Jean Plaidy - [Queens of England 07]

by The Queen's Secret

  She put her arms about me and patted my back, as she used to in the old days when I myself was little more than a baby. “There,” she said. “It has not come to that yet. Let us hope it does not…for a long time.”

  “It will, though, Guillemote. Royal children are never left to be happy with their mothers.”

  “This will be different.”

  I smiled sadly at her, shaking my head.

  “You are with him now. Just forget what may come. Be happy in the moment.”

  I realized the wisdom of her words and I determined to try to do as she said. For the time being Henry was with me, and Duke Humphrey was pursuing his wildly ambitious plans. They would all be too concerned with him to think very much about Henry.

  So I wanted to make each day last as long as I could. But every morning when I awoke I could not help thinking that this might be the day. Then I would dismiss the fear. Not yet…not yet. Why, it might be a year before they took some action.

  That was my mood during that time. Perhaps that was why I behaved in a rather reckless fashion now and then. I certainly did when I appointed Owen Tudor as Clerk of the Wardrobe, which was a post which would keep him close to me.

  “He is very handsome and not much older than you are,” said Guillemote, who, over the years, and because she had known me more or less as a baby, often spoke more familiarly to me than the others did.

  “What of that?” I said.

  She lifted her shoulders and raised her eyes to the ceiling. “You are the Queen,” she said.

  Was she implying that Owen Tudor was too young and attractive to live so close to the Queen who was perhaps only a little younger than he was?

  I laughed at her. Yes, I was indeed reckless. I think it was because I missed Henry. Perhaps I regretted those times when we had been separated while he had pursued a war which had in the end taken him from me altogether. Perhaps it was because I lived in fear of the desolation which would come upon me when they—as they undoubtedly would—brought certain highly born ladies into the nursery to take charge of my son and decided that caring for him was not a suitable occupation for a queen.

  Owen’s coming into my household brightened my days. He was very sympathetic and understood my anxieties. Young Henry had grown fond of him.

  He was now entirely my child. He recognized me as his mother; and I believe there is a special bond between a child and its mother, in spite of early separation. Even with my own mother, whom I hated, there was a certain link. I liked to think that I was especially loved by my son.

  He was now taking notice, babbling a few words which Guillemote pretended were “Maman” and “Gee Gee”—for herself, of course—but I am not sure whether others recognized them as such.

  I would walk in the gardens and wish that Henry could have been with me playing under the trees, as any normal child might have done with his mother; but although I was left in peace with him at this time, it must never be forgotten that he was the King and he could never be allowed to go out without his guards.

  But at least in the nursery he was living the life of a normal child.

  I found myself often looking for my Clerk of the Wardrobe and detaining him that I might chat with him. The strange manner in which he spoke attracted me. He was different from the others about me. I supposed it was because he was not English. Henry had liked him, too. He had rewarded him for his bravery at Agincourt by making him an Esquire of the Body.

  I would not admit even to myself that the memory of Henry was fading a little. He had been a good husband; we had lived intimately together; I believed we had loved each other. Yet always for me there had been reservations which I had not recognized at the time, and I was beginning to be aware of them now. Henry had been unreal to me in a way…remote…a hero…someone not quite human, in spite of his earthy conversation and manners—the manners, as he had often said, of a soldier.

  He had been a hero—the most loved king the English had ever known. Many had said so and many would in the years to come. He had been dedicated to his kingship, and the fact that this great king had emerged from a rather disreputable youth made him something of a mystic figure. I had idealized him with the rest. I had been proud of him. But was that love?

  My thoughts were now occupied…not with my loss of him but with my fears that my son would be taken away from me.

  I felt I did not know myself and that Owen Tudor in his way was helping me to find the person I was.

  Sometimes we would sit together and talk. He had a small room in the apartments where he kept his accounts.

  One day I went to this room and found him alone. He immediately rose and bowed as I entered.

  I said: “Sit down, Owen Tudor.” And I sat too so that we faced each other.

  “Tell me truly,” I said, “how does it feel for a brave warrior to be thus engaged, on boring accounts?”

  “My lady, I am happy to be here,” he said.

  “Perhaps you are…as I am…tired of war?”

  “They were great days under the King.”

  “They brought about the humiliation of my country.”

  “But the triumph of the King’s armies.”

  “One country’s victory must be another’s defeat.”

  “That is so, my lady.”

  “Are you sure you do not want to return to fight?”

  “I have had my fill of fighting. The King is dead. Having served with the greatest, I would not wish to do so with any less.”

  “So you will stay here. Perhaps one day you will guard the King and be beside him as you were beside his father.”

  “Who can say, my lady?”

  “I think it would be what my husband, the King, would have wanted. He thought highly of you.”

  “He was gracious enough to do so.”

  “Did you not fight bravely with him at Agincourt?”

  “It was a great honor to be close to him in that battle.”

  “He mentioned your name to me. I remember it well.”

  “And rewarded me, too. Being Esquire of his Body was the greatest honor I had known at that time. There were some who complained that I was too young for the post, but the King said that there were qualities which were of more importance than years. He was a great king, my lady. There was never one like him before, nor ever will be after. That I know. I shall never forget the day he saved his brother’s life.”

  “His brother’s life? I did not know of this. Which brother?”

  “The Duke of Gloucester, my lady. I was nearby and saw it all. It could have been the end of the Duke. The Duke of Alençon was in command of the enemy, and I saw him strike down the Duke of Gloucester with his own hand. The Duke lay on the ground for a few seconds. He would have been killed, but the King was at hand. He dashed forward and knocked the sword out of Alençon’s hands. He saved his brother’s life then.”

  “The Duke must have been thankful to him.”

  Owen was silent and I went on: “Was he not?”

  “It is difficult for a proud man to acknowledge a debt.”

  “But for a life!”

  “That would make him feel even more indebted.”

  I wanted to pursue the point, but Owen would not be drawn into it. He was wise really…wiser than I was. He taught me discretion.

  These tête-à-têtes were becoming frequent. They were easy to arrange because of his position. I was known to set great store by clothes, and as he was my Wardrobe Clerk I would have a certain amount to say to him. I suppose one of my ladies might have conducted the necessary business, but it was not unnatural that I should want to do it myself.

  I liked to listen to his musical voice with the accent which was now becoming familiar to me. He was proud of his ancestors with the unpronounceable names. I used to laugh as he reeled them off and I used to make him say them again, syllable by syllable.

  How he loved to talk of Wales! I said: “I think your heart is still there, Owen Tudor.”

  “A man’s heart often
stays where he first saw the light of day, my lady. And you?”

  I shook my head firmly. “No, Owen Tudor. I was very unhappy there. Home! That was the Hôtel de St.-Paul. You could not imagine it. Those cold and drafty rooms. Guillemote will tell you. She came to us when we were there. She looked after us…poor, hungry, shivering little children. We were kept there by our mother, who lived in luxury with her lover and spent so much on garments, perfumes and little pet animals that there was not enough to feed her children. And all the time there was the fear of that wild man…our father…who was often chained to his bed in a room more dismal than ours.”

  I was startled by this outburst. This was no way for a queen to talk to one of her subjects. I stopped abruptly: “I…er…Forget what I said. I was carried away. It was what you said about one’s home. I never had a real home, Owen Tudor. This Windsor…with my son…is the best home I ever knew.”

  I left him then. I was too emotional to remain. I sat alone in my apartment. Why had I allowed this to happen…to talk so frankly, so intimately…to my Clerk of the Wardrobe?

  I wanted to tell Guillemote about it. But no. It was something I could not say to anyone. I could not understand it myself.

  · · ·

  I insisted that Owen tell me about his family. I loved to hear him talk; he had a love of words and could be carried away by his own rhetoric.

  “My sire, my lady,” he told me, “was one Meredydd. He lived in Anglesey, that island at the head of wild Wales. He was what is known in those parts as Escheater of Anglesey, and I pray you do not ask what his duties entailed for I cannot tell you. Yet I know this: later he reveled in the post of Scutifer to the Bishop of Bangor, and I can tell you that that was a grand name for butler or steward. He married my mother. She was named Margaret, her father being Dafydd Fychan ap Dafydd Llwyd, which means that he was the son of the last named.”

  He made me laugh and I was eager to hear more.

  “My father Meredydd was a man of wild temper. If a word was uttered against him that did not please him, it would be his hand to his sword. I do not believe any were surprised when he killed a man.”

  “Owen Tudor!”

  “Alas, ’tis true, my lady. ’Twas before I entered this world. Perforce he fled to the mountains taking Margaret with him, and there in the shadow of great Snowdon, I was born.”

  “And you left Wales to come and serve the King?”

  “There I had good fortune. Look you, is it not so? A man knows this one…knows that one…and that can be another step up the ladder to fame. My father’s mother was a connection of the great Owen Glendower who was of some use to England. His own son, in time, entered King Henry’s army and so brought me to it.”

  “So that is how you came to be with us?”

  He looked at me earnestly and murmured: “’Twas the greatest good fortune I have ever known, my lady.”

  “I am pleased. I often think that a warrior such as you will want to be off again…fighting.”

  “My lady, I am more content here than I have ever been before.”

  It was fulsome. But he was Welsh, I reminded myself. He had a poetic soul and might sometimes choose words for their musical sound rather than because they expressed the truth.

  But I continued to look forward to our meetings; and they took my mind away, now and then, from the haunting fear that I might lose my son.

  Margaret, Duchess of Clarence, was with me again, and I was delighted to see her, particularly as she brought with her her charming daughter of her first marriage, Jane.

  Margaret was happier than she had been at our last meeting when she was mourning her husband. Now she had settled down to a life of widowhood and I could see that the center of that life was her daughter.

  I found a great pleasure in their company. I, myself, was fast recovering from the shock of Henry’s death, and my nightly prayers were that I should continue in this state.

  There was another visitor to Windsor. This was James I of Scotland.

  It was not quite true to call James a prisoner in the ordinary sense. He was just being held in England until such time as the Scots paid his ransom.

  James was a delightful companion. I had liked him from the moment I met him. I felt I knew him fairly well for he had been with us on our triumphant entry into Paris. Henry had taken him to France in the hope that he would be able to persuade the Scots there not to fight for the French. I believe he had not been very successful in this; but James himself had fought side by side with Henry in several battles and I could not believe that for one moment he saw himself as an enemy. He had been in exile for so long. I think at this time it was nineteen years. But he had always been treated as royalty. The only difference was that his liberty was curtailed. For instance, he could not ride out and return to Scotland. I had a sneaking notion that he had no desire to. Conditions above the border were somewhat harsh compared with the south; and while he was treated in a royal manner, I supposed James felt no restraint—or very little—in not being allowed complete freedom. He was happy enough to be in England. In any case, he never showed any nostalgia for his native land to my knowledge—in fact, he could scarcely have remembered it, for he was about ten years old, I believe, when he had been captured.

  He had lived hardly any of his life in Scotland, for he told me that when he was eight years old he had been put into the care of the Earl of Northumberland to learn the manly arts and for a while was educated with the Earl’s grandson, who later became known as “Henry Hotspur.”

  It was another case of a minor being too young to take over the government of his country; and his old, sick father decided he would send his young son to France for safety. His efforts failed, for the ship in which James was being taken was intercepted by the English; and that was how James came to be a prisoner awaiting the ransom to be paid.

  He was writing a long poem about his life which he called The King’s Quair, and he used to read extracts from it to us, which we found both moving and entertaining.

  So I grew very fond of James and hoped we should go on enjoying the peaceful days together for a long time.

  It was inevitable that, as they were both at Windsor, one day James should meet Jane.

  I remember the occasion vividly. James was in my apartment and we were looking down on the gardens as we chatted. Suddenly Jane came into view.

  She looked up at the window and, seeing me with the King of Scotland, she bowed her head; then she looked up again and smiled.

  “What a beautiful girl!” said James.

  “Yes, is she not.”

  “Who is she?”

  “She is the daughter of the Duchess of Clarence. Her father was John Beaufort, the Earl of Somerset.”

  “Oh…a Beaufort.”

  “Yes. The Duchess’s first husband. Poor Margaret, she has been twice widowed.”

  “Yes,” he said. “It is sad for her.”

  At the earliest possible moment I presented Jane to him. James was clearly bemused. I was not sure of Jane. She was perhaps more in command of her feelings. They talked together for some time and I noticed that his eyes never left her face.

  I fancied a certain radiance had touched her too. It was rather charming to see the effect those two had on each other.

  I talked to Margaret about them.

  “I think there is no doubt that James is falling in love with Jane…or, more likely, has already fallen.”

  “I trust that is not so.”

  “But why, Margaret? I should like to see James happy. Poor young man! Think of his being a prisoner for nineteen years.”

  “It has been a very comfortable prison.”

  “If Jane married him, she would be Queen of Scotland.”

  “A queen without a crown…a queen without a throne.”

  “If the ransom were paid, he would return to Scotland.”

  “They say it is a barbaric land, and the ransom will never be paid.”

  “James does not seem barbaric, and the ra
nsom will surely be paid one day.”

  “He has been brought up in England.”

  “Margaret, I thought you would rejoice. I think it is wonderful to see two young people so happy. If they are in love, they should be allowed to marry.”

  “Well,” said Margaret. “It has not yet come to that.”

  I watched the courtship grow. This was love…true love. It was something I had missed. Henry had never been like that.

  I could see it all clearly now. He had been kind to me…gentle…loving…but it was not love such as the King of Scotland had for Jane Beaufort. I felt envious. I would have given a great deal to be loved like that.

  They talked to me about it.

  “We are going to marry,” James said firmly.

  “Then I wish you all the happiness in the world,” I told them.

  Jane embraced me. “Nothing will change our minds,” she said. “They can forbid us as much as they like…we will marry. We have made up our minds.”

  “You will,” I said. “But do not do anything rash just yet. Surely soon the King’s ransom must be paid.”

  “Surely soon,” said James.

  Margaret was less optimistic.

  “Will they pay his ransom after all these years? It must be nearly twenty now…just because he has fallen in love with an English girl?”

  “They must want their king back.”

  “After all these years? You can depend upon it—for every one who wants him back, there will be two against it.”

  “Why are you so pessimistic, Margaret? Let us hope.”

  And so the golden days slipped by.

  Trouble with Burgundy through Humphrey’s marriage continued to hold the attention of those who might otherwise turn it to the education of my son, which was a blessing to me. And here in Windsor I had Henry to love and to cherish and I could watch the growing love and courtship of Jane Beaufort and the King of Scotland. And there was Owen.

  Happy days when I could forget the shadow hanging over me.

  The summer was passing. I lived through the golden days treasuring each one as though it might be the last. I watched with mixed emotions the progress of my son. Each day he seemed to change; he would soon pass out of babyhood. They would be made aware of that passing and they would take him from me. He was now taking a few uncertain steps. Guillemote and I would stand him on the floor, a few paces from each of us, and he would take his tottering steps before stumbling into our arms. We clapped our hands in rapturous applause and he would clap with us, his face a picture of delight. There were happy moments like that to be treasured and I knew I should remember them forever.