Chapter 27
‘I am worried about Edward,’ Jeanette said, folding her hands in her lap.
John of Lancaster’s work chamber was airy and comfortable with thick cushions on the benches and woven rush mats on the floor, covered with Turkish rugs in dark reds and golds.
John had been working on items for the parliamentary session to be held at Westminster in a week’s time, and his table was covered in parchments, scrolls and ledgers.
‘Windsor took so much out of Edward,’ Jeanette continued. ‘I do not believe he will be fit to attend Parliament without a miraculous improvement.’
‘I suspected as much when I saw him,’ John answered. ‘I doubt our father will be well enough to attend either. His own health is precarious.’
‘But you will be there to conduct business?’
John looked wry. ‘Who else is there? Not my younger brothers – Edmund and Thomas do not have the wherewithal. Edward has been working to prepare the way for discussions, but he was so ill at Windsor I knew he would only be attending Parliament as a token gesture, if at all.’
Jeanette gripped her hands together. ‘John, I am at my wits’ end. Each time he rallies, he never returns to the place he was before. It is always a step down, and soon there will be no more steps.’
He rose from his work table and came to put his arm around her. ‘I know, but let us pray he lasts a while longer yet. Let me see this Parliament through, and then we shall decide what is to be done. I know how hard it is.’
Jeanette steadied herself. ‘Edward wants you to visit him before Parliament convenes. He could have sent a messenger, but I said I would come myself because I wanted to know how you were faring . . . and to see if you could exert your influence on your father to visit us at Kennington.’
A pained expression crossed John’s face. ‘Our father is ailing too, as I have said, but I shall speak to him.’
‘Without the company of the lady Alice,’ Jeanette qualified.
He nodded, a slight curl to his lips. ‘I shall do my best, and in the meantime I shall visit Edward myself on the morrow.’
‘Thank you.’ Jeanette pressed his arm and blinked away tears at his kindness. He was a rock – not always a comfortable one, but steady and sure.
When Jeanette arrived back at Kennington, she noticed one of the smaller royal barges tied up at the jetty, with a couple of attendants in the King’s livery waiting at the mooring. Stepping from her own barge, she demanded to know who was visiting her husband.
‘Mistress Perrers, my lady,’ said one, hastily lowering his gaze to the pointed toes of his shoes. ‘She is visiting the Prince to see how he is faring.’
Jeanette curtly ordered Richard’s nurse to take him to his chamber, then stood for a moment, smoothing her gown, collecting herself.
Had she been male, she would have drawn her sword.
She fixed the royal crewmen with a burning look.
‘Mistress Perrers will not be staying,’ she said. ‘Make ready to leave.’
Once inside the palace, she marched up the stairs to Edward’s chamber, but had to pause outside, breathless with rage, her heart thundering fit to burst. Dear God, dear God. What was this woman doing here in the heart of their haven?
The door was shut, and when she pushed it open it was to the sight of Alice Perrers at Edward’s bedside leaning over him, her low décolletage exposing the valley between her ample breasts. A hamper of food stood on Edward’s work table beside his letters and documents.
Alice whipped round as Jeanette entered the chamber. Her eyes widened and a look of fear briefly crossed her face before her expression hardened into stone.
‘What are you doing here?’ Jeanette demanded.
Alice stood up, icily composed. ‘I have brought a gift of fresh food from Westminster for your husband to aid his health, and with the best wishes of his father the King,’ she said with superior dignity, and indicated the hamper.
‘Let the King bring it himself if he wishes to see his son,’ Jeanette snapped. ‘You are not to venture for any reason to see my husband alone and closet yourself with him. Never, never, do you hear it?’ She was shaking.
‘Jeanette,’ Edward said weakly from the bed, and raised his hand.
‘I will not have you upsetting the Prince in my absence. You will not set foot here without my express invitation, and let that be known to all. How dare you!’
Alice faced her, drawn up and regal. She neither curtseyed nor acknowledged Jeanette’s rank.
‘I will not venture to ask for your pardon yet awhile, for I am sure the King will see to this matter and clear it up so there can be no misunderstanding in future as to the requirements of his will. For now, I shall take my leave.’ In a rustle of heavy fabric, Alice swept from the room, still without a curtsey.
Jeanette was so hot with indignation that sweat was running down her face. Barely able to contain herself, she imagined chasing down the stairs after Alice and shaking her like a dog with a rat.
‘How dare she!’ she spat, and flung round to Edward, who was half sitting up in bed with one hand across his forehead.
‘Christ, Jeanette . . .’
She went to him, saw his pallor and bluish lips, and helped him sip from his cup of tincture, although her hands were shaking and some of the contents dribbled down his chin and she had to dab his face with a napkin.
Contrition at not being present to protect him joined the wash of emotions flooding through her.
‘She must have known I was absent, otherwise she would not have dared to come here. She shall not interfere again. I shall make certain of that.’
‘I am all right,’ he said weakly. ‘Calm yourself. She had barely arrived when you returned. Whatever she thinks, I will never allow her to act as the intermediary between me and my father.’
‘Is that what she was doing? What need have you for an intermediary? Your father can come to you as he wishes, and if anyone is going to speak for you, then let it be your brother or me, not that . . . that bitch!’
He tried to leave the bed, but she pressed him back. ‘Let your physic do its work. I shall deal with her. You have enough with which to contend already. What did she want?’
Edward grimaced. ‘You will not like it. She came with a gift of food from my father, saying he is concerned for my welfare and sends me dainties that he hopes will tempt my appetite.’
‘We are all concerned for your welfare,’ she said. ‘I agree it is thoughtful of him to send you such a gift, but not at the hands of his mistress, especially as it was probably her idea. What else did she say to you?’
He shook his head. ‘Nothing you want to hear.’
Her anger flared up again. ‘Tell me! We have always agreed there should be no secrets between us.’
He looked beyond her at the wall, as if not meeting her gaze would distance himself from the words.
‘She said my father worries I am too much under your influence, and if I wished, I could go to him for protection and he would care for me properly and see that my health was fully restored – and more of that ilk which you will never bring me to repeat, but which made me sick even to hear.’
Jeanette’s anger boiled into red rage. In her mind’s eye she imagined tearing Alice Perrers limb from limb. ‘Small wonder that the witch approached you when I was not present.’
‘Well, after this she will return to my father and say it is as bad as she thought – that you are a termagant who threatened her and threw her out when she was on an errand of mercy. She will say you are an unfit wife.’
‘We shall see about that,’ Jeanette seethed.
‘Look, I need to protect you as much as you want to protect me. I counsel you to do nothing for now, lest it rebound on us – and you especially. We must bide our time.’
‘How much time do you think we have?’ She folded her arms around her body. ‘If we stand back and wait, she certainly will not, and she will use your father to enforce her will.’
She looked at the basket on the table, mocking her with its presence in the heart of their home, and abruptly went to it.
Grabbing the handle, she took it and pitched it hard out of the open window.
Pastries flew far and wide from the food cloth and an earthenware bottle of liquid smashed on the cobbles below.
Jeanette marched back to the table and, hands on hips, looked at the various documents on which the basket had been standing.
‘Matters are already in motion,’ Edward said. ‘I cannot speak yet, but Mistress Perrers has overstepped herself in more ways than one. I take it that John is visiting tomorrow?’
‘What do you mean she has overstepped herself?’
Edward gestured to the documents. ‘Evidence that men with whom she fraternises at court and promotes to my father have been stealing money by usury, and that she herself has been immersed in their murky dealings as a usurer. Evidence too that she has been using necromancy to tie my father to her will. Those rings of his? She had a Dominican friar enchant them first with binding spells.’
Jeanette stared at him. Spells and charms were part of everyday life – she had had priests say them over Edward, and small wounds were often bound with ribbons of parchment invoking the intercession of a particularly helpful saint – but there was a dividing line, and if it was politically expedient to discredit Alice, it was a lever they could use.
‘Nothing surprises me. Whether true or not, she understands how to manipulate and influence others, your father especially.’