Queen By Right

by Anne Easter Smith

  Dear Mother of God, Cecily prayed as her horse picked its way along the rough path, do not let this innocent child die.

  As soon as Cecily arrived back at the castle, she dictated a letter to Richard. She signed off herself, writing, “All I wish for now is your swift return. Your loving wife, Cecily.” She pressed down on the hot wax with her falcon seal.

  Then she returned to her solar, where a roaring fire greeted her. Constance had already sent a servant for the cradle and a large copper pan of cold water. Rowena and a tiring woman were laying a simple meal upon the green felt cloth on the table, and Rowena urged Cecily to take some nourishment in case the night was a long one. But Cecily could only nibble at some cheese and a slice of apple, anxiously watching Constance.

  “You do not intend to bathe her in that, do you?” Cecily demanded, rising and removing Joan from the cradle. “The water is cold, doctor. It will almost certainly kill her.”

  Constance put down her bottle of cherry-bark syrup, which she was diluting with rosewater. Although Joan’s glazed unblinking eyes frightened her, Constance was more concerned with reducing the high fever in the child. In Paris, she had learned that the idea of immersing a feverish body in icy water had proved effective for a fully grown man, but she was reluctant to try it on a babe, especially with Cecily hovering. But Constance persisted.

  “I swear to you it will not kill her, your grace.” Her brown eyes courageously held Cecily’s terrified blue ones. She dared to murmur, “Do you truly believe I would wish to harm the child? Trust me in this, as you did the night of your dream.”

  Cecily dropped her gaze to the feverish child in her arms. “Certes, I know you for a good woman, Constance,” she said. She hesitated for a brief moment before deciding. “Very well, if I let you dip her in the water for a moment, will you also try another infusion? What else could help?”

  “I have an old remedy given to me by a doctor in Salerno, madame, but I do not know if a child should be submitted to it,” she replied, biting her lip. She did not stand by some of the old medicines, including the one that Cecily wanted. It called for ground horn of unicorn and dried mare’s blood. But the doctor desperately wanted to try the cold-water method of reducing a fever and hoped the panacea might help the infant and pacify the desperate duchess.

  Cecily nodded vigorously and began to undress Joan, while Constance mixed her potion and coaxed a few drops of the medicine between the child’s cracked lips. The child’s blocked windpipe caused her to gag and struggle for breath, and Constance grimaced, wiping away the expelled elixir.

  “Try again,” Cecily urged. This time Constance dipped her finger in the mixture and gentled it into the baby’s mouth with more success. Cecily smiled, stroking the child’s cheek. Constance opened her hands for the baby, and Cecily sighed and nodded again. “Aye, now you may try the water—but only for a second, mind you.”

  Knowing it took more than a quick dip to produce results, Constance reluctantly obeyed her mistress, sensing that Cecily would not tolerate more dissent. The child spluttered and seemed to revive as soon as she felt the cold water upon her fiery skin, and Constance was cheered. But Cecily cried out, “Enough!” and the doctor withdrew the whimpering Joan. But there was no miracle, and the fever persisted.

  “Your grace, I know not what else to do,” the doctor finally said as Joan’s breath became shallower. “I believe we all need to ask for God’s guidance and perhaps”—she hesitated—“send for the chaplain.”

  Cecily’s wail sent Rowena to her knees, wringing her hands and reciting the paternoster. Constance was by Cecily’s side in an instant and, without thinking of her station, took Cecily in her arms and rocked her.

  Father Lessey was summoned to the duchess’s apartments a few minutes before the church bell was rung for vespers. He took in the scene at a glance: the child lying unnaturally still, her eyes staring unseeing at the colorfully painted beams; the duchess kneeling by her daughter’s cradle, tears running down her face; the Frenchwoman discreetly kneeling in a darkened corner; and the two attendants telling their rosaries in unison.

  “In nomine patris, et filius, et spiritus sancti,” he began quietly, joining Cecily at the cradle. Reaching into his robe, he brought out the holy oil. Dipping his finger into it, he performed extreme unction by making a sign of the cross on the baby’s burning forehead. After intoning the ritual deathbed prayers, he blessed the kneeling women and quietly left the room. He had never seen Cecily Neville cry before, and indeed he had not thought her capable until now.

  Constance got to her feet and approached Cecily, who had not moved since the chaplain’s arrival. Her tone was anxious. “Madame, can I do anything for you? Would you prefer to be alone or shall we stay and keep you company?”

  “Go! All of you,” Cecily commanded, not looking up. “I must watch over her alone tonight.” She lifted her eyes to the heavens and cried in a loud voice, “Perhaps You will be merciful this time, Father. You alone can help Jeanne now. She is burning alive!”

  Constance had never heard Cecily use the French name for her child before. She was at first startled by the description of the fever-racked Joan but then understood the parallel. Dear God, she thought with alarm and awe, the duchess must be thinking of La Pucelle, and she crossed herself, whispering an ave. She was watching from the doorway and wondered if she should stay. But then she thought better of it and left to join the others in prayer.

  Cecily was unaware she was now alone. She could not take her eyes from her precious daughter’s face, but the face she was seeing was not Joan’s but Jeanne’s just before the faggots leaped into flame.

  “I should have stopped them, Jeanne,” she whispered to the dying child. “Maybe I could have saved you. Is this my punishment? That He must take your namesake? Ah, Jeanne, Jeanne, have mercy on me. I lost one child that day. Do not let me lose another. Sweet Virgin, Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on this wretched mother.”

  But as soon as Jeanne’s face dissolved into the lifeless one of her child she knew her prayer had not been heard, and picking Joan up, she carried her to the tester bed. Drawing the curtains around them both, she curled up with the tiny limp form whose soul had flown to heaven, and she grieved well into the night.

  RICHARD’S SPEEDY ARRIVAL astonished even Sir William Oldhall, who had seen his patron cover dozens of miles in half the time taken by other men during the duke’s governorship in France. He had often observed the duke and duchess of an afternoon riding out together at a sedate trot along the outer moat path to the east gate bridge, gardeners and other yeomen doffing their caps as they passed, only to see them break into a full gallop across a field and into the castle’s great park, each trying to outdo the other in horsemanship. Richard’s distinctive laugh would often float back to Oldhall at his third-story window in one of the towers.

  Two pages were loitering by the marshalsea when their master and his small retinue clattered into the cobblestoned stableyard three days after little Joan had died and the castle had been plunged into mourning. Richard dismounted before his horse had even stopped. He flew up the stairs of the duchess’s apartments, along a dark passageway, and to the door of her solar. A guard jumped to his feet, but before he could put his hand on the latch, Richard had already thrown the heavy door open without an announcement.

  “Richard!” Cecily cried when she saw her husband come striding into the room and, not caring for decorum in front of her ladies and Father Lessey, she fell into his arms. “Oh, my lord, you are come at last! I did not know how I could go on another day without you.” She was weeping now. Richard, behind her back, motioned for everyone to leave.

  “My dearest, I came as fast as I could. I shall never forgive myself for not being here with you for this terrible ordeal. I pray that you will forgive me,” he said, gently holding her and noting with dismay how gaunt her face looked and how haunted were those lovely eyes. “Come, let us kneel together and say a prayer for our dear little Joan.” He knew t
he act of kneeling and praying would calm her. He led her to their exquisite altar, and they both gazed in awe at the perfect face of Jan van Eyck’s heavily pregnant Virgin with the light of the Holy Ghost upon her.

  “Even she did not help Joan,” Cecily whispered, sniffling. “The Blessed Mother, my own benefactress.” Richard squeezed her hand and turned the pages of the book of hours on the lectern to recite a prayer for the departed.

  “Deus veniae largitor et humanae salutis amator,” he began, and the Latin in his rich baritone resonated with Cecily, stemming her tears. She peered at the words with him and they prayed in unison. “We beseech thy clemency: that thou grant the brethren of our congregation, kinsfolk, and benefactors, and especially our beloved daughter, Joan, which are departed out of this world, blessed Mary ever virgin making intercession with all the saints, to come to the fellowship of eternal blessedness.”

  Then without another word Richard led her to the bed, helped her off with her soft velvet shoes, and lay down beside her, curling her into him as he always did. In less than a minute he knew that she was sleeping and then, unabashedly, he shed his own tears.

  “ THE BOAR’S HEAD in hand bear I,

  Bedecked in bays and rosemary.

  And I pray you, my masters, be merry

  Quot estis in convivio . . .”

  So sang the college choristers from the minstrel gallery of Fotheringhay’s great hall on Christmas Day, their mellifluous voices rising to the blue and gold star-studded roof. The song always gave Cecily gooseflesh, and when the cooks and kitchen boys brought in the platters piled high with food, led by the duke’s master cook, who presented the roasted boar’s head to Richard and Cecily, it seemed that the black mist that had enveloped her since Joan’s death began to lift. She found herself taking pleasure in the music and the traditions of the season and beamed at the cook as he sliced her a sample of the delicate cheek meat from the ferocious-looking head of the boar.

  Richard had watched with relief in the weeks that led up to Yuletide as his wife’s face regained its bloom, the dark circles under her eyes disappeared, and her trill of laughter reemerged. Infant Joan had been laid to rest in a niche in the tiny chapel of the castle, where Cecily was now wont to go daily rather than to St. Mary’s. “She is too little to be buried all alone in that vast choir,” she told Richard. “Indulge me in this, I beg of you. No one but us will remember her, and I can keep her company by her little tomb so much more easily in the chapel.” How could Richard refuse such a simple request? And as the child had been baptized there, it seemed fitting.

  He was feeling the effects of the tun of wine he had had sent from Gascony for this Christmas season, and he had difficulty in controlling the urge to caress Cecily’s thigh as they sat side by side, very visible on the dais. Her dress of rose damask embroidered with pearls was trimmed with ermine, the mark of royalty, and with her gold filigree headdress sparkling with jewels framing her oval face, she looked a queen tonight, he thought. She turned to him and offered to feed him the second slice of meat from her fork, which he gently slid off with his teeth and relished with his tongue, their eyes never leaving the other’s face. It was then Richard knew Cecily was ready to be seduced again.

  With more passion than both knew they possessed, husband and wife made love for many hours that night after the mummery, music, and merriment were over. The Lord of Misrule presided over the rest of the revelries, allowing the duke and duchess to escape to their private chamber and revel in each other. A very few weeks into the new year, Cecily knew she had conceived again, and this time took no chances. She lit a candle in the chapel daily to the Virgin, St. Monica, and St. Anne, and prayed fervently for an heir to the dukedom of York.

  14

  England and Normandy, 1441

  Anne, namesake of Richard’s mother Anne Mortimer, was a year and a half when Cecily finally gave the duchy of York its heir one snowy February day in 1441. Overjoyed with their son with his almost white hair and dark blue eyes, the proud parents named the baby Henry in deference to their sovereign lord.

  Cecily was so disappointed when the second child turned out to be another girl that she could not find it in herself to love Anne as she had her beloved Joan. Thus, with a boy in the cradle now, the little girl had to find comfort in her adoring nursemaids. A quiet, pretty child with Richard’s dark hair, fortunately Anne was too young to recognize the difference between her mother’s affection for her and her new baby brother.

  Cecily’s disregard for her daughter did not abate after a messenger arrived suddenly from Howden Manor in Yorkshire with the sad news of her mother’s death following a lengthy illness. Cecily had collapsed in a dispirited heap, blaming herself for not traveling with Constance to be at Countess Joan’s bedside in time. Unbeknownst to Cecily, Constance had learned Joan had a canker in her breast when the countess had come for little Joan’s birth, but she had begged Constance not to tell Cecily for fear of compromising the impending delivery. The doctor had held her peace for almost a year until Cecily had received a letter from her mother following Anne’s birth.

  My dearest daughter, I greet you well and I trust you are recovered from the birth of your second child, which news brought me great joy. It is fitting you should name her for Dickon’s mother, as I was already honored with little Joan, God rest her soul.

  Forgive me for not being present this time, but I am not quite myself these days. My physician tells me I have a canker growing in my breast that leaves me without my usual vigor, and thus I am not strong enough to travel. I pray that when baby Anne is past the first stage of life, you will ride to Howden Manor so I may know her. It is a pleasant place, and I am fortunate your brother, the bishop, allows me to make it my home.

  Richard had relayed news to Cecily the previous year that Robert Neville had been elevated to the bishopric of Durham, and Howden was now part of his estates.

  I found Middleham too large on my own, despite many visits from Richard and Alice, and this small cozy manor suits me well.

  Not long after discovering she had conceived Henry, Cecily had indeed visited the countess with the infant Anne. The sixty-year-old Joan had lavished affection on the child, who was at the standing stage and who seemed to prefer her grandmother’s lap to her mother’s.

  “You are distant with your child, Cecily. Are you afraid of loving her too much and losing her?” Joan asked one day with Anne perched on her knees, and as though she knew she was being talked about, Anne jerked onto her little legs, her strength surprising Joan. The delighted child bounced, gurgled, and flailed her arms like a windmill.

  “I pity you for losing your first-born, but when one is a mother, each child must be loved for who she is and not for who she is not,” Joan told Cecily gently. “I lost my share of babes, my dear, and there is not a day goes by when I do not grieve for the little mites. But not at the expense of the living children, who need our love and help to grow into good Christian men and women until they are sent away—which is another grief we mothers must bear.” She leaned forward and patted Cecily’s hand. “You must not deprive this poor child of a mother’s love because she is not Joan.”

  Cecily had broken down and wept then, recognizing the truth in her mother’s words. But try as she might, her heart would not open wide for this little girl. And now her wise mother was gone, the last friendly Beaufort link to her and Richard.

  Not only were Joan’s siblings and their progeny beginning to alienate Richard at the council, but the countess’s death had caused a serious rift between the two Neville branches of Ralph’s family.

  Perhaps her mother’s famous wisdom was faulty when she chose not to leave a little more of her inheritance from Ralph to the Nevilles born of his first wife. Granted, Joan had never been accepted by them, but Cecily could well understand how her half brother, the second Earl Ralph, may have felt slighted by his grandfather’s will in favor of the second wife.

  Was it because Joan could not bear to think of the Staffords cast
ing aspersions upon her bones that she chose to be buried alongside her beloved mother Katherine Swynford at Lincoln? Cecily wondered. She well remembered Ralph’s tomb and the effigies of both his wives at Staindrop, but he now lay with Margaret Stafford alone. Cecily was saddened when she discovered her mother’s wish, because she had witnessed the great love her parents had enjoyed. Family feuding is accursed, she thought, especially in ours.

  And now Alice had written that young Ralph and his siblings were making life difficult for the Beaufort Nevilles. A feud had begun with Richard Neville and Alice that had spread to include Cecily’s other brothers, George, William, and Edward.

  Even the king had ordered both sides to stop squabbling, but things were still no better. What good was a title, young Ralph complained, without estates to accompany it? He demanded that Richard Neville, now earl of Salisbury and thus enriched with all the lands that came with the title, give up Middleham—by far the largest of the Westmorland estates—and Sheriff Hutton Castle, but Salisbury had refused.

  Cecily had gleaned from conversations with Sir William Oldhall that from the time King Henry had taken the reins of government into his own hands at his majority three years before, the lawlessness of his early years had continued unabated due to his ineffectual governing. The Neville in-fighting that went unchecked was just one more example of that unrest. The solemn little boy king had grown into an indecisive, pious young man—or at least so Sir William believed. Henry was easily swayed by forceful personalities on his council. The elderly Cardinal Beaufort’s influence was gradually being superseded by that of his two nephews, John of Somerset and Edmund Beaufort, and, more significantly, the old councillor told Cecily, “by William de la Pole, earl of Suffolk.”

  “And where does my husband stand with the king?” Cecily asked, her wide eyes and innocent expression not fooling the wily Sir William for a second. He had long since recognized the duchess’s intellectual capabilities. “A magnificent consort,” was how he had described her to another of Richard’s loyal councillors. “’Tis said her father gave her her head when she was a girl, and I swear I have yet to meet a more spirited lady. She may have been named the Rose of Raby then, but this rose has grown thorns,” he had said, enjoying his own wit.