Wife to Henry V: A Novel (33 page)

“Then you have been patient, indeed!” Johanne said, dry. Suddenly bitterness took her. “When you first came into England, Madam—and all the world at your feet—you cared not at all to see my face; no, nor that I languished in prison where an unjust King and ungrateful son had thrust me.”

Catherine's soft mouth drooped still further. “It was none of my doing,” she said mildly. And suddenly she wanted Johanne with her hard mouth and her clever eyes as a friend. “Forget the
Madam
; I am your kinswoman.”

“And when did you remember that, kinswoman?” Johanne asked mocking. “Did you ever visit me? Or ask to visit me? Surely my fair son could not have refused his bride so natural a request? And my dower, kinswoman; my revenues and my lands—what of them? Gone to fill your pockets, so I hear. You and Madam Jacque—my other kinswoman—have not done ill between you.”

“You shall have it back and at once; my share, at least. Back payment, too—when I can. I have the dower my father agreed upon; twenty thousand gold crowns. As for the rest, the forty thousand crowns England promised—it will come.”

“Will it indeed? Not if you count upon Gloucester; he could not, if he would. It is my Lords in Council you must woo. As for Gloucester, keep out of that tangle with Madam Jacque. I warn you—and I have been thought none so foolish in my time—there's a tangle that may cost us dear; all of us.”

“Henry himself desired the match.” Catherine remembered the unspoken bargain with Jacqueline.

“Tell that to another and not to me! Henry would never stir up a hornet's nest in the hope of honey; he wasn't such a fool. As for my revenues—let them go. I have been over-careful in my time and for that I have been punished. Had I gone on giving I should never have seen the inside of a prison. A witch! Son Henry knew better than that! It was my money he was after and all Christendom knows it. For why was I never brought to trial? And why, when he felt death at his shoulder, did he order them to set me free? Well, I have said my say; and now I must guard against growing garrulous as well as old...But...” she paused, “if I did not speak once, the thing would fester and we should not be friends but enemies.”

“I am glad you spoke. I am glad we are to be friends—I need a friend. These English—I don't understand them. Help me, Johanne.”

“The days of my power are gone.”

“Your wisdom, your advice—that's all I need. It's the child, it's Harry. A boy needs a man to govern him, I know, I know it well. But he's a baby; not yet twelve months old. I must keep him a little. Would Humphrey help me, do you think?”

“He would if he could. Oh not for your sake, don't think it; he's one who gives nothing for nothing! But* he would dearly love to take the King out of Exeter's hands—Beaufort hands. To get anywhere at all you'd have to play Gloucester against Beaufort—and that's not an easy game to play; the balance is too fine. Still it's a game that could be played—but risky, risky.” She gave Catherine a searching look.

“I'm Harry's mother “

“It's not all mother-love with you, never tell me that! You're your mother's daughter. You itch to stir every pot.”

Isabeau's daughter...but Isabeau's wit?
Johanne looked at the soft drooping underlip. “Well you can but try. Stake your die on the Beauforts. My brother-in-law the rich bishop is out to clip Master Humphrey's wings. Henry Beaufort's your man.”

“He's another to give nothing for nothing,” Catherine reminded her. “What have I to offer the rich bishop?”

“A Queen's countenance and a niece's obedience. Oh they're quite intangible; but like many things you can't see or touch—they're weighty. At this moment the people love you—young widow, young mother; you stir all hearts. Popularity. It's quite a straw to add to his balance. Besides, one is never so rich one can't be richer. Throw in your lot with the Beauforts.”

“They told me you were wise,” Catherine said, “but you are wiser than any telling—a very Queen of wisdom.”

* * *

Henry Beaufort looked at Catherine with thoughtful eyes.

“So little a child,” he said at last. “It is right and seemly he should be with his mother. I will speak to my brother, Exeter, Madam; he should not be hard to persuade.”

“Dear brother,” Johanne lifted a smooth face. “The King is an infant, true. But still he is the King.” She paused. “The Great Seal,” she said very deliberately, “should it not be returned to the King, the King himself—in person?”

Catherine looked to see if Johanne could be joking. The Great Seal in those infant hands that could not, by themselves, endure the metal's weight? But Johanne's face was grave. Catherine looked at my lord Bishop of Winchester, surprised the gleam in his eye.

“But naturally,” he said and it was as though he had thought of the matter himself. “The lord Protector must receive it from the King—the King's own hands. My nephew Gloucester shall come to Windsor for the purpose.” He looked with respect at this subtle Johanne who had found so neat a way of keeping his enemy in his place. Return the Great Seal to the King. It would show the whole country, show Gloucester himself, that there was no Regent; a Protector, merely, acting by will of Parliament and receiving his office from the King.

He bowed over Catherine's hand, over Johanne's; and was gone.

* * *

She had won. She was to keep her child. Blessings, blessings upon Johanne! Until he is five years old, my lord of Exeter had said. Five years. Why look beyond them? Five years in which to make and mould. It would not need five years or four, or three, even, to make him hers forever. The King's love and her own power. They were strings intertwined.

She had known great moments—her marriage, her crowning, the birth of her son, the triumphs through England, through France. But never a greater than this, when upright in her chair, the child upon her knee, she saw Chancellor Langley kneel to deliver the Great Seal. Guiding the tiny fingers to touch the heavy disc before it was handed to Gloucester, she felt the upsurge of power. She gave no sign; she sat still as stone with the child grave and quiet as though he understood—a true little King.

When the great officials had gone, she gave herself up to delight in her son. He was so beautiful with his great blue eyes and his flaxen hair and his dimples; his wrists and ankles wore the most exquisite bracelets, not of gold, but—much more precious—of perfect rose-leaf flesh. The most beautiful child in the world, his mother thought; and the cleverest and the most loving. Look how he crowed the moment he saw her and leaped in the nurse's arms to come to her! Old Astley could not hide her jealousy, no, nor her disapproval either! She was forever trying to model him into a grave decorum—and he not a year old! But all the same she had to admit his baby gravity was charming. She thought, sometimes, it was a pity his father had never seen him. Well, that was Henry's own fault. She could so easily have carried the baby into France. But then Henry had had no heart. He had seen the child as heir to his greatness; nothing more.

These few weeks before Christmas, putting aside ambition, she enjoyed him as any mother her first child. She would kneel by his cradle shaking the coral or gently throwing a soft ball; or she would walk in the great park of Windsor, the small fur bundle that was the King held close in her arms. For a little while she was a girl again, a child almost, with her child...the child she had never been. Here there was no looking over one's shoulder for fear of the madman; no cringing from threat of a whipping; no small gnawing of hunger or of cold. It was all gentle and comfortable as her own childhood had never been.

Henry had wounded her to the heart; but it was a wound already healing. Soon she would commission a great tomb—marble, silver, gold, whatever was needful to his glory. But for this little space of time she would forget death, forget she was a Queen, forget, even, her ambition. She would give herself this small taste of Paradise—mother and child.

* * *

It had been death. And death. And death.

Now all the world was wedding and bedding, so it seemed. At Hertford, where she had invited James of Scotland for Christmas she heard nothing but praises of his love. She herself might have been cross-eyed, she thought; and hump-backed, too, for all the compliments he paid her! And yet she was young; and yet she was pretty...and she had helped him to his freedom and his love. He was to marry his Joanna early in the new year and carry her back home.

Jacque had come hot-foot from Hadley at the news. “Joanna Beaufort stepping into the royal bed of Scotland! Another Beaufort stepping up, up, up!” Jacqueline was barely friendly. Catherine herself was cool. Jacque had indeed thrown her cap over the windmill; she was living openly with her handsome Humphrey as man and wife. She had scrambled through some sort of marriage ceremony without consulting anyone—certainly not her friend. Now she was watching, all jealousy, lest Catherine show favour to her lover's enemies.

“Madam Jacque should be well whipped for a fool!” Johanne said. “No good can come from this marriage—if we may call it so—neither to us, nor to herself. If the charming Humphrey doesn't tire of her soon and take the Brabant marriage as an excuse to get rid of her—and what better excuse since it still stands?—then be sure the little Cobham will deal with the matter.”

“I've been hearing that name more than a little lately. Who is she?”

“Humphrey's latest; otherwise a nothing and a nobody. No birth; poor as a church mouse—except what she's managed to collect, she's had a string of paramours; no need to guess at her virginity! But for all that he's mad for her.”

“Mad, indeed! But it won't last long. Faithfulness isn't in him.”

“She's a flaming beauty and she's got brains,” Johanne said. “They say she's a witch and they could be right—those slanted eyes, that full red mouth—though for my part I'm chary about casting that particular stone. But witch or not, she's a woman; and a jealous one. Cousin Jacque would do well to let her cupbearer taste first.”

“Jacque isn't so easily disposed of. Besides, they're not likely to meet. He's got the good taste surely to keep his wife and his mistress apart.”

“His two mistresses, wouldn't you say? Jacqueline isn't his wife yet,” Johanne reminded her. “Besides, you can't count on Humphrey's good taste when he wants anything. The little Cobham has already established herself—one of Jacque's ladies. I told you she was clever.”

“There won't be much chance for the Cobham to exercise her cleverness or her charms. Jacque is off to the Low Countries, as everyone knows, to win back her inheritance. Humphrey goes with her—and a whole army so they say.”

“It's enough to make Henry turn in his grave. No man has the right to fight his private battles when every sword is needed in France. Here is Humphrey garnished with all Jacqueline's titles—Count of Hainault, Count of Holland, Count of Friesland, of Zeeland—the whole lot. Burgundy will never forgive him for poaching on his preserves.”

“They're Jacque's, not his,” Catherine said.

“Possession is nine points of the law, so they say. Jacqueline runs away and her husband seizes her possessions—Duke of Hainault he styles himself—one better than Humphrey! And further, he declares Burgundy his heir; he's a sick creature and Burgundy's hopes are naturally high. Now here comes Jacqueline making over all her property to her new husband—and prepared to fight for her rights. Do you think Burgundy will allow that? He'll certainly withdraw some of his forces from France to defend his 'rights'. If he's pressed far enough—he'll withdraw them all. And then where will you be?”

“We still have John, the best captain of all the armies in France, friend or foe.”

“I know, I know. Here's John sparing himself no labour for Harry's inheritance and here's Humphrey set to bring all to disaster. I tell you this may yet cost Harry his French crown.”

“Let them but see their King,” Catherine was complacent so that Johanne longed to shake her. “He's so beautiful. No-one could deny him anything.”

“You have your mother's itch for power, but not her hard head! Henry was right not to name you in the Regency; but not so right when he named Humphrey—if he ever did, which I doubt. Well, as God sends, He sends—as Henry used to say; and our gossiping here won't mend matters; though once my whisper would have gone far towards it. Come, tell me about my grandson, if I may name him so.”

“Who has a better right? You played a mother's part to his father. You know he's to attend Parliament, Harry himself? But of course you do. It was you that put it into Uncle Bishop Beaufort's head.”

“It didn't need much putting. Let all England see—and my lord Protector Humphrey in particular—that though the King is an infant, he is still the King; and law comes from the King and not from any Protector—not even Master Humphrey.”

“You know I'm to carry the King to Parliament? Or did you put that notion into Uncle Beaufort's head, too?”

“That was another idea that didn't need much putting. Such a pretty picture—mother and child; and of all that pretty innocence, the Beauforts sworn protectors! Trust my lord Bishop to turn it to his own advantage. But,” she paused, said slowly, “don't think, my dear, to turn it to your own. Don't let that distress you overmuch. Be glad of the Beauforts on your side—Humphrey's reputation isn't so sweet just now, with all the scandal about Jacque—she's sleeping openly with him at Hadley. But you—you'll be riding through London, the child on your knee and the odour of sanctity all about you; and about my lord Bishop of Winchester and the good Exeter who protect you. But be careful, Catherine. To the Beauforts the power, to
them
. Not to you; never to you.”

Again Catherine smiled the small, secret smile...Johanne was wise; but Johanne was growing old. What heart would not soften at the Queen's first appearance with her child since her husband's death—she young and forlorn and pretty, and the child beautiful as the infant Jesus? She was her mother's daughter—in spite of Johanne's poor opinion of her wits; she'd be a fool, indeed, if she couldn't make something out of that!

* * *

The Clerk to the Wardrobe whose name she could not remember, brought out gowns and cotes; brought out cloaks and houppelandes. Sitting queenly, the nurse behind her holding the child, Catherine thought, But for this man there might have been no child; and I thrust from the public eye or returned unwanted to France. A pretty gown...so small a thing. But it needed that spark to fire Henry's coldness.