The Queen's Choice. Anne O'Brien

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      Anger drove out all other thoughts from my mind. ‘Could it have been done no other way?’ I demanded of John, sotto voce.

      ‘It was not tactful. Burgundy is never tactful.’ He took my arm. ‘I think we had better rescue our protégé from the depths of despair.’

      I had seen anger. But despair?‘But the King absolved him of treason. Didn’t he?’

      John’s flat brows said it all. There had been no absolution here, only a cowardly sidestepping of the issue. But first things first.

      ‘I have need of a moment with my cousin,’ I said.

      I could not leave it like this. Calmly smiling, answering greetings as I went, I was at Mary’s side, wasting no time in fine words.

      ‘You knew, didn’t you? You knew what was planned here. You knew it would strip his pride from him. How could you not warn him of this little conspiracy to humiliate him and damage his reputation for honesty and integrity beyond repair.’

      ‘What is it to you?’ There was undoubtedly guilt from the set of Mary’s fine jaw to the clench of her hands into inelegant fists. ‘What could I have done?’

      ‘Could you not have warned him?’

      ‘I was told not to discuss it.’

      ‘So you let him go into that bear pit unprotected. To be torn apart by the dogs.’

      Mary tilted her chin. ‘Duke Henry needed no protection from me.’

      ‘He deserved to know that he would be proclaimed traitor before the whole Court!’

      There was high colour in her cheeks. ‘It’s a marriage I’m well out of. If a man feels threatened, his judgement can be impaired.’ Her eyes flitted over my face. ‘What I don’t understand is why you should take me to task. What is he to you?’

      ‘He is a friend.’ I would not be discomfited. ‘Friends should be treated with honour.’

      Her mouth twisted. ‘You are very hot in his defence, Joanna.’

      ‘And you are cold for a woman who, yesterday, was not averse to marriage.’

      ‘Such heat, my dear Joanna, is unbecoming and could be misconstrued.’

      Here was danger. ‘I know the value of friendship,’ I replied, smooth as the silk of my girdle. Yet gratitude was strong as John appeared at my side to rescue me, saying:‘My wife is supportive of Duke Henry, for my sake. The family is very much in my heart. We take it ill when his good name is blackened for no reason.’

      Mary, a little flushed at the mild chastisement, bit her lip, while I withdrew into icy civility. Perhaps I had been intemperate but injustice could not be tolerated. If I had known as she did, I would have done all in my power to protect him.

      ‘Forgive me, Mary, but it was not well done. Not at all.’

      ‘Would you have disobeyed your father? I doubt it.’

      ‘I might well if I thought it honourable. You are no longer a child. You have a right to your own thoughts on these matters.’

      Mary turned away, leaving me to explain my intemperance to John, who was regarding me with some irony.

      ‘Well, that put Mary firmly in her place, didn’t it?’

      ‘It had to be said.’

      ‘But perhaps not so furiously.’

      ‘I thought I was very restrained.’

      ‘Then God help us when you are not.’

      *

      In the aftermath, Henry bore the affront to his dignity with a fortitude stronger than any I had ever witnessed, even knowing that it was King Richard who, in the name of his little Valois wife, had dispatched an ambassador, the Earl of Salisbury, festooned with seals and letters of credence, demanding that Charles rescind his offer of marriage and sanctuary. Duke Henry accepted the judgement with nerve-chilling control.

      ‘My father’s loyalty to the English Crown, and mine, is beyond debate. This is how Richard repays me, making me persona non grata in every Court of Europe. A political liability.’ He was pale, as if he had suffered a blow from a mailed fist, but his delivery was eloquent. ‘I have been conspicuously loyal to him for ten years, since the Lords Appellant set his feet on the path to fair government. I have done everything in my power to support my cousin. Now he destroys my good name, hounding me when I could have made a temporary life for myself here in France. My every motive, my principles, every tenet of my life—all now suspect. So Charles will think again of the marriage, when I have come into my inheritance? Before God, he will not!’

      Which summed it up succinctly, as cold and crisp as winter ice beneath the tumult in his eyes. Duke Henry glowered like a thunder cloud about to break and deluge us all.

      ‘Richard considers me a traitor, worthy of banishment. How can the courts of Europe cast that aside, as an accusation of no merit? I know that Charles has tolerated me because of my Lancaster blood, and you too because of past friendships, but unless I can clear my name there will always be rank suspicion hanging over me. And how can I clear my name? Until I can return to England and take my place again as heir to Lancaster with Richard’s blessing, there is no hope for my restitution. And I think I will never have Richard’s blessing. He has covered it well over the years with smiles and gestures of friendship, but he despises the air I breathe.’

      Henry had understood from the beginning the insecurity of his position. He might have been lured into believing he could make a home here and wait out the empty years with French support and a French wife, but I thought he had never truly believed that. He had always envisaged this ending. Now his masterly summing up left neither John nor I with anything to say. As he faced the uncertain future, I admired him more than I dared admit. A proud man driven to his knees. A man of honour forced to accept the charge, and bear it, because there was no evidence that he was not a traitor. What would his denial weigh against the conviction of King Richard?

      ‘What can we do to help him?’ I asked John, hollow with regret when he had gone.

      ‘Not a thing.’

      As bleak a reply as I could envisage.

      *

      Couriers brought the news. Surely there should have been storms and fiery comets lighting the heavens, signs of great portent? There were none. The stars continued to pursue their habitual path. The sun rose and set without interruption, when John, Duke of Lancaster, the greatest of the Plantagenet princes, passed from this life. It was rumoured that King Richard heard of his uncle’s demise with a sort of joy, but no one spoke of it in Duke Henry’s hearing. There would have been no rejoicing at Leicester where Lancaster breathed his last, alone except for his wife Katherine, without the comfort of his son and heir, over whose unprotected head the clouds grew blacker yet.

      In Paris a High Mass was ordered by King Charles, to pray for Lancaster’s soul.

      But Henry was Lancaster now. A man of title, of land and pre-eminent rank, yet a man destined to kick his heels in whichever СКАЧАТЬ