The King's Grey Mare (68 page)

In the City a bizarre rumour arose.
On the corner of Eastchepe and Candlewick a strange knight, coming face to face with John, threw himself on his knees and cried: ‘Jesu!
Richard liveth yet!’
and wept uncontrollably.
He was gently disillusioned, but the day ended badly; John neither spoke nor ate, but stood for hours at the open casement, his arms stretched wide on the shutters as if crucified.
Grace sorrowed.
She had thought him to be mended.

‘Are you happy, my love?’
she asked, when the spasm had burned itself away with the dawning.

‘Are you?’
he said anxiously, as if he feared a parting.
At such times she was hard put to express her happiness.
Never in her life had such kindness come her way.
Now it was loaded upon her in such ardent measure that often she was uncertain what to do with its excesses.
They stood together at the window and he held her.
The crown of her head was level with his neck.
She was so slight she seemed to melt against him.
He bent his head to touch his lips to hers.

‘Yes.
I’m happy.
Or I should be the most ungrateful dog in the world,’ he said.

Grace leaned from the window.
By stretching her hand she could almost touch the gable of the house opposite.
There was a woman in the window, who quickly banged her shutters closed.
John pulled Grace back into his arms and covered her mouth with his.
She was unaware of the street’s opinion; that she was called a whore and he a popinjay … He thought: there are some who see evil and some whom it passes by, invisible as the wind.
Whether this is stupidity or saintliness, who knows?
I only know that without Grace I should have died.

‘What shall we do today, sweeting?
There’s a cockfight at Southwark, and we could dine at the Tabard.
Or we could go to Petty Wales and watch them picking pockets.
At Billingsgate the Fishmongers are rehearsing a play.
But …’

‘I’d rather stay here,’ she said.
‘I feel …’ He looked at her sharply.
To him she seemed pale.

‘You’re not sick?’
he cried.
There were still occasional outbreaks of the sweating sickness in the City.
Or … He looked at her closely.
There was a sickness that was no sickness …

‘I am only a little weary,’ she said, and laughed.
Relief, coupled with a whimsical disappointment, showed on his face.
My love, he had said, more than once: if I should get you with child!
And: Yes!
Let it be, then!
Let there be more Plantagenets, for even bastard Plantagenets are better than Tudor’s spawn!
And his lovemaking had brought fear; fear that swiftly became delight.

Now he said: ‘So be it.
We’ll watch the world from our window.
I’ll buy mutton from Master Gloom below, and have one of his boys cook it.’

Grace prepared the table, brightening it with kingcups gathered in Paul’s churchyard.
She and John played cards, made light, teasing love.
He had a brittle uneasy merriment, as if his flashing temper were only just held in rein.
After an hour, a prentice, carrying a tray, kicked at the door, entered, banged the meal down and left, clumping in his worn-out boots.
Grace lifted the cover of the dish; the saddle of mutton was black on one side and raw on the other.
When she touched it, it fell apart, white with maggots and stinking like a month-old corpse.
John’s lips paled with fury.

‘Our host has a right merry humour,’ he said.
He pushed back his chair.
‘God’s passion!
How dare he treat us like this!’
He stormed from the room, and she heard him running downstairs, angrily calling the prentice back.
His sharp imperious voice and the mumbling replies from the youth rose indistinctly.

‘Gould is occupied,’ he told her, returning.
‘Jesu!–’ pacing about with anger – ‘I have had my belly full of Gould and this place.
Love, how would you like to leave it?’

‘Where could we go?’
She was surprised.

‘To Ireland.’
He knelt beside her and took her hands.
‘Sweetheart, they would welcome us there.
They are still strong for my father.
Desmond’s kin still live – both your father and mine loved them well.’

‘Desmond,’ she said slowly.
A strange little memory, a cradle-dream, tantalizingly vague, crept in her mind.
‘The Earl died before I was born.’

‘I will write,’ said John.
‘A courteous letter; I’ll not press or commit them.
Come to Ireland!’

The door rattled discreetly; a young man entered bearing a fresh tray.
This prentice was fair and sturdy, with melancholy blue eyes in a comely face beneath a straight-cut fringe.
Without a word he replaced the stinking mutton with a fair piece of beef, perfectly cooked.
The mutton he tossed out of the open window, where it landed in the gutter, to the rapture of a bony cur.

‘My thanks,’ said John, bewildered.

The youth bowed.
‘Your pardon, highness.
The other was a mistake.
Master Gould is busy, and young Harry does not know bad meat from the Pope’s head.’

‘I’ve not seen you before,’ said John, frowning.

‘I’m new to the trade,’ said the prentice, and a cloud crossed his face.
‘Moreover, it doesn’t suit me.
It’s a bad trade, with a bad master.
I was to be trained for holy orders, but … No matter, my lord.
Enjoy your dinner.’
He bowed again, and stepped back a pace nearer the door.

John, carving-knife poised, said curiously: ‘It’s a far cry from the priesthood to the slaughter-house … or is it?
What changed your fortunes?’

‘My father followed Richard Plantagenet,’ said the youth simply.
‘The wrong fortunes, therefore; I bore the reprisal …

Very carefully John laid down the knife.
His voice shook a little as he said: ‘You have my sympathy.’

They stared at each other.
Then the prentice said, with a kind of shudder: ‘My lord, I should beg your pardon for more than the meat!’

‘Well?’
said John softly.

The young man’s eyes were fixed on his.
‘Walls are thin sir.
My lord, I overheard your conversation.
I heard you speak of Ireland.
I cannot leave without asking forgiveness for my ears, or without offering my services.’

‘What services?’

The prentice wiped his hands on the sides of his apron.

‘If you have correspondence for Ireland,’ he said very softly, ‘I could help you.
With this new King–’ a look of utter abhorrence crossed his smooth face – ‘it is most difficult to transmit bills.
His agents are everywhere.
Even here.’

Grace spoke, amazing herself: ‘This is treason!’

The youth was trembling.
‘Lady, lady, I know!
But I can help you both.
For the love of God, don’t refuse my aid.
And if you do, I pray you, forget I ever spoke of this.’

‘Be still.’
John’s eyes were far away.
Colour stained his cheeks.
‘I did not know.
Before God, I did not know there were still loyal followers who dared speak their mind.
You, for one, risk your life.
Gould is Henry’s man!’

‘The more fool he, to love a tyrant and a usurper.’

‘I would make use of your services, your good services,’ said John softly.
‘Come, sit down.
Eat and drink with us.’

The prentice laughed sadly.
‘And lose my employment?
Later, my lord.
Now, we have little time.
Listen: I can transmit your bill.
My brother is a sea-captain bound for Wexford.
He sails next month if the tides be right.
Sir,’ he said soberly, ‘I would take your letter myself if I could.
I long for Ireland … the White Rose still blooms there.
They drink–’ he was almost choking – ‘to Richard’s blessed memory.’

John rose, and embraced the youth, greasy apron and all.
When they separated, tears shone in both pairs of eyes.

‘Serve me,’ he said.
‘What is your name?’

‘Ralph, sir.’

‘Serve me, Ralph, in honour of your brave words.
You cannot know what you have brought me this day.
The finest dinner in the world – a dinner of hope, of comfort.
God bless you, Ralph.’

‘And you, my lord.’

‘I will write the letter.’

‘When shall I come for it?
I must not visit you too often.
Gould watches constantly, for any covert doings.’

‘In a little while.
In a week or so.
I must think how to write it.
It is to friends I have not seen for years, and I do not want them to find me presumptuous.
I’ll make some excuse to see you, send for you.’

‘Yes.
Next time I’ll drink with you.
We’ll toast Plantagenet …’ He looked quickly towards the door.
‘That is Gould shouting for me.
I must go.’

He raised his hand as if in blessing, went swiftly from the room and ran downstairs.
Grace rose from the table and put her arms about John.
He was weeping, shaking, smiling.
He was changed.
She had never seen him so happy – at least, not since his father’s death.

Dorset was more frightened than he had ever been.
His mother had come from the King’s privy chamber like a horribly animated doll.
Straight past where he waited she walked, with her head held to one side and her face working as if struck by countless little blows.
He remembered a tower at Grafton Regis when he was a child; a Jack-o’-the-clock, a small brass man who struck the hour.
Like Jack, she went with one thin hand wagging before her; dreadfully stiff and steady she went towards the Queen’s room.
She was turned away, and Dorset caught up with her, as she fell swooning to the stones.

A physician pronounced the malady a rare palsy.
Tincture of yarrow was prescribed, pennywort balm and daily bleeding.
Desperate, Dorset followed these instructions faithfully.
Gradually Elizabeth’s twitching subsided save for an occasional frightful spasm, but she lay without speaking.
Dorset sat holding the bowl of trickling rubies.
Each drop taken seemed to come directly from her face, and each shade of pallor seemed to drain the years away, so that she looked like a dying young girl.
On the seventh day Dorset dismissed the leech.
‘Enough.
Do you want to suck the soul from her?’
He wondered what had passed in the King’s chamber to bring his mother to this, and decided that he would rather not know.
The Queen’s time was near, and Winchester was in a state of preoccupation.
Twelve doctors and midwives were in residence and already quarrelling fiercely among themselves.
Margaret Beaufort had taken her bed into Bess’s room and looked likely to remain there until Doomsday.
So Dorset sat, ill-at-ease, in his mother’s chamber, his eyes fixed on her waxen catelepsy.
Her servants had been changed; Renée had gone to France with a pension from the Countess of Richmond; Catherine, now not quite so complacent, was at Pembroke as wife of Jasper Tudor.
Grace he scarcely missed.
There were only about half a dozen women who spent their time leaning on walls, watching Elizabeth, and yawning behind-hand.
They are waiting for her to die, thought Dorset, and he abused them in an uncourtly manner.

‘She will soon be strong again!’
he said fiercely.
I pray that I am right.
Without her I am alone, save for my uncle Edward, always at sea.
I would not be alone in a Tudor court.
He bent to his mother, stroked and massaged her left hand.
She opened her eyes.

‘You have come back,’ she said.
Then her gaze cleared and hardened on Dorset’s face.
‘Ah.
It’s you, Tom.’

There was a shiver around the wall as the women assumed attentive attitudes.

‘Take me …’ whispered Elizabeth.

‘Where, Madam my mother?’

‘Take me to Bradgate,’ she breathed.
Dorset got up to ask the King’s assent to their
congé
.
Wildly Elizabeth wagged her stricken head.