Royal Mistress (14 page)

“Mistress Shore is a freewoman of the city, Dame Stathum,” Will announced to the wife of one of his retainers who gave Jane a haughty stare, while the other woman could barely suppress a titter. “Her husband, a mercer, was unable to accompany her on such short notice, but Mistress Shore kindly helped in the choosing of cloth for my dear wife recently, and this is her reward. It seems Mistress Shore has a liking for the hunt, and thus I invited her to join us.”

Jane knew instantly that the two women understood exactly why Will Hastings had included her in the party, and she hoped her face did not reveal the flush of humiliation she felt as Will tried to justify her presence. It was her first experience with shame, and she suddenly wanted to bolt from the room back to Coleman Street and the safety of her merchant-class life. She did not belong here.

“Did I hear you say the wife of Mercer Shore, Will?” The agreeable, familiar voice broke into the introductions, relieving Will greatly. He, too, was regretting his impulsiveness in including Jane in such a hunting party. They should have gone alone, he thought too late, and spared Jane any embarrassment, but he had clearly misjudged the situation in his eagerness to win her.

“My lord of Gloucester, you have the acquaintance of this lady? She will be glad to have someone pleasant to converse with, I have no doubt.” He ignored the two women, who were now discredited by Richard of Gloucester’s acceptance of Jane. Sensing they had offended their host, they shuffled their feet and backed away as Hastings asked: “May I leave her in your capable hands while I see if the falconers are ready with our birds, Lord Richard?”

“Willingly, my lord,” the king’s youngest brother replied. “Mistress Shore and I met in the Chepe while she and her husband were returning from”—he thought for a second—“why, ’twas
from here, I believe. Did you know they were set upon by thieves, and a purse of gold was taken?”

Will looked genuinely concerned as he listened to Richard’s accounting of the robbery. “How unfortunate, mistress. I should recompense your husband somehow. I trust you were not hurt?”

Richard spoke up, amused. “I think not. She proved the cleverest of us all and, after warning Rob Percy and me of the impending attack, hid herself in a doorway. It happened so quickly and was an unlucky affair. But ’tis all too common these days.”

“Indeed it is,” Will agreed. “My lord, excuse me,” he said, and he took his leave.

Jane swept Richard a low reverence and murmured her thanks.

“Thanks for what, mistress?”

“For rescuing me,” Jane replied, giving him her most enigmatic smile. “Twice.”

“I think not, mistress. I have the impression you are not someone ever in need of rescuing.”

“If I may be so bold, I would disagree, my lord duke,” she told him, her eyes merry. “I would venture that most females are in need of rescuing in one fashion or another.”

To her chagrin, Richard did not appear amused. Mother of God, but he is a serious man, Jane thought. She wondered what his wife was like and could not help but think life with Richard of Gloucester might be a solemn business indeed.

Hearing the hunting horn signify an imminent departure, Richard chose not to comment further but offered her his arm to escort her to her mount. A most forward lady, he mused, and at once the face of his first love, Kate, and her teasing amber eyes were conjured guiltily to his mind. He felt an unexpected stab to his heart. Aye, his former mistress was also strong-willed, but how he had loved her! He had given her up upon marriage to Anne Neville, but he still had news of his two children by her from Jack, Lord Howard, whose wife had taken Kate under her
wing. He had not regretted letting Kate go as, like his father, he was a man to whom duty and loyalty meant everything in life, but he still had guilty pangs each time he remembered their heartbreaking last night together. Sweet Jesu, he had thought Kate would lose her mind. But she was of common stock and unfit for a prince, he had known all along; as a royal duke he must secure his line and his line’s future. Unlike Edward, he thought, as he expertly threw his leg across his horse’s back and settled into the saddle. Ned had squandered an important alliance with a foreign power by marrying an English nobody—and in secret, no less. Both younger York brothers had chosen better, Richard thought grimly: he and George had married the Neville sisters, Isobel and Anne—joint heiresses of Warwick vast wealth and power.

Then there was Ned’s whoring. Who knew how many bastards his brother had left up and down the realm? Edward’s penchant for pretty women knew no bounds, and Richard disdained the way he took and discarded paramours. Richard had grown to accept his sister-in-law, the queen, and wondered how she endured Ned’s infidelities. He was certain Edward would never have behaved thus had their father, the duke of York, survived Wakefield and become king.

Richard observed his host, Hastings, with concern as the party trotted through the gate and out into Thames Street, their horses jostling for space on the bustling street. Here was Ned’s cohort and fellow philanderer, who appeared to encourage his sovereign to live life to an excess bordering on dissipation. True, Richard could not question the man’s loyalty to the king any more than Richard’s own, but it disgusted Richard that Edward would often hand down his discarded concubines to Will. Even more despicable was Edward’s willingness to relinquish some poor young woman to that profligate Dorset. And Tom Grey was Ned’s own stepson. Aye, Ned’s behavior was degrading, and it astonished him
that their formidable mother, Cecily, had not left her seclusion at Berkhamsted or summoned him there to upbraid her eldest son. Perhaps she did not know, Richard mused, but then dismissed the thought with a laugh. Nothing escaped Cecily’s notice, he well knew.

As the horses clattered over London Bridge, its shops and houses teetering precariously three stories above the bridge on either side and people standing aside to let the royal party pass, Richard prayed his infant son, another Edward, might not inherit any of his namesake uncle’s weaknesses. He smiled to himself as he cast his thoughts northward to Middleham and the serene Yorkshire dales where his dear wife and son were impatiently waiting for him. How he longed to leave the city and return home.

O
nce through the city and over London Bridge, the ride to Greenwich took more than an hour, and Jane exulted in the fresh scents that allowed her to forget the foul city odors of London and its growing southern borough of Southwark. She hung back from the other ladies and fell into conversation with Nicholas Knyveton, Will Hastings’s burly squire, who had been instructed to see she was not neglected.

“I have never seen the palace,” Jane told him, craning her neck as they crested the hill above the red-roofed building, its graceful facade untrammeled by heavy fortifications unlike the Tower. “Such a beautiful setting on the riverbank. I can understand why ’tis the queen’s favorite.”

“Aye, and when Duke Humphrey built it more than a half century ago, he named it Bella Court, but it has grown since then,” Knyveton replied. He was warming to the spirited young woman after having his pride hurt that his master had relegated him to damsel duty, as he called it. Jane had talked to him of poetry, a passion of the squire’s, and he was amused by her reenactments of some of Geoffrey Chaucer’s choice characters. Her gift for mimicry
was impressive, he told her, and she had laughed and then imitated Hastings’s Northampton burr so perfectly, he had slapped his thigh in mirth and frightened his horse.

When the hunting party had reached the ivy-covered watch tower atop the hill, the riders dismounted to stretch their legs and take advantage of the privy that Duke Humphrey had built for the guards stationed there day and night. The ladies were given the option of using the covered cesspit first, but Jane demurred, preferring to wander a little farther away and make use of a bush. She did not often avail herself of the public privies in the city, hating the ignominious hanging of her backside over the communal plank and doing her best to avoid soiling her skirts. Squatting behind a tree or bush seemed more civilized, she thought.

She could hear the men laughing and talking as the two packhorses were unloaded to provide the party with a canopy, cushions, and refreshments, while the falconers and grooms set up perches for the birds and allowed the horses to graze the lush grass.

Jane rearranged the skirts of the riding gown she had designed from a fine murrey Milanese fustian, chosen for not only its warmth but also its plush look of velvet, and gratefully sat down out of sight behind a clump of blackberry bushes to stretch out her stiff limbs and knead her sore back. The late-November sun was warm enough to let her shed her mantle, and removing her jaunty feathered hat, she loosed her thick braids, which had been pinned under it, and mopped her perspiring forehead and neck with a kerchief.

“That is much better,” she said aloud to a squirrel that was eyeing her from a bare birch tree. “How fortunate you are, Mistress Nutkin, to live in such a beautiful place. Do not misunderstand me, my little red friend, I love the hustle and bustle of London, but there are days when I long for an hour without a ringing bell, the constant buzzing of voices, rumbling of carts, chanting clerics, and the clatter of hoofs. Listen! Here all you hear are birds and the
song of the river—except today there are our loud visiting voices. I am afraid we may disturb you, dear squirrel.”

She laughed at herself for talking to an animal, but then she ruminated on why she was there at all. Why had Lord Hastings invited her? She had convinced herself she had flirted only to annoy William and to prove that she was still desirable despite her husband’s snub of her the night before. She was not in the least attracted to Hastings, especially as her waking dreams were filled with young Tom Grey. When she had seen Hastings at the door this morning, he had looked old, and she was dismayed then to think he might want to seduce her. Why, he must be twice her years, she suddenly thought. Aye, what had she been thinking when she agreed to come today?

“Mistress Shore, are you quite well?” the object of her thoughts asked, peering around the bush, his face full of concern. “Lettice Strathum told me you had wandered over here. I sincerely hope the ride was not too much for you.” Then his face broke into a grin. “But here you recline, looking as much a part of the woodland as a nymph or a siren, and just as lovely.”

Will felt the familiar rush of blood as he admired the graceful, recumbent figure, her skirts raised to her knees, revealing slender legs and delectable ankles. He had to resist pushing those petticoats up around her waist and taking her there and then.

Jane sat up, hurriedly covered her legs, and pulled her hat back on. “Sirens live in the river, my lord,” she faltered, recognizing desire in his eyes. “I am quite well, thank you, and I apologize for causing you any concern.”

“The only concern we may cause is by staying behind this bush any longer, Jane. I may call you Jane, may I not?” he said as he helped her to her feet and retrieved her mantle.

Jane painstakingly pulled on her gloves to hide her reddening face. “Only if I may call you Will, my lord,” she countered with false bravado. “And as I never intend to call you Will, I think you know my answer. I pray you, let me be Mistress Shore.”

“God’s bones, Mistress Shore, you are even lovelier when you are cornered,” Will answered, disappointed but undeterred. “I had the strongest notion the first time I saw you that we would become . . . friends, at least. Tell me you are not displeased with my candor.”

She looked up at him then, her composure restored, and smiled. “How can I be displeased with you, Lord Hastings, when you are so kind as to bring me to such a glorious place.” They were nearing the group now, and Jane noticed Richard of Gloucester assessing her with disapproving eyes. Sweet Jesu, she thought irritably, what did he think we could have been doing in those few seconds behind a thorny bush? His gaze made her hold herself more erect and she answered Hastings quietly: “I shall be honored to be your friend, my lord, and consider myself fortunate.”

If she had offended him, it was not evident, for Will became the affable host again, conversing with one, slapping another on the shoulder or bending down to offer more wine to the two ladies reclining on cushions. When Jane heard Lettice Strathum inform Will that she and her friend were too comfortable to bother with hunting, Jane knew she must refuse, too: she had caused enough gossip for one day and did not want any more attention. Instead, as the men trotted along the hillside, she chose to climb to the top of the watch tower to follow their progress and admire the falcons as they swooped upon their prey on that last fine day of the year.

At one point, Will, his white horse easily discernible among the other riders, turned in his saddle and, shading his eyes, found Jane’s small figure standing alone atop the tower, and he raised his hand in salute. You have a friend in me should you need one, Jane Shore, the signal seemed to say, and Jane gave him an answering wave. He had not taken her rebuff amiss, and she was grateful.