The Stolen Crown: The Secret Marriage That Forever Changed the Fate of England (52 page)

Poor Catesby; he might have been a good man in better company. I sighed, thinking of the waste.

“Well, my lady, you shall receive the jointure that you should have received upon the late duke’s death. And we also wish to assure you that your husband’s good services to us will not be forgotten. His attainder, along with those of the many others who were unjustly condemned by the late usurper, will be reversed at the next Parliament, which we will be calling soon. Your son Edward will be restored to his father’s dukedom and to his lands.”

“Thank you,” I murmured. I could not help but feel a little dizzy as all we had lost was handed back. King Henry saw my reaction. “Be seated, my lady. Ah, thank you, uncle.”

A man who had unobtrusively entered the room had pulled a stool for me. Now that I got a better look at him, I recognized him as Jasper Tudor.

“Thank you, my lord,” I echoed.

“My pleasure,” said Jasper Tudor.

“We understand that you speak excellent French, my lady.”

“It was my mother’s native tongue, of course, and we learned it from her,” I said half apologetically, remembering my small husband’s reaction all those years ago.

“Of course.” The king suddenly switched to French. “We rather like speaking it ourselves, don’t we, uncle?”

“
Oui
,” agreed Jasper Tudor firmly. He smiled at me and reverted to English. “It was my mother’s tongue, too, of course. Queen Catherine.”

He crossed himself, and we all followed suit. “Were you named for her, perchance, my lady?”

“No, my lord. Saint Katherine is my patron.”

“A fine saint,” said Margaret Beaufort firmly.

3 5 8 s u s a n h i g g i n b o t h a m I was beginning to find all of this approval bewildering. So wrapped up was I in my puzzlement that I nearly missed the next remark of the king’s mother. “As you may know, Duchess, my brother-in-law Jasper has never married.”

I almost said, “That is a pity,” until I thought about it. Perhaps it was not to be thought a pity, but a conscious choice? “Ah,” I said, in a vague tone that I hoped covered any eventuality.

“He has not had the settled life that lends itself to marriage, you see.”

So perhaps it was a pity, I surmised. “When my dear husband died, Jasper took up his fight for the cause of the sixth Henry, his half brother, and in his service of that cause, he was forced into long years of exile, as was my son the king. It was not a disinclination for the married state that kept him single, but his situation.”

“And now that has changed,” the king put in. “So that—”

“If you please, I can handle this,” interrupted Jasper Tudor. He stepped toward me and lifted my hand. “I am asking you, my lady, to do me the honor of becoming my wife.”

I sat there, stunned. I should not have been surprised, I suppose—more often than not, young widows did remarry, especially young widows with handsome jointures—but still, I had not seen this coming, especially in the presence of the new king himself. As the moments passed without my returning an answer, Margaret Beaufort cast upon me her familiar look of disapproval. “Perhaps the king’s uncle, and Queen Catherine’s son, does not suit you, your ladyship?”

“It is not that,” I said. “It was unexpected.”

“Well, then? Might we have an answer?”

“Might I see my prospective groom alone? And then I can give
him
my answer?”

Margaret sputtered, but her son looked amused. “Of course, my lady.”

He nodded to Jasper Tudor. “We will leave you to court in private. There is business to see to elsewhere in any case.”

t h e s t o l e n C r o w n 3 5 9

“Well, my lady?”

“I shall marry you. How could I refuse you, with my children and I dependent upon the good will of the king, and he himself urging the match? I simply wished to give my answer without the Countess of Richmond boring her eyes into me.”

Jasper smiled. “The countess is a managing woman. Having been apart from her for so long, I had forgotten precisely how much that was true.” He took my hand. “But, my lady, I do not wish you to feel that you are compelled to marry me. The king will treat you and your children justly, for their late father’s sake and for honor’s sake, whatever your answer.”

“That may be, but if life has taught me nothing else, it is to be cautious around kings. I cannot risk finding out otherwise. I will marry you.”

Something amused in his expression made me add, “So do not think of withdrawing your offer.”

“I shall not, for you are very fair.”

“Flatterer.”

He smiled and lifted my chin gently. “You know, my dear, when the king told me that I should find a wife, it was you I thought of immediately, for I remembered when I first saw you. Even then I thought you would be a lovely woman when you came of age. And Margaret confirmed it.”

I snorted. “My jointure had nothing to do with your decision?”

“Of course it did. You are wealthy as well as young and lovely. You can hardly expect a rational man to ignore that. And to add to your appeal, you are closely allied with the House of York. The king is eager to see the houses united. So, dear lady, you hardly stand a chance of remaining single, unless you take a vow of chastity, and that would be a tragic waste.”

I smiled. “King Edward’s daughter betrothed to a Tudor, and now his sister-in-law to another one? The poor man must be spinning in his grave.”

“No doubt. And I think he would be rather jealous of me, too.”

“Why?”

“Because of what I am going to do now.”

3 6 0 s u s a n h i g g i n b o t h a m He drew me against him, whereupon I soon found that this man could kiss life into a statue. “Goodness,” I managed weakly when it was over.

Then I startled myself by anticipating and indeed almost initiating the next kiss. It was every bit as satisfying as the first, and led to more intimate contact, thereby confirming every joke made about lusty widows. But I had badly missed being in a man’s arms, more than I realized, and this man knew a woman’s body well indeed.

In the midst of a complicated embrace we heard Margaret Beaufort’s voice at the door. “Jasper?”

“Bother,” muttered Jasper, and I snickered a little breathlessly. “I shall be with you presently, Margaret,” my betrothed called. Then he led me out a back door to his bedchamber, where in less time than I care to admit we were lying together in his bed, our clothes marking the trail of our progress to it.

I do hope Margaret Beaufort didn’t spend too much time waiting for Jasper that day.

While Jasper and I were thusly improving our acquaintance, things were bustling around me. Bishop Morton, chirpier than ever, returned from exile, along with my nephew Dorset. The king had set his coronation date, and with it flowed the inevitable ceremonies and rewards. Thomas Stanley was made Earl of Derby. My older son, Edward, was made a Knight of the Bath—and I freely admit that I wept when I saw him in his garments and thought of the day my nine-year-old husband had received the same honor.

Jasper Tudor was made Duke of Bedford.

And in the midst of all these events, I married Jasper and became the Duchess of Bedford. It was the title my mother had borne through her first marriage, and for weeks afterward I started when I heard myself heralded, expecting Mama to be right beside me. Perhaps in spirit, she was.

t h e s t o l e n C r o w n 3 6 1

Yet in all of this flurry and ceremony, I did not forget my Harry. Just a few days after my marriage to Jasper Tudor, I traveled to Salisbury, where my brother Lionel had been bishop for such a short time and where my husband had died. With me came my children.

We passed by the Blue Boar Inn, where poor Harry had spent his last night on earth. I asked to be shown the room where he had stayed, but it was occupied, and although the friendly innkeeper would have allowed me to look inside anyway, I decided to let it be. It was enough to stand at the last earthly doorway through which Harry had passed on his way to the scaffold, enough to gaze at the spire of Salisbury Cathedral where his own eyes must have wandered in his last moments. Then we walked on to the Grey Friars Abbey, where Harry lay at rest. I remembered that the Grey Friars at Leicester had taken Gloucester’s body, and wondered, as ever, at the Lord’s strange sense of irony.

The abbot himself greeted us. “I shall lead you to his grave straightaway, your grace. But first, this was found pinned inside of his shirt when we buried him. It was addressed to your ladyship.”

He handed me a folded, but unsealed, sheet of paper. I felt a weak-kneed sensation as I recognized Harry’s handwriting on the outside:
For my duchess
.

I thanked the abbot, who moved away. Then I unfolded the letter.

There is no one here to whom I can entrust this letter, for I can expect no
kindness from the king’s guards. I believe that the monks of Grey Friars will
take my body when all is done. I can only hope, Kate, that they will find
this paper then and that you will be the one who reads it.

I have been faithful to you since we consummated our marriage. I make no
boast of this, for there is little else that can be said good of me as a husband.

Were it not for whom I leave behind, I would be glad of my death, which
I have deserved.

Until the darkness fell, I could see from my window the scaffold that I am
to die upon. I have been rehearsing in my mind my walk toward it. For

3 6 2 s u s a n h i g g i n b o t h a m
your sake and our children’s I shall be brave and approach it composedly and
quietly. Better men than myself, like Hastings and your brother Anthony,
have made that final walk and for much less cause; I can do no more than
to emulate them.

I love you, Kate, and I love the children you have brought me. I cannot write
of them more—if I do, I wil break down, and I have tried to be courageous.

Give my love to them. May all of you prosper.

Harry

“What did he say?” Elizabeth demanded as I stood there, tears streaming down my face.

“That he loved all of us,” I said, wiping my eyes. “Come. Let us see your father’s grave.”

Harry’s grave, in an obscure, dingy corner, was covered only by an unmarked slab. Now that I had the means, I would have to provide a suitable monument, though what would be suitable for a man who had helped to destroy so many I held dear, and whom I still loved deeply nonetheless, was something that would surely baffle even the most skilled mason.

“Harry,” I whispered. I dropped to my knees, along with the children, and together we prayed for his soul. And then we wept, I not only for my husband, but for all of those who had lost their lives in these past two years, including Queen Anne and her young son. I even shed a tear or two for Richard—for Harry’s sake.

When we had cried our fill, we carefully spread a cloth of gold over the slab, then decorated it with the bright red and white roses the children had carried in with them. Elizabeth laid hers down last. “Mama, you won’t forget Papa, will you, now that you’ve remarried?”

I put her hand on her shoulder. “Never,” I promised my children. “I will always be your papa’s duchess.”

I was the youngest of twelve, and by 1492, i was the last of the Woodville children left on this earth. It was a strange feeling.

My sisters Anne, Margaret, and Joan and my brother Richard drifted off peacefully in their beds, attended by priests and surrounded by their families and servants, but poor Edward was killed in 1488 at St. Aubin-du-Cormier, fighting for the Duke of Brittany in what proved to be a lost cause against the French. He died a Knight of the Garter, having been raised to that honor by King Henry just months before his death.

After the rest died, there remained but two of us—myself and Bessie, whose marriage to the king had raised our family so high and brought us so much sorrow. And on June 8, 1492, Bessie died at Bermondsey Abbey, to which she had retired in 1487 with the active encouragement of King Henry, who was not at all displeased at the revenue this saved him.

I did not go to the funeral; the news reached me too late for me to travel to the ceremonies. My oldest daughter, Elizabeth—now one of Queen Bess’s attendants—went in my stead. On Whit Sunday, two days after her death, Bessie was conveyed by water to Windsor, where her husband the king rested. She was attended by the prior of Charterhouse at Sheen, by her chaplain, and by Grace, a bastard daughter of the king whom Bessie had reared in her household. My sister was buried without pomp, in accordance with her wishes for simplicity. On Wednesday the requiem mass was held, attended by her only surviving son, Tom, and his wife, Bessie’s daughters Anne, Katherine, and Bridget, my own daughter

3 6 4 s u s a n h i g g i n b o t h a m and several other nieces, and a few others. The queen did not attend, having just been confined with her fourth pregnancy. Neither did the king nor his mother.

“King Henry should have come,” my daughter said indignantly. Aged sixteen now, she had grown tall and very fair; Harry would have been proud. “And his mother! It was disrespectful of her not to do so.”

“Come, you know that the king is busy with the French,” I said. We had fallen out with our allies of 1485, partly because of their reception of a young man, one Perkin Warbeck, who claimed to be the younger of Bessie’s murdered sons. Henry was planning an invasion. “And the Countess of Richmond probably fancied herself needed by the queen’s side,” I added dryly. Bess had borne the king three children already: Arthur, Margaret, and, just a year before, little Henry. Margaret Beaufort had been present at each confinement and birth, sending the royal midwives into a state of distraction with her determination that everything be done according to plan. Bess, usually rather gracious toward her motherin-law, had once muttered that Margaret would have probably been present at the conception of the royal children if King Henry had been willing.