Epitaph for Three Women (43 page)

This threw the household into a panic, not because of the King himself but all who would come with him. It was hardly to be expected that Henry would travel without a considerable entourage. After all he was not the boy Katherine had handed over to Warwick. He was growing up. He had been crowned King not only of England but of France.

As a mother Katherine longed to see her son, but as the wife of Owen Tudor she was afraid of what his visit might mean.

She talked long with Owen about it and they decided that Edmund and Jasper should stay in their nursery. After all, who would think to look for them and they were too young to understand that they were being put out of sight. Owen would return to his squire’s quarters and they could rely on the discretion of their servants.

Katherine was tormented by her doubts and longings.

She was at the topmost turret to watch Henry’s arrival. She saw him coming in the distance, pennants waving and his standard-bearers riding ahead of him. She was filled with emotions, remembering her pride when he was born and that faint twinge of apprehension which she felt then because she had disobeyed her husband’s wishes and had borne their son at Windsor.

And there he was riding at the head of the cavalcade – her son, her little King. Oh yes, he had changed. She saw that at once. He had assumed a new dignity. Poor little boy. Did he realise the weight of the responsibilities which would be laid on his shoulders?

She went down to greet him, and when Henry saw her he forgot everything but that here was his mother whom he had loved so dearly in those days before he understood the difficulties of being King.

‘Dear lady!’ he cried and ran into her arms.

The Queen smiled at stern Warwick who of course did not approve of such conduct.

‘Ah, you have not forgotten me then, my son.’

‘Oh Mother,’ he said, ‘I am so happy to see you. Is Joan here still? Is Alice?’

‘Oh yes …’ Katherine hesitated for a second or so and this was not lost on Warwick. She could not say that they had stayed with her to care for her other children. ‘They will be delighted to see you …’

‘So they stayed after I went,’ said the King.

‘They had grown accustomed to our household.’

They walked side by side into the house.

‘Do you like being shut away here, dear lady?’ asked Henry.

‘It serves me well,’ she said.

‘And how is Owen? Is he still here?’

‘Yes … he is still a member of the household.’

‘I want to see him.’

‘I doubt not you will.’

They were listening, all of them. She was aware of it. How much did they know? How much would they discover? Was this not so much a visit of the King to his mother as an investigation to discover the true state of affairs at Hadham?

She was delighted to see Henry again, although he did not seem her child now in the same way that Edmund and Jasper did. He had when he was their age, of course. I hope, she thought, that I shall be able to keep my Tudor babies with me forever.

She and Owen had been right when they had agreed they could rely on the loyalty of their servants. Joan and Alice were delighted to see their charge. They marvelled at his growth and his grasp of affairs. They questioned him and there was no doubt that Henry was happy to be treated as a child again.

He went to see Owen and they talked of horses and Henry kept recalling those days when Owen had helped him master a horse.

There was an occasion when Katherine had a chance to speak to her son alone. She wanted to know whether he enjoyed his life now as he did long ago.

‘It is so different,’ said Henry a little sadly. ‘I am so rarely alone. Do you know, dear Mother, when I lived with you everybody did all they could to make me forget I was King; now they do everything to remind me of it.’

‘Is the Earl good to you?’

‘He is good
for
me, they tell me.’

He was developing a sharp wit, this Henry. Her father had been like that in his lucid times. A sharp fear shot through her. No … no … there was no resemblance between this solemn little boy and her deranged father.

‘It is not quite the same thing,’ she said quickly.

Henry agreed with that. ‘He is a good and honourable man. Sometimes I wish he were not quite so good and honourable. He is reckoned to be so chivalrous. He has done so much that is worthy.’

‘It is why your father commanded that he should be your guardian. I hope he is not too hard a taskmaster.’

‘No. Perhaps not. I had been used to you and Joan and Alice …’

‘They did not always spare the cane …’

‘But it never really hurt, dear Mother.’ He was thoughtful for a moment. ‘I went to France, Mother. I saw my grandmother.’

The Queen felt her heart beginning to beat uneasily as it always did at the mention of her mother. Her name brought back so many memories. She remembered the beautiful face distorted with rage, the cold aloofness when she ordered her children to be sent to the Hôtel de St Pol; she remembered one occasion when Michelle had clung to her skirts in an effort to plead for them all to be allowed to stay at the Louvre and not to be dispatched to that cold palace where they could hear the sounds of their father’s madness. She could see, in her mind’s eye, her mother angrily slapping Michelle’s clinging fingers while her sister cried out in pain and let go of her mother’s skirts.

‘What thought you of your grandmother?’

‘She was very kind to me. She is very beautiful.’

‘She must have changed though since I knew her. Her life is very different from what it was.’

‘She asked for you. She hoped you were well.’

Katherine was silent.

‘And I saw the Maid, Mother. I saw Joan of Arc.’

Katherine caught her breath. ‘When? You did not …’

‘No, I did not see them burn her. I looked through a hole into her cell. I saw her there with her guards. They looked … brutish … and she, my lady, she looked like a saint.’

‘You have been listening to rumours and gossip. It’s never wise to do that, my son. They tell me she was a peasant girl who had learned the witch’s craft.’

‘She was no witch, Mother. And then I was crowned in Paris because we could not get to Rheims. I think of her a great deal. She did not want me to be crowned King. That was why she came from her village to fight. Do you believe that saints can … can harm those who go against their wishes?’

‘Saints would not harm, my son. They do nothing but good. That is why they are saints.’

‘Then she will not harm me for I know her to be good.’

Yes, indeed he had grown up. He had not only been crowned King of England and France but he had seen Joan of Arc, and her fame had travelled far and wide. People even talked of her in England. She was a witch, they said, who had fought with the French and won a few successes.

If King Harry had been alive she would never have succeeded; he would have captured her as soon as she appeared on the scene, tied her up in a sack and thrown her into the Seine.

But she had impressed Henry. She had made him thoughtful. But perhaps that was just the burden of kingship.

The stay would not be long and Katherine’s feelings were mixed. She was not sure whether she wanted the King to go or stay.

Warwick talked to her after dinner while they listened to the minstrels. He asked her if she was satisfied with the quiet life she led. She told him that it filled her needs. They had agreed that it was not suitable for the King to be brought up by his mother and as her son’s upbringing and education were in his capable hands she was sure that she need not concern herself on that account.

He said: ‘You are well served, my lady? You are served as is fitting for the King’s mother to be?’

‘I am indeed well served. I have no complaints,’ she answered.

‘You have good menservants, bodyguards and the rest?’

‘The best,’ she answered.

‘I see Owen Tudor remains in your service.’

‘I see no reason to rid myself of a good squire,’ she said. ‘No reason at all.’

‘Tudor has been long in your service.’

‘Oh yes. The late King noticed him at Agincourt.’

‘Ah, his place in the household was no doubt a reward for good service. Mayhap the late King would be pleased could he look down from Heaven to see that you treat well one who served with him at Agincourt.’

‘He would be pleased to see Owen Tudor rewarded I doubt not.’

She was in no doubt that there were rumours about her and Owen. Warwick had come down to probe, and although she was sorry to lose her son she could not help being relieved to see the party ride away.

Then she could return to that cosy domesticity which meant so much to her.

John, Duke of Bedford was not a happy man. He could not understand why since the meteoric rise of Joan of Arc everything had seemed to go wrong. Ever since his brother’s death he had been wishing that he had lived, but never more so than at this time.

What had happened? Since Agincourt the star of the English had risen high and there seemed no reason why it should not continue to dominate the sky over France. A vacillating King, son of an imbecile father and the Jezebel of the age, a country ravaged by war, powerful allies against it … what chance had it? And then suddenly that peasant witch had changed everything.

It had been a terrible day when they had burned her at the stake. He had not gone near the square in Rouen. That would have been unwise. He had remained – some would say skulked – behind closed doors and heavily curtained windows. He did not want to hear how she had gone bravely to her death, how someone said he saw a white dove rise from the burning pyre at that moment when she called the name of Jesus in one last shuddering cry before the silence. He did not want to hear that people – even the English soldiery – were saying that they had burned a saint.

He did not want to hear the name of Joan of Arc again. But what was the use? The witch had appeared and that was the beginning of the end of English power in France.

But how could he help hearing her name? She was still spoken of and if he forbade her name to be mentioned what good would that do? It still went on repeating itself in his mind.

A curse on Joan of Arc! A curse on misfortune! What had happened to the victories, the successes?

They had just lost Chartres. Why should they lose Chartres? He had been so incensed that he had determined to make a great attempt to reverse this tide of misfortune. God help us, he said, we shall lose all that Henry gained if we go on in this way.

There was another matter which gave him cause for great uneasiness. Anne was looking ill these days. Sometimes he thought the witch of Arc had laid a spell on her.

She tried to soothe his anxieties by assuring him that she felt well, a little tired perhaps, but that was due to the heat, the cold or that she had perhaps ridden too far. Excuses which he did not believe.

Sometimes he thought she was more ill than she let him know.

Those were happy times he spent with her.

Once he had said to her: ‘It is a marvel to me that we who married for State reasons should have been so singularly blessed.’

‘I always determined that I would make a happy marriage,’ she told him.

‘And to be determined on something is the best way to succeed at it. Oh, Anne, I wish we could end this fighting. I wish we could be more together. I wish I could be more sure of your brother.’

She had been thoughtful. She knew her brother well. Proud, haughty, royal, he had always deplored the fact that the French throne had not descended to him and thought often how different life would have been for the French if it had.

Burgundy was not a man easily to forgive his enemies. When Charles as the Dauphin had been with those who murdered the old Duke of Burgundy he had made that Duke’s son his enemy for ever. A feud was in progress which had almost cost Charles his throne … and would have done but for this peasant girl about whom everyone was still talking.

But Philip of Burgundy loved his sister. He would listen to her, she knew, and whatever his own feelings towards the Duke of Bedford were, he was pleased that Anne had found happiness with him.

Anne had said: ‘I shall do everything I can to keep that friendship between you and my brother warm, dear husband.’

And she had, comforting him as she always did. No, he had reason to rejoice in his marriage. He had a wife whom he loved dearly and the marriage had served its purpose which had primarily been to strengthen the alliance between Bedford and Burgundy.

And now her health gave him anxiety. But he had a great many causes for anxiety. He was afraid of the subtle change which was creeping over France. Surely the powers of witchcraft were not as great as they seemed? And yet it had all begun with the Maid.

It was always the same. It came back to the Maid. It seemed as though in spite of the fire the witch lived on. As he brooded messengers came to him. Eagerly he awaited what they had to tell. Good news, he hoped, from Lagni-sur-Marne to which he had sent out a strong force to take the place.

But alas it was not good news. Everywhere the French were showing a stubborn resistance. The Maid seemed to have imbued them with a new spirit. They were holding out and the English troops were getting short of provisions. If help did not come soon they would have to retreat.