Succession (24 page)

‘I have a letter from the king,’ Jasper told her, and she did not look at him, but her heart began to pound. At last he had sent for her; she would return to court with her baby. There was a short pause then Jasper began to read.

The king sent his heartfelt condolences to his beloved kinswoman in the hour of her grief. He felt the loss of his brother as a blow to his body and his soul. Such a loss was beyond measure of words, beyond all hope of redress. He could only pray for his enemies as Our Saviour Jesus Christ had prayed for His. He hoped that in the fullness of time they would all find forgiveness in their hearts and live in peace.

Now she did look at Jasper, as he finished reading.

‘Is that all?’ she said.

‘He thanks you for naming Edmund’s son after him,’ said Jasper.

No hint of rage, or retribution, or even the hope of bringing Edmund’s murderers to justice?

‘Let me see the letter,’ she said.

After a pause Jasper handed it to her.

She read it through twice, scanning the words as if she might have missed some hidden message that would tell her that the king was going to pursue his brother’s killers, and take care of his widow. But there was nothing, and nothing about sending for her, to take her away from Wales and into his own protection.

She let the letter droop in her hand.

Jasper was looking at her ironically. ‘We should prepare for a journey,’ he said.

She didn’t hear him at first, so he said it again.

‘A journey?’ she said. ‘Where to?’ thinking he meant to take her to the king.

‘To Newport, in Gwent,’ said Jasper, and she stared at him. ‘The Duke of Buckingham has invited us to stay in his household.’

‘Why?’ she asked, then, realizing this was not very polite, she added, ‘Perhaps later in the year. When the weather improves.’

‘We have not been invited later in the year,’ Jasper said. ‘We have been invited this week.’

‘This week?’ She laughed a little. ‘But the roads …’

The roads were still flooded; she had heard the servants talking about it.

‘Difficult,’ Jasper said, ‘not impossible.’

‘But – there might be snow. And the plague – the plague is still in the villages.’

‘We can bypass the villages.’

‘But where will we stay for the night? I will not put my baby at risk of plague.’

Jasper wasn’t angry. He appeared to be considering what she said. He reached over and touched the silken curls in the soft folds of her baby’s neck.

‘It will not be for long,’ he said. ‘A month, maybe two. No more than that.’

She stood up then, unsteadily, clutching her baby. ‘I am not going anywhere,’ she said. ‘He is too young to travel.’ Unexpectedly, tears were threatening, and she was furious with herself.

Jasper nodded, without looking at her.

‘Listen to me,’ he said. ‘The Duke of Buckingham is the most powerful magnate and the greatest landowner in all of Wales. He will offer protection to your son. How long do you think it will be before Lord Herbert turns his attention to Edmund’s heir?’

Margaret said nothing, but her grip on her baby tightened. The name of William Herbert filled her with horror.

‘He would not try to attack in winter,’ Jasper went on, looking at her now. ‘But the spring is coming.’

Margaret sat down again. Her knees felt weak and a sense of helplessness overtook her. The king had deserted them. He had left them to their enemies.

‘Can the duke not – come here?’ she said.

‘He has invited us to stay with him there,’ said Jasper. ‘It is a most gracious invitation. Do you wish to offend him?’

She would not look at Jasper, but all her protests died away. As usual she felt outmanoeuvred, and as though there was something he wasn’t telling her.

‘I will make all the necessary arrangements,’ Jasper said, and she looked at him with reddened eyes.

‘I do not want to go,’ she said.

It was a long journey, over rough terrain. She travelled in a carriage with her nurse, Betsy, and the wet nurse, Jane, who held her baby, swaddled, on her knee. The carriage shook and rattled so much she feared it would damage him, but in fact he seemed to like the motion and remained sleeping, except when he fed.

Jasper rode alongside the carriage, pointing out views or objects of interest from time to time, or feeding them information about the duke.

‘He is the greatest landowner in England as well as Wales,’ he said, and her nurse clucked and said, ‘Fancy.’

‘The manor at Greenfield is not his largest, but still it is impressive – more than a hundred rooms, I’m told.’

‘A hundred!’ her nurse said in amazement. ‘Did you hear that, my lady? And not his biggest house, either.’

Margaret turned her face away. She wanted to tell her nurse to stop parroting what Jasper said, that maybe he would go away and leave them alone if she did. But she would not give him the satisfaction of acknowledging him and her silence had resulted in this pantomime.

The duke’s eldest son had been dreadfully wounded at the Battle of St Albans, Jasper told them, and had been ill ever since. Her nurse said, ‘Oh, what a pity,’ but Margaret only thought of Edmund with a piercing pain.

His wife was Margaret’s cousin, Jasper told them, daughter of the Duke of Somerset who had been killed in that same battle. Her son was also called Henry.

‘Did you hear that?’ said Betsy in amazement.

‘I am not deaf,’ Margaret said.

She would also be staying at the manor at Greenfield, so the two of them would have plenty to talk about, Jasper said, and then, to Margaret’s vast relief, he spurred on his horse and rode ahead.

They had come to a particularly rough stretch, where a stream had burst its banks and flowed over the road. The horses slipped and stumbled, and everyone in the carriage was flung from side to side. All conversation stopped for a while as Jasper struggled with the horses and her nurse exclaimed that all the bones in her body would be quite broke. Slowly they forded the stream and the road levelled out again, and Jasper joined them once more. And he resumed talking just as though he had never left off.

‘The duke has other children, of course – it is quite a large family,’ he said, and Betsy commented that that must be a comfort.

‘The second son is also called Henry.’

‘I hear he is a very fine young man,’ her nurse said.

Margaret stopped listening, for now they had turned a bend in the mountain road and the land fell away from them into clear blue air. Blue-green woodland clustered up the valley sides, curlews called and the clouds were tinged with fire.

It was a beautiful land, God’s own country, as all the poets said, blown out on His breath and shaped by His fiery fingers. But it was
an oppressive beauty – the towering mountains like a fortress, the sea an impassable barrier. And Edmund could no longer see it, all the beauty and magnificence; Edmund would see nothing any more.

‘Whoever marries the younger son, of course,’ Jasper was saying, ‘will inherit many of the Stafford estates. Which are considerable.’

‘How fortunate they would be!’ said Betsy, and just for a moment a dark suspicion flickered in Margaret’s mind, but she dismissed it as unfeasible, too horrible even for Jasper. Who was nothing if not loyal to his brother.

They had to stay overnight at an inn. It was an out-of-the-way place, built for travellers and near no villages, since Margaret was still haunted by fear of the plague. She was to share a room with her nurse, while Henry’s nurse took him into an adjacent room, and Jasper took a room on the next floor. His men camped outside.

While they were settling in, Jasper knocked on their door. He had come to see how they were recovering from their journey, and to assure them that the next part would not be as rough. Then he sent Betsy away, to order wine and ale, and sat down in the chair, crossing his long legs, watching Margaret. She could feel his gaze upon her, though she did not look at him.

‘The duke is most anxious to see you,’ he said. He told her how important it was to be on good terms with him, how hard he had worked for it. It was their only chance of suppressing the rebels in Wales. As she listened to him a growing dread crept over her. Finally she turned to face him.

‘Why am I here?’ she said.

If Jasper was surprised, he did not show it.

‘I have told you,’ he said. ‘We have been invited.’

‘But why?’ she persisted. ‘Why have I been invited?’

Jasper stood up then and stared out of the window, and her stomach contracted.

‘The duke – wants to be gracious to Edmund’s widow,’ he said. ‘You are his kinswoman, after all.’

‘Tell me,’ she said.

Jasper turned slowly and looked at her. It was one of the occasions when she wished she was taller. She stood very straight and stared back at him.

‘The duke thinks – we both think – that it would be best for you, and for your baby, if an alliance were made –’

‘No,’ she said.

‘– and for the king,’ Jasper continued as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘The king wishes it. To create a stronger link between the Duke of Buckingham and the crown.’

‘No,’ she said again. She could not believe that he was even considering it.

‘I understand,’ he said, looking at her, but she wouldn’t have this.

‘I am not a child,’ she said. She could hardly get the words out, they were so important to her. ‘I am – Edmund’s widow.’

And once again she was almost crying. She hated herself; she hated him. Why did he always have this effect on her?

Jasper let out his breath. He turned back to the window, then shook his head, started to speak, then stopped. She carried on, her voice so choked with emotion she could hardly wring the words out.

‘You treat me as a child – but I am not a child. I am Edmund’s widow. And the mother of his son. It is just four months since he …’

Jasper nodded. Then he sat in the chair again, pressing the tips of his fingers together, watching her face.

‘Edmund – is gone,’ he said, then he carried on quickly before she could interrupt him. ‘What is the most important thing now that he is not here?’

She knew the answer to that, of course, but she would not answer him. He leaned forward.

‘What is the best way of securing the interests of your son?’

She shook her head and Jasper spoke again.

‘What happens if I am not here to protect him? What happens if I die? You are surrounded by your enemies.’

Even her breath hurt, catching at her ribs.

‘It is – too soon,’ she said.

Jasper stood now, and started to pace.

‘It is not too soon for your enemies to attack,’ he said. ‘Do you not know that the vultures are already gathering? Even now Lord Herbert is rallying his forces in the north. Your baby – Edmund’s son – needs all the alliances we can make. And the Staffords are most powerful: if they stand behind him he has a chance – the best chance …’

She could hear him, but through a barrier of noise that was the blood rushing to her head. This was what they had planned together – Jasper and her nurse – in all those hidden conferences, behind her back.

‘No,’ she said faintly, but he didn’t hear.

‘Now that his heir is so ill the duke is anxious to secure the interests of his younger son. Nothing matters to him so much – he will act and act soon. That is why I went to stay with him after Christmas. Because if he does not look to you, my sister-in-law, he will look elsewhere. He wants his son married before the end of the year. And he is well aware of your value.’

He sat down again, facing her.

After Christmas?
she thought.
So soon after Edmund’s death? Before the birth of his son? Had it all been settled even then?

When she didn’t speak, Jasper went on, somewhat awkwardly. ‘I wasn’t going to tell you any of this. I was going to let you settle in there and enjoy their hospitality – which is famous, you know – and to meet the younger son, Henry, for yourself – to see for yourself what a pleasant fellow he is –’

‘But you did not tell me.’ Her voice sounded distant and strange.

‘Of course there would be no question of marriage if you did not agree – no question at all. I am simply trying to secure the interests of your son.’

What about my interests?
she could have said, but this was the man who would have had her cut open to save Edmund’s child. And he was still speaking.

‘You cannot remain a widow for long, you know – your estates are too vast for that. It is my duty as your brother to look after you and my nephew.’

She started to speak, to say that it was too soon; her husband had been dead for just four months, his child was one month old. She would have liked a year, one year at least – one year of mourning, to be with her son – was that too much to ask? And to have been consulted, of course, but then that would never have entered into it. Not with Jasper.

‘You do not have to marry straight away,’ he said. ‘But we need to seal the alliance.’

Somewhere inside she felt a white-hot spoke of rage. Jasper was still talking, but she cut right through him.

‘I won’t do it.’

He stopped talking then. There was a complete and deadly silence. Then he said, ‘You would rather be taken by your enemies, and forced into marriage with the Herberts or the Fitzwalters? Your husband’s murderers?’

She blanched a little at this, but he went on.

‘You do not seem to realize the danger you are in. You can stay with me, of course, but that is the first place they will attack.’

He paused, and into that pause she forced her words: ‘I love Edmund.’ Her voice was unnaturally tight. Jasper did not respond to it.

‘You could return to your mother. But the king will expect your marriage to be arranged – and arranged by me.’

‘I love him,’ she said.

Jasper sighed. ‘You will love again,’ he said.

‘No!’ she said, still in that high, unnatural voice. ‘I loved him – I still love him – I think about him all the time. Every morning I wake up and feel him next to me – the touch of his breath here – on my neck – I can still smell him …’

Jasper looked shaken by this outburst, but he recovered.