Rebellion (34 page)

And when he came to the palace within the
Tower his wife ran out to meet him. She clung to him and wept with more emotion than she
had shown since the early part of their marriage. And he lifted her up and took her to
their private room.

In early October, when the king came to
London, Margaret's husband set off to meet him wearing a new hat and spurs, in the hope
that the king would see he was there.

It was a trying experience since he did not
like crowds. There was a moment when he had been lifted from the ground by the sheer
mass of people, his feet barely touching the pavement. The stench of the crowd had
something feral about it that had quite put him off his food. And he had lost his
hat.

‘But did he see you?' she asked. Henry said
he couldn't be sure. He had seen the king, but there was no chance of drawing closer to
him. He had been seen by one of the lords who surrounded him – Mountjoy or Arundel – he
was sure of that. And he had written from the safety of his inn to express his joy at
the king's return.

There had been no reply, of course, but he
had every hope that the king had received his message.

Margaret knew that it was pointless to
speculate. They had done what they could. She'd joined her husband in London because
they had other business to attend to. They were finally going to meet with Lady Herbert,
to discuss the question of her son.

They would meet on the twenty-first day of
October, in the Bell Inn on Fleet Street. Lady Herbert would be there with her brother,
Lord Ferrers, and their lawyers. Margaret felt steeled, as if for battle.

‘It is good of Lady
Herbert to come,' her husband said. ‘She is still grieving.'

I am still grieving
, she
thought.

‘We must be conciliatory and amenable,'
Henry said. ‘It is a great concession for them to come.'

She looked at him impatiently. He had grown
fatter as she had grown thinner. He was starting to go bald. ‘I will be as amenable as
the occasion demands,' she said.

The inn was dark, the walls blackened by
smoke and grease. They were greeted by Henry's lawyers and candles were brought to the
alcove where they sat. They ordered a platter of mutton, bread and cheese then waited
almost half an hour for their company to arrive.

Lord Ferrers came in first. Margaret
recognized him by his resemblance to his sister. He had the same fair, aristocratic good
looks. Lady Herbert came in behind him. She was thinner, Margaret noticed, and seemed
distracted. They were accompanied by two lawyers.

Lord Ferrers did most of the talking,
addressing Henry and his lawyers.

His brother-in-law, William Herbert
(deceased), had paid one thousand pounds in 1462 for the wardship and marriage of Henry
Tudor, Earl of Richmond. He had looked after him well, at his own expense, raised him as
one of his own sons. He was part of his sister's family now – in fact, it could be said
that he had lost his father.

‘I would not say that,' Margaret said, and
Lord Ferrers looked at her sharply. Lady Herbert merely blinked at the candle flame.

‘My brother-in-law was the only father the
boy has ever known,' Lord Ferrers said, with a slightly aggressive insistence. ‘He fed
and clothed and educated him as he would one of his own sons – his children are the
young earl's brothers and sisters. It would be wrong at this time of grieving to pluck
him from the bosom of his family.'

Henry shot her a warning
look to tell her not to say anything. He began to spread the documents on the table, for
the benefit of the lawyers. Lord Ferrers did not even glance at them.

She did not like him. She had not expected
to like him, of course, because of what he'd done. He'd taken Edmund captive at
Carmarthen Castle, kept him under guard while plague broke out and killed him. He, as
much as his brother-in-law, had caused this situation.

Now that she sat near him, however, she
found that she did not like him because of a certain brutality beneath the elegance.

She turned away from the discussion and gave
her attention to Lady Herbert, leaning closer. ‘I am sorry for your loss,' she said.

She could sense Lady Herbert's withdrawal.
This expression of sympathy exposed the change in their position. There was an
alteration in her, Margaret could see that. It was as though she was preoccupied or lost
in the twilight world of grieving. Margaret remembered it well.

Now she knows what it feels like
,
Margaret thought.

It surprised her sometimes, this part of
herself that lurked beneath the surface like a cold pebble. Did she not feed the poor,
minister to the sick, give alms regularly and conspicuously?

The elder of the two lawyers was saying that
there were no legal grounds for keeping Margaret's son, and went on to read the writ he
had brought, which was in Latin. Margaret had no grasp of Latin. She would have to sit
in silence while they discussed the future of her son in a language she did not know.
Lord Ferrers, however, interrupted him, saying that the writ did not signify – it was a
matter for the king.

She would not dare to approach the king
after her visit to Clarence only a few weeks ago. She felt a burning resentment towards
Lord Ferrers, who was so resistant to her claim, unmoved by the evidence of their
lawyers.

But then, unexpectedly, Lady Herbert leaned
forward. ‘He does not belong to us,' she said. ‘We should let him go.'

Everyone looked at
her.

‘Everything must go, sooner or later,' she
said, looking back at them with luminous eyes.

‘My sister is unwell,' Lord Ferrers
said.

‘I am not unwell,' she said. ‘I am bereaved.
That is different.' She looked at Margaret. ‘Your son should be returned to you,' she
said.

Margaret's heart began to pound.

‘It's hardly that simple,' Lord Ferrers
said. ‘It is the king's command that you should have custody of him.'

‘But you can speak to the king,' Lady
Herbert said, turning the beautiful blue blankness of her gaze towards him. ‘He will
listen to you.'

Both sets of lawyers began talking at once,
but Lady Herbert stood up.

‘It's hot in here,' she said. ‘There is no
air. I'm going outside.'

Henry looked at Margaret and she realized
she was expected to accompany Lady Herbert into the street. Even though the discussion
was at this crucial point.

Reluctantly she followed Lady Herbert to the
door. In front of them was a squalid, malodorous alley, leading to all the clamour of
London.

Margaret supposed she should speak. ‘I – am
grateful to you,' she said. ‘I know you are – fond of him – that you have taken good
care of him – given him an excellent education –'

Lady Herbert did not even look at her. ‘I
know what loss is,' she said. Margaret murmured something to the effect that the
acceptance of loss was in itself a kind of gain. Lady Herbert looked at her kindly. ‘You
don't think that,' she said.

No, she did not think that. But she was
anxious to return in case Lord Ferrers had managed to turn the argument his way
again.

‘You know what he asked me, before he left?'
Lady Herbert said. Margaret did not know, and was not sure that she cared.

‘He asked me to spend the
rest of my life in chastity and prayer. Take holy orders if I could. He made me promise.
On the Bible. And wrote it to me again in a letter the night before he died. In case I
should forget. He was about to lose his life – he could not bear the thought that I
might not lose mine.'

She said the last words with such bitterness
that Margaret looked up. ‘Will you do it?' she said, but Lady Herbert did not answer her
directly.

‘William was not a man who took kindly to
loss,' she said, with an edge to her voice.

He inflicted enough on me
, Margaret
thought, but she was looking at Lady Herbert with different eyes, seeing suddenly what
her marriage must have been.

‘That's why I can release your son,' she
said. ‘Because I no longer want to be a prisoner.'

And there it was suddenly, the shift inside
Margaret of a long-held grudge, a fixed and rooted resentment. She was so disconcerted
by this that for the moment she couldn't speak.

Outside in the street a great rabble passed,
drunken, noisy. ‘Perhaps we should go back inside,' Lady Herbert said.

They made their way back to the alcove where
the lawyers were now talking money with Lord Ferrers. Margaret slipped back into her
seat in time to hear him name an exorbitant sum, and her spine stiffened. She had been
expecting some sort of monetary transaction, had been putting money aside for it all
these years. Even so, the amount mentioned would cripple them.

Henry was leaning forward, his face creased
in concentration. He said that he did not think any amount was owed for the upbringing
and care of his stepson – given the fact that Lord Herbert had purchased his wardship,
the
care
of his ward might be taken for granted. Lord Ferrers said that he was
not proposing to draw up a bill of actual expenditure, but he thought some
acknowledgement should be made of the
investment of care
, and some compensation
for what they might lose.

‘Don't be ridiculous,
Walter,' Lady Herbert said. ‘He is their son. They should not have to buy him back.'

Lord Ferrers looked so confounded by this
that in another situation Margaret might have laughed. ‘I am merely trying to recoup
your investment,' he said.

‘Investment!' said Lady Herbert. ‘He is not
a coin. He is a child. And he is not my child. He is Lady Margaret's.'

Lord Ferrers' face reddened, but he would
not give in. He insisted that at least the original amount of money for the wardship
should be returned. And that the matter should be referred to the king – they could do
nothing without the king's express permission. The king himself, he said, would decide
on any monies that were payable.

Margaret's spirits, which had risen
mercurially, fell at this. She looked at Lady Herbert, but she could hardly disagree;
she was forced to accept that it was a matter for the king. Henry was giving her another
warning look, to silence her. So it would be put off again.

‘I will be seeing the king myself very
soon,' Lord Ferrers said. ‘I have been called to council and can speak to him in person.
Then we can meet again.'

Margaret's spirits sank even further. The
king would listen to Lord Ferrers, of course. There would be no one to put her case
forward and the king would not listen if they did.

‘I will write to the king,' Lady Herbert
said unexpectedly. ‘I will say I am perfectly willing to return your son.'

Margaret did not want to cry; not here, not
now. ‘Thank you,' she managed to say.

And then Lord Ferrers was ushering Lady
Herbert away and Henry was saying goodbye to the lawyers. He took her arm and steered
her into the unclean air of the street.

She tried not to guess what he was thinking.
All he would say, when prompted, was that he too should probably write to the king.

‘But if Lady Herbert is
prepared to give him back to me –'

‘It's what the king thinks that
matters.'

He did not say that the king would not be
predisposed to grant her any favours since she had visited Clarence. The consciousness
of what she had done overwhelmed her now. How terrible it would be if she herself had
cut the lifeline held out to her! Terrible and cruel. She had not known what she was
doing.
Lord, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

‘But – she is willing –'

‘The king has no money,' Henry said shortly.
‘This is one of his more lucrative wardships.'

‘But we can pay.'

‘He will want to reward those who have
supported him,' Henry said. ‘It would not be beyond him to take your son from one
guardian and give him to another.'

She could feel the actual sensation of
falling, of nausea, from so much mutton and ale.

Henry would be better off staying with Lady
Herbert rather than being removed to anyone else. Someone she did not know, where she
would have to begin the great business of establishing communication with him all over
again.

Once more, it seemed, she had made matters
worse.

Henry did write a long letter to the king,
wishing him well, assuring him of their support, then raising the more delicate matter
of Margaret's son. But in the next few days events moved so swiftly that it seemed
unlikely the king would find the time to read it, let alone answer.

The great council was summoned to meet on 6
November. Henry Percy, senior, was released from the Tower to attend it. Nothing was
said about whether he would rejoin his family afterwards, or reclaim the wardship of his
son from Lady Herbert, or what that might mean for Margaret's own son if he did.