Jean Plaidy (46 page)

February had come, bleak and bitterly cold when the Queen’s pains started and on Candlemas Day, the second of that month, the child was born.

Katharine Courtenay felt sad when she saw that the child was a girl. Dear Elizabeth, she had so longed for a boy. Perhaps if there had been a boy, Katharine thought, there could have been a rest from this incessant childbearing, which was undoubtedly having dire effects on the Queen’s health.

The child was sound but a little frail. As she held the baby in her arms she heard the Queen’s voice calling her.

She went to the bed. “A dear little girl, Elizabeth,” she said.

Elizabeth closed her eyes for one despairing moment. Then she opened them and she was smiling.

“She is … healthy?”

“Yes,” said Katharine, and put the child in her arms.

After a while she took the baby from its mother who fell into a sleep of exhaustion. This time next year, thought Katharine, we shall doubtless be in a similar situation. Will it go on and on until they get a boy? And how will Elizabeth endure it? She won’t admit it but she is less strong after each confinement.

The midwife was looking anxious.

“Why are you worried?” asked Katharine.

“The Queen is not strong enough,” said the midwife. “This should be the last.”

“I will talk to her.”

“Someone should talk to the King.”

Why not? thought Katharine. He had a son and now three daughters. That must be enough.

When the Queen was rested Katharine sat at her bedside and they talked together.

“She is a beautiful child, I hear,” said the Queen. “They would not deceive me, would they?”

“Why should they? You have three other beautiful children, sister.”

“Arthur was weak and they kept that from me for several days.”

“You brood too much on Arthur. You have Henry. You could not have a son who was more full of strength and vitality.”

“It is true. You have been a great comfort to me, Katharine, and I know you have troubles of your own. I am going to call this little one Katharine … after you.”

“Then I am honored, dear sister.”

As Katharine bent over the bed and kissed the Queen, she was a little startled by the clammy coldness of her skin.

Within a week the Queen was dead. Her passing was not only a matter of great sorrow but of amazement. She had appeared to recover from the ordeal of childbirth and it was not until six days later that the fatal symptoms appeared.

When Katharine Courtenay had found her in a terrifyingly weak state she had sent a messenger at once to the King and when Henry arrived he was horrified. He had sent with all speed for his physician, who believing that the Queen was on the way to recovery, had left the Tower for his home in Gravesend.

The news of the deterioration of the Queen’s health spread rapidly as Dr. Hallyswurth came hurrying through the night with the help of guides and torches to speed his coming, and people were already in the streets whispering of the mortal sickness which had come to the Queen.

She died on the eleventh of February, nine days after the birth of the child. It was her own birthday and she was thirty-eight years old.

In all the churches in the city the bells were tolling.

Crowds watched while spices, sweet wine-gums and balms with ells of Holland cloth were taken into the Tower and they knew that these things were for the dismal purpose of embalming the Queen.

From her apartments she was taken to the chapel in the Tower and there she lay in state for twelve days after which her body was put in a velvet carriage and taken to Westminster. An effigy in robes of state and crown was put in a chair on the coffin and it was said that this bore a startling resemblance to the Queen at her most beautiful. It was a day of great mourning.

The King was genuinely stricken with grief. Although he knew that Elizabeth had been in ill health for some time he had not expected her to die. She had recovered from the birth of the child and everyone had believed she would soon leave her bed. It was a bitter blow; but being Henry he was immediately facing the grim fact that now he had no wife and only one son to follow him. Margaret was already the Queen of Scotland. He needed children. And Elizabeth who was to have provided them was dead.

The Prince of Wales was equally bewildered. He had loved his mother. She had been very beautiful and he was susceptible to beauty. That she should have died so suddenly was disturbing. He felt bereft. He had not loved her as he had Anne Oxenbrigge, but now he was growing up he was becoming very much aware of his royal dignity and he would not admit that a nursemaid had been so very important to him. His mother had seemed remote but good and beautiful and she had been the daughter of a king. As a Tudor he attached great importance to that. And now she was dead.

He was twelve years old now and he was going to be betrothed. He looked at the Spanish Princess. She was wary and did not meet his eyes.

Poor Katharine, she must admire him very much. Well, she was pretty, and he had envied Arthur. It was strange how everything that he had envied was now coming to him.

Katharine looked very sad. She was realizing that if her parents decided she must stay here she had just lost one who would have been a good friend to her.

Henry was looking at her, smiling faintly.

She returned the smile. She would have to please him, she supposed. If she did not, what would happen to her?

She looked about her. Here was genuine sorrow. Even the King looked older and more gray. As for the Lady Courtenay, she was quite distraught as she with the Queen’s sisters laid their palls on the coffin.

What will become of us all? wondered Katharine. She will not be here to see.

A few days later the child Katharine, who had cost the Queen her life, was stricken with a grievous illness and within a short time she was dead.

The Search for a Queen

he king was restive. He had lost his queen but he could not afford to waste time in grief. He was not yet so old that he was beyond getting children. He was forty-six—a mature age it was true—but he was by no means impotent. His life with the Queen had shown that. He could convince himself that he was a comparatively young man and therefore he must at once make plans to remarry.

The Spanish Sovereigns were being awkward about the dowry. Ferdinand was a wily man to deal with and Henry did not trust him. Isabella was a great queen but she was concerned for her daughter and Henry believed that Katharine might have written to her expressing repugnance for the match with young Henry. He knew, of course, that that would carry little weight with Ferdinand, but with Isabella it might be another matter.

But suppose he had a more dazzling proposition to put before the Sovereigns? He sent for de Puebla, a clever man who delighted in intrigue and was not averse to a little sharp practice. He was the sort of fellow who could always be safely sounded out and who for considerations could be counted on to give consideration to every scheme—however shocking it might appear to some.

Henry said: “The Sovereigns are no doubt a little concerned about their daughter’s future.”

“Why, my lord, they know that she is to have Prince Henry. That seems to them a sensible and happy conclusion to the Infanta’s matrimonial affairs.”

“Henry is only a boy, not yet twelve years old. I fancy that the Sovereigns are concerned about waiting for him to come of age before the final ceremony can take place. I have another idea. How would they feel about seeing their daughter Queen of England immediately?”

“My lord!”

“Why not? I am free to marry.”

“And you would take your son’s widow!” Even the worldly de Puebla was taken aback.

“It seems reasonable. Katharine is here. There would not be the expense of bringing her over. She is a widow. I am a widower.”

“I do not know how it would be regarded,” said de Puebla. “But it can be put to the Sovereigns.”

“We could marry almost immediately. I have always held the Princess Katharine in high regard.”

Why, thought de Puebla, she could be in childbed before the year is out … she might manage even that. No time wasted between the birth of the little Princess and the birth of the next child even though there had to be a change of queens. Even by de Puebla’s standards there was something very cynical about this king.

“Well?” said the King.

“I will put the notion to the Sovereigns without delay.”

“Do that,” said the King. “We do not wish for unnecessary delay.”

De Puebla could not resist the chance to break the news to Katharine. Moreover he felt that by so doing he might ingratiate himself with her. He wanted to assure her that he was working for her, so he called on her.

“My lady Princess,” he said, “I have news which I thought I should impart to you without delay. I have this day written to your noble parents.”

“Written of me?” she asked, growing pale.

“Yes, at the request of King Henry.”

“Of what does he wish them to know?”

“He is sending them a proposition. He is asking for your hand… .”

“For Prince Henry, I know. That has been decided.”

“No … for himself.”

Katharine stared at him. She could not have heard correctly.

“The King …”

“’Tis so. The King would make you his queen … without delay.”

“I can’t believe this. The Queen has not been dead two months.”

“The King is in a hurry.” He came closer to her. “He is obsessed by the need to get heirs. Elizabeth gave him several but too many died. He wants you who are young and strong to take the place of the Queen in his bed.”

De Puebla was smiling in a way which nauseated her. Horrible pictures sprang into her mind … images of something she did not understand and which made her uneasy, more than that—terrified her.

“No,” she said. “No. I shall never agree.”

“I have been ordered by the King to write to your parents.”

“Oh no, no,” she cried. “Not that … anything but that …”

“I believe Queen Isabella has decided you shall have Prince Henry. My Princess, when I hear from her I shall come straight to you. I thought it best to warn you … that you may be prepared.”

She stood staring straight before her and de Puebla, bowing low, asked leave to retire.