The Silken Rose

by Carol McGrath

  Nell said, ‘The family lives in the City, in Paternoster Lane, close to St Paul’s.’

  Ailenor peered out of the window down at the river. ‘The rain has stopped, Nell. All is drying out. Send for her.’ Ailenor thought for a moment. ‘I want to learn some of her skills. Do you think she might teach me? The winter here is endless. My friends are bored. I want my women to remain with me. I want them to be busy and happy here.’

  ‘I can see all this. Their faces are as long as winter’s staff.’ Nell glanced over at Willelma who was mending one of Ailenor’s fragile veils. ‘The girl would be honoured, I am sure. We shall ask her.’

  Nell sent a royal messenger for Rosalind who, accompanied by her father, came to the Tower on the following Thursday. The tailor was a little plump and his hair was beginning to grey at the temples. Despite his stiff pose, Ailenor noticed how his eyes twinkled and liked him at once. He introduced his daughter and withdrew.

  The quivering girl fell onto her knees in front of Ailenor’s chair. She was small. Her plaits beneath her cap were golden, her skin white and clear, and the fingers clutching her simple gown long and delicate. Ailenor liked the English girl at once.

  She glanced over at the long-nosed ladies who had accompanied her from Provence. She was tired of their complaints. Only that morning, one young lady had burst into tears and said she could not serve Ailenor any longer. Her sister needed her to help with their mother, who was unwell, and she missed her sister. Others followed suit with various grumbles. It was cold, which was untrue because her apartment was comfortable and fires burned constantly. When she pointed this out to them they found other complaints to make. The food was too heavy and they had little fruit except endless stewed apples. The gardens were soggy underfoot and without flowers. They were homesick and there was no fun to be enjoyed. Even the troubadours were forgetting to sing. England was dull. That morning, she had said firmly, ‘There are earls’ sons here without wives. They are very wealthy.’

  Domina Willelma added with a frown, ‘Where will you all find husbands if you return to Provence? You must be patient. Summer will come soon enough.’

  Ailenor said with a snap in her voice, ‘I have a mother and father and sisters, too. I am determined to be happy. You must be also.’

  She would bring summer to them by creating rooms for them filled with beautiful fabrics displaying embroidered and woven images of stories and song. Her chambers would become their indoor gardens. She would create joy, even on the most miserable winter’s day. Her ladies would forget Provence. And now she would encourage them to learn new embroidery techniques, but only if this girl who seemed so frightened of her would teach them. It would keep them busy.

  She did not dare suggest to Henry that she hold courts of love in his hall as her mother, the Countess, had in Provence, or that her troubadours sing ballads of love and betrayal in case he disapproved. He watched over her with sharp eyes like one of the hawks that sat tethered to a perch in his bedchamber. At the coronation feast, she had admired Sir Simon. Henry had not liked that. It might be risky to upset him. Embroidering tales of love with silver and gold threads and with pearls and semi-precious stones might be a less treacherous occupation.

  ‘Rise,’ she said to the embroideress in stumbling English. ‘Do you speak French?’

  The girl scrambled awkwardly to her feet.

  To her surprise, Rosalind spoke perfect French, ‘Oui, ma grandmère etait Français et aussi ma mère. I speak both French and English.’

  Ailenor clapped her hands. ‘Bien. I intend to improve my English. I hear that it is occasionally spoken at court these days. I want to know what people say.’ She smiled. ‘Particularly if they think I cannot hear them. What is your name?’

  ‘Rosalind, Your Grace. Rosalind Fitzwilliam.’ Ailenor, of course, knew the girl’s name but wanted to put her at ease.

  ‘Do you know why you are here, Rosalind?’

  ‘No. . .no. . . I do not, Your Grace. I -I. . .’ The girl was tripping over her words.

  Nell quietly intervened. ‘There is no need to stumble over your words, Rosalind. The Queen won’t devour you. We saw the King’s elephant some days past and the beast was so big we were all afraid. It spat water like a fountain from its long, long nose. As if these rains have not brought us more than enough. And we heard the King’s lions roar. There is something to truly affright you.’

  There were chuckles from Ailenor’s Provençal ladies. Ailenor stared sternly at them. Her mother had advised her to take no forward behaviour from her women. ‘When you are a queen, Ailenor, begin the way you mean to go on. Take no nonsense from anyone.’ Surely this laughter at the expense of a girl her own age, her subject, was unacceptable. She kept her gaze steady. The women dipped their heads to their embroidery frames. Domina Willelma spoke sharply in French to three of the Queen’s ladies seated on stools. Their faces reddened as they composed themselves. Ailenor snapped her fingers at English Mary, her newest lady. Mary was sensible enough not to laugh in such a frivolous manner. She always displayed humility. She liked this wife of one of Henry’s gentlemen of the bedchamber. ‘Lady Mary, kindly bring me the cushion.’

  The lady disappeared through a low door and reappeared with the rose-covered cushion. Ailenor held it out with both hands and said, ‘Is this all your own work, Rosalind?’

  ‘It is.’ At last the embroideress appeared confident, as if on seeing her own familiar work she became a different person, a girl who knew who she was and that she possessed a unique talent. She smiled at Ailenor showing even white teeth. Her blue eyes widened.

  Ailenor nodded. ‘I can see you care about your work. Would you be able to embroider more? This is so fine. I would like four rose cushions, roses with golden hearts embroidered on velvet just like this one. How long will it take?’

  The girl studied her embroidery for a few moments. She ran her hand over the silken roses. She did something Ailenor thought peculiar. She lifted the cushion to her nose and inhaled. ‘It smells of attar of roses, the perfume I think you favour, Your Grace. They will take me a few months to stitch. It is detailed work.’ In a halting voice, she added, ‘But I’ll need coin to purchase silks and velvet. Gold thread is expensive.’

  ‘You shall have it. And if the King agrees, I may request hangings for my bed.’ After she had spoken, Ailenor frowned. Already she had gleaned that, whilst the King was hard-pressed for money, their wedding had been expensive. There were whispers amongst Ailenor’s English ladies that he was profligate and, on overhearing these murmurings, it occurred to her that the King had amassed great debts on her behalf. The coronation feast, the improvements on her apartments and the gifts he showered on her were extravagant. She found herself turning to Nell and saying, ‘Princess Eleanor, will coin be released from His Grace’s wardrobe, or may I have a loan, perhaps?’ She loathed having to ask the King’s sister this but her own allowance had not been settled. Biting her bottom lip, she blinked tears away. She was humiliated and should never have mentioned money. Rosalind glanced away. The girl was embarrassed, too.

  Nell said, ‘I shall see that Rosalind has a purse to purchase her threads and velvet. She will be paid for her work. Think nothing of it, Your Grace. It is a gift.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said into the air which, for a heartbeat, had crackled with tension.

  She promised herself to do Nell a service in return. And she knew exactly what. Nell must not remain prisoner to the ridiculous pledge made to Archbishop Edmund of Canterbury. She had once heard that such an oath made under duress could be annulled if His Holiness, the Pope, was generously approached. She would speak about Nell’s oath to Henry. She must!

  She smiled and said, ‘Rosalind, return to us when your commission is completed. If we like the cushions, perhaps you will teach my Provençal ladies English embroidery.’ She pointed at the embroidery frame by which her ladies sat. ‘This embroidery shows Sir Galahad. Next, we plan to work on the story of Gawain. Do you know these stories?’
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br />   ‘Ballad singers tell them at our guild feasts.’

  ‘They are thrilling tales,’ Ailenor said with enthusiasm. ‘Return soon.’

  Nell ushered Rosalind towards the door into her bower-chamber. She overheard Nell say in a quiet voice, with discretion, ‘I shall send you a purse to take care of all your needs. It is an honourable commission and more will follow. Attend it well, Rosalind.’

  Rosalind nodded. ‘I am honoured.’ She added, with just a hint of hesitation, ‘Does the Queen really want instruction in English work?’

  ‘We shall see,’

  Ailenor saw the Princess smile at the tailor, the girl’s father, Master Alfred, who hovered by the doorway as Nell said, ‘Good day, Rosalind. I shall send the purse to your father’s house.’

  A week later Henry swept through the maidens’ chamber seeking Ailenor. She was discussing with Willelma about how the ladies would celebrate her birthday in the hour following Vespers. The pittancer had promised Willelma dates, candied oranges, and pears he had purveyed from Gascony, all of which he had kept aside from the coronation feast. When Henry approached Ailenor, she dipped a curtsey, all her damsels including her new English ladies following her lead.

  ‘Rise, all of you.’ He waved them away and took Ailenor’s hands in his own. ‘My love, I have not forgotten.’

  She drew an excited breath. ‘My name day,’ she whispered. ‘I am fourteen today.’

  He withdrew a purse from his mantle and placed it into her hands. ‘You must spend these sovereigns as you will, sweeting.’ He leaned forward and removed her circlet and veil. He slipped a fine golden chain over her head. She glanced down. It contained a cut emerald set around with pearls. It was even more beautiful than the other jewels he had given her. It gleamed like the eyes of a magical sea creature and when she touched it, its facets as smooth as satin.

  ‘It is too generous, my lord,’ she said.

  He shook his head. ‘Once, long ago, it belonged to my mother. Like you, she is very beautiful.’ For a heartbeat he looked sad. ‘A pity she is far across the sea, but I have you and now you are more precious to me than she.’

  Moments later he was gone. Ailenor gave the purse into Willelma’s care. Now she had money of her own and her first thought was to pay Nell back for the loan she gave her.

  3

  Summer 1236

  After Ailenor told him her ladies had felt homesick for Provence, Henry made more effort to make them happy. He welcomed her Provençal attendants into their retinue with smiles and attention, learning their names and addressing them personally. He especially welcomed her beloved Uncle William. Ailenor wrote to her mother, Countess Beatrice. She wrote to her sisters Marguerite and Sancha. Little Beatrice was still very young, so she sent her youngest sister a poppet for which she had stitched a gown just like one of her own.

  Gradually, Ailenor accepted the changes in her own life. She liked the deference shown her by the English ladies in her train. She enjoyed sitting with Henry on feast days at the high table looking down on his stuffy barons. Nell was often in her company, as was Sir Simon and Richard of Cornwall whose wife was the great William Marshal’s eldest daughter, Isabel. Ailenor considered Isabel possessed of an ethereal fragility. Sometimes as she watched how Isabel ate like a bird and moved light-footed as a wood nymph, she wondered if this older, beautiful woman would vanish like an angel, there one moment and the next not. Earl Richard’s wife’s countenance bore a sadness that caught at Ailenor’s heart, though she never understood why Isabel was sad until Nell explained that Isabel had recently lost a child.

  Although Ailenor’s birthday had passed, intimacy had not yet come into her and Henry’s marriage. Gradually, morsel by tiny morsel, she began to want more than a meeting of lips. She felt a weakness in her legs when he kissed her and she began to return his desire with a hunger for prolonged kisses, the sort priests disproved of. Women were Eves, temptresses, or else they imitated the Virgin and were mothers. Priests frowned upon desire. Could she ever dare hold a Court of Love here to pose the question - why should a woman not feel desire? No, she dared not; not whilst the frowning Archbishop Edmund visited them with a frequency that bothered Ailenor. Henry loved Edmund because he was a truly pious man, a piety Henry determined to emulate. Whilst her religious devotion – praying at shrines, learning about Henry’s favoured saint, Edward the Confessor, giving alms to the poor, and endowing nunneries and chantries dedicated to the Virgin – was an honest display of piety because she was devout, priests’ opinions on the subject of desire could not be the whole truth. She possessed a passionate, earthly nature and it confused her.

  That winter, Ailenor, Henry, and Uncle William often dined privately together, discussing poetry, pilgrimage, and Jerusalem - the centre of the known world. Ailenor listened closely when they discussed Henry’s finances and how he depended on a treasury ruled by his barons. When William recommended Savoyard administrators, able clerks whom Ailenor had brought to England in her train from Provence, to reform the Treasury, Henry agreed to try them. She encouraged him.

  ‘Your uncle is knowledgeable and wise,’ Henry said as they entered the Great Hall at Westminster one evening after Vespers. ‘I hope he will stay with us.’ Ailenor glanced across the hall to where her uncle was standing by a pillar surrounded by courtiers. They were all laughing and Uncle William seemed to be accepted by them. ‘Indeed, I might find William a bishopric here,’ Henry remarked. ‘If he is not settled in Valence, Winchester could suit him. After all, he is only Bishop Elect of Valence.’

  She said with excitement at Henry’s suggestion, ‘I think he would be pleased to consider Winchester. My mother’s brothers are all knowledgeable but Uncle William is my favourite of them all.’ The thought of having her favourite uncle by her side caused Ailenor’s heart to leap as if a March hare was jumping about inside her. ‘Please persuade him, Henry.’

  Smiling, Henry folded his arms. ‘He is a man of genius. I’ll ask him.’

  Ailenor felt herself grow taller. Her small chest puffed out with pride. She decided to chance her good fortune further. ‘What about my ladies and my escort and my advisors and secretaries, my priests and doctors?’

  Henry nodded. ‘There’s plenty of space in our castles for them all.’

  ’Thank you, my lord.’ She threw her arms about his neck and he held her close.

  ‘Grow up soon, my love,’ he said into her hair.

  ‘At my age my mother was chatelaine of many castles.’

  ‘As are you.’

  ‘But you know what I mean.’

  ‘We shall give England a son soon enough. You are young for childbearing, my sweet. Too risky.’

  She dropped her head and remained silent. It was difficult to say it to him but she was strong and she was sure she was ready to carry his son.

  Her days passed pleasantly with dancing, feasting, and embroidery in the company of her new English retainers and all her friends from Savoy and Provence. The sun shone again. New growth sprouted on the trees around the Tower and flowers grew amongst herbs in the garden. Spring was filled with promise. Henry would love her completely soon. They walked in the garden hand in hand, prayed together, exchanged gentle kisses and shared a plate when the court set down to dinner.

  In March, Rosalind brought Ailenor the embroidered cushions. Her father, Master Alfred the tailor, once again accompanied his daughter to the Tower. Learning that he was waiting out in the draughty corridor, Ailenor called him into her presence.

  The tailor knelt before Ailenor and when she told him to rise, he stood to attention like a guardsman, straight-backed. She admired the new cushions and sent Willelma to place them on chairs and on her bed. Turning to Master Alfred she said, ‘I need a tailor. You are a tailor. Bien! I want you to make me bed curtains and, you, Rosalind’ - she smiled at the girl by his side - ‘must embroider them with English flowers - marigolds, daisies, pansies, une tapisserie of flowers of fields and the woods.’

  Master Alfred bow
ed, his greying hair falling untidily about his face. On coming up he smiled broadly, displaying a set of even teeth. ‘It would be an honour, Your Grace. I’ll need to measure your bed-rail.’ He whipped a rule from out of a battered leather satchel.

  Ailenor nodded at Lady Mary. ‘Mary, assist him. You, too, Willelma.’

  After they had pushed through the arras to the bedchamber, Ailenor turned to Rosalind. ‘Let us wait in the window seat. I love to watch the river. ’

  The embroideress appeared ill at ease. She was awkward and unsmiling.

  ‘Come.’ Ailenor led the girl to a wide window bench. She said, ‘Now, sit.’

  Rosalind immediately moved to the other end of the bench as if Ailenor was about to cast a wicked spell on her. Yet, once seated, the embroideress seemed to relax and for a moment it felt as if they were simply two curious young girls idly viewing the world outside together. A gently warming thin March sun slanted through the glass. Soon, they became engrossed watching the many small boats bobbing up and down on the river below.

  ‘It’s huge,’ Ailenor said after a brief silence. ‘There are ships, docks, merchants, travellers, visitors from all corners of Christendom, so says my husband, the King.’ She studied Rosalind whom she was sure was not much older than she. ‘How many summers do you have, Rosalind?’

  ‘I shall be fifteen soon.’ She paused and added, ‘My mother died when I was born. She was an embroideress too.’

  She looked younger than Ailenor yet she was a year older. It was sad not to have a mother. Countess Beatrice was far away in Provence but she was alive and well and wrote to her daughter every month. ‘I’m sure, Rosalind, your mother is an angel in Heaven watching over you. My mother said this when my grandmother, whom I loved dearly, died of the flux.’ The next question slipped out. She had not intended to embarrass the girl. Tact was not her best attribute and sometimes, as when she had asked Nell about marriage, words tumbled from her mouth. ‘Do you have a betrothed?’