Patience, Princess Catherine (5 page)

I sighed, knowing that the leisurely journey from Plymouth was at an end. Throughout the coming weeks, my days would be filled from morning until night with ceremony. I hoped that I would have the strength to endure it.

The procession ground slowly to a standstill, and I climbed down from my litter. I had dressed for this occasion in the pale blue gown and darker blue robe that my duenna had selected. Now she tied a large red hat with lace of gold over my hair, which streamed long and loose down my back. Two black plumes fluttered from the hat. I had observed that none of the English ladies wore hats, and this troubled me. Again I feared that I would appear strange.

My ladies reassured me. "You are every inch a queen," Maria said. "And a beauty," added Francesca, nodding.

Mounting a handsome mule of gleaming black, I rode slowly to the head of my vast procession, which by then numbered several hundred. Approaching from the opposite direction were two richly dressed noblemen, accompanied by their gentlemen-at-arms. Their combined retinues were as large as mine. Ayala, riding by my side, told me what I might expect.

"The king and Prince Arthur are traveling by royal barge from Richmond to Bayard's Castle, where you shall meet the rest of the royal family after the wedding ceremony." The ambassador counted them off on his plump, jeweled fingers: "You have already made the king's acquaintance. His queen, Elizabeth of York, is called Elizabeth the Good by her adoring subjects. The king's mother, Margaret Beaufort, countess of Richmond and Derby, rules the family with an iron fist. I pity the queen, having to put up with such a mother-in-law. I expect you will find a companion, for a short time at least, with Arthur's sister, Margaret, said by all to be her father's favorite. She is just eleven, but he intends to marry her off as soon as possible to James of Scotland. What a lot of barbarians she will find up north! The queen has lost three children in infancy. The youngest surviving is Mary, a child of six."

As the English and Spanish retinues came face-to-face, Ayala broke off his recital to exclaim, "And now, Princess Catalina, you shall meet the duke of York. Just ten years old, and look at him!"

The young duke halted his mount and leaped from the saddle. He bowed low and stood grinning up at me. He was a strapping lad with red-gold hair and merry blue eyes, robustly handsome if not so delicately beautiful as his brother. He spoke to me in a language I recognized as French. Ayala, speaking softly, translated: "The duke of York puts himself at your service, my lady."

"Tell him that the princess of Aragon thanks him."

And so it went, exchanging all the usual polite phrases. After the presentation of the duke of Buckingham and other formalities, the combined procession, numbering perhaps a thousand persons, started off again and advanced with solemn dignity into the great city of London, a city like none I had ever seen.

The narrow, winding streets were badly paved and muddy. I held my breath, both from the overwhelming stench that assaulted me and from the fear that my mule might stumble and toss me into the muck. At every street crossing the procession halted so that I could hear an oration or listen to a choir or witness a spectacle. Knights and squires rode through the crowd, driving back the curious onlookers who pressed ever closer, peering up at me, reaching out to touch me, cheering and shouting incomprehensibly. Though I could make nothing of their words, I sensed their goodwill and waved to them, first with my right hand until it tired and then with my left. Even when both arms ached, I kept on waving.

 

The next few days passed in a wearying blur of pageants, banquets, and tournaments with Arthur and the English nobility seated at one end of the Great Hall and my people at the other, maintaining the strict separation that formal custom required until after the wedding ceremony. My escort at these events was Henry, duke of York. I knew that he was several years younger than Arthur, but my altogether delightful companion was taller than either of us, by at least a head, and already well muscled. Owing to his size, Henry looked older than Arthur, whom I had not seen since his visit to Dogmersfield, but Henry's demeanor belied his age—he was still a child, an exuberant, high-spirited, ebullient child. I had liked him at once.

As the ceremonies and pageantry droned on, I was sometimes hard put to maintain the discipline that my mother had instilled in me. The life of a queen meant enduring many such occasions. I often wished that I could sit down for a while. I was thirsty but could not ask for something to drink, having deprived myself of liquids for a day so that I would not need to relieve myself. But through it all, the brash young duke of York kept me amused and managed to distract me from my discomfort.

During a pause between a speech by the head of the bakers' guild and the sermon of still another clergyman, Henry said, "Good lady princess, it would make me the happiest boy in all England if you would consent to call me Harry."

"If that is all that is required to make you so happy, dear brother Harry, then I should be happy to oblige," I told him. We spoke in Latin, of course. "But I shall exact a price," I added, suddenly inspired. "You must then call me Catalina." He looked at me quizzically. "My name in Spanish," I explained. I wanted to add "my real name" but did not.

"Catalina," said Henry, trying the name on his tongue. "Catalina."

Henry had an ear for languages that was truly brilliant. He quickly grasped that he and I used the same Latin words but pronounced them differently. He seemed to recognize instinctively what I was saying, and when he replied, he made every effort to speak the words in the same manner I did, so that I could more easily understand him.

"You really should learn to speak French," said Henry. "Everyone at court does. It sounds so much nicer than Latin. Later, of course, you must learn English, too."

"My brother's wife taught me a little French," I admitted. "She said it would be useful to me at the English court. But after he died, my sister-in-law left Spain." I thought of beautiful Margaret of Austria and the gaiety she had brought briefly to our family. "I was fond of her, and if she had stayed, I am sure I would have learned much more from her."

"Then I shall teach you!" Henry promised, and I agreed that I would be happy to learn from him whenever the chance presented itself. "Say
merci,
" instructed the duke. "It means 'thank you.'"

"
Merci,
" I repeated, laughing. "Harry, I believe this is not the time for a French lesson!"

"Why not, my lady Catalina? As good a time as any, I should think. Now say
s'il vous plaît,
meaning 'if it please you.'"

And so we got on merrily, as the duke of York escorted me from one event to another, pointing out things he thought I might find interesting and asking me all manner of questions about my family and life in Spain. I felt that this pleasing youth would become my good friend.

***

Over and over I wondered what Arthur might be thinking. Was he as curious about me as I was about him? Then I thought of my sisters, all of whom had left home, family, and country to marry. Had they felt as fearful but excited as I felt now on the eve of my wedding? How I wished I could talk with them and confide my tumultuous feelings, on this, my last night as an unmarried woman.

I lay down in the sumptuous bedchamber that had been prepared for me in Bayard's Castle and thought about how my life was about to change. I had already made my confession to Padre Alessandro and finished my prayers, but as I tossed among the silken coverlets, sleepless with an excess of nervous excitement, I prayed again:
Oh, \ind and merciful God, if it be your will, let me learn to love Arthur and let him learn to love me!

Love was not part of the bargain, I knew, but it could happen—it had happened to my sister, Juana, who five years earlier had journeyed to Flanders to marry Philip. I had received a letter from her shortly before I left Granada, confiding that she was so madly in love with her husband that she could scarcely bear for him to leave her sight. Philip's sister, Margaret of Austria, married my brother, Juan. I believed it was a real love match as well. Margaret and I became close friends. But by the summer of 1497, Juan was dead of a fever, and soon after his death, his widow lost the child she carried. Poor Margaret! Before sleep came at last as a blessing, I prayed earnestly that I might be spared such heartache.

 

Sunday morning began the wedding day I had awaited so long. Cannons boomed to announce my arrival at Saint Paul's Cathedral on this day, the fourteenth of November
anno Domini
1501. I was dressed in a white satin gown over a farthingale with several hoops made of whalebone that caused the skirt of the gown to stand out from my waist, showing off the intricate gold embroidery and many jewels sewn all over the skirt. My hair and face were covered by a white lace mantilla bordered in gold and pearls. My heart beat almost as loudly as those booming cannons, my stomach churned uneasily, and my shoulders ached from the weight of all that finery. Yet I brimmed with gladness, too. Six months ago I was preparing to leave Granada. Today I would become a wife.

The duke of York, dressed in a suit of white velvet ornamented with gold and jewels, gave me his hand. For a moment we paused at the great west doors of the cathedral. A hush fell over the waiting throngs, and then the trumpeters who had accompanied me from Spain for this occasion blew near-deafening fanfares as we began the long, slow walk down the entire length of the nave. My thoughts leaped once more to my mother, wishing she were here with me to witness this important event, and to my sisters, wondering what they had felt as they made similar walks toward their future.

The royal family watched our progress from the choir. Among them was an elderly woman who appeared to be sobbing convulsively. We approached the high altar, where the splendidly arrayed archbishop of Canterbury waited with Arthur, prince of Wales. Arthur, too, was dressed all in white. He kept his eyes lowered.
Why does he not loo\ at me?
A ripple of anxiety caused me to shiver.

My left hand, resting on Henry's right, had begun to tremble, and for a moment Henry's fingers gripped mine tightly. I sought his merry eye as he stepped aside to relinquish me to his brother, and I thought I heard him murmur "Catalina."

I moved stiffly through the many parts of the ceremony, aware of the blond boy kneeling at my side and sensing that his nervousness was even greater than my own. When the archbishop had pronounced the benediction over us, we rose from our knees and I lifted my veil—officially this time. My husband and I gazed at one another.
What is he thinking?
I wondered. Then Arthur smiled, and a wave of relief swept over me.
It is done,
I thought.
Nothing can go wrong now.

We clasped hands eagerly and together began the great procession down the long aisle of the church and out into the street where bells pealed and more trumpet fanfares shattered the air.

Immediately, the duke of York appeared again by my side. "I am to escort you to the banquet at Bayard's Castle," he explained. "The prince is obliged to remain here at the cathedral to affix his seal to several documents."

"Harry," I said, as we made our way through the throngs, "please tell me: Who was the old woman who wept throughout the ceremony? She stood with your parents, and it seemed she never stopped sobbing."

Henry laughed heartily. "My father's mother, Lady Margaret. She always does that. She believes that every drop of happiness must be paid for with a cup of suffering and pain, and so when she is the happiest, she weeps the most." He looked at me and shrugged. "But do not be fooled by those tears and mistake them for softness. My grandmother is as strong as a suit of armor!"

 

Conduits of wine flowed freely in the streets of London for the enjoyment of the common people, while at Bayard's Castle the royal feasting began. I occupied the seat of honor on King Henry's right, with Ayala and Doña Elvira on the other side of me. Arthur's place was at a separate table with his brother and sisters. I found that odd. Should not my husband be at my side? Was this an English custom? When at last I managed to ask Ayala, he replied with a shrug, "The king's orders."

For several hours a parade of servitors presented a seemingly endless succession of dishes. Every creature that roamed the forests, swam the rivers, or flew across the sky appeared in some guise at the wedding feast: boar, venison, and rabbit; mutton, and kid; trout, pike, carp, perch, eel, and sturgeon; crane, partridge, egret, peacock. Some creatures were stuffed and roasted; others were stewed, boiled, or preserved in a jelly. Between courses we marveled at elaborate warners and subtleties: towering creations of spun sugar depicting various scenes from the Bible and ancient mythology. Doña Elvira had instructed me to take only tiny tastes of each, but her advice was unnecessary. I was far too nervous to eat, thinking about the one more ceremony I had to endure.

Torches were lit around the Great Hall, and feasting gave way to dancing. My ladies again distinguished themselves as they executed our beautiful dances that bespoke of starry skies and abundant sunshine. Arthur led one of his aunts in a stately dance that I did not know, and I was well pleased by his gracefulness.

Then my new brother-in-law took as his partner his older sister, Princess Margaret, herself a skilled dancer. The two performed a lively dance that Henry contrived to make even livelier, entertaining the company with astonishing leaps and jumps, eventually casting off his surcoat and continuing to caper about in his doublet.

I was weary to the bone by the time it all ended in the small hours, but I knew this was only the beginning. The celebration would continue for ten days of feasting, dancing, and jousting. And now, before this night ended, I would have to submit to the part I had been dreading all along: the ceremony of the bedding.

Bayard's Castle, November 1501