Queen by Right (13 page)

Once the long notes died away and the small procession entered from the king’s apartments, Richard pointed out the main characters. “Humphrey of Gloucester,” he said, indicating a stocky man with wide-set eyes and a sensuous mouth in a handsome face who wore a knee-length purple gown. He chuckled. “I doubt he is pleased to have to walk side by side with Bishop Beaufort. They were made to reconcile in February, but ’tis not evident in their posture today.”

Cecily had recognized her Uncle Henry, his tall, lanky body dwarfing his companion, his wealth apparent in the dazzling gold and jewels he was wearing. She knew her clever uncle had amassed a fortune second to none. He had even made loans to the king, Joan had told her proudly. But Cecily did not know what Richard meant by “made to reconcile” and determined to ask him later.

“There is my lord of Bedford,” Richard whispered, “and his lady, Anne of Burgundy. She has impressed everyone with her grace and kindness, and indeed she has even sought me out particularly to ask after my well-being.”

Cecily looked with interest at the tiny, thin young woman with the elaborately rolled and wrapped headdress that was almost as big as she was. Her lively brown eyes, the most attractive feature of her rather plain countenance, were scanning the courtiers near her for familiar faces, which were now bowed reverently over bended knees or in graceful curtseys. Cecily was more curious, though, to see John, duke of Bedford, for the first time. Henry the Fifth’s most trusted brother and now regent, Bedford was a broad-shouldered, brown-haired man, with finely arched brows over steely blue eyes and an aquiline nose. As if he knew she was staring at him from across the room, Bedford turned to look in her direction, and Cecily was relieved to find warmth in his gaze. She smiled shyly at him, and he, not knowing who she was, merely inclined his head politely. Then he escorted his wife to her place with the other ladies near the raised platform and mounted the steps to his own position behind the throne, piled high with cushions.

“Duke John has taken a liking to me as well, Cis,” Richard murmured, and Cecily heard excitement in his voice. “It may be that I go with him to France when he returns.”

Cecily stiffened, her hand gripping his arm tightly enough to make Richard frown. “France? Why would you go to France?” she whispered. “Your place is here in England—and, when we are married, with me.”

Richard grinned. “I will join the army in Normandy, I hope, if your mother gives me leave. I want to be part of the victories that I am certain will rid the English territories of the French once and for all. Bedford is a great commander and I will learn much.”

Cecily stared at him. “You
want
to go and fight?” she asked. “Why? Now that we can be together.” And then she remembered the day of the hunt when they had shared their hopes and dreams. “You still wish to be a commander, is that it?”

She did not get an answer. The trumpeters blew again in earnest to announce the entrance of the king and his mother. Standing on tiptoe, she caught a glimpse of the boy wearing a gold crown and a purple mantle trimmed with ermine. She was transfixed by being in the presence of the king for the first time in her life.

On his knees, Richard tugged on her skirts. She was now the only one in the room standing. Five-year-old Henry caught sight of her, and his big blue eyes registered her face before he continued slowly past his kneeling courtiers, an earl holding up his heavy mantle. The crown, too, weighted the boy down, Cecily could see, and she was sure he must want to throw it off. Twenty-five-year-old Queen Catherine held her son’s hand, giving him strength, and when he would have stumbled on the first step of the dais, she bore him up with a kind word and lovely smile of encouragement. Cecily recognized the same maternal strength that she was lucky enough to enjoy in her own mother. Although a widow’s wimple accentuated Catherine’s hollow-eyed sadness, the Valois princess was very beautiful, Cecily decided, sinking to her knees.

“Your mother will present you to the king,” Richard told her, when they were allowed to stand again. “I can be with you or not, Cis. As I have met him on more than one occasion, it matters not to me.”

Cecily looked at him askance. “Dickon, it would seem to me that the more you are seen by the king, the more you will be in favor when he is grown. Am
I not right? Certes, you must go with me. I shall want to be presented as your future duchess so that he does not forget me either.”

Richard was taken aback by her fledgling grasp of court politics, but before he could properly acknowledge it, a chamberlain reached Joan and begged her to follow him to the dais. The countess twitched Cecily’s veil in place, centered the sapphire on her daughter’s flat chest, and led the way behind the officer.

“The lady Joan Neville, countess of Westmorland, and her daughter, the lady Cecily Neville, your grace,” the chamberlain called for all to hear. He leaned forward to catch Richard’s name, but he was superseded by the little king.

“’Tis my cousin Richard, duke of York,” Henry cried without waiting and, turning to his mother, he asked in his high, childish voice,
“C’est juste, maman?”
Catherine nodded and smiled, and Henry was pleased with himself for remembering yet another title. “You are right welcome at our court, ladies.” He rattled off the rote greeting he had been taught. “And you too, my lord duke.” Catherine bent and whispered something, and the little king was quick to add, “My mother, the queen, and I wish to offer cond . . . con . . .” He turned to his mother for help.

“Condolences, Lady Joan, upon the death of my son’s much respected councillor, your husband Earl Ralph,” Catherine finished for him.
“N’est-ce pas,
Henri?” and Henry nodded gratefully.

Cecily and Joan were still in deep obeisance, but Cecily looked up and caught the boy’s eye.

“Oh,” Henry said pointing at her. “You were the one standing just now when everyone else was on the ground.” A few anxious intakes of breath were heard from those close to the Neville women.

Joan was mortified. “’Tis her first time at court, your grace,” she told him, drawing herself up and attempting to hide Cecily with her wide sleeves. “And she misses her father’s influence. Believe me, she will be punished later,” she said, venturing an apologetic smile at Catherine. “I can assure your grace my punishment will be far more severe than your displeasure.”

Henry’s eyes spoke apologetically to Cecily’s crestfallen face, cheering the chastised Cecily in a moment of understanding between children.

Catherine laughed and her face lost its haunted look.
“Tiens, Henri, mon fils,”
she murmured to him, patting his hand. “
Madame la Comtesse,
she is a very good mother, I think,” she said in her accented English. She looked at
Cecily and stretched out her hand. “
Ma chère fille,
think no more about it. We are not offended, are we,
monseigneur?
” she asked Henry, who shook his head. “
Voilà, comtesse,
there is no need to punish her.” Joan could do nothing but incline her head in assent.

“
Viens là,
milady Cecille,” the queen continued. “You are soon to marry milord of York,
non?
” she asked, as Cecily mounted the four steps to the throne and knelt again. Joan held her breath and prayed to St. Nicholas to guide her child in courtly manners. She caught the eye of her brother, who was standing a few paces behind the throne, arching a brow. Henry Beaufort was known for his brilliant legal mind, not for his sense of humor.

Cecily knew she must beg the king’s pardon, and taking advantage of Henry’s empathy a few minutes earlier, she kissed his small hand with a pleading look. “Forgive me, your grace, I did not mean to offend, but I was so captivated by your majesty that, like Lot’s wife, I was turned to a block of salt.”

Joan almost fell sideways off the step. She heard Richard choke on a laugh behind her, and a smothered guffaw came from one of the councillors ranged behind the king.

But five-year-old Henry was puzzled by this explanation. “Lot’s wife, Lady Cecily? Who is she?
Maman,
do you know?”

Queen Catherine was not fooled by Cecily’s pretty speech, but she was amused by the young girl’s gall. She told Henry that it was a story in the Scriptures that he would learn one day and then brought the subject back to Cecily’s impending marriage.

“Aye, your grace,” Cecily answered, relieved that her wild apology had been accepted. “I am betrothed to my lord of York, but we cannot wed until I am twelve—which will be in May of next year,” she added for their edification. “I am counting the days, in truth. My dear father, Earl Ralph—God rest his soul—told me Duke Richard is a perfect match for me, and I believe he was right.” Again, a smothered guffaw, but this time Joan realized it was from her half brother, John of Bedford.

“I think milord of York is fortunate to have you, milady,” the queen commented evenly. “I can see you will be much help for him.” Then she leaned forward and whispered so that only Cecily could hear. “A
soupçon
of advice. It is better to use your cleverness in private,
ma chère fille.
Men only care for ladies with wool in the head, you understand?” Cecily nodded, thinking that if the queen believes this too, then Mother must be right.

Queen Catherine gave Cecily her hand to kiss, signaling that the audience was ended. As Cecily again made a reverence to the little king, who was yawning and absently kicking his leg against the chair, the queen told Joan: “You have a beautiful daughter, madame. I anticipate to see her at court
souvent
—often.”

Joan was so grateful for Catherine’s graciousness in the face of Cecily’s outspokenness that she backed out of the royal presence, bowing all the way, to the middle of the hall. Cecily copied her, a picture of proud contentment. The queen had singled her out, and she was sure Henry would remember her—and thus Richard. Aye, her first audience had been a success, she thought—until later in their chambers, when Joan unleashed her displeasure on her daughter.

“I thought you had turned a corner. I thought I could trust you to behave like a duchess, and a duchess should be stately and silent. Sweet Mother of God, I despair of you,” she groaned, wringing her hands. “I only hope you did not offend the king with your foolish chatter. Lot’s wife, indeed! Her grace was kindness itself, and ’twas as well the king did not understand you. Sweet Jesu, where do you learn to prattle so?” She sank down in her chair and shook her head.

Cecily’s eyes filled with tears, and she ran to Joan’s side. “I do not mean to be bad, Mother, truly I do not.”

Her contrition was so sincere that Joan relented, stroking the now unbound hair. In truth, Joan believed the girl had tried to say the right thing, but nevertheless a boundary had been crossed that was hard to explain to her daughter. Perhaps Cecily was too young to have been presented, Joan mused, but she could not undo what had been done.

She sighed, blaming Ralph for the thousandth time for spoiling the child. “The sooner you marry York, the better,” she muttered instead. “Then you will have to answer to him and not to me.”

Joan did not really mean to be so harsh. Cecily was all the comfort she had at this lonely time in her life. But she was tired of raising children. While an element of truth was in her words, she regretted having to chastise this innocent child.

H
ENRY
B
EAUFORT, BISHOP
of Winchester, sat stiffly on Ralph’s old chair opposite Joan in the countess’s wood-paneled chamber in a wing of Leicester Castle.

“I am this close to a red hat, Joan,” Beaufort told his sister quietly, pinching his thumb and index finger together. “But I dare not hope that the pope will be any more successful this time than last, if Gloucester has ought to say in the matter. The man hates me, that much is certain.”

Joan glanced across the room at her ladies, Cecily among them, and knew their loyalty to her was strong, but she kept her voice low. “Why, Henry?”

“Upon Christ’s Cross, he is a menace!” Beaufort hissed, and Joan blanched at her bishop brother’s blasphemy. “The truth is that he is as popular in London as I am unpopular. I have oft-times felt myself in danger, and indeed a threat came to my ear that the commoners were ready to drown me in the Thames.”

Joan’s barely perceptible eyebrows shot up. “Surely not,” she exclaimed. He nodded, flicking a flea from his scarlet gown.

Beaufort swilled his wine and swallowed a mouthful. “Humphrey is not fit to govern, that is certain. He is rash and favors conflict.”

Cecily found her uncle’s permanent sneer and piercing eyes frightening at the best of times, but now that he was scowling, his eyebrows meeting in the middle over his long, hooked nose, she hoped that she would never be the cause of his ire.

Joan shook her head sympathetically. “I shall pray you receive your red hat, Henry. You deserve it above all men.”

Beaufort’s intense gaze now turned on Cecily. She carelessly pricked herself with her needle and winced. Pretending to concentrate on her sewing, she kept listening. This is how one learns what is happening in the outside world, she told herself. I need to know things like this when I am Dickon’s wife. Then, in a panic, she realized that her uncle was now speaking of her, and she prayed that her heated skin did not mean that she was blushing.

“The child understands the stakes in all of this, does she not, sister?” he said to Joan, his eyes never leaving Cecily. “We cannot have York believing he has a right to the throne, and she must discourage him when they are wed. We must make sure the crown stays with Lancaster.”

“Certes, she knows her place in our family and that Lancaster must endure. She is as sharp as flint, that one,” Joan murmured, as Cecily strained to hear. “I shall keep her close and impress upon her where her loyalties lie. And ’tis my belief York is fond of her already, so she is likely to have influence with him.” She grunted. “God knows, she asserts her will . . .”

Cecily was perplexed yet again. Had Joan not insisted that a wife must be loyal to her husband’s house and to his ambitions above all? Dear God, will I ever learn to be a duchess?