The King’s Sister (34 page)

So far so good. Henry was safe and John was not dead. The royal boys, rejoicing at the news, would live to be reunited with their father. But what I knew beyond any argument was that John would never be reunited with me. How could Henry forgive him for such blatant rebellion that had threatened to bring conflict and bloodletting to England?

It was Henry who brought the news, still in armour but without his shield or its dread burden. I let him tell the boys, allowing him to assuage their fears. I had expected elation from him, but instead there was only a cold and weary determination to stamp out any future repetition.

‘I will have peace in this land,’ he said to me.

‘I pray you will.’ I was as cold as he. ‘What of Huntingdon?’ I asked, deliberately formal.

All I got was a hitch of one shoulder.

‘Did he go to Devon? To Dartington?’ I asked.

‘We have not heard of him in Devon. There were no forces raised there against me.’

‘So he is alive. He is not your prisoner.’

In spite of everything, relief was trickling through me.

‘Not yet. But not for long.’ The weary chill was suddenly submerged in a roil of hot anger, Henry’s face flushed with it. ‘The most noble lords who dared defile my realm are running for their lives, but they’ll not get far. The squire, Richard Maudeley, who they were using to pose as Richard
to rally the masses has already been taken and hanged for his sins. A clever ruse, don’t you agree? Same build, same fair skin, same hair colouring. Put him in armour with a gilded helm and who would know the difference? The good citizens of England would see their rightful King once more walking amongst them and flock to his standard against me.’

So I had been right about the squire, who had been there for a purpose and had paid for his part with his life. The revolt was over. Henry was safe. I should be rejoicing with the rest of them.

I could not.

‘Are you not at least relieved?’ Henry demanded bitterly, easily reading the ferment in my mind, in the white tension of my interlocked fingers. ‘The plan, as I now understand it, was to cut me down at Windsor in the heat of the tournament. And my four sons with me, clearing the path for Richard’s return. As bloody a plot as I could have envisaged.’

‘Yes. Of course I am relieved.’

I could manage no more now that the true savagery of John’s conspiracy had been placed before me, merely repeating his words.

‘You are hardly enthusiastic.’ He turned on his heel and marched to the door. ‘Here’s a piece of news for you. I hear that Huntingdon is in London. If he tries to make contact with you, we’ll take him and kill him. There will be no clemency, so don’t waste your breath in begging.’

If he was in London, where was he? He would never try to go to ground at Pultney House. It would be watched, far
too obvious a bolt hole for a rebel with a price on his head. Nor would he come here to me at the Tower.

If John was in London, there was only one possible place to my mind where he might seek sanctuary. The Abbot’s lodging at Westminster Abbey. Henry did not know that the Jerusalem Chamber had been the conspirators’ meeting place. That is where he might take refuge. But with no hope of mercy from Henry, what was he thinking? Was he planning some escape route? Perhaps it had already been put in place, for fear the revolt would fail.

Henry being preoccupied with the stamping out of any further pockets of loyalty to Richard gave me some space. A cloak, a hood, a horse at my disposal, my authority as royal sister imposed, and unaccompanied except for a page in royal livery, I set out to cover the short distance from the Tower to the Abbot of Westminster’s lodging.

When I gestured to my page to knock on the door, it was not immediately opened. Nor at his second insistent rapping.

At last: ‘Who is it?’

I motioned to the page to reply, which he did, his voice trembling with nerves.

‘The Countess of Huntingdon. She is here to see the Earl of Huntingdon.’

The door was opened by one of the Abbey servants, anonymous in his robes, allowing me access into the abbot’s parlour, and for a moment I simply stood on the threshold and looked. Magnificent tapestries, superb linenfold panelling,
an ornate fireplace welcomed me. Was this where the lords had plotted? Had all this grandeur been witness to the detailed planning that would have brought a bloody end to my brother? A plot as treacherous as it was possible for a plot to be: no well-mannered debate between Henry and his disaffected lords who feared there would be further retribution against them tucked up their King’s capacious sleeve. No frank discussion over the future of Richard, their rightful king, imprisoned in Pontefract. In this, the Jerusalem Chamber under the auspices of Westminster Abbey, they had met in secret to piece together a terrible revenge.

And now, as I had thought, it contained one of the defeated rebels, the Earl of Huntingdon, surrounded by signs of a hasty departure.

My page dispatched beyond the closed door, we stood and looked at each other. How could I ever forgive him for what he had planned? And yet the relief that he was here and unharmed was strong enough to make me light-headed. How could love and despair exist so strongly in the same heart, twisted into an unbreakable cord? He had misled me, lied to me. Yet what point in berating him, or allowing my anger free flow? It would do no good.

John’s face was expressionless, his hands filled with leaves of parchment, as I waited for him to attempt the impossible and explain.

‘Elizabeth.’ There was no welcome. His eyes glinted in the candlelight but not from pleasure at seeing me. ‘I did not expect you.’

‘I don’t suppose you did. Why did you do it?’

‘To save Richard.’

‘At Henry’s expense.’

‘It was the only way.’

Neither of us moved one step. I was not sure that I could cross the Abbot’s tiled floor towards him, nor he to me, so great was the distance between us, so deep the chasm. I could not be compassionate, and yet I understood. There was no hope for Richard now. There was only one means by which Henry could rid himself of this dangerous man who would always be a focus for rebellion. John knew it too as he stood, the documents still in his hand. I could see it in the tightening of his mouth into a thin line.

‘Our failure has signed Richard’s death warrant.’

‘Yes.’

‘And mine too, I don’t doubt.’

‘Yes, if you are caught.’ What point in deception? We knew it to be so.

‘Are all our forces defeated?’

‘Yes.’

‘We misjudged Henry’s speed in collecting an army. And London’s loyalty.’

‘They don’t want war.’

‘And were promised reparation if they fought for Henry. We had nothing to offer them. It was a risk, and we failed.’

Even now he was well-informed. And how incongruous, the stark observations of our conversation, set against the luxurious furnishings of our surroundings. How could one be so bleak, the other so sumptuous? But the furnishings were of nothing compared with our words, which sounded a death knell to our love.

‘Where are you going?’ I asked.

‘I have passage on a ship. To take me to France.’ He began to stuff the pages into a saddlebag.

‘Would you have told me?’

‘No.’ He raised his head to meet my gaze. ‘I imagine you despise me.’

‘You would have killed my brother.’ I slid around the question he had asked. ‘You always meant to.’

‘Yes.’

And I discovered that tears were running down my cheeks.

‘Why are you weeping?’

I could not say. I did not know, except that my life was falling apart and the light in it extinguished.

‘I go within the hour to catch the tide.’

‘The weather is bad with high winds.’ How could I be so practical when he was leaving me, when my reason for living was like a battlefield of devastation?

‘I can’t stay in London.’ The silence drew out. ‘Can you forgive me?’

‘I don’t know.’

He held out his hand but I did not move. When I could not step across the dark pit he had created, John allowed his arm to fall to his side.

‘I don’t know what to say to you,’ I whispered. But I could not let it go, because I needed to understand. ‘You gave your allegiance to Henry when he took the crown. Would it have been so hard to continue to be his man? What was so very different? I know your loyalties to Richard, but you had accepted that his rule was damaged, that he was no longer fit occupy the throne. That Henry would make
a better King. You could have stood at Henry’s side, as his adviser, his well-loved counsellor. What had changed for you?’

‘Different? Changed?’ Eyes opening wide, a glint of light, John considered the sumptuous surroundings with scorn. ‘There was no difference. Yet everything suddenly changed for me. It would have been the simplest of matters to let events take their course. To let Richard go to his incarceration and death—’

‘You have no evidence of that!’ I broke in.

‘—for I see nothing less than death for him,’ John continued as if I had never spoken. ‘I could have worked for a return of my titles and lands from a grateful Henry, and taken a stance on the side of power and military might. How painless it would have been to accept office under the banner of Lancaster, mimicking the affection of a close-knit family.’ The sneer took me aback. ‘I thought I could do it. And then I could not. My little sojourn in Hertford as Henry’s prisoner made me aware of my vulnerability, and of my true allegiance. And if
I
was vulnerable, how weak is Richard? It was not right, Elizabeth. I could no longer pretend that it was.’

In spite of the anguish that was building—for was this not indeed farewell between us? —I forced my mind into the paths that John’s was taking:

‘But was Richard right in his judgements? Was he a better man than Henry? If you had murdered Henry and released Richard, would your brother have ruled England with fairer justice than my brother? There is no evidence of it. Rather of the contrary, I’d say.’

He sighed. ‘Probably not, but Richard is King by true inheritance. Where will we be if might is allowed to have its day? Do we accept that a king be usurped by a powerful man with an army at his back, simply because he is the stronger?’

‘Not any man,’ I urged. ‘Henry has enough royal blood and more to make him eligible. He is our grandfather’s heir by royal entail and male descent. It is his right to be King.’

‘And there are many who would question that right!’ Frustration gave fuel to John’s arm as he flung the packed saddlebag to the floor. ‘The whole Mortimer faction will be crying foul on Henry’s claim.’

Which I knew. Descended from my dead uncle Lionel, second son to my grandfather, the Mortimers had a sound claim, except that it ran through a female line which old King Edward had overstepped in his entail.

‘And you know full well,’ John was continuing, ‘that Richard chose the line of your uncle of York to succeed him.’

‘Of course I know. With Cousin Edward smirking with regal pretension.’ Still I would argue Henry’s cause. This was no time to be distracted by Edward of Aumale’s posturing. ‘Henry’s claim has the force of law behind him. He has the right to rule through our mother’s blood too, from Henry the Third. It is a claim that is hard to resist.’

‘It’s hard to resist because Henry has men who’ll fight for him in their own interests! But does that make it legal?’

‘Yes. To me it is entirely legal.’

As John, furiously, marched to the end of the Jerusalem Chamber to collect his outer garments, animadverting bitterly on the cunning words of lawyers, I scooped up the
saddlebag and waited for him to return to me. Which he did in the end, to stand foursquare before me.

‘I know there is no bending you,’ he said. ‘But let me speak to you.’ And at last, anger draining away, I saw grief and regret in the flat planes of his beloved face. ‘This is the last time we might see each other. If the fates smile on me, and bring me safe to a foreign shore, will you come to me? Or will spending the rest of your life with me be more than you can bear? If I have indeed destroyed your love for me, then I must accept that we will never meet again.’

Against my will, the beat of my heart quickened. Still at this eleventh hour, he was offering me a choice.

‘You never make life easy for me, do you?’ I said

‘No. We never thought it would be.’

‘Would you want me with you?’

‘Yes. You are the heart of my heart. That will never change.’

I loved him so much. In spite of everything, I loved him. I suspected I always would. But would I willingly go with him into exile? Would I leave my children and follow John into an uncertain existence in France? An exile that might never be rescinded? The alternative, the terrible alternative, was never to see him again.

Could I refuse him—and myself—that final vestige of hope of living together?

Reality rushed through my mind to cool my heated thoughts and show me what it would mean. He would never again be there at my awakening, or in the final hour of my day. Never would we ride together through pasture and woods, a hawk on his fist, the hawk no fiercer than
he. Never would I see the golden lions of his banner in a tournament heralding his incomparable dexterity of hand and eye. Never again would I know the brush of his fingers against my wrist to set my blood pounding into desire. Never would he shower me with opinion, inviting my response as if I were an equal, not a woman to be kept in the background.

John smiled a little at my silent presence as if he could read my thoughts. And I was stabbed with love and desire that heated me all over again. Remaining apart from him was no alternative at all. My decision was made, chasm or no chasm.

‘If you can get word to me, I will come to you,’ I said.

‘It will mean being an exile.’

‘Then I will live in exile with you.’

In spite of everything, I could not let him go.

‘You don’t have to decide now. Wait until I can send for you.’ His lips twisted into a smile that was barely a smile. ‘Will you allow me to kiss you in farewell?’

I stepped across the abyss and there I was, enfolded in his arms as I had been so often in the past.