Some Touch of Pity

by Rhoda Edwards

His opinion confirmed my own feelings. Until the afternoon of our second day at Bestwood, I felt that we were hiding our faces behind masks, like players gesticulating upon a pageant stage. For us, though, the play was almost over.

  The following morning was spent in the forest, hawking. Watching riders fan out across a patch of open heathland, I had an odd notion of viewing a painted scene through the initial letter of a book. We rode like figures in the land of a French romance. Skirting clumps of whins, we could hear pods popping in the sun like gorged fleas caught between fingernails. Green bracken choked the birch saplings and droned with flies in the warmth, while the horses tossed their manes irritably. Rob Percy was whistling tunelessly, swatting at the flies and midges that danced a jig around his head; he’s so blond — they seem to prefer the taste of fair-haired people. Brown and white plumy tails of spaniels waved busily through the cover; kennel boys moved chest-high in bracken, so-ho-ing to encourage them.

  Late in the afternoon, when the day had clouded over, and rain threatened, we rode back towards the lodge. Two men urged their sweating horses at a hand canter along the sandy ride towards us. Their faces were familiar to us from the north. One, a portly, burgundy-complexioned man, on a stout horse as broad in the beam as himself, radiated the dignity and importance of his office; he was John Sponer, Macebearer of the City of York. The other was a lanky, leathery individual who acted as messenger for the Council. The King frowned when he recognized them, then smiled as Sponer dismounted — well, he rolled off the horse like a barrel trundling down into a cellar.

  Richard said, ‘John Sponer! I’m glad to see you. But what brings you to Bestwood? Couldn’t John Nicholson here have been your messenger?’

  Sponer was puffing slightly. ‘Your Grace, the matter is of sufficient importance for me to attend you in person. The Council of our City, our Mayor, have not taken this action without deliberation. They — we, are in a state of gravest anxiety, the gravest anxiety. I do not presume to question your Grace’s intentions, but we have heard that your enemies and rebels have come through Wales, and we have had no orders. Since the letters your Grace sent us in July, when we began to hold ourselves in readiness, we have heard nothing. We have not known whether to call out the soldiers from the city wards and send them to Nottingham, or to ask my Lord Northumberland for advice.’ He said in bewilderment, ‘We’re all confused as rats in a bag. We know that my Lord Northumberland had not left Wressell before we set out to come here. Your Grace, what must we do?’

  I drew in my breath, and Richard said quietly, ‘The army musters in Leicester in three days’ time… My Lord Northumberland will have to make haste. Is there any reason why he has not directed you? The city levies should have been raised a week ago.’

  Sponer stared at him in amazement. ‘But the Earl of Northumberland sent no word… True, there is plague, this new sweating sickness. But it is not worse than in any other city.’

  ‘I see.’ The King’s face showed none of the alarm I felt, but his horse suddenly began to play up, snatching at the bit and barging sideways into Sponer’s indignant mount. My falcon bated with a furious ‘kek kek kek’ from my fist, wings beating noisily as wooden clappers, while it hung almost upside down in its frenzy. Richard was trying to quieten his horrified horse, bringing it round in a trampling circle out of my way.

  ‘Let John Nicholson go home to York, and have the soldiers sent to me at Leicester as quickly as possible. They will very likely be in time. I doubt if we shall fight until after the twentieth.’

  A falconer took my screeching bird. Under my breath, I took the Lord’s Name in vain several times. I knew that Richard would fight as soon after the twentieth as he possibly could. They’d never be in time. Clearly he did not wish the City to feel in any way to blame for this inaction. It was plain as a pig’s arse, and as ugly, that Northumberland had delayed putting his commission of array into effect.

  The thick, leaf-enclosed silence of the forest seemed to have grown unaccountably cold, and sour, like the old wine vaults under Nottingham rock. The reason for Percy’s delay was not hard to discern. If things went against us, he would be able to plead that he had done nothing to hinder our enemy! I remembered that Maud Herbert, his wife, had been brought up with Tudor at Pembroke; it was even rumoured that she had been sweet on the fellow then. No doubt she was nagging her husband unmercifully not to take up arms against him.

  We rode back to Nottingham, nerve-taut, talking little. The next day was absorbed in a hectic routine of preparation, as Richard intended to march for Leicester very early the following morning. I didn’t look forward to that march; it was about twenty-five miles, and the weather seemed set fair to be extremely hot.

  Late in the evening, long after it grew dark, the King sent for me. He was sitting by the hearth of his room in the high tower. Between his feet had been tipped a spilling heap of papers, which he dropped piece by piece into the fire. The room reeked of burning parchment, and the fire sank low, choked by ash.

  ‘What is it?’ I said, indicating the litter on the floor.

  ‘Letters.’ He went on methodically tearing sheets across and stuffing them into the weary flame.

  ‘It’s better done,’ he said softly. ‘I should not rest easy if others were to pry into my private life.’

  These words filled me with alarm. It was the first time I’d heard him speak openly as if he’d accepted the possibility of defeat — well, not defeat — death. I touched the back of his hand. I wanted him to come away, to stop sitting there, staring at that heap of ashes, the burnt-out ruins of his life.

  He stood up, and produced from the heaps on the table another paper, which he passed to me. ‘This was taken from one of Tudor’s agents who got no further than Dover.’

  It was a letter from Tudor himself, to an unnamed supporter in England. Apart from its blatant evidence of treason, and his arrogant claim to the crown, two things turned my stomach, one the insults to Richard, and the other the signature, HR in huge capitals, a royal sign manual.

  ‘Homicide and unnatural tyrant,’ Richard said, without emotion. ‘We’ve all qualified for the first. The second, well, do people really believe me so monstrous among other men?’

  I called Tudor a number of highly obscene names, and wished eternal damnation on him.

  ‘You credit him with too much ingenuity,’ Richard said dryly. ‘He has to provide a righteous cause.’

  ‘He signs himself as a king!’

  ‘It’s to be expected.’

  ‘I’d take infinite delight in killing him with my own two hands!’

  I thought Richard did not show enough anger against the man, until he gave me a quick glance and said, ‘You’d have my competition for that prize.’

  ‘We’ll have Tudor’s head on a pike over the gates of Coventry or Leicester before the end of another week.’ I couldn’t prevent my words from sounding empty; it was hard to look forward in time beyond each present hour.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, without much conviction. Then, ‘Francis, stay with me a while.’ He did not ask often for company as if he needed its comfort. By burning those letters, he’d only managed to lacerate himself.

  I sent for one of the chapel singing boys, thinking that the sound of a human voice making music might soothe the wound a little. Then I poured wine into cups of Venice glass, and we sat eating plums and damsons from the castle garden. I admired the clear glass of the cups; it seemed almost a pity to darken it with the blood-coloured wine, to obscure its enamelling of blue entwining flowers and knops of gilt and crystal whorls.

  Richard said, ‘Did you hear, Francis, that I’m to become a grandfather? Katherine sent me the news after you had left for Southampton. It makes me feel old.’ He spoke lightly, and I could tell he was pleased, though nothing, it seemed, could lift that tired, sad look from his face. He sat meditatively turning the glass between his hands.

  I had not heard the news, and felt absurdly astonished. ‘When is it to be born?’ I asked.


  ‘November.’ He would be just thirty-three.

  I grinned at him. ‘Should I compliment you on having a sixteen-year-old daughter, or save all the praise for William Herbert? I hope the child favours you if it’s a boy, or your lovely little Katherine if it’s a girl.’ I was deliberately taking a flippant tone, trying to raise a smile from him. I succeeded briefly, but it was a rueful effort.

  ‘I never could believe that I fathered such a pretty daughter,’ he said. It was typical of Dickon that after twelve years of happy marriage, he still thought so little of himself. He had begun to worry about Katherine, who was far away in Wales with her husband.

  ‘I told Huntingdon to stay with her. If anything should happen to me, they will be safer for having kept out of it. I trust him, but Walter, his younger brother will probably join the rebels. I am afraid for my children, especially for my son John.’ As if to change the subject, he went on, ‘Francis, where is Anna? Have you seen her since you left London?’

  ‘With her mother, Lady Fitzhugh, in the north.’ I shrugged; he knew very well my marriage wasn’t what his had been. ‘She’ll be safe enough,’ I said, a trifle bitterly, ‘she’s more relations who are old Lancaster supporters than we can count.’

  ‘So have I.’ Richard sounded faintly amused. Then his face clouded with extreme and savage gloom. ‘We are back fifteen years. Brother kills brother.’ He crossed himself, and I knew he thought of his own brothers. Then he said abruptly, ‘I sent a man north today. One of Brampton’s ships will be standing off Hartlepool. If anything should go wrong… I want my brother’s sons taken from England. News of the field would reach the Tees within twenty-four hours.’ He heaved a huge sigh, as if this speech had been an effort.

  I nodded, surprised and relieved that he had volunteered so much; he hated talking of King Edward’s bastard sons, the lords Edward and Richard, and would never mention them by name. Consequently I was also reluctant to touch on the subject. I knew they were in the north, and I knew where, but of what might be intended for the future, I was in ignorance.

  The boy who came to sing for us was about ten years old, with bright red hair and freckles, and the face of a small, smiling demon, but he had a voice as pure as an angel of God. He sang an old Italian ballata, in a setting by the master of English music of our fathers’ time, John Dunstable, O Rosa Bella. I would have rather he hadn’t sung that last couplet:

  Soccoremi ormai del mio languire

  cor del corpo mio non mi lassar morire.

  which translated into English means: ‘Save me from my suffering; O heart of my body, do not let me die.’ Richard had become so still, one would not know he breathed. I could feel his sadness like a wall around him.

  By five o’clock next morning, Friday, the soldiers were streaming south over the Trent by Hethbeth Bridge. By midday, the heat had us by the scruff of the neck, and in the afternoon, slowed us to half-speed. The King and any other lords of importance had to ride in full armour, as we were intent upon making as fine a show as possible. I felt as if I were lying in Hell mouth itself, and watched even the plodding archers with envy. One hulking, hairy-chested bull of a man marched along in nothing but a pair of patched and sagging hose hitched up by a belt like a saddle-girth, and a steel kettle hat festooned with leaves, as if to make a cooling arbour for his head. Even so, sweat ran down his dirty, sunburnt back and bulging belly. He shouldered a pike as if it were a pitchfork, and he off to load a harvest wain, though he’d probably carve up Welshmen like sheep carcases when the time came.

  During the longest halt of the day, at Cotes Bridge, the river meadows were littered with the prone bodies of soldiers, who scooped up water from the Soar in helmets or flasks to pour over their heads. Some poor bastards were stuffing grass into their shoes, feet raw after coming only just over halfway. But they did not grumble too loud while there was enough free beer and bread for dinner. The horses rested while we dismounted, were fed and watered and allowed to graze a while. The King stood with us in the shade of trees whose dust-coated leaves drooped in the heat. He was silent, though we talked a little, and drank wine watered down thin, which did not quench thirst well. I ate bread and cheese, in preference to meat. Richard tried to eat, but he went rigid at the first bite, as if he gagged at even the thought of food. At one o’clock he gave orders to move again.

  I remembered how three summers ago, marching twenty thousand men to Edinburgh, over the bare Lammermuir Hills, cauldron-hot as Scotland can be in July, we’d all sat in the heather, laughing. Hot enough, as the men said, to fry the cods on our own boar banners! In spite of that, we had wolfed food, swilling it down with pints of horrible, warm Berwick beer. Will those days never come back? I wished we marched against the Scots now, tasting the old rough life, instead of this soul-destroying treachery.

  By the time the four o’clock halt ended, some of the men had to be kicked on their feet again. The road was inches deep in dust, that formed a sagging, rusty cloud over our heads, and left a drifting fog in the wake of our passing. Horses and men were filthy with it. The army staggered on blistered feet into Leicester that evening at past eight o’clock, every face so caked with dust and sweat they more resembled a horde of Moorish pirates than honest Englishmen. Our enemy the sun was sinking like a huge juiceless orange behind the pitched roofs; I for one had never been so glad to see it go.

  Friday night and Saturday merged together in my mind. We were frantic, tearing out our hair trying to marshal an army of over twelve thousand, all pouring into the town by the hour. Sir Robert Brackenbury rode in from London, fuming. Sir Walter Hungerford and Sir Thomas Bourchier, who had travelled with him, had done a moonlight flit on Friday night, near Stony Stratford, and joined Tudor. Norfolk had already arrived, and late Saturday night, Northumberland. He was full of apologies, as usual. I could have spat in his shifty face, but Richard gave him a weary welcome, and showed much concern for the men, who had been flogged down from York as if they were droves of cattle. It was hard to find room for them, and some of the best men from the north had to make shift and sleep wherever they found to drop.

  After Northumberland had departed for bed, I looked at Richard and began to worry again. Last night, I thought, he said he felt old; now he looks it. Probably only one or two of us realized how exhausted he was. The Duke of Norfolk did, though; he’d come back out of Suffolk, not having seen the King since May, and was as worried as myself. After we left Nottingham, Richard’s decisions had seemed drained of hope, even his voice lacked life. Worst of all, he could not sleep. He’d been like this for a long time, but now, when he most needed the rest, it had deserted him. In that big, hot room under the gabled roof of the inn, he had lain most of the night awake, turning to and fro and sweating, even in the familiarity of his own travelling bed. I was tired too, though I’d been sleeping like the dead.

  We moved the army out of Leicester on Sunday morning, when all the church bells rang for Mass. I was out early, marshalling men in the market-place, and ranging them along the streets. People peered out of their doors, blinking in the dazzle of a new morning. They looked both frightened and curious, though many had an eye to the main chance of making good money out of the army. By six o’clock sunshine already cut the long shadows under gabled caves, and the plaster walls began to soak up its warmth. The broken paving in the street stank abominably, worsening daily with the dry weather. Fat blue bottles zigzagged across the gutters, buzzing merrily. When we rode down the High Street, the ground vibrated under the horses’ hooves, and the buildings themselves trembled at the din of an army on the march. Between walls, the rumble of iron-bound wagon wheels and gun-carts was deafening; irate citizens slammed windows and shutters.

  The White Boar yard was crowded enough for East Cheap and a horse fair run together; grooms and soldiers rushed to and fro, and horses were led up and down, already saddled. It seemed impossible to move a step without falling over men, stacked arms or stores. From the bawling and shouting, one would have thought we were an arm
y of hucksters. Servant girls ran hither and thither, dodging groping hands. There were plenty of bleary eyes and thick heads that morning. Soldiers on the brink of war take their pleasure where they can, and as much of it as they can get.

  Richard stood in the middle of this rowdy throng, talking to Norfolk and his son Surrey, and to Dr Hobbes, the surgeon. Hobbes appeared to have commandeered a corner of the yard for his own use, and the other surgeons were loading medicines and equipment on to carts. Richard wore a silk tabard over his armour, like a herald’s, the leopard and lily arms of England beaten in pure gold upon scarlet and azure. As he lifted his arm to brush a fly away from his face, the sunlight played on the steel and made a Johnny Noddy flicker on the wall opposite.

  While I sat my horse, waiting for us to leave, my eyes roved round, above the milling yard. At a window over the gallery, a girl leant out. She had very long, very straight hair, not blonde, but a pretty, fair colour in the sun. As she leaned forward, it cascaded over the window-sill, and I could see her breasts, soft within her shift. She began to comb her hair, heedless of observation. There seemed no design in this, to flaunt herself; she was too absorbed in the scene below, too young, too entranced by this colourful, alarming world of men. I wondered when I might see a woman comb her hair again, for me to touch. In that moment I envied the soldiers their last night in a soft bed.

  Looking round, I saw that Richard had noticed me staring upwards and his eyes had followed mine. The glance left his face naked; there was great pain in it, too much for me to look on comfortably. Then he turned away, and continued to talk to Hobbes.

  At first I was surprised, I’d begun to think he’d become blind to women. But it did not take long to realize why the casual sight of what was, after all, a very ordinary girl at a window, had hurt him. It must have been her hair — that fairish colour and immense length was so like Anne Neville’s. That she had been gazing down directly at him, fascinated, had probably increased the illusion. Dear God, even now, I’d not managed to understand how he was grieving for her. It’s only five months — some say that this time is worse than at the first loss; the numbness has begun to wear off. I did not think it good for a man his age, possessing normal appetites, to live too long without a woman. Well, if he’s ever hooked into taking a mistress, it’ll be when he has his defences undermined by some girl like that, who evokes a memory, and it will be a long time before it happens.