The Tudor Bride

Lady Joan looked crestfallen. ‘I am sorry that you would even think that of me, Madame,’ she said indignantly. ‘I am the one female among the queen’s ladies who would rather chase a deer than dawdle in a pleasure garden. Did you not hear that I gave one stupid squire a thick lip for his wandering hands during a galliard?’ She gave me a sidelong glance – a flash of bright blue filtered through thick, dark lashes. ‘I do not know who I will marry, but I do know that it will not be a booby such as that.’

I detected a rather endearing touch of the convent schoolgirl in Lady Joan’s pugnacious prudery, very similar to the queen’s.

‘I have poured my heart out to my horse over the past two days. She is the most loyal of creatures, aren’t you, Artemis?’

She leaned forward and scratched her pretty dappled mare fondly between the ears. The horse responded with a flick of those ears and a little sideways swerve, which almost sent her into the path of a well-lathered horse galloping past us ridden by a man in royal livery. Lady Joan clung to the saddle like a limpet, calming her startled mare with a steadying hand and giving a little cry of excitement.

‘That might be a dispatch from France! I must go and see. Au revoir, Madame – and thank you!’

I watched her horse dance away on dainty hooves, following the messenger’s sweating courser, and wondered what Lady Joan’s real reason was for wanting to stay at court.

7

We French have always believed St George to be an Anatolian knight-errant who, among other chivalrous acts, fought crusades in the Holy Land, slew a dragon in Cyrenia and was finally executed there for refusing to deny his Christian faith, but the English placed his feats in a whole variety of other places, most of which were located within a few days’ ride of Windsor. Rather than being a Mediterranean martyr, in English eyes St George was a local hero, greatly honoured for pursuing and killing a dragon which had terrorised the maidens of numerous English villages. King Edward III had named his new palace at Windsor St George’s Hall and his great-grandson had given the saint much of the credit for his Agincourt victory. King Henry had planned a tournament to celebrate the Feast of St George on the twenty-third of April, a week after arriving back at Windsor. Knights from all over England, those who were not involved in the French campaign, had been invited to take part and began riding in the middle of the month but a downpour had turned the tourney ground to a quagmire. The event had therefore been postponed until the first of May. Like the king’s recent pilgrimage around England’s shrines, the tournament had a hidden agenda.

‘With the borders relatively peaceful, most knights will surely be glad of the chance to flex their fighting muscles and it will be a good opportunity to recruit more lances for France,’ King Henry observed to his brother Humphrey one morning as they prepared for arms practice together.

The Duke of Gloucester had ridden in the previous night, full of his usual flamboyance and self-assurance. ‘I am still short of knights ordinary for my contingent,’ he admitted. ‘I will tell my captains to keep an eye out for likely recruits.’

The two brothers were standing outside the barrier surrounding the area of hard sand where knights and men at arms practised their fighting skills. Squires worked busily around them, buckling on various pieces of armour. Part of the reason for arms practice was to maintain fighting fitness, so heavy plate and mail was worn to give their muscles a proper work-out.

After the downpour, spring had re-asserted itself and Catherine had asked the king for a chance to watch him at practice. She had brought her ladies with her to spectate and their fashionable gowns made bright splashes of colour against the grey walls of the castle. I noticed several of the bolder young ladies, particularly Joanna Coucy, casting eloquent sidelong glances in Gloucester’s direction. A bachelor prince who was so closely related to the reigning monarch was inevitably going to attract female attention, although Humphrey affected to ignore their sly scrutiny, restricting his attention to Catherine.

‘Since I am supporting my brother in France on this campaign, Madame, you may be sure that your lord will be in safe hands.’

It had already been announced that during King Henry’s next campaign, Humphrey and his brother John of Bedford would swap their roles as king’s lieutenants in England and France, but I could see that Catherine was not enormously impressed with Humphrey’s flagrant boast.

‘If your hands prove as safe as his were when he defended you against all comers after you were felled at Agincourt, my lord of Gloucester, that will indeed be great reassurance.’ Noticing his flush of irritation at her reference to the king’s famous battlefield rescue of his youngest brother, she was unable to suppress a twitch of her lips before turning to her husband with an eager query, ‘Where will be the best place to view your swordplay, my lord? I so look forward to watching you hone your legendary skills.’

Clearly riled at being put in his place by a woman, Gloucester cut in with a glacial smile, ‘So you like to see men sweat, do you, Madame? Or perhaps it is blood you relish? If so, I fear you will be disappointed. We spar only with wooden swords – see!’ His squire had just placed the practice sword in his hand and he thrust it towards Catherine, making her jump back.

King Henry rounded on his brother furiously. ‘How dare you, sir! A knight never shows the point of his sword to a lady, let alone a queen, as well you know. You will apologise at once or consider yourself on a charge of treason!’

With a shaky laugh, Humphrey hastily drew back his weapon. ‘Steady, brother. It was only a play thrust, I meant no harm.’ Nevertheless, seeing the king’s fierce expression, his bow to Catherine was so abasingly deep, he almost kissed his own kneecap. ‘I humbly beg your grace’s pardon if I startled you.’

This was not enough for King Henry, who abruptly shoved his brother in the back, making him stumble to the ground. ‘On your knees, villain! Apologise on your knees!’ he ordered. ‘You have offended the queen, not merely startled her. I should make you eat dust.’

Humphrey shot an astonished glance at Henry, as if expecting him to break suddenly into a laugh, before realising that he was fiercely in earnest and swivelling back to fall on his knees before Catherine. All bluster apparently gone, he bent forward to gather a handful of dirt from the ground which he held out to her and said, ‘On my knees I abjectly crave your grace’s forgiveness. If you so desire, I will indeed eat the dust from beneath your feet.’

Catherine’s intense look of gratitude to the king surprised me and the determination of her riposte to the duke was equally unexpected. It was also delivered in French, which gave it added fluency and authority. ‘I crave dust as little as I crave blood or sweat, my lord Gloucester. But I demand and I will have the respect due to the wife of your king; so I will pardon your sword thrust, but I will not forgive any repeat of the disrespectful thrust of your original remarks.’

Humphrey was taken aback. Expecting only a formal acknowledgement of his insincere grovel, he was more than a little shocked by her robust rebuttal of his veiled insinuation that she might have an unnatural lust for blood and sweat, so it was a somewhat sullen Gloucester who rose, frowning, to his feet, backed away and followed his brother across the sand towards the row of pells at one end of the practice ground. I detected more than a trace of venom in the violent blows he immediately began to inflict on the quilted padding of the stout pell-post, a far cry from King Henry’s deft thrusts and lunges.

I noticed Walter Vintner approaching from the palace with an impressive-looking missive in his hand. He bent his knee to Catherine. ‘This has just come for the king, your grace; it is from the Duchess of Hainault and I believe his grace will want to consider its contents with all speed.’

Like all the king’s official correspondence, the seal had been broken and the letter read by his chief clerk so Catherine was able to scan its contents. It was written in Latin, the universal diplomatic language of Europe.

‘It is from Jacqueline, Mette,’ she confided, moving nearer to me so that her voice did not carry to the rest of the spectators. ‘Jacqueline of Hainault, who was married to my poor brother Jean, if you remember. Her father died soon after Jean did and left her heir to the territories of Hainault and Holland. Then I believe she married her cousin the Duke of Brabant, although it seems not willingly.’ Her brow creased with concern as she read on. ‘Now she is in terrible trouble and asking for our help.’ She nodded at Walter dismissively. ‘You are right, Master Clerk; his grace will want to deal with this immediately. I will see that he gets it.’

We moved to the seating area where Catherine perused the letter more closely.

Nearly an hour passed before the king and Gloucester abandoned their energetic assaults on the pells and wandered across to the barrier to take refreshment. Their faces were glistening with sweat and both men hastily removed the heavy gauntlets they had been wearing in order to grasp the cup of the wine their squires poured for them. Catherine immediately approached the king and drew him aside to read the letter, while the duke took the opportunity to stroll over to the spectator stand where Catherine’s ladies still sat. He rapidly had the three Joannas giggling at some light-hearted remark, but his dallying was interrupted when King Henry strolled up and thrust the letter into his brother’s hands.

‘You had better read this, Humphrey,’ he said. ‘The Duchess of Hainault and Brabant is a lady in distress. You may have met her in Flanders when you stood hostage for the Duke of Burgundy during our peace talks in Calais four years ago.’

Humphrey pondered this suggestion but shook his head. ‘No, although I did hear talk of the new dauphin’s beautiful wife. Would that be the same lady?’

‘Yes, but she was not dauphiness for long, as Prince Jean died soon after that and she married the Duke of Brabant. Not a successful union it seems. Anyway, she is in Calais now and asks permission to come to England. Awkward though it may be in view of her close relationship with our ally Philippe of Burgundy, I do not see how we can refuse. Greeting her is a job for the Lord Warden of the Cinq Ports but, although we must regard her as an honoured guest, I would not advise carrying her ashore in one of your infamous chair-litters. This lady is reputed to need careful handling.’

Catherine protested at this. ‘I think that is a little unkind, my lord. Her husband is a violent brute and the Burgundians have invaded her territory. She deserves our sympathy.’

Ignoring this outburst, Humphrey returned his attention to the letter, but King Henry gave Catherine a quizzical look. ‘Another way of looking at it may be that she has run away from her husband and abandoned her people. Not something any prince worth his honour would do.’

‘But she is not a prince,’ Catherine insisted. ‘She is a princess who has been forced into marriage with a half-wit cousin by the Duke of Burgundy on the basis that there will be no offspring to inherit either of their territories, meaning that in due course he can add them to his own. That is manipulation of the ugliest kind and Burgundy should surely not be allowed to get away with it. Jacqueline is connected to every royal house in Europe and might have been Queen of France, if my brother Jean had not died before his time. She deserves our help.’

King Henry forced a placatory smile, clearly unwilling to enter into a public debate on the subject. ‘I understand that you have sympathy for your former sister-in-law, Catherine, and with that in mind I will agree to let her come to England, even though it will undoubtedly annoy Philippe of Burgundy who, I am sure I do not need to remind you, is our greatest ally against the forces of the Pretender. Now, let us drop the subject.’

Catherine allowed him to take her hand and lead her back to her seat on the dais, but from where I stood I could see a mutinous expression that the king did not see. King Henry immediately went to speak to his brother, who was again surrounded by a giggling gaggle of young ladies.

‘Well may you practise your charm, Humphrey,’ I heard the king remark in a tone too low for Catherine’s hearing. ‘You may soon need all you can muster. I will send a courier to Calais today and I suspect that Duchess Jacqueline will waste no time in taking ship for Dover. If you take the highway tomorrow, you should be there in time to greet her and bring her back to Windsor for the tournament. You do not want to miss that!’

Following the talk about the Duchess of Hainault’s letter, Catherine became unusually quiet for the rest of our stay at the practice ground. She waited to reveal the reason for this until we were in her bedchamber with no men present, preparing her for dinner in the great hall.

‘Why should a woman have no say in her own future, even when she is the ruler of her own country?’ she asked indignantly as Agnes and I removed her fur-lined heuque and began to unlace the warm woollen kirtle beneath. Sensing that the question was rhetorical, we exchanged quizzical glances, but remained silent, expecting further enlightenment. Being the maid of honour on duty, Lady Joan busied herself in the queen’s jewellery chest, selecting the pieces to be worn and sensibly keeping her counsel.

‘If we show the slightest sign of exercising any power, even power that is legally ours, we are instantly considered to be difficult or, as my lord puts it, to “need careful handling”.’ Catherine glanced round at the three of us, still busy at our tasks. ‘Not one of you speaks, but you all know what I mean. Joan, has your mother never complained of such things?’

Lady Joan looked up from the jewel casket, her cheeks hot. ‘Not in my hearing, your grace,’ she said diplomatically.

Catherine shrugged and sat down on her dressing stool. Agnes moved in to arrange her hair more elaborately for the formal headdress she would wear with her elegant ground-sweeping gown. I had not yet noticed any of the court ladies copying Catherine’s French fashions, but it could be only a matter of time before there was a rash of steeple hats and houppelandes.

Agnes began to twist handfuls of Catherine’s hair into ropes, pinning them to the crown of her head. ‘Have you ever met the Duchess of Hainault, Madame?’

‘No.’ Catherine shook her head, tugging against the tress her attendant was arranging. ‘Ouch, be careful, Agnes! Well, I was at her wedding when she married my brother Jean, but we were all children then and I do not remember her except as a bride in the cathedral at Compiègne. Charles met her later, when she was the dauphiness, and said she was very beautiful but heiresses are always beautiful to men, are they not?’

‘Will she live here at the English court now?’ Lady Joan laid a collar of Lancastrian SS gold links set with diamonds on the dressing chest, ready to drape around Catherine’s shoulders. ‘After she arrives, I mean.’

‘We shall have to see if we like her,’ Catherine responded. ‘She may not fit in with our merry little band. You are happy that you stayed with me, are you not, Joan? Or do you miss your mother?’

This double question flustered Lady Joan. ‘Oh yes – I mean no. Well, I miss my lady mother, of course, but I am very happy that you managed to persuade her to let me remain in your service, Madame.’

‘That is good because it was not easy. And of course King James is here for the occasion of his being knighted by the king. Does that please you also?’

This abrupt change of topic seemed to turn Lady Joan’s cheeks a deeper shade of pink. ‘King James, Madame?’

I frowned, striving to fathom where this conversation was going.

With a teasing smile Catherine pursued her theme. ‘He spoke to me of you yesterday, Joan. He said he had watched you from a window, playing bowls in the garden, and thought you the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. I received the impression, however, that he actually knows you rather better than merely as a vision of loveliness viewed from afar. Would I be right?’

Both Agnes and I were by now wide-eyed with astonishment. This suggestion of a liaison between Lady Joan and the King of Scotland came as a complete surprise; then I remembered Joan’s plea for my intervention with Catherine on her behalf. Suddenly I understood the real reason why she had been so anxious to stay at court.

I felt quite sorry for her in the circumstances. Clearly her lover, if he was that, had spoken to the queen of his interest without forewarning Joan. Tongue-tied and deeply embarrassed, she was unable to think of anything to say.

Catherine took pity on her. ‘Well, since you do not deny it, I must suppose that the two of you are at least acquainted. And whilst King James is obviously very enamoured, he spoke most honourably and delicately about you. He writes poetry, did you know that? Well, of course you do. Really, Joan, there is no need to look so crestfallen. You have not committed any crime and not even your high-minded mother could object to such an acquaintance. King James has asked me to take his part in marriage discussions with your mother and the king, but first I would like to know whether you would be willing. Consent is still required by the Church, however; many marriages are somehow forced on unwilling and unfortunate noblewomen like Duchess Jacqueline.’

By now Lady Joan had dissolved into tears, and it was impossible to tell if they were tears of relief or remorse. I was about to rush to her side and put my arm around her, but Catherine beat me to it, pulling her hair from Agnes’s grip and abandoning her dressing stool to take the tearful girl’s hands and lead her to a window-seat where they subsided together. Wordlessly I handed Catherine a kerchief taken from my sleeve and she gently mopped Lady Joan’s eyes.

‘I am sorry, little Joan. I took you by surprise and clearly King James has raised the question of marriage without your knowledge. Men do that, I am afraid, especially kings, I find. They tend not to understand that women have feelings and wishes of their own and should be consulted. But do not cry. There really is no need. You are lucky if you have attracted the love of someone you might be permitted to love in return. If you wish, I will speak to your mother on your behalf when she returns to court. Meanwhile, I think you may continue your friendship with King James, always remembering that he is still a king without a kingdom and may never be in a position to marry if he is not restored to his throne. Besides, you know that he will be going with King Henry to France before too long, so perhaps it would be wise not to get too attached.’

‘H— he has promised to write to me f-from France, Madame,’ confessed the sniffling girl. ‘I did not wish to deter him. I am told that men going to war often need someone to write home to.’

‘Ah – the sweet innocence of the child!’ Catherine handed Lady Joan the kerchief, casting a playful smile at me as she did so.

I raised an eyebrow in return, thinking that she was not so far from being a child herself.

‘I am sure he will write charming and lyrical letters and you will treasure them.’ Catherine stood up, her tone suddenly brisk. ‘Now, I must finish dressing or there will be scores of people waiting for their dinner and I shall be chastised by King Henry for keeping them all waiting. You see – even queens live under orders.’

I shrugged my shoulders and gave her a smile of sympathy. At eighteen she had thought marriage and a crown would give her freedom to exercise her own will and was fast discovering otherwise.

8

Early next morning I had thought the queen was still abed, asleep, when Agnes came rushing into the robe room, her face a mask of fear. ‘Quickly, Mette, come quickly! The queen is hurt!’

Catherine was very pale, propped up on cushions in a chair in the presence chamber, where she had been carried by the Master at Arms, a sturdy soldier who had heard Lady Joan’s cry for help as she clattered into the stable yard at a hectic canter. It seemed that the horse-mad lady-in-waiting had been persuaded to assist Catherine in taking a secret dawn ride in the Windsor deer-park, which had come to grief when the queen had been knocked from her horse by a low branch. King Henry had been sent for, but had not yet arrived because at sunrise he had crossed the river to inspect the latest Thames navigation works. He must have missed Catherine and Joan sneaking out of the royal stables by minutes.

‘I am perfectly all right. Do not cluck like a mother hen, Mette!’

Catherine was right, I was fussing around her in trepidation, feeling her brow and propping her feet on a stool. ‘Well your grace, if you would care to tell me exactly what happened, I might be able to help,’ I fretted. ‘Should we send for a physician, I wonder?’

I would have liked to give her a more thorough examination, but was very conscious that we were not alone. Several high-ranking courtiers had interrupted their breakfast to offer help and were hovering anxiously in the background.

‘My back hurts a little, that is all. I was knocked clean off my horse!’ Catherine’s indignation had increased in proportion to the number of people she could see in the room. ‘Blessed Marie, Mette, send all these spectators away! There is nothing for them to see.’

She had dropped her voice to a hiss, but it still carried to every ear in the room and most of the courtiers began to drift away, muttering to each other.

‘Truly, Mette, I am not badly hurt, just shamefaced because I am entirely to blame for my bruises. I wanted to gallop, to be free!’ She winced as she shifted on the cushions. ‘I daresay the king will scold me thoroughly.’

‘Certainly he will and with some justification!’ King Henry heard her words as he strode through the door. The small gathering of remaining courtiers dipped their knees as he passed. Frowning fiercely, he bent over his wife and kissed her cheek, placing one hand on her forehead in concern. ‘I am happy to see that my worst fears appear groundless. I had dreaded to find broken bones at least. Please tell me there are none.’

Catherine’s expression was that of a small girl found with her fingers in the sweetmeats. It was only with a visible effort that she met his gaze, shaking her head. ‘No, my liege, none. I am sorry you were brought back from your business unnecessarily.’

King Henry continued to stand over her, like a tutor over an unruly student. ‘I heard that you fell from your horse in the park. What in Heaven’s name made you ride out without even a groom, Catherine?’ Turning to me, he demanded, ‘Did you not notice she had left her bed, Madame Lanière?’

So flustered was I by this sudden verbal thrust that I neglected to make any deferential move, simply staring dumbstruck at the king before dragging a garbled response from my frozen brain. ‘Er, no, your grace. That is – I usually rouse the queen soon after first light but I had not yet entered the bedchamber.’

‘Oh do not blame Mette, my liege! Do not blame anyone but me, it was my idea!’ cried Catherine. ‘I am not a child to be watched every moment of the day and night. I simply wanted to go for a ride with my lady-in-waiting without everyone else knowing where I was. Now let us have an end to this and allow me to retire to my chamber and lick my wounds!’

At this she kicked away the stool and rose gingerly from her chair, allowing me to support her in a painful progress towards the door. There were dirt-marks on her skirt, but I was relieved to see no sign of blood. She stopped halfway across the room to speak to Lady Joan, who stood shifting from one foot to the other, biting her lip and looking guilty. Dishevelled and also splattered with mud and dirt, it was clear that it must have been Lady Joan who had been persuaded to tack up the horses for this dawn escapade. Catherine put her hand on the girl’s shoulder and turned to face the two kings.