Wife to Henry V: A Novel (53 page)

She lay dreaming herself back into girlhood.

...She was young; she was pretty, untouched by any man. She was the hope of France. She was wife to great Henry and the hope of England. She was more than that—she was her love's love...

She would lie there, whispering his name letting out her heart's pitiful secret.

She came to herself one crisp December morning. In spite of the great fire burning, in spite of the fur rugs heaped, she shivered.

“I dreamed I was a child again,” she told Johanne, sitting faithful by her bed. “Because of the cold. We were always cold when it was winter at St. Pol. I cried sometimes. So did my brother...the Dauphin, you know. Not Charles; not John. We didn't see them much; we hardly knew them for our brothers. We had Philip, though; a nice little boy—to look at. But sly, sly even then. Yes, it was Louis who cried—the oldest of us all. Poor fat little Louis with his chilblains! He cried a lot. Michelle didn't cry, ever. She was too proud. For Philip. She worshipped him.”

She stopped, thoughtful. “Little children should not be cold or hungry,” she said.

* * *

It was later in the evening when she sent for the Abbess. “Is it near Christmas?” she asked. “I am glad of that. Men of goodwill take on for a little the pity of Christ. Send for my lord the King.”

“It is a hard thing for you to understand,” Johanne said, “because you are not yet a man.”

“Man enough to honour chastity,” the King said. And what did she know, this old, old woman, how desire can take a man and twist a man, young though he may be; and how he must drive it from him, knees upon cold stone, rope upon bare flesh!

“But there is one thing—” Johanne said and it was as though he had not spoken, “you can understand; or so I think. Loneliness.”

Loneliness. Yes, he knew that! He turned his head so that she might not see how her arrow found its mark.

“She was young when she left her home” Johanne said, “not so much older than you are now. A strange land, a strange people, a strange tongue. But she kept her courage high. She loved your father at the first; would have loved him more had she been let. He was not an easy man; he found it hard to put off his greatness. In his way he loved her; but he loved the clash of battle and the glory of a crown better. And their life together? What was it but a few weeks, a few little weeks?”

“Yet she had been his wife and he her husband. Of all men living he was chaste.”

She curbed her tongue from telling him his father had been lustful in youth, in manhood cold.

She said instead, “As long as she might keep her child, she was content. To watch over you, to love you—it was all she asked.”

He said nothing, remembering, or thinking he remembered, the soft touch of her cheek against his baby cheek, the kindness of her hand guiding his.

“But they took you from her. Your father wronged her there.”

“A King is not to be ruled by petticoats,” he told her, stiff.

“A King is pretty much like other boys,” she said, and saw his profile, that delicate and beautiful profile, grow hard. It was not his kinghood she had affronted, as well she knew; it was his preposterous sainthood. She was too old to care for a King's anger. “A King, even, needs his mother—if he's small enough. Your father should have named her a guardian. She was young but she would have learned, been guided by wiser heads. To take you away, so utterly away—it was wrong.”

…Do you tell me of the misery of waking and knowing she was not there, would never be there again? And the long shame among the palace boys because they were stronger than I. Five years old and no-one to turn to—save Astley with her rod; and Butler who was not behind hand, either. And the reproofs of my Uncle of Exeter; or worst of all my lord of Warwick...cold looks, cold rod...?

She could not, wise as she was, know his thoughts. But she saw his profile hard as marble. Exeter had mentioned the harshness, a fault across his gentleness; Warwick complained still of immovable obstinacy.

She said, “When you pray, ask for a gentle heart.”

He said nothing; but his lips moved; his fingers slipped upon the rosary.

She spoke now to a gentler Harry; but remote. He wore the look, she thought, of a young monk.

“She was so young and so lonely...and so lovable. Many men asked her in marriage but your uncle of Gloucester refused; time after time, refused. He was afraid. This alliance or that, how would it affect him—his power, his interests? Not your power, not your interests, but always
his
...”

She saw he was listening now. She said, “How could she go on, young and unloved and alone? It was not to be expected. And your uncle did not expect it. How should he, slave to his own base passions, taking his pleasure where he would, seeking his satisfaction as always; no cost too high—as long as someone else paid piper. In one case—you! You paid for his passion and his greed with Burgundy's friendship; you may yet pay with France itself!”

She paused. The widened eyes, the mouth half-open told her all this was news to him. She went on, adding to the picture with firm, bold strokes.

“He didn't expect your mother to weep for ever—of course he didn't! And he waited to pounce. Can you doubt it? That law of his concerning the marriage of women holding crown lands—at whom was it aimed do you think? No need to ask since he named his victim in particular—the Queen Dowager. Death to the man who weds her without leave. Such a thing has never been heard of before. The man might die by the assassin's hand, but by the law of this country—never! Yet for all his cunning, all his care, your Uncle of Gloucester found nothing; for years nothing—he and his dark witch spying together.

“I tell you these things because your mother will not; I think she cannot...she is very sick. Sir, I am reckoned wise as this world goes; and you may believe me now. If you are not generous when you should; you cannot be generous when you would. It will be too late and all your praying will not help you. Harry, my dear...” and she no longer called him Sir, treating him instead as a child near to her heart and not the King at all. “If you are not loving now, then one day you will break your heart for it—and nothing will make it whole again.”

He felt his heart—that obstinate heart against which my lord Governor had warned him, and which he alone knew to be bruised and vulnerable—ache now with its sorrow. If he kept her longer here, the wise old woman, the terrible old woman who knew how to strike true, he would overflow with his tears—tears a King must not shed as my lord Governor had told him with scarce-hidden contempt.
A King must not weep
; not when the crown God has given and the people sworn to, is stripped from him; not when he is torn in anguish between a mother dying and her fair name disgraced.

Back turned, he nodded dismissal; heard the soft fall of her gown as she swept her curtsey.

...No, a King does not weep—not even when the mother he has worshipped has lain in a man's bed to bring forth his bastards.

His innate simplicity sicklied over with false purity, his passionate deprived adolescence rose to condemn her, turned back bitter upon himself.

...He had worshipped her. As a little child had commanded her image to be set upon his subtlety for all to see—the Blessed Virgin. Fool that he had been, blasphemer that he had been! Well, men had broken it and eaten it and there was no-one to remember his folly. But
he
remembered; he himself remembered; just as he would always remember the whispering now and the tittering as he…

He felt himself stiffen in the bitterness of his pride.
The People's Servant must be be humble
—Warwick filled top-to-toe with his own pride warning him.
God's Servant must be humble
—was almost as though Thomas Netter, risen from his grave in far Rouen, stood by to warn him. The holy man and world-soiled Warwick warning him in one breath.

He knew not what to do, what to say. He wanted to pray to St Edmund, to St. Dunstan that they might intercede for him all unworthy. Unworthy, indeed, to cry upon the saints, his heart so bitter and so wild. He longed unspeakably for Father Thomas who had known him as a little child, in whose kind arms his father had died. Father Thomas would have known how to help him to a gentler heart. .

He set his thoughts upon Father Thomas, till he felt his heart grow gentle and fell upon his knees; knelt there until his limbs grew cold until heart and soul had emptied themselves into space...knelt blind and deaf until God gave him back his heart and soul again, gentle and clean and all-unknowing of the journey they had made.

* * *

When he came into her room he thought it was empty, so flat the mattress beneath the heaped furs, so linen-white the face against the pillow, so faint her breathing. Then the lids lifted and he saw her eyes fever-bright, dark in their dark sockets; saw, most pitiful, how she tried to lift herself in the bed, as though she would rise to pay reverence.

He went to her quickly then, forgetful of the struggle and the anger and the bitterness; remembering only that she was his mother and that he loved her.

He nodded to the lady Abbess to go; brought the stool and set it by the bed. And all the time her eyes, her sunken eyes were upon him, could not leave him, this dear son of hers. And surely he was like an angel of God with his hair bright as a halo, and his blue eyes and all the sweetness and the gentleness about him. She wanted nothing but to He there and look upon him before her eyes darkened forever.

But she must not rest upon the gentle moment. Urgent against the body's weakness, the mind as yet unclouded, warned her. Upon this moment hung her dear love's life and the future of her children.

Her lips moved. He took her hand lending her his own young strength. Almost he could shame his kingship, seeing it so wasted.

“Madam,” he said gently; and then, “Mother...mother.”

“My son,” she said, “oh my son...” The slow tears welled. She had seen so little of him, so very little. Of all the children she had borne, not one left with her for her solace and her joy.

“The children,” she said. “Your brothers, Harry...”

“Yes,” he said, gentle, the battle fought.

“A man's brothers...shield upon his arm, cover to breast and back.”

“Yes,” he said again. “And so it shall be.”

“They will serve you well. Blessing them you bless yourself...and me...and me.”

She fell to silence again, smiling upon the thought of her little sons...Owen's sons.

“They are of the blood of Kings,” she said.

In spite of himself the anger flew to his cheeks.

She said, gently, “I could not give myself to any common man,” and thought of Owen who was above all men, gentle or simple, yes, or royal, even. “He is a true man,” she said and she was smiling, “brave and strong and beautiful...and the kindness of God. Be merciful to him,” she said, “because he was my husband and I his heart's delight.”

Was, she said,
was
. He was torn between his pity and his jealousy; for the man she loved so passionately, so tenderly, that, dying, she was not afraid to name his kindness with the kindness of God. His jealousy swelled, reached out to those children-like himself sons of her body—whom her dying lips smiled to remember.

She watched him, her whole soul set upon God that He would win the battle for Owen's sons.

And watching, she saw his eyes widen, begin to stare; saw the colour drain from his face; he was stiff now as though the soul had gone out from his body and he had died in his place.

In the silence he spoke, empty voice of the empty body; and the words he spoke were the words he had spoken before.

“My brother...the son of my brother...shall wear the crown.”

Her soul struggled with his; urged his meaning.

But already the stiffened body was relaxing, the faint colour staining his cheeks, light stealing again to those blank eyes.

But still her soul urged his.

“The crown?” she said. And again, “The crown?”

“Did I speak of a crown?” he said as once before. Why then, the heavenly crown. All good men shall wear it...all good men, my brothers...my brothers...” He shivered a little in the warm room, looking about him as though he had come a long distance and was not yet sure where he might be. “My brothers I shall cherish.”

“So God shall cherish you,” she said. “And my husband? What of my husband?”

She forced his eyes, all unwilling, to meet her own. “By him I will deal justly.” “Then you will set him above all men.” Her head dropped upon the pillow; her eyes closed. The door opened. Soft and dark as death the lady Abbess came in. For the moment, weary with his soul's journeying he thought it
was
death. His bones went weak as water.

Catherine's eyes half-opened. “My intent...” she said, beseech you, forget not my...intent.”

He knelt leaning his cheek against her hand as often when a child, “I promise, with kindness and with tenderness to fulfil your intent. You shall see...when you are strong enough. We shall fulfil it together.”

He rose, stood looking down upon her. “I shall come tomorrow, and every tomorrow till you are well again. His voice was steady though his heart was broken with sorrow.

Yes, he would come tomorrow, and tomorrow, until there were on more tomorrows. Let the Council wait; let his Uncle of Gloucester prick at him with affairs of State and Warwick threaten with a cold eye. He was fifteen...and his mother lay dying. Let them wait—Gloucester and Warwick, England itself—let them all wait.

* * *

Catherine turned her head to the lady Abbess. “Let him come here no more; neither he, nor my dear love, nor my young children.” She smiled the small smile that had once enchanted great Henry. “I am still full of sin, holy mother, and most of all the sin of pride. I cannot endure those I love to look upon my face...except my cousin Madam Queen Johanne. Let her be with me...at the last.”

She lay, eyes closed; she opened them again upon the lady Abbess. “It is time to make my will,” she said.

The Abbess put out her hand to the pens, the parchment; there was no false word of recovery.