ASilverMirror (2 page)

“Let us go in, you are cold,” Barbara said.

“No.” Joanna found a smile, released her grip, and sat back,
but she did not move away or reach for her work. “The sun is coming from behind
the cloud now. And it was not cold that made me shiver. I was thinking of the
king.”

Their glances met and shifted guiltily because of the
unspoken thought in both minds. Henry III of England was old. Why could he not
die? Why did he live on and on, bringing misery to all? Barbara thought again
of what she had said, and it was true. The king
was
selfish, petty,
spiteful, vindictive, and spendthrift. Unfortunately he was also both more and
less than that. Henry was more in that he was clever, often brilliant, in
devising political expedients to escape the consequences of his blunders and to
thrust the blame for them onto others. He was less in that he was basically
weak and had, despite his fifty-seven years of age, a kind of hopeful innocence
that seemed to prevent him from learning from his mistakes. Barbara bit her
lip. It was the weakest part of the king’s nature that was the most dangerous,
that hopeful innocence made even Henry’s worst enemies wish to help him and
protect him.

The bitten lip did not dam speech for long. Barbara burst
out, “How can Uncle Hugh allow himself to be seduced over and over by that
man?” And then she choked on a sob that was half laughter. “How can I be so
stupid as to ask when Henry does the same thing to me too each time I speak to
him.”

Joanna’s lips almost curved into a smile and then drooped
again. “The king is not an evil person. His faults are those we all understand
too well. Those he loves, he loves too much, so he is blind to the wrong they
do. He is of expansive spirit, generous, and gives away what he should not,
then when he feels the pinch he seeks a way to get back what he gave so
blithely. He is easily frightened and under duress promises what he knows is
wrong.”

“He is not fit to be a king,” Barbara snapped. “He needs a
governor, and you know it.”

“That does not make it right to govern him,” Joanna said
slowly. “It was by God’s will that he was crowned. It is not for us to question
God’s will. If His holy purpose is served in some way by our suffering then we
must endure with patience.”

Barbara jumped up and stamped her foot. “You cannot tell me
Hugh believes all that. I know he agreed with my father when Leicester first
urged the barons to accept the Provisions of Oxford, and he knew quite well
that the purpose of the Provisions was to govern the king.”

Joanna shook her head. “To help the king govern. That is the
difference between what happened when the Provisions were first signed and now.
In 1258 the king was willing to accept the Provisions. Henry was truly
distressed when he learned of the terrible abuses that had crept into his
government and desired that they be amended. But the king became dissatisfied
with the reforms over the next three years.”

“You mean he missed his greedy and accursed lick-spittle
relatives more than he cared about his kingdom,” Barbara retorted. Then she bit
her lip. “Not that I care. I only care for Papa and Uncle Hugh. Good God, I
know Leicester is just as seductive as the king, but could not my father and
Uncle Hugh at least have been seduced by the same man?”

“Neither Henry nor Leicester had much influence on Hugh’s
decision. In the beginning Hugh supported the Provisions of Oxford with all his
heart. But when he saw how they were being used, not only to cure ills but to
overturn the natural order, how the king’s right to rule was being taken from
him against the will of God by Leicester and his party, Hugh had to side with
Henry. I do not think the king seduced Hugh. He is not easily seduced—”

Joanna stopped abruptly and blushed. Barbara saw the blush
with her eyes, but it meant nothing to her at the moment. She was remembering
her father’s admission that many of the barons had not realized where the
Provisions of Oxford must lead if they were fulfilled to the letter. Papa
himself had not understood the full ramifications until the king’s will had
conflicted with the Provisions three years after they had been sworn to by all.
Then her father had been forced to decide whether his oath stood above the will
of a bad king or whether the anointing of a weak man as king set that man above
all oaths, as Joanna claimed. Papa had decided one way, Hugh had decided the
other.

Barbara slowly sank down on the bench again. Three years
earlier her sympathies had been with her Uncle Hugh’s Royalist point of view,
but she now knew her father was right about the king being unfit to rule. Henry
had not only bent the Provisions of Oxford but had arranged for the pope to
declare them null and void. And then, as in the past, the king had repeated
every mistake that had brought him into conflict with his barons in the first
place. Henry had interfered with the special court sessions meant to redress
judicial and financial abuses, and he had recalled his Lusignan half brothers,
who had caused such turmoil by their cruelty and rapacity.

When Hugh was dismissed from his office by the king, Barbara
had been distressed and asked leave of the queen to visit her uncle. She had
not told her father where she was going because she had been afraid he would
either forbid her to visit Hugh or urge her to plead with Hugh to oppose the
king again, which Barbara felt would be cruel at such a time. But her visit had
been brief. Her uncle was not brokenhearted, as she had feared. Indeed, Hugh
had looked well and rested for the first time since the Provisions had been signed.

Relieved and delighted, Barbara had gone on to Framlingham
Castle and confessed to her father that she had been at Kirby Moorside, Hugh’s
favorite manor. Norfolk forgave her when she told him that Hugh seemed settled
into private life without regret, but he would not agree that she should end
her service with the queen. She was a clever chick, her father said, and her
eyes and ears at court were useful to him. Unless Eleanor dismissed her out of
spite over his opposition to Henry, her father insisted she continue to go to
court for her regular months of service and be meek and listen, even if she had
to bite her tongue when Eleanor criticized him.

More than three years had passed without giving Barbara much
reason to worry about Hugh’s withdrawal from participation in the king’s
government. Even though matters had gone from bad to worse, Hugh had kept
himself quietly retired. She knew he was not happy about the state of the
realm, but because her father and her uncle quarreled each time they met, she had
seen less and less of Hugh and Joanna.

Serving at court was horrid. When Hugh and her father were
summoned at the same time—and the king seemed deliberately to demand they
attend him together—they seemed to Barbara to be a hairbreadth from drawing
knives on each other. Nor was her life much easier when her father and uncle
were absent. The king’s sycophants said offensive things about Norfolk when he
was not there, and the courtiers who were of Leicester’s party made bad worse
by trying to protect her. Leicester himself had sullenly retired to France,
riding a high horse of pride, after Henry had seized the reins of government
again. But the barony in general seemed sunk into apathy, allowing the king to
go his own way, except for stubbornly refusing to help him extricate himself
from his increasing financial woes.

Then a quarrel between Henry’s son, Prince Edward, and his
steward Roger Leybourne had been blown out of all proportion, and in the past
year the barons had again combined and risen against the king. Edward had acted
like a stupid hothead at first and temporarily lost the support of the lords of
the Welsh Marches, who had been his most faithful friends. In their initial
rage, the Marcher lords had asked Leicester to return to England and lead them.
There had been some minor battles in the west, and the king had withdrawn to
London. But even there he found no real support. Instead of being protected,
the king had found himself trapped in the Tower of London, and the people of
London had stoned Queen Eleanor’s barge when she tried to leave the city.

Terrified by the violent hostility of the Londoners, who had
always supported him in the past, the weathercock king had again promised
everything to everyone and, as soon as his tether was relaxed, had gone back on
his promises and the weary round was about to be danced again. There were
differences, however. Although the king had not changed, everyone else had.
This time Leicester seemed to have made up his mind to fight. King Henry would
have been helpless, but Prince Edward had learned a sharp lesson too and had
made his peace with the Welsh Marcher lords, but he had made peace with his old
friends in order to make war on Leicester. Not all desired war, but so much
harm had been done, so much bitterness aroused, that few were able to keep
their balance.

Barbara’s hands were again idle, even though she held her
needle poised over the sleeve cuff she was embroidering. She was recalling
miserably that even her father, who knew it was wrong to fight, had said
bitterly that he could only hold back so long.

“They will call me a coward,” the Earl of Norfolk had
mumbled, half turning his head from Barbara in shame after his chaplain had
read him the Earl of Leicester’s letter and he had waved the man away. “But it
is wrong to bear arms against the king and yet Leicester has tried everything
else.”

“You are no coward,” Barbara had cried. “No one will even
think it, Papa. If more men had your good sense and no one on either side would
fight, there could be no war.”

Her passionate remark had brought a faint smile and a rough
hug, but then Norfolk had straightened and stood looking out of the window at
the teeming rain, one hand still resting on Barbara’s shoulder. At last he had
said, “If it comes to battle, Leicester will win, you know. If I thought he
needed my help, I would go, but he has men enough and is a far better soldier
than any who support Henry.”

That was the first time Barbara remembered thinking beyond
the fact of the danger in fighting to the results of a great battle won or
lost. Until then fighting between the two parties had been raids and
skirmishes, tests of strength, perhaps, but with no major effects. She had
cried out, “It will not come to battle. It must not! But…but if it does and
Leicester wins, what will happen to those who opposed him? What will happen to
Uncle Hugh?”

“I will do my best for him,” Norfolk had said slowly, “but I
do not know how much influence I still have. Leicester is not pleased with me.”
He shrugged and his lips twisted. “You heard his letter. He thinks me not
sufficiently committed to the cause. But if Hugh will remain quiet, I know
Leicester will leave him in peace.”

Barbara’s relief over those words, and her gladness that her
father wished to protect his brother despite all their quarrels had made her
smile and say, “Surely he will. I am very certain that Uncle Hugh is sick of
King Henry and his lies and excuses.”

It had been a shock when her father shook his head and said,
“I wish I were sure. I am afraid that Hugh, thinking as I think that the king
is the weaker, will answer Henry’s call to arms. Also, he may hope to serve as
peacemaker.”

“Then you must go to Uncle Hugh. You must stop him.”

“I dare not go, chick.” Her father’s scarred knuckles had
stroked her cheek. “First because Hugh would not listen to me. Second because I
might be accused of some conspiracy with him. Guy de Montfort did not come here
only to carry a letter from his father. He asked some strange questions of my
steward and master-at-arms.” He hesitated and looked down at her and suddenly
smiled. “But you can go to talk with Hugh.”

Barbara had left the very next day for Kirby Moorside
despite the continuing rain. She had a head full of reasoned arguments supplied
by her father to convince Hugh it was his duty to refuse to respond to the
king’s summons to arms. She had been too late; Hugh had been gone when she
arrived.

Remembering, a wave of cold passed over Barbara and she
glanced up, but the sun was still shining. She did not speak, only swallowed
hard, laid down her work, and took Joanna’s hand in hers. At least, she
thought, she had had sense enough not to tell Joanna the real reason why she
had come. That could only have added to her aunt’s fear for Hugh. The tale of
wishing to escape the lewd attentions of Leicester’s younger sons had been the
first idea to pop into her head because Guy had made a nuisance of himself
whenever he contrived to catch her away from her father. Now the memory of her
father’s remark about Guy’s “strange questions” came together with her fear
that her uncle might be imprisoned or his lands confiscated, and she suddenly
wondered how a victory for Leicester might affect her. Might she be considered
a spoil of war, particularly if she were taken here, in an “enemy” household?
Might Guy believe that evidence gathered against her father could be used to
silence Norfolk if she were despoiled?

Barbara uttered a gasp of laughter as she realized how fear
could inflate one’s self-importance. Her father held wide lands from which many
men and rich supplies of grain could be mustered, and he commanded many miles
of the eastern coast that could be used to land mercenaries from the Continent
if he did not oppose the landing. If Guy was trying to find evidence to accuse
her father of disloyalty, it would be so that another governor could be set
over Norfolk for those reasons, not because that spoiled child desired her.
Probably he had only reached for her because she was there and he, like so many
others, could not believe that she neither wished to take the veil nor used her
single state to lie with any man at any time without the interference of a
husband.

“Tell me,” Joanna said, squeezing Barbara’s hand. “I would
like a cause to laugh, even at myself.”