We Speak No Treason Vol 2 (4 page)

I crossed myself, rage bubbling.

‘False harlot!’ I said, trembling. ‘You shall be whipped to the stocks an the King hears of your heresy!’ I cast round for my esquires, separated from me by the forest.

Hogan smiled.

‘You...’ he said. ‘And your King... the foot that strikes the stone shall turn into a head, and the bones tossed on a dunghill,
to stink for ever.
’

He was raving mad. He should be exorcized. My guardian’s chaplain would have soon drawn out his devils—he was ever rebuking me, mostly for swearing on the Wounds of Our Lord. He would say: ‘Think, my son! Think on His Pain!’ I searched my soul for compassion towards this poor wight.

‘Are you hungered?’ I asked, feeling in my pouch.

His beard wagged to and fro. ‘Never, for I live on my wits,’ he said. And then I heard the scudding of hooves in the distance. They were catching me up. I mounted, feeling the warm nobbly sacks of money at my saddle-bow, feeling sober and shamed, turning my back upon the madman Hogan. When I faced the gateway again, astride my horse, he was gone. And the woman. There was only the wind wavering the grasses. The men-at-arms came up at a gallop, hot with relief.

‘Come!’ I cried, all my gaiety gone. ‘The King’s army awaits us!’

After Lynn, and our brief sojourn at Croyland, we cooled our heels for a week at Fotheringhay, where Richard conferred with the captains: which was the best place to flank the archers if we should encounter rebels on a plain, or a hillock, or in wooded country. All the strategies of war were meat for his keen mind. He asked questions, gave opinions: even the seasoned warriors Louis de Bretaylle and Edward Brampton seemed moved by his sense. It was upon reaching Newark that I first had speech with King Edward. I had been shooting with Richard. I was his master here, but only just. He had paid me. I had received his wager with thanks and a pledge that he would recover it at the dice later. We were handing our bows back to the royal stewards when I looked across the meadow and saw a party of horse approaching.

‘It is his Grace, riding from the hunt,’ I said, absently.

Richard was cognizant of my keen-sightedness and said, with great good-humour: ‘And is he sad, sombre, gay?’

I caught the King’s face within the candle of my eye. A face so fair and clean it was almost too beautiful. A short face with a mouth for kissing, as well as giving commands. His rippling golden hair hung to the level of his chin. His gold collar shone upon his breast. His blue eyes gleamed above rosy cheeks.

‘He smiles,’ I answered.

Walking over the green, Edward towered above his followers. He saw his brother, and his smile spread.

‘Well, Dickon,’ he said.

I tried not to stare at the King, but I had seldom seen him so close. Then his glance caught mine, and I saw the jewelled hand raised in a beckoning gesture. It seemed a long way across the grass to where he stood. We had had a little rain, and as I knelt I felt the dew soaking the knee of my hose.

‘You are one of my brother’s henchmen I do not know,’ he said, and I saw a knight of his—it may have been Sir John Fogge—making a note on parchment. The King’s eyes took in the quarterings on my mantle.

‘Your father was a brave knight—I do not need to tell you this.’

‘Sire, if I can be as true a man, I will lack no reassurance.’ The answer seemed to please him. He set his arm about my neck: I am tall, but my head reached only to his shoulder.

‘I have not the honour yet, Sire, to be your brother’s henchman.’ His arm around me was warm as sunlight. I could see the hairs curling golden on his neck. I decided instantly that Richard was right: this was a King whom all would obey, as long as life lasted. His hounds fawned about him, covering his slender satin-clad thighs with pawmarks, while he fondled them carelessly.

‘By God’s Blessed Lady, why not?’ he asked suddenly. He turned with a smile to Sir John Woodville and the others who pressed up behind him. ‘One day, my lords, I declare I will have a Book of my Household made, written clear, and thus exclude all unwanted followers.’

‘Such as my lord of Warwick,’ a voice said, but the King gave no sign of having heard this. His arm was still fast about my shoulder, and his glance returning downward to mine bade me admire him, do him homage.

‘Watch his Grace my brother, then,’ he said, releasing me. ‘He will keep you wakeful half the night with chess.’ The Woodvilles’ laughter was like tinkling cymbals. I bowed, kissed the royal hand and retreated, as the party passed on.

‘He is pleased with you,’ Richard said softly. I thought for a moment how Sir John Paston would give his teeth for my chance. And I was not betrothed to anyone.

Thereafter being a gentleman usher to my lord of Gloucester, I shot in a bow with him each day. We played games—we liked the same things: the works of Ovid and Cicero, battle-talk and music-making. I found his mind like a rainbow, all varied colours, some coming hard and clear and bright, then waning, as do the parts of a rainbow grow brilliant and pale, when God manifests his thoughts to the eyes of man. He had a statue of St George, to which he sometimes spoke aloud. Often, he made me feel a whit frivolous, when I accompanied him and his esquires on the nightly forays around the swelling ranks of men, familiarizing myself with the supplies of armaments: the barrels of harness, the hundreds of spears, cross-bows, bills, leaden mauls; the fine horses. I looked with distrust on the few handguns which had been engaged, and more so when Richard recounted to me how even King James the Second of Scotland had blown himself heavenward while firing one of these imperfect weapons. Verily the devilish inventions seemed to me vastly inferior to the sweet surety of a longbow, or the keen and whirling tooth of the axe. Only once did my lord and I speak of maidens. I told him how my guardian was seeking an heiress for me. I had never met Margetta, but reckoned hers a pretty name. She was twelve or thirteen years old; I often mused on whether her colour was dark or fair, or if she were tall or little. My guardian knew only that she was well-purveyed of money and would bring me a good dower. Richard fell very silent and released no confidences. It was Robert Percy who told me one day, while my lord was busied with letter-writing, that the King had plans to marry his brother to a foreign princess.

‘As his Grace should himself have been wedded, had Lord Warwick not been outwitted,’ said that one, with a calm smile.

A storm, and something else, hung over us at Newark. I felt it as we sat at cards and the day drew in a little. The hounds were restless. One raised its muzzle and growled, like thunder.

Richard’s voice made me start a little.

‘We should be moving northward,’ he said. ‘I feel... as if we have tarried overlong here.’

One of the other young men shuffled his feet in assent. Robert Percy stretched out his legs under the table. I laid down my cards.

‘His Grace will move off shortly,’ someone said.

‘Who is Robin of Redesdale?’ asked another.

‘Christ’s Passion!’ said Richard impatiently. ‘A rebel. An agitator bought by the Lancastrians to cause strife. As for his
nom de guerre
, possibly he thinks it romantic!’ He gave a short laugh, and the hound thundered again.

So we sat on and played, yawning; and supper faded into the past and bed drew near, or a look at the men, until that idle pattern was suddenly broken by a noise of shouting that coiled up the stairway. It was not yet dusk but as we descended the circling stairs and emerged from the root of the tower the glow of torches grew and lapped around the busy scene. A dozen men-at-arms surrounded one knave—as we came into the courtyard I saw him clubbed to the ground, rise to his knee and remain, bowed-headed.

‘They have taken a rebel agent,’ Richard said softly.

‘
Halte, au nom du roi
!’ roared a voice. Louis de Bretaylle strode across to the mute prisoner. He thrust aside the men-at-arms, with his free hand searching inside the man’s garment. It was a piece of parchment which he drew out, soiled with journey sweat, too tough to tear. The rebel clung to it, tried to devour it but was knocked to the ground and lay retching in the shadow of a great form to whom all knelt.

King Edward had arrived, and at leisure was reading this, Robin of Redesdale’s proclamation. My keen sight took in the smile of contempt, the indrawn brows, the look like the ring of steel in a scabbard.

A courier was riding in over the drawbridge. Behind him came two more prisoners: one limping beside his captor’s mount, a rope binding his arms; another swaying on the pillion. I saw the fine trickle of blood at his brows. I saw all manner of things which others could not. These men wore a familiar emblem powdered small on their garments, over the dusty harness that still picked up a gleam from the departing sun. The courier reached King Edward first. He threw himself down before the King.

‘Hush, fellow!’ said one. ‘His Grace reads of most wonderful treason. Hold your peace until he has finished.’

‘Sire, you must get to Nottingham!’ cried the courier.

‘So!’ said King Edward in a low, distinct voice. ‘He likens me to those of the old royal blood who have been deposed, murdered! He likens me to those whose favourites led them to ruin! By God, now I will show him a true likeness...’

In my ear came another voice, like the wind that rushed up through the trees, bringing the first drops of rain: ‘Tell me,’ Richard of Gloucester said, ‘of whom does he speak?’

‘That I know not, sir,’ I muttered, my sight still fixed on the distant oncoming prisoners. Their powderings showed sharp and clear.

‘What then of your far-sightedness?’ he said mockingly, and stung, I replied:

‘I am at your disposal, my lord.’

‘The captured esquires—what emblem do they carry?’

And I turned to look fully at him, not knowing the great agony I should see upon his face as I answered: ‘The Bear and Ragged Staff, your Grace.’

He staggered a little, but shook off this frailty quickly and stood braced against something that lashed him from within, as the wind now lashed the trees. The ward was filling with armed men, and the captains were running to their weapons and to take mount. One of these surged by me as I stood near Richard, waiting for him to speak again, which he did not do for a long time. It was Sir John Fogge, his face fearfilled.

‘To Nottingham!’ he cried. ‘Earl Warwick approaches with a great puissance of men. By Christ, we have tarried too long! Where are my squires! My lord...’ and he was gone, his voice trailing off in a lonesome cry.

In a jostle we harnessed Richard, and ourselves, with hands that shook from excitement and the sharp thrill of fright. So busy was I, indeed, that I did not notice the tears in Richard’s eyes, though others whispered of them afterwards.

And then, for us, more waiting for extra men. He kept me wakeful at Nottingham. Within that stout pile, hewn from a sheer grey sheet of rock, I passed many an unquiet hour with Richard Plantagenet. Sir John Conyers, calling himself Robin of Redesdale, had raised a great force. The Woodville knights were no more with us; they were fled all ways, fear-shodden. We played chess. Chess, yea, and talking long into the night, and when at length I sought my weary couch beside Richard’s bed, I knew no easement or rest. For he would oft-times move with sudden, fretful plungings and murmurings to make me start up, thinking he had called me.

‘How can I ease you?’ I took up a lute. ‘A song, a story?’

He looked at me, but without seeing.

‘This palace...’ he said. ‘I feel a chill...’ He shuddered. ‘Old ghosts. Or sorrows to come, mayhap.’

I stood silent, touching a soft lute-chord.

‘It is a care-ridden place,’ he said finally. Then a great reversal of humour took him. He cried: ‘Yea, let us have entertainment. Sing the airs of Burgundy, which I loved when a puling knave. Or tell the lay of Beowulf,’ which was as much for my pleasure as his own, for he knew of my affection for the old meadhalls... long before Kentishmen fought and died in blood and despair... Hogan—curse him.

With music I conquered his strange melancholy, but not so, later, when we learned of Clarence’s disaffection. Richard laughed softly at this news; a joyless sound, the strained mirth summoned by an old, bad jest; and later he woke me roughly by crying of ‘Three Suns’.

‘The parhelion.’ He shivered with sweat. ‘At Mortimer’s Cross. The King... a man called by God Himself. The Saviour of our noble House. And now betrayed
by his own brother
. God’s Blessed Lady,’ he said, using Edward’s oath. ‘The folly, and the shame! Has he forgot that we are all one blood?’

‘I know. My lord. Richard,’ I said humbly.

‘George was born in Dublin,’ he said, with a sickly smile. ‘The Irish runes are powerful—mayhap some wanton sprite looked on his cradle... What think you?’

I merely cried—sounding like my Kentish chaplain: ‘Let not hatred put your soul in jeopardy, my lord.’ I cursed my tongue and was relieved when he answered calmly:

‘Tell me then what is hatred, for I know it not. He is my brother, and I love him. But loyalty binds me to Edward until death. And beyond.’

He slid from the bed.

‘Pray with me,’ he said simply. ‘Pray for a settlement of this mischief.’

So we knelt together, like children, two pairs of hands joined at the point of the chin, and above us the statue of St George flickered and gleamed in the waning rushlamp hung below; and I grew sleepy and leaped with horror out of a dream of archery to hear his muttered: ‘...
dona nobis pacem
.’

‘Mayhap our reinforcements will come in the morning... Lords Pembroke and Devon...’ I said hopefully, thinking his orison to be over; yet he breathed again: ‘
Agnus Dei,
’ the gleam falling on his bent head. As I watched him carefully, there came an old and puzzling remembrance of another evening when I was just as slothful.

It was at Fotheringhay, and I had gone down into the camp, late, with some message. Everything was steaming with damp summer heat and in the musky darkness I discovered him with a young maid, whom he bade me guard through the ranks and deliver to the Duchess of Bedford’s apartments.