by Anne O'Brien
I must be patient. I lived in a flurry of hope as early blossom began to clothe the trees in white beauty. Thomas’s advice clear in my mind, I refused to allow anger to flare and destroy. Even now Thomas might be persuading the King to come to Leeds and break my bonds. And indeed with the mild spring weather harnessed to my restored stability of mind, and the ministrations of Mistress Alicia with a tincture of precious colchicum mixed with honey, poison to some when drunk immoderately but healing when used wisely, my health improved, my joints were restored to something like normality. Vanity could once more allow me to admire the elegance of my fingers. My dexterity was restored to me. My stitches were even and my lute sang out with fervour. My habitual resilience had been reborn under Thomas’s forthright handling.
Even if the King refused to see me, Thomas would come back to me. Thomas would not leave me in suspense longer than he must. Thus I watched the road from the wall walk, even when I promised myself I would not. How many times every day did I find a need to take the air from that vantage point, looking out towards the north and the road from London, my heart lifting as I did so?
Come home, Thomas. For I missed him. I wanted him here with me, for his company, for his erudition, for his rumbling laugh when something pleased him, his slow smile. For his embrace which reminded me that imprisonment could not rob me of affection. Come home, I urged, yearning to see the red and gold and white of his standard on the road.
Perhaps when he returned it would please me to allow our closeness to step beyond mere friendship. Perhaps it would be right to allow him to love me in more than thought; it occupied my mind.
And then the small entourage arrived when I was bathing in my chamber at the end of the day and least expected it.
‘It’s Sir John,’ Marie remarked after taking a message from the page at the door. ‘Arrived in a hurry and a cloud of dust too, which is not like him.’
‘Fetch my gown,’ I ordered, rising from the scented depths, pushing aside the curtains that shielded my modesty. For it was true. Sir John was always careful of his horses.
It took an age to clothe me to make a suitable entrance.
‘It may be that the King has sent his decision by Sir John rather than by Lord Thomas,’ Marie observed, buttoning my sleeves, knowing exactly the direction of my thoughts.
And so he might, the King being a stickler for protocol, and Sir John my official guardian. I fretted and fidgeted.
‘I’ll not allow you to hear of your release looking like a mad woman dragged from a ditch,’ Marie said when I shook my head at the intricate caul and veil. ‘Best to sit down and allow me to finish as I intend.’
I resigned myself.
Then I was down in the little audience chamber to meet with Sir John who had come straight from the stables and stood by the door with squire and page and an air of great weariness only offset by his irritation at my tardiness. I approached with eagerness, absorbing the scents of horse and sweat that clung to his clothes. The scents of freedom to me.
‘What have you to say to me, Sir John?’
‘My lady.’
He made a show of pulling off his gloves, then his jewelled hat, handing them to his squire, before taking my arm and leading me away into a little space.
‘Is it good news?’
Sir John’s expression should have warned me.
‘No, it is not. I don’t know how to tell you this…’
I braced myself for the worst. ‘So the King has refused to reconsider. I should have known that marriage would have done nothing to soften his emotions.’ I smiled as well as I could through my disappointment. ‘Don’t worry, Sir John. I could not have expected it, could I? I have been building a fantasy for myself, where you presented me with a royal pardon for crimes I had never committed, before opening the gates and inviting me to ride through, a free woman at last.’ I clasped his arm briefly. ‘It couldn’t be, could it? I must be a good hostess and offer you wine…’
‘No, my lady.’
Sir John closed his hand over mine, something he had never done. ‘I know nothing about the King and his deci-sions, my lady.’
‘Is it my allowance?’
He shook his head, a dismissive little gesture. ‘No, no.’
‘Am I being moved again? At the will of the Royal Council?’I did not want to be moved. This prison was better than most. ‘Where is it to be this…’
‘My lady…’ His hand gripped hard. ‘It is the Baron de Camoys.’
‘Oh. Is he not returning? Will he not come back to Leeds?’ I realised why this might be, with the return of the King. ‘Is it that the King wishes him to make another diplomatic marriage?’ Of course that would be it. Thomas, a King’s man through and through, was a valuable ally for any King, and a marriage would create another alliance to tie the nobility to the King’s heels. I forced myself to reply with generosity even when my heart fell into a black void. ‘His new wife would hardly want him living here with me, would she? Who is she? Do I know her? Will she make him a good wife, do you think?’
When Sir John did not reply, I realised that I had been less than appropriate. Perhaps he thought me insensitive to raise such a matter that was Camoys family business, and not a subject for gossip. Sir John was not one for gossip at the best of times.
‘I expect Lord Thomas will come and tell me of his plans,’ I said, but wishing that he had found the time to break the news personally. I wished he had not felt the need to send Sir John with a message that would have such personal repercussions for both of us. ‘Has he gone to his estates in Sussex?’ I asked.
It was only then that I realised the weight of Sir John’s silence. The long drawn-out tension in his face and absence of explanation. The mark of emotion that I had never previously seen in Sir John. Perhaps it told me all I needed to know, before the words could be spoken. Before they could sink in and wound my heart.
‘Tell me.’
‘My dear…my dear lady. Lord Thomas is dead.’
It was a lightning strike. A fiercely unexpected slap of a hand against soft skin. A turn and twist of a knife. A bolt of unimaginable pain.
No.
‘I am afraid it is so.’ As if I had shrieked my denial of what could not be. I was aware of his hand once more on my arm, turning me, leading me back to the door. ‘It is so. I came to tell you myself. It should not have been left to someone you did not know, who was not aware of the deep affection that existed between you.’
‘How?’ No more denial. I was aware of my nails digging into the palms of my hand. ‘Where did he die?’
‘In Sussex. On one of his manors. It was unexpected, and without pain as he took his ease at the end of the day.’ Sir John shrugged. ‘His heart just stopped beating, as I understand.’
‘Was he alone?’
‘Except for his servants who discovered him—yes.’
‘Did he speak of me, at the end?’ Selfish. How selfish! But how could he leave me so finally and not converse with me ever again? How could he be gone from this earth without sending me some remnant of his love and comfort?
‘No,’ Sir John was explaining. ‘There was no intimation of ill-health. Lord Thomas did not even have a will. He was found in his chamber by his body servant.’
I found myself standing outside, the wind cool on my cheeks, the sweet perfume of apple-blossom touching my senses. From the stables I could hear the yapping of a new litter of hound pups. Around me the world continued on its habitual path. Only I was lost with undirected feet. And Thomas gone from it.
Marie had been summoned and was standing beside me as I fell into the mode of efficiency.
‘Thank you for coming, Sir John. It was kind of you. I will arrange for Lord Thomas’s possessions to be packed and returned to his family. To his grandson and heir. That is what he would have wanted. Will you arrange for the delivery for me? I think some of his swords are still here. They should belong to his grandson, of course.’
I should have been grieving rather t
han concerning myself with such details, but it seemed that my mind could do nothing but concentrate on the mundane.
Thomas de Camoys, my friend of so many years, was dead.
‘I will, lady. I am so sorry.’
I walked away, muscles trembling. Never had I hated my imprisonment as much as at that moment. Unaware of climbing the stairs, of Marie following me at a distance, all I knew was the impossibility of taking it in. I had known death. With John in Brittany it had been unexpected but I had seen him fall. I had held his hand, tried to ease his breathing. I had been with Henry in those days of his terrible suffering when the final release had been a blessing. The experience had been real, the flesh cooling under my hands, the heartbeat dying until it was no more. With both John and Henry I had been free to arrange their burial, to mourn them as they deserved and as I needed.
But this? Unreal. Thomas could not be dead. He would come back to me. I would hear his footsteps…
At the turn of the stair I halted, looking back to Marie, seeing the grief in her eyes. Of course he would not come back.
‘Leave me,’ I said.
Beyond feeling, I simply sat in my room, in my chair, and looked out at the view of fields and low hills and water until night hid it.
Thinking. Imagining. One phrase.
You were fortunate to have his love.
Oh yes. And his admiration, his esteem, his friendship. It had been there in the recesses of my life since that day, now long distant, that Baron de Camoys had arrived in Brittany to petition me in the name of his King. I had not realised the depth of it.
I was blessed indeed. Such love, such friendship in my life.
But what now? What did life hold for me now?
On impulse, when morning broke I retrieved the tapestry, once stitched with such frenzy, from my coffer, unfolding it, for I realised I had a mission to accomplish here. It was still incomplete. The falcon on the lover’s wrist was perfect in its execution, but the pale flower in the lady’s hand was far too insipid and did not tell the whole tale I wished it to announce to any future admirer. I sat and thought. Then I began.
I unpicked the stitches, beginning rapidly to re-stitch, as the day passed into evening. Then sat back to witness my achievement, with more than a modicum of satisfaction. The falcon was still adorning the lover’s wrist, but now in his free hand he held out a miniature red heart in his fingers, offering it to his lady, for her to take if she had the desire. As for the pale flower in the lady’s hand, it was quite gone, to be replaced by one of Henry’s forget-me-not spangles, the symbol of everlasting love. It gleamed in the strengthening light, enhancing the whole with soft glamour. I was satisfied. It was truly a work of love.
‘You will live in my heart for all time, Henry,’ I said at last, my work complete, smoothing my hand over the even stitches. If there was evidence of tears falling, there was no one to see and it would soon be obliterated. ‘What a glorious friend Thomas de Camoys has been. To both of us. His care and compassion have been beyond measure. I will mourn his passing.’
As I spoke, it seemed that I was alone no longer, even though the room was as empty as before. It was as if some spirit of Henry was with me, stepping from the tapestry, so strongly that I could sense the displacement of air. Not speaking, not moving, he was simply here, with all the familiar strength of his will and his power. It was as if he touched me with it. And so I sat and breathed, allowing my racing heart to still, allowing my thoughts to settle. My strength returned. My will that I would not be defeated. And although my sense of Henry gradually faded softly into the shadows, he had given me what I needed. I would wait out the term of imprisonment, however long it took, with serenity.
June 1422
‘We are invaded, it seems.’
I was standing at the window. A hot June day, almost six months since Thomas had ridden out, not to return. The popinjay had died, probably from boredom, but I purchased another because my rooms were too silent without the occasional ear-splitting screeching. Irritation being more acceptable than silence, I decided. A kitten joined us from the stables, secreted into my domain by a sentimental Agnes. Tempted as I was to banish it, I could not. It took to curling in my lap, purring contentedly under my fingers. I ordered black clothing for my household. So did my stone-and-water-girt world continue without Thomas in it, when I was more alone than I had ever been.
It had continued without the King too, for within months of Thomas’s death the King returned to France to pursue his military ambitions, with no thought of redemption for me. It proved to be a cold winter, an even colder spring, that did nothing for the spirits as the kitten grew into a cat and the new popinjay eyed it askance. I swear I had stitched enough altar cloths to furnish every church in England and Brittany.
Now the courtyard below was crowded with an escort and a magnificent palanquin which took my eye. Furnished with swags and garlands, all strangely foreshortened from my vantage point, its curtains vivid with newness, its four bay horses, impeccably matched and gleaming in the summer heat, it made a statement of grandeur. Now who would be visiting me with such ostentation? It was fit for a Queen, except that my niece Katherine had, Bishop Henry so informed me, gone to France, following her absent husband.
‘It’s Sir John,’ I said, regretfully, noting his spare figure dismount, anticipating a half hour of clipped conversation. But Sir John was better than no visitor at all.
I stepped out, my women at my back, to where Sir John continued in some heavy discussion with my steward that seemed to involve much giving of orders. The gates were still open to the outside world, as if more visitors were expected. No one had yet emerged from the lavishly curtained marvel.
‘Sir John…’
He spun round and bowed. If I had not known him better I would have said there was almost a bright excitement about his pale features, a burgeoning of emotion that tightened his mouth into what might have been a smile. If I had not known him for the dry stick that he was.
‘Who have you brought for me?’ I asked.
‘No one, my lady.’ And when I gestured at the palanquin, ‘This is yours, my lady.’
I looked at it. I looked at him.
‘But I have a loan of your horses if I wish to ride.’
Whereupon Sir John angled his chin towards the still-open gates.
‘It is yours for your immediate use, should you wish it. As I imagine you do. You are free to go, my lady.’
‘Go?’ Even to my own ears I sounded foolish. ‘Go where?’
‘Wherever you choose. You are no longer under my jurisdiction. The horses are yours, too, at the request of the King. They will take you wherever you desire.’
Slowly, while my eyes were blinded by the sun’s rays, my mind assimilated this amalgam of words, drawing together the threads of an entirely new altar cloth. The King, Sir John had said. The King had released me. He had restored my freedom. I was free to go, and here was my means of travel. All announced with no more fanfare than the King sitting down to an intimate supper within his own household.
‘Tell me that again!’ I demanded.
Instead Sir John held out a letter. I did not take it. There was so much that had not been said, my freedom reinstated as if I were being offered no more than a new hunting hound. Uncertainty a slither of ice in my belly, I was not of a mind to believe it. Was this some new cunning punishment inflicted on me by my imaginative step-son? What was it he desired from me this time?
‘What of the charges against me?’ I asked.
‘Removed. You are completely exonerated. This will explain.’
A strange weightlessness touched me, as if I had drunk too much wine, too fast. How could I believe this? After so long suddenly to be set free without warning, like my popinjay, released from its cage after years of captivity, only to flounder in the vast space of air and hostile birds, come to mob it.
It seemed that I had become inured to captivity, like my poor bird.
I took the letter, turning
it as if I might discover the content through the outer cover. Seeing that the seal and superscription were Bishop Henry’s own and the writing in his own hand. Surely he would not be complicit in any mischief taken against me? Opening it, proud that my hands were steady even though my heart beat loudly in my ears, I read it.
I read it again.
‘How dare he. How dare he release me in this manner!’
‘Madam?’
I crushed the fine parchment in my hands, turned my back on the means of escape and stalked back to my rooms where I had spent so many reluctant hours, like some wild beast taking refuge from the hunters in the only lair it knew.
‘I do not need you.’ My women, who had followed me, scurried out. ‘Take that damnable bird with you.’
Hot fury was there, shaking me as I strode the length of my solar and back again.
‘Do you know what it says?’ I asked, sweeping my skirts behind me as I turned. Sir John had followed me.
‘No, Madam. Only its direction.’
Flattening the creased folds, I read aloud from Bishop Henry’s elegant script.
‘This is what the King says: “…doubting that it should be a charge on our conscience, to occupy longer the Dowager in this manner, the charge against her will no longer be on our conscience…”’
Once more I creased the document.
‘On his conscience! What is it that has prompted our noble King to such magnificent magnanimity towards me? Not my innocence. Not my despicable incarceration for a deed I had never committed. Nothing here about my state, only his fear of God’s retribution for his sin against me. He would remove me from his conscience, and so achieve absolution and God’s grace. My time of suffering is to end because the King wishes to put himself right with God.’ I had to breathe more slowly as anger took its toll. ‘Does he hope that I will understand and forgive him? I will not.’
