The King’s Concubine: A Novel of Alice Perrers (55 page)

But some events, through association, touched me closely.

Wykeham, my dear Wykeham, was formally pardoned, thus confirming the healing of the wounds between Edward and his former Chancellor. At least I had been able to achieve that much for an old friend. Wykeham wrote:

I am restored to grace, but not to political office. I shall turn my mind to the matter of education at Oxford with the building of two new colleges. I know that will appeal to you—although no woman will set foot within their doors! I might owe you that—but we must both accept that it cannot be done.

It made me smile. How difficult for a priest to acknowledge a debt to a sinful daughter of Eve, but he had done it, and with such elegance. I wished him well. I thought we were unlikely to meet again.

Finally, there came some unsettling news that made me laugh—and then frown. With the meeting of Parliament, Gaunt was invited to join a committee of the Lords to deal with the threats from across the Channel.

“So, Gaunt’s star is in the ascendant,” Windsor remarked, reading Wykeham’s letter over my shoulder.

“To be expected,” I replied. “He has the blood and the experience.”

“Unfortunately no reputation for success!”

Windsor’s contempt did not disturb me. What would Gaunt’s waxing power mean for me now? Our ambitions no longer ran in parallel lines. But Windsor was thoughtful, taking Wykeham’s letter to reread at his leisure. It always worried me when he felt the need to brood over a cup of ale.

But I laughed when I read of Parliament’s outrageously high-handed
petition to young Richard. How predictable of them! In the future, only Parliament should have the right to appoint Richard’s Chancellor, Treasurer, and every other high office of state they could discover. Parliament would control the King at every step. No one was ever to be allowed to do what
I
had done when Edward was too ill to do it for himself. There would never be another Alice Perrers, ruling the royal roost.

Yes, I laughed, but there was not much humor in it.

I found nothing to laugh at afterward. A heavy hammering on my door at Pallenswick, much like the thump of a mailed fist, brought me hotfoot from my receipts and estate records. Windsor, I knew, was engaged in draining water meadows over at Gaines. Nor would I expect him to knock on my door when he returned—we still led a strange peripatetic life, in no sense a united household, as if our marriage were still some unshaped business entity that sometimes demanded our intimacy and sometimes did not. No, Windsor would not knock. Rather he would fling the door wide and stride inside, his voice raised to announce his arrival, filling the house with his formidable, restless presence. This was not Windsor. My heart tripped with a fast rebirth of the fear that always lurked deep within me, but I would not hide.…I strode toward the repeated thud.

“A group of men, mistress.” My steward hovered uncertainly in the entrance hall. “Do I open to them?”

“Do so.” If this was a threat, I would face it.

“Good day, mistress.”

Not a mailed fist, but a staff of office, and potentially just as forceful. The man at my door was clothed in the sober garments of an upper servant: a clerk or a gentleman’s secretary. Or, a breath of warning whispering over my neck, a Court official. I did not know him. I did not like the look of him, despite his mild expression and his courteous bow, or the dozen men at his back. My courtyard was crowded with pack animals and two large wagons.

“Mistress Perrers?”

“I am. And who are you, sir?” I asked with careful good manners.

All had been quiet on the London front over the past months, Richard getting used to the weight of the crown and Joan queening it over the Court. I had not stirred from my self-imposed exile.

“Keep your head down,” Windsor had advised after my previous flirtation with danger. “They’ve too many problems to be concerned about you. Defense of the realm has taken precedence over the old King’s mistress. Another few months and you’ll be forgotten.”

“I don’t know if I like that thought.” Obscurity did not sit well with me. “Do I want to be forgotten?”

“You do if you’ve any sense. Stay put, woman.”

So I had, and as the weeks had passed with no further evidence of Joan’s malevolence, my dread had abated. But if Windsor was well-informed, as he usually was, what was this on my doorstep? It did not bode well. Mentally I cursed Windsor for his overconfidence, and for his absence. Why was a man never around when you needed him? And why should I need him, anyway? Could I not deal with this encroachment on my own property? I eyed my visitor. This man in his black tunic and leather satchel carried far too much authority for my liking. My throat dried as his flat stare moved over me from head to toe.

But they cannot arrest you. You have committed no crime. Gaunt stood for you! He rescinded the banishment!

I breathed a little more easily.

The official bowed again. At least he was polite, but his men had an avaricious gleam.

“I am Thomas Webster, mistress.” From the satchel, he took a scroll. “I am sent by a commission appointed by Parliament.” Soft-voiced and respectful despite those assessing eyes, he held out the document for me to take. I did so, unrolling it between fingers that I held steady as I scanned the contents. It was not difficult to absorb the gist of it within seconds.

My breathing was once more compromised. My hand crushed one of the red seals that spoke of its officialdom, and I pretended to read through it again whilst I forced a deep breath into my lungs. Then I stood solidly on my doorstep, as if it would be possible for me to block their entry.

“What’s this? I don’t understand.” But the words were black and clear before my eyes.

“I am given authority to take what I can of value, mistress.”

The beat of my heart in my throat threatened to choke me. “And if I refuse?”

“I wouldn’t if I were you, mistress,” he said dryly. “You’ve not the power to stop me. I have a list of the most pertinent items. Now, if you will allow me…?”

So they came in with a heavy clump of boots, Webster unfolding his abomination of a list. It was an inventory of all I owned, everything that Pallenswick contained that belonged to me.

Panic built, roaring out of control.

“The house is mine!” I objected. “It is not Crown property. It was not a gift from the King—I bought it.”

“But bought with whose money, mistress? Where did that money come from?” He might have smirked. “And whose are the contents? Did you buy those too?” He turned his back on me, beckoning to his minions to begin their task.

There was no answer I could give that would make any impression. I stood and watched as the order of Parliament’s commission was instigated. All my property was hauled out before me into the courtyard and stowed in the wagons and on the pack animals. My linen, my furniture, even my bed. Jewels, clothing, trinkets, and through it all Webster reading from his despicable list.

“A diadem of pearls. A gold chain set with rubies. A yard of scarlet silk ribbon. A pair of leather gloves, the gauntlets embroidered in silver and…”

“A yard of ribbon…?” A cry touching on hysteria gathered in my throat.

“Every little helps, mistress. We have a war to fund,” he replied caustically. “Those jewels will fetch by our reckoning close to five hundred pounds. Better a well-armed body of men to defend English soil than these pretty things ’round your neck!”

It was useless. I watched in silence as everything was carried out of my house. When I saw the robes clutched in the arms of a burly servant, a heap of fur and silk and damask in rich blue and silver, the robes that Edward had had made for me for a second great tournament at Smithfield, I choked back the tears. They had never been worn; that
second tournament was never held. The robes were cast on the wagon with all the rest.

And there I was, left to stand in the empty entrance hall of my own house.

“Have you finished?”

“Yes, mistress. But I should warn you: Parliament has taken on the burden of your creditors. Any man with a claim against you is invited to put forward his demands.”

“My creditors?” It grew worse and worse.

“Indeed, mistress. Any man with a grievance for extortions or oppressions or injuries committed by yourself”—how he was enjoying this!—“can appeal to Parliament for redress.”

“Where…where did this order come from?” I demanded. Oh, I knew the answer!

“From Parliament, mistress.”

Inhaling slowly, I clenched my fists against the shriek of anger in my head. This was not from Parliament. I would wager the pearl diadem that had just disappeared into the pack on the back of a mule. I knew whose fingers were in this pie. So she was not content to allow me to live in obscurity! I knew from whence this campaign of retaliation had stemmed and it was vicious! I could see her rubbing her hands with the satisfaction of it.

God’s Blood!

I forced myself to think coldly and logically. If this was all she took…I had other manor houses, each well furnished. I would allow her this, however furious it made me.

And then I saw Webster removing yet another scroll from his satchel.

“Have you not taken everything you can?”

“This is not a reclamation order, mistress. It is for you to present yourself in London.”

I snatched it from him. Read it. I was to appear before the House of Lords.

“A trial?” I gasped. He stood unspeaking, stony-faced. What possible charges had they discovered now? “Tell me!” I demanded. “Is this a trial?”

“It is written there, mistress.” Webster indicated the document crumpled in my hand. I must appear before the House of Lords on the twenty-second day of December. And the charge against me? Fraud. Treason!

Treason?
That was not possible!

But I knew that anything was possible. Fury was replaced by terror. This was to be no political slapping of my knuckes: This was to be a trial with legal consequences. How far would Joan go in her desire for revenge? The penalty for treason was death.

Windsor returned from a damp morning in the flooded meadows around Pallenswick to find me sitting mindlessly on the floor in the now empty parlor. No furniture, no tapestry; even the log basket beside the fireplace had been taken.…I was stunned, as if Joan had struck my face with the flat of her hand—as she had once so long ago. When I failed to register the echo of his boots on the polished boards, he knelt and lifted the document from my unresisting fingers. Skimming down it, he swore fluently, threw his gloves and sword onto the floor, and sat down beside me.

“I see the vultures have been here.”

“Yes.” His boots in close proximity to my skirts were filthy with mud and slime and the odd strand of duckweed. I did not care.

“Where are the girls?’ he asked.

“With Webster,” I replied dully. “Being fed bread and small beer in the kitchen. If our visitors left us any…”

“Is every room as empty as this?”

Words failed me. I lifted my hands, let them drop. Misery engulfed me.

“What are you going to do?” He thrust the question into the silence.

“I think I’ll sit here and wait for the ax to fall on my neck.”

“Really?” Windsor stood. He gripped my forearms and with a flex of muscles stood, lifting me with him. “Stand up, Alice. You need to stand on your feet. You need to think!”

“I can’t.”

“Is the woman I love so easily intimidated?”

I stood rigid in his embrace, unable to think, unable to respond. Into
which black hole had all my courage vanished? I was full to the brim with self-pity, and because I no longer felt brave, I wept for my own weakness, for all I had lost. That the gifts given to me by Edward out of love and gratitude should be snatched back in spitefulness, destroying the physical evidence of Edward’s place in my life. And when honesty forced me to consider that I had not always been entirely without blame, I wept for that too. I had enjoyed my power as King’s Concubine. I could not be completely absolved of using crown gold for my purchases, but I had always paid it back. Hadn’t I? Well, for the most part I had paid my debts. And here was the day of reckoning. I wept into Windsor’s shoulder.

“Is the woman I love so lacking in backbone that she will stand and weep rather than fight for what is rightfully hers?”

They were harsh words, but he tightened his hold and propped his chin on top of my head until I began to relax and take my own weight. The solid beat of his heart had a reassurance all its own. I eventually rested my forehead against his shoulder and could breathe evenly again.…

The word blazed in my mind. I looked up sharply, dislodging his chin, seeing myself reflected in his eyes.

“
What
did you just say?”

“Which bit of it? That you lacked backbone?”

I ran my tongue over dry lips, scrubbed at my face with a square of linen that Windsor obligingly offered me, and frowned. “I think you said that I am the woman you love?”

“You are. Didn’t you know? You don’t look very pleased with the idea.”

My hands tightened on his sleeves. “Say it again. As if you mean it.” In case he did not. Pray God he did!

“Dear Alice. I love you. You hold my sun and moon in your hands!”

“And that is poetic!”

I thought his answering smile was a little wry. I could not believe it! But I must, mustn’t I? Windsor was not a man to say what he did not mean. An immeasurable joy rioted through me, as if to fill me with a shimmering light to disperse the shadows in my mind and heart. Until all the events of the morning flooded back…

I stared at him. “Why did you have to tell me now?”

“When should I tell you?”

Windsor was humoring me, distracting me. I pushed his hands
away so that I stood alone. “Tomorrow. Last week. Anytime but when my face is blotched with tears and my home stripped bare and my mind full of Joan’s perfidy.”

“I thought you knew.”

“No, I didn’t! How could I? You have never said it before.” How could he be so obtuse? There he stood, solid and real and
difficult
! And infinitely loved. “I want to enjoy it, not have it outweighed by the fact that I might be staring financial ruin—even death, if they prove treason against me—in the face! And I think you should know”—I did not even hesitate—“I love you too.”