Treason

by Meredith Whitford

  While I’m speaking of letters: another Bishop wrote to Richard that August. Opening the letter Kendal began to read it through, stopped, choked, read on, and near pissed himself laughing.

  ‘Share the joke?’ Richard glanced up from his work.

  ‘It’s – well – your Solicitor-General begs your permission to marry.’

  Gazing in wonder at his spluttering secretary Richard said, ‘Thomas Lynom? Well, he has my best wishes – thought he was a confirmed bachelor – but what’s so funny?’

  ‘He wants to marry Jane Shore!’

  Richard’s jaw dropped. Everyone’s did. Thomas Lynom was one of those good men, solid, salt-of-the-earth, honest as the day is long, but strait-laced, moral and dull.

  ‘Thomas Lynom and Jane Shore? The same Jane Shore?’

  ‘Yes,’ William Catesby looked up from the letter, ‘and oh yes, screamingly funny, but Lynom is a good man, too good for this. Your Grace, you won’t allow it? I mean – Jane Shore!’

  Taking the letter Richard said, ‘He’s exactly the type who goes through life uninterested in women, then falls for a tart. Oh dear. Yes, the Bishop of London writes that they’ve made a contract of marriage... Then why is he asking my permission? For a lawyer he’s remarkably vague about details. Huh, met her in prison in the course of his duties... hmm, hmm... And no doubt nature took its course.’

  After Hastings’ execution Richard had sentenced Jane to do public penance as a whore through the streets of London – and very fetching she looked in her shift and striped hood, carrying her penitent’s candle – then popped her into prison. In my opinion he would have done better to turn a blind eye. Janey was popular with the Londoners, and they thought Richard a hypocrite for kicking up such a fuss about her whoring with King Edward and his friends. Of course he held them to blame for Edward’s ruin, but que voulez vous...

  ‘Nature did not take its course, not with Thomas Lynom,’ said Catesby crossly. ‘Marriage or nothing. And of course he has to ask your permission, Sire, she is a prisoner. Don’t allow it, I beg you. Lynom is too good for her, and she’d cuckold him before they’d been married a week.’

  ‘Isn’t that for him to worry about? He knows what she is. And she has enough sense to know which side her bread’s buttered. Besides, I owe Jane a favour.’ Catesby’s face was a study. Grinning, Richard said, ‘Not what you may be thinking.’ Catesby tried to look as if he was thinking nothing at all, never had and never would. ‘She did her best to stop my brother George’s execution.’

  ‘If so, she cancelled the debt when she plotted with Dorset.’

  ‘Oh, maybe, maybe. No, I’ll allow the marriage. Write to the Bishop saying Jane is to be released into her father’s custody and they can wait till I am back in London. Give them both time to think. Then, if they’re set on it they can marry with my good will.’

  And, if anyone is interested, they did, and Jane mended her ways and faded from public view into faithful matrimony. Well, faithful so far as one can tell.

  ~~~

  And now we were back in the north. York.

  Richard asked me to bring the Prince of Wales and the other children to York, and on my way with Lancaster Herald I took Kendal’s letter to the Mayor. I knew Kendal had dropped a heavy hint about the southerners who would be in the King’s train, with their beady noticing eyes and their conviction that civilisation stopped at the Trent, so I watched the Mayor’s reaction with interest.

  ‘So the King is bringing foreigners,’ said the Mayor.

  ‘Well, a Spanish ambassador.’

  ‘Aye. Spain. What’s a Spaniard eat?’ It sounded like a riddle.

  ‘Don’t know.’

  ‘Well, he’ll get our good northern food and like it, especially if he’s been eating that southern shite. But Master Kendal says our King is bringing southerners.’

  Ah – real foreigners. ‘Yes, many of them.’ My own southern birth had long since been forgiven.

  ‘And we don’t want them looking down their long noses and saying we’re savages, now do we? Not in front of our King Richard. There will be pageants,’ he said in the tone of the Creator decreeing light. ‘And dancing. And the Creed Play, perhaps. And Kendal says to hang the streets with arras and tapestry as they do in the south. Not enough, my lord, not for King Richard’s York!’ I think if I had hinted that the King would like to see the Ouse flowing with milk and honey they would have done it. ‘Children to present the Queen with flowers – eh, our little Anne Queen of England! The streets will be cleaned. Gold and silver given to their Highnesses. Food. New costumes for the actors. New scarlet for the Aldermen. Music, of course – the King’s own minstrels, and I’ll send for his lady mother’s. Paint the houses. And wine. Eh, York will show them how to treat the King!’

  I left him scribbling lists, and rode on to Sheriff Hutton. This was always one of my favourite places, with its double moat and nine great towers. The village was preparing for its annual fair, and I couldn’t resist stopping to buy some sweetmeats and little fairings for the children. The moment my retinue entered the courtyard my children were scrambling to meet me. I was always soft with my children; many parents would be horrified not to be greeted with formal bows from offspring who speak only when addressed, but I would rather the hugs and kisses and clamour of questions. Even the baby, little William, not yet two, toddled eagerly along with the twins holding his hands.

  Behind my horde came three quieter children, strikingly alike in their blonde and fragile looks. Shy in his new dignity, the Prince of Wales held out his hand. Bowing, I kissed it and said the formal words of greeting, and his gap-toothed grin widened.

  ‘Uncle Martin!’ In private this honorific had been allowed from the time he could speak. I kissed him, and he flung his arms around my neck. ‘Uncle Martin – I mean, my lord – you’re taking us to York to my parents, I mean the King and Queen – oh!’ Remembering his manners, he drew the other two children forward. Shyly George’s children bowed to me.

  After George’s death King Edward had made Dorset their guardian, and I don’t say he mistreated them, for although I never liked him he was no monster, and he was a father himself; but it was a frightened, almost cringing pair of children who came to London once Dorset was out of the way. The boy, little Warwick, couldn’t remember his mother, but they had been three and five when George died, and for all his faults he had loved them tenderly. I think they had known neither love nor interest under Dorset’s care, for they were bewildered by the open affection that surrounded them once they were under Richard’s wing. Lady Margaret, ten now, had a grave, sweet manner that hid a lively intelligence. The little boy, young Warwick, was a different matter, so shy and young for his age I had wondered if he were quite normal; wondered, too, what he had heard of the circumstances of his father’s death and how deeply it had wounded him. However, he greeted me sensibly, and was watching my entourage and listening to the din of arrival with interest, and he didn’t cower away from me as he had done in London.

  These greetings over, and a thousand questions about the King’s progress to York answered, I went to call upon Sheriff Hutton’s other two junior inhabitants: the Lords Bastard. I sent in my compliments as formally as I would in the past – no need to cause offence – and while I waited I inspected their quarters. Certainly they couldn’t complain they were ill-housed. They had two rooms for themselves, and one for their body-servants, and I remembered the bleak dormitory in which Richard and I had nursed our chilblains at Middleham. Here all was luxury, thick new hangings on the walls, fur rugs, cushioned chests, a livery cup-board holding some splendid plate, an inlaid chess set. The long table under the windows showed two distinct personalities. At one end a pile of devotional works, paper and ink and a Greek grammar were stacked with painful neatness. At the other, heaped with a boy’s untidiness, were an unstrung bow, a knife in a nest of wood-shavings, a battered copy of De Re Militari, a pair of grubby gloves.

  A servant brought a message that the elder b
oy asked to be excused on grounds of poor health, but after a moment young Richard came shyly from the inner room. ‘Lord Robsart, how do you do. Um, my brother’s not very well.’

  ‘So your man told me. Is it serious? You have good doctors, of course?’

  ‘Oh yes, everyone looks after us very kindly.’ He looked up through his lashes. ‘He really isn’t very well, though it is none too serious. A summer cold, and he gets a lot of toothache. And he – he – It is different for him, you see.’

  ‘I understand. My lord, your uncle asked me to see that you have everything you need. He is coming to York, the other children are to meet him there. Would you care to come too?’

  Looking wistful, he shook his head. ‘My brother could not, so I won’t either. He’s my brother, you see. But please give our uncle my – our good wishes.’ Staring anxiously at me he said all in a rush, ‘Ned doesn’t know Uncle Richard very well, you see. But I remember him, I saw him more often, and I remember that my father trusted him. So – so can you explain that we can’t come to York, and say all the right things from us both?’

  Touched, I said I would. ‘And you know that if you need anything you have only to ask? You like it here well enough?’

  ‘Oh yes!’ he said, relieved that we were back on more neutral ground. ‘Yes, I like it. We’ve good tutors; Ned’s very bookish, you know, much more than me, he reads a lot with our cousin Margaret. And we ride and hunt and all that sort of thing, and I like the other children. And I’m getting some good training, because if I can’t be a prince I’ll be a soldier. The food’s very good. I miss my sisters, though. Are they still in Sanctuary?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. But the King hopes your mother will soon come to terms with him, and then perhaps your sisters could live up here too. Look, Lord Richard, things are still rather dangerous. You’re old enough to understand that; I suppose your father used to talk of political troubles?’ He nodded earnestly. ‘When things have settled down perhaps you and your brother could live with your mother – we’ll see – but at present your uncle is concerned to keep you safe. There was an attack on the Tower not long ago, on the rooms you used to live in.’

  He was a sensible boy, and he must have absorbed from his father a good deal of the political realities of royalty, for he saw the point at once.

  ‘It could have been people trying to – to save us, or – or something quite different. Lancastrians.’

  ‘Quite right. So for now we have to keep you safe. And listen, Lord Richard, I’ve been your uncle’s friend for more than twenty years, so I know he can be trusted. Well, that’s the sort of thing his friend would say, isn’t it, but remember your father trusted him too; he named you for your uncle. Cling to that, and be patient.’ I gave him a hug, because he was only a little boy of ten, and lonely.

  ~~~

  With my group of children, with the Mayor and Aldermen and citizens, I stood near York’s Mickel Gate awaiting the King and Queen. An outrider galloped up the road, shouting that the King was not a mile away. A sigh of anticipation went up; everyone made last-moment adjustments to their clothes. Then there was the sound of trumpets, and we could discern the banners and the matched greys that had been Richard’s last anniversary present to Anne. The cry of welcome that went up nearly split the heavens. I will never forget how they looked that day, Richard and Anne, the King and Queen of England, riding on a wave of pure happiness. Richard wore crimson and cloth of gold, Anne blue with diamonds. Above them blazed the royal arms of England, the banners of St George, of York, of Gloucester ad Neville. Behind them in glorious pageant rode the nobility of England, the bishops, the ambassadors, the Knights of the Household, Anne’s ladies in their jewel-like colours.

  They rode into York on solid noise – cheers, weeping, whistles, battle cries, clapping, trumpets and drums. The first northern King was home. And you never saw anything so fine as York that day. A rich and beautiful city at the best of times, now it outshone every legend in the world.

  The royal retinue halted. Richard dismounted and himself helped Anne down. In front of everyone, they kissed. On the din that simple action produced, I urged the Prince of Wales forward. He stared, half-afraid I think, but he had practised this with me and after that first moment’s awe he went forward with great aplomb and kissed his parents’ hands. I heard Richard whisper, ‘Well done!’ then he and Anne moved as one to sweep their son into their arms. The townspeople loved that, and I saw a couple of hard-bitten southern lords blow their noses.

  The Mayor made his speech – and nothing provincial here, it was as graceful and able as any London Mayor could manage – then out came the gold cup holding a hundred marks for Richard, and the hundred gold pounds on a gold plate for Anne. And here there was no thought of refusing the loving gift.

  In thanks for past and present loyalty, Richard remitted half York’s annual taxes to the crown. Also, he hit on the idea of investing his son as Prince of Wales here. One in the eye for London, eh? It was a rush to get everything ready, of course, but who cared. It was so splendid an occasion that word went around that Richard had held a second coronation at York – and I think he was tempted to do just that; but only tempted. He knighted many men after the ceremony of investiture, including George’s son Warwick, and the flattered Spanish ambassador. And including his son John Plantagenet, for illegitimacy is no bar to knighthood. And when the King and Queen and seven-year-old Prince of Wales left the Minster to walk among the people again, York proved it knew how to celebrate.

  But that was York, and the north. In the south, trouble was brewing.

  ~~~

  In hindsight, you could say it began with that damned impudent letter from Duke Francis of Brittany. Georges de Mainbier, the Breton ambassador, had taken a lively interest in the York celebrations, and nothing could have exceeded his proxy demonstrations of amity and friendship. Richard had made it discreetly clear that he would be obliged if Brittany refused to harbour Sir Edward Woodville and his treasure ships, but of Woodville Duke Francis had nothing to say. Plenty to say, however, about Henry Tudor.

  Ever since Edward IV regained his throne in ’71, Tudor had been lurking in Brittany, eking out a living on the scraps from European royal tables, bitterly aware that his only value lay in the nuisance he represented to the English king. I counted it up once, and made Tudor twenty-ninth in line to the English throne, and that only if you ignored the fact that on both sides he was descended from bastards. Remember his father Edmund was one of Queen Katherine’s bastards by her Welsh lover Owen Tudor? And, for all her vaunting airs, his mother Lady Margaret was from the illegitimate Beaufort line, and they had been expressly debarred from the royal succession. So as a pretender to the English throne Henry was as shabby as the tattered old Lancastrian banner he held aloft. But a nuisance, just the same. Louis of France had a few times waved him threateningly at Edward IV, and now Duke Francis was playing the same old game.

  And so de Mainbier regretfully told Richard that for love of his ally England, Duke Francis had refused Louis’s many offers to take Tudor under his wing – but now, alas, for this recalcitrance Louis was threatening Brittany with war. And dear me, Francis could only hold out with English help. Therefore, unless Brittany promptly received at least four thousand archers – at English expense – Duke Francis would have to hand over Henry Tudor to France, who no doubt would promptly outfit him with an army with which to invade England.

  It was blackmail, of course, although Richard dressed his refusal in fair and loving terms. He wasn’t about to give Duke Francis, or any other European ruler, the idea he was afraid of Henry Tudor.

  Then at the end of August King Louis of France died, and France was plunged into such chaos it was for the time being removed from the international game. Just as well, for we had our own worries.

  We were still in the north when word came that the men of Kent were rioting. Kent had always been a hotbed of Woodville sympathies; Lord Rivers had had lands there. It seemed that the prime movers
were men who had held offices under Edward IV and lost them under the new regime. I doubt if the aims of the uprising were very clear even to the conspirators; certainly we never unravelled them. As far as we could discover, the plot was to send Edward IV’s daughters abroad; ‘rescue’ his sons from the Tower; overthrow Richard; and march gloriously to Westminster to set a discredited, bastard, under-age king on the throne and restore the Woodville domination. Not surprisingly, few people found this tempting. However, there was another strand woven into this uprising: the Beaufort-Lancastrian one. Henry Tudor had somehow raised enough cash – no doubt from the irritated Duke Francis – to muster some sort of army. As soon as the southern parts of England had overthrown Richard, or provided enough trouble to keep him busy, Tudor would sail to England and march gloriously to Westminster etcetera etcetera. Presumably the restored Edward V and the brand-new Henry VII would then toss for the crown.

  Richard had already appointed commissions of oyer and terminer, and the Duke of Norfolk and the Council were on the alert against action in the south. Rather enviously we sent our wives and children up to Middleham, and set out southward. News came in at every halt. Lionel Woodville, Bishop of Salisbury, had somehow escaped from Sanctuary and was stirring trouble in his diocese, aided by Dorset who had been hiding heaven knows where. Sir Richard Woodville and the Stonor family were mixing it in Berkshire. Fomenting trouble down in Exeter was Richard’s brother-in-law Sir Thomas St Leger; and one wonders what it was about Anne of York that made her husbands so consistently rebel against her brothers. Quelle galère. Then, better news. The south had risen too early to suit the rest of the conspiracy, and with his usual efficiency Norfolk quashed the rising before it spread to make real trouble. However, rumours were going around, wrote Norfolk in disgust, that Richard had murdered the late King Edward’s sons...