The Pearl of France

by Caroline Newark

  ‘How is your marriage?’ she asked, tucking her arm into mine as we wandered slowly back to the gardens where the air was clearer and we might even be able to hear the birdsong.

  ‘Are you still content?’

  She was my only confidante now that my sister was gone and Lady Margaret became daily more like my mother. I knew Alice’s own marriage was unhappy whereas I who had been sold to my brother’s enemy for the price of a treaty and thrust into the bed of an elderly man who might have been dead before I was out of my wedding garments, was ... what? I thought perhaps I was content.

  ‘Marguerite?’

  ‘I have a secret, Alice. But you mustn’t tell anyone.’

  ‘A secret?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She looked at me expectantly and when I didn’t say any more her gaze dropped to my belly.

  ‘You’re not?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Oh Marguerite!’

  ‘But you mustn’t speak of it for I haven’t told my husband.’

  ‘Oh cock’s bones! This is women’s business. What have husbands to do with it?’

  I patted my belly. ‘I think my husband would dispute that.’

  Alice began to laugh. ‘I pray God will give you a daughter.’

  I thought of my boys and how much they would enjoy a sister.

  ‘My husband desires more sons,’ I said quietly. ‘He cannot forget what happened to Eleanor’s sons and fears a repeat of the past.’

  ‘I will not have it called a realm,’ thundered my husband. ‘It is a land. From henceforth it is part of my kingdom, a lesser part, a limb. However, I am a merciful man and I will allow the Scots whose lands were given in war to my men, to buy them back. Is that not fair to everyone?’

  I was told they had all nodded in agreement; nobody dared gainsay the king of England, though one or two had looked anything but happy.

  The king of England’s position as overlord was undisputed and his kingdom would stretch from the northernmost tip of the lands of Scotland to the shores of the Narrow Sea. But matters had to be arranged to everyone’s satisfaction because my husband knew only too well how fragile this peace might prove to be.

  There were men who were consistently loyal to my husband, men like the earls of Buchan and Ross who, with John Balliol gone, saw no profit for themselves in a Scottish king. But I suspected others, like the earl of Carrick and the Scottish bishops, were only biding their time.

  The air reeked of smoke and roasted meat and from the body of the hall drifted the unmistakeable stench of men and wine and sweat.

  ‘Would you like my husband to escort you back to your apartments?’ whispered Joan. ‘These first months can be most uncomfortable.’

  ‘You know?’ I said in surprise.

  ‘Of course I know,’ she laughed. ‘I’m sure every woman in the hall knows.’

  ‘I must tell his grace, your father,’ I said in panic. ‘He mustn’t hear this from someone else. And yes please, I should like to leave if it is no trouble to your husband.’

  Joan looked at me in despair.

  ‘You are the queen, Marguerite. Of course it is no trouble to him. You are such a goose.’

  Ralph de Monthermer helped me from my chair, solicitously taking my arm as he led me out into the humid afternoon air. The early autumn was airless and the continuing heat made my nausea worse. I longed for a cooling shower of rain.

  As we crossed the dusty yard we met the earl of Carrick hurrying from the opposite direction looking less than pleased.

  ‘Do you know my good friend, Sir Robert?’ enquired Ralph.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, lowering my head. I found it difficult meeting Sir Robert who seemed to have the knack of reading my innermost thoughts.

  ‘My lady,’ said the earl of Carrick, bowing and taking my hand. ‘We meet again.’

  I wanted to snatch my hand back in case he should feel how much I was trembling but with a great effort of will I left it where it was.

  ‘I am escorting her grace to the archbishop’s palace, Bruce,’ said Ralph. ‘I’ll see you later.’

  ‘Her grace should rest awhile,’ said Sir Robert, casting a look at my body with a practiced eye. ‘Standing too long cannot be good for her. You should take the greatest of care, my lady.’

  I blushed further. How could he tell? How did he know?

  ‘I shall,’ I muttered. ‘Thank you for your kindness, Sir Robert.’

  ‘It is nothing,’ he said, finally relinquishing my hand. He smiled slightly, one side of his mouth turned upwards as if he found our conversation amusing.

  Ralph gazed after him as he strode away.

  ‘Are Scottish matters safely resolved?’ I enquired.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘They are not. The earl of Buchan and his cousin the lord of Badenoch are sworn enemies of the Bruces. They cannot forgive Sir Robert’s grandfather for disputing Balliol’s right to the crown.’

  ‘His grace will keep their quarrel under control.’

  ‘It has already come to a fight with swords drawn.’

  ‘Sainte Vierge,’ I whispered.

  ‘Sir Robert has accused the earl of Buchan of whispering in his grace’s ear.’

  A cold thought slid into my mind and I wondered if this might have something to do with that day at Cambuskenneth when I’d seen the bishop of St Andrews and Sir Robert talking. I’d never told anyone what I’d heard and I’d tried to put the memory aside but it kept returning, an unwanted reminder of my concerns about Sir Robert’s loyalty to my husband.

  When we reached the inner walls of the palace. I disengaged my arm and turned to thank Ralph for his care of me.

  ‘Does my husband think well of Sir Robert?’

  ‘He did but now his grace is inclined to doubt him. He is asking for sureties for Sir Robert’s castles.’

  ‘But Sir Robert is not in danger, is he?’

  Ralph looked at me curiously.

  ‘Not yet. But I’ve warned him to be careful so he’s on his guard.’

  He waved to one of my husband’s men, bidding him escort me up the steps into the palace.

  ‘I trust you will be recovered soon, your grace,’ he said bowing slightly.

  What a pleasant man, I thought. How lucky Joan was in her marriage.

  That evening, once we were alone in my chamber, I told my husband my news. He pulled me against him and for a moment said nothing.

  ‘You are certain?’

  ‘Yes, my lord. I am quite certain. It will be in the spring.’

  He gave a deep contented sigh as if I had given him what he desired most in the whole world.

  ‘I can think of no better celebration of our marriage than another child,’ he said gently, ‘and though I pray for more sons I think you deserve a daughter.’

  He looked immensely pleased. He would delight in showing his enemies how potent he was and if any of them thought his powers were waning, the sight of his wife’s swollen belly would silence them at once. I pushed away the niggling doubts I had about his regard for me. Behind the bed curtains he was a vigorous lover but I believed his desire was for more sons, not for me. At other times he displayed the placid affection of a man for a young mistress whom he kept to satisfy his carnal lust rather than the all-encompassing passion and devotion he would feel for a beloved wife. But after our reconciliation at Burstwick I had never again asked about Eleanor and he had never once mentioned her. If placid affection was to be my lot then I must be grateful for what I had been given and not keep wanting more.

  Sheen was one of my husband’s favourite manors, built in a pretty spot on the water’s edge, a small fair palace half-circled by meadows with a low hill rising up behind. From the topmost mound the smoke of London was clearly visible and, high above the chimneys, the spire of St Paul’s at the top of Ludgate Hill. My husband
liked to keep an eye on the city. He said if trouble broke out in Kent or Essex you could be sure the seeds had been sown by some prating cleric in a London pulpit. The one thing he knew for certain about Londoners was that they couldn’t be trusted.

  On the first day of our visit, before I had even finished unpacking my gowns, I had a visitor. It was Ned. He breezed into my rooms while my women and I were discussing plans for the Christmas celebrations causing a flutter of excitement. I turned at the sound of his feet and clapped my hands.

  ‘Oh! How wonderful. Lord Edward!’

  ‘My dearest lady mother.’

  He bowed, greeted me formally and then swept me up into his arms.

  ‘How good it is to see you again,’ I cried. ‘But you must put me down, Ned. I am not supposed to be tossed about.’

  ‘But I feel like tossing you about.’

  I blushed. He looked at me closely and then smiled.

  ‘Another child?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What fun. Thomas and Edmund are wonderful little fellows and this one will be just as fine. Am I allowed to kiss you or is that forbidden too?’

  ‘Of course you may kiss me,’ I said, ‘but only if you tell me why you are here. Have you reconciled yourself with his grace, your father?’

  He yawned. ‘I have just come from a very lengthy and particularly painful interview where I abased myself in the most humble way possible. You would have been proud at how contrite I was, dear lady mother. I crawled across the floor on my belly and licked his boots so now he is pleased with me and has accepted me back as his son.’

  I tried to look disapproving at this mocking of his father but failed because I was so pleased to see him again.

  ‘And now, may I kiss you?’

  I offered him my lips and closed my eyes as he placed his mouth on mine feeling a little frisson of recognition but of course he was my dearest stepson and it was perfectly natural for us to kiss like this.

  ‘Piers said it was the dullest three months he’d ever spent. But now all is forgiven and forgotten and I am the prodigal son returned.’

  I laughed. He truly was the most delightful company. My women, who had slunk away to the far end of the chamber with their embroidery, were craning their necks and cocking their ears. There was precious little amusement for them at the moment and Ned was someone who brightened their lives. Of course they loved him. I loved him. Who could not love my stepson? Only his father it seemed.

  ‘And is his grace to kill the fatted calf in your honour?’ I enquired.

  ‘In no way. I am to give the feast. We have settled a day and a place and we will celebrate my father’s new realm and our newly happy family.’

  He sat down beside me, stretching out his long legs and half closing his eyes. I could sense my women sighing over his well-made body and handsome face. His hair had darkened slightly over the years but the summer sun had bleached it golden again. He was more handsome than ever. In truth he was probably the best-looking man at court, a shining handsome prince who only needed a radiantly beautiful lady to complete the romance.

  There was no need to search the families across the Narrow Seas for a suitable bride because my husband had already found one. The peace treaty when I became his betrothed and the one he had made with my brother’s negotiators two years ago which finally brought an end to the fighting, had sealed the marriage contract for Ned with Philip’s little daughter.

  I remembered Isabella as a beautiful blue-eyed four year-old but she must be ten now, nearly old enough for the marriage bed. They would make a marvellous couple: two golden angels set together, and I was sure their children would be perfect, just like them, golden and blessed.

  Ned tipped his head against the back of his chair and looked sideways at me.

  ‘Now, my lady mother, you must tell me the news. What’s been happening since I’ve been away? Who has done what and what scandals have I missed? And what about you, lady mother? Have you been good?’

  ‘Of course I have. What possible mischief could I get up to shut away in your father’s palaces? I’ve been at the archbishop’s house entertaining my friends. I suppose you heard about Wallace?’

  ‘I did,’ he said. ‘His grace, my father, must be pleased it’s all finished.’

  ‘Are you not pleased?’

  ‘Oh of course, but I didn’t consider this a personal matter like my father did. I think you could say that, for him, it has been an obsession, this war with the Scots. If I were to have an obsession it certainly wouldn’t be war. There are far more enjoyable things to expend one’s energies on.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Music, singing, building.’

  ‘Building?’

  ‘Yes, building: palaces, walls, gardens, churches, anything that takes your fancy. Now that’s something my grandfather was obsessed with too.’

  ‘But he didn’t do the building himself, Ned. He didn’t lift the stones and thatch the roofs and paint the walls, and he certainly didn’t get down and dig in the mud with the workmen and get himself covered in filth like you do. Your grandfather commissioned palaces and helped design them. He decided what he wanted and others did the work.’

  ‘You are beginning to sound like his grace, my father,’ said Ned nastily, pulling back his legs. ‘I must lighten your days to stop you from being such a bore.’

  He said it with a smile in his voice yet I detected a note of warning - don’t trespass into my private life, keep out! As he sat there smiling and joking, I wondered what he really thought, what made him the man he was? He was unlike his father in so many ways. My husband was a man of duty and determination whose friends would never desert him, while Ned, despite his outward piety, was like Blanche: frivolous and pleasure-loving. And I feared he had no desire to be a leader of men unless he was leading them down a primrose path.

  I had no time to be alone or to worry about my stepson for next morning Alice came upriver in a small boat with just a couple of her women and two of her husband’s men-at-arms. I was overjoyed for I thought she’d returned to Pickering.

  ‘No,’ she said, shaking her cloak to be rid of the spray from the river. ‘I could not possibly miss one of Ned’s entertainments. He is so talented at organising feasts, much cleverer than my husband who leaves everything to his steward, a man with no imagination at all. I wonder who will be there? Have you heard the new viol-player, Master de Roos? He is very skilful. I wish I could play an instrument with such passion.’

  ‘I think everyone will come because one day in the future Ned will be king and they won’t want to offend him.’

  Alice pursed her lips but my mind was already racing ahead to thoughts of which jewels I would wear. The rubies suited me but I had a fondness for the emeralds and pearls my husband had given me.

  ‘You know they talk about him?’ she said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The prince.’

  ‘Who talks about him?’

  ‘My husband and his friends: Guy de Beauchamp, Humphrey de Bohun, and the others.’

  ‘Of course they talk about him. He’s the king’s eldest son.’

  ‘Marguerite, listen to me. You of all people need to understand the dangers. I pray your husband lives for many years, but there will come a time when the prince will be king.’

  ‘Everybody knows that.’

  ‘Yes, but not everybody thinks he will be able to command. They look at him and find him wanting, and it worries them. They whisper in the shadows trying to decide what they should do. They talk of his unsuitable friends. I shouldn’t like to tell you what they say about the closeness of the prince and Master Gaveston.’

  ‘Why should they mind about his friendship with Piers Gaveston?’

  ‘They think he is besotted with him. They don’t trust Gaveston and they think he is dangerous. They see how the prince uses his time
and they don’t like the things he does or the people he consorts with. You must believe me, Marguerite. I’ve heard them in my husband’s castles, and by God’s truth, it frightens me.’

  ‘He’s still young, Alice. He will be wiser as he grows and a wife will steady him. When he marries all will be well. My niece will solve all Ned’s problems.’

  Alice looked at me with pity in her eyes.

  ‘He doesn’t want her.’

  ‘What do you mean he doesn’t want her? Of course he wants her. He pledged himself two years ago and so did she.’

  ‘The last thing the prince wants is a marriage with your brother’s daughter. If he has to marry he would prefer a Castilian bride and who can blame him. From what I’ve heard I wouldn’t care for your brother Philip as my father-in-law.’

  I knew little of my stepson’s feelings for his friend Master Gaveston. I knew they were close but Alice was hinting at a closeness that was, what – unsuitable? Unnatural? I thought back to the feast at Carlisle long ago when I’d first noticed Piers Gaveston, remembering the feeling I’d had, the sensation that danger lurked around hm. But I couldn’t believe ill of my stepson and was sure Alice was exaggerating what she’d heard. Yet wriggling away at the back of my mind was the uncomfortable thought that much of it might be true.

  Ned had never shown any particular interest in the women who fluttered like butterflies around him other than taking their adoration as his due. I’d never seen him steal a kiss or slide his arm around one of my maids the way other men did when they thought I wasn’t looking. I was the only one to whom he was overtly familiar but of course I was his stepmother and there was no impropriety there. He could kiss me and think nothing of it and if occasionally I felt a quiver of something else, I carefully ignored it.

  His sole pleasures involved the men of his household and what my husband referred to as his gutter churls. Previously I’d merely thought of him as too young and too interested in boyish escapades to respond to silly girls making calf’s-eyes. But he was no longer a boy, he was a man, and men, as I was well aware, desired women.