He was uneasy about Edward, Earl of Warwick, but he was safely in the Tower and there he must remain. It was fortunate that the only legitimate son of Richard the Third had died. The Yorkists would say that Elizabeth of York was the heiress to the throne. Well, she was his wife. That had been the only possible marriage for him and he had to thank his good fortune that he had been able to bring it about. Elizabeth not only had a claim to the throne but she was also a good wife. His mother had said: “She will bring you great joy and little trouble.” That was what he needed. So he had his gentle Elizabeth, the legitimate daughter of Edward the Fourth, who had already shown that she could be fertile.
There was the core of his anxieties. If she were legitimate then so were her brothers.
He did not want to think of those boys who had been lodged in the Tower. He kept telling himself that he need not worry anymore about them. Richard had been a fool to remove them from the public eye after those rumors of their death. He had made one or two mistakes in his lifetime—the thoughtful Richard. Trusting the Stanleys was one—that had cost him his crown; and removing the Princes into obscurity had lost him his reputation.
“I am not by nature a cruel man,” mused the King. “I am not a natural murderer. But sometimes what would seem to be evil deeds are necessary for the good of many. Then surely they cease to be evil. And what are the lives of two little boys compared with the prosperity, well-being and lives maybe of an entire kingdom?”
He must put unpleasant thoughts behind him. That would be easy enough if it were not for the constant fear that ghosts could arise from the past to confront a man when he least expected them; and if that man were a king, the results could be disastrous. But it was folly to see trouble where it had not yet raised its head. Time enough for that when the moment of danger arose.
There was one big threat to the throne and that could come through Clarence’s son. Henry’s enemies might decide to strike at him and use the boy as a figurehead. There would always be those to remember that Henry was a Lancastrian and the Earl of Warwick a Yorkist heir to the throne—providing the young sons of Edward the Fourth were truly no more. But unless it was absolutely necessary the boy must not die yet. There must not be too many deaths.
These were uneasy thoughts, but a king’s thoughts were often uneasy, and he had always been prepared for that. Life had never been smooth. How many times had he believed his to be at an end? And how grateful he should be now that he had a chance to reach his destiny!
His good friend John Morton, Bishop of Ely, had assured him that God had chosen him. Morton should have the Archbishopric of Canterbury. He deserved it, and Henry was going to bestow it on him next month. He owed his life to Morton and that was something he would never forget. He promised himself that he would be ruthless toward his enemies, but every man who had shown friendship to him should have his gratitude.
His Uncle Jasper and Morton were the best friends he had ever had—not counting his mother, of course, but complete devotion was something which came naturally from a mother . . . perhaps an uncle too. Morton though—without ties of blood—had been his greatest friend.
He did, however, owe a great deal to his uncle Jasper Tudor. Jasper had been true to the Lancastrian cause even when its fortunes were at their very lowest. His mother had told him how very alarmed she was to be left alone with a young baby and she could not imagine what might have befallen them but for his uncle Jasper.
“I remember the day he came to me,” she had told her son. “He embraced me. He told me that he looked upon you as a sacred charge. The Tudors always stood together and as you had lost your father he was going to do for you all that a father should. I never forgot that. And he did, Henry. He carried out his word. Never forget what you owe to your uncle Jasper.”
No, he would never forget Jasper. As soon as he had come to power he had created him Duke of Bedford and made him a Privy Councillor; he had restored the earldom of Pembroke to him and made him Chief Justice of South Wales. No, he would never forget Jasper.
His education had been supervised by his uncle who had provided him with the best tutors.
“We have a boy here,” Jasper had said, “who loves learning. It would be a sin not to let him have the best.”
His mother had fully agreed with these sentiments, so he had become immersed in his lessons, particularly stories about the Kings Arthur and Cadwallader whom he claimed as his ancestors. He had quickly become aware of the uncertainty of life, for his uncle Jasper was constantly engaged in battles as the war raged, with the Lancastrians victorious one day and the Yorkists the next. After one heavy defeat, when Henry was only five years old, Jasper had been obliged to fly to Scotland; the boy had been taken from Pembroke Castle to the fortress of Harlech where he had remained in Lancastrian hands until he was nine years old.
That had been a terrifying time. Henry hated war. He would do so all his life. He was not going to be one of those warrior kings like Henry the Fifth and the First and Third Edwards who, it seemed to him, sought to make war when it was not necessary to do so and when it would have been so much better for them and their countries to have lived in peace. He could not say the same of his family’s arch enemy, Edward the Fourth, for he had fought only when war was forced upon him, when he had to make it or risk losing his crown. Henry could understand that a crown was something well worth fighting for.
When he was nine years old William Herbert had come and taken the castle of Harlech for the Yorkists—and young Henry with it. Then Henry had a new guardian and he was amazed that he could quickly grow fond of the Herberts, particularly Lady Herbert who treated him as he had never been treated before—as a child. Oddly enough he enjoyed that. She scolded him and looked to his comforts and was as affectionate toward him as though he were her own son. Lord Herbert had been given the title of Earl of Pembroke for this had been taken away from Jasper. Henry and young Maud Herbert did their lessons together, rode together, quarreled together and in truth found each other’s company very agreeable. Lady Herbert watching, thought that one day they might enter into an even closer relationship. Then there had been a new development in the war. Fortunes had been reversed. The newly created Earl of Pembroke was killed in battle, the Lancastrians were restored to power, Edward the Fourth fled the country, and Uncle Jasper returned.
That had been a very important time in young Henry’s life because he was taken to London and there presented to King Henry the Sixth, his father’s half-brother, who welcomed him warmly, complimenting him on his handsome looks and musing in his somewhat absentminded way that it might well be that in time a crown would grace that head.
That was when young Henry first began thinking of the possibility of becoming a king. He had noticed the deference bestowed on the King; he was delighted to hear that he was related to him; he went back to Wales and read more and more of Arthur and Cadwallader. He was one of them. He could one day be a king.
Uncle Jasper had been full of high hopes at that time. The King was gracious to his Tudor kinsmen. It was clear that he had been impressed—as far as his addled mind could let him be—and had been struck by the looks and learning of young Henry.