Queen of Trial and Sorrow (10 page)

“For the sister of the queen,” I pointed out.  Since I had wed the king, how could anyone imply that my sister wasn’t good enough for a duke?

“You have certainly become adept at snatching up titled bachelors, not to mention ladies in their dotage,” he said, provoking a titter of laughter from among his attendants.  “My lady worries about where we will find husbands for our daughters.”

“That is surely no concern of mine.” 

I was no good at trading barbs and only wanted to get away from him, but as fast as I walked he had no difficulty keeping up.  Then I remembered something and came to a halt, turning to that vulpine profile.

“Marriage seems to be on everyone’s mind these days. One would think I had introduced a new fashion.  I hear you have proposed a double match between your two daughters and the king’s two brothers.  Now that
is
reaching high,” I said to a gratifying smatter of laughter from my ladies.

Warwick’s half-jesting manner changed in an instant.  He sucked in his breath sharply, his nostrils flaring.  “It is an eminently suitable match.  Where could the king’s brothers find better?  More of your sisters perhaps?” he sneered.

“You will surely see that it is in his Grace’s interests to use his brothers’ marriages to further his foreign policies – ” 

At this he barked out a rude and most unmusical laugh.  “
God’s Precious Son! 
Do you tell me that he squandered his own hand on a commoner, yet wants to use his brothers as political tools?  I fear the king is greatly confused!”

For several moments I was speechless with fury.  “How dare you?  The king shall hear of your insolence.  Leave me.”  

He bowed most correctly, not the least daunted that he had angered me, and strode away with his attendants clustered around him, laughing among themselves.

I stormed off to the king’s apartment.  I was so furious I was shaking with it: furious with Warwick for speaking so about his king and just as furious with Edward because he showed not the least annoyance when I told him about it.  “Such insolence!” I fumed.  “How can you bear it?”

“You will learn, my dear, to bear what you must.  Warwick’s value to me is worth a little insolence.”

“Truly, I don’t know how you put up with him,” I said.  When that got no response, I continued: “He sees you are slipping from his control and he can’t abide it.  First you wed where you will and now you are seeking closer alliance with Burgundy instead of France against his wishes.  He must be thinking you intend to be king in fact as well as name!”

Still he did not respond and I felt my fury growing.  For some reason, I was spoiling for a quarrel.

“Well?  Are you going to submit yourself as a puppet to a man whose policies are erroneous and will prove detrimental to England?” 

But he was not an easy man to quarrel with and would not indulge me.  Typically, he had pretended absorption in a book he had picked up as soon as I started speaking of the earl’s insolence. I was beginning to understand that my husband hated confrontation and would rather wheedle that argue.  He was also a procrastinator by nature and by choice.  He believed that as long as one could defer an unpleasant matter, there was always the chance that a stroke of fate might intervene to resolve it.

“You don’t understand.  I owe him more than I can ever repay.”

“He has been amply repaid!”

“Sweetheart,” he said, almost imploring, “you must love him for my sake.”

It is not given us women to know the kind of brotherhood born between men who have shared battle and strife and grief, and yet I understood that it is a bond that would be hard to break.  But what, I wondered, would such a man do in order to regain his ascendancy over the young king who was slipping from his grasp?

The irony of Warwick’s life was that for all his wealth and possessions, he was without a male heir.  There would never be a son for Warwick.  After the difficult birth of his second daughter, he had been told that his countess would never conceive again.

It must have tested the limits of his faith.  Every man wants a son.  Be he tanner or tinker, lord or prince, every man wants a son of his own body to whom he can pass on his name or titles and the possessions he has spent his own tenure on earth accumulating; and this was even more true of a man like the Earl of Warwick who had so much wealth to pass on.  How cruel to have been gifted with so much only to be denied that final, ultimate, priceless blessing.  A son was a man’s immortality in a way a daughter never could be.   

Of course, proud Warwick could never admit that he had failed at something most men could do bound and blindfolded, that he longed for something he couldn’t have, that he was sick with envy of those who had what he did not.  No, not he.  He must put a brave face on it; show the world it did not matter.

……….

Pentecost Sunday was as glorious a day as could be wished for and the sun was a warm, benign hand on my head and shoulders, a benediction.  It was the greatest day of my life, the pinnacle of my ambitions, the denouement at the end of the fairy tale: my coronation day. 

The Friday before, I had come down river from Greenwich in the royal barge, seated upon a gilded chair canopied with the arms of England, my ladies around me in their gorgeous gowns.  We had practiced various positions, with some standing and some sitting or kneeling until we believed we had achieved maximum affect.  None moved, except that the breeze stirred a veil or a tendril of escaped hair; we were a brilliant living fresco.  The river reflected the sky, a cloudless blue, and the breezes ruffling its surface were sweet as a baby’s breath.  Propelled by banks of oars rising and dipping in perfect rhythm, a flotilla of other boats followed behind, scrubbed, repainted and regilded for the occasion, carrying the noble families of England, the ornaments of the court, all those who said I was too lowbred to be queen, who whispered about me behind their hands while paying their respects to my face.   Pennants flew; minstrels standing in the bows played music that wafted soft as goose down on the breeze.

The flotilla was still far from the city when we heard the bells ringing.  The banks were lined with cheering people.  It seemed that the whole of London had turned out to watch.  Nothing brightened the people’s lives like a bit of pageantry.  They would turn out in droves even to watch that sad sack Henry VI ride in procession on certain Feast Days. 

The Tower of London discharged its cannon in salute and the bells pealed out a paean of joy.  By tradition, the king could take no part in the ceremonies, but he was waiting at the Tower and when the royal barge drew up he assisted me ashore.  He kissed my hand formally and those standing on the wharf and crowding close on the river gave a great cheer.  “Smile,” he whispered, and I tried, but when I forced myself to smile it felt like a gargoyle’s grimace. 

That night forty-eight Knights of the Bath were created, compared to thirty-two at the king’s coronation.  It was intended as a mark of honor, but of course there were those who said it was another blatant attempt to obscure my low birth.  Among the knights, were the Duke of Buckingham and his brother, Viscount Lyle, the Earl of Oxford, the eldest son of Lord Grey of Ruthyn, wed to my sister Eleanor, Lord Maltravers, wed to my sister Margaret, and two of my brothers: Richard and John, the latter now having the distinction of being both brother-in-law and uncle-by-marriage to the king.  Also honored were several prominent merchants and former mayors of London.

Sunday, I rose before first light apprehensive and yet determined to play my part to perfection, to show those who disparaged me that I was worthy of the station to which I had been raised.   After being ritually bathed and shriven so my soul was as clean as my body, I was dressed in a gown and mantle of purple.  Under a golden coronet, a gilt-edged veil concealed my braided hair. 

A herald led the procession, shouting my pedigree.  Behind rode my uncle, the Count of St. Pol, glowing with pride.  His hat was off, waving in the air.  No reticence there, I noted.  Edward wished everyone to know that his wife, so often referred to as lowborn or even a commoner, was in fact descended from an illustrious house that was closely related to the dukes of Burgundy.  The new knights in their blue robes followed and then came the great lords.  There were five dukes present: Suffolk, Norfolk, Buckingham and the king’s brothers, Clarence and Gloucester.   

I rode in an open litter drawn by four perfectly matched white horses.  They wore bells on their headstalls and tinkled with every step.  Then came the great ladies, the elderly and infirm in litters, the younger on high-stepping palfreys.  Following behind came my uncle among the foreign ambassadors, a complement of archers of my guard in their livery, the city fathers and guildsmen all dressed in new murrey gowns.  The route had been thoroughly swept and sweetened and was decorated with streamers, flowers and banners.  The cheering was ceaseless.  There was music and singing and at every major junction the procession paused briefly while I was entertained by a tableau or a pageant or a speech. On Tower Hill my eyes were delighted by a chorus of angels fluttering glorious golden wings made from nine hundred peacock feathers.  At the Standard in Chepe St. Paul, St. Elizabeth and Mary Cleophas made speeches of welcome.  Temple Bar had the seven wise and seven foolish virgins.  White rose petals showered down like falling snow, from windows, from tree boughs and roof gables, where people perched like brightly feathered birds.  In the streets below, the crowd was so thick that the nearest had to suck in their stomachs and tread on the toes of those behind in order not to fall under passing wheels or hooves.

The open areas around the abbey and palace were jammed with a motley crowd.  Where space could be found it was usually occupied by a troupe of dancers or jugglers or a bear performing ludicrous tricks to entertain the crowd while they waited.  For their refreshment, stalls had been set up on the perimeter and apprentices strolled along with trays slung around their necks shouting the merits of spicy sausages, eel pies and fresh fruit.  As it was a Sunday, few were at work, and although the crowd was vast and happy it was orderly, wanting nothing to mar the occasion that could be interpreted as a bad omen.  When I arrived a great roar went up and children were hoisted onto shoulders so they could see. 

The Dowager Duchess of Buckingham carried my train, followed by the great lords and ladies.  The Bishops of Salisbury and Durham led me first to Westminster Hall, where I was presented with the scepter of the queen.  At the north door my shoes were removed and I stepped upon cloth of ray that stretched all the way to the venerable Abbey of St. Peter. 

The occasion dictated that everyone dress in their robes of state.  The dukes and duchesses wore scarlet robes and mantles lined and trimmed with ermine and golden coronets with eight strawberry leaves alternating with crosses; the earls and countesses wore miniver and coronets with twelve strawberry leaves and crosses.

Before the high altar stood the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Archbishop-elect of York, three bishops, the abbot of Westminster and various other clergy who had a part to play, in all their sacerdotal finery, with brilliantly embroidered vestments, jeweled miters and gold pectorals reflecting light from the many candles and the magnificent stained glass windows.  In their stalls the choir sat in their snowy surplices.  The pulpit and throne were arrayed with cloths of gold and silk and embroidered cushions.  The standards of the high nobility hung from poles high above the crowd.  Everywhere was color and the glitter of gold and jewels.

I had practiced every stage of the ritual until I was weary, so determined was I that nothing should go wrong, that I should play my part to perfection.  Yet even as I was being divested of my state robes, I was full of anxiety that I would make some horrible error and let my husband down and confirm the general belief that I was unfit to be queen.  Lady Alice Fogge was my mistress of the robes.  She helped me dress in the simple anointing gown, which was slit at breast and back and the sleeves to the elbow.  The Dean of Westminster poured consecrated oil from the eagle-shaped ampulla into a filigreed spoon.  Assisted by George Neville, the archbishop-elect of York, the primate anointed me on breast, back and brow and on my inner elbows in the form of a cross, with the words: “Let this anointing increase your honor and establish you for ever and ever.” Afterwards I was arrayed again in royal robes, each article being blessed before being presented to me.  I was then led in procession to the coronation chair that sat in a central place before the high altar. 

Three days before, Viscount Bourchier had taken the queen’s crown from its leather coffer in the jewel house and had it lovingly polished and inspected for loose stones or blemishes, before conveying it along with the rest of the royal regalia to the abbey, where it sat on the altar until the primate reverently elevated and blessed each item before presenting them to me.

How can I describe how great was the exultation of Lord Rivers’ daughter, Sir John Grey’s widow, at that transcendent moment when the crown was placed on her head and she became the first lady in the kingdom, next in a long line of English queens… that she, of all the women in the land – and other lands – had won the right to wear this crown and to carry the blood of kings into future generations?  To say that my heart soared, as if filled with the most beautiful music, as if my feet were no longer chained to the earth and my soul was ascending to God does not convey how I felt.  Words must fail.