Katharine, the Virgin Widow

by Виктория Холт

  He was unfortunate inasmuch as he irritated Katharine; she was by nature serene and compassionate, but the little Jew, perhaps because he was her father’s ambassador in a Court where she needed great help, exasperated her almost beyond endurance and she began to feel—wrongly—that, if only she had a man more worthy to represent her father and to work for her, her position would not be so deplorable as it was and had been for most of her stay in England.

  “Dr. de Puebla,” said Katharine, as he shuffled towards her and kissed her hand, “have you realized that the fifteenth birthday of the Prince of Wales has now come and gone and there has been no mention of the marriage which was once proposed between us?”

  “I fear I did not expect there would be, Highness.”

  “What have you done about this matter?”

  Puebla spread his hands in a well-remembered gesture. “Highness, there is nothing I can do.”

  “Nothing! Are you not here to look after the interests of my father, and are they not mine?”

  “Highness, if I could persuade the King of England to this marriage do not doubt that I should do so.”

  Katharine turned away because such bitter words rose to her lips, and the sight of the sick little man made her feel ashamed of her anger towards him.

  “Is nothing ever going to happen?” she demanded. “How do you think I live?”

  “Highness, it is hard for you. It is hard for me. Believe me, I am well acquainted with poverty.”

  “It goes on and on and on,” she cried. “There is no way out. If I could return to Spain…”

  She stopped. In that moment she had made a discovery. She did not want to return to Spain, because all that she had wished to return to was no more. She had longed for her mother, but Spain no longer contained Isabella. Did she want to be with her father? There had never been any great tenderness between them, because his affection for his children had always been overlaid with hopes of what they could bring him. Maria was in Portugal. Juana had grown strange. Did she want to go to Spain then to be with Juana and her husband, to see their tempestuous relationship, did she want to see that handsome philanderer gradually driving her sister over the edge of sanity?

  Spain had nothing for her. What had England? Nothing apart from the dazzling prospect of marriage with the Prince of Wales.

  Katharine realized in that moment that she must marry the Prince or remain all her life an outcast from Spain, the unwanted stranger in a foreign land.

  She needed brilliant diplomacy to bring about the marriage, and all she had was this shabby, gouty Jew.

  He was saying now: “Highness, I have done everything I can. Believe me, I will not spare myself…”

  Katharine shook her head and murmured: “Mayhap you do your best, but I like not the way these matters go. You may retire now. Should you become further acquainted with the King’s mind, I pray you come to me, for I am anxious.”

  Puebla shuffled out, and he was surprised, when he had left her presence, to find his cheeks were wet.

  I am worn out, he said to himself, with all the work which has come to nothing. I suffer pain; I can no longer amuse and entertain. I have outlived my usefulness. That is why old men shed tears.

  And, left alone, Katharine wrote to her father. She told him that his ambassador in England was no longer able to work for her good or the good of Spain. She implored him to give this matter his attention and appoint a new ambassador to the Court of the Tudor King, for the sake of Spain and for his daughter, who was beside herself with misery.

  * * *

  EAGERLY SHE AWAITED news from her father. Each day during that summer seemed more trying than the last. The maids of honor did not attempt to hide their dissatisfaction. They were continually longing to be back in Spain.

  There were perpetual quarrels in the household, and Katharine almost wished that Doña Elvira was back with them to keep them all in order. Francesca was more restless than the others and she seemed to find a wicked delight in accusing each member of the household of intriguing to keep them in England. There could be no greater sin in the eyes of Francesca.

  The fact is, thought Katharine, they need to be married. If Arthur had lived, they would all have worthy husbands now, and rich, full lives.

  It seemed to her that each month it was necessary to rifle her store of jewels and plate. She felt guilty when she sold or pawned these pieces, but what could she do? Her expenses had to be met, and disposing of her plate and jewellery was the only means of doing this.

  At last news came from Spain, and when she read of the death of Philip she could not help but rejoice.

  He was my father’s enemy, she told herself; he turned him from Castile and he would have taken the crown from Juana. She is miserable now, but it is a good thing that he has gone.

  She imagined her father’s secret delight, for if Juana were incapable of ruling it was certain that Ferdinand would come back to Castile and the Regency.

  She realized what this would mean. Ferdinand would be of more account in Europe than previously, and the manner in which the King of England treated her depended largely on what was happening to her father.

  So could she consider this sudden and mysterious death of her handsome brother-in-law good news? She believed she could.

  There was a letter from her father in answer to that which she had sent asking for a new ambassador.

  “Why should you not be my ambassador?” wrote Ferdinand. “You have been at the English Court for some years. You know their ways; you speak their language. In due course I will send you an ambassador, but in the meantime you may consider yourself as such. Listen to Puebla; he is a clever man, perhaps cleverer than you realize. Be guided by him. He has worked well for Spain and will, I hope, continue to do so.”

  When Katharine had stopped reading there was a faint color in her cheeks. She felt more cheered than she had for a long time. Now she would have an interest in life; now she would have more power, and she would try to serve her father faithfully and at the same time bring about a happier state for herself. And how could she achieve such a state? There was one answer: Only by marriage to the Prince of Wales.

  * * *

  THE KING OF ENGLAND requested the pleasure of her company. She went to his apartments, her hopes high, wondering what news he had to impart to her.

  He was alone and he received her with graciousness, as though, she believed, he considered her of greater importance than he had when they had last met.

  When she had been formally greeted she was allowed to sit in his presence and, cupping his face in his hands, the King said: “This is a matter which I believe I can entrust to your hands more readily than I could to any other.”

  “Your Highness delights me,” she answered.

  Henry nodded, his lower lip protruded, his expression more pleasant than usual.

  “I shall never forget the day when your sister, the Queen of Castile, arrived at Windsor. What grace was hers! What charm!”

  Katharine was puzzled. She too would never forget that day, but had been struck more by Juana’s melancholy than her grace and charm.

  “I have not forgotten her from that day to this,” said the King. He paused and then went on: “You now act as your father’s ambassador, so I am going to entrust this matter to you. I want you to tell your father that I am asking for the hand of the Queen of Castile.”

  Katharine caught her breath in astonishment. Juana…the wife of the King of England! She, who had adored that handsome, golden-haired philanderer, to become the wife of this ageing man with the cold, hard face and the uncertain temper! It was impossible.

  But was it? Royal marriages could be incongruous. And if this one were to become fact, she would have her sister in England, the Queen of England. Surely the sister of the Queen of England could not be humiliated. Surely she would be able to live in a state worthy of her relationship to the Queen.

  And what joy to have her own sister in England!

  Katharine’s busy
thoughts were halted suddenly. But to be married to the King. She remembered her own feelings when it had been suggested that he should be her next bridegroom. She had shuddered with distaste, and yet she had felt delighted at the thought of Juana’s taking the place she despised.

  But this could not be. Juana was mad. She had begun to believe that there was little doubt of this, since she had heard further rumors of her sister’s strange behavior.

  The King was watching her intently. She must learn to guard her expression. She hoped that she had not allowed distaste to show itself.

  He seemed not to have noticed and was smiling almost vacuously, as a country yokel might smile at the prospect of a bride. It was almost as though he had fallen in love with Juana. Oh no, no! Henry VII could never fall in love…except with a crown. That was the answer. He was falling in love with the crown of Castile.

  She must be wily. She must not tell him that she thought this marriage would be quite distasteful because he was an old man and her sister was mad.

  If she listened to his plans, if she worked with him, he might be prepared to reward her in some way. She was not a foolish young girl any more. She was a woman who had suffered great hardship and deep humiliation, and there was little that could make an Infanta of Spain suffer more.

  She said calmly: “I will inform my father of your request.”

  Henry nodded, still smiling that smile which sat so oddly on his harsh features.

  “You should write to your sister and tell her of the delights of the English Court. Tell her that I have been a faithful husband to one Queen and would be so to another. You will plead my cause; and from whom could that plea come more effectively than from her sister?”

  So Katharine, in her new role of ambassadress, prepared herself to open the courtship between that incongruous pair—Henry Tudor, King of England, and Juana, Queen of Castile, who was now becoming known as Juana the Mad.

  The Strangeness of Juana

  WHEN JUANA RECEIVED THE INVITATION TO STATE HER views as to a marriage with Henry Tudor she shrugged her shoulders and immediately dismissed the matter from her mind. She was concerned only with one thing, which was to keep Philip with her now that he was dead.

  She would sit for hours alone in her darkened room, wearing the mourning garments which were like a nun’s and included a great cowl, the purpose of which was to hide as much of her face as possible.

  She would mutter to herself: “Women…Let no women come near me. They are seeking now to take him from me. It was always so. Wherever he went they sought him. He could not escape from them even had he wished…but of course he did not wish. Now they shall not take him from me.”

  Sometimes her attendants heard wild laughter coming from her apartments. They never heard sobs. She had not shed a tear since his death. When the melancholy moods were with her she would sit silent for hours at a time.

  She ate scarcely anything and her body was pitiably thin beneath the flowing nun’s robes. But there were times when she would have musicians play to her, for only music could soothe her. She would send for her minstrels and they would play to her in the darkened room until she tired of them and sent them away.

  There were no women now in her household, except one, her washerwoman.

  “And even that one, I must watch,” she often murmured to herself. Then she would send some of her men-servants to see what the washerwoman was doing, and have her summoned to her presence.

  “Wash the clothes here,” she would cry, “that I may see what you are about.”

  And water and tubs would be brought to the royal apartments while the poor bewildered washerwoman washed the clothes under the suspicious eye of the Queen.

  It was small wonder that rumors of her madness were growing.

  She was heavy with her child now, and sometimes she would talk of it.

  “It is not so long since he was here,” she would say, putting her hands on her body that she might feel the movement of the child. “He was happy to see his family growing. I hope I shall be able to tell him soon that we have another boy.”

  There were occasions when certain grandees came to her and implored her to take an interest in state matters, reminding her that she was the Queen.

  But she only shook her head. “I shall do nothing more, until I die, but pray for the soul of my husband and guard his dead body,” she said. “There is time for nothing else.”

  They could only shake their heads and wait for the return of Ferdinand.

  The year was passing and December came. In January her child would be born, and those who wished her well told themselves that with the coming of the child she would forget this obsession with her husband’s dead body.

  It was one cold December day when she set out to hear mass at the Cartuja where Philip’s body lay. Soon, it was said, she would be unable to make even the short journey from the palace, encumbered as she was with her pregnancy. She went through the usual ceremony of kissing the lips of her husband and embracing his feet; and then suddenly she announced: “It was his wish that he should be buried in Granada. He has tarried long enough here. I shall take him to Granada. Pray prepare to leave at once.”

  “Your Highness,” she was told, “this is winter. You could not cross the steppes of Castile at this time of the year.”

  She drew herself up to her full height and her eyes flashed wildly. “It was his wish that he should go to Granada, and it is my desire to take him there.”

  “With the coming of the spring…”

  “Now,” she said. “We leave today.”

  This was indeed madness. She proposed to cross the snowy wastes between Burgos and Granada in the bitterly cold weather, and she herself in her eighth month of pregnancy!

  The monks did their best to dissuade her. She grew angry; she reminded them that she was their Queen.

  “He shall stay no longer in this place,” she cried. “It is unworthy of him. Prepare at once, I say.”

  “But the weather, Highness…”

  “He will not feel the weather. He never cared for the heat. He loved the open air. The cold winds invigorated him, he said.” Then she suddenly screamed: “Why do you hesitate? Do not dare disobey me. If you do it will be the worse for you. Prepare at once. We are taking him to Granada this day.”

  * * *

  ACROSS THE SNOWY TABLELANDS the procession slowly made its tortuous way. The wind penetrated the garments of the bishops, the choristers, the men of the Church and the menservants. The only person who did not feel the cold was the Queen who, in her nun’s robes, was carried over the rough land in her litter.

  There was not a person in the retinue who did not hope that the Queen’s child would be born before the middle of January when it was expected. They prayed for anything which could put an end to this nightmare journey.

  Beside the litter, and covered with a velvet pall, was the hearse, so that it should never be out of the Queen’s sight. As they walked it was the duty of the choristers to chant their mournful dirges.

  At dusk the Queen reluctantly allowed the cortège to halt at an inn or a monastery, and there each night the coffin must be opened that the Queen might throw herself upon the dead body, kissing those silent lips again and again.

  Those who looked on at this ritual asked themselves how long they could expect to be at the mercy of a madwoman’s whims.

  One night the coffin was carried into what was believed to be a monastery; and there, before entering the buildings, by the light of torches the coffin was opened and the gruesome ceremony began.

  While it was in progress a figure appeared from the building followed by two others.

  One of the bishops said: “We come, with the Queen, to rest here a night.”

  “I will make ready to receive Her Highness,” was the answer. But at the sound of that high, musical voice Juana leaped to her feet, her eyes suddenly blazing.

  “That is a woman!” she cried. “Come here, woman. No…no. Stay where you are. I will come to y
ou. You shall not come near him.”

  “I am the Abbess, Highness,” said the woman.

  Juana screamed at her bishops: “How dare you bring me here! There are women here. That place is full of women. You know I will let no woman come near him.”

  “Highness, these are nuns…”

  “Nuns are women,” she retorted. “I trust no women. Close the coffin. We are going on.”

  “Highness, the night is cold and dark.”

  “Close the coffin!” She turned to the Abbess. “And you…go back into your convent. Do not dare to set foot outside until we have gone. No woman shall come near him, I tell you.”

  The Abbess bowed and retired, thankful that the mad Queen was not to be her guest.

  The coffin was closed; the procession left the convent precincts and went on, in the hope that the next place of refuge would be a monastery.

  So the dreary journey continued with painful slowness.

  It was a great relief when it reached the village of Torquemada, for here Juana’s warning pains began, and even she realized that she could not go on. They had come only thirty miles in some three weeks.

  The coffin was set up where she might see it and make sure that no woman came near it; and on the 14th January in that year 1507 her child was born.

  It was a girl and she called her Catalina after her sister, about whom now and then her conscience troubled her. She was unhappy, even as I am, she thought; and yet I did not listen to her tale of suffering.

  She lay in melancholy silence, the child in her arms, while she kept continual watch over all that was left to her of her gay and heartless Philip.

  * * *

  IN ENGLAND HENRY was waiting impatiently for news of his proposed match with Juana.