The Queen of Last Hopes (7 page)

It has been achieved, your grace. François de Surienne has taken Fougères. It took place on the twenty-fourth day of March.”

Henry sighed, and I wondered again if he were having second thoughts about my proposal. It seemed a good one at the time: We would start by seizing Fougères, a wealthy town on the border of Brittany, through the agency of Surienne, an Aragonese mercenary in the pay of England. We would then restore Gilles of Brittany to a position of influence and build an alliance between Brittany and England that could be used as a bargaining tool against the French should they be inclined to attempt to win back Normandy now that they had Maine. It was a risky plan, I’d freely admitted to Henry, but ceding Maine had not proven the path to peace. The troops who left Maine had settled on the border between Brittany and Normandy, irritating King Charles, and the English had their own complaints of violence from the French. Brittany was a necessary ally, and the council had agreed. Something had to be done. After much consideration and prayer, Henry had given his consent as well. Much as he wanted peace with his and Margaret’s uncle, he did not want to lose Normandy. When he learned that no lesser a person than Charles VII himself had ordered the arrest of Gilles of Brittany—a longtime friend of not only Henry, but of the interests of England—the matter had been settled.

“Well, what is done is done,” Henry said aloud. “I shall write to him telling him to keep it diligently and to keep his troops in good order for its safety and defense, and you shall do the same.”

“Yes, your grace.” I lingered, having the feeling that the king was not done with me.

“I have not told Margaret about this,” Henry said after a moment or two. Whenever he spoke the name “Margaret,” an undertone of affection entered his voice. It made me feel all the more protective of him, and of her. “Do you think I should tell her that we were behind the seizure? I know she feels it deeply that ceding Maine has not had the results we hoped for. Poor girl, her uncle no longer even writes to her.”

“I would keep it to myself.”

“Then I shall,” Henry said, an unhappy look on his face. “Suffolk, there is something underhanded about this I have never liked.”

“I know, your grace. I don’t like it much myself. But sometimes such means are necessary. If only Maine had worked out better for us.”

“If only,” Henry said sadly.

***

If only
, the two saddest words in the English language. If only Margaret’s grandmother, Yolande, had never taken Charles VII under her wing years before and helped him to the French throne. If only the Maid of Orléans had never invigorated Charles. If only Henry V had lived to an old age. If only the Duke of Brittany, following the seizure of Fougères, had not declared himself a vassal of France and appealed to Charles to aid him against us. If only Charles, seizing the opportunity to be relieved from a truce that had long ceased to be of advantage to him, had not declared that the seizure of Fougères had broken it. For that was what happened. On July 31, 1449, England and France were again at war, and Henry’s dream of peace—the dream I had supported for years—was shattered.

If only I had fallen at Jargeau with my brothers. It would have been better for us all.

Rouen has fallen, your grace.”

I looked into Suffolk’s face and saw that it was as gray as the November sky that hung over Greenwich. “Would you believe me if I told you that I was very, very sorry?”

“I would. I do.”

“I thank you for that. Few others would believe me. The king, you and your duchess, and my ladies are the only people who do not treat me as a potential spy.” I sighed. “I have not heard from anyone in my family since war broke out. I dare not ask anyone else this. Do you know whether my father has joined King Charles’s men?”

“Yes. He, your brother, and your brother-in-law were all at the siege. They were all there when Rouen fell. ‘Fallen’ is the wrong term, actually. Somerset put up only a token fight before he surrendered it. Not only did he surrender it, he also has had to agree to surrender Harfleur, Caudebec, Arques, Tancarville, Lillebonne, and Montivilliers as well. Oh, and Lord Talbot and a few others will have to stay in Rouen as hostages. It’s a debacle.”

“Sit, my lord. You look ghastly.”

Suffolk obeyed. His hand when he picked up the cup of wine my servant offered him was shaking.

“Why did he surrender it so easily?” I asked.

“They say he had no real choice. The citizens there would have cooperated with Charles. They were fearful of being besieged and having the town sacked. They would have offered him no support and might have even put him and his family in danger. Somerset’s very fond of his wife and children; there are risks he would take for himself that he wouldn’t for them. Anyway, he and his family are off to Caen now.”

“There must be some way to prevent further losses.”

“We are trying to get troops over. I’ve lent money to the crown. So have others. Of course, in my case it’s the least I can do, having put us into this situation with my mad scheme about Fougères.”

I shook my head. “That was rather foolish, my lord.”

Suffolk’s bleak face lit up with a half-smile. “That’s almost refreshing to hear, your grace. Alice tells me not to brood upon it, and the king tells me he knows I meant well. And I suppose it was capable on paper of succeeding. But it did not, and I will have to live with the consequences of my folly forever. As will others, including your grace. These past few weeks can’t have been easy for you.”

“No one understands that I love Henry and would never rejoice in something that has brought him—and you, my lord—so much misery. They think that all of this delights me, and they could not be more wrong. I am wretched. With this war if I hope for my husband to prevail, my father will suffer, and if I hope for my father and my uncle to prevail, my husband will suffer. There is nothing I have wanted as much as peace.”

I sighed so deeply that Suffolk roused himself out of his own misery to say, “We mustn’t give up hope yet, your grace. With reinforcements, we might be in a better bargaining position. But I must get back to Parliament. I came here only to tell you the news.”

“No one tells me anything these days. I am grateful to you.”

Suffolk tried to smile. “That is a sentiment, your grace, in which you are entirely alone.”

Between Suffolk and others lending the crown money and Henry—and I—pledging some of our plate and jewels, we managed to come up with enough money to pay the men who had gathered at Portsmouth, waiting to embark under Sir Thomas Kyriell to fight in France. As their pay was far in arrears, their mood was ugly, and it was made uglier on New Year’s Day when Harfleur—whose captain had refused to comply with Somerset’s orders to surrender it to the French—fell.

Adam Moleyns, Bishop of Chichester, arrived at Portsmouth on January 9, 1450, bearing the men’s back pay. Henry saw him off on his mission with relief. “How glad they will be to finally get paid.”

Instead, they dragged the bishop out of his lodgings and took out their anger on him. When all was over, the Bishop of Chichester lay face down in the mud in a field near Portsmouth, his skull shattered.

***

“They are saying that with his dying breath, the bishop denounced me as a traitor who sold Maine and Normandy to the French,” Suffolk said in the matter-of-fact tone he announced each new calamity these days. He had come to see Henry and me in Henry’s privy chamber at Westminster: Parliament, recessed for one of the most miserable Christmases in memory, was to reopen the next day. “It is in the mouth of every commoner in England, I believe.”

I dropped the embroidery I was making a pretense of doing. “How could he say such an outrageous thing? He worked with you!”

“More than that, we were friends. But if he did say it, I don’t blame him. He was probably being tormented, poor soul. Most likely he was made to say it. If so, I hope it put him out of his pain. They say he was hardly recognizable by the time they finished with him.” Suffolk bent his head. “God assoil him.”

“Suffolk, you know we have no doubts about your loyalty,” Henry said.

“I know, your grace. Disloyalty is the one thing I cannot task myself with. But the commons have latched onto this like a dog does a tasty bone, and I must answer. Tomorrow, I shall beg you to allow me to clear my name—of treason, at least. Of folly is perhaps another thing.”

And so it was, on the next day, January 22, thirteen days after the bishop’s murder, William de la Pole knelt before the king. I was not there, of course; some time later, Humphrey Stafford, the Duke of Buckingham, told me what had happened.

“Your grace,” Suffolk said, in a quiet voice that nonetheless carried, “it is said throughout the realm that I have been disloyal to you, that I have sold our country to the French. It is said that the dying words of the Bishop of Chichester, whom God absolve, were that I had been a traitor to my country. I beg you, our most high and dread sovereign lord, to allow me to clear my name.” Suffolk’s voice cracked and he kissed the hem of Henry’s gown.

Henry, moved, stared down at Suffolk while the lords shifted uncomfortably in their seats. The commons, meanwhile, perked up. Almost in unison, they moved forward so as not to miss a word.

“My lord, you may arise and address us,” Henry said finally.

“Your grace, my father served that king of noble memory, your grandfather, in all of his expeditions, in sea and on land. He died in the service of your father at Harfleur. My eldest brother died thereafter at Agincourt. Two other of my brothers died in your grace’s service at Jargeau, where I was captured and paid twenty thousand pounds for my ransom. I have borne arms for thirty-four winters in the time of the king your father and in your own time, and I have been a Knight of the Garter for thirty. As a younger man I was abroad in your service in France for seventeen years without coming home or seeing this land, and since my return home I have served about your most noble person for fifteen years, in which time I have found as much grace and goodness as any liegeman has found in his sovereign lord. And yet men say I would betray all that I have worked for a Frenchman’s promise?”

“Damn right, the sorry whoreson would,” muttered one of the commons.

“If I were false or untrue to your high estate, or to this your land whereof I was born, there would be no earthly punishment great enough for me,” Suffolk continued, ignoring the outburst. “I beg, your grace, that whatever rumor might be sown against me, I will be charged of it during this Parliament and that in your presence, my excuses and defense will be heard.”

He knelt again, visibly weeping, and Henry said, “Of course, my lord, you shall have a hearing. But we do not believe that there is a man in this Parliament who believes these odious rumors. Still, it is well to get these matters out in the open.”

Suffolk, rising at the king’s command, bowed and returned to his seat, and the lords and the commons settled back in theirs, the commons smiling. “He wants a hearing?” one whispered to the other. “By God, he’ll get one. And more.”

***

“Your graces, two days before, the commons asked that the Duke of Suffolk be committed to prison while he awaited a hearing of the charges against him. The request was denied because there was no specific charge against him, only a most general one. Now, however, I am appointed by the commons to say that a serious charge does exist against him, namely, that he has stocked Wallingford Castle, entrusted by the king into his care, with provisions and that he has fortified it.” The Duke of Buckingham started to interrupt, but William Tresham, speaker of the commons, continued doggedly as he faced the duke and the rest of the delegation sent to him by the king. “He has stocked it with the intention of aiding the French when they invade England, as is expected daily.”

“That’s utter balderdash,” said Buckingham.

Tresham, who had been chosen as speaker at several Parliaments but would have gladly avoided the honor at this particular one, looked uneasy. “But nonetheless, my lords, it is a specific charge, as was requested to be brought, and it is a grave one.”

“So it is,” acknowledged John Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, with a smile. For years, the Duke of Suffolk had kept him out of any real influence in East Anglia. “I believe, my lords, we have no choice but to advise the king to imprison the Duke of Suffolk.”

***

“They took Suffolk as a prisoner to the Tower?” I stared at Henry. “Like a criminal?”

“My dear, he was not humiliated. He was taken at dusk, in a closed barge, and let out in my own private water gate. And he will be lodged comfortably. I have appointed three of my most trusted squires to care for him. The duchess may visit him if she wants.”

“But you let them imprison him! You gave the order!” I balled my hands up into fists.

“My dear, calm yourself! I had no choice. You know that he himself asked that he be given the chance to answer the charges against him, and when a specific charge were brought, it was of too serious a nature to be ignored.”

“But it is a ridiculous one! Suffolk would never aid my uncle against you—or me. He has done nothing like that.”

“I know it, my dear.” He drew me to him and stroked my hair, even as I held my fists up next to his chest. “I will not let harm come to him; he has been loyal to me and my father for all of his life. Do you think I would forget that, Marguerite? Do you think I am so poor a man that I would abandon a friend to his fate?”

His tone as he spoke the French version of my name was so reproachful that I hung my head and began to weep. “I am sorry,” I whispered. “I know you would do none of those things. But after what was done to Bishop Moleyns—”

“I do not even wish to think of it.” Henry shuddered.

“But you must. They are vicious people, Henry! They will not be satisfied with keeping Suffolk in the Tower, and that is bad enough. They are capable of any vile act, I think.”

“Now, my dear, that was in Portsmouth, and the soldiers were ill-fed and discontent. Do not have so little faith in our commons. They are good men, I’m sure of it. It is just that our reverses in France have set them on edge.”

“You have more faith in them than I do.”

“We must have faith in them,” said Henry, so sincerely that I felt a pang of guilt for my own doubts. “And in the Lord. Remember that, my dear.”

***

Henry did not trust entirely to faith. In February, when the commons formally impeached Suffolk of treason and misprision, he refused to refer their bill to a judge. On March 9, however, the commons delivered a second round of charges. This time, Henry, under pressure from both the lords and the commons, required Suffolk to make an answer to both sets of accusations. First, however, he moved him to the Jewel Tower at Westminster.

Suffolk was sitting at a small writing desk, quill in hand, the next day when his guards let me, followed by Katherine Peniston and several other ladies, into his chamber. He stood, his face breaking into the first full smile I’d seen from him in months. “Your grace?”

Katherine Peniston and my other ladies discreetly moved into a corner. “I could not visit you before, my lord, because I feared it would only give rise to more gossip about your loyalty when word got out about it. But when they moved you here so close to my own chambers, I had to come see you; I hated to think of you being lonely here. How are you faring?”

“Well enough.”

“I am so glad they moved you from the Tower; it is a gloomy place, I have always thought.”

“I was kept comfortably there, but I was glad to leave it.” Suffolk smiled sheepishly. “I was once told a prophecy that if I could keep clear of the Tower, I would be safe. Why I chose to listen is beyond me; it was more for my own amusement at the time, but the foolishness has stuck with me.” He touched a book lying on his desk. “But enough of that. It was kind of your grace to send me poems and so many little delicacies. Each day I had something to look forward to, wondering what would come next. It cheered me immensely.”

I blushed. “Alice came to see you too, did she not?”

“Yes, she has come several times, but I prefer her to be at Ewelme with our son. He was not told that I am a prisoner, but children sense when something is amiss, and he has been worried. He needs her with him.”

“Jane?” She had married Thomas Stonor early in the previous year. Around Christmastime she had borne Stonor a healthy boy, named William after her father.