The White Princess Read online

  I nod. This means that Henry’s spy has beaten, coerced, and bribed the silk merchant to say all that he knows about the boy, and now will pay him to spy for us, and the boy—whoever he is—will be betrayed. He has lost a friend and probably does not even know it. “Does he say who the boy is?”

  “Nobody can say who he is. He says the name that the boy likes to use.”

  “He calls himself my brother Richard?”

  “Yes.”

  “And did the silk merchant see any proofs?”

  “Merchant Meno met the boy at the Portuguese court, where he was widely known as your brother, popular among all the lads, beautifully dressed, well educated. He told everyone he had escaped, as by a miracle, from the Tower.”

  “Did he say how?” I ask. If my husband learns that it was my mother and me who put a little page boy into the Tower in place of my brother, then she will face a charge of treason and execution and my life will be ruined for he will never trust me again.

  “He never says how,” my husband replies irritably. “He says that he promised not to say, until he is restored to his throne. Imagine that! Imagine a boy with the nerve to say such a thing!”

  I nod. I can imagine a boy like this only too well. He used to always win at hide-and-seek because he had the patience and the cunning to hide longer than anyone else. He would wait until we were called for dinner before he came out laughing. And he loved his mother and would never put her at risk, not even to prove his claim.

  “Pregent Meno now says that the boy wanted to see the world and it so happened that they sailed to Ireland. If you believed him you would think that the boy invented himself, all alone, with no backers and no money and no support. If you believed him you would have to think that Ireland, a country filled with savages wearing little more than animal skins, was an excellent market for silk, and that any clever silk merchant was likely to go there, and most likely to show his wares by dressing his page boy up like a prince.”

  “But really?”

  “Really, the boy must have backers and money and support. Really there must have been a plan, for Pregent Meno chose to sail with him to Ireland—of all places—and he was greeted as a hero on the quayside and borne aloft by half a dozen of the most faithless Irish lords who all happened to be there, waiting on the quay at the same time, and now lives like a king in one of their castles, guarded by an army of Frenchmen who just happen to be there too.”

  “And shall you capture him?”

  “I have sent Meno back to him with gold in a chest and his mouth full of lies. He will promise friendship, take him on his ship again, guarantee him a safe voyage to his friends in France; but he will bring the boy straight to me.”

  I keep my face very still. I can hear the beating of my own heart. It is so loud that I think my husband will hear it in our quiet room, over the gentle flickering of the fire. “And what will you do with him then, Henry?”

  He puts his hand over mine. “I am sorry, Elizabeth; but whoever he really is, whoever he says he is, I cannot have him wandering around using your name. I’ll have him hanged for treason.”

  “Hanged?”

  Grimly, he nods.

  “What if he’s not an English boy?” I ask. “What if you can’t accuse him of treason, because he’s something else: Portuguese perhaps or Spanish?”

  Henry shrugs, looking at the flames. “Then I’ll have him secretly killed,” he says flatly. “Just as your father tried to kill me. It’s the only way with pretenders to the throne. And the boy knows this as well as I do. And you know it too. So don’t look so innocent and so shocked. Don’t lie.”

  BERMONDSEY ABBEY, LONDON, SUMMER 1492

  Henry goes on progress to the West Country, and finds himself riding into the little town of Abingdon just as the townsmen are up in arms challenging his rule. To everyone’s surprise he is merciful. Generously he halts the trial of the townsmen, graciously he orders their release. To me he writes:

  Faithless and disloyal—but there was nothing I could do but forgive them in the hope that others see me as a kind king, and that they turn away from the treasonous counsels of the Abbot Sant, who—I would swear—inspired all this. I have had every blade of grass he owns off him, and every penny from his treasure box. I have made him a miserable pauper without bringing him to trial. I don’t see what else I can do to hurt him.

  While Henry is away I go to visit my mother. I ask the prior of Bermondsey Abbey if I might come to stay. I suggest that I need a retreat to consult the health of my soul, and he advises me to bring my chaplain with me on a visit also. I write to my mother to tell her I am coming, and I get a brief, warm note in reply, welcoming my visit and urging me to bring my little sisters with me. I’m not going to take them as she asks. I need to speak to my mother alone.

  The first night we dine together in the hall of the abbey and listen to the reading of the sacred text. As it happens, it is that of Ruth and Naomi, a story of a daughter who loves her mother so much that she chooses to be with her rather than making her own life in her own land. I think about loyalty to one’s family and love for one’s mother as I pray that night and go to bed. Maggie, who has come with me, my most faithful and loving companion, prays beside me and climbs heavily into the other side of the broad bed.

  “I hope you sleep,” I say warmingly. “For I can’t stop my mind whirling.”

  “Sleep,” she says comfortably. “I shall wake twice to use the pot anyway. Every time I lie down the baby turns over and kicks in my belly, and I have to get up to piss. Besides, in the morning you will have your questions answered or . . .”

  “Or what?”

  She giggles. “Or your mother will be as unhelpful as she always is,” she says. “Truly, she’s a queen, the greatest queen that England ever had. Whoever stepped up so high? Whoever has been braver? There has never been a more intractable Queen of England than her.”

  “It’s true,” I say. “Let’s both try and sleep.”

  Margaret is breathing deeply within moments, but I lie beside her and listen to her peaceful sleep. I watch the slats of the shutters gradually lighten with the autumn dawn, then I rise and wait for the bell for Prime. Today, I will ask my mother what she knows. Today I will not be satisfied with anything less than the truth.

  “I know nothing for sure,” she says to me quietly. We are seated on the benches at the back of the chapel of Bermondsey Abbey. She has walked with me beside the river, we have attended Prime together and prayed side by side, our penitent heads on our hands. Now she sinks down and puts her hand to her heart.

  “I’m weary,” she says to explain her pallor.

  “You’re not ill?” I ask, suddenly fearful.

  “Something . . .” she volunteers. “Something that catches my breath and makes my heart race so that I can hear it pounding. Ah, Elizabeth, don’t look like that. I am old, my dear, and I have lost all my brothers and four of my sisters. The man I married for passion is dead and the crown I wore is on your head. My work is done. I don’t mind sleeping every afternoon, and when I lie down I compose myself in case I don’t wake up again. I close my eyes and I am content.”

  “But you’re not ill,” I insist. “Shouldn’t you see a physician?”

  “No, no,” she says, patting my hand. “I’m not ill. But I am a woman of fifty-five. I’m not a girl anymore.”

  Fifty-five is a great age; but my mother does not seem old to me. And I am very far from being ready for her death. “Won’t you see a physician?”

  She shakes her head. “He could tell me nothing that I don’t already know, my dear.”

  I pause, realizing that I can do nothing against her stubbornness. “What do you know?”

  “I know I am ready.”

  “I’m not ready!” I exclaim.

  She nods. “You are where I wanted you to be. Your children, my grandsons, are where I hoped that they would be. I am content. Now—never mind my death, which is bound to happen one day whether we like it or not—why