rose unsteadily to my feet. I noticed that one side of the room sloped down to the floor.

I said, “Please tell me what has happened. I left Warwick Court in the carriage. What happened? I must have gone to sleep.”

“Asleep and dreaming, that's what you've been doing…when you ought to have been washing them pans. There's work to be done in the kitchen, my girl. The place don't run itself.”

“Oh, God help me,” I prayed. “I am going mad.”

I was given a push that sent me reeling against the wall. I turned to the woman appealingly. “Will you please tell me what this means? Who brought me here? Where are my clothes? Will you tell me where I am?”

“You're out off your mind, Nan, that's what you are. You know where you are and where you've been this last month. Sometimes I think you're truly addle-pated. We don't believe your stories about you being this and that great lady. Stop it, Nan, or people 'ull say you're really off your head. You won't know the difference twixt what is and what ain't.”

She pushed me toward the door. It opened onto a flight of stairs and, seizing my arm, she made me descend them with her.

We went along a dark corridor and another door was opened. I was dazzled by the light that came from a window through which I glimpsed a yard containing several tall bins.

I blinked and saw that I was in a kitchen. A man was standing against a bench. His shirt was open at the front, disclosing a hairy chest, and there was a black fuzz of hair on his arms. He was tall, commanding-looking and he surveyed me with some interest.

“Oversleeping again,” said the woman.

“I demand to know where I am and who brought me here,” I cried.

There were two girls, one plump with a saucy, laughing face, the other small, pale and insignificant.

The saucy one pranced into the center of the room and said, “I demand to know where I am and who brought me here,” in an attempt to imitate my voice.

“Who are you today, sweeting?” said the man.

“What do you mean?”

“Lady Muck or Madam Slosh?” asked the saucy one.

I was staring at them aghast. I had been the victim of a conspiracy. It was becoming obvious to me that there had been some diabolic plot and these people were involved in it.

I said, “I am the Lady Anne Neville. I left Warwick Court, as I thought, for sanctuary. Will you take me there immediately?”

The tall man bowed. “My lady, your carriage awaits,” he said.

“Where is it?” I asked, and they burst into laughter.

“Here,” said the saucy girl. “We've had enough of this. Don't stand there. Will your ladyship get on with washing them pans? They'll be wanted for the midday trade.”

I had never washed pans. I did not know how to begin. The thin girl was at my side. She said, “'Ere, I'll give you a 'and.”

I heard someone say, “She is going to faint or something.”

I was pushed into a chair. The kitchen was swimming around me. Thoughts chased each other through my mind. The girl who had told me that she had a message from Richard…the attentions of Clarence as he had sat beside me…his favorite Malmsey wine, which he had insisted on my drinking. Yes, it was a plot…a dastardly plot. It had nothing to do with Richard.

There had been something in the wine to make me drowsy, to dull my senses; the driver of the carriage had waited until it had had its effect so that I should not know where I was being taken. And they had brought me here to this dreadful place. Richard would not know where I was.

As the horror of my situation dawned upon me, I felt numb with terror. All these dreadful people around me were involved. They were trying to tell me I was not myself, that I belonged here. I was someone called Nan.

I felt my whole life slipping away from me. I was a prisoner in this frightening place. I was caught, trapped in a conspiracy devised by the Duke of Clarence.

         

Even now when I look back at that time, I find it hard to believe it ever happened to me. It was so wildly melodramatic and there were times during that terrible period when I found it difficult to cling to sanity, and they almost convinced me that I was mad.

I would whisper to myself: I am Lady Anne Neville. I am the daughter of the Earl of Warwick. I am betrothed to Richard, Duke of Gloucester. These people are liars, all of them. They are playing parts that have been written for them as in a play. Why? And who is the playwright?

I knew, of course. It was Clarence. He was my enemy, our enemy: mine and Richard's. He was going to prevent our marriage at all costs. That was why he had put me here. To be rid of me? But why send me here? Why could he not simply have killed me? Because he dared not? Richard was my protector. Clarence was the king's brother—but so was Richard.

What if Clarence ordered these people to kill me? They could bury my body somewhere here, or throw it into the river, and no one would hear of me again.

I was in a state of numbness for two days; after that, growing a little accustomed to my dismal background, my mind roused itself from its hopeless lethargy and I began to consider what I might do.

I was forced to work by threats of physical violence from the woman whom I had first seen when I had awakened in these sordid surroundings. I had to try to play the part assigned to me—that of kitchen maid.

I discovered that I was in a cookshop that sold meat pies. I was carefully watched and never allowed out of the kitchen when the shop was open. The two girls served the customers.

I had to watch the meat on the spits and wash the pots and pans. I was no good at it. I would be forced to stand at a tub with hands thrust in greasy water up to my elbows, scouring the utensils used for cooking. The big woman would call to me to fetch this and that, and as I did not know what she was talking about in those first days I was clumsy and inadequate. I was constantly being called a dolt, a fool. Addle-pate was the favorite epithet; and even if I had realized what was expected of me, it was difficult to understand their speech, which was very different from that to which I was accustomed.

I began to know something of these people. The man spent his time between the kitchen and the shop. His name was Tom. He, with his wife Meg, were the owners of the shop. She was the woman whom I had first seen on awakening. Then there were the two girls—Gilly, the bold one, and Jane, the other.

I was aware that all of them watched me with a certain furtiveness, which raised my spirits a little. I felt it implied that they all knew I was not this Nan and had been brought here against my will, and that they had been instructed to obey the orders they had received. They had to pretend that I had been with them for some time and that I was addle-pated Nan who dreamed of grandeur because I had once been a lady's maid to a rich woman.

At first I had insisted that I was Lady Anne Neville and that a message should be sent to the Duke of Gloucester telling him where I was.

They had jeered at that.

“The Duke of Gloucester? Did you hear that?”

“Aye, I heard. 'Tis a wonder she stoops so low. Why not to her friend, the king?”

I said, “Yes…yes. Send to the king. Tell the king. Then you will see.”

“Perhaps he'll send his crown for you to wear,” suggested Gilly.

That was not the way. I must find out what this meant. I must delude them. I must be quiet and watchful. I must try to find a way of getting out of this place.

The two girls, Gilly and Jane, slept in a room similar to mine. I slept alone, which was significant, and every night my door was locked, I knew, because I had thought to steal out of the place when they were asleep. I could only be locked in at night because they wanted to prevent my escape. I guessed they dared not let me escape.

In those first days I had eaten little. I could not bear the food that was offered. I was not prepared to eat with them. Their manners sickened me.