Some Touch of Pity

by Rhoda Edwards

  On the road, we met a shepherd, alone except for his dog, which crouched at his heel and took no notice of our hounds. The man carried a lamb round his neck, and used his crook as a walking staff. He took off his greasy cap as we passed and bowed awkwardly, as if unconscious of the lamb’s little hooves dangling over his shoulder and straws stuck in his hair. He gave us good day, and said something about it being middlin’ fair, and the lamb bleated in unison, much to our delight.

  I put my merlin up after a lark, then regretted it, for she was blown away, disappearing into the sky to the south. A merlin is too small to fight a high wind, especially if she is young and inexperienced; she will give up and go with it. I felt annoyed at having let this happen. Richard saw me frown, and smiled. ‘I haven’t flown away from you,’ he said, coaxing. As I didn’t want to seem put out, on a day when we were so happy to be in each other’s company, I smiled too.

  The silver horse stood waiting for the signal to move, his ears pricked, watching the dogs run about the hillside. Richard was staring out over the great expanse of sunlit dale, as if he would see from here to Scotland, over all his lands. He’s like a king, I thought, watching his kingdom. Then the spell broke and he turned his gaze back to me. ‘I can never tire of looking at it,’ he said. ‘If I were a prisoner in a faraway land, this is the picture I should carry in my mind, the dream I should dream. Two things I can never tire of looking at, this, and your face.’ Even now, after ten years of marriage, he can make my heart jump by saying things like that.

  ‘Love,’ I said, ‘my own dearest lord, this is our home, our kingdom. We’ll stay here all our lives, together — until we are called to God’s kingdom.’

  He looked at me, and smiled very gently, his eyes creasing up in the sunlight. ‘Yes,’ he said quietly, ‘if He is willing.’

  April 1483

  2

  An Earthly Prince

  Told by Dr William Hobbes, the King’s Physician

  O noble Edward, wher art thowe be-come,

  Which full worthy I have seen goyng in estate?

  Edward the iiijth I mene, with the sonne,

  The rose, the sonne-beme, which was full fortunate.

  Noon erthly prince durst make with hym debate.

  Art thowe agoo, and was here yestirday?

  All men of Englond ar bound for thee to pray.

  The Death of Edward IV (c. 1483)

  The skin upon the inner side of King Edward’s arm was, I observed, as fair and tender as an infant’s, the veins under it thick and blue, swollen with the juice of life. ‘At the joint of the elbow, Master Halliday,’ I said to my assistant surgeon, ‘where the vein shows at the surface.’

  The King was lying with his arms outside the sheets, his hands slack, the candlelight turning to gold the chestnut hairs on his thick wrists and wide, white chest. The counterpane and tester were crimson silk, gleaming with golden suns and roses. ‘Would your Highness be so kind as to brace your arm…’ He sighed, and scarcely opened his eyes, though he did as I asked obediently enough. He clenched his fist, and the big muscles in his upper arm swelled and stood out surprisingly hard. I say surprisingly, because he had put on much flesh in the last ten years, and those once lean, muscular shoulders were cushioned with fat. That fist might well be relied upon to knock many a lesser man into Purgatory still, and the large hand with its long, flexible fingers would no doubt grip a weapon to as good advantage as before — and I looked at his left arm not the right, the sword arm. Halliday took about a pint from the vein — it only needed a little nick — and the blood flowed into the silver bowl as dark and syrupy as hippocras. After it was done, he bound the cut with a strip of linen. The King never flinched. He lay there inert, like a felled tree, a heavy, majestic oak, a very big man indeed. The mound his body made reached almost to the foot of the huge royal bed; six feet four inches in his skin, heavy-boned, and carrying a belly on him fit for a gross old alderman. When he had collapsed at Mass this morning, it had taken half a dozen strong men to get him to bed. There never had been such a youth as Edward for growing, I remember, two yards tall at fourteen, with enormous hands and feet. By eighteen, though, he’d have looked well as St Michael the Archangel in a pageant, and later as Mars, the mighty warrior.

  When I had first completed my surgeon’s apprenticeship, I had been fortunate enough to obtain, through the good offices of a grateful patient of my father — he was a well-known surgeon in the city of London — employment in the household of the Duke of York. The Duke was newly home from Normandy, the French war over, and his eldest son Edward five years old. I served the Duke of York for twelve years, travelling with him to Dublin, returning to England, and seeing the outbreak of war when at last he made claim to the throne. He was a good master, and an upright man; I honoured him greatly. I served him as surgeon in peace and in war, and he rewarded me by supporting me at Oxford and Cambridge, when I studied to become a Doctor of Medicine, which is no easy thing for a professed surgeon, because the universities are reluctant to admit them. During that time, York was killed at the battle of Wakefield, and young Edward became King.

  Not young Edward now, he was nearly forty-one years old, and looked older in sickness. His eyelids flickered open, and he gazed at me without moving his head, or trying to heave himself higher upon the pillows. His eyes were dull, with bloodshot whites.

  ‘Your Grace must rest,’ I said severely, as if he were a boy again. ‘A light diet, milk, much water in the wine. I’ll bleed your Highness again tomorrow.’ I expected to hear a groan at this, or some blasphemous expletives, but he made no comment and shut his eyes, as if he cared about nothing.

  He’d been taken ill just after the feast of Easter. Because the weather had turned suddenly fine and unseasonably warm, a fishing party had been suggested, upon the pleasant stretch of the Thames between Chelsea and Brentford. The King was fond of fishing, now that he had become so heavy and afflicted by spells of poor health, and unable to take part in more strenuous sports. So there had been much laughter, competition for a place in the King’s boat, and gallons of wine drunk — they’d rowed along with big jars of it slung over the side in nets, to cool in the water — and a few fish caught. Late in the afternoon, the fickle weather had turned petulant, and rain had poured down. The royal party had returned with the servants baling out the boats, and the King, like everyone else, cold and very wet, both inside and out. It was hard to tell how much he’d drunk, because through much practice, a great deal shows in him very little. He was certainly flushed and merry, as much from the conviviality of the outing as the wine. At supper, he ate over-heartily of a green salad, and several oranges, washed down by yet more wine. This combination of heat and cooling food is not good, and disastrous for a man who suffers many stomach disorders.

  For the fifth year, King Edward had been excused by the Pope’s indulgence from eating fish in Lent and on Holy Days. This had been obtained on my advice, for fish upset him so severely, forty days of eating it might well be the death of him. I always kept a strict eye on his diet, though there were times when, like a rebellious boy, he decided to eat what he liked, and suffered for it. Because the King frequently dines in public, people noticed if he made a sudden dash for the basin waiting in an anteroom, his stomach in upheaval. As with such occurrences, gossip foolishly said that the King would induce vomiting, like the old Roman gluttons, so that he might gorge again after it. Knowing what I did of his low state of health and spirits, I was greatly alarmed at his sudden collapse. The fainting fit had been inexplicable. It might have appeared to onlookers a stroke of apoplexy, but I noticed that he had none of the bluish colour about his lips that usually comes with a seizure, and no pain. Now his face had a yellowish tinge.

  In the night, the King succumbed to a fever. The squires who were watching over him came rushing to fetch me, and any of the other royal physicians who were within the palace. I gave draughts of herbs in an attempt to reduce the fever, and the others crowded round with their own sovereign
remedies, but nothing provided ease. Lord Hastings, the King’s Chamberlain and close friend, kept asking me anxiously for reassurance, which I could not give. He kept watch night and day at the King’s bedside. They had been friends, these two, since before King Edward was crowned. Hastings was a dozen years the elder, though he did not look it, handsome, debonair and amiable, managing to be both a man’s man and a woman’s man at one time. He and the King loved women: a favourite form of wager at court was on their latest conquests in bed. This might seem indecorous, but caused them both to laugh, and make a great many improper remarks themselves. That their friendship went beyond mere convivial companionship, however, was testified by Hastings’s present distress.

  In his delirium, the King grabbed his friend’s arm and began calling someone by name. We thought that he said, ‘Edward’, at first, and that he wanted his son the Prince.

  ‘Safe at Ludlow,’ Hastings said, to soothe him.

  ‘Ludlow’s a shambles — in ruins — not safe… Don’t go — Edmund! Edmund!’

  ‘Merciful Christ!’ Hastings said. ‘He’s babbling about his brother Edmund of Rutland, dead twenty-two years ago! I can’t even remember the boy’s face. He was seventeen when Clifford cut his throat at Wakefield Bridge.’

  ‘They were close,’ I said, ‘a year between their ages.’

  By the time the King had been ill three days, all Westminster was certain that he was dying. His collapse had sent rumours of poison flying around, and everyone lived in great apprehension of the future. I was afraid myself, that if he did not rally in a day or two at the most, he would indeed die; he was coming to the end of his strength. He was coughing painfully, and bringing up brown phlegm. Every so often, I got him to pass water into a glass urinal, so that we physicians might observe the signs of the progress of disease. ‘The mirror of mankind, Hobbes,’ he croaked, ‘in which you read all things about all men. I want no mirrors of steel or glass any longer, to tell me the havoc time has wrought on me. Self-indulgence too — I don’t need to make my confession to you, Hobbes, you’ve known me too long. Why, I can remember a time when you put me across your knee, and your surgeon’s hand was harder than my tutor’s!’ He grinned feebly, a shadow of his old humour in his eyes. He’d always been a great one for laughter, in the past. Men had called him the handsomest prince in Christendom. Now, he’d lost much flesh through the fever, and his face, with its prominent cheekbones, big jaw and long straight nose, could have been the face of his youth, if it had not been so ghastly with sickness.

  That day, the King summoned his executors. In a spell of weak and sweaty calm, he made what provision he could for the future of his realm, and for his heir, the Prince. He’d made a will years ago, before he went on his French expedition, and the substance of it remained unchanged. He dictated portions that he required to be altered, then asked the lawyers to draw up a codicil.

  ‘I wish,’ King Edward said, his breath wheezing like an old bellows, ‘I wish to make provision for the government of this realm after my death — no, Will, we’ve faced Death too many times not to know his face by now… It is necessary that the realm is left in the hands of a strong man…’ A ripple went through the assembly; a new tension was felt. ‘A man of my blood,’ the King went on, ‘who is qualified by rank and experience to rule for my son until he is of age, to guide and teach him. My dearest brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, shall be appointed Protector, and have the tutelage and oversight of the Prince, and all my other children. Let it be known that I put my entire trust in his ability and known probity — he is the best of brothers.’

  Amid the murmurs of astonishment and approval from one side, Lionel Woodville, Bishop of Salisbury, the Queen’s brother, said, ‘But your Grace has already appointed my brother Rivers as tutor and governor of the lord Prince in letters patent issued only a month ago — shall he lose his office?’

  King Edward’s congested lungs let out a gusty, impatient breath. ‘My lord Anthony is well suited to oversee my son’s education. I have always admired his talents. This should continue, as it would if I lived, but he must accept Richard in my place, until my son is his own master.’

  There was no concealing the dismay of the Bishop, nor the grim triumph of Lord Hastings. If all our remedies failed and the King died, the realm would be riven in two — a house divided. There they were, ranged on either side of the bed, two factions, as hostile to each other as the Turk is to the nations of Christendom. I am not fond of death-bed spectators; they gathered round the King like kites, some holding musk balls to their noses. I thought: you’ll be less dainty when your time comes, when you suffer the humiliations of sickness, too weak to get up to the stool, and ministered to with bedpans. Kings are not spared the weaknesses of humanity. No one knew the enmity of the two factions better than King Edward, for it was he himself that kept them from each other’s throats. He also knew that as soon as he was dead, they would leap at each other like unleashed mastiffs, to fight for that bone of power, the person of the Prince — who would be King, God help the child, at twelve years old. The only man with any chance of keeping them apart was Gloucester, and even he might not be strong enough. I wondered if the King knew the perilous situation he was leaving to his brother, then was left in no doubt that he did.

  When the King had settled himself, half upright on bolsters and pillows, and had recovered his breath somewhat, he said to Hastings, ‘Will, before I consign my soul to Almighty God, there is something I’d have you swear.’ Hastings nodded, unable to speak. The King looked at his stepson, the Marquess of Dorset, who stood there, his beautiful face resentful of Hastings, his shallow mind registering only fear for his own skin. ‘And you, Tom, if you respect nothing in this life, will you respect the wishes of a dying man? Will you swear to quarrel no more with Lord Hastings? And you, William, by the faith you’ve always kept with me, will you make peace with my lord Marquess?’

  The two men stood as if turned to pillars of salt, like Lot’s wife, glaring at each other across the bed.

  ‘My son,’ the King gasped, ‘shall not be bequeathed a realm split by factions. If you bear me and the Prince any loyalty, patch up these differences. For God’s sake, help Richard my brother. Will, you stood by me always, in the bad times; stand by Richard now. All that we have won together will be sacrificed if this quarrel continues — swear to end it, swear on the Blood of Christ! Do not let me die thinking I have built my house on sand.’

  ‘I swear,’ Hastings said instantly; he would have denied the King his friend nothing, and being a generous and tolerably honest man, would sincerely try to keep his word. Dorset looked askance at first, then smiled disarmingly and grasped Hastings’s proffered hand. ‘So be it,’ he said, with every appearance of sincerity. So a weather vane moves, and stands firm, when the wind blows hard. Then the others joined hands, feeling some gesture of goodwill was needed, if only to please the dying King. On one side the Woodvilles: the Bishop of Salisbury, Sir Edward and Sir Richard, the Queen’s brothers, her younger son Lord Richard Grey, and various of their followers. On the other, those lords of the realm who were present in Westminster: the Earl of Lincoln, the King’s nephew, an energetic and decisive young man of twenty, already known to be a close associate of Gloucester, William Herbert, Earl of Huntingdon, a quiet man in his mid-twenties, who had survived a dozen years of marriage to the Queen’s sister, been deprived of his father’s Earldom of Pembroke, and watched the ascendancy of the Prince’s council, dominated by the Queen’s family, in his old Welsh inheritance. Then there was Lord Stanley, one of the older lords, whose allegiance would go to the strongest, as it always had. Now, he seemed to favour Lord Hastings.

  Seeing him take the hand of the Bishop of Salisbury, King Edward said, ‘Watch your wife, my Lord Stanley, her son Tudor in Brittany may think my death offers him some advantage.’ Stanley, quick to protest, said that the Lady Margaret’s only hope was that her son would come home to England of his own free will, thus implying that Tudor’s claim
to the throne was all but forgotten, a protest that deluded no one. Then, as if unable to believe in this show of comradeship taking place at his request, King Edward heaved a huge sigh, and rolled over onto his side, turning his face into the pillow, dismissing them all from his sight.

  By the seventh and eighth days, the King’s fever worsened. The bouts of delirium grew more frequent, and he raved like some of my mad patients at the hospital of St Mary of Bethlehem. People, many of them dead, passed across his mind like shadows. I’ve seen so many men make such a variety of ends, good, bad and indifferent. Some fear Purgatory’s fire, and the punishment for their misdeeds in the life after death, others are loath to leave the splendours of this world. A King, God knows, in the nature of things, must suffer a lifelong sore conscience, and King Edward, though I bear him much affection, had committed some grievous sins. The worst of these, in my opinion, was fratricide. His brother of Clarence’s wine-sodden shade haunted the King’s fevered mind like some mischievous, taunting Bacchus, much as he had haunted the court of Westminster in the last years of his life, the ruin of a beautiful and talented but destructive young man. King Edward often cried out his name, and when it was not Clarence, it was the name of his own son, the Prince Edward, as if he feared less his going from the world, than the troubles he’d leave behind for others.

  All the time Lord Hastings stayed with him. By his side often was the King’s mistress, known as Shore’s wife, though her marriage to William Shore the mercer had been annulled seven years before. King Edward had possessed many, many women, but this one, I think he had truly loved, after his fashion. The kindest and merriest of my Elizabeths, he had called her, to distinguish her from numerous others of that name, including his wife, the Queen. Now she showed much dignity, not weeping, holding the King’s hand when he lay quiet. Once, in a lucid spell, he knew her, and stroked her thigh and smiled, as if he found her presence comforting. Even at such a time I knew that Hastings wanted her, he could not disguise the desire in his looks. I thought him old enough to know better, for everyone knew that Mistress Shore had cast her fancy upon the Marquess of Dorset, a man more than twenty years younger. In the days to come she would need protection, and had already made her choice. King Edward had gone beyond the complexities of the loves of men and women. Soon, he asked for his confessor, and we left him to make himself ready to meet his Maker. In an outer room the Host and Holy Oils were ready; the Archbishop of York lay nearby, waiting to be called to administer the rites.