‘I have a message from my husband, your lord,’ she says, her voice hard and clear. ‘He writes that he has restored the King of England, Edward, to his throne. My husband, your lord, has made an agreement with King Edward and in future the king will be guided by the natural lords of the kingdom; there will be no newcomers.’
Nobody says anything. These are men who have served my father for many years, through good battlefields and bad; they are not likely to stir and comment at ominous news. But the ladies shake their heads and whisper. Someone nods at Isabel as if in sympathy that she is not to be Queen of England after all and need not think herself special any more. My mother does not even look at us; her gaze is fixed on the wall hangings above our heads, and her voice never trembles.
‘We are going to London to demonstrate our friendship and loyalty to the rightful King Edward and his family,’ she says. ‘My daughter the duchess will meet with her husband George Duke of Clarence. Lady Anne will attend me of course. And my lord sends me more good news: our nephew John is to be betrothed to the king’s daughter, Princess Elizabeth of York.’
I snatch a quick glance at Isabel. This is not good news at all; it is utterly terrible. My father has taken up another pawn just as Isabel feared, and she is put aside. He is marrying his nephew into the royal household, to the royal heir, little Princess Elizabeth. My father will get a Neville on the throne one way or another; this is his new way. Isabel is the old way that he has surrendered.
Isabel is biting her lower lip. I reach out for her and, hidden by the widely spread skirt of her gown, we grip hands together.
‘My nephew will be given a dukedom,’ my mother says steadily. ‘He is to be the Duke of Bedford. This is an honour from the king and a gesture of his goodwill to our nephew, my husband’s heir. It is proof of the king’s friendship with us and his gratitude for our care of him. That is all. God save the king, and bless the House of Warwick.’
‘God save the king and bless the House of Warwick!’ everyone repeats as if it were possible to wish for two such contradictory things at once.
My mother rises to her feet and nods to Isabel and me to come with her. I walk behind Isabel, showing the respect due to a royal duchess: a royal duchess – but not a queen. In one moment Isabel has lost her claim to the throne. Who cares about being a royal duchess if our cousin John is to marry the heiress of York, the king’s own daughter? Cousin John is to be a duke, and the king has signalled to his brother that he can easily make other dukes and bring them into his family. Father has other pawns to put on the board.
‘What will we do in London?’ I whisper to Isabel as I lean forwards and straighten her veil.
‘Show our friendship, I suppose,’ she says. ‘Give back the furs to the queen, return the coronation gown to the royal wardrobe. Hope that Father is satisfied with marrying our cousin into the king’s family, and doesn’t take arms against the king again.’
‘You won’t be queen,’ I say sorrowfully. Ignobly, I feel a secret little glow that my sister will not wear ermine, will not be the greatest woman in the kingdom, Queen of England and my father’s favourite, the daughter who fulfils his greatest ambition, the pawn that can make the winning move.
‘Not now, no.’
WESTMINSTER PALACE, LONDON, CHRISTMAS 1469–70
Once again Isabel and I walk into the queen’s rooms sick with apprehension. The queen is in her great chair, her mother Jacquetta standing like sculpted ice behind her. Our mother comes behind Isabel but before me, and I wish that I were young enough to get my toes under her train and pass unnoticed. Nobody will think I am charming today. Isabel, though a married woman and this queen’s sister-in-law, has her head down, her eyes down, like a child in disgrace longing for this moment to be over.
My mother curtseys as low as she must do to a Queen of England and comes up, standing before her, hands quietly clasped, as composed as if she were in her own castle of Warwick. The queen looks her up and down and her eyes are as warm as grey slate in icy rain.
‘Ah, Countess of Warwick,’ she says in a voice as light and cold as drifting snow.
‘Your Grace,’ my mother replies through gritted teeth.
The queen’s mother, her lovely face blank with grief, wearing white, the royal colour of mourning of her house, looks at the three of us as if she would cut us down where we stand. I do not dare to do more than snatch a glance at her before I drop my eyes to my feet. She smiled at me at the coronation dinner; now she looks as if she will never smile again. I have never seen heartbreak engraved on a woman’s face before; but I know that I am seeing it in the ravaged beauty of Jacquetta Woodville. My mother inclines her head. ‘Your Grace, I am sorry for your loss,’ she says quietly.
The widow says nothing, nothing at all. We all three stand as if we are frozen in the ice of her gaze. I think – well, she must say something, she will say something such as ‘fortunes of war’ or ‘thank you for your sympathy’ or ‘he is with God’ or any of the things that widows say when their husbands have been lost in battle. England has been at war with itself, on and off, for the last fourteen years. Many women have to meet each other and know that their husbands were enemies. We are all accustomed to new alliances. But it seems that Jacquetta, the widow of Richard Woodville, Lord Rivers, does not know these conventions, for she says nothing to make us any easier. She looks at us as if we are her enemies for life, as if she is cursing us in silence, as if this is the start of a blood feud that will never end, and I can feel myself start to tremble under the basilisk hatred of her gaze and I swallow, and wonder if I am going to faint.
‘He was a brave man,’ my mother volunteers again. In the face of Jacquetta’s stony grief the comment sounds frivolous.
At last the widow speaks. ‘He suffered the ignoble death of a traitor, beheaded by the Coventry blacksmith, and my beloved son John died too,’ the queen’s mother replies. ‘Both of them innocent of any crime, in all their lives. John was just twenty-four years old, obedient to his father and his king. My husband was defending his crowned and ordained king yet he was charged with treason, and then beheaded by your husband. It was not an honourable death on the battlefield. He had been on dozens of battlefields and always come home safe to me. It was a pledge he made to me: that he would always come home safe from war. He didn’t break it. God bless him that he didn’t break his promise to me. He died on the scaffold, not on the battlefield. I shall never forget this. I shall never forgive this.’
There is a truly terrible silence. Everyone in the room is looking at us, listening to the queen’s mother swear her enmity against us. I look up and find the queen’s icy gaze, filled with hatred, is resting on me. I look down again.
‘These are the fortunes of war,’ my mother says awkwardly, as if to excuse us.
Then Jacquetta does an odd, a terrible thing. She purses her lips together and she blows a long chilling whistle. Somewhere outside, a shutter bangs and a sudden chill flows through the room. The candles bob and flicker throughout the chamber as if a cold wind has nearly blown them out. Abruptly one candle in the stand beside Isabel winks and goes out. Isabel gives a little scream of fright. Jacquetta and her daughter the queen both look at us as if they would whistle us away, blow us away like dirty dust.
My formidable mother shrinks before this extraordinary inexplicable behaviour. I have never seen her turn from a challenge before but she flees from this, as she ducks her head and walks to the window bay. Nobody greets us, nobody breaks the silence that follows the unearthly whistle, nobody even smiles. There are people here who danced at the wedding at Calais Castle where this whole terrible plan was set in motion; but to look at them you would think they were utter strangers to us three. We stand in stony shame, quite alone, while the gust of air slowly dies down and the echo of Jacquetta’s long whistle goes silent.