‘M-my father says that I am never to see her again.’ The little boy stared solemnly, his blue eyes glazed with further tears. ‘I love her, Sir Miles.’ Jesu, Miles felt as though his heart would break. ‘Can you not make my lord father change his mind?’
‘Me?’ He rubbed a callused thumb over the child’s fist, his voice husky with humility.
‘You like her too, don’t you, Sir Miles?’
‘Yes,’ swallowed Miles. ‘I like her very much but I …’ He shut his eyes, trying to staunch the pain, the hollowness. ‘I cannot help you, Ned. I am sorry.’ Little hands jerked away. Opening his eyes, he found the thwarted child ugly with anger.
‘You and my father want her, but you won’t let me have her.’
Oh God, how much had Ned eavesdropped? But what did it matter any more? Harry knew it all now. Unhappily, he let the child run from him. But Ned stopped and turned, examining something in his hand.
‘I forgot,’ he said nastily. ‘Lady Haute said I was to give you this.’
Something metal hit Miles’s cheekbone and spun into the dirt – the garnet ring that had adorned Heloise’s marriage finger.
*
‘Make cheer, man.’ Harry, his good temper restored now that he had Miles back on his gauntlet like a tethered hawk, leaned from his saddle and clapped him on the shoulder as they rode out of Northampton next morning in the prince’s retinue. ‘You made the right decision. You do not want to be in Gloucester’s pocket. A shame ap Thomas fell foul of him but no matter, he will come round in a day or so. ’Sides, there may be richer pickings ahead.’ Oh, Harry was damnably forgiving now, a right Job’s comforter!
Miles thumbed the garnet ring beneath his glove. Trust me! Ha! What a jest that had been. How Heloise must despise him! Oh, he should have made his peace with her, but Gloucester and Harry – God curse them – had cleverly ensured he was tied down answering the Northampton coroner’s questions while they parcelled Heloise and her coffined father back to her family. Then there had been the chaplain, playing message boy, informing him he was to have no more truck with Gloucester’s new ward. My Lord Protector, curse him, had been swift as lightning in snatching control of Ballaster’s wide resources. Guardian indeed! Itching to cream off a lucrative interest to make up for losing the loan, no doubt, and Miles would wager his soul that Gloucester had no intention of ever letting Ballaster’s vast resources disappear into the Rushden ledger. No, Heloise would be sold off to someone ‘reliable’, some fawning Yorkist who licked Gloucester’s boots. Christ forbid! He could not bear the thought of another man even touching her.
‘Stop chewing the cud, Miles,’ muttered Knyvett, as they rode knee to knee. ‘Would you jeopardise a prosperous future for the sake of a wench? Harry has forgiven you, so make the best of things.’
But Heloise’s soft hazel eyes haunted him throughout the journey. Each hay meadow they passed made him daydream of tumbling her. The bluebell wood they rode through conjured possibilities of delightful dalliance. He could only sigh with relief when the royal procession arrived at St Albans.
The great monastery there had been forewarned, and the abbot’s house – insects chased out with pennyroyal, scrubbing brushes and ardent prayers – was at the disposal of the noblest of guests while the lesser beings cluttered the adjoining guesthouse and overflowed cheerfully into the town. Richard of Gloucester was happily playing uncle and the prince had been gratified – publicly by the address from the townsfolk and privately by a large bowl of luscious cherries all to himself. Only Harry and Miles needed placating.
‘This journey is becoming a pilgrimage through my family’s defeats,’ Harry groused, rising from the visitors’ prie-dieu, tossing his dressing gown to Pershall and mounting the steps to the abbot’s second-best bed.
‘And mine!’ muttered Miles, who had pulled the long straw over whether he or Latimer should sleep on the trundle bed in the alcove by the garderobe. He shifted morosely to the bed’s middle. ‘I hope no one starts a fire,’ he jibed, scowling at Harry’s red hair looped in linen twists. ‘If anyone sees you looking like that, they will never let you within a mile of Westminster.’
‘Wait, your grace. One of ’em has come out.’ Pershall, like a diligent nurse, retrieved the damp scrap from the oxhide rug and wound it back in place.
Harry was still grumbling as he thumped the pillow: ‘First Northampton, and then today dear Uncle Gloucester had to take the brat across the St Albans battlefields. The precocious whelp was smirking at me. Asked me where my grandsire had been slain. And there is Barnet still to come tomorrow, a Yorkist victory conspicuous for my absence.’
‘Since you were only sixteen at the time, my lord, surely …’ Miles broke off wearily.
‘That is not the point, is it? The duke plucked at the abbot’s insignia embroidered on the bed curtain. ‘Gloucester was leading the vanguard at eighteen. He will know every poxy molehill on the field and be able to fill in all the gore and glory to his heart’s delight. By supper, there will be a martial halo around his head and the whelp will be snuffling out of his hand like a lap dog.’
‘Can we not get some sleep?’ suggested Latimer from the corner, but the duke continued in a fierce whisper: ‘I am out in the cold, Miles, and I do not like it one jot. Every time the brat looks at me in that arch way of his, I can see his mother in him. Nudge Knyvett, for God’s sake!’
Miles elbowed Sir William, who was already snoring like a sty of porkers, onto his side, while Harry spat on his fingers and pinched the candleflame.
‘I guess we had better pray that the queen is too cowardly to leave the sanctuary.’ Miles extracted a spike of lavender that had snagged beneath the pillow and javelined it across Sir William. It fell short of Latimer. ‘Gloucester is in your debt, my lord. He will protect you.’
‘Oh yes, my wondrous Lord Protector,’ sneered Harry. ‘The trouble is I want him dependent on me, not the other way round. Once we reach London, he will have Hastings and Howard and all his other friends flocking to polish his bootcaps. I shall be as redundant as a flea on a corpse.’
‘I am sure your loyalty will be rewarded threefold, but if you could keep his grace somewhat anxious … Suggest he should summon more followers from York.’ Buckingham made a face at him and jerked the curtain across to keep out the moonlight from the shutter slats. ‘By the by,’ Miles added, his politic mind beginning to turn once more. ‘My w—’ No, best not to mention Heloise. ‘Someone,’ he said carefully, ‘pointed out to me that Bishop Stillington was travelling with Bishop Alcock’s retinue like a prisoner.’
‘Yes, I noted that too. Mind, the poor wretch looked as though he was in dementia. It explains why I hadn’t heard of him since he fell foul of King Edward when Clarence was put to death.’
‘Have you ever wondered why King Edward punished Stillington, my lord?’
‘Yes, and why he executed his own brother,’ Harry agreed. ‘You are right, it is curious – why should Alcock, the queen’s man, be still guarding Stillington? Pity the bishop’s brain is addled. You think it worth making inquiries in London?’
‘Certes, I do.’
‘If Stillington had his wits, he would be the bishop dealing with your annulment, would he not?’ Binding insult to injury, Harry continued: ‘Could Mistress Ballaster have put the evil eye on him?’ It was tempting to grab the Plantagenet pigtails and hold a fist under the Stafford chin. ‘You know it adds up, does it not? Hag’s hair, potions, cat, and young Bess said she had a strange look at times as though she were seeing things. Bewitched us both, if you ask me. Gloucester’s chaplain wants her examined on her Articles of Faith. Miles? Miles?’
*
God’s Truth, the smell of power was a healing vapour! Shading his eyes against the hurtful brightness of the morning, Miles drew rein on the hill and felt the Rushden serpent in him stir. Ahead lay the selfish city of London – the unpredictable powder keg of the kingdom. A calligraphy of walls, spires, and towers on the horizon with the tall letter of St P
aul’s against the hazy sky, higher than anything else man-made in the entire realm. He glanced at his duke and saw his own emotions mirrored. Mentally they slapped palms and prayed that the long years of waiting were at an end.
‘What in God’s name is that?’ Harry’s face, of a sudden as white as a whale’s tooth beneath the black-beaver hat and the imported ostrich feathers, froze as the drumming reached them from the wooded valley.
‘It seems as though we are either about to be welcomed or attacked,’ murmured Miles, and bowed as Gloucester rode up with his nephew and henchmen. Beneath a smile, the Rushden blood was running cold; what if the queen had managed to best Lord Hastings after all?
Prince Edward looked across at Harry, his cornflower eyes feline beneath the blue Burgundian cap and creamy plumes. ‘You think it might be my Lady Mother riding to welcome me, Uncle Buckingham?’
‘Won’t that be a blessed miracle if it is,’ Harry replied, but his knuckles were tight upon the reins as the Stafford and Gloucester heralds rode down the hill to investigate.
Deo gracias! Relief flooded through Miles when the scarlet velvet and black cap of estate of the Lord Mayor of London emerged from the trees, with a caterpillar following of aldermen in scarlet, and city worthies in mourning violet with sprigs of rosemary pinned on their shoulders.
*
London, the flower of cities! Flower, no! Miles smelt the city’s ordure long before they entered it at Aldersgate: not just the smoke issuing from the thousands of chimneys but the stinking ditches that surrounded the city, oozing the filth and the detritus into the innocent streams. Hunger was fraying Miles’s temper as they traversed the drawbridge into the city, but the press of people was a heady antidote. The battlements were iced with citizens cheering so loudly that he could hardly hear the city bells ringing out their welcome. Many of the earls, arrived for the coronation, were waiting on caparisoned steeds with their glittering standards and retinues. Miles recognised Suffolk, Lincoln, Kent, each bowing low as the prince passed, before they swung their horses in behind the dukes. Golden chains of office gleaming, jewels flashing in their hats, they made a glistening sable train for the royal fledgling.
Hindered by fulsome poetry and untrimmed oratory at every corner, the procession rode down Cheapside and then back along Watling to the reception at the Bishop of London’s palace. Liveried guildsmen and apprentices ran alongside, tossing up their caps. Chains of flowers hung betwixt the gables, pennons decorated the rooftops, bright cloths cascaded from every window, and maidens, blushing blossom pink, tossed garlands. The prince was wreathed in early roses, white, of course for York, his shoulders besnowed with blossom. As he waved, the wind played out his sleeves, blue and gold like a kingfisher’s wing, and the crowd roared its loyalty.
Sweet Christ, the boy would be a saint not to have his head turned. There were huzzahs also for Gloucester, but few for Buckingham. Harry was not well known yet – but he would be, vowed Miles, trying to see him as the crowds would: handsome and striking with the red-gold hair (no longer curling) bright against his sable collar. Would they be offended by the knops of gold that belied the mourning or the nosegay held closely to the ducal nostrils at St Paul’s churchyard, where the excess of reeking armpits was strongest? Miles sympathised, trying to hold his breath as the odour of the charnel house added a bass note to the already sweaty air. But better this than a few damp Brecknock aldermen and a scatter of rounded-up Welshmen.
He brushed a scatter of petals from Traveller’s mane – Heloise would be amused to hear how …
Suddenly the glory and his pleasure diminished. It took two to tell a story.
Chapter 17
‘I never care if I set eyes on it again, but here’s to Wales!’ exclaimed Harry, bashing cups with Miles and Knyvett. Three damnably long weeks since they arrived in London and Miles was weary from carousing and being careful with anyone who mattered. It had been edging curfew tonight when they arrived back at Harry’s London house, the Manor of the Red Rose in Suffolk lane, but they had really something to celebrate.
‘Justiciar of North and South Wales! Thank you, Gloucester! I could almost wish Lord Rivers at liberty so I could gloat.’ Harry gestured Pershall to remove his boots. ‘Dame Fortune at last is playing godmother, but if that royal brat tries to make me appear a Philistine one more time, I shall turn rebel. “Oh, have you not read the Institutes of the Emperor Justinian, Uncle Buckingham?” I could kill him.’
‘Still early days,’ consoled Knyvett.
‘Pah, if Gloucester lets the child be crowned next month, the boy will immediately invite his mother out of sanctuary and she will have our heads. And another thing, Gloucester will not be able to hold Rivers and Grey hostage much longer. The royal councillors are already muttering about conciliation and, ooh, we have to please them. What do you say, Master Sagacity?’
‘Perhaps we have not gone far enough,’ suggested Miles and let that droplet swirl in their minds.
Buckingham swaggered to the window, hands on waist and swung round. ‘I want the rest of the Bohun inheritance, which King Edward withheld from me,’ he declared through clenched teeth. ‘The Devil of it is that it can only be given by a king, a friendly one, and it is not within the power of a lord protector to make the grant.’ He glanced at Miles. ‘Now if Gloucester were to wear the crown, he would hand it over gladly, but this Woodville whelp will not.’
‘Just so.’ Miles agreed, twisting the garnet ring. ‘Leave the matter with me, my lord.’
‘Ah, now I think on’t, you will be relieved to know that your erstwhile wife has been brought down to her grace my aunt of York’s household. Dr Dokett tells me the deceitful creature is consumed by guilt for her father’s death and is thinking of taking the veil. Gloucester is not pleased, but if that is what the woman has decided, it should speed the matter of your severance.’
No wonder he had received no answer from Northamptonshire. The bewitching bane of his existence was at Gloucester’s mother’s. Just a short boatride along to Paul’s Wharf. Becoming a nun? The trouble was it might just be true.
*
A scrawled, overdue note and an unexpected white rose of peace were delivered to Baynards Castle, but the plethora of prayers and penances in her grace of York’s household had left Heloise as implacable as a caged-up lioness. It was true that Gloucester’s mother, the Duchess of York, had been compassionate but Heloise, younger than her grace’s companions by some thirty years, felt she might scream if she had to endure another pious reading from Walter Hilton’s Scale of Perfection or St Bridget’s Celestial Revelations. She loathed the hushed conversations over meagre helpings, the snoring naps, and the inflexible regime of devotions. Stirred by Dr Dokett, they were trying to net her soul. A silk chemise in exchange for a hair shirt? As for self-scourging, No, with an illuminated capital! But her joints ached from hours of kneeling and it was a wonder that her rosary beads had not been worn down to a nothingness. Miles Rushden could go hang. How could she have ever considered him as a permanent husband at Northampton? She must have been moon-mad. Three weeks it had taken the knave to remember her existence. Well, Myfannwy was welcome to him. She could decorate him with leeks and daffodillies and bed him in a sheepbyre.
*
‘Mistress Ballaster sent a message as you could have it back, sir, put it somewhere personal like and she hoped it still had thorns on it when you did so.’ The offending blossom, withered and pitiful – except for the thorns – was thrust into Miles’s hands and his servant fled from the hall before he had his backside boot-marked. With a dagger-sharp look at de la Bere who was bent double with laughter, Miles unfolded the letter and saw his writing was much water-stained.
‘It has not rained these past two days, has it?’ he asked, frowning.
‘No, what of it?’
‘I am going to Baynards, Dick!’
‘But you cannot,’ spluttered de la Bere, mopping his eyes with his sleeve. ‘You have to escort his grace to dine with Lord Hastings a
t Beaumount’s Inn.’
‘To Hell with that, I have feasted enough.’ Heloise needed him.
*
‘I am afraid you cannot see Mistress Ballaster, sirrah. The young woman is not to receive any male visitors.’
‘And why is that, pray?’ Miles asked the elderly lady-in-waiting, who had received him like an abbess in the duchess’s audience chamber after keeping him waiting. If he had understood the geography of this sprawling palace, he would have hunted Heloise out already.
‘Those are her husband’s orders, sirrah.’
‘I am her husband.’ But he was dressed like a notary, mostly to entertain Heloise and partly to test his disguise upon her since he intended it to be his means of gaining access to Bishop Stillington.
The censorial gaze swept over him. ‘No, I think not, young man. Now go and do not make a further nuisance of yourself.’
‘I am her husband,’ Miles answered, smiling through clenched teeth. ‘Pray order her down immediately!’
The widow clasped her hands across her waist. ‘I will not be party to infidelity, nor am I easily cozened. Her husband is a knight in the service of his grace of Buckingham. You, sir, are evidently a common notary – and a rapscallion. Be off or I shall have you removed!’
Miles set down the wooden box he was carrying and removed the clear-paned glasses from his nose. ‘Perhaps you would like to go and ask my wife what manner of complexion her husband has? Give her this, please.’ He drew off the turquoise ring he always wore. ‘I shall await her in the garden.’ The woman stood immoveable. ‘Now, if you please!’ And he advanced upon her with an authority that did not match his clothing.
Waiting beyond the trellised arches and the neat, lozenged beds of herbs, he had time to study Heloise above his spectacles as she walked towards him. Waifs begging outside the castle gate looked heartier. Dear God, the wench must have taken some foolish vow of abstinence – a fragile flower that could be borne down with a breath. If they were ill-treating her …
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