Among those with no mind to ignore him was Anne Neville. I saw her stare as he came across the hall, shyness battling delight in her face. She couldn’t take her eyes off him, she sat open-mouthed, touching the place where his hair had brushed her cheek when he kissed her.
Let me try to describe Anne as she was that night, for she changed little in her short life. Her face was shield-shaped, pure curving lines sweeping from high square forehead to pointed chin. She had her mother’s high-bridged nose, and her eyes were a speckly blue-grey. Her hair was the colour of good honey in the sun; as an unmarried girl she wore it loose under a jewelled band, a silky mass long enough to sit on. For this, her first adult party, she wore blue and gold brocade trimmed with fur, and a gold necklace drew discreet attention to the new roundness of her bosom. She was lovely, and happy, and innocent – and she might as well have worn a sign around her neck saying ‘Richard of Gloucester: this is your prize if you support me, signed, Warwick.’
Edward knew, and he looked as if he’d sucked a lemon every time Richard spoke to Anne.
And all I could do was hope that Richard’s sudden interest in Anne was only pleasure that his little cousin had become a pretty girl. But the King was taking no chances, and he had us back in the west a week after Twelfth Night.
But before that Richard was given something else to think about. So was I.
~~~
I was evidently in high favour with the Woodvilles, for the Queen’s son Richard challenged me to tennis. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I liked him, although I infinitely preferred him to his brother Thomas, but I found him quite pleasant now he had out-grown some of his prickly airs. But he was no athlete, and I had to work rather hard not to beat him too easily. It turned out, as we talked after the game and shared a cup of ale, that he was wistfully envious of Richard and me for our share in releasing the King and the campaign in Wales. He wanted to be a soldier too, he confided, but his mother worried about him and wouldn’t let him. Jousting, in imitation of his uncle Anthony, was all he was allowed. ‘Not that I suppose it is at all like the real thing?’
‘No,’ I said, ‘not in the least.’ I didn’t care for the pretty ritual of the lists. It has its uses, of course, as an entertainment, but because Anthony Woodville – now Earl Rivers, on his father’s death – was a prime exponent of the art I was tactful.
‘Do you think Warwick will cause more trouble?’ he asked over our second cup. ‘The Queen is worried, you see. The Duchess of Clarence is with child. If it is a son... ’ Edward had three daughters, the last, Cecily, born more than a year ago, and there was no sign of another pregnancy. A would-be king with a healthy male heir has a strong advantage.
‘Are you sure about the Duchess?’
‘Yes. My mother thought she, er, had the look, what-ever that is, and asked Lady Warwick. It is to be born in May, I think. So you see, I think Warwick will... do something. I think the King should be prepared.’
So did I. I thanked him for the game, and went thoughtfully up to my room. I found my lord and master sitting by the fire, his booted feet propped high on the hearth, smirking over a letter held in his lap.
‘We look pleased with ourself?’
‘We’ve every right to. Look.’
I looked first at the signature on the letter – Linnet Ogleby. Oh yes, the pregnant grocer’s daughter. Or the grocer’s pregnant daughter. I skimmed through the large unpractised writing. ‘Richard, you have a daughter! Wonderful! Shall you agree to calling her Katherine?’
‘Yes, I like the name.’ He took the letter back, gazing at it fondly. ‘I hope she’s healthy. Do you think it’s true girls are stronger than boys?’
‘Yes,’ I said with the confidence of total ignorance.
‘But so many babies die... My mother bore twelve, and five died young. Remember my little sister Ursula? She lived such a short time.’
‘Perhaps,’ I hazarded a guess, ‘when a woman has had many children, the later ones are more delicate? Though there’s nothing wrong with you, and look at the Queen’s children, great strapping healthy things all of them. Richard, that reminds me.’ I told him of my tennis game, and Richard Grey’s news.
‘So Isabel’s pregnant, eh? That’s been kept quiet! She must be four months gone. I don’t think the King knows; no, if the Queen has told her son she has told Edward. Hmm. I’ll have a word with the King, of course, though he is taking Warwick and George more seriously than he wants people to realise. Now, I’m going down to Windsor to see my daughter, want to come?’
‘Would you excuse me? I would be glad of the free time, with your permission?’
‘Well, certainly.’ He looked surprised at my formality, and I knew he thought I had a woman. Well, so I did, but not in the way he supposed. It was time to see if I was over Innogen once and for all.
I bought an ivory rattle as a present for the baby, then waved Richard off to Windsor. Then I put on my best clothes, brushed my hair till it gleamed, purchased a box of sweetmeats (anything more would look too eager), and trotted around to the house in the Chepe.
I didn’t know the maid who answered the door. When I asked for Innogen she said she would have to see, the mistress wasn’t having visitors much, and her sharp black eyes travelled over me in a way I did not quite like. I cooled my heels in the hall for quite a time before the maid returned and said Mistress Shaxper would see me. ‘Top o’ the stairs and turn right – though I daresay as you knows the way, Sir.’
Innogen was standing by the fire. She had been reading; her book lay open on the table, and the cushioned chair and footstool showed where she had been sitting. She looked different: paler, tired, her face fuller. Well, very different.
She was pregnant.
‘Martin,’ she said with neither pleasure nor displeasure. ‘How good to see you. You have changed a great deal.’
‘So have you.’ I gestured at her swollen belly. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ She looked at me gently, with pity, and I understood. I swear I felt my heart contract with pain. ‘You mean it is not my child.’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Don’t know! Christ, how many –’
‘Martin.’
‘Sorry. But – I can’t help – I thought you knew ways to prevent... ’ Of course I had never confessed my share of the sin of trying to prevent conception; I had begged the question by telling myself it was too private a matter. And, like many of the Church’s teachings, it seemed curiously unrealistic, almost as though the Church designed hurdles in the way of human nature and called them sins. When Innogen let me into the female secret of the vinegar-soaked sponge she put inside herself, my surprise was not at the sin but at her practicality.
‘I thought so too,’ she said wearily. ‘I was wrong.’
‘You could have told me, though?’
‘Men value their friendships.’
Very well, it was slow of me, but this obscure answer puzzled me. Then again I understood. ‘It’s Richard’s child?’
‘I don’t know. Oh, sit down, Martin, don’t loom over me like this.’ She sat down, with that pregnant-woman’s hand in the small of her back. I realised, with a shock, that I found her condition sexually arousing. The high gathered skirt of her gown did little to conceal the triumphant swell, and her breasts would no longer fit into my cupped palm, nor could I now span her ankles with my thumb and finger, but I wanted her more, in this state, than ever before.
‘When will it be born?’
‘February.’
I calculated. May. Hmm. Angry, I cried, ‘But how could you!’
‘How could I, or how could he? Or both of us?’
‘I – you – he – I don’t know! But you knew I loved you. So did he.’ With more pain at the thought, I asked, ‘Were you two lovers, all the time, when I thought – ’
‘No.’ I had made her angry. Leaning forward, or as far forward as she could, she said with cold intensity, ‘You men, you think it is all up to you, don’t you. Well, it’s not. I
chose Richard, then I chose you. When he realised I was the lady you’d been babbling about – ’
‘Babbling... ’
‘ – about, he oh so kindly, so honourably, so malely, stood aside. Because he knew you thought you were in love with me and – ’
‘Thought – I was!’
‘ – and he valued your friendship, your love, more than me. Well, all very fine, very noble. Not that I was in love with him, and anyway he had other fish to fry, but what of me? Why could it not be my choice? What if I had wanted him more than you? No, it’s always up to the man to decide, isn’t it? Or so you think. You dispose of us women as if it’s your right.’
I was only seventeen. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I suppose you think it’s a clever way to justify the fact that you’re a whore. I bet if I was richer and titled that would be my child, you’d have hustled me to the altar as fast as you could. Pity you can’t marry Richard, eh? How many lovers have you had? I bet you’ve enjoyed yourself laughing at me, you must have split your sides every time I said I loved you. No wonder the Queen dismissed you, you’re enough to choke even a Woodville!’
I had one quick impression of her ashen face, her eyes silver with hurt, then I was racing down the stairs. The maid gave me my cloak, avoiding my eye in a way that carried more contempt than if she’d spat in my face. I wanted to damn her for an insolent slut and her mistress for a hell-bent whore. Looking down my nose, I waited for her to open the door.
But, my hand on the door latch, I stopped. Some sound on the edge of my hearing, or perhaps the memory of things said or unsaid, made me go back up the stairs.
Her head down on her crook’d arm, Innogen was weeping as if her heart would break.
I had the sense to say nothing. I put my arm over her back, curling my hand around her head. She gave no sign of knowing I was there. She merely wept on, her tears soaking the tablecloth and my sleeve, sobs shaking her body. I had never seen her cry, and I noted absently that she was not one those rare women, Isabel Neville for instance, who can cry without looking ugly. Yet her sticky lashes, red nose and curranty eyes moved me more deeply than her most triumphant moments of beauty. I loved her, and I finally knew it. Still I said nothing, for all I had to give her was my undemanding silence.
The maid had followed me upstairs. She stood in the doorway, arms akimbo and her mouth squaring with female reproaches. I silenced her with a gesture, mouthed ‘Bring wine,’ and shooed her away.
Innogen was still crying, and I began to fear she would harm herself or the child. I put my handkerchief into her hand, and she began to calm, the sobs giving way to little snuffling whimpers. I lifted her in my arms, no easy task with a heavily pregnant woman who neither resists nor co-operates, and carried her through to her bedchamber. The bed was neatly made. Holding Innogen with one arm I tugged the counterpane back and laid her down. She was in housewife’s undress, a loose gown and slippers, and her hair netted under a velvet cap. I took the slippers off, managed the cap and hairpins. Innogen lay unmoving, her eyes shut. I went back to the parlour for the wine, and made her drink a few mouthfuls, her head propped on my arm. Tears were still trickling from under her lashes. I closed the shutters, took off my boots, and lay down beside her. After a while she sighed and closed her hand over my wrist. Unlearned in the ways of pregnancy, I was astonished that then she simply fell asleep. I watched her for a while, but I too was short on sleep and soon I let my eyes drift shut.
It was almost dark when I woke. Innogen’s head was on my shoulder, her arm around me. I squinted down at her. ‘Are you awake?’
‘Yes.’
I wriggled my arm under her, holding her closer against me. ‘I’m sorry for what I said.’
‘I deserved it. Martin, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I have made such a mess of things.’
‘You have, rather.’ I felt as if I had grown up in those few hours’ sleep. ‘But you’re not a whore, that was hurt pride talking. Forgive me. You said you are not sure who fathered this child. Tell me.’
‘Remember that night, back in May, we argued – ’
‘You threw me out – ’
‘Yes. You were being childish, and possessive, and you made me so angry that I determined to have no more of you.’
‘And I of you.’
‘Exactly. And a day or two later, there was Richard. Don’t ask, for I won’t tell you. It was revenge, of course, on both of you. I didn’t know something had gone wrong and there would be a child. And next night I forgave you, I’d missed you. So this baby could be yours or Richard’s.’
‘So I see. Well. Richard’s gone to see the girl who has just given birth to his daughter.’
I’m ashamed to say I thought this might hurt her. But she raised her eyebrows, no more than interested, and said, ‘Well, well, what a busy young man he’s been. As bad as his brother. The King has two bastards that I know of and probably more. And more mistresses than you could poke a stick at – or anything more personal.’
I laughed, and when she fell silent I let the pause go on. It was curiously peaceful. Out of sudden new knowledge I said, ‘Jenny, Innogen, I do love you. Before, it was little more than lust and delight in having you. But now I know. I love you. I hope that baby is mine.’
She looked at me. ‘So do I.’
Goddam it, I’d been slow. ‘Innogen, you do love me!’
‘Yes. Yes, Martin, I do. I love you very much.’
There was more power in those sober words than in a hundred love songs. Tenderly I turned her face up and kissed her. Her lips clung to mine, then we sighed and settled into one another’s arms. ‘If the child were definitely mine I would marry you.’
‘The King would not let you.’
‘Oh yes he would. His bark’s worse than his bite. He loves me. Besides, I’d only have to go to his mother and she’d have us married before you could turn around. But my love, I’m afraid that as it is...’
‘I know. You’re still under-age.’
‘Not for much longer. The King’s drawing up the documents to declare both me and Richard of age. Can’t give us the sort of responsibilities we’ve had, and will go on having, yet keep us children. Actually, Jenny, I’ll be quite rich.’
In making me his ward the King had taken his guardian’s duties seriously. He had put good people in to manage my family manor, and although the house was beyond repair the lands were in good heart. I had inherited more than I had expected; my family had not been rich since we had had to ransom some ancestor from one of the Crusades, losing the title when we no longer had the money to keep it up, but the estate had been quite sizeable. After all, my father had been able to wage two dozen men in the Duke of York’s service. Carefully invested all these nine years, the income had swelled, and Edward’s people had bought more land, built up good herds. As well, Edward had rewarded my exertions on his behalf, and I now had a second estate, and some London property. I had been delighted when the King’s Treasurer presented me with the proofs of all this husbandry. I knew I could always count on Edward and his family, but it was a pleasant thing to be independent.
‘Well, I’m glad about that,’ Innogen said when I told her. ‘But you still cannot marry without the King’s permission, and he’ll not give it. Not as things are.’
‘No. But later... If the child is mine we’ll marry and the child can be legitimated. Edward will do that – or if we have to get Papal approval he will do whatever’s necessary. I’m sure there’s no bar to legitimation.’
‘I should think not. Richard the Second legitimated his cousins the Beauforts when their parents married, even though the Duke of Lancaster was married when they were conceived. I think their mother was too. A double adultery.’
‘And that was one bit of legitimation that should never have been done. The Beauforts have been nothing but trouble ever since they helped bump off King Richard and make their half-brother King.’
‘But if they hadn’t been legitimated, don’t forget, Joan Beauf
ort could not have married the Earl of Westmorland, and then the Duchess of York would never have been born.’
‘No,’ I said, rather struck: I had forgotten the Duchess was part Beaufort. ‘Well, as to marriage – later, perhaps?’
‘Perhaps. I think we’d better make no promises yet. If this child is yours, then we shall consider ourselves bound to marry and have the child legitimated. Otherwise... things may change, Martin.’
‘Love doesn’t change.’ But for some reason I found myself remembering the King saying it would be a sorry world if we all married our first loves. Dimly, for at seventeen it is hard to overestimate your maturity, I understood that I had more growing up to do. Nothing is certain; once I would have scoffed at the idea that Warwick could turn against the King. In a year’s time I might find myself bound to a woman I disliked and whose chastity I mistrusted. Or no, I would not. The thought had been enough to make that clear to me. I had found my heart’s companion, and my life’s. ‘I love you, Innogen, and that will never change. But any number of other things might. So let’s make no promises yet.’
For a while longer we lay there, the talk drifting. I told her about rescuing the King, about Wales.
‘No wonder you’ve changed so much,’ she said soberly.
‘Have I?’
‘Yes, greatly. You were a boy last year, but now you are a man. Responsibility suits you.’
‘Thank you. I’ve turned out quite a good soldier. All that training wasn’t wasted.’
‘And you’ll be needed more. These troubles aren’t over. What will happen, do you think?’
‘I’ve no idea. Warwick has gone too far. At present he is lying low... Jenny, you were lucky to miss Yule at Court, everyone was walking on eggs, George making his little barbed comments, the Queen seething... I don’t know what will happen.’
By tacit consent we rose up then, and went and had supper. We talked of indifferent things through the meal – books, music; nothing personal, nothing political. Innogen ate like a horse, I noted. Eating for two. The thought made me uneasy. If I had been certain it was my child, how different things would have been.
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