Soon after Easter, as April crocuses and narcissus peeked out from the blanket of snow that covered the palace gardens, my father celebrated his fortieth birthday. My mother arranged for lavish entertainment, and nobles from all over the kingdom attended. There were parades, and the streets of London were lined with tapestries and bright silk cloths that hung from houses and balconies; there was feasting, masques, and plays, and bonfires were lit in the streets. I knew that my father’s mistress, Jane Shore, was among those who came to court for the celebration, but I couldn’t tell her apart from the noble ladies, neither by her dress nor by her carriage.
Our joy proved brief. On the twenty-third day of May, my fourteen-year-old sister, Mary, in the full bloom of beauty and youth, died of an infection of the ear. I had never felt such pain and shed so many tears. One night, I couldn’t sleep. I slipped out of the palace and went down to the river. It had rained heavily and it was dark, almost black, for there was no moon at all, no light, not even any torches, for they had been extinguished by the deluge. I was sitting by the water, clutching the silver crucifix Mary had given me, and weeping, when suddenly there was a flash of blue light and I heard Mary’s voice call “Elizabeth!” I leapt up and looked around, but there was no one. “Mary?” I cried. “Where are you? O Mary, Mary—”
Only the lapping of the water broke the silence. Yet I knew it was Mary, and that she was safe in Heaven, and I was struck with awe to be singled out this way. I fell to my knees and tearfully thanked God for the comfort He had seen fit to send me.
But the joy of that beautiful moment dulled in the shadow of my grief. For weeks I had no heart for food or merriment. I had lost my best friend. The year of 1482 seemed shrouded in black.
IN AUGUST, SOME GOOD NEWS FINALLY ARRIVED TO break the gloom wrapped around our hearts. This came from Uncle Richard of Gloucester, fighting the Scots on the border. Berwick Castle, the great fortress on the sea that Marguerite d’Anjou had surrendered to the Scots twenty years before, fell back into English hands. Papa was jubilant. As far as Calais, Uncle Richard’s victory was celebrated with bonfires, and Papa ordered him to appear before him at Yuletide in order to receive his thanks. Uncle Richard came in late December, as the year of 1482 drew to a close. A few days later, Aunt Margaret’s embassy arrived.
Uncle Richard had just returned to the Great Hall where the Twelfth Night festivities were in progress, and had taken his seat at the High Table beside my father, who was merry with drink. Everyone was so happy, especially my mother and her relatives, who danced to lutes and viols and clapped for the actors who performed the pageant “The Agony of Mankind Besieged by World, Flesh, and Devil.” My brothers and sisters and I had dressed in the most lavishly splendid brocaded gowns we had ever worn. But, for some reason I couldn’t fathom, Uncle Richard didn’t partake in our merriment. He sat at the table, deep in thought, a gloomy expression on his handsome face.
“Louis . . .” Papa was saying to no one in particular, “has had two attacks of apoplexy; he will soon die! That shall put an end to our worries about Burgundy, indeed it shall.” He set the jeweled goblet he had been waving around to his lips, but wine splashed on his face. He coughed. Servants rushed to him with gilt-edged towels.
“Sire!” said one of my father’s most trusted retainers, Edward Brampton, striding up. He made a bow. “Messengers from Burgundy, my liege!”
“Burgundy . . . Burgundy . . .” Papa burped. “I cannot give up fifty thousand crowns . . . Would you give up fifty thousand crowns, Dickon?”
Brampton seemed embarrassed. “My Lord, they are not here to ask for aid. They bear urgent tidings.”
I turned my gaze back on my father. He had sunk into his chair and was muttering to himself, for he’d had too much to drink. My mother was watching him with a hard expression.
“Have them brought in,” Uncle Richard said. “I will see them.” He rose and took up a position beside Papa’s chair.
Brampton left the hall. He returned with two knights. They knelt at my father’s feet. “Sire, your royal sister, the gracious Duchess of Burgundy, sends greetings,” one began. My father burped.
I felt so embarrassed for Papa, and the messenger seemed distressed. He looked to Uncle Richard. At his nod the man continued, addressing my uncle instead of my father. “As you know, King Louis of France has swallowed up the Duchy of Burgundy and overrun Artois. Flanders is crumbling before him. Therefore, the Emperor Maximilian, unable to find allies against Louis, has had no choice but to make peace with France.”
I watched my uncle turn pale. He glanced at my father. Papa no longer muttered but sat quietly. I didn’t know how much my father had understood of this exchange, for he made no reaction.
“By this Treaty of Arras, Maximilian has agreed that his daughter Margaret shall marry the Dauphin of France, her marriage portion to be the counties of Artois and Burgundy.”
I froze. There was whispering, and then silence engulfed the room. What did this mean? Surely there is some mistake—I am to marry the dauphin! I turned my eyes to my mother. She wore a stunned expression on her face and her mouth hung agape. It isn’t possible that King Louis has reneged on the marriage! It means too much to my parents that I wed the dauphin!
There was a sudden crash followed by a wailing cry. My father had upturned one banquet table and was staggering down the dais toward the next, yelling like a madman. Uncle Richard rushed after him. He grabbed his arm, but Papa shook him off. My father’s friend, Lord Hastings, ran to Uncle Richard’s assistance. Together they managed to take Papa from the banquet hall, while my father muttered to himself. I rose and ran after them. I heard my father’s words as he staggered into his privy chamber. “So many mistakes, Dickon,” he moaned. “Too many mistakes . . . Louis . . . Warwick . . . Bess . . . Bess . . .”
I had no chance to ponder my father’s words after Twelfth Night and Uncle Richard’s return to the north, for it soon became apparent that Papa was ailing. Needless to say, my seventeenth birthday passed almost unnoticed, with little joy and minimal celebration. Not since Uncle George’s death had he been so despondent and listless. This time it did not pass away, and nothing I did brought the laughter back to his spirit. Morose and silent, he watched court jesters stand on their heads for him, and mummers pretend to be maidens in distress, calling out for help in silly high-pitched voices, and his mouth didn’t lift even with the hint of a smile.
Mother worried about his health. I knew it was serious when she insisted in late March that my father’s bosom companion, Hastings, whom she had always loathed as a rival, take Papa fishing for Easter. The enmity between my mother and Hastings—nay, between Hastings and all my Woodville relatives, especially my brother Dorset, who had become Papa’s other bosom companion—ran deep. At one point, Mother had managed to get Hastings sent to the Tower. But Papa’s love for his boyhood friend trumped her jealousy, and in the end Hastings was released.
“He needs a rest from affairs of state. The fresh air of the country will surely do him good,” my mother told Will Hastings, who nodded and gave her a bow.
But Papa returned abruptly just before Easter, unable to stand, leaning heavily on Hastings’s shoulder, feverish and ailing. Mother put him to bed and summoned doctors to his side. My heart broke to see my magnificent, invincible father, the victor of so many battles, lying so feeble in his sickbed. I didn’t leave his side. I feared this was the end. And so did he.
“Elizabeth,” he murmured in the night, as candles flickered in the darkness and I sat dozing by his bedside.
I was instantly awake. “Papa! Dear Papa, what is it?”
“Elizabeth, fetch . . . Rotherham. I must add something to my will . . .”
“Papa, you need your rest! Can it not wait?”
“Cannot . . . wait . . . Elizabeth.”
“Oh, Papa,” I cried, my fingers tightening around his hands and tears stinging my eyes. I laid his palm against my wet cheek and kissed it tenderly. “I will fetch the archbishop. I wil
l drag him from his bed, if need be. You sleep now.”
“Make . . . haste”
My father’s lord chancellor,Thomas Rotherham,Archbishop of York, arrived bleary-eyed before the rooster’s crow, in the thick of the darkness before dawn, and with him came a delegation of other clerics, including Bishop Morton.
“Sire, I am here,” Rotherham said kindly.
“I wish . . . to add a codicil . . . to my will,” my father managed, struggling with each word.
“Very well, sire,” Archbishop Rotherham said, motioning for the scrivener to bring his pen and ink closer to Papa’s bedside. The man did so and seated himself in a wood chair. He raised his pen and nodded to the archbishop that he was ready.
“And what is the codicil you wish to add, sire?”
“I name . . . my brother, Richard of Gloucester . . . Protector of the Realm.”
“Aye, sire.” Rotherham repeated the words aloud for the benefit of the delegation. “Is that correct,Your Grace?”
“Aye . . . correct,” Papa said.
The scrivener dipped his quill into the ink and scratched out the words on the parchment. He dusted it with sand and passed it to Archbishop Rotherham, who took a candle between his bejeweled fingers and held it to a tiny silver pot. The smell of melted wax filled the air as he poured its contents over the document. Papa held out his hand, and Rotherham removed the signet ring from his finger. He set the seal and returned the ring to Papa’s hand. He held the document up so Papa could see it. “ ’Tis done, sire.”
Seized by a hacking cough from deep within his chest, a harsh braying, choking cough that would not cease, Papa managed a nod. My heart twisted in my breast as I watched him. “ ’Tis all,” my father whispered at length.
Archbishop Rotherham made the sign of the cross over my father, and with a bow to me, he departed the chamber, for Papa had already confessed his sins and received extreme unction. The delegation of clergy turned and filed out after him.
As soon as he had shut the door, Papa stretched out his hand to me. “Elizabeth . . .” I drew close and held my ear close to his lips, for his voice was a bare breath.
“Summon . . . Hastings . . . Dorset . . . I must speak to them. Before I die.”
I swallowed hard on the wrenching anguish his words unleashed in my heart. “What about Mother?” I asked. He hadn’t mentioned Mother.
“Not your mother—” he panted. He clutched my arm urgently, with surprising strength. I pulled my gaze from his hand to his face, and saw fear in his eyes. Thus was I made aware that my father knew—and had always known—the ineradicable enmities my mother’s nature had created for us all the years of her life.
I fled the room fighting my sobs, knowing this was the last errand I’d ever run for my father. A sense of urgency and desperation hung over the palace as I sent a groom to summon Hastings and my brother Dorset. Monks chanted dirges and thick crowds gathered before the palace. I saw them through the arrow slit of the tower stairs, standing quietly, their caps at their breasts, the women weeping into their handkerchiefs. I crumpled down on the steps. Removing Mary’s crucifix from around my neck, I pressed my lips to the cold metal and prayed to the Blessed Virgin for a miracle.
Within the hour, Hastings galloped through the gates of Westminster Palace and leapt from his horse, a frantic expression on his broad-carved features as he dashed to my father’s room, my brother Dorset at his heels. I ran with them through the palace hallways and stairways. The man-at-arms opened the door to the bedchamber.
All was silent here. The drapes were drawn and candles flickered. My father’s tall frame was stretched out on the bed, his hands at his side, his face white and pinched in the dimness, his breathing labored. He hadn’t opened his eyes at the noise of the door clanging open, and I rested my hand on his. “Papa, Lord Hastings and Dorset are here, as you wished.”
He opened his eyes, and a faint smile touched his lips at the sight of his good friends. I withdrew, and stood in a corner by my father’s prie-dieu.
“Now I see everything clearly, with the eyes of the dying,” Papa said, and his voice surprised me, for it was no longer breathy but stronger than I had heard since he had taken to bed. “I sacrificed England to Louis and to your mother, Dorset. I don’t want to sacrifice my sons.” Tears shone in his eyes, and my heart broke at the sight of my father swept with such remorse.
“All these years, so many mistakes,” he went on. “Edward is too young to be king. He cannot survive without your help. Help me, Hastings! Help me, Dorset! Help England. Soon I will be gone, called to account for my sins by Almighty God. I won’t be here to patch your quarrels, to keep peace between your factions. Your enmity will tear the land in two. Surely you see that? Surely—”
My father’s chest heaved with the exertion of lengthy speech, and a racking cough seized him. A silence fell as he gathered strength to continue. I glanced at Hastings, but his back was to me and I did not see his face. His head was bowed; his shoulders slumped. I felt him fighting a depth of emotion as he stood at my father’s deathbed.
“No use pleading with Bess, only ice in her veins . . . and ambition.” My father exhaled the words like a sigh. “ ’Tis not enough that you love my sons, if you hate one another. Hatred will tear them down—will undo everything we built together. Hatred will rain grief on England. If you love me, put aside your hatred for one another . . . Swear it over my body while I still live.”
I looked at Dorset. His thick mouth worked with emotion, and he held a hand over his brow to hide the tears that trickled down his cheeks. Though I did not see Hastings’s face, muffled sobs came from him. His shoulders shook violently, and I knew his face was a mask of grief. Of them both he’d loved my father best.
My father witnessed their sorrow quietly, but when they made no move toward one another, he wrenched himself from his bed and, lifting himself up, cried out with great effort, first to one, then to the other, “Swear forgiveness to one another before ’tis too late—I beg you! Put aside your hatred for my sake! For the sake of my children! For the sake of England. Or all shall be undone!”
Over my father’s body, the two men finally reached out and grasped one another’s hands. They stood, arms locked in friendship, and vowed forgiveness to one another, their voices cracking with emotion as they did so.
“I thank thee, my dear friends,” Papa whispered. “Now I can die in peace . . . knowing all can be resolved.” He labored for breath, and said,“I commit my soul to God, and my kingdom and my children to the hands of my faithful brother, Richard of Gloucester.” He closed his eyes. “In manus tuas, domine . . .”
My breath stopped in my chest. I let out a long, shrill scream and ran to his side. Sobbing, I clutched his limp fingers and kissed his face again and again, my tears streaming over his still, lifeless body.
“GLOUCESTER, PROTECTOR OF THE REALM?”MY MOTHER cried with a gasp of horror. “Gloucester must not get such power! He hates us. He will destroy us.”
“Mother,” Dorset said. “Be reasonable. The king has ordered it so. There is naught that can be done about it now.”
She swung on him. “Naught that can be done? You imbecile! Of course it can be undone! We shall undo it.”
“Gloucester has done nothing against us,” Dorset insisted. “He’s proven himself a just and able governor of the north. People there love him. All is well. Why can you not let things be, Mother?”
She moved close. “All is well?” she hissed in his face. “When Gloucester vowed to get his revenge on me for Clarence’s death? When he married the daughter of the Kingmaker, the man who told Edward I was a woman so reviled in the land that no son of mine would ever be permitted to mount the throne of England? All is well? Is all truly well, my dear idiot son?”
“Mother—”
“Have done!” she screamed. “Let me think!”
“I vowed friendship to Hastings, Mother. I cannot go back on my oath.”
“Silence! You always were a fool. Go to your w
omen. Let me deal with policy. You have not the intellect. Your brains are elsewhere.” She looked mockingly at his groin.
I shot poor Dorset a look of sympathy from where I sat silently observing the scene. He gave me a helpless shrug. We watched Mother pace back and forth across the room as she worked out her strategy. There was no point in my rallying to his defense, and he knew it. Mother despised me.
“We must write my brother Anthony in Ludlow and tell him to get himself back here immediately! There is no time to be lost. Fetch me a scrivener!”
I hurried to the antechamber and sent a servant for one.
“ ’Tis imperative my Edward be crowned right away.”
“You cannot do any of this without the agreement of the council, you know,” Dorset said resignedly. “And they may object.”
She threw him a withering look. “We would surely be lost if matters were left in your hands. The council will approve whatever I want. For I shall pack it with our supporters.”
Dorset rose. He went to the door and gave an audible sigh. “Hastings will never agree to setting Gloucester aside.”
“Fool!” Mother screamed. She picked up a wine cup from a small table and hurled it after him. It missed its target, hit the wall, and landed at Dorset’s feet. He bent down, retrieved it. He set it on the table by the door and left.
“Fool,” Mother said more quietly. She turned to me. “We must make a clear and determined effort to preserve by force the power we have hitherto exercised by our influence over your father. You understand that, don’t you?”
I said nothing.
“Then you are a fool, too.”
AT A HASTILY SUMMONED COUNCIL MEETING, PACKED with family and supporters, my mother laid out her strategy.
The King's Daughter (Rose of York) Page 5
