I, Richard Plantagenet: Book One: Tante le Desiree
Page 23
At length the familiar towers of Fotheringhay Castle rose in the distance, and the perpendicular tower of St Mary’s and All Saints next to it, like a lighthouse shining across the flat lands near the River Nene. For the first time in days, my heart lifted a little. My father and brother were home. Safely and respectfully, I had brought them home to rest—forever.
Reaching the churchyard, the bishops of Lincoln, Carlisle, and Hereford came forward to receive the bodies. Edward stood amongst them with George, Thomas Grey, Hastings and Rivers. Clad in a deep blue cloak trimmed with white fur, Ned came forth and bent over the remains of our father, laying his hand upon them and leaning to kiss them while tears streamed freely down his face. He knelt in obeisance to the body, “My lord, who should have been King, I kneel to you who made me what I am. In my memory you will ever have eternal honour.”
Twelve aged retainers of the Duke then proceeded to lift the coffins and bear them into the church on their shoulders There, before the high altar, my sire was placed in another hearse fringed with black sarcenet, bearing the image of three golden angels who carried aloft the Arms of England and France. Edmund’s remains were taken into the Chapel of Our Lady and likewise laid in repose, under a sea of banners and pennants.
My mother, Dame Cecily, arrayed in jet and dark sapphires, stood nearby in regal splendour. The Queen was with her, face a picture of indifference, surrounded by dozens of her court ladies. I looked for Anne as I took my place next to a subdued George within the pillars of the hearse, but I could not see her through the candle-smoke and the wall made by the Queen’s voracious relatives as they jostled for position.
The Dirige was sung and Will Hastings draped my father’s coffin with cloth of gold in the shape of the Cross. I emerged from the hearse with George and other kin and nobles, and presented offerings at the bier—the Duke’s shield, sword, helmet and coat of arms. Lord Ferrers, wearing full armour and carrying an axe with the blade reversed, came in riding one of my father’s own coursers; still a proud beast despite it age. Dismounting, he offered up both mount and axe to the Duke’s memory. This done, all the mourners, myself included, were ushered through the doors of St Mary’s to the ringing of the bells, leaving my father’s host of loyal servants to guard the coffin throughout the night.
Beyond the church, the meadows of Fotheringhay were filled with pavilions for the evening’s funeral banquet. Edward had spared no expense, bringing in his own pavilioner, Richard Garnet, to oversee accommodation for over a thousand guests. A hastily constructed kitchen block stood near the castle’s outer wall, where food could be prepared by cooks and serving staff carted in from Edward’s palaces in London. Never had I seen so much activity in Fotheringhay, a small place and relatively quiet, even with its great castle.
“Richard!” I turned and saw Anne waving frantically at me. Instantly I was gladdened; when I did not see her in the church, I feared some malady had kept her in Middleham. It was not my usual wont to kiss and embrace in public as peasants do, but a strange feeling of emptiness had risen within me ever since I held my father’s broken skull, and I sought to fill it with Anne.
“Ah, sweeting…” Pulling her away from her ladies into the shade of a pavilion, I clutched her to me. Her arms went round my neck; she was warm—inside, I felt chilled to the soul.
“I hardly recognised you, Richard, amongst all the other mourners. So many dark robes…you look like a monk!”
She pushed my hood back; inside, my hair was slicked with sweat, clinging to my cheeks. “You look so hot, so pale…you must come and get something to drink, my lord.”
I pushed the heavy hood back even farther, drawing air into my lungs in gasps. My hands were numb and shaking. “Oh, to throw these robes of death aside…and live!”
Seldom did I speak with such open passion, and she stared at me, realising how deeply affected I had been by the gathering of my father and brother’s bones. “Do it then, my husband. I will help you.”
She unfastened the heavy cowl, slung it to the ground. “I dare not take off more,” she said, although she loosened the fastenings of my robe near the top of my throat, “else passersby think I am stripping you naked before all! Call your squires, you must go and change into less dour and heavy garb. And you must rest….have you slept at all or have you spent each night on your knees?” She ran a light finger down my face. “Your chin is scratchy, too, my lord; if you are to attend the feast, you need to be shaved. I could have it put about that you have taken to your bed. You do look…pale.”
I touched my own rough cheek; I had not noticed the stubble. “I would fain sleep rather than eat, if I am honest, Anne. But I must attend, it is my duty.”
“Damn duty,” said Anne, chin tilted defiantly.
“I am bound by duty,” I said, “and by my loyalty. I must see this through.”
The funeral feast of the Duke of York stretched late into the night. Dominating the high table was a pie fashioned into the shape of a crown with silvered points, while two hundred roast piglets basted in mustard and wine sizzled on silver trays. Crabs dripping in herb butter complimented pike baked in rich burnt cream.
Subtleties were on offer too, cakes and jellies and honeyed confections…I enjoy sweet things, a vice that has on occasion caused my mouth to ache. Two teeth had to be extracted by barber surgeons—a hideous procedure! Thanks be to God, the front of my mouth was never affected; I may not have the vanity of George or Edward, but I care for my looks enough that I would not wish for black or gapped front teeth. So I try to care for these as best I can, rubbing salt upon them after table and teasing out food with a clean twig.
Seated next to me, Anne was nibbling daintily on wafers, which she dipped in cream covered by fennel and pomegranate seeds. I attended to my own fancies upon my trencher: sweetmeats and a red-and-white jelly that bore my own device of the White Boar.
By now I was feeling so exhausted I thought I might end up face-first in the jelly…I ended up chasing the wobbly shape of the boar around my platter, then, having consumed more wine that was perhaps sensible, started to laugh hysterically, and then, quite inexplicably, to cry.
Anne looked alarmed and made a signal with her hand, and my poor squires and pages, all very straight-faced, took hold of the drunk and weeping Duke of Gloucester and escorted him to his chamber.
I woke up with a raging head. Anne lay next to me. I was surprised she had not gone to her own quarters in embarrassment after my little performance the night before. “Anne, you did not have to…I made a fool of myself yestereven,” I mumbled into the coverlet.
“Yes, I did,” she said, quite firmly. “You were not yourself, Richard…I wasn’t leaving that pack of boys to tend you.”
I glanced around the chamber. As members of the king’s family, we were lodged in the castle. Indeed, as boys George and I had once shared this room; I remembered him holding me up to gaze out the window…then the little beast threatened meanly to tip me out into the courtyard below. However, that was all in the distant past. Now I was perplexed because the fire was out and there wasn’t a squire in sight. “Where are the lads?”
“I dismissed them and told them to go stuff their fat little faces on the leavings of the feast and then do as they would. They were thrilled.”
“Is Edward angry with me?”
“No, why would he be? He was as drunk as you, and George even more so. It was your father’s funeral feast. Why should you not cry and drink too much?”
I swung my legs over the side of the bed. My head pounded. “Because I was Chief Mourner and appointed to see him rightly buried, not to weep and wail like a woman. I accepted my father’s death years ago. I tell you, Anne, I did not shed one tear back then and I was only eight!”
“Maybe you should have, husband.”
Morose, I hunched over, uncaring that it made my back look worse than it was. Anne’s hand came to rest on my shoulder. “What it is that troubles you so? Was it not a great honour to be Chief Mourner?”
There. I had blurted it out. The terrible fancies that had haunted me since we had exhumed the Duke’s body.
Anne was silent a moment. Then she said slowly, “But England is at peace, Dickon. Edward is still young, he is hale, and he has two healthy sons. The wars are over.”
“There are still those who support Lancaster. What, for instance, of Margaret Beaufort’s son, Henry Tydder, hiding away in Brittany with dear Uncle Jasper?”
“Henry Tydder?” Anne sounded surprised. “What threat could he be to Edward and York? He is of debarred line! There are many with far better claims to the throne than him!”
“Edward thinks he is a threat. You know that. He will never allow him to return to England no matter how much his mother whines and wheedles.” I pulled a face and put on a false high voice, emulating Margaret Beaufort’s pleas, “Oh my Lord King, please let my boy come home! Mama wants to see him and all he really wants to do is settle in his lands and marry a nice Welsh sheep…I mean, girl!”
Anne stifled a laugh. “You are incorrigible sometimes, husband. Yes, Henry might cause trouble but who would ever accept him as King? My goodness, the rulers of Spain and Portugal have better claims to the English throne than he does! And could he really cause much trouble? He’s a weedy, deep fellow with an oddly turned eye, by all accounts! Not a warrior like Edward…”
“Yes, he could cause trouble…Jasper Tydder is with him, and he is a warrior if Henry Tydder is not.”
“But both of them are far away in Brittany… and the King is strong.”
She was right, but the powerful sensation that gripped me at the exhumation of my father’s bones, his beloved, broken bones, had not yet deserted me. A sensation of doom, of unavoidable destiny, of the Wheel of Fate spinning round with Death riding atop it holding his honed scythe…
Pushing the feeling from my mind as best I could, I took a deep breath and clambered from the bed. I could not sit moping in Fotheringhay like some hag-ridden fool. I had duties to perform.
“We need to find where my squires have got to, and make ready for the day. It has gone cock’s crow. The last Requiem mass for the Duke and Edmund is being sung this morning…and then we are free to go.”
CHAPTER TWELVE : CRUEL MIDWINTER
Snow settled over the towers of Middleham. Beyond the walls, the old earthen castle with its lumps and bumps lay silent under a white blanket. Down by the stream the waters of Black Dub were frozen, deep green under a sheet of ice. The trees around the swimming hole hung down sorrowfully, their branches dripping with ice.
The sorry weather did not make me cheerless. Christmas was upon us, and I had some delights prepared to please Anne and my little son. Mummers and musicians were on their way from York; I just prayed the roads would be clear enough for them to reach us in the Dales. I often spent the winter season in York, enjoying the celebrations at the Lendal, but not this year—little Ned had a wracking chest cough and Anne would not leave him, and I had no stomach to go alone.
It was Christmas Eve, and Anne and I fared into Middleham town to hand out alms to the poor. The villagers carolled around the Market Cross, dancing in a circle as the snow fell, dusting their hair and clothes with white. At the church of St Alkelda and St Mary, the priests and other clergymen were decorating a tree in the churchyard with Apples…the Eve of Christmas was called by some ‘Adam and Eve’ night. Snow stuck to the apples, made them into glistening, frosted spheres.
By the time we finished our visit, the sun was setting. The snow had ceased, and the snow-clouds parted over the castle; a shaft of burnished gold streamed down, as if God himself lit up the walls of our home. The strange, surreal light hung over everything, adding blush to our faces, flame to our hair, and illuminating the entire village in red-gold splendour, from the gleaming cobbles to the small stone houses, to the great stone cross where the dancers ceased their gambolling and stopped to stare.
A hush fell, as if the whole world held its breath, then abruptly a cloud severed the light and a purple pall fell across the land, a sombre twilight heading swiftly toward nightfall. A few snowflakes began to fall again, glittering in the flames of the torches around the market square.
I was silent for a moment, as the coldness of impending night swept over me, and a northerly wind moved the snowdrifts in the gutters. But Anne laughed, “What are we waiting for? Soon it will be time to feast! And look, the players are coming!”
Down the street that led from York danced a party of maskers or guisers, Disguised Men, some banging on cymbals and shaking tymbrels, while others played upon flutes and horns. Dressed in rags twined with sprigs of winter greenery, they wore outlandish masks of devils and dragons or else had their faces painted dark as Saracens. Some folk did not approve of such revelry at Christmas, thinking it heathenish, and preferred to spend the dark evenings playing at tables or cards, but we were young and I saw no harm in it, and it pleased my guests. We frequently invited local families of note to join us when they could: our neighbours the Scropes, Greystoke, John Conyer, Rob and Joyce Percy, Francis when he was at his northern manors, my friend Miles Metcalfe of Nappa Hall, and others. This year a good many of them were visiting the castle and I planned a surprise of all for them, better than any lavish feast. I grinned, imagining their stunned faces when they saw what I had planned.
Inside the castle, servants and courtiers buzzed about like a hive of industrious bees. Holly and ivy hung everywhere, alongside bunches of mistletoe tied with bright ribbons…I had sent the young pages on a search for it amongst the winter- bitten trees, laughing as I watched them scramble up to find the biggest bunch and bring it down. I rewarded each of them with a penny for their pains—and there were a few complaints of bruises and torn hose.
The banquet took place late in the evening, after more guests had arrived, coming in dribs and drabs along the icy, snow-bound roads. A boar’s head snarled in the centre of the table, gaily dressed up with edible trappings; the cook had silvered the boar’s bristles to make him glow pale—my emblem, the Boar. There were boar-shaped pies too, filled with venison from the forests on the estates of Middleham, and Umble pie, which contained the liver, heart, and kidneys of the deer, flavoured by imported spices. Never forgetting their lord, the good folk of York had sent a gift of swans and pike in thanks for my support of the city.
Cheerfully and without restraint, for the fast of Advent was ending and we were all famished, we drank and ate as we celebrated Christ’s birth and our own good fortunes in these cold days of winter, while around us the maskers performed and the minstrels sang a merry ballad to gladden our hearts:
“Good day, good day,
My lord Sire Christemasse, good day!
Good day, Sire Christemasse, our king,
For every man, both old and young,
is glad and blithe of your coming;
Good day!
Good day, good day,
My lord Sire Christemasse, good day!
God’s Son so full of might
From heaven to earth down is alight
And born of a maid so bright;
Good day!
Good day, good day,
My lord Sire Christemasse, good day!
Heaven and earth and also hell,
And all that ever in them dwell,
Of your coming shall they tell;
Good day!
Good day, good day,
My lord Sire Christemasse, good day!
All manner of mirth we would make
And solace to our hearts take,
My seemly lord, for your sake;
Good day!
Good day, good day,
My lord Sire Christemasse, good day!”
Once the song was over, a horn was blown at my command, silencing all the revellers. I rose from my high seat as sev
eral hundred pairs of eyes swivelled in my direction, filled by wonderment and in some cases, not a little annoyance; they were enjoying the food and drink too much, and resented the interruption.
“I have a Christmas gift for all of you, my good friends. Something I doubt many—if any—of you have ever seen before. A special event to celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ upon this night so long ago. Gather up your cloaks and make for the fields behind my castle. There you will witness a sight of much wonder.”
Murmurs rippled through the company, many of whom were deep in their cups. You could tell they were miffed that I had asked them to cease their merriment and fare out into the dark and cold. But I would not be denied. I had spent much money to provide entertainment, and by Christ Himself, my guests would be entertained.
I turned to Anne, who was just as surprised as the rest, for I had kept my plans secret from her. “Go and fetch our son, Anne. I would not have him miss this. Indeed, it is mostly for him.”
“But Richard!” She was startled, shaking her head in protest. “He has been so ill. To take him into the deadly night air…”
“The physic told me he was improving, that the cough has broken. Get his nurses to wrap him up in his warmest garb and bring him. It will not take long. He must not miss tonight.”
Anne looked dubious, but hurried away nevertheless. She soon returned with two of Edward’s nurses, Jane Collins and Agnes Cooper, clucking away like a pair of old hens and holding our son between them…Well, I presumed it was our son, for he was so heavily wrapped in blankets and fur that I could not see his face.