by Livi Michael
3
The Summons
She dressed in the least shabby of her clothes and put on what jewellery she had not pawned. Her mouth was entirely dry.
The little prince was dressed in the blue velvet that he had nearly outgrown. He insisted on carrying his sword.
Together they approached the royal chamber.
‘You are hurting my hand, Maman,’ he said, pulling away from her. He was nearly nine now and did not want to hold his mother’s hand.
She released him as the doors swung open.
The king sat in his robes of state, surrounded by his ministers. His face was severe, she noted, but as they stepped forward, he smiled.
Somehow it made him look even less approachable.
They knelt before him, making the usual obeisance, and she began to thank him for his great bounty and hospitality, but he cut her short. ‘Cousin,’ he said, ‘I have given your situation much consideration.’
Not as much as I have, she thought, but he carried on. ‘I have given you a general. De Brézé has my authority to muster men in Normandy. I can offer you ships and twenty thousand francs. In return for a small consideration –’
He indicated that they should rise.
Margaret of Anjou stood. She could hear her own heart pounding.
‘I wish only for the town and fortress of Calais.’
Her heart and stomach lurched, then seemed to fall.
‘I cannot give you Calais,’ she said.
King Louis’ eyebrows raised fractionally and a murmur ran around the room.
‘The English people would never accept it,’ she added faintly.
Calais was the last bastion of the English in France. All the other territories, hard won by Henry V, were lost.
The English already blamed her for the loss of territories in France.
‘Your majesty,’ she said, ‘I need the people to fight for me, not against me. They must see me as their queen, not their enemy.’
‘Then I cannot help you,’ said the king, and a chorus of assent arose.
Margaret of Anjou could feel tears stinging her eyes. ‘Your majesty –’ she began.
‘I have given you so much already,’ said Louis. ‘What can you give me in return?’
Margaret of Anjou was keenly aware that she had nothing else to give.
‘Everything you give me,’ she said, ‘will be repaid, twice over, when I have won back my country.’
Several of the nobles shook their heads or looked away as though casting doubt on her ability to win back her country. She felt the injustice of it burning in her breast. But then, unexpectedly, the young prince spoke.
‘My lady mother will win back her country,’ he said, ‘and I will be king.’
Everyone held their breath, waiting for the French king’s reaction.
Louis smiled again. It was not pleasant.
‘Well, my young fellow,’ he said roguishly. ‘So you want to be king, eh? Perhaps you would like to try on my crown?’
Margaret of Anjou shot her son a warning glance, but he was already speaking.
‘I wish only to wear the crown that is rightfully mine, your majesty.’
‘Well said,’ responded the king, looking around, and there was a small scattering of applause.
Margaret of Anjou begged the king’s permission to approach. When she was within earshot of only a few of his council she said in a low voice, ‘Your majesty, I cannot give you Calais – I have already given Berwick to the Scots.’
‘Exactly so,’ said King Louis. ‘One nation helps another. That is how the great game of diplomacy is played.’
Margaret of Anjou could only say that once she was queen again they could draw up any number of treaties, England would renew old agreements, all the money would be repaid – but she could not turn the entire country against her before she had even set foot on its shores. It would only add fuel to her enemies’ fire. They had already denounced her and alienated her subjects from her because she had given Berwick to the Scots.
King Louis pressed the tips of his fingers together.
‘I can see that you might need a little time to consider,’ he said. ‘And you can have a little time. But not much.’
He was reminding her that they had already outstayed their welcome.
Many thoughts ran through the queen’s mind. She wanted to ask her cousin what he would do in her situation. To consider whether it was kind to put her in this positon, into a vice. She wanted to fling herself at his feet and beg. But she knew, of course, that it was pointless to either rail at or plead with Louis.
Even as a child he had enjoyed only those games he could win.
So she looked at him without speaking and their gazes locked.
‘You may have the rest of this week to consider,’ Louis said.
‘I cannot give you Calais,’ said the queen.
4
The Queen’s Forces Muster
She had not given it to him exactly – she had only mortgaged Calais. Once she had paid back twice the amount of money Louis had given her, he would have no claim on it. And she would pay it back. All that mattered now was the speed with which she could gather an army and return to England, for then all treaties could be renegotiated. But then Louis had tried to send his own garrison to Calais, and Philip of Burgundy had refused to let them through his lands. One delay after another seemed to afflict the process, and now the summer was gone, and the autumn weather was unsettled.
But Louis had kept his word, and given her ships and money; though when she saw the men de Brézé had assembled at the port of Honfleur, the queen closed her eyes momentarily.
‘I see they have emptied the prisons,’ she said.
‘Madame,’ said de Brézé, ‘all these men would lay down their lives for you.’
If some of these men lie down, the queen thought, they might never get up again. Not least because the person lying next to them would have cut their throats. However, all she said was, ‘There are not two thousand men here.’
De Brézé looked discomfited. ‘No, madame,’ he said. ‘Some of the least deserving took flight.’
‘They deserted? Have you not pursued them?’
‘We do not need such lily-livered creatures. Let them run. Every man here is an experienced fighter and keen for the fray.’
Certainly they looked as though they had fought, for hardly any one of them was whole. One had an eye missing, one an ear. One, more worryingly, had lost both his hands. ‘How is he to fight?’ whispered the queen as they passed. But de Brézé said that he carried his dagger in his mouth and could throttle a man with his arms – de Brézé had seen it himself, or he would not have believed it. Also he had a kick like a mule.
‘How many men are here?’ the queen said wearily, and de Brézé looked discomfited again, but said he thought they were a little short of a thousand.
‘One thousand?’ said the queen.
‘It is not numbers, my lady, but strategy that counts – intelligence, eh?’ He tapped his head. ‘Besides, you have your own men, do you not?’
The queen had perhaps a hundred knights with her.
‘And supporters in England?’
This much was true. In anticipation of their arrival Sir Richard Tunstall had already wrested Bamburgh Castle from his brother, who was constable there.
That was where they planned to land, near Bamburgh.
‘So the attack will come from two sides,’ said de Brézé. ‘From inland and from the sea.’
She allowed herself to be encouraged. After all, anything was better than being kept waiting at King Louis’ pleasure. She returned to her lodgings, warning the little prince not to leave her side, because anything might happen. They might all have their throats cut in the night.
And, in fact, a fight did break out that night, and several men were killed. And in the general chaos a lantern had been knocked over and a fire had started and burned one of the ships. De Brézé found the two perpetrators and ba
nged their heads together so hard it looked as if at least one of them would not regain consciousness. Then, of course, there was a delay while the ship was repaired. And once it was repaired the wind turned and they were delayed for several days more.
‘We are not meant to leave these shores,’ the queen said.
‘Tomorrow the weather will change,’ said de Brézé.
‘You said that yesterday,’ said the queen, adding savagely, ‘God is not with us!’
‘My lady, remember the Conqueror,’ said de Brézé. ‘He was delayed also. But then the time was right, et voila!’
It was not the best comparison. William the Conqueror had been delayed for eight months; his men had mutinied. He’d had to dig up the corpse of St Valery before the wind changed and he’d been able to convince his men to sail with him. And then they’d sailed straight into a storm and many of them had drowned.
‘But then, majesty, all England fell before him.’
The queen gazed at the restless sea.
‘I am not the Conqueror,’ she said.
She was more like that unhappy queen, Matilda, the Conqueror’s great-granddaughter, who had fought her usurping cousin and lost. Because the people of England did not want a queen.
But Queen Matilda’s son had been the first of the House of Anjou to be crowned King of England.
She looked disconsolately at the assembled rabble. ‘Louis promised me an army,’ she said. ‘Is this the best you could do with twenty thousand francs?’
De Brézé was silent. She looked at him. ‘Louis promises many things,’ he said. And suddenly she knew that Louis had not advanced the money at all. ‘But how –?’ she said. De Brézé pulled down the corners of his mouth, then raised his shoulders. The queen understood that these were his men, it was his money. She turned away, her heart beating rapidly, terrible thoughts raging through her mind.
‘Ah, God,’ she said. De Brézé stood behind her.
‘My lady – why are you returning?’ he said. ‘Because you have an army? No. Does the sun rise because it has an army? Does the moon require the people’s consent to return? No. You are returning because you are England’s queen. And because you must.’
The queen knew there was a flaw somewhere in this argument, yet oddly she was comforted by it, and by the conviction in de Brézé’s face. He was in his own way a visionary, untroubled by practicalities; one of a breed of men who, like the Conqueror, was only truly at home on the battlefield. No woman would ever own him and possibly no king or queen.
But he had paid, out of his own depleted purse, for her ships and men.
She shook her head. She would have her revenge on Louis one day. Certainly he would never own Calais.
She turned back to her general and managed to smile. ‘It appears I am indebted to you,’ she said.
‘No, my lady.’
She nodded. ‘I think I am. And tomorrow the weather will change?’
‘It will, my lady,’ he replied.
And it did. On the morning of 19 October the sun shone and the wind blew in the right direction.
There was no time to discuss this turn of fortune. All the men, horses, weapons and supplies had to be loaded on to the ships. Then the anchors were raised and the sails filled with wind, and the first ship drifted out into the sea.
The queen and the little prince stayed on deck, watching the land of Normandy recede, and the wide, sparkling sea that would take them to England to reclaim the crown.
5
Storm
The first shots were fired almost as soon as they were within sight of land. The cannonballs fell short of the ships but made the waters choppy.
They advanced anyway, slowly, but were met with a bombardment so intense that it caused the vessels to swerve. Yet none of them had been struck and the queen still thought they should go forward.
De Brézé said something to the captain, who shouted back at him in an accent so strong that the queen hardly understood it, but she caught the words for ‘testicles’ and ‘cow’. De Brézé cuffed him hard then seized the wheel and began to shout himself.
‘That one is not for us!’ he cried, as a great cannonball struck the water some feet to the side, causing the boat to lurch. ‘Do you hear me, you sons of whores? You pox-ridden, dung-eating lepers!’
He roared like a maniac when one of the ships was struck, and the queen too cried out. Even from where she stood she could see her ships retreating.
‘Tell them to come back!’ she screamed.
The captain reappeared and tried to take the wheel, and a furious altercation occurred. The queen set out towards them, but the boat lurched again and she was flung back against the mast.
‘My ships!’ she cried.
Seeing her difficulty, de Brézé left the wheel and leaped down from the deck to help her. The captain at once began to turn the boat round.
‘No! No!’ cried the queen and the captain shouted back.
‘What is he saying?’ she cried. She had caught the word ‘curse’.
‘He says that you should go below, my lady – for your own safety.’ He took her arm.
‘Tell him to turn back at once.’
‘We are not retreating, my lady – if we sail a little further up the coast they cannot fire.’
‘Is that where the other ships are going?’
De Brézé didn’t answer, apparently concentrating on guiding her down the steps towards her cabin.
‘I must stay with him, my lady, he doesn’t know the coast.’
‘You do not know the coast.’
‘I know that we need to go further north. If we can reach your garrison at Bamburgh, we can get from there to Berwick. I don’t know where we are now, but that was not your garrison. Excuse me, my lady – it will take more than one man to navigate this ship.’
The queen had no intention of remaining in her cabin. During her first voyage to England she had been trapped below deck until the Duke of Suffolk had managed to find and rescue her. But she did want to return to the little prince who was waiting for her there.
‘Who is firing at us, Maman?’ he said. The queen didn’t answer him but held him tightly for a moment until he strained away. ‘I don’t like this ship,’ he said.
The queen didn’t like it either. Six days in its stinking belly had convinced her that she never wanted to set foot on a boat again. She did not say this, however, but took the little prince back with her to the deck, where they clung to a wooden rail above the rudder. From there they stared anxiously at the receding land. They could see no sign of the other ships at all.
She had come so close, only to be turned away.
‘Where are we going, Maman?’ said the little prince, but she couldn’t reply. Already the waters were less choppy, but it was difficult to turn north because the wind was blowing from that direction, so they made slow progress. Then, as the land disappeared, the sky darkened and the wind moaned.
‘Look, Maman!’ cried the little prince, pointing to the sea, which was churning to foam and already climbing the sides of the boat. The queen could not help but remember the storm that had accompanied her to England, when all her ships had been wrecked.
‘It is just a game, my little cygnet,’ she told him (for the swan was his symbol). ‘The wind and the waters are playing a game.’
She knew she should get him inside, but she had a horror of being trapped in her cabin like last time.
The boat rolled and lurched and they clung to the wooden rail. All sight of their destination had gone. There was no sign of the first stars that should have navigated them – it was as though they had been snuffed out like so many candles. Then rain began, like a dense fall of arrows into the sea.
The ship juddered, then lurched horribly to the right. The queen’s breath was knocked from her as she was pressed against the rail.
‘In,’ she managed to say, but the little prince leaned over and vomited copiously into the sea.
She clasped him, ignoring the v
omit-stained clothing, and began struggling back – not to the cabins, she would not stay there – but to the deck.
She was flung backwards as she tried to climb the steps and forced to crawl up on hands and knees. Then when she reached the top the boat reared and plunged and both she and the prince were hurled to one side; her ribs struck a wooden beam. She could just make out de Brézé by the wheel, but she couldn’t seem to reach him – it was like one of those nightmares where it was not possible to move forward. She hauled herself along the beam, the little prince clinging to her side, and cried out three times to the Seneschal.
And he heard. He looked over his shoulder once, twice, then shouted to the captain and left the wheel.
‘What are you doing, my lady?’ he called. ‘This is not safe.’
She tried to tell him that she could not stay below but he could hardly hear her. Already he had taken the little prince in his arms and was manoeuvring her back inside. She clutched at him and made him stop. ‘I cannot stay here – on this ship!’ she cried, almost sobbing.
De Brézé tried to calm her. ‘This storm will die down,’ he said, ‘and then we will land.’
She clutched him harder. ‘Promise me!’ she said. ‘Promise me you will take me to shore.’
‘Of course,’ he said. Once the storm died down they could drop anchor and he would row her to land himself. ‘I swear,’ he said and she believed him.
‘We should have fired back,’ she said bitterly, but de Brézé said that the garrison would have more munitions than they – they had to preserve all they had for the real war. ‘But I have to steer the ship,’ he said. ‘Promise me you will stay here?’
Reluctantly, she nodded and released him. But she remained at the bottom of the steps, listening to the cries of those above as the foaming sea swept over the deck.
As de Brézé predicted, however, the storm did die down. The waters became less agitated and the ship made some progress towards the north. As soon as she could the queen left her shelter and peered out to where she could see the first thin line of land, then made her way to de Brézé.
