Philippa Gregory 3-Book Tudor Collection 1 (27 page)

‘What news of my husband?’ she said, speaking slowly and clearly for him in French.

‘I am sorry, he is no better.’

‘But he is not worse,’ she suggested. ‘He is getting better.’

He shook his head.
‘Il est très malade,’
he said simply.

Catalina heard the words but it was as if she had forgotten the language. She could not translate them. She turned to Lady Margaret. ‘He says that he is better?’ she asked.

Lady Margaret shook her head. ‘He says that he is worse,’ she said honestly.

‘But they will have something to give him?’ She turned to the doctor.
‘Vous avez un médicament?’

He gestured at the table behind him, at the apothecary.

‘Oh, if only we had a Moorish doctor!’ Catalina cried out. ‘They have the greatest skill, there is no-one like them. They had the best
universities for medicines before…If only I had brought a doctor with me! Arab medicine is the finest in the world!’

‘We are doing everything we can,’ the doctor said stiffly.

Catalina tried to smile. ‘I am sure,’ she said. ‘I just so wish…Well! Can I see him?’

A quick glance between Lady Margaret and the doctor showed that this had been a matter of some anxious discussion.

‘I will see if he is awake,’ he said, and went through the door.

Catalina waited. She could not believe that only yesterday morning Arthur had slipped from her bed complaining that she had not woken him early enough to make love. Now, he was so ill that she could not even touch his hand.

The doctor opened the door. ‘You can come to the threshold, Princess,’ he said. ‘But for the sake of your own health, and for the health of any child you could be carrying, you should come no closer.’

Catalina stepped up quickly to the door. Lady Margaret pressed a pomander stuffed with cloves and herbs in her hand. Catalina held it to her nose. The acrid smell made her eyes water as she peered into the darkened room.

Arthur was sprawled on the bed, his nightgown pulled down for modesty, his face flushed with fever. His blond hair was dark with sweat, his face gaunt. He looked much older than his fifteen years. His eyes were sunk deep into his face, the skin beneath his eyes stained brown.

‘Your wife is here,’ the doctor said quietly to him.

Arthur’s eyes fluttered open and she saw them narrow as he tried to focus on the bright doorway and Catalina, standing before him, her face white with shock.

‘My love,’ he said.
‘Amo te.’

‘Amo te,’
she whispered. ‘They say I cannot come closer.’

‘Don’t come closer,’ he said, his voice a thread. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too!’ She could hear that her voice was strained with tears. ‘You will be well?’

He shook his head, too weary to speak.

‘Arthur?’ she said, demandingly. ‘You will get better?’

He rested his head back on his hot pillow, gathering his strength. ‘I will try, beloved. I will try so hard. For you. For us.’

‘Is there anything you want?’ she asked. ‘Anything I can get for you?’ She glanced around. There was nothing that she could do for him. There was nothing that would help. If she had brought a Moorish doctor with her, if her parents had not destroyed the learning of the Arab universities, if the church had allowed the study of medicine, and not called knowledge heresy…

‘All I want is to live with you,’ he said, his voice a thin thread.

She gave a little sob. “And I you.’

‘The prince should rest now, and you should not linger here.’ The doctor stepped forwards.

‘Please, let me stay!’ she cried in a whisper. ‘Please allow me. I beg you. Please let me be with him.’

Lady Margaret put a hand around her waist and drew her back. ‘You shall come again, if you leave now,’ she promised. ‘The prince needs to rest.’

‘I shall come back,’ Catalina called to him, and saw the little gesture of his hand which told her that he had heard her. ‘I shall not fail you.’

Catalina went to the chapel to pray for him, but she could not pray. All she could do was think of him, his white face on the white pillows. All she could do was feel the throb of desire for him. They had been married only one hundred and forty days, they had been passionate lovers for only ninety-four nights. They had promised that they would have a lifetime together, she could not believe that she was on her knees now, praying for his life.

This cannot be happening, he was well only yesterday. This is some terrible dream and in a moment I will wake up and he will kiss me and call me foolish. Nobody can take sick so quickly, nobody can go from strength and beauty to being so desperately ill in such a short time. In a moment I will wake up. This cannot be happening. I cannot pray, but it does not matter that I cannot pray because it is not really happening. A dream prayer would mean nothing. A dream illness means nothing. I am not a superstitious heathen to fear dreams. I shall wake up in a moment and we will laugh at my fears.

At dinner time she rose up, dipped her finger in the holy water, crossed herself, and with the water still wet on her forehead went back to his chambers, with Dona Elvira following, close behind.

The crowds in the halls outside the rooms and in the presence chamber were thicker than ever, women as well as men, silent with inarticulate grief. They made way for the princess without a word but a quiet murmur of blessings. Catalina went through them, looking neither to left nor right, through the presence chamber, past the apothecary bench, to the very door of his bedchamber.

The guard stepped to one side. Catalina tapped lightly on the door and pushed it open.

They were bending over him on the bed. Catalina heard him cough, a thick cough as though his throat was bubbling with water.

‘Madre de Dios,’
she said softly. ‘Holy Mother of God, keep Arthur safe.’

The doctor turned at her whisper. His face was pale. ‘Keep back!’ he said urgently. ‘It is the Sweat.’

At that most feared word Dona Elvira stepped back and laid hold of Catalina’s gown as if she would drag her from danger.

‘Loose me!’ Catalina snapped and tugged her gown from the duenna’s hands. ‘I will come no closer, but I have to speak with him,’ she said steadily.

The doctor heard the resolution in her voice. ‘Princess, he is too weak.’

‘Leave us,’ she said.

‘Princess.’

‘I have to speak to him. This is the business of the kingdom.’

One glance at her determined face told him that she would not be denied. He went past her with his head low, his assistants following behind him. Catalina made a little gesture with her hand and Dona Elvira retreated. Catalina stepped over the threshold and pushed the door shut on them.

She saw Arthur stir in protest.

‘I won’t come any closer,’ she assured him. ‘I swear it. But I have to be with you. I cannot bear…’ She broke off.

His face when he turned it to her was shiny with sweat, his hair as wet as when he came in from hunting in the rain. His young round face was strained as the disease leached the life out of him.

‘Amo te,’
he said through lips that were cracked and dark with fever.

‘Amo te,’
she replied.

‘I am dying,’ he said bleakly.

Catalina did not interrupt nor deny him. He saw her straighten a little, as if she had staggered beneath a mortal blow.

He took a rasping breath. ‘But you must still be Queen of England.’

‘What?’

He took a shaky breath. ‘Love – obey me. You have sworn to obey me.’

‘I will do anything.’

‘Marry Harry. Be queen. Have our children.’

‘What?’ She was dizzy with shock. She could hardly make out what he was saying.

‘England needs a great queen,’ he said. ‘Especially with him. He’s not fit to rule. You must teach him. Build my forts. Build my navy. Defend against the Scots. Have my daughter Mary. Have my son Arthur. Let me live through you.’

‘My love –’

‘Let me do it,’ he whispered longingly. ‘Let me keep England safe through you. Let me live through you.’

‘I am your wife,’ she said fiercely. ‘Not his.’

He nodded. ‘Tell them you are not.’

She staggered at that, and felt for the door to support her.

‘Tell them I could not do it.’ A hint of a smile came to his drained face. ‘Tell them I was unmanned. Then marry Harry.’

‘You hate Harry!’ she burst out. ‘You cannot want me to marry him. He is a child! And I love you.’

‘He will be king,’ he said desperately. ‘So you will be queen. Marry him. Please. Beloved. For me.’

The door behind her opened a crack and Lady Margaret said quietly, ‘You must not exhaust him, Princess.’

‘I have to go,’ Catalina said desperately to the still figure in the bed.

‘Promise me…’

‘I will come back. You will get better.’

‘Please.’

Lady Margaret opened the door wider and took Catalina’s hand. ‘For his own good,’ she said quietly. ‘You have to leave him.’

Catalina turned away from the room, she looked back over her shoulder. Arthur lifted a hand a few inches from the rich coverlet. ‘Promise,’ he said. ‘Please. For my sake. Promise. Promise me now, beloved.’

‘I promise,’ burst out of her.

His hand fell, she heard him give a little sigh of relief.

They were the last words they said to each other.

At six o’clock, Vespers, Arthur’s confessor, Dr Eldenham, administered extreme unction and Arthur died soon after. Catalina knelt on the threshold as the priest anointed her husband with the oil and bowed her head for the blessing. She did not rise from her knees until they told her that her boy-husband was dead and she was a widow of sixteen years old.

Lady Margaret on one side and Dona Elvira on the other half-carried and half-dragged Catalina to her bedchamber. Catalina slipped between the cold sheets of her bed and knew that however long she waited there, she would not hear Arthur’s quiet footstep on the battlements outside her room, and his tap on the door. She would never again open her door and step into his arms. She would never again be snatched up and carried to her bed, having wanted all day to be in his arms.

‘I cannot believe it,’ she said brokenly.