Crown in Candlelight (61 page)

Yet I know she told me I had another son. He came forth before his time. So frail that he was instantly baptized Owen by the monks of Westminster, in whose care he now was. Eleanor Cobham had sent her own midwife and a wetnurse. My blood became icy. Gloucester had returned unexpectedly. Guillemot held me while I shivered and shook. And when she told me where they had taken Cathryn, she had to give
me
wine, for she thought I would fall dead where I sat.

The Abbey of St Saviour, Bermondsey. I. thought: it is only a name. Bermondsey. A dour place run by the Church. The rumours surrounding such places are often exaggerated. Still I shivered. A place of retirement for ladies in poor health. Like Queen Joanna. (Cathryn, when last I saw her, was in superb health.) No. A place of savage penitence, and Gloucester had put her there. I thought: they can’t misuse her. She is a Queen. Little Harry will oversee her fortunes. Then I saw that the men who were turning our home Upside down among the wailing servants wore the livery of the King’s Council, and I remembered that little Harry was little indeed, and a refugee within his holy disposition. And I remembered who the leader of the Council was …

The manor is to be closed up, Guillemot said, at the Council’s orders. They sent me home with all the others. They would not let me touch her. (Or, did she say: ‘
She
would not let me touch her? … I, who love her as my life …?’) I know your feeling, Guillemot. Oh, sweet Christ, I know. I asked where my sons were. The old steward came with a parchment in his hand.

‘My lord of Suffolk came and took them away to his sister at the Abbey of Barking.’

My heart lifted the barest inch. Suffolk is Beaufort’s man, and the King’s favourite councillor. Cathryn first, then. We should soon see what kind of a place Bermondsey is. I got up.

‘The bay is done. Saddle me fresh horses.’

The servants, crowding, were looking to me for all the answers I couldn’t supply, Huw in the forefront. And Caradoc with his little new bride Angharad wondering what madhouse she had come to and weeping with the rest. And the priest, looking somewhat detached from it all, with £90 in his purse. I told Huw to come with me and he sprang forward, ready to put his life in pawn. And the priest too, I said. I don’t pay money for nothing, and I need no Masses yet! and he nodded and made ready.

Then the steward said: ‘There is more. You are summoned to Westminster to answer to certain charges.’ And when I heard what the charges were I burst out laughing, although the laughter hurt my chest; I thought: how typically devious of Gloucester to feign a charge! How could he say to the face of the Council: I charge that man with having lain with the King’s mother? We’re no adulterers. Theirs is a secular court of justice. Hence the accusation of having initiated a Welsh rising. I, who haven’t set foot in rebel country for years! The steward gave me the parchment, saying he’d taken the liberty of paying 12s. 6d. for it.

‘It’s a certificate of safe-conduct to Westminster.’

I thought then: better to go straight to Westminster. Leave Bermondsey alone until I have petitioned little Harry. I remembered us walking hand in hand on the Pembroke shore. I love you, Master Tydier. Harry’s signet would open the gates of Bermondsey or Hell. I had again forgotten he was only Little Harry.

They were waiting for me outside Westminster Hall. I went forward, leaving my horse half-dead behind me. The Judas Waterton was there. He had grieved for King Henry for too long. He spat in my face.
Fornicator
, he said, then stood back so that the guard could take me and bring me to this living death. So much for the charge of rebellion. So much for the safe-conduct.

I came to my senses on the floor of the cell. Huw said there was blood all over my face. He was weeping over me, trying to wipe it off. I felt nothing. The pain took root in my heart. It grows, and flowers, and I am lost.

Oh, my Cathryn.

The new turnkey seems drawn to my cell. Time and again I ask after Cathryn and he turns away. But he always comes back, wanting stories. He was wetting his baby-breeches when I was standing at the Harfleur palisade. But I tell him, because it’s the only thing that keeps me sane, and I tell it well—the smoke and flame and the quarrels spitting men like chicken against the planking, and the coloured beasts and birds of the great tower falling … then I look deep in his eyes and pour my strength into him, whispering: ‘Is she still at Bermondsey? Take this letter to her. Where are the letters she has written me?’ And he shakes his head, silent, and goes away.

But how could she have written to me? My guess is, she doesn’t know I’m here. She wouldn’t think to look for Meredyth, an anonymous Welsh rebel …
Annwyl Crist!
a most terrible thought: does she think I’ve deserted her? Think of something else, quickly.

The priest escaped. He took a look at the situation outside Westminster Hall and was off, a flying black skeleton, taking a good horse and the £90. I had told him to lodge at John Bore’s, and as far as I know, there he still is, among the harps and clarions, living like a prince. Avarice has its uses, for sometimes, only sometimes, I feel that he may be a gateway out of this stinking hell.

We’re so lucky. Out of the money she gave Huw in secret we are allowed certain facilities in here, but the stench that filters from the main jail, even through the locked connecting door, is indescribable. It is compounded of rottenness, wanhope. I’ve heard the children crying. The saddest sound in the world. Oh, Edmund, Jasper! And my littlest, new, importunate son, my little Owen. Does he live, my love?

It seems yesterday that I knelt and kissed her white fragrant body. I couldn’t resist the fiery, silky, dewy dream … poured my life into her … felt the child quicken … now the real torture begins: The dream is a mighty adversary, fleshed in untouchable splendour. My loins ache. It seems yesterday that we first lay together. I have all but had her soul from her body and kissed it. I have never felt guilt, not for a moment. I would never confess, as sin, all we have done together. Our bliss is given by God. Or if not by God, by the old gods of the singing mountains. My gods. Hywelis’s gods.

I dreamed once of Hywelis, in this place. One night, early January, colder even than now. I think I’d been here about six weeks. A passing-bell began to toll, outside in the City. Its burden was taken up by other bells. My broken hands were hurting. The bell throbbed with each surge of pain. I dreamed of Hywelis; she looked sad, and nodded in her fateful way. She had her fox on a lead. This proves that dreams are nonsense. Madog has surely outlived his span. I dreamed that the passing-bell was for Madog.

I must keep still, to outmatch these ills of love. There’s a part of me that has its own life and memories. It remembers how we never lay apart, save on her brief absences. Early dawns when she’d sweetly break my sleep, rolling to lie on me, whispering, her mouth on mine, her flesh like silk making me fire all over … and it was I, not the King, who taught her how to kiss.

Well, we shall kiss again. The dream will be dragged from its idleness and worked within an inch of its life. I’ll kiss again, those blue-pale veins on breast and thigh, those threads of mother-of-pearl where she has borne my sons. And, within the dream, again, again, again, I’ll embalm these long months of wasted love in velvet, not hastily, but building for us both the shining mountain to its sunburst, from the deepest dominions of tenderness that are mine and therefore hers. Cathryn.
Cariad
, my love, my little one, where are you? Do you pray for me? Are you still at bloody Bermondsey? I’m so lost,
fy merch fach
. I wanted to buy you beautiful presents, but you bought them for me. A lovely bay horse. A silly pair of garters. I always fancied myself your protector, now I know that you are mine. Help me, Cathryn, help me, dearest dream. We’re split, we’re halved. This is me, Meredyth, with the grey hair and the broken hands. Still in love. For ever in love.
Am byth
, Cathryn.
Toujours
, Owen.

For the strangest reason I feel slightly more hopeful. It’s to do with this new jailer, Nickson. I’ve heard nothing about my plea to Chancery. But there must be a way out. There must. I’m going to try – to work my will on Nickson. I’ll fathom how I may use the priest. The answer’s there somewhere. And when I’ve worked my will, I’ll be from this Hell, and I’ll have my little girl and my three sons away and, by
Dewi Sant
! we’ll start a small rebellion of our own, in Wales, in the wild country.

The whore came and looked at me today. Nickson lets her through to ply her trade with someone in a cell down the passage. I think he takes a cut of her earnings but I’m not sure. He’s not interested in money. I’ve discovered this myself.

She looked at me so intently. We talked for a few moments. She asked me how we kept ourselves so clean. Somehow I feel she too could be useful. It is far from clear in my mind, but I wonder. She and the priest, and this uncertain young jailer, Nickson.

My love and I will be safe in Wales. I will it shall be so. Everything will come right.

My sweet darling. Christ! send me news of her.

Nickson’s was a narrow life. He had no friends, no wife, his parents were dead. He had done nothing and travelled nowhere. But he could read, and write an ill hand which made him something of a prodigy in the other jailers’ eyes. He particularly looked forward to Searching Time on Fridays, when the head keeper was away, and the other staff were hugging the brazier in the gatehouse, or teasing the harlots, or scoring hits on the fleeing rats with lumps of wood. Then he would go quietly to the end of the passage and lean against the bars (careful to keep his keys out of jeopardy) and watch the eyes and listen to the voice. He could never have enough. Harfleur, the Somme crossing, Agincourt, Rouen, Verneuil. He had the glory without the danger.

He wasn’t afraid of the Welshman now; the man seemed placid, no longer harassing him with enquiries after unlikely acquaintances among the nobility. Very occasionally a letter would be handed through and these Nickson took, to humour Meredyth. The last had been to King James of Scotland; it followed all the others into the brazier flames. He hurried to the cell. Friday again; bitter cold outside, the black sky full of whirling motes of ice. For once the Welshman was sitting down., He didn’t seem to feel the cold, but the little one was hunched and glowering. Nickson thought: I could bring them a few live coals, but no. Before his time a felon had set fire to his bedding, himself, and had nearly incinerated the entire jail delivery.

He nodded affably against his own huge shadow on the torchlit walls.

‘I’ve brought you some mulled ale.’

Huw rose and held out two mugs. Nickson tipped the contents of a flagon into them through the bars.

‘Pay him, Huw,’ Owen said.

‘No, no,’ Nickson said hastily. ‘There’s plenty. It’ll warm you.’ Owen said to Huw, in Welsh: ‘I may be wrong. But I think he’s softening.’

The head keeper would have roared at them to speak English. Nickson said wistfully:

‘Could I speak your tongue? Could you teach it to me?’

Owen came to lean, mug in hand, against the bars.

‘None can teach it, but some can learn. It’s the ancient tongue of the gods.’ Then he said: ‘I’ve something to ask you, Nick.’

‘Christ, no, Master Meredyth!’ said Nickson impatiently. ‘I can tell you nothing!’

‘Why, Nick! This is nothing. I’m over my madness. No more royal delusions for me, boy. This concerns my servant. He’s blameless. You realize he should be at liberty?’

Huw said, sharp and quick: ‘I’ll not go! I’ll never leave you!’ and Owen rapped back: ‘Quiet! You’ll do as I say!’ while Nickson looked from one to the other, yearning to understand the strange quicksilver speech.

Owen said: ‘He’s quite innocent. He was never charged.’

Nickson felt bemused:
No one goes in, no one goes out
. Yet the Welshman was right: The other jailers will look to you for judgement, the head keeper had said. Maybe now was the time to use that judgement.

Owen smiled at him.

‘Tell me again,’ said Nickson, ‘that final charge … where the old Duke of York was slain …’ but Owen turned away and sat down.

‘I’m weary tonight,’ he said bleakly. ‘Too many war memories. It’s not good for a man to dwell on these things.’

‘Oh!’ Nickson revealed his bitter disappointment. ‘Well then. A good night to you.’

He stumped off, great wavering shadow, shoulders drooping like a child ousted from a game. Owen called after him softly, ‘Think on what I said!’

He got up. Always pale these days, now his face was drained. Sweat rimmed his lips. He went to where Huw sat shivering, and clasped him round the neck.

‘Drink your ale. You young fool. I have him. You nearly wrecked it. You’ll be going out, you see. You’re my way out, boy.’

‘Oh, my lord.’

‘I’m not your lord. Now listen. You’ll be going out, and soon. But you’ll be back,
exactly
four weeks from tonight, before the City gates are closed. You’re my key, you and the priest. God grant he’s where I think he is still. And the woman—I’ve yet to talk to her. And all the others. Now sit still. Listen, and then, let us pray … now first, when you return, you’ll find me dying.’

The first week is gone, and so has Huw. Christ be praised. Nickson is puffed with pride that he has got away with taking his momentous decision, though I doubt the head keeper even noticed Huw’s departure. Nick has earned himself more yarns from me. He also has a new toy. He tortures the gods with his filthy English tongue, and the brainwork is nearly killing him.

‘
Telyn
,’ he says. ‘Harp?’ That’s right, Nick. ‘
Mynydd
—mountain.
Carchar
—prison!’ And looks at me with furrowed forehead and I say: ‘
Da iawn!
—good boy!’ and he smirks. By tomorrow every word will have flown his thick pate.

The difficult part is to come. For my death will need to be convincing and dramatic, in this place of casual death. Nick leans convivially close. He retains sense enough not to enter, though did he know it I wouldn’t lay hand on him. Not yet. The lesson’s over for tonight. What now? Ah yes. Killing the prisoners at Agincourt. King’s orders, Nick, I say gently, and his eyes are avid. There’s something unhealthy about this, but I must give him what he wants, then I can have …