Baynard’s Castle, London, Spring 1427
Baynard’s Castle, London, Spring
IT IS TRUE that the strain of the Leicester parliament was too much for Duke Humphrey, who took to his bed as soon as we got back to London, with pains in his belly and dancing lights behind his eyes and stayed there through autumn and winter.
He is too sensitive to sustain a running battle with his uncle as well as the constant demands from Jacqueline, who writes of near escapes and emergencies in the Hollands and demands that he come at once and bring her reinforcements.
He begs me to run the household and all his business; he will see no one but his doctor Gilbert Kymer, his chaplain Canon Southwell, his astrologer Roger Bolingbroke, and some alchemists from Oxford.
The little group are the only men admitted to his private rooms, and he refuses to return to public life until his older brother Duke John finally goes back to France.
To everyone’s relief, he takes Bishop Beaufort with him – the very best thing he could do for his country.
The bishop is bribed to leave his troublemaking in England by a cardinal’s hat, and he goes off on a crusade for the pope, to make the Hussites of Bohemia hate him as much as the Londoners already do.
Edmund Beaufort goes with him – so that is the end of his courtship of the queen and his flirtation with me, and a complete victory for Duke Humphrey.
The duke emerges from his rooms thinner and paler than ever, his dark hair curling around his sensitive face, as beautiful as a woman.
He is determined to be strong and well again; he rides out every day and runs up the stone stairs from the foot of the guard tower of Baynard’s Castle to the top of the turrets and down again – three times every day until he can do it without gasping for breath.
He summons Owen ap Maredudd from the queen’s court at Windsor to practise sword fighting on the flat meadow beside the river.
I cannot resist going out to watch them.
Though Duke Humphrey is ten years older than Owen, he is quick on his feet.
He makes a feint and seems to fall back, and Owen – younger and more eager – comes forward and is caught in a trap.
They both turn to me, hot and laughing at the end of the bout and say I must declare the champion and give a prize, as if I were the lady of the joust.
‘It is His Grace,’ I say, with a smiling apology to Owen. ‘You are too hot-headed, Master ap Maredudd.’
‘I am,’ he says, bowing to the duke and offering a handshake. ‘And my lord has been taught by the finest in the world and fought in the greatest battles when I was just a young fool running about with a wooden sword.’
‘I think the Glendowers were doing a little more damage than that,’ the duke says slyly. ‘Weren’t you all Welsh rebels?’
‘Not me, Sire,’ Owen says a little stiffly.
The duke turns to me. ‘So what’s my prize?’ he demands, smiling.
I spread out my hands. ‘I have nothing.’
‘I know what I’d take,’ says Owen.
My lord Duke Humphrey laughs. ‘Any man would!’ He turns to me. ‘I’ll take a kiss.’
I can feel I am blushing as I step towards him and turn up my face.
His kiss is as light as the brush of a feather on my lips.
If he were not a married man, and married to the finest woman I know, I would wonder if I would ever have a chance at being a duchess?
It is a little squirm of a thought, from my resentment that I do all the work of a lady of the castle with no reward.
I glance past the duke to Owen and think: that is the mouth I want on mine.
As we are walking back to the house, the two men with their scabbards over their shoulders, their padded leather jackets slung over their arms, I see a boat – a little wherry, rowing towards our pier – and a messenger, in the duke’s livery, waving from the stern.
‘A message, Sire.’ I point, and the duke turns and waits for the man to jump ashore and run up the river stairs.
‘A message on a Dutch ship.’ The man bows. ‘I was at Steelyard waiting for your goods to be unloaded, but the man said it was urgent, so I left my delivery and brought it.’
‘You did right,’ I say and give him a coin as the duke takes the letter, breaks the seal and opens it.
He reads it once – it is only a line – and hands it, with a little smile, to me.
It is his triumph at last: an announcement of the death of John of Brabant, Jacqueline’s false, disloyal husband.
He was only twenty-three; it must be God’s will that he was struck down so young.
The man who falsely claimed he was her husband is dead.
Her true husband is the only one left: there is only one man who can call himself Count of Hainault, and it is Duke Humphrey.
He nods for me to show the letter to Owen ap Maredudd.
‘Look at that,’ he says. ‘At the very moment that I am fit enough to lead soldiers back to my lands! God’s will. God bless us, and God save the Countess Jacqueline.’
‘Congratulations,’ the younger man says with a crooked smile. ‘If that’s not disrespectful to the departed count. Congratulations to you, and God pardon him his sins.’
‘You couldn’t be disrespectful to that man; God has saved me the trouble of killing him.’ He smiles at me. ‘Eleanor, you know what this means to my wife the countess.’
Now it does not matter what the pope in Rome announces as his decision on Jacqueline’s marriage. God has decided for him. The marriage – good or bad, annulled or not – is over. Jacqueline has only one husband; it is Duke Humphrey of Gloucester.
DUKE PHILIP OF Burgundy sends his army to rescue the town of Haarlem as Jacqueline sets a siege with her indomitable supporters – but he is clearly in the wrong: everyone knows it.
Whether John of Brabant was her husband and owned her lands no longer matters.
Now he is dead, and she is the undeniable heiress of the lands of Hainault, Holland, and Zeeland, and Duke Humphrey is her true husband and the owner of everything that is hers.
Now we will return to Hainault with a new army, certain that not only the English parliament but even God supports Jacqueline.
The City of London, the people of England, the lords and the parliament all agree that Jacqueline – as an Englishwoman, an English wife, an English duchess – must be protected and her lands returned to her.
Everything is changed! Parliament grants new funds to Duke Humphrey to raise an army to rescue his wife’s gallant fighting force; lords from all around the kingdom volunteer to go to the Hollands.
Everyone is excited: it is a war of chivalry, a crusade for a lady.
The Earl of Salisbury – famous expert on chivalrous rules and knightly behaviour – will lead it himself.
This expedition, well manned and well commanded, will leave as soon as the ships can sail, armed and ready for a naval attack.
Once again, I pack up my few goods and the queen’s rich presents for her friend and force myself to find the courage for the journey to Hainault. This time, I will be on the winning side. This time, I will make my fortune, I think. This time, I will earn my dowry.
But at the very last moment, just as we are about to embark, Duke John, thinking only of the English lands in France, sends an urgent letter to his brother.
‘No!’ I cry, as I see his red wax seal and the livery of his messenger. ‘Surely, he won’t stop us again?’
It is the same old song. The Burgundy army are all that prevents the complete defeat of the English in France.
John of Bedford writes passionately to the parliament that if they want to hold English lands in France – the boy king’s inheritance, which his father died for – they must not support Jacqueline against Philip of Burgundy.
Duke John begs us to preserve the alliance above any other claim.
Any settlement for Jacqueline must come by agreement: he swears he will broker an agreement that will see her rights protected, but no invasion can take place, no fleet set sail.
Duke Humphrey insists on rescuing his wife, but the English parliament – a hundred weathercocks – spin with the prevailing wind and agree that our vast lands in France matter more than Jacqueline’s lands in Hainault. The army is stood down before we can set sail.
My lady Jacqueline, setting siege to Haarlem, waiting for support that never comes, grits her teeth, and turns to face her enemies alone.
I imagine her tight smile, as she looks across the flat marshy lands, thinking herself like the rising waters in flood.
But she is alone; there is no help coming through the wetlands.
There is no help coming from over the narrow seas.
The duke locks himself in his rooms for a week in silence and says his belly is sick; but Roger Bolingbroke says his heart is broken.