The Queen's Choice

by Anne O'Brien

  The joy of my wedding day seemed many months ago. It was, in a painful way, a relief when Henry pleaded business away from Westminster. Since he was absent from my table and my bed I was not compelled to think of what we could possibly talk about.

  Chapter 10

  Once again, with what was becoming an uneasy regularity, Henry donned his armour and prepared to lead a campaign into Wales where the stronghold of Carnarvon, dangerously undermanned, was under siege.

  He saluted my fingers. ‘God keep you, lady.’

  ‘May the Blessed Virgin smile on you, my lord.’

  After our difference of opinion over my Breton rents, our demeanour was as polite, as carefully courteous, as that between ambassadors negotiating a truce, where good manners must be preserved at all costs but with little hope of a friendly outcome. Royal policy reached my ears in droplets, like ice melting in a slow thaw. Or through women’s gossip. Should I, Queen of England, learn of a siege in Wales or another Breton attack on the Isle of Wight from the chattering of my women?

  ‘Do you have any demands of me, my lord?’

  ‘I’ve left all in Bishop Henry’s hands. And Archbishop Arundel’s.’

  Which rubbed even more salt into my wounds, for once more I was left sitting on the margins of events where I was no more than an onlooker. Was I not Queen, invested with orb and sceptre and Crown, anointed with holy oil? It was my right to be Henry’s confidante and adviser. It was my right to stand at his side.

  Henry continued to turn a blind eye to my rights as wife and consort.

  ‘Do our lives spin in separate circles,’ I asked, unctuously sweet,‘meeting only when the arc of yours collides by chance with mine? Is that to be the pattern of our days?’

  Henry’s eye was not indulgent.

  ‘That sums it up fairly well, as things are. The arcs, as you put it, will collide in the second week of December, at Abingdon where we will celebrate the birth of Our Lord. If you will make arrangements to meet me there. I have a need to meet with the Royal Council in January. And after that I have summoned a parliament for the new year.’

  ‘So a brief meeting, I collect. At Abingdon.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘After which our perfect circles will spin on alone,’I might have said, but I did not since Henry was already too distant to hear.

  Irritation became the ruin of my days, annoyance the strident companion of my nights. And when I could not sleep, there was the fear. Military campaigns could so easily result in death.

  ‘You are as intransigent as each other,’ I thought in a moment of weakness as, moodily, I rejected one rolled chaplet and demanded another.

  Which I promptly denied with vehemence. Henry was the intransigent one here, unused to allowing a woman access to his closest thoughts and his policies.

  As for this Royal Council that seemed to approach every matter with a gauntleted fist, and this parliament that demanded to be heard, how should I deal with them? Was Henry so powerless that he must dance attendance on them? I did not think that the King of England must bow the knee before his subjects. Was he not King in God’s name? It did not seem to me that the man I had come to know in Brittany, the man who had moved heaven and earth to woo me, the man who had returned to England to reclaim his inheritance with such fervour and dedication, would become a cipher in so short a time.

  Who held power in this country? How would I ever learn it if Henry was unwilling to open the journal of his days for me to read?

  *

  On the surface Christmas at Abingdon was a splendidly festive affair, enhanced by an aura of family: the presence of all four of Henry’s sons as well as my daughters. I might have more than a brief acquaintance with John and Humphrey but this was an opportunity to meet Hal and Thomas, both young men who had already had their taste of warfare. Thomas was full of lively humour, Hal more reserved. And suffering, beneath the austere demeanour that cloaked his young shoulders. His greeting was courteous but not effusive. I doubted he would ever be effusive, but I was not deterred. I knew how to deal with growing boys.

  Except that Hal was no longer a boy. He was a young man blooded in battle. By the Virgin he was! It was a terrible blemish for a young man to carry, a blow to his pride as much as to his flesh.

  ‘Will you allow me to help you?’ I asked when we had a moment’s privacy between the religious observance and the feasting. No point in pretence; the boy was in pain.

  ‘And how can you do that, Madam?’

  So he would deny any such need, a normal reaction from a youth who had a dignity to uphold. It was natural that he would reject my approach, a mere well-meaning female, with tinctures and potions tucked in her sleeves.

  ‘One of my household,’ I ventured, ‘Mistress Alicia, the nurse who has the care of my daughters, is skilled in dealing with the aftermath of severe wounds. She has salves and ointments, of great value, to encourage restoration of the flesh.’

  Hal visibly stiffened. ‘There is no need. A soldier must bear the wounds he suffers in battle. My father’s surgeon John Bradmore has done all that can be done.’

  ‘Master Bradmore saved your life, I have no doubt. But I think there is a need, if only to relieve the pain. I know that you were greatly hurt and I think it still troubles you.’

  I could see it in his eyes, the constant dragging hurt of a deep wound, as I offered a more direct comment that would influence this controlled future king who was destined to bear such a terrible wound, for the arrow head that had found its mark, from one of the Cheshire bowmen in the Battle of Shrewsbury, had been lodged deep within the bone of his cheek. It was a miracle that he was alive.

  ‘No one doubts your courage, Hal. You do not need to suffer. Also the salves will restore the quality of your skin, so the wound becomes less obvious.’ I placed my hand on his arm, risking rebuttal, knowing, as did he, that nothing would ever fully mask so hideous a scar. ‘Let Mistress Alicia try what she can do. An ointment of Wood Betony will do no harm and may do much good. Nor will it hurt you more than you have already been hurt.’ I felt him relax a little beneath my fingers and smiled at him. ‘Pride should not stop you. I am not your mother and can claim no authority over you, but I know all about the pride of young men. I have my own sons. Will you allow Mistress Alicia to come to you? No one else need know but you and she.’

  I would not talk to him of the properties of hemlock and henbane, difficult herbs, witches’ herbs to bring death and terrifying hallucinations. He did not need to know. Hal might balk at their usage but in the right hands they had the power to alleviate the most severe of pains. I could concoct a tincture, the sharp taste disguised under the heavy sweetness of honey. Mistress Alicia would administer it as carefully as any nurse to her charge, to allow this impressive prince a good night’s sleep.

  After a moment’s thought, Hal smiled, his sombre face lighting as if from an inner candle. He was much like his father. ‘My thanks, Madam Joanna. I am grateful for any help that will make my future wife not look on me with horror.’ He took my hand and kissed my fingers, and then my cheek, admitting: ‘You are very kind. Sometimes the pain is still great. I will let Mistress Alicia come to me.’

  If Henry learned what I had done, he said nothing, allowing both Hal and myself our privacy, for which I was grateful. I thought that neither father nor son would appreciate the content of some of my manuscripts.

  ‘You look sombre,’ Henry observed in a moment’s respite after we had returned from a hectic hunt through the meadows and he helped me dismount. ‘Too much hunting?’

  I shook my head, already turning away.

  ‘You miss your sons. That’s it, isn’t it?’ It made me stop and look back.

  ‘Yes.’ Briefly, very briefly, for I still had not entirely forgiven him, when he put his arm around me I rested my head on his shoulder. ‘Celebrating the New Year without them is always difficult.’

  ‘I am sorry.’

  It helped, that smallest acknowledgement, so that the tensio
ns between us retreated from the knife edge on which they had been balanced. There might even have been a restoration of warmth between Henry and myself, but it was a fragile thing and needed nurturing. Whatever problems dogged him, Henry had not escaped them for the birth of the Christ child. Barely were the Twelfth Night junketings over than Henry was heading back to Westminster. No nurturing was possible.

  ‘Do I accompany you?’

  ‘If it is your wish.’

  It seemed to me that he did not greatly care. He was stacking documents, handing them to one of his clerks.

  ‘What are they?’ I hoped for a reply.

  ‘Proposals for a tax, to be raised on the value of land-holdings.’

  ‘Will parliament and the Council accept them?’

  ‘They must. There’s a lot hanging on it.’

  Nothing more.

  ‘Will you be busy?’

  ‘Yes. You could go on to Eltham with the girls if you would find that more comfortable.’

  I went to Westminster, of course. And once there I asked Baron Thomas, newly returned to Court after the military success against the Percy rebels,‘Who rules this country, Lord Thomas? Parliament, Council or King?’

  ‘A heavy subject, Madam, for so bright a day.’ He looked startled at my forthright approach with no gesture towards polite welcome. Whereas he kissed my fingers with punctilious grace.

  ‘Heavy for any day. Who holds power here?’

  ‘It is a matter of balance. Discretion is needed in all things, Madam.’

  ‘The answer of a born diplomat and courtier, Lord Thomas. Are you avoiding my question?’

  ‘Possibly, Madam.’

  He bowed and walked away. And I realised, after all he had done for me, I had not even had the courtesy to ask him about his welfare and that of his children. I had disappointed him, and I was regretful. I did not like to be thought discourteous. Neither could I afford to alienate the friends I had in England. There were few enough of them.

  But discover more I must. Since Henry was as close-latched as a cleric’s purse, and Lord Thomas obdurately loyal, I must make my own arrangements.

  *

  I had sent for him. Bishop Henry, resplendent with the intricately linked chain of Lord Chancellor gleaming. I thought he sighed as he walked into my private chamber in the Tower, for once, at my arrangement, free from clerks and officials. He sat neatly on one of the clerk’s stools, one leg crossed over the other, his velvet cap poised on one knee.

  ‘I have the strangest feeling that you have a request for me.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll not ask the impossible.’

  Although perhaps I did. Perhaps he would refuse, Queen or no Queen. I did not know the precedent for this, but I could guess. The Bishop smiled. I returned the smile with dulcet charm. We had come to a remarkably good understanding.

  ‘I have come to realise that I know nothing of how this country is governed,’ I said plainly. ‘It is becoming a weakness for me, this not knowing. I need to learn more, rather than being cushioned by those who tell me it is not their place to inform me, or who do not understand why I would wish to know. Henry is either silent or absent. Or just angry.’

  ‘Understandable.’ Bishop Henry shrugged. ‘How may I help?’

  I told him.

  ‘No.’ He refused without even taking a breath.

  Why not?’ I was determined not to be refused.

  ‘There is no precedent for it.’

  ‘Does that mean it cannot be done?’

  I poured a cup of ale for him.

  ‘Not quite,’ he admitted. For a moment he sat in contemplation, running a finger around the rim of his cup. ‘Alice Perrers, the old King’s mistress—our grandfather—broke the precedent, but that was only because she had been accused of witchcraft and was summoned.’

  ‘That is hardly likely to be relevant to me.’

  ‘No.’ His brows levelled ominously. ‘I will not arrange it. If you were discovered, your reputation for meddling would be rolled even further into the mire of foreign relations.’

  ‘Meddling? I do not meddle. In fact, I would like to meddle, as you so inelegantly put it, more than I am allowed.’

  ‘And that’s the crux of the matter, my dear Joanna. It is thought that you might indeed meddle. We do not think kindly of Breton meddling at this moment. Hand in glove with the Welsh.’

  ‘I know. The bloody Welsh.’ I remembered Henry’s cold fury.

  ‘Exactly. So I will not.’

  I persisted. He could not refuse for long.

  *

  ‘Stand there. Don’t move. Don’t shuffle. Don’t even breathe.’ Bishop Henry’s hand was heavy on my shoulder, his voice soft but authoritarian in my ear. ‘If you are discovered we’re both up to our necks in hot water.’

  ‘Will not even your dignity as bishop and Chancellor save you?’ I whispered back. I felt a breath of nerves on my nape, but I had got my way.

  ‘I might survive the approbation. It will do you no good at all.’

  I stood, dark cloaked, dark hooded, in the shadow of a screen set up by some clever means by Bishop Henry in the side gallery to the rear of the Great Hall at Westminster. I could see little, but I would hear all, and I found that I was trembling. Never having seen Henry dealing with matters of government in this formal setting, I did not know what to expect, but would it be so different from John and his dealings in Brittany? I prayed for a good outcome, even though I did not know what that would be. And I prayed for an understanding of what it was that drove Henry so that he slept little and worried much.

  Here Henry was meeting with the parliament he had summoned. In my mind’s eye I could see him, striding into the chamber, footsteps echoing, then taking the royal throne in this magnificent setting. His figured houppelande would fall in majestic folds to his ankles, sleeves and cape edged with royal ermine, his burnished hair clipped around with a golden coronet. I might not see, but I could imagine as silence fell, taut and severe. This parliament would be impressed. It would be cooperative, amenable to Henry’s request for taxation. It needed Henry’s steadying hand on the reins of power to obliterate insurrection and so ensure England’s future greatness.

  Here I would learn. Here I would gain a sense of Henry’s calm assurance, his clear authority, his unquestionable right to wear that coronet.

  And did I learn?

  Oh, I learned it well, retreating even further into the shadows.

  What a lesson it was for me as the next hour unfolded. What an appalling education in humiliation and degradation. It was an essay in calculated insolence, impossibly damaging to Henry’s dignity and majesty as King as the Speaker issued parliament’s demands. The words might be honeyed in respect but this was all artifice; their intent was vicious. This body of subjects, summoned by Henry, proceeded to question Henry’s spending, his taxation, his choice of advisers, even his right to rule England. Henry was ordered by this recalcitrant parliament to reform his lifestyle and practise economy. He was advised to discuss every matter of business with his Council if he wished to enjoy peace in his realm. His request for taxation based on landholding, for which he had held out so much hope, was thrust aside until parliament was satisfied with Henry’s response to their demands. Their demands!

  It was a stunning rebuke from subjects to their King.

  Throughout it all, even when his right to rule was actually questioned, Henry responded with clear argument that nothing could shake.

  ‘It is known to the whole realm that I am the true heir of Lancaster. I was chosen by all the lords of this realm to be its governor and its King. I have the right to rule this country as I see fit.’

  It was to my mind an irrefutable argument. I stood in stunned silence, absorbing his pain as he answered every attack, but to no avail. I could not see Henry but I understood, from the low level timbre of his voice, his anger at what this parliament was demanding from him: that Henry’s royal accounts be subject to public scrutiny.

  H
ow could he tolerate such defiance, so much rank disaffection? Standing as motionless as the pillar at my side, I wondered at his apparent weakness. Was it merely a matter of financial dependence? But was it not in the interest of England to destroy the Welsh rebels once and for all? Surely they would see the need. If I were Henry I would dismiss this rabble of Englishmen who had no respect for their ruler, and summon another parliament.

  If I were Henry…

  But then, I was not, and could not understand how this had happened, that he should be supported so strongly, so effectively, against Richard, yet within four years here he was forced to face such rampant disobedience, such defiance at the hands of his own parliament.

  As my heart beat in compassion for him, Henry’s hopes of taxation were rejected out of hand. The insurrections and incursions that tore England apart weighed nothing against parliament’s hold on Henry’s purse strings.

  And here was the measure of my new knowledge. Now I understood Henry’s silence, and I understood the dogged protection of his close family, his friends, who closed ranks around him. Now I understood his reticence to involve me. Like the lock of my ivory coffer, where the key clicked neatly, cunningly, into place, all became clear to me. This was his burden to bear, his task to restore England to peace and fair rule, even when thwarted by this ill-mannered, disloyal body. What a terrible weight for him. And even worse that he could not, would not, share it with me.

  For what man of Henry’s imperious nature would admit to his wife that his parliament was beyond his control? What man of pride would confess willingly that his authority, sanctified by God, was under threat from a power apparently greater than his own?

  And then, when I thought this parliament’s defiance could get no worse.

  A pregnant hush. A rustle of leaves of parchment. A new voice.

  ‘We present a petition, Sire. That in the interests of our security at this dangerous time of imminent invasion, all French persons, Bretons, Lombards, Italians and Navarrese be removed out of the palace.’