“He’ll be after making no more Kings now, my liege!”
Edward turned to look at the man and then backhanded him across the mouth, a blow that would have been inconsequential from another man, but coming from Edward, drove the man to his knees, spitting blood.
No one moved; none dared to aid their fallen comrade. Edward was kneeling before Warwick, turning the body over. Looters had already been at work. Parts of Warwick’s armor had been pried loose and both gauntlets were gone; gone, too, were the jeweled rings he’d worn with such pride. Edward raised the visor and gasped. Until then, he’d not realized how Warwick had been killed, held down while daggers were driven deep into his brain. Richard was beside him now. He slammed the visor shut, caught Richard’s wrist as he leaned forward.
“You don’t want to see, Dickon.”
One glance at Edward’s face was enough for Richard; he took him at his word, nodded. After a moment, Edward rose, but Richard remained where he was, gazing down at the body of his cousin. He looked up sharply, though, as he heard his brother turn his rage upon the frightened soldiers.
“I did give orders that he was to be spared, God damn your worthless souls!”
They stammered denials, swore they’d had no part in Warwick’s death, that they’d found him as he was now, God’s truth; he’d been trying to reach the horse park with men in pursuit; they’d seen them enter the woods and followed, but he was dead ere they reached the scene.
Other riders were coming up, Will Hastings and John Howard among them. Howard dismounted, came to stand beside Richard.
“A pity,” he said quietly. Richard nodded, said nothing. He wondered if Howard knew about his son, opened his mouth to speak, but somehow the words wouldn’t come. Something must have showed in his face, though, for John Howard then did something totally unexpected, thoroughly out of character. He reached out and, for a moment, let his arm encircle the boy’s shoulders.
There was sudden activity across the clearing, where Edward stood. Richard raised his head, stared at the agitated, gesturing men. Even before he saw his brother’s face, he knew.
He didn’t move, stood very still. He was no longer aware of John Howard, or of the encircling men who’d drawn near to view with curiosity the body of the Kingmaker. It was some moments before he could nerve himself to cross the clearing, to hear Ned tell him that Johnny, too, was dead.
They stood apart from the others. Edward was staring down at the ground, at the trampled uprooted grass that spoke for the extreme violence of Warwick’s end. After a time, he crossed himself, but Richard knew these minutes of silence had been given over to Johnny, not prayer.
“You’ve the right to know, Dickon,” he said at last, said in a voice that was thick, scratchy with emotion. “Johnny wore our colors under his armor. He went into battle against us wearing the blue and murrey of York.”
“Jesus pity him,” Richard whispered. Tears had filled his eyes but they clung tenaciously to his lashes, wouldn’t fall. He felt frozen; not even for Johnny could he cry.
Other men were riding up. Richard recognized George and managed to pull himself together, said in an almost inaudible undertone, “Ned, I don’t want George to see…” His voice trailed off and Edward nodded, watched as Richard moved to intercept George, to keep him from too close a scrutiny of his father-in-law’s body.
One of the new arrivals approached Edward, said with a smile, “Your Grace has had a great victory this day.”
Edward nodded.
Above him, the sun at last broke through the fog. Flashes of bright blue were widening overhead, and the men within the clearing now found themselves standing in soft morning light. It was not yet ten o’clock.
28
Cerne Abbey
April 1471
Easter Sunday. A High Mass was in progress at St Paul’s Cathedral. The service was abruptly halted by the triumphant return of the Yorkist lords, and as the congregation watched in awe, Edward strode up the aisle and laid a bloodied banner on the altar. The Archbishop of Canterbury, who had himself lost two kinsmen that day on Barnet Heath, then resumed the Easter Mass, offering grateful Yorkist prayers for God’s favor.
Easter Sunday. The Countess of Warwick landed at Portsmouth. From there, she took ship for Weymouth, where she was to await the arrival of Marguerite d’Anjou, Prince Edward, and her daughters. Her ship put in briefly at Southampton, and there she was told of the battle that had been fought that dawn at Barnet Heath. She at once abandoned her plan to journey on to Weymouth, and instead rode to Beaulieu Abbey in nearby New Forest. There within the walls of the Cistercian monastery she sought and was granted right of sanctuary.
Easter Sunday. After a storm-delayed Channel crossing, Marguerite d’Anjou reached Weymouth, ending seven years of French exile. With her were her son Edward, her daughter-in-law Anne Neville, and Anne’s sister Isabel.
With her, too, were three men sharing a common Christian name and little else. Dr John Morton, shrewdest and most trusted of her political councilors, a man who, like George Neville, wore the vestments of a priest and nurtured ambitions thoroughly secular in nature; both he and Marguerite intended that he should be named as Lord Chancellor of England upon the defeat of York. John Beaufort, younger brother of Edmund, Duke of Somerset, a youth still in his twenties who’d never wavered in his allegiance to Lancaster. And John, Lord Wenlock, soldier, diplomat, whose loyalties had been pledged, at one time or another, to Lancaster, York, and the Earl of Warwick.
The next day, Monday the 15, they moved inland to the Benedictine Abbey of Cerne. In midafternoon, the Duke of Somerset and the Earl of Devon rode into the confines of the abbey, and from Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, Marguerite learned of Barnet.
Marguerite was shaken by Warwick’s death as none could have foreseen. She’d stared speechlessly at Somerset, black eyes suddenly enormous in a face blanched of all color, and when the Countess of Vaux pressed an ivory rosary into her hand, she clutched it so tightly that the beads broke apart, spilled onto the flagstone floor. To her uneasy audience, it was an ill-omened occurrence.
Marguerite herself was oblivious of the scattered rosary. Warwick had been her sworn enemy, her mortal foe. She had hated him, mistrusted him, and needed him. For it was through Warwick alone that she was at last able to get from the King of France the aid he’d so long denied her. And so she’d been driven to accept Warwick as ally, driven by her own desperation, the ambitions of her son, and the unrelenting persuasions of the French monarch. She’d come to terms with the one man she hated above all others, allowed herself to be seduced into sharing his belief that destiny was his for the taking. All his life, had he not done what other men would never dare? The mightiest of the mighty Nevilles, the maker of Kings. She’d not let herself believe he might fail.
They were all watching her, Somerset and Devon, the Countess of Vaux, Dr Morton, Abbot Bemyster. Somerset spoke her name, but she ignored him; what more had he to say after telling her of Barnet Heath? She’d begun to pace, found herself before the prie-dieu. In years gone by, she’d knelt on prayer seats cushioned in white satin, studded with jewels. This was a rude monk’s seat, little more than a bench. She lowered herself onto it, rested her forehead on her clasped hands, but she did not pray.
She could not say with certainty how long she knelt before the prie-dieu. After a timeless interval, she heard another step approach her, this one springy with the sureness of youth, heard the voice she loved above all others.
“Maman?”
She turned to her son at once. He took her hand, helped her to rise. She leaned against him, within the circle of his arms.
“Édouard…do you know?”
“Oui, Maman.” He glanced over her head, across the room where Somerset and Devon stood. “Somerset told me.”
When agitated, her heavily accented English tended to fragment, to slur into Gallic incomprehensibility. Such was the case now, and she switched abruptly to her native tongue, began to speak rapidly,
scarcely pausing for breath. Somerset and Devon found the swift colloquial French hard to follow, but they caught enough of her meaning to exchange looks of dismay.
John Morton, who was polished courtier as well as cleric, was sufficiently alarmed to commit a serious breach of etiquette. He stepped forward, blurted out, “Madame, surely you cannot mean to return to France! I implore you, assure us we did misunderstand you….”
Her surprise was evident, as was her displeasure. “You did not mistake me.”
Somerset was appalled, Devon no less so. They were quick to add their voices to that of Morton. They protested, argued, entreated…to no avail. Marguerite turned a deaf ear to their pleas, gave them the most reluctant of monosyllabic responses. Her mind was made up. She would return to France with the next tide. She’d not risk her son’s life now that Warwick was dead. Nothing was worth that to her. Nothing, she repeated, in tones of implacable ice.
For the men a dream was dying, and they persisted well beyond the boundaries of her patience.
“You’ve said enough, my lords,” she snapped. “We do sail for France and I’ll hear no more on it!”
Her son had listened in silence…until now.
“No, Maman.”
She swung around to confront him as Somerset, Morton, and Devon watched, taut with sudden hope.
“Édouard?”
“I am not willing to take flight, to concede the day to York. If we do not seize our chance now, it will never come again. It grieves me that we must be at variance over this, Maman. But I will not live out my days in exile while a usurper claims the kingship which, by rights, is mine.”
She nodded slowly. “Indeed, the crown is yours, Édouard, my son…upon the death of your lord father.”
He was momentarily silenced by the rebuke. He frequently spoke of his father’s suffering, dutifully vowed to avenge his captivity. But the truth was that he often went for long periods of time when he forgot about Harry of Lancaster altogether. His memories of his father, never vivid, had clouded considerably over the years and were, as well, obscurely unpleasant to recall. Both the memories and the emotions they stirred were unexplored, had never been exposed to the light. Instinctively, he preferred it that way, suspected his mother did, too. He knew now that she must truly be fearful for him, to make such use of his father’s name.
Taking advantage of his hesitancy, she closed the space between them. She reached for his hand, her fingers closing around his in a coaxing caress, and the watching men saw that her smile had lost none of its charm during her years of exile.
“I ask you to give up nothing, bien-aimé. I ask you only to wait, to wait till the time be more favorable…. No more than that.”
“If we leave England now, we lose all,” he said flatly. “The chance will not come again.”
“Édouard, you do not understand. You do not realize what we risk….”
“I realize what is at stake. The crown of England.”
She grasped his shoulders as if she meant to shake him. But she didn’t, and after the space of several shallow breaths, she let her arms drop to her side.
“Édouard, my love, listen to me,” she said urgently. “You do not know your enemy. Edward of York is a seasoned soldier, a ruthless man who has never been defeated on the field.”
Both Somerset and Devon stiffened at that, for her implication was obvious, but she had no time to spare for their sensibilities now.
“York did swear we owed him a blood debt after Sandal Castle, and though he does lie as easily as other men draw breath, this one time he means to keep his word, has waited ten years to do so. Should we lose, he will accord you no mercy.”
She’d blundered and she saw it…but too late.
“I ask no mercy from York,” he flared. “I ask only to see his head on London’s Drawbridge Gate, and by God, I shall!”
“Well said, Your Grace!” Devon interjected, while Somerset and Morton maintained a more prudent silence, unwilling to further offend their Queen when there was no need, knowing now that they would have their way, that their Prince would prevail.
Marguerite knew it, too. That was evident with her next words.
“If I do insist, Édouard?” And the very fact that she needed to ask was in itself a concession of defeat.
“Do not, Maman,” Edward said softly.
The ensuing silence was awkward, even for the exultant men. Devon had discovered a wine flagon and cups on the sideboard. He knelt before Edward, holding out a brimming cup.
“I should be honored to drink your health, Highness.”
Edward accepted the cup, smiled at him. There was admiration in Devon’s eyes; Somerset and Morton, too, were regarding him with approval. Only his mother’s morbid misgivings marred the pleasure of the moment. He gave her a look of affectionate impatience, thinking that she’d come to her senses soon enough. She wasn’t given, after all, to the foolish fears and fancies that he thought common to most of her sex. This was the woman called “Captain Marguerite” by the Yorkists, the woman who’d routed Warwick at St Albans with an imaginative flank attack of her own devising. Not that he thought women should take upon themselves the duties and prerogatives of men, but his mother was not like other women. She was Marguerite d’Anjou and he could feel only pride when he looked upon her. Even now, when she was being so unreasonable, so strangely faint-hearted.
Leaning over, he deposited a conciliatory kiss upon her taut cheek. “I know you did not expect Warwick to be beaten. But once you do think upon it, Maman, I am sure you will come to see how little we have lost by Warwick’s death.”
His eyes flickered from her, across to Somerset. “What say you, my lord Somerset? You lost both your father and brother to the Nevilles. Can you, in truth, tell Madame my mother that you have regrets for Warwick or Montagu?”
Somerset shook his head. “No, Your Grace. I do not weep for Warwick,” he said dryly.
Edward turned back to his mother. “When my lord father was taken into custody by York, it was Warwick who led him through the streets of London to be jeered and mocked by the rabble. It was Warwick who bound his feet to the stirrups of his saddle, as if he were no more than the meanest, poorest felon…and he an anointed King! It was Warwick who dared slur your name and my heritage, Warwick who placed the crown of Lancaster upon York’s head.”
“You may be sure I have not forgotten,” Marguerite said with some asperity.
Unfazed, he gave her his most winning smile. “We are among friends; we may speak plainly. What if it had been York who died at Barnet? We’d still have had to deal with Warwick. We knew the reckoning would come in time; he had much to answer for. But with York dead and Warwick securely in the saddle…Well, he might not have been that easy to unhorse.” He grinned suddenly. “No, in truth, Maman, we might even say York did us a service of sorts at Barnet!”
Devon laughed. “His Grace is right, Madame. Men will flock to your banners, men who would scorn to fight for a turncoat like Warwick.”
“My Prince,” Somerset said suddenly, warningly, for he alone had noticed the girl standing in the doorway. He wasn’t sure how long she’d been listening. But he was sure she’d heard words that were never meant for her ears, for he had guessed her identity at once, needed no one to tell him this was Warwick’s daughter, she who was wed to his Prince.
She was unnaturally still; the slender body was rigid. Her gaze was unfocused. For a moment her eyes flickered over Somerset’s face, but he felt sure she did not see him. He had marked that look often enough to recognize it now. Men maimed in battle had all too often gazed up at him with that same expression of puzzled intensity, in the fragment of time between the rending and the realization.
He took an instinctive step toward her and then checked himself. He was not the one, after all, to offer her comfort; that was for Marguerite and Prince Edward to do. But neither his Queen nor his Prince gave any indication of doing so. Somerset hesitated; why risk royal disfavor for a misguided moment of pit
y? But the girl had begun to tremble. As he watched, she swayed, caught the doorjamb for support. Somerset swore under his breath, went to her.
“You’d best sit down, my lady,” he said brusquely, and taking a firm grip on her elbow, he steered her toward the nearest seat. She didn’t resist, leaned on his arm. He didn’t think she was even aware of his assistance. But as he straightened, stepped back, she raised her face to his.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
At a loss, Somerset glanced over at his sovereigns. They were watching intently, but it was he, rather than Anne Neville, who held their like dark eyes. He was suddenly angry, with them for their uncharitable indifference and with himself for his reluctance to perform a simple act of kindness. He opened his mouth, words that could compromise him taking shape on his tongue.
“Anne? Sister, what ails you?”
Somerset turned, grateful to relinquish an unwanted responsibility to one better able to handle it. He watched as Warwick’s elder daughter bent over her sister. He stood close enough to see the younger girl swallow, to hear her halting words and Isabel Neville’s gasp.
She froze and then spun around to face the others.
“Madame, what does my sister say? Surely it’s not true!”
Marguerite had seated herself in the Abbot’s high-backed chair. Thus appealed to, she looked toward Isabel, said, “There was a battle fought yesterday morn, near a village called Barnet. York won. Your father and uncle were slain on the field.”
Somerset winced; however much he loved his Queen, he could wish she’d found softer words. Behind him, he heard Anne Neville make a strangled sound, and he thought, Christ, she didn’t know about Montagu! Isabel Neville, however, made no sound at all. Her back was to Somerset, but he saw her shoulders hunch forward, saw the shudder that shook her body.
“What…what of my husband?”
Somerset was startled. He’d been thinking of the girl as Warwick’s daughter, had almost forgotten that she was wife to Clarence, too. It occurred to him that she’d have done better not to remind them of it.
The Sunne In Splendour: A Novel of Richard III Page 42
