The Lady of the Rivers

by Gregory, Philippa

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘Don’t speak of ruin. This is wonderful. This is the solution to everything. We will get married.’

  ‘We will have to get married!’ he exclaims. ‘Or you will be shamed. But if we marry you are disgraced. God, what a trap I have put myself in, and what a trap I have put you in!’

  ‘This is the way out of the trap,’ I say. ‘For nobody will make us deny our marriage if we have exchanged our vows and have a child on the way. The council, my mother, the king, everyone will have to accept it. And though they won’t like it – they will come to bear it. They say that the king’s own mother married Owen Tudor without permission . . . ’

  ‘And was disgraced! She slept with the keeper of her wardrobe and never came back to court. Her own son changed the law of the land to prevent a royal widow ever doing such a thing again! That law applies to you!’

  ‘She survived,’ I say steadily. ‘And she has two handsome boys, half-brothers to the king. Richard, I cannot live without you. I cannot marry another man. We were driven by desire to become lovers, and now we are driven on to marry.’

  ‘I don’t want to be your ruin,’ he says. ‘God forgive me, though I desire you, I won’t desire that. I despised Owen Tudor for conceiving a child on the queen he should have served, a man who ruined a woman he should have laid down his life to protect – and now I have been as selfish as him! I should leave right now. I should go on crusade. I should be hanged for treason.’

  I take a long pause and then I raise my eyes and give him a look as limpid as a forest pool. ‘Oh, have I been mistaken in you? Have I been long mistaken? Do you not love me? Don’t you want to marry me? Shall you cast me aside?’

  He drops to his knees. ‘Before God, I love you and cherish you more than anything in the world. Of course I want to marry you. I love you heart and soul.’

  ‘Then I acceptut of say gleefully. ‘I shall be happy to be your wife.’

  He shakes his head. ‘I should be honoured to marry you, my love, you are far, far above my deserts – but I so fear for you.’ The thought strikes him. ‘And for our child!’ Gently he puts his hand on my belly. ‘My God, a child. I shall have to keep the two of you safe. I shall have two to care for now.’

  ‘I shall be Jacquetta Woodville,’ I say dreamily, turning the name over. ‘Jacquetta Woodville. And she will be Elizabeth Woodville.’

  ‘Elizabeth? You are sure it is a girl?’

  ‘I am sure. She will be Elizabeth, the first of many children.’

  ‘If they don’t behead me for treason.’

  ‘They won’t behead you. I shall speak to the king, and I shall speak to Queen Catherine, his mother, if I have to. And we will be happy.’

  When he leaves me that night, he is still torn between delight that we are to marry, and remorse that he has led me into trouble. I sit up at my window, my hand on my belly, and I look at the moon. Tonight there is a new moon, in the first quarter, a good moon for new beginnings, new hopes, and for the start of a new life. On a whim, I take out the cards that my great-aunt gave me, and I spread them out face down before me. My hand hovers over one card and then another, before I choose one. It is my favourite card of all: the Queen of Cups, the queen of water and of love, Melusina’s own card, a card of insight and tenderness. A girl whose card this is will be a queen herself, a beloved queen.

  ‘I shall marry your father,’ I say to the little spark of life inside me. ‘And I shall bring you into the world. I know you will be beautiful for your father is the most handsome man in England, but I wonder what you will do with your life, and how far you will go when it all becomes clear to you – when you too see the man that you love, and know the life that you want.’

  GRAFTON, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE,

  AUTUMN 1436

  We wait till the court is on its slow way back to London, staying overnight at Northampton. Early one morning, before my ladies are stirring, I slip out of my rooms and meet Richard at the stables. He has Merry saddled and bridled, and his own war horse ready to go, and we ride down the little road to his home village of Grafton. A priest lives here alone, in his retreat, and there is a little chapel near to the manor house. Richard’s father is waiting there, his face stern and anxious, and he has brought three witnesses. Richard goes to find the priest as his father steps forwards.

  ‘I hope you know what you are doing, Your Grace,’ he says bluntly, as he helps me down from my horse.

  ‘I am marrying the finest man I have ever known.’

  ‘It will cost you dear,’ he warns.

  ‘It would be worse to lose him.’

  He nods as if he is not so sure, but he offers me hisarm and he walks me into the chapel. At the eastern end there is a little stone altar, a cross and a candle burning. Before it stands the priest in the brown gown of the Franciscan order, and beside him, Richard, turning and smiling shyly at me as if we were before a crowd of hundreds and wearing cloth of gold.

  I walk to the altar and just as I start to respond to the priest’s gentle prompting of our vows the sun comes out, and shines through the circular stained-glass window above the altar. For a moment, I forget what I am to say. There is a veil of colours at our feet on the stone floor of the chapel and I think dizzily that I am here now, marrying the man that I love, and that one day I will stand here when my daughter marries the man of her choice, rainbows beneath her feet, and a crown before her. The sudden vision makes me hesitate, and Richard looks at me. ‘If you have any doubts, a moment’s doubt, we need not marry,’ he says quickly. ‘I will think of something, I will make you safe, my love.’

  I smile up at him, the tears in my eyes making a rainbow around him too. ‘I have no doubts.’ I turn to the priest. ‘Go on.’

  He leads us through our vows and then declares us man and wife. Richard’s father kisses my cheeks and gives his son a powerful hug. Richard turns and pays the three clerks he has hired as witnesses, and tells them that if he calls on them they must remember the day and the time and that we were truly married in the sight of God, and he puts his family ring on my finger, and gives me a purse of gold before them all, to prove that I am his wife, that he trusts me with his honour and his fortune.

  ‘What now?’ his father asks grimly as we come out of the chapel into the sunshine.

  ‘Back to court,’ Richard says. ‘And when the moment serves us, we will have to tell the king.’

  ‘He will forgive you,’ his father predicts. ‘He is a young man quick to forgive anything. It is his advisors that will cause your difficulties. They will call you a mountebank, my son. They will say you are pretending to a lady too far above you.’

  Richard shrugs. ‘They can say what they like as long as they leave her with her fortune and her reputation,’ he says.

  His father shakes his head as if he is not sure of that either, and then helps me onto my horse. ‘Send for me if you need me,’ he says gruffly. ‘I am yours to command, Your Grace, and your honour is in my keeping too.’

  ‘You can call me Jacquetta,’ I say.

  He pauses. ‘I was your late husband’s chamberlain,’ he says. ‘It is not right that I should call you by your given name.’

  ‘You were his chamberlain, and I was his duchess, but now, God bless him, he has gone from us and the world is different, and I am your daughter-in-law,’ I say. ‘And at first they will say that Richard has leapt up, but then they will see that we are going to rise together.’

  ‘How high?’ he asks drily. ‘The higher you rise, the greater the fall.’

  ‘I don’t know how high we will rise,’ I say stoutly. ‘And I have no fear of falling.’

  He looks at me. ‘You are ambitious to rise?’

  ‘We are all on fortune’s wheel,’ I say. ‘Without a doubt we will rise. We may fall. But still I have no fear of it.’

  WESTMINSTER PALACE, LONDON,

  AUTUMN 1436

  The baby is not yet showing through the graceful sweep of my gowns, though I know that she is growing. My breasts are
bigger and tender to the touch, and more than anything else I have a sense of being in company, everywhere I go, even when I am asleep. I decide to take the news of the baby and the marriage to the king’s council before the anniversary of my husband’s death, before anyone proposes another marriage for me, and so forces me to defy them. I try to choose a good time, but the council is torn between Cardinal Beaufort and his ally the Earl of Suffolk William de la Pole, and their great rival Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester and his court. There is never a time when they are not fretting about safety in the country, and empty chests in the treasury. There is never a moment when they can agree what should be done. I wait for a week after our wedding and then I visit the great favourite William de la Pole in his rooms in Westminster Palace, in the quiet hour before dinner.

  ‘I am honoured,’ he says, putting a chair before his table for me. ‘And what can I do for you, Your Grace?’

  ‘I have to ask for your help in a matter of some delicacy,’ I say. This is not easy, but I press on. ‘A personal matter.’

  ‘A personal matter for a beautiful duchess?’ he says. ‘I take it this is a matter of the heart?’

  He makes it sound like a girl’s folly. I retain my smile. ‘Indeed,’ I say. ‘To be blunt, sir, I have married without permission and I am hoping that you will take the news to the king, and speak for me.’

  There is a painful silence. Then he says, ‘Married?’

  ‘Yes.’

  His gaze is sharp. ‘And who have you married?’

  ‘A gentleman . . . ’

  ‘Not a nobleman?’

  ‘No. A gentleman.’

  ‘And he is?’

  ‘Richard Woodville, of my household.’

  His gleam of amusement is instantly hidden as he drops his eyes to the papers on the table before him. I know he will be thinking how he can take advantage of my folly. ‘And this is a love match, I take it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You were not prevailed upon nor forced? It was done legally with your consent? There are no grounds for an annulment or a denial? If he seduced you or even persuaded you, then he can be arrested and hanged.’

  ‘There are no grounds for denial, and I want no grounds. This is the husband of my choice, this is a marriage I desired.’

  ‘Desire?’ he asks coldly, as if he has never felt it.

  ‘The gentleman is to be congratulated; there are many men who would have been glad of your desire. Any man would be glad of your consent. Indeed, the council has been considering your next husband. Several names were proposed.’

  I hide a smile at this. There is almost no council but him, Cardinal Beaufort and the Duke of Gloucester. If names were proposed then it will be this man who was proposing them.

  ‘The matter is already settled,’ I say stoutly. ‘And we are wedded and bedded, there is nothing that can be done. Whoever they have chosen for me is proposed too late. I am married to a good man. He has been very kind to me since the death of my lord John.’

  ‘And I see you have been very kind to him,’ he says with a little snigger. ‘Exceptionally kind. Well, I will tell His Grace, the king, and you can ask him for forgiveness.’

  I nod. It would help me if William de la Pole would recommend this to the king. The king is always given to the opinion of the last man who spoke to him, and the three councillors compete to be the last out of the door. ‘Do you think he will be very angry?’ The king is a boy of fifteen. It is ridiculous that I should fear his anger.

  ‘No. But I am sure that his council will advise that you must be exiled from court, and they will fine you.’

  I nod. ‘But you could persuade them to be kind.’

  ‘They will fine you heavily,’ he warns. ‘The king’s treasury is short of money and they all know you have the Bedford fortune. And it is a serious offence to marry without the king’s permission. They will say that you don’t deserve the money.’

  ‘I have only my dower,’ I say. ‘Most of the fortune has already gone to the king, and he has given it to his favourites.’ I don’t say, ‘You among them,’ but we know that is what I mean. ‘My lord’s brother, the Duke Humphrey, had the rest, I didn’t keep Penshurst.’

  ‘You have the dower of a royal duchess, but you have chosen to be the woman of a squire. I think you will find they will want your dower. You may find you have to live as the wife of a squire. I only hope that in a few years’ time you still think you have made a good bargain.’

  ‘I hope you will help me,’ I say. ‘I am counting on you.’

  He just sighs.

  He is right. One thousand pounds in gold they demand from us, and they order Richard to return to his post at Calais.

  Richard is aghast. ‘My God! A fortune! We will never raise it! It is the price of a house and an estate, it is greater than my father’s entire fortune. Greater than any inheritance I could hope for. Greater than anything I could win. They mean to ruin us. They are forcing us to part.’

  I nod. ‘They are punishing us.’

  ‘They are destroying us!’

  ‘We can find the money,’ I say. ‘And we are banished from court, but we don’t care, dowe? We can go together to Calais?’

  He shakes his head. ‘I’m not taking you there. I’m not taking you into danger. The Earl of Suffolk has offered me a property where you can live. He has taken most of your wealth as a fine, and he is prepared to take the rest as a rent. He has said he will lease his manor at Grafton to us. It’s not much of a favour since we cannot afford to pay him. But he knows I want it. It is near my home, I have had my eye on it since I was a boy.’

  ‘I will sell my jewels,’ I say. ‘And books if we have to. I have lands that we can borrow on, some things that we can sell to raise the rent. This is the price of our life together.’

  ‘I have reduced you to the position of a squire’s wife with a nobleman’s debt,’ he says furiously. ‘You should hate me. I have betrayed you.’

  ‘How much do you love me?’ I counter. I take his hands in mine and I hold them to my heart. I can feel him catch his breath at my touch. He pauses and looks at me.

  ‘More than life itself, you know that.’

  ‘If you had to put a price on it?’

  ‘A king’s ransom. A fortune.’

  ‘Then consider, husband mine, that we have a bargain, for our marriage has cost us only a thousand pounds.’

  His face lightens. ‘Jacquetta, you are my joy. You are worth tens of thousands.’

  ‘Then pack your things for we can leave court this afternoon,’ I say.

  ‘This afternoon? Do you want us to flee from disgrace?’

  ‘I want us to be at your home tonight.’

  He hesitates for a moment and then his smile breaks out, as he realises what I am saying. ‘We will spend our first night together as a married couple? We will go to our bedroom as husband and wife? And tomorrow we will go to breakfast together openly? Ah, Jacquetta, this is the start of everything.’ He bows his head and kisses my hands. ‘I love you,’ he says again. ‘And please God, you will always think that you have a good bargain for our thousand pounds.’

  GRAFTON, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE,

  AUTUMN 1436–1439

  I do think it a good bargain. We raise the money for the fine by borrowing against my dower lands, and then we borrow more to buy the manor house at Grafton from the Earl of Suffolk. For all his sly smiles he does not refuse to sell to the disgraced duchess and her squire. He wants our friendship so that we can be his allies in the country as he gains power at court. Richard goes to Calais and prepares the garrison for a siege as my kinsman, the faithless Duke of Burgundy, marches against his former allies. The great lords of England, the Earl of Mortmain and the Duke of York, turn out for their country and Richard holds Calais for them. Finally Humphrey, the Duke of Gloucester, sets sail for Calais and earns much credit for the saving of the town, though, as my husband points out, the siege was already defeated before the king’s uncle came in with his standard flying.
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  I don’t care. Richard’s courage has been demonstrated to all of England and nobody can doubt his honour. He has come through a siege and several raids without a scratch and returns to England a hero. My first child, the daughter that I had foretold, is born without difficulty when the hedge is bobbing white with May and the blackbirds are singing in the dusk, that first spring in the country. The next year comes our son and heir.

  We call him Lewis, and I find I am entranced to have a boy of my making. He has very fair hair, almost silvery, but his eyes are as dark as the sky at night. The midwife who helps me for this, my second time, tells me that all babies’ eyes are blue and that both his hair colour and his eyes may change; but he seems to me a boy who is half-fairy with this angelic colouring. His little sister is still sleeping in the Woodville cherrywood crib and so at night I put them in together, side by side on their swaddling boards like pretty little dolls.

  Richard says with satisfaction that I am a woman who has forgotten all about being a wife and a lover and that he is a miserably neglected man. He is joking though, and he revels in the beauty of our little daughter and in the growth and strength of our son. The next year I give birth to his sister, my Anne, and while I am confined with her, my father-in-law takes a fever and dies. It was a comfort to him that he lived long enough to learn that we had been forgiven by the king, and summoned back to court. Only with a daughter of just two, a boy of one year old and a new baby in the carved cradle, I am not very eager to go.

  ‘We will never earn enough to pay our debts, living in the country,’ my husband advises me. ‘I have the fattest cows in Northamptonshire, and the best sheep, but I do swear, Jacquetta, we will live and die in debt. You have married a poor man and should be glad that I don’t make you beg in your petticoat.’