The Scandalous Duchess (24 page)

Kneeling beside him, resting my head against his shoulder
and feeling the tension there that the mask could do nothing to hide, I changed my mind.

‘Was it very bad?' I asked. I thought he needed to speak of it after all. He did not resist.

‘It was bad. Our army suffered beyond belief.' Then: ‘I hear no good of what I did.' Straight to the point, as ever.

‘No.' I could not deny it. The loss of men and land had come in for scathing criticism, the Duke's reputation ravaged.

‘My policy in France has been stripped bare. Once we ruled a mighty Empire stretching from Calais to Bordeaux. And now we hold the towns but no land to connect them. Our Empire is no more and I failed to bring England a victory…' He looked away towards the window, as if he could absorb the grumbling complaints from the London streets even at this distance. ‘What do you think?'

‘How can I judge?' I combed my fingers through his hair. Nothing I could say would make matters any better. He would have to face his demons, as the burden demanded by royal blood, but I would stay at his side as he faced them. He would not be alone.

‘I am of a mind…' He hesitated. ‘I think I was wrong…'

‘And I never thought to hear you admit that.' I essayed a little humour.

And indeed the faint remnants of a frown were smoothed out by a wry twist of his lips. ‘Do you accuse me of arrogance, Lady Katherine? Many would.' And then with a lift of a shoulder: ‘What value is there for England in such a war, to hold fast to territories so far away and surrounded by those who would take them from us?'

Such an admission astonished me, and he saw it.

‘Should I not admit to it, when I am coming to believe that it is true? What do we gain, except a drain on our wealth and the death of our soldiery? The Pope is calling for negotiations and a lasting peace. I think we should do it.'

‘It will not be well-received,' I ventured.

‘I care not. It's a storm I must weather. I am not popular now, and the losses at Bordeaux will bring more invective down on my head, but who can harm me?' The Duke's sardonic smile became even more pronounced. ‘Consider the advantages. Peace will bring an increase in trade, lower taxes. We cannot continue as we are with this vast drain of money and taxation so high that it all but beggars our merchants. The stain on England's reputation is a wound on my soul.'

‘Parliament will not support peace with France,' I suggested.

‘God's Blood! I'll be damned if I let Parliament dictate my policy.'

Which promised no good for the future when foreign affairs and finance must collide. ‘Will the King agree? To peace-making?' I asked, to divert into calmer channels.

‘I must persuade him. Since my brother is too ill to hold the reins himself it's for me to take up the banner of England's future. I'll do it readily, with or without Parliament behind me. They'll follow me if they know what's good for them.'

And as I felt a single, solid beat of his heart beneath my hand, my presentiment that this was not the full cause of his wretchedness was enforced as the Duke turned his face against my hair and, beneath my hands, in his laboured breathing, I felt the earlier grief rush back in a torrent.

‘John…' I whispered aghast.

He shook his head but I persisted. When he might have pulled away, I held onto his shoulders so that he must look at me. It was all I could give him. And by some strange female intuition, I realised what it must be to make such pain live in his eyes. The breath continued to shudder in his lungs.

‘It's the Prince, isn't it?'

‘He's dying.'

My heart throbbed with reflected pain. His much-loved older brother, his hero, the perfect prince.

‘I doubt my brother will live to see our father die.' And then because the pain had spread its tendrils much further: ‘What will England do with a child king? I doubt Richard will be more than ten years when the crown drops into his lap. What then?'

‘I will tell you what then,' I replied with smooth urgency, fastening my hands tight around his wrists. ‘You will stand at Richard's side. You will support and guide him until he is of an age to rule in his own right. You will do it for your father and your brother and because it is your duty to your name and to England. That is what will happen.'

I could not reassure him about the Prince's health, but I could paint a bright picture of the future in which his role would be so very important. I pressed my lips against his brow as I felt at last an infinitesimal softening in his shoulders.

‘You see it very clearly,' he observed.

‘I see the truth,' I replied. Here was no place for doubts, and so I lightened my tone. ‘Would you argue the point with me? I don't advise it.'

And the Duke's eyes were now clearer, and his mouth curved in a vestige of a smile. ‘My thanks, Lady de Swynford.'

‘My pleasure, my lord,' I responded archly, still intent on distraction because I could do no other. ‘And I have to say, you have eaten all my sweet pears.'

‘I have?'

I nudged the empty bowl with my toe. ‘What do I demand in reparation? I swear you have as great a sweet tooth as young Henry, and I've never seen any boy clear a dish of marchpane as fast as he can.'

He laughed, a little rough at the edges, but still a laugh. It was not from his heart, and I had perforce to accept the limitations on my powers. It was his brother who weighed heavily in his mind, and I had to allow it as I acknowledged that I could do nothing to lift the burden, and yet my heart was steadier, for the Duke had opened a new door for me, one that I had never been allowed to step through before, allowing me the right to trespass in his own emotions and fears. But only as far as he saw fit. All I could do, with gratitude that he gave me freedom to know the thoughts that troubled him, was distract and wrap him around with my love when he needed it. It was my pleasure and my heart's delight to do so. I knew that he laid that burden down before no one else.

Was it not a precious milestone in the journey that we were travelling together?

‘You should sleep now, John,' I said.

And he did, deep and dreamless. For the first time, I thought, for many nights. I lay awake to watch over him. Was that not the essence of love? It was for me. Sometimes it was all I could do for him. And was that not another lesson
for me to learn? I had had no recognition of the inner strength I would need to draw on as the truth of our relationship was exposed. Now as our love grew, I needed to be strong for him too. For who else was there for him to turn to in grief or despair?

He could turn to me, and I would answer all his needs.

It had its repercussions, our reconciliation at The Savoy. When the Duke left Tutbury, en route to London in August to commemorate the sixth anniversary of Duchess Blanche's death, he held me close in a final embrace, for I was not to accompany him. His arms were firm, his lips soft, then he raised his head and looked at me. And looked again, trailing the palm of his hand over the panels of my close-cut gown.

I drew in and held my breath, perhaps still a little nervous.

‘Are you breeding?' he asked.

‘Yes.'

‘When?'

‘At the start of the new year.'

‘Does it please you?'

‘Yes.'

‘It pleases me too.'

He kissed me, lingeringly gentle but with the underlying passion that was now part of my life. I smiled. I would never again need to flee in fear that the Duke would reject me and this new child. Our love would stand firm against everything.

Chapter Twelve

July 1376: The Savoy Palace, London

I
sat at Blanche's bedside. How had I not realised how small she was despite the passage of years? Philippa and Elizabeth, particularly Philippa, were now grown to be young women, but Blanche was still my little girl. She was twelve years old. The hangings of the bed dwarfed her, the pillows seemed far too large to support her frail neck.

She had the dreaded sweating sickness.

I remembered Henry with similar symptoms, here at The Savoy as we were now, how he had responded with all the vigour of youth to the powerful mix of leaves and potions I had administered. It should have soothed me to recall his fast recovery, but anxiety over my daughter's health built, stone upon stone, until it presented a rampart against any comfort. I had been here at her side for five days now but saw no improvement in her condition as she lurched from
frenzied delirium to fractious mutterings, the bed linens soaked with the heat of her poor body.

Administering another dose, I settled a little as Blanche fell into a more restful sleep. Perhaps this time the fever would not return. Her forehead was cooler, her breathing less laboured. I thought it was evening, but I could not tell. Nor did it matter. Nothing mattered but Blanche's ability to recognise me again. To sit up and laugh and demand her singing finches to keep her company.

Brother William Appleton, the Duke's own physician, entered quietly, hands tucked in his sleeves, to stand at my shoulder.

‘How is she?'

‘Better, I think.'

‘I'll watch her for you. You need to rest.'

‘I cannot.'

‘You can. You will, if you desire to bear this child safely, my lady.'

For I was breeding again. My ankles were swollen and my back ached. Very near my time, I was burdened with this third Beaufort child as I had been burdened with no other.

I went to my room but I could not rest, and was back at Blanche's side within the hour.

‘I will sit,' I promised. ‘I won't exert myself.'

‘Only worry yourself to death.' Brother William pressed a hand lightly on my shoulder. ‘You are exhausted. The Duke will not thank me if I do not take care of you too.'

I tried to smile. ‘I'll take no harm. Pray for me. Pray for Blanche.'

‘I will, of course.'

He brought me a cup of wine and left me, with dire warnings, to my night watch.

Where are you, John?

It was a silent cry from my heart.

I knew where he was, dealing with a recalcitrant Parliament and a failing King. Despite the much-vaunted peace policy between England and France, unsteady as it was, England had once more a need for an army, and Parliament, faced with a demand to consent to high taxes, was flexing its muscles under its ambitious new Speaker. This man, Peter de la Mare, had the Duke in his sights for all the ills of England. A scapegoat was needed and who better to target? The Duke was considered to be too high-handed, too powerful, too intolerant, usurping the royal power that should have been wielded by the King, even though King Edward, his mind afflicted, was incapable of wielding any such power.

So the Duke would be striving to keep his temper, or perhaps not even striving at all in the face of such outspoken opposition. A man renowned for his ability to negotiate between hostile parties, he would not always choose his words with discretion. All I knew for certain was that he was not here with me, when I most had need of him.

Never had I felt so alone, for Agnes was at Kettlethorpe and the Duke so terribly preoccupied. He had not returned to The Savoy since the day before Blanche had slid from her knees in the chapel into a miserable little heap of flushed face, aching limbs and raging fever.

‘Hush now.'

The effect of the henbane, to cool a fever, was beginning to wear off, so that Blanche became restless again,
struggling against the bed linen. My holding her hand and speaking to her, trying to calm her, had no effect. Although her eyes were open, they held no recognition for either my face or my voice.

‘Hush now. Drink this. You will be well. Philippa and Elizabeth miss you and ask for you. They are waiting for you to be well.'

She drank the potion but her expression was wild, her face and chest mottled with heat as I bathed her tortured limbs, the cool, sharp scent of lavender pervading the room.

‘Sleep now.'

It calmed her, but Blanche seemed to be fading away before my eyes, her skin translucent in the light of the single candle beside the bed. My fingers moved over the coral beads of my rosary as I petitioned the compassion of the Blessed Virgin who knew all the travails of motherhood.

In the end I fell asleep, my body awkward, my cheek turned on the coverlet beside her. My rosary fell to the floor.

Hours later I woke in a state of confusion, unsure of my surroundings, before it all swept back to squeeze my heart dry. I looked around, thinking that the physician had returned. And then at the bed.

Blanche lay still. Impossibly still.

I stood, abruptly, clumsily, my hands in the small of my back where my muscles were taut and stiff. Had the fever broken at last?

And then the absolute breathless silence pressed down on me, filling the room, filling me. Blanche lay unmoving, all the heated anguish of past days now gone, her face pale, eyelids closed, her lashes spiked and fragile on her cheeks. She might have been asleep, so perfect, so beautiful her features.
I touched her cheek with the back of my fingers to prove my fears.

She was not asleep.

I had lost her. I had lost my daughter.

Holy Mother. What do I do now?

My mind cried out with the agony of any woman losing her first-born child. There was nothing I could do. I sat on the bed so that I could lift her gently into my arms, as if she might still wake and fling her arms around me, telling me what she had done that day that had given her joy. She did not stir. How light she was after the days of fever. What a beautiful young woman she would have been. Blanche Swynford, much-loved damsel to the ducal daughters. Incomparable daughter of Hugh and Katherine de Swynford.

‘I am so very sorry, Hugh,' I murmured against her hair. ‘I could do nothing for her. I could not save her.'

My Blanche, my lovely Blanche was dead.

I laid her back on her pillows, combing her hair, straightening the neck of her shift so that it lay in a seemly fashion on her chest. And then I sat, my hands clasped, my eyes fixed on Blanche's face. I could not weep. It was as if all my tears were frozen in an endless sea of ice. If I had stayed awake, could I have saved her? Could I have anchored her to this life, until the fever had worn itself out? But I had not, and she had been taken from me when I had been unaware.

The hours stretched emptily, wearily before me. I had lost my daughter and the man I needed could not be with me, and therefore I must bear my grief alone. Was I not capable
of that? I dried my tears and went to arrange for my daughter's body to be carried to the chapel.

I was desolate. I was beyond desolation. I would carry my grief with fortitude.

It was two days before the Duke returned to The Savoy.

‘Before God, I'll not have it! Do they think I'll bow the knee to their demands?' he blazed, exhibiting a royal temper in vituperative flow. ‘Do they think they are kings of this realm, in their pride and arrogance?'

He flourished a document like a war banner.

He did not know about Blanche. No one had told him.

‘Do they not know my lineage?' he continued, casting the offending missive into the fire. ‘Would they dare to take it into their heads to curb royal power? The effrontery of it. I'll have de la Mare's balls stuffed with rosemary on a platter. Our Parliament complains when our army fails, yet will not grant the funds to make a campaign across the sea viable. You can't have one without the other, as they well know. It's merely a damned ruse to attack me and bolster their own authority.'

The Duke had entered one of his private chambers at The Savoy—where I was sitting in discomfort, in spite of cushions and a footstool—with the force of a winter storm. Now he prowled the length of the room, much like one of his hunting dogs, out for blood. This was not the man who had wooed and beguiled me. This was the Duke, hard-eyed and driven, plotting revenge against those who questioned his right to use the power invested in him with the decline of the King. I remained silent for he was in no mood to accept advice.

‘Those mealy-mouthed members of Parliament have no authority other than that given to them. God rot the lot of them!'

I abandoned the embroidered panel on my cumbersome lap. What matter that the girdle was incomplete? I would not be wearing it for some weeks yet.

‘They dare to accuse me of corruption! Parliament is dissolved. I'll have no more of it. And God save us from sanctimonious prating priests,' the Duke continued, with no apparent recognition of my silence.

And I knew all about this too. Thomas Walsingham, a priest with a gimlet eye and a vicious pen. A man seeing himself as an upholder of God's morality on earth, intent on bringing the Duke down. Were not England's losses in France to be piled at the Duke's door? Walsingham did not mince his words either.

Setting aside my embroidery, I reached to the coffer at my side and poured a cup of ale and held it out.

‘John…'

Without thanks the Duke took it as he strode past me and continued to prowl. ‘Do you know what he's done?' The Duke's eyes were alight with fury. ‘He's stirred up the old slander all over again.'

I had not the energy to ask which one, but listlessly picked up my stitchery again. He told me anyway.

‘I only arranged the murder of Blanche's sister Matilda. I poisoned Matilda of Lancaster, by the Rood. So that the whole of the Lancaster lands fell to Blanche and so to me. Would I do that?' he growled, coming at last to a halt in front of me. ‘Would Blanche have agreed to wed me if I had done away with her sister?' he demanded.

It was all too much.

I took a deep breath and, tossed the fine cloth to the floor at my side.

‘John, I need to tell you—'

‘They are saying that I already have my eye on the throne since my father is sinking fast by the day,' he stated, full of ire. ‘When the King dies I'll snatch it from my nephew, they say. Did I not give my solemn oath to my dying brother that I would be loyal to his son as king? That I would serve Richard as his friend and counsellor?'

I was so weary. ‘Richard is only nine years old,' I observed. ‘No older than Henry. Is it surprising that they will suspect you of naked ambition if you stand beside him?'

‘Richard is the heir. Would I oust him?' Heated emotion had him in its thrall again. ‘Do you of all people believe such rumours too?'

And it was as if the emotion poured over me as well. ‘No! I of all people do not. I of all people at this precise moment do not care overmuch!'

He stared at me. ‘I would like to think that I had your support.'

I could not force Blanche's name past my teeth. ‘You don't need my support,' I snapped back. ‘You have enough confidence for both of us!'

Uncontrollable tears welled up again in my throat from what seemed a bottomless source. My mind was too sore to be compassionate. My bright, loving Blanche was dead, and all the Duke could think about was Parliamentary disobedience. My breath caught. Blanche, my darling Blanche, lost to me. All that sparkling promise wiped out by some nameless fever that would not respond to common henbane or doses
of wood sorrel. There was no room in my mind for politics and power-brokering when my daughter lay cold and still in the chapel. I stood in the middle of the room, my mind in turmoil, any pleasure I might expect to feel that he had at last come to me refusing to settle, flitting round the edges of my thoughts so that I could not grasp it.

I knew that I must be strong enough to contain my grief, not allowing it to encroach on this moment, but I could not. It threatened to overwhelm me. Perhaps it was due punishment for my great sin. Had Blanche been taken in penance for my immorality? I shivered in the upheaval of my despair.

‘And of course, our august members of Parliament claim to believe every word if it,' he continued. ‘And that I wed Blanche only for her inheritance. Next they'll be arguing over that old dispute that I am not my father's son. A changeling, by God! Who would dare accuse my lady mother of infidelity! Do I not have more than a resemblance to the King? But it has its uses as an arrow to loose at me. As a royal bastard, was I not doubly disloyal to Blanche, not fit to wed her? So I duped Blanche into…'

Blanche…

I burst into tears.

‘Katherine…?' For the first time I thought that he truly noticed me.

‘Blanche is dead. My daughter is gone from me and nothing will bring her back.'

Pressing my fingers against my lips I ran as well as I was able from the room.