Daughter of York (76 page)

She is fair and flower of all.

Might I have her at will,

Steadfast of love, lovely, true,

Of my sorrow she might save me,

Joy and bliss were e’er to me new.”

“Of my sorrow, she might save me,” she repeated. “And I wish that you might save me from mine, my love.”

B
UT IT WAS
Edward, not Anthony, who changed her life.

A week after she had carried little Philip to his baptism in St. Donatian’s, she left Bruges to supervise the renovations to the residence in one of her favorite dower towns, Binche in Hainault, about forty miles south of Brussels. The old castle at the northwest corner of the impressive wall around the small city had suffered in the fires during Louis’ attempt to push his boundaries north, and she was supervising its restoration. The decoration took her mind off continued aggression by Louis in many other parts of the duchy, but she felt relatively safe here.

It was another warm day, when, with a simple cap covering her head and her overdress tucked up in her belt, she consulted with the mason on improvements to the chapel and reception room. She had asked for the windows to be enlarged so that she could look out on the terrace garden and pleasant meadows on the hill beyond the wall. She was not expecting a visitor and was somewhat dismayed when Olivier de la Marche hurried in and announced Will Hastings. She hastily pulled her skirt down over her chemise and straightened her cap.

“Certes, my lord Hastings, this is a surprise. Please forgive my appearance,” she said, smiling and stepping gingerly over some masonry on the floor. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your presence here in my humble house?”

Margaret never ceased to astonish Will with her ability to adapt herself to any situation, and he went forward with an answering smile and low bow. He waited for her to put out her hand to kiss.

Instead she laughed. “Let us dispense with the usual formalities, my lord. My hand is filthy, as you can see.”

His eyes twinkled with amusement, and he offered his arm to lead her out to the garden. A true Englishwoman, Margaret insisted that roses be a mainstay of all of her gardens, and the scent from the myriad blossoms was almost overpowering. She breathed it in with a sigh of pleasure.

“May I say you are as lovely as ever, your grace,” Will murmured. “I always find your company intoxicating.”

Knowing all too well his reputation as a seducer, she did not take the compliment seriously. “’Tis the roses have intoxicated you, my lord, and addled your wits. You cannot fool me, for I see myself daily aging in my mirror. You, on the other hand, do not look a day older,” she rejoined but quickly changed the subject. “Let us forego the false flattery and agree that time is not kind, shall we? I would far rather know how Lady Hastings is liking Calais?”

She felt him stiffen. Sweet Jesu, did he really believe I might fall for his flattery? She almost laughed. What utter foolishness! Surely, she thought, this is not why he came, although he has only brought a squire and a groom with him.

“My wife looks on Calais as an outpost, your grace,” he replied, dropping the unctuousness from his voice so suddenly that Margaret was disconcerted. “We shall return to London shortly, and I believe she is counting the days.”

Ah, his lady’s displeasure was what caused his distemper, she thought with relief, not the reminder that he was married. She relaxed and again asked him the reason for the unexpected visit.

Will wanted to say “a hare-brained scheme of your brother’s,” but of course he did not. He looked about them and saw he could speak freely. Then he turned to face Margaret and gave her Edward’s message. He watched her face change from benign smile to outright astonishment, and he was amused that he had rendered her speechless by the end.

“The little boy’s mother has been sworn to secrecy, and she is waiting for my message with her husband in Tournai and will be close by in case … well, in case …”

“In case I cannot fulfill my duty as a surrogate mother or in case I die? I understand, my lord,” Margaret was finally able to say.

“Something to that effect, your grace.”

“And you say George sanctioned this? It seems hard for me to imagine he had a conversation about his bastard with Ned before … when under sentence of death,” she finished, lowering her eyes to the dusty path. “Was it George’s idea?”

“Nay, your grace. Edward—I mean, the king’s grace—was in such torment over Clarence’s imminent death that I believe he wanted to make some atonement. He said Clarence was grateful and that you should know he could not think of anyone better to whom he would entrust his son. I understand the mother will be paid handsomely and will ready the boy—Jehan is his name—should you agree to the plan. ’Tis necessary that he remain in seclusion for obvious reasons and because ’twas my lord of Clarence’s last wish that history not know he had dishonored his wife on one night.”

“Certes, George’s honor did not desert him completely, I am happy to know,” Margaret said sadly. “In matters marital, he was far more moral than Ned and Dickon.” Or you and I, she almost said, but stopped herself.

Will had the grace to color beneath his graying beard. “Aye, he was,” he agreed. They walked on in silence, Will giving Margaret time to digest the extraordinary plan Edward had concocted. Margaret was touched beyond belief when Will told her Ned thought George’s son would fill the void of her own childlessness as well as provide a permanent link to her favorite brother. Her heart glowed and her excitement mounted. Why not? she thought. As they turned at the ten-foot-thick wall that separated them from the sheep in the field beyond, she gazed up at the warm bricks of her house and made a decision.

“He shall live here!” she exclaimed, her joy not lost on Will. “’Tis far away from court and prying eyes, and no one will look for him here. I shall appoint a chaplain to tutor him, and he shall be brought up prop-erly—but quietly. One day, I shall tell him about his father,” she said, her step quickening. She was already making plans and wanted to talk to the mason again. “You may tell Edward that I am very agreeable and that he can count on my discretion. I shall write my thanks to Ned and have you send the letter from Calais.”

“Nay, your grace. ’Twas the king’s express wish that no written trace mark this exchange. I will tell him when I return to London next week. He will be delighted, believe me.”

“Not as much as I am, Lord Hastings,” she cried, and she ran up the steps. As she reached the door into the house, she turned. Just as quickly as enthusiasm had bubbled, her mood changed, and her voice was suddenly tinged with doubt. “But his mother. The little boy’s mother—how can she bear to let him go? How can I be happy when I am taking another woman’s child?” Dejected, she waited for Will to mount the stairs to her side.

With a kindness she had not seen before, he took her hand and kissed it.

“It seems the mother is pleased to divest herself of her bastard, your grace. She and her boatman husband have trouble enough feeding the two they have had since being wed and they welcome the money. Your concern is misplaced, I can assure you.”

She was all smiles again. “Then we shall prepare a palace for a prince, my lord,” she cried, happily.

M
ARGARET FELT LIKE
a young, adventurous woman again as Fortunata and Henriette helped her into a plain kersey gown. Despite the fine lawn of her chemise underneath, the scratchy material irritated her skin, and she pitied the women who had to wear these clothes every day. Her tailor had produced a light mantle and hood that would conceal her face from all but prying eyes, and she wore a widow’s wimple with folds that hung from her chin and completed the picture of an ordinary townswoman.

Only three people in her residence at Oudenaarde knew of her mission: Fortunata, Guillaume and Henriette. Seeing the tears in Henriette’s eyes when the plan was revealed, she was deeply moved.

“Certes, Henriette, why the sad face?”

“Your grace, they are tears of happiness. Every time you speak to my little Guillaume, I know how you have longed for a child.” Henriette curtseyed as she spoke.

Margaret thanked her and turned away. There was a time, she thought, when only Fortunata would have understood. Disguising herself as she was doing today took her mind back to that May Day at the Wardrobe when she and her ladies had sneaked away for a day of anonymous entertainment.
She remembered Fortunata attacking the young man who had taken the liberty of kissing her mistress, and she could not forbear a chuckle.

“Guillaume will meet you at the stable, your grace,” Henriette whispered conspiratorially. “He looks like a farmer today. You will not know him.” She giggled.

Margaret had explained to Fortunata that it was imperative that she and Guillaume not be recognized. “You are well known,
pochina
, and would give me away.”

“I understand,” the dwarf had answered. “I will make the room ready for the child.”

Margaret and Guillaume traveled as though brother and sister on two hackneys, with one of his soldiers dressed as a groom on another. On dry roads along the River Schelde they were able to cover the eighteen miles in one day, reaching Tournai at Compline. The unusual five-towered cathedral of Notre Dame was ringing its bells for the final service of the day. Inside the city wall, they crossed the river and rode up the hill and past the famous belfry, making their way to a respectable hostelry by the episcopal palace recommended to Guillaume. For the first time in her life, Margaret lay on a crude wooden pallet padded with fresh straw. Guillaume was to sleep on another but first he covered her with a blanket he had brought for the occasion, knowing she would not touch any bedding provided by the inn. They also shared the room with a merchant and his wife on their way to Santiago de Compostella.

“How do you know that is where they go, Guillaume?” Margaret asked while they were eating the meager fare of the penny-pinching landlord. Margaret had stared hard at the trencher on which sat a large lump of fatty beef and a slab of cheese. The ale was good, and the cheese robust, so she chewed as much of the beef as she could stomach and hoped the gravy-sopped trencher would satisfy her hunger along with the cheese.

“Do you see the tin shell-shaped badge pinned to his tunic?” Guillaume said quietly, as they sat at the other end of a long refectory table opposite the couple. “That proclaims a pilgrim, and it serves as a sign that the wearers should be respected on their journey south. ’Tis also a keepsake, proving you have made the pilgrimage. Do you not have such a badge in England, your grace?”

Margaret now remembered seeing pilgrims on the road to Canterbury with similar pins, but it had not occurred to her they were connected to their journey. Compostella made her think of Anthony, and it was his face that haunted her dreams that night. She saw the scarred ear, his clear blue eyes and fine chestnut hair. And then she touched him and his clothes miraculously vanished and they were once again naked together stretched out on the hard floor. He gently ran his finger up her calf as he kissed her mouth. This time, though, there was no fire in the hearth, and she was shivering. She woke up with a start, forgetting where she was but knowing she was cold and indeed something was moving up her leg. She kicked off the blanket and slapped at her calf.

“What is it, Margaretta?” Guillaume whispered into the pitch black room. He had been instructed to use the name to avoid recognition, but it came hard after years of using her title. He need not have worried, for the pilgrim couple snored in the exhausted sleep of those who have walked all day. “Are you unwell?” He fumbled for his tinderbox and used the spark to light a taper he had by his pallet. Margaret held up a bedbug in her pinched finger and thumb and flung it from her. “Ugh!” was all he heard. He was dismayed. The dowager was getting quite a lesson in humility, he thought, but would she blame him for his choice of shelter? He had spent many a night bedded thus during his heyday as a philanderer. He now preferred his feather bed and soft Henriette next to him.

“I am cold, Guillaume. May I share your pallet?” the duchess asked, as if she was asking him to help her dismount or open a door. Guillaume blanched in the darkness. “I promise to be good,” she added, chuckling to herself at her audacity.

“I … I do not … what did you say?” Guillaume stammered.

Margaret did not bother to reply but crawled towards him dragging her blanket with her. “’Tis no time to be high-minded, Guillaume. Your mistress is cold,” she muttered, losing patience. “I pray you make room for me.”

Bowing as best he could from his position on the straw, he managed to remember his manners, much to Margaret’s amusement. “I would be honored, Margaretta,” he said. Regretfully, humor was not something that came easily to Guillaume, she knew, so she lay down beside him, her back to him, and wished him good night. A few minutes later, she felt
him turn towards her and put his arm over her in a protective gesture that warmed her in more ways than one.

T
HE NEXT DAY
, storm clouds threatened to burst over them, and Margaret was almost regretting she had come. Several fleas and bugs had gnawed her delicate skin all night, and when she rose to take a piss in the jakes by the window, she was so stiff that she could hardly stand up straight.

The groom was ordered to stay with the horses, and Guillaume escorted Margaret to Notre Dame so that she could visit the precious relics of St. Eleftheria and recite her prayers at Prime with the townspeople. It was her first time in the huge cathedral, and she looked about her in awe. She was not used to being jostled, and when one man rudely pushed her aside to make his reverence before the holy shrine, it took all her self-control to not demand he go down on his knees to her. As if he would believe I am who I am, she realized, chiding herself for her arrogance. She made the sign of the cross and prayed for forgiveness.

They wended their way through the streets and over the bridge, to the Quai St. Brice, on the east side of the Escaut river, which faced the fish market on the opposite bank. From the busy market a cacophony of raucous voices almost drowned the coarse calls of the boatmen on the river. The scene was colorful and alive. Margaret sat down on a wall, Guillaume standing by her, and watched fascinated as ordinary people went about their daily tasks. Farther up the river she saw a group of washerwomen, skirts tucked up to their knees, bent over in the river rinsing their laundry, others slapping wet clothes on the rocks or rubbing them with lumps of lard soap. They were laughing and gossiping and occasionally called to a child too near the water to move to safety. The river near the Pont des Trous ran so swiftly that Margaret could see the fortified bridge was not the only way the Tournois kept unwanted visitors out.