The merry mistress, p.23
The Merry Mistress, page 23
I doubt whether the bishop believed the tale. He was kind and did not smile or laugh and he blessed me when I curtsied from his chamber, but I saw in his twinkling eyes that he knew me for a liar.
“May heaven make you fruitful with another husband,’ said he.
“Amen,” said I.
When in the barge I was being rowed back to the palace, Lymon, seated beside me under the awning towards the stern, smiled and asked whether I had a second husband in my head.
“God save me, sir,” I cried, making pretence to shudder, “never again! Once is enough for any silly woman.”
Stiffly he smiled but his eyes were empty looking into mine.
“I have never married,” he said. “I have been too busy all my life to think of marriage or even of love. All my life I have been too busy to find time for pleasure, and I wonder whether I have not wasted the years. I have money, I am respected, feared, yet my house is cheerless when I go back at night to an empty bed.”
“Men,” said I, “even more than women are fools to marry unless, of course, for the dowry. What can you find in marriage that you cannot buy outside? It is different for a woman; her reputation, unless she live at court, is easily soiled and she needs a husband if she is not to sour her soul in lifelong maidenhood. But men… I can’t see why they ever want to marry.”
“For peace, mayhap,” he said.
“Peace with a shrew to rail at you when you come home late? peace with the children screaming through the night to keep you wakeful? peace when you examine your accounts and see what it costs to dress a woman so that she’ll not disgrace you?” I laughed, leaning back against the cushions. “You are the last man,” I mocked him, “from whom I expected such younglings’ talk; you, after all your experiences of broken marriages, to talk of peace with a wife!”
He shrugged, not looking at-me. “Yet,” said he, “I have known peaceful marriages with loving husbands and obedient wives, homes blessed with peace which you can feel the moment you enter them. And I did not mean the kind of peace you meant. I was thinking of the peace of the soul, the contentment found even amidst riot when you are happy in your life… Ah! you are right,” he cried. “I am a fool to talk like this, particularly to a lady soon to be quit of her husband that she might have her lovers without fear.”
“That is not true,” I said. “I have no lover but the king.” He smiled, pushing out his lower lip, and did not answer. “Before God,” cried I, astonished at my own anxiety to convince him, “I have been loved by no men save my husband and his majesty. There have been offers enough, but I have spurned them all. You cannot say I am a wicked woman.”
“No,” said he, “you are too young to be wicked. Thoughtless, mayhap, selfish, amorous, but not wicked, for wickedness presupposes intent and you would not be deliberately cruel.”
Drawing away from him I said with dignity, “You seem to know me well, better than I know myself, for I would not have said that I was thoughtless or selfish or more amorous than other women. I try to be loyal, and to my lord to act justly, hurting no one. That could not be called thoughtless or selfish.”
He turned away and, to my annoyance, did not speak as though the subject wearied him, and always had I liked to talk about myself, while I longed to convince him of my innocence.
His eyes, however, revealed only a sparkle of contempt and his smile was sad. The lawyer’s impenetrable mask had returned. For a moment had he shown himself a man dreaming of a happy marriage; now he was again cold, withdrawn, his expression saturnine, and I realized there was nothing I could say that would make him think well of me.
*
Over the leaden waters under a leaden sky, from the bishop’s palace to the king’s palace beside the great abbey we went, the rowers singing softly in time to their strokes, the rowlocks squeaking and the water frothing at the bows. And as the palace jerked closer, its gardens dead in winter facing us with, at their back, the huge pinnacled St. Stephen’s Chapel showing glass dulled with damp, I felt a dread of that return. Soon I would be a free woman, proclaimed legally a maid again; and I was not glad of it. Merry it might be at times at court, yet my future showed dark, for though many men swore they loved me, offering gifts for my favours, none would marry me, and I must grow old someday, as my husband had warned me. Then would I find myself alone. It had been Lymon’s talk of his cheerless house no doubt that had brought such sad thoughts on me; and I recalled how ashen had the king looked when last I saw him, how old he had become, and how he sweated and shook for no reason, his heart thundering when I listened on his chest. Suddenly any day he might die and the queen and her relations would rule England while the prince remained a minor; and what mercy could I expect from her?
To insure against that future it would be well, I thought, if I could capture Dorset. With her son as my protector, I might be safe from the queen’s malice; but he had always pretended not to notice me, and if I tried openly to trap him he would despise me for it. At a whisper Hastings would have sprung to my side, but he was no use to me. Once the king lay dead and the Woodvilles ruled, he would suffer like myself, being hated by them. No, I had best think of Dorset.
Frowning over this problem, I glanced up when the barge knocked against stone, and, showering water, the oars were shipped; and I saw the dark face of Lymon watching me. For once there was no mockery in the brown eyes; almost, it seemed, with pity did he look at me, as a man might contemplate a headstrong foolish child whom no adult argument could move from her self-willed destruction.
*
Once the bishop had decreed my divorce, the queen could not refuse to accept me amongst her ladies again. With the faintest bow she acknowledged my curtsey when I waited on her, then she turned with a shrug to talk with the older women gathered about her throne under the tasselled canopy, and I was left to back away as silently as I was able. Strange now does it seem to me that I was eager to return to that tedious court of stiff ceremonies. What pleasure could I have found in acting the servant to a high-stomached woman who fleered into anger at the littlest indiscretion, who sought ways of insulting and humiliating me and who was not above hitting me over the ears should she think me clumsy or inattentive to her wishes? The work was wearisome and exhausting when we were not allowed to sit or even lean against the walls in her presence, and often our tasks were menial. Yet I believed myself happy and proud to serve a queen. Such is the silly vanity of women, loving always the outward show, the husk above the nut. To feel that one has been chosen before most others, to know oneself the mistress of a king and the envy of many, to mock at city-folk living their tame lives in terror of the neighbours and never visiting the court, that gave me a feeling of exaltation and scorn for the citizen-world. In such foolish thoughts did I find satisfaction; and my rewards were few, were, indeed, almost nothing.
*
Only a few months ago… Now that seems to me to have been a different world and I a different person. Under these boards I can hear rats nibbling while insects keep me awake, spotting my white skin with their red poison; my hair, once my pride, is matted, for I cannot wash, there being no basin or water, I who loved bathing and the sponge, and I dare not sleep heavily lest the jailor steal upon me, or lest some of the drunken crew who sing throughout the night break down the door and think it sport to ravish her who was once loved by a king.
My husband had wept to see me in my kirtle with the candle, walking barefoot over the cobbles… yet he had not visited me since my arrest. Perhaps he dared not come lest he be laughed at after having confessed himself no man before the bishop; perhaps Agnes kept him at home. Her face had been sharp with satisfied malignancy when she had watched me step, arching my feet from the stones, along the path of penitence. To her, at least, had I brought happiness, proving her right in her dark prophecies, and she would rule that house henceforth, my husband humbled, and that would make her merry in her heart however sour her face might look. Pitiful was it that she and my husband could not marry, and he was too righteous a man to consider doing anything which the church damned as a sin, such as sleeping with his dead wife’s sister. Quickly would Agnes have consented had he asked her. Her piety lay on her lips, not in her heart. Quickly would she have seized him if he had made the faintest amorous gesture; and that he would never make even in his loneliest nights. Separate, each tossing in a lonely bed, they would remain, enjoying their abstinence with images of lust they praised themselves for rejecting because they dared not act. Agnes I could not pity; but my poor husband… he deserved a happier end than to remain till death that woman’s butt and whipping-boy.
With friends of my girlhood had she watched me walk down Chepe, exulting in my disgrace; and many of those friends now were wives and mothers. Virtuous they must have felt, never having known temptation and the thrill of true love; yet, strangely, few had jeered and not one person had thrown muck or stones, as I had feared they might. Mayhap they remembered how I had not abused my power, how I had always helped the poor and had pleaded with the king against injustice, delighting to be sued unto by great and little men for small rewards, while proud to show what I was able to do with the king and that wanton women were not always covetous. Like ill deeds, good deeds, it seemed, also sometimes meet their reward.
Had I my life to live again, no doubt I would act no differently. Even though my glory has been brief, I’d not part with it for a crown in heaven. No. I have been happy, have known ecstasy such as Cheapside wives could never understand. The progresses through the country, the manors opening their doors and the retainers running to welcome their king; the feastings, the dances, the hunts, the hawking… Even though my remaining years are years of poverty, of worse than poverty — please God, no! — I have such jewels of memories they’ll light me through dark places. Only death can rob me of them; not imprisonment, no penances, not even a flogging, can steal them away. I am different from other women, having been chosen for great things, and I lived through dangerous times, embroiled in plots of which I scarcely understood the purpose; and we almost won! Had we won, what would have been my end? Would Dorset have loved me? would he and Hastings have fought over me? and the queen, although for a while she had hooded her hatred, had never in her heart forgiven me. In the end, disaster would have had to come, and I might have been hanged or burnt… Perhaps it was for the best that we failed, and certainly King Richard had shown himself merciful towards me, this penance not being his doing but the judgment of the church; while, had he wished, he could have had my head.
Perhaps I should be grateful… Yet listening in terror to the rats, plucking the insects off my skin, dreading the thought of the jailor opening the door to take me, I can feel little gratitude. Even though Dorset wearied of me, for a little longer might I have known happiness… I wonder… I wonder if Dorset ever really cared for me… If he had truly loved me, as he said, could he have acted so callously, could he have sent his beloved to another man’s couch, -and particularly to the couch of him he detested most? Could he have… ? No! he did not love me…
Only God can read the secret thoughts within the skull. I believed in Dorset because I wished to believe in him, because otherwise life would have grown intolerable; yet underneath, even at the time, I doubted him and was afraid.
*
When after my divorce I returned to court, Dorset ignored me as he had done before and he was usually with Eleanor. Nothing, it seemed, had changed during my absence, except that there was less gaiety and people with solemn faces whispered together as though expecting some calamity. I thought of Babylon and the writing on the wall. There was a feeling of suspense, of dangers over the skyline, which affected even me who took small heed of politics. Then when I saw the king, I, too, grew afraid. In my dim bedchamber I had thought him ill, but not dangerously; now that I saw him walk, leaning on a page’s shoulder, amongst hale folk I could not help but note the contrast of his grey skin against ruddy cheeks, his dull eyes against bright eyes of health. He was dying. The blow of King Louis’s treachery had made him old, robbing him of hope, and his body suffered with his mind. Sick humours which he had managed to subdue till now took hold of him and shook him; years of hard drinking and lechery, with the ague he had caught in France, began at last to master even that splendid body.
With the sickening of the flesh, the spirit appeared to strengthen. His glance roved everywhere, seeing everything, and he missed few words even when they were whispered. Quick were his rages, his face turning purple, the veins swelling, and he would shout until the man who had offended him trembled like a child. Usually he had Hastings with him, and often on his other arm he would take Dorset; then would he make the two enemies walk up and down, he between them, while he coaxed them to be friends. They would smile, darting suspicious looks at one another, and swear that there was no enmity betwixt them.
Once when they passed where I stood, I heard the king saying: “There’ll be troubled times when I’ve gone. You two must stand together for the prince’s sake…” and they said, “Yea,” humbly; but I saw that they smiled and I knew that they intended no friendship.
“They must be friends,” often the king said to me when we were alone. “My trust’s in Hastings and in Dickon. But should my lady and her relations keep their stiff-backed way, there’ll be quarrelling; and God help us, war again in this kingdom. Would I had never married her. Had I been like other princes and chosen my queen from royalty overseas, there’d not have been this problem and I’d die happy. I did not think like that when I was young, so certain was I that I would live for ever, and by breaking Warwick and the other mighty lords I believed I was building a peaceful future for my sons… Instead, I clothed an upstart crew in glory and they’re not content. It is my death they wait for. My queen, thinking of her family, not of me: her brothers, cockscomb Anthony, a coward at heart for all he boasts of how he fought at Barnet and Tewkesbury: he kept to the rear and encouraged the others. His war’s within the lists, he likes to charge with a blunted spear and have the ladies wring their hands and shrilly plead he be not hurt. More at home is he in a perfumed bedchamber, scribbling verses to his lady’s toenails. And such as that did I raise till their greedy fingers touch my crown!…”
He groaned, running his hand through his wet hair; for although the night was cold, he sweated.
“There’s his brother, Lionel,” he continued, sipping his wine, “whom I made chancellor of Oxford University and Bishop of Salisbury. Like all of the brood, he is no fool, a cunning fellow and a lover of the arts; but he’s dying, I am told; or as near the grave as I; so him we need not fear. Then there’s Sir Richard, a weakling. Yet they can combine, being a close-knit family, and if one strikes a corner of the web, all feel the touch and run to unite. I must not forget Dorset. I like the rogue, yet do not trust him. If only he and Hastings would kiss in peace, I could die content. But he’s a Woodville, too, and none of them can be trusted.”
“What do you fear?” I asked, smoothing his clammy hair. For a long minute he did not answer and his hand on my knee pressed my kneecap till I feared I’d scream. Then his fingers opened when he muttered:
“Conspiracies, treacheries, plotting, villainies. Ay, this nation hates to keep peace. I’ll name my brother lord protector, sole guardian of the Prince of Wales, for him alone can I trust amongst these wolves, he and Hastings. But Dickon’s up north, settling my wars, while should I die suddenly… There is only Hastings to keep the peace, and he’s a hasty temper.”
“Still I don’t understand,” I said.
“There may be trouble,” he whispered, “lies said about me when I’m no longer here to beat them down. And my queen knows it. She’s determined to rule, and, if she rules, with her pride she’ll lead the nation to destruction; and her greed, her vanity… Men would rise against her or lose their manhood and be skirted knights. My brother would not stand for it, nor would I blame him. He alone must be the prince’s guardian, then will I know that justice will be done and England ruled with wisdom under a strong hand. Were he at my side now, I’d have no fears. Even the Woodvilles know he is their master, being incorruptible, honest, chaste and noble. Until he comes, we must keep the peace at court and Dorset must kiss Hastings. For blastings I trust save for his hasty temper. Should those two be friends, all might be well until Dickon could ride from the north.”
“You talk, my lord,” I cried, “as though you were to die tomorrow.”
“‘Twere well,” said he with a tight-lipped smile, “to be prepared, for in the midst of life, my child, is death.”
*
Death was on his face, in the darkened eyelids and the sallow skin, in the sudden sweats that shook him and left him lying, scarcely able to breathe, for hours on the bed. He would mutter against Louis and weep at the insult to his daughter; he would bewail the hot frenzies of his youth that could breed dreadful consequences, and he spoke of the future as though it were the present with the queen and her relations conspiring to seize the prince and capture Gloucester. Only while I was alone with him thus did he talk. When he hobbled amongst his courtiers or entered the queen’s antechamber, his eyes yet sharp in the hollows glancing here, there, suspiciously, he seemed, save bodily, the same strong fearless king. And men bowed low and women curtsied while he passed stiff-legged, and with curling nostrils and sardonic smile he looked down on them, as though to tell them that he knew that they were traitors in their souls, should opportunity beckon.
Until then, I had not realized the greatness of the king. Blinded by his crown and the semi-divinity conferred on him by the holy chrism at his coronation, I had failed to understand the man. Now I saw how he alone held in unity the divisions of his court; the secret rancours, the jealousies, the gnawing ambitions of these men and women, all thinking of themselves and not of England, were concealed only in fear of his displeasure. He was right. Should he die, the court would break in factions. About young Prince Edward, a lad of roughly thirteen, who was at the moment in Ludlow Castle, men and women would plot to gain control that they might rule during his minority. Now they watched the king, birds of prey, waiting for his death that they might race to seize the prince before his brother, Gloucester, could act.
