The author is especially indebted to the Royal Literary Fund, for financial support and employment throughout this project.
Several people were helpful to me while I was writing this novel. Especial thanks are due to Fergus Wilde and Josie Christou for help with the Latin translations; to the librarians of the Chetham’s and John Rylands libraries; to Liz and Tom McIlroy for taking me to Pembroke Castle, and to Dave and Jackie Lamb for their hospitality while I was there. Ian Pople supplied me with books and Ian Hunton helped me through several computing crises. Ben Pople and Alan Parry also rendered a similar service with patience and goodwill. I owe a big thank you to my readers, Anna Pollard, Anthony Taylor and Paul Andrews, for supportive and discerning comments. I am especially grateful to Anna for her unstinting support, optimism and help with the family tree. And last (but not least) thank you to my agent and editor for more helpful comments, and for taking me on!
In this time by means of the forenamed Earl of Suffolk a marriage was concluded between the king and Dame Margaret, the king’s daughter of Sicily and Jerusalem, a woman of exemplary birth and chargeable to this land, for … it was agreed by the king … that he should give over all his right and title in the duchy of Anjou and the earldom of Maine, the which two lordships were in the keep of Normandy. The which conclusion of marriage was the beginning of the loss of France and of much heaviness and sorrow in this land.
Great Chronicle of London
She was not beautiful in the English sense, being small and dark, but there was a vivid quality to her, an intense attentiveness. She walked like a dancer; her ribs were lifted, her collar bones open so that her neck seemed long. It took most people some time to realize she was not tall. Her father had given her no dowry, so she walked taller than ever. Seed pearls glistened like tiny teeth in her hair.
The Earl of Suffolk adjusted his body to an attitude of admiration and deference. She was fourteen years old, but it seemed to him that she would require a great deal of deference. As she drew closer he could see the minute contractions and dilations of her pupils, a nerve quivering in the soft upper lip.
‘They will not love me, I think,’ she had said to him once, with that air of certainty that left no room for doubt or hesitation. He had said that of course the people would love her, just as the king had loved her, from the first. Though, privately, he considered that love was an accommodating word, like beauty.
It was true that the king had felt a passion fix’t and unconquerable from first seeing her portrait. The dim miniature which to everyone else had seemed unclear, slightly damaged by its journey, had in the king’s eyes resolved into a composite of everything he yearned for, for himself and the nation. He had attached himself to this vision with that fixity of which he was unexpectedly capable. Amenable to most things, he would from time to time grow obdurate as a stone; there was no reasoning with him, no persuasion. That was why the earl had accepted, on his behalf, this young girl who brought with her no dowry, who had to be bought at the great cost of the territories of Maine and Anjou.
It had been part of his mission to win her confidence, and he had won it. In any company she looked first to him before speaking or taking a decision. Now he smiled encouragingly as she took her place beside him, and although she did not smile back he could see a certain release in the set of her shoulders, the tilt of her head. They stood together while the choirs sang in a soft curtain of light that came through the great windows, and the earl had the sense of being as insubstantial as one of the motes of dust that danced about in its rays.
Then there was the journey to England.
After several hours at sea the clouds gathered out of nowhere; the sky began to brood and churn, and the sea to broil and foam. It twisted like the coils of some monstrous intestine, spewing out extraneous matter from its depths.
The crew, fleetingly illuminated by flashes of light, battled frantically with the sails. Soon the air was nine parts water and it was difficult to breathe. All the passengers were ordered below, where they clung to one another and prayed.
Some said they saw armies marching from the battlements of the sea, while others saw the faces of devils in the waves, and yet others the faces of their saints, to whom they cried out for aid. The first ship was dashed against hidden rocks but remained afloat, lurching dangerously, with part of its belly gone and some of the crew swept overboard.
One man swore he saw the Son of God walking towards him. In His hand He held a shining cross and His face was smiling. This smiling Jesus came towards him on a wave, and the man tried to cry out to Him, but his mouth was full of the storming sea, and so the Son of God walked past.
Yet he was saved, this man, by the beam of timber from the broken ship to which he clung, though afterwards he always said he had been saved by the smiling Jesus. In later years, when he told this tale, some laughed, while others grew sober and joined in with fantastic tales of their own, and others asked, half mocking, what the Son of God had been smiling about, which was hard to say. Also it was hard to describe the nature of the smile. ‘Was it pitiful?’ they asked him. No. ‘Was it joyous, for He was bringing His flock home?’ No. Nor was it triumphant, nor sad. When they doubted him, because he could not describe the face of his Lord, nor say how he knew for certain that it was Him, he remembered how in childhood he had walked across the rafters of a burnt-out house for a dare. And in a burst of inspiration he said that it was just as if He was right pleased at being able to walk on water again.
And at this several members of his audience withdrew, shaking their heads, and saying that his wits had been addled by the sea.
But the Earl of Suffolk had been charged with the duty of bringing the king’s new wife back to him. Somehow he got her into a tiny boat together with his own wife, Lady Alice, and a boatman who rowed them strenuously towards the shore.
Several people had assembled on the sands, startled by the news that their new queen was landing. No one had expected her to land there, at that point. But the mayor of that town, Porchester, was a man who considered himself equal to any task that the Lord should throw at him, and he ordered carpets to be laid across the beach, and hastily summoned a small band of musicians to play the royal party in. They waited for more than an hour in the rain and wind, while the little boats bobbed restlessly back and forth and the bigger ships lurched on the horizon. As soon as they drew near enough the mayor commanded his men to run into the water and haul them in.
So the earl at length emerged on to the shore, carrying the crumpled princess, though his legs were unsteady, surprised by the feel of land. His soaked clothes clung to him, his hair was plastered to his head, and he was only recognizable as the earl because of the insignia he wore. He stumbled drunkenly across the carpets, holding what looked like a bundle of rags, so that the mayor and all who stood with him doubted what they saw, and the musicians began to play uncertainly, out of time.
Suffolk could think only of how he had begged the king not to give him this mission. His right arm hurt where he had been battered against the side of the ship, and his ribs felt bruised, so that he carried the princess with some difficulty, but she was too sick to walk and he would not entrust her to anyone else. He concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, and on not dropping his royal charge as he trod unevenly over the carpets. By the time he reached the mayor he had hardly enough breath left to request that they should be taken to a shelter where the princess could lie down. He saw doubt in the eyes of the mayor, so he spoke sharply, and they were conducted to a tiny cottage where the startled occupants offered them what they could. And he carried the princess all the way, though his right arm grew numb in the process. He was too old for this, he thought; he felt every day of his forty-eight years.
When at last he set her down on a wooden pallet with a straw mattress, her face was as white as death and she could only whisper at him in French. He knelt down heavily to hear what she was saying, and found she was enquiring about the other ships, and her attendants, and the storm. He assured her that they were not lost; it was entirely possible that some would be swept up later that day or the next, or further along the coast.
He thought she must have misheard him, for despite his assurances she turned her face away and wept. Gradually he understood that she was weeping for a greater loss.
Our dear and best beloved wife the queen is yet sick of the labour and indisposition of the seas, by occasion of which the pox has been broken out upon her.
Letter from Henry VI to the Lord Chancellor
As soon as Suffolk was admitted to his presence, the king broke away from his attendants and went straight to him. The earl sank clumsily to his knees, but the king raised him up and kissed him on both cheeks and clung to him in a long embrace.
Suffolk, still suffering from his ribs, and unused to the awkward weight of a king in his arms, winced, and the king drew back at once in concern.
‘You are injured!’
‘It is nothing, your grace.’
The king immediately embraced him again, more carefully, and Suffolk noticed that he was quivering with excitement or relief.
‘She is really here?’ he said, finally releasing the earl.
‘She is, your grace.’
The king’s face was luminous with joy. He could look, in such moments, like a handsome man.
‘And – she is well?’
‘She is recovering marvellously, my lord.’
In fact, the princess was far from well. She had been taken to a convent to recuperate, but was showing no signs of improvement as yet. But Suffolk assured the king that it was nothing serious, she merely wanted to look her best, as women do, when she met her new husband for the first time. As soon as she was well enough she would be taken in state to Southampton, and the king could meet her there.
Actually, the delay had allowed Suffolk to hire a dressmaker from London to create a new trousseau for the princess. When her cases and trunks had been recovered, and the contents inspected, the earl had been appalled by the state of her wardrobe: old dresses visibly made over and mended, some of them threadbare. He had felt a spasm of rage towards René, who had sent his daughter off so shoddily to be England’s queen. Then his wife had suggested that they should contact her dressmaker in London. There was nothing for it but to pay for this himself. The princess had no money; she had already begun to pawn her plate. To spare her feelings he had told her that the rest of her clothes had been lost in the storm.
But his majesty was still talking.
‘I hardly slept all night for fear, when I heard,’ he said, ‘but that is nothing now – God heard my prayers.’
You should have prayed harder, Suffolk thought, then maybe there would not have been a storm.
‘He heard my prayers,’ the king repeated, ‘and she is here at last, safe and well. The people will see this as a sign of God’s blessing on our union.’
The people, as the earl well knew, would see nothing of the kind.
‘It is all thanks to you – you have saved her from the teeth of the storm!’
Suffolk bowed and said words to the effect that he had done his duty to the best of his ability. Not even a storm at sea could part two people who were destined to be together. The king nodded emphatically.
‘Does she speak of me?’ he asked eagerly.
‘All the time, your grace.’
In fact, she hadn’t mentioned him at all; she seemed to have fallen into a state of melancholy, from which Suffolk hoped the new clothes would rouse her.
But the king was restless. Some perfunctory questions followed, about the health of Suffolk’s wife, then he said to his attendants, ‘I would speak with my Lord of Suffolk alone,’ and ushered him into a tiny room.
Suffolk anticipated, with some anxiety, that awkward questions might follow about the deal he had brokered with the French, about the loss of lands and money. The cost of transporting the queen had exceeded the sum allotted, and some of the fifty-six ships were as yet unaccounted for, but as soon as the king turned to him he could see that he was full of suppressed excitement.
‘I have a great plan,’ he said, ‘for when we meet.’
He outlined his plan to the earl, who allowed his gaze to rest on the soft squares of sunset on the wall. Each square was alive with the nodding shadows of leaves, stirred now by a much gentler wind. He was thinking that the king, who had not yet seen his bride, had never once asked the question that any other king might have asked: whether she was as beautiful as her portrait had suggested. And this was because in his mind she was beautiful, fixed and eternally so; Suffolk might have presented him with an old washerwoman and he would have greeted her with the same delight. Suffolk thought of what the king’s tutor had said when he had begged to be released from his duty of instructing the king: that either he was a natural fool or a holy innocent, and he did not know which was more dangerous to the nation.
But the king was looking at him now with anticipation. He had pressed his fingers to his mouth in the kind of unkingly gesture that his tutor had always tried to train out of him, and Suffolk realized that he was expected to speak.
‘It is a marvellous plan, your grace,’ he said, and the king at once expanded upon it in greater detail, while Suffolk again contemplated the light from the windows, how beautifully it fell upon the wall. A few days ago he thought he had seen his death in the rearing waves, but now there was only this soft beauty. And the king’s voice, outlining his marvellous plan, with which he was expected to collude.
I am so tired, he thought, so tired.
When the queen landed in England the king dressed himself as a squire, the [Earl] of Suffolk doing the same, and took her a letter which he said the King of England had written. While the queen read the letter the king took stock of her, saying that a woman may be seen very well when she reads a letter, and the queen never found out it was the king because she was engrossed in reading, and she never looked at the king in his squire’s dress, who remained on his knees all the time.
Milanese ambassador
She had hated it, of course; who wouldn’t?
They had knelt before her for some time while she read the letter with the utmost concentration. And several times over, or so it seemed to Suffolk, who knelt behind the king with his head lowered, and thought about his complaining knees. It was not a complicated letter, nor overly effusive; the king had read it to him for his approval. It bade her cordial welcome and assured her of the king’s affections.
Suffolk hoped that, whatever the king thought he might see in her preoccupied face, it would not change his mind or his heart. And that the princess would not keep them waiting too much longer or, worse still, lose her temper with them for bringing her a letter rather than the king. As it was, when she had finally finished, she turned to her chamberlain and said, ‘But why does he not come here in person?’
Suffolk thought then that the king might give them both away; he could see suppressed laughter in his majesty’s shoulders. It might have been the moment for him to declare himself, but the princess turned away in evident disappointment and, after a pause, the king rose somewhat clumsily and left the room, and Suffolk followed.
Outside, the king put back his hood from his thinning hair, and Suffolk was relieved to see that he was smiling. But he said nothing, only with a series of gestures and nods conveyed that Suffolk should go back in. Then he mounted his horse and rode away.
Resisting the urge to sigh, Suffolk took off the cloak and hood identifying him as squire and went back into the room. The princess looked up at him with a face full of eager uncertainty, and the earl said, ‘Most serene highness, what do you think of the squire who brought you the letter?’
The princess’s eyes moved fractionally from left to right as she scanned Suffolk’s eyes. She was disconcerted, but not yet suspicious of a trick.
‘I did not think anything of him,’ she said. ‘I was reading the letter.’
But realization dawned on her with that quick apprehension that often caused her to respond to what people said before they had finished speaking.
‘Ah!’ she cried. ‘Why did he not tell me?’
And Suffolk, who had every sympathy for the princess in that moment, said, ‘It was a whim, your highness – it pleased his majesty to see you unawares.’
She turned away from him, biting her lip, and said, ‘But I kept him on his knees all that time!’
The earl assured her that she had done nothing wrong.
‘But why? Did he want to see what he thought of me? What did he think of me?’
‘He thought you were delightful – his most gracious beloved, soon to be queen.’
‘But what did he say?’
The king had said nothing, but she would not believe that, and so for the next few minutes Suffolk had a hard time of it, until he promised to go and escort the king back to her in proper guise that evening.
And when they returned with the king looking almost regal, tallish and slender in his royal clothes, she was waiting for him in a new gown created for her by the dressmaker. She had been sitting, but rose, of course, at the king’s entry, then sank into the deepest curtsy with admirable grace. He raised her and said nothing, seemingly overcome, and she looked at him earnestly, and Suffolk wondered what she saw. The king had a boyish face, overly sensitive, almost raw, as if he had never grown that extra skin that all courtiers necessarily developed. Then he smiled at her, that unique smile of great kindness, and Suffolk was startled to see that her eyes filled with tears. She stood blinking rapidly, momentarily unable to speak. The king said a few words, extended his hand and led her to the table. And Suffolk saw that it was all right between them, and he felt a vast relief – he had not realized until that moment how oppressed he had felt by the whole business. But the king’s ideal passion was undimmed, and she had responded, not to the way he looked, but to his kindness, which was what she needed, after all.
And if the king and queen were all right with one another, he thought, surely the nation would follow.
The next time Suffolk saw the king he was restless, and inclined to talk about the things that vexed him. The Duke of Gloucester, his uncle, was speaking out of turn again. He still assumed an authority over the king that was no longer his, and had spoken openly against his nephew’s marriage. Then there were all the demands for money from his cousin the Duke of York, in Normandy, and the trouble in Brittany caused by another cousin, the recently deceased Duke of Somerset.
Suffolk and his wife, Lady Alice, sat to one side of the king, making commiserating noises when necessary. To Suffolk’s relief, he did not mention the loss of Maine and Anjou (it had been decided that it would be best not to break this news generally just yet); the fact that Suffolk had only brokered a truce rather than peace with France; the excessive cost of transporting the princess. He returned several times to the subject of the Duke of York, whose overweening pride made him ever more demanding, and to the tragic Duke of Somerset – who had driven a much harder bargain than York, it had to be said, because he had never wanted the commission in Gascony in the first place.
The king’s voice was becoming somewhat querulous. He was not like his father, whose rage was to be averted at all cost; he was an injured boy, complaining that it wasn’t fair. Also, he was distressed by his cousin’s death. However aggravating Somerset had been, and incompetent – failing to settle the war in Gascony and almost causing war in Brittany in the process – his death was something of a calamity for the king, who had so few relatives to rely on. Every attempt had been made to suppress the rumours of suicide, but rumour, like the tide, could not be suppressed.
‘How is my lady, the duchess?’ Lady Alice said, her large blue eyes raised sympathetically to the king, who shook his head.
‘How can she be?’ he murmured. For Somerset’s wife was beside herself, it was said. She had taken to her rooms and would not come out.
‘I have visited her, of course,’ Lady Alice said, and the king looked at her in some surprise.
‘She is accepting few visitors,’ Suffolk added, ‘but my lady wife is always welcome.’
‘I took gifts for the little girl,’ said Lady Alice. ‘She is such a bright little creature – you should have heard her prattling to our son, John – they played together so sweetly. It was good for them both to have a playmate.’
Suffolk gave her an appreciative glance. He had often had cause to be grateful that he had married, late in life, a clever woman.
‘They are of an age, are they not?’ said the king.
‘Just a few months apart,’ his wife said. ‘And they took to one another right away.’
Suffolk could almost hear the king thinking. Somerset’s daughter, Margaret Beaufort, was heiress to a great fortune and everyone at court was competing to be her guardian. It was known that Somerset had stipulated that custody of his only child should remain with his wife, but then, the king could not afford to pay Suffolk directly for his services in France.
‘I believe that both mother and daughter would benefit from a little time apart,’ his wife was saying, ‘while the duchess recovers from her illness.’
But the king’s restless mind had shifted back to York, whose latest bill for his expenses was almost forty thousand pounds.
‘So much money!’ he said, bewildered. ‘How can he have exceeded his budget by such an amount? He has not even accomplished his project.’
‘I hear that rumours of his efficiency are greatly exaggerated,’ Suffolk said.
‘Forty thousand pounds!’
Suffolk said that bills, like rumours, were also often exaggerated. ‘Your majesty has no way of knowing how he is spending his money,’ he said.
‘I am his king,’ the king said, as if this should settle the matter.
‘He has the mind of a market trader,’ Suffolk said. ‘He should know that your majesty has better things to spend his money on at this time. Your loyal subjects would not dream of asking you for money.’
Suffolk thought the king looked at him sharply at this point, before returning to his theme. The Duke of York and the Duke of Gloucester were in league together, he did not doubt it – they conspired against him at every turn.
‘There should be more dukes,’ the king said suddenly. It was not good for one or two men to be so elevated above other nobles – it was time to rock the bastion of their pride. Suffolk dared not look at him. He glanced instead at his wife, who had dropped her own gaze downwards.
But the king was looking at Suffolk with luminous eyes; he would have to make some response.
‘His majesty giveth, and his majesty taketh away,’ he ventured, and the king’s eyes registered uncertainty for a moment, then understanding.
‘You have asked for nothing, for all your services,’ he said, in a voice full of suppressed emotion, and Suffolk hastily assured him that he wished for nothing – service to his king was his best reward – and Lady Alice said, with apparent inconsequence, that if it were the king’s wish, she would ask the Duke of Somerset’s widow to stay with them for a while.
‘With little Margaret, because she would be such an excellent companion for our son.’
‘She would be like a sister to him,’ Suffolk added, and the Lady Alice said that she would treat Margaret as her own daughter, placing one hand on her stomach in a poignant reminder that she was unlikely to have any more children.
‘I am sure she would benefit from the company,’ said the king after a pause.
Suffolk’s wife leaned forward earnestly. ‘I would instruct her myself, to the best of my ability. It would be my great pleasure to do so.’
The king nodded slowly. ‘She would have much to gain from the care and instruction of the most cultivated woman in the realm,’ he said.
He was referring, of course, to the fact that Lady Alice was the granddaughter of the great poet Chaucer, and was herself the patron of poets and scholars. ‘She should come to you,’ he said, then, remembering that he had promised the duke that his only child should remain with her mother, added, ‘Perhaps not to stay – but she should visit you often. I will write to my lady the duchess, and to the archbishop – the matter should be settled.’
Lady Alice was overwhelmed, and Suffolk’s gestures indicated that he was lost for words. ‘Your majesty is more than gracious,’ he said.
On the way home they did not discuss it further, for their marriage had reached the stage where there was an understanding between them about all important matters, and the smile in his wife’s eyes said it all. Suffolk sat with more ease than he had in months: the set of his shoulders, the tilt of his head, proclaimed a sense of well-being. The mission which so far had brought nothing but disaster now seemed set to yield a greater benefit than he had thought. For little Margaret Beaufort, Somerset’s daughter, brought with her the Beaufort fortune, and the advantageous alliance with her uncle, Edmund Beaufort. Who was currently the Earl of Somerset, but might soon be the new duke. All because of the fortuitous demise of little Margaret’s father, the late Duke of Somerset.
The noble heart of a man of such high rank … was moved to extreme indignation; and being unable to bear the stain of so great a disgrace, he accelerated his death by putting an end to his existence, it is generally said; preferring thus to cut short his sorrow rather than pass a life of misery, labouring under so disgraceful a charge.
Crowland Chronicle
On that Friday the mayor of London with the aldermen, sheriffs and commons of the city, rode to Blackheath in Kent, where they remained on horseback until the queen’s coming. Then they accompanied her to the Tower of London, where she rested all night. The king, in honour of the queen and her first coming, made forty-six new Knights of the Bath. On the morrow, in the afternoon, the queen came from the Tower in a horse-bier with two steeds decorated all in white damask powdered with gold, as was the clothing she had on; her hair was combed down around her shoulders with a coronel of gold, rich pearls and precious stones and there were nineteen chariots of ladies and gentlewomen as well as all the crafts of the city of London, who proceeded on foot in their best array to St Paul’s.
Brut Chronicle
Suffolk’s men rode among the crowds, ushering those who were cheering to the front, rounding up and harrying those who expressed dissent, who shouted that their new queen had beggared the country and ‘was not worth ten marks’. They saw to it that the conduits ran with red and white wine for the full three hours of the procession, that the streets were hung with silver and gold silks, that no one should tear down or make off with the valuable hangings, and that everyone was supplied with bunches of daisies, or marguerites, the new queen’s emblem, to throw in her path. Suffolk himself rode ahead of the queen, carrying a sceptre of ivory with a golden dove on its head. The procession stopped in several places, where musicians played and children sang, and verses by the court poet, John Lydgate, were recited. An array of gods and goddesses, lowered on harnesses from the heavens, reminded the new queen that her main duty was procreation, to bring forth an heir to the throne, and the figures of Peace and Plenty blessed the fruit of her womb. Three days of feasting, tournaments and miracle plays followed, and in all that time Suffolk sat at the king’s side while his wife tended the new queen.
It was enough time to ponder his changing fortunes; the fact that he was descended not from the nobility but from wool merchants in Hull who had grown wealthy enough to bail kings out of their debts. After his older brother had died at the Battle of Agincourt he had inherited the title of Earl of Suffolk. Now he might soon be duke, though the king had not mentioned this again. At any rate, his pedigree was now held to be unimpeachable.
The same could not be said for the Duke of York, whose father had been executed for plotting to kill Henry V – and whose mother came from the Mortimer line; from that Mortimer, in fact, who had deposed the second King Edward and, it was commonly believed, had arranged to have him killed. Yet this man had his ardent supporters, men who said that his claim to the throne was better than the king’s. He had money and influence and a growing brood of children.
It was, of course, fervently to be hoped that the king would have children. If there were no heir, either the Duke of Gloucester or the Duke of York would be in line for the throne. Neither of them was a supporter of Suffolk, nor of his policy in France. It could be said, however, that little Margaret Beaufort, who had already been to stay at Suffolk’s home, would have her own claim. For the king had been an only child, and his family was not extensive. There were his half-brothers, of course, though they were the sons of a Welsh steward; Suffolk did not think anyone would take them seriously.
At the end of the first feast, after all the ladies had danced together, Suffolk rose to dance with the queen. His wife handed her to him with her dazzling smile. He could feel the tension in the queen’s young body, lithe and bristling. Her face was flushed with open affection for him, and it seemed to the earl, as he whirled her around on his arm, that they were natural partners.
At the time we are talking about there were in the kingdom of England two parties contending for the government and administration of the king and his people. In one of these parties there was Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, King Henry’s uncle, and Richard Duke of York … the other was an alliance between [the earls of] Somerset and Suffolk.
Jean de Waurin
While it was obviously unfortunate that all three of his older brothers were now dead, the Earl of Somerset could not help but see it as significant. Who would have thought that he, the fourth son, would have inherited all those lands and titles? Was it any coincidence that he was the only brother to have a large family of his own, and the only one to enjoy the special favour of the king? Not to mention the queen, who was, even now, waiting breathlessly for him to defeat his opponent.
It had to be said that he cut a better figure than any of his brothers, especially poor John, who might have been mistaken for a clerk of law rather than a courtier or general. No one would make that mistake about Edmund Beaufort. Sunlight glinted on his helmet and the tip of his lance as he paraded round the field; he wore a whole garland of marguerites in the queen’s honour, and a silk ribbon as her token.
The king and queen sat in the gallery, with Suffolk at their side: Suffolk, who was descended from a family of wool-pedlars but was richer than Midas, people said. He had been granted wardship of Somerset’s niece, little Margaret Beaufort, and was assiduously cultivating an alliance with Somerset – who had not discouraged this, because it seemed to him that something was necessary to offset the influence of the Dukes of Gloucester and York.
The king had already said that there should be more dukes in the land.
And Somerset, like York, was cousin to the king. His great-grandfather was Edward III, but the Beaufort line was illegitimate, and had been debarred by the fourth King Henry from any claim to the throne.
Still, it was not beyond one king to correct what another had done.
It seemed to the Earl of Somerset, as the crowds cheered for him, that while the mind of God might be impenetrable to some, to him it was transparently evident. He, the fourth son, had been chosen to restore the family fortunes, its honour, its greatness, as he had done once before in France. He had already suggested to the king that he would do a better job there than the Duke of York. York, who had referred to the Beauforts as ‘that bastard clan’.
The bugle sounded and the earl took his place to one side of the wooden fence. He could feel the tension in his horse; a coil of power. As he lifted his lance and prepared to charge, all he could see was not his opponent in the field, but his absent enemy, the Duke of York.
As Governor-General of the duchy of Normandy, Richard of York’s duty was to protect this country from the French our enemies, and during this time in office he governed admirably and had many honourable and notable successes. Nevertheless envy reared its head among the princes and barons of the kingdom of England and was directed against the Duke of York. Above all envy prompted Somerset, who found a way to harm him so that the Duke of York was recalled from France to England. There he was totally stripped of his authority to govern Normandy …
Jean de Waurin
He left the council meeting feeling a rage such as he had never felt before, so that once he was outside he had to stand for a moment against a tree and close his eyes.
Few people had ever seen Richard of York really angry. But now he was sweating and his heart was banging unevenly, as though it might burst out of his ribs. For the first time he understood what it must be to suffer ‘an attack of the heart’. In the meeting his face had congested with blood; he hadn’t been able to help it. For they had all been there: Somerset, Suffolk and that smiling fox Moleyns, Suffolk’s lapdog, who had dared to accuse him of financial malpractice.
‘Your majesty is pleased to believe many things of me without evidence,’ York had said. And that was all he had said before leaving. He could not have trusted himself to say anything else.
He had spent almost forty thousand pounds of his own money in the service of the king; he had pawned his most prized possession, a gold collar enamelled with the roses of York and adorned by a great diamond. The king had repeatedly ignored his requests for money and troops. And Edmund Beaufort, Earl of Somerset, had stood there smiling while false charges were made against him.
What was it Beaufort had said to Moleyns?
‘My dear bishop, it is not fair to reproach the duke with miscalculation, when it is not at all clear that he can count.’
And this, of course, had raised a general laugh.
Even with his eyes closed he could see Beaufort’s smiling face as though it were printed against his eyelids.
It was not hard to imagine stamping that smile out.
When he opened his eyes he was surprised to feel the fine rain on his face, cooling his heated skin. He got on to his horse and rode hard, without giving any orders to his men, who followed him wondering whether they were being pursued, or in pursuit. Then, gradually, his anger congealed into something more brooding and sullen. He settled to a slow trot, and then a walk, soothed as ever by the motion of his horse, that rhythmic movement of muscle and bone. He could feel his horse’s ribs moving against his knees.
He had learned in childhood to suppress his rage. Shortly after his father had been executed he had been sent to stay in the noisy and burgeoning household of the Earl of Westmorland. It was the first of several visits to the castle of Raby, before he went to live there. No one had spoken of his father’s disgrace, though he had always been a little set apart. Solid and taciturn, he had made few friends, though some of the earl’s children had been roughly his own age. He had recoiled from kindness, endured cruelty with a stoic silence and learned to be alert and more observant than he seemed.
On that first visit, he had seen, by chance, the earl’s new baby daughter. He had somehow evaded his nurse, the other children and their tutor, and was trying to find his room, when a door opened very softly. He saw a maid leaving a chamber, carrying a small bundle. He hung back, but she smiled at him. ‘Would you like to see?’ she said, and sat on a stool to one side of the door.
Cautiously, he approached the linen bundle, which might almost have been laundry, apart from a tiny fist that waved defiantly in the air.
‘Her name is Cecily,’ the maid said, and when he didn’t respond she said, ‘What do you think?’ But he didn’t know what he thought. The baby’s face was somewhat blotchy, its eyes tightly closed and its mouth a small bud, continuously working, now puckered and pursed, now stretched as if to cry, then folded in on itself so that the lips entirely disappeared. The little arm waved erratically as though summoning aid. The maid touched the baby’s fist and it opened promptly, grasping, the fingers splayed wide like the rays of a star. Richard’s own fingers moved and he touched the baby’s palm, which was so soft, like wrinkled silk. At once, the baby’s fingers curled round his own, and in that moment something changed. He had the sudden, keen sense of being her one connection in this alien and shifting world. He smiled, astonished, and the baby clung on as though she had no intention of ever letting go.
That was thirty years ago, of course, but the little girl had not outgrown her attachment to him. On subsequent visits she had toddled after him where possible, so that he was forced to discourage her at times, though secretly he looked for her when she wasn’t there. At the age of three she had loudly declared her intention of marrying him, and everyone had laughed. By the time she was nine, however, most of his titles and estates had been restored to him, and they were betrothed.
Now he was riding back to her as though drawn by an invisible rope, seeking restoration in her eyes, so that his heart could begin to heal. She would come to meet him, and her eyes would seek his and he would not need to explain anything, not at first. In her eyes he would find a sense of connection in this alien and shifting world.