The Dragon and the Rose (39 page)

If only, Henry said, Francis could keep out of an actual war for a year or two, he might be able to provide a more palatable alternative as a suitor for ten-year-old Anne than Maximillian, a widower, or Gaston d'Orleans, who already had a wife, or Lord d'Albret, who was older than either of the others and widely known for his cruelty and his vices.

England was building ships as fast as the old shipyards could turn them out and as new shipyards could be built. Soon there would be a fleet capable of making Henry's wish to help his benefactor a practical possibility. There were boys in England, like Buckingham—masters of great estates that could provide enormous wealth and many men. Private armies had been mustered from such estates in the past and could be so mustered again, especially with the king's permission. Let Francis delay until England's naval strength was greater, and much might be done to ensure Brittany's safety.

And all the time that Henry talked, he wondered what Elizabeth was saying, for a page had whispered in his ear that the French ambassador, had arrived soon after Henry and the envoy from Brittany were closeted together. Foxe, of course, would keep her from making any drastic mistake, and Henry did not care whether the French envoy thought Elizabeth had power either as the king's wife or through her Yorkist influence. The more sure France was that Henry had domestic problems, the less closely the French would watch him and the less likely they would be to press him for active intervention against Brittany. Henry simply did not like Elizabeth to come into close contact with anyone who could awaken pretensions to majesty in her.

He was somewhat surprised when Foxe arrived to give him a synopsis of the interview, as close to giggling as a dignified churchman and the principal secretary to the king could get. Henry said blightingly that he did not see anything in the situation that could provoke mirth, but Foxe refused to respond to his master's mood.

"Sire, that is because you were not there. I had much ado to maintain my gravity, but fortunately I was not called upon to open my mouth even once. Her Grace has the finest ability to say nothing to the point that I have ever seen in my life in man or woman. Yet she never wandered from the subject nor gave the impression that she did not understand it."

Henry's lips twitched. He had suffered not infrequently from this ability of Elizabeth's.

"Take the question of Anne's betrothal," Foxe continued. "When the envoy complained that Duke Francis wished to use it as a weapon against France, Her Grace replied that she did not like Anne and hoped she would not be betrothed at all."

"Why should she dislike Anne, whom she has never seen?" Henry wondered, distracted for the moment from the main point.

"Oh, she made that clear enough. Do you not remember, Your Grace, that you were nearly betrothed to Anne?"

"By God," Henry exploded, "that woman's mind travels the same rut—"

"And a very useful rut it is. The envoy is convinced now of two things—that it is useless to talk of political matters to Her Grace, for she sees all in a personal light, and that she will use her womanly influence upon you against Brittany. The track of her mind made another point even more important—that it is utterly useless to think of her as a focal point for any conspiracy against Your Grace."

But Henry ignored that and said, "Oh, she will use her influence against Brittany, will she?"

Foxe looked at his master with concealed annoyance. It was ridiculous the way anything relating to Elizabeth upset him. It was no more than annoying, no cause for alarm; practically, the queen had no influence on Henry's decisions at all. He did not permit what he felt toward her, whether it was fondness or anger, to becloud the practical situation, but whenever she was involved he was testy and irritable.

Still, Foxe knew that for a time, at least, until Henry became better known to the envoys Elizabeth could be endlessly useful. He was not inclined to forgo that usefulness because it induced bad temper in the king.

"I think," he said, "you should try her on the Breton envoy next time. Francis must know your sympathies are with him. Aside from your personal attachment, any aggrandizement of France must be to your political disadvantage. If Her Grace is hostile to the envoy from Brittany, it may make Francis less sure of your ultimate support and more willing to listen to present advice."

After some further argument and hearing an outline of the complete interview, which made him laugh in spite of himself, Henry agreed. When he went to Elizabeth that evening for an hour or two of music and conversation before going to bed, he thanked her somewhat ungraciously for her help and told her he would require it again. Elizabeth put down the cap she was embroidering for him with an ill-tempered thump.

"Really, Henry, I do not know where you expect me to find time for this nonsense."

It was the first time in any court that Henry had heard international affairs called nonsense, and he blinked.

"If France swallows Brittany, it will make her that much more powerful and, perhaps, that much more dangerous to us."

"If France swallows Brittany, she will find herself with a disturbance of the bowels that will keep her busy for some time—and I have that just being made to listen. Oh, yes, I know the matter is important, but it is not important to me. This is your work, not mine, Henry."

"It is a wife's duty to obey and help her husband," Henry snapped, and then wondered if he had been maneuvered into pressing her to do something he did not want her to do.

"Very well. Tell me what I am to say to the envoy and I will say it with as many simperings as I can manage. But I tell you plain, I would like to spit in his face, and I may not be able to hide it. Also, you should consider that if you keep pressing these unwomanly duties on me, your son and Charles will be raised by chambermaids. Is that what you desire?"

As if she realized that her suspicious husband had doubts of her display of unwillingness, Elizabeth returned to the subject later when they were in bed. Henry was resting for a few moments before he left her, looking very peaceful and relaxed, flat on his back with his clasped hands behind his head.

"Harry, why are you making me deal with state matters? I do not like it."

"No?" He did not move, but his eyes slid sideways toward her.

Elizabeth stretched out a hand to play with the sparse hair on his chest. "No. And that is the truth. I am fit for certain things and not for others. I am fit to raise your children, to make them love and fear God, to teach them simply of right and wrong. I am not very brave nor very wise. Harry, I have such a terror of saying the wrong thing …"

"Make no certain promises and no certain denials, and you cannot do much amiss. Foxe will be there."

"It also leads to things I do not like. The ambassador sent me a fine pair of jeweled gloves—for my help. Harry …"

"You did not send them back!" Henry exclaimed, jerking upright.

"Of course not. I am not a complete fool, although since you plainly think me one I cannot understand why you place me in these situations. What I do not like is that it was no official gift. He wants something, and I have nothing to give."

"Give him—give them all—your sweet smile and your assurance you will speak well of them to me. And do so, if you like. It will make no difference." Henry's narrow eyes peered more sharply at those words, but if Elizabeth was offended she showed nothing. "The cards are thrown on the table," he added, softening what might seem contempt for her opinion, "and must be played to advantage, not for liking or disliking."

So
, will she nill she, Elizabeth was temporarily drawn into international intrigue. True, the envoys soon gave over trying to interest her in the actual affairs, but they plied her with personal attentions and Henry slyly made them dupes by smiling more particularly the next day upon those who had courted Elizabeth the day before. The rumor grew that Her Grace could not be relied upon to introduce any particular idea into her husband's mind, but that she could incline him to listen more favorably after pillow talk to this man or that who pleased her.

Unfortunately this growing conviction among the ambassadors was no longer growing among the Yorkists. Henry had taken no revenge on them … yet. But every day he grew stronger, every day he drew more threads of government into his own hands, strand by strand stripping the local magnates of their powers. The king's writ was growing in force, the local magnate's strength decreasing. Soon a man would be unable to ignore the king's order to summon troops or come to court to be punished for what Henry decided was a misdeed. Then the snake would turn and strike them, when they were powerless.

Little rumors from the court fed this. Before the queen had delivered, she had begged her husband in frantic terror not to be angry with her if she bore him a girl instead of a boy. The king had pretended to expect her to die in childbirth and had nearly frightened her into doing so. And when the queen was ill with an ague after her delivery and her husband had been called to her, she had begged her ladies not to call him again, no matter how sick she was. If Henry oppressed his wife, would he not oppress them when they were equally in his power? And the poor earl of Warwick, the rightful heir to Edward's crown, was he not shamefully mistreated?

With the new year came new rumors. Lord Lovell had escaped and—marvel of marvels—had contrived the escape of Warwick. Here was proof that Henry was not all powerful and might still be challenged. If the mighty Tower could not keep so important a prisoner, there was wide disaffection toward the king close to the throne. Warwick was safe. Warwick was in Ireland and had been recognized by men who had seen him in childhood.

Henry tried at first to keep the rumors from Elizabeth, but to control the tongues of the court was to try to restrain the buzzing of wasps by blocking the opening of their nest. Elizabeth struggled valiantly and she did not succumb to hysterical terrors, but she grew so pale and thin that Henry rode to Richmond himself to beg Margaret to come to her support.

"I am taking her to Sheen where there will be less formality, but she needs someone, mother."

"She needs only you, Henry."

An almost overwhelming desire to throw himself down and weep in his mother's arms stopped Henry's tongue, and he rose and walked away. If only he could confess, speak out of the vision that stood before his eyes, perhaps it would leave him. He did not dare. Not because his mother would think him weak or betray him to others, but because he might transfer his fear to her.

He could not even give her the real reason why her presence was so necessary, that his terrors were infecting his wife and hers him, so that they could barely endure sight of each other. Only if Margaret believed him confident would she be able to comfort Elizabeth, and Elizabeth's comfort was now more necessary to him than his own.

"I can be with her so little," he said calmly, returning to his mother's side after seeming to have examined a missal which was lying open on a table. "Any disturbance of this kind makes sore labor for a king. There is another reason, also. Elizabeth is not on good terms with her mother. I fear they quarrel about me. And she does not trust her ladies because of some things I had to bring to her notice."

"Then this is a good time to get her new ladies she can grow to trust and be rid of her mother's agents."

"Alas, it is the very worst time. There are already tales that I am cruel to her. I dare not dismiss those chattering women lest they say I make as much a prisoner of my wife as of Warwick. Mother, you must come. Elizabeth will go mad if she has no one to talk to and no one to drive out her silly fears. You know how hysterical and fanciful she is."

Margaret riffled the pages of the Bible she held. Lay persons were not encouraged to read the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, but Margaret had permission. The book fell open, as if by long usage, at the story of Naomi and Ruth. "Very well," she said softly, "I will come to Sheen."

CHAPTER 19

On February 2 the king called a full council of forty men to decide what was best to do about the growing recognition of the false Warwick in Ireland. He seemed, himself, to have shockingly little interest in the matter, saying merrily that he would need to be king there as he was in England before he could make them obey, and then suddenly bringing his restless nobles up short by adding, "And this will make me king there—without the cost of transporting Englishmen to fight them."

Then, frustratingly, he would not enlarge upon that fascinating theme, turning his attention to measures to ensure the peace in England. The first decision that was reached, after considerable argument, was that arrangements should be made to take Warwick from prison and display him. He was to be ridden through the major streets of London and taken to High Mass at Saint Paul's Cathedral where any who wished to would be allowed to speak to him, assure themselves that he was truly Warwick and that, except for being confined, he was well treated.

The second proposal met with even more argument. It was Henry's customary gambit of offering a free pardon to anyone implicated in the affair so long as he took no active part in it.

"Pardons, pardons," Oxford muttered. "They will think us too weak to fight."

"No one who knows I have you to lead my armies could believe that, John," Henry soothed.

"Do not such pardons encourage men to conspire?" Nottingham asked unhappily.

"No," Foxe offered. "They keep men from becoming desperate. Men who have perhaps done no more than listen to loose talk or received letters urging them to join the rising. If they feared punishment they might indeed join, thinking to be hung for a sheep instead of a lamb."

"A thousand well-wishers who will not lift a hand to help my enemies are less dangerous to me than a thousand friends who will not lift a hand to support me," Henry said pointedly.

There was some unhappy stirring among certain of the councilors who had been wondering whether they could get away with just that game. Henry's eyes swept the faces before him. There was no more protest.