The Constant Princess Read online

  Catalina nodded, and turned to sit by the window and look out. The sky had clouded over, the sun was quite gone. It was raining again, the raindrops chasing down the small panes of glass. Catalina watched them. She tried to keep her mind from the death of her brother who had loved his wife so much, who had been looking forward to the birth of their son. Juan had died within days of taking sick, and no one had ever known what was wrong with him.

  “I shan’t think of him, not of poor Juan,” Catalina whispered to herself. “The cases are not alike at all. Juan was always slight, little; but Arthur is strong.”

  The physician seemed to take a long time and when he came out of the bedchamber, Arthur was not with him. Catalina who had risen from her seat as soon as the door opened, peeped around him to see Arthur lying on the bed, half undressed, half asleep.

  “I think his grooms of the body should prepare him for bed,” the doctor said. “He is very weary. He would be better for rest. If they take care, they can get him into bed without waking him.”

  “Is he ill?” Catalina demanded, speaking slowly in Latin. “Aegrotat? Is he very ill?”

  The doctor spread his hands. “He has a fever,” he said cautiously in slow French. “I can give him a draft to bring down his fever.”

  “Do you know what it is?” Lady Margaret asked, her voice very low. “It’s not the Sweat, is it?”

  “Please God it is not. And there are no other cases in the town, as far as I know. But he should be kept quiet and allowed to rest. I shall go and make up this draft and I will come back.”

  The low-voiced English was incomprehensible to Catalina. “What does he say? What did he say?” she demanded of Lady Margaret.

  “Nothing more than you heard,” the older woman assured her. “He has a fever and needs rest. Let me get his men to undress him and put him properly to bed. If he is better tonight, you can dine with him. I know he would like that.”

  “Where is he going?” Catalina cried out as the doctor bowed and went to the door. “He must stay and watch the prince!”

  “He is going to make a draft to bring down his fever. He will be back at once. The prince will have the best of care, Your Grace. We love him as you do. We will not neglect him.”

  “I know you would not…it is only…Will the doctor be long?”

  “He will be as quick as he can. And see, the prince is asleep. Sleep will be his best medicine. He can rest and grow strong and dine with you tonight.”

  “You think he will be better tonight?”

  “If it is just a little fever and fatigue, then he will be better in a few days,” Lady Margaret said firmly.

  “I will watch over his sleep,” Catalina said.

  Lady Margaret opened the door and beckoned to the prince’s chief gentlemen. She gave them their orders and then she drew the princess through the crowd to her own rooms. “Come, Your Grace,” she said. “Come for a walk in the inner bailey with me and then I shall go back to his rooms and see that everything is comfortable for him.”

  “I shall go back now,” Catalina insisted. “I shall watch over his sleep.”

  Margaret glanced at Doña Elvira. “You should stay away from his rooms in case he does have a fever,” she said, speaking slowly and clearly in French, so that the duenna could understand her. “Your health is most important, Princess. I would not forgive myself if anything happened to either of you.”

  Doña Elvira stepped forwards and narrowed her lips. Lady Margaret knew she could be relied on to keep the princess from danger.

  “But you said he only had a slight fever. I can go to him?”

  “Let us wait to see what the doctor has to say.” Lady Margaret lowered her voice. “If you should be with child, dear Princess, we would not want you to take his fever.”

  “But I will dine with him.”

  “If he is well enough.”

  “But he will want to see me!”

  “Depend upon it.” Lady Margaret smiled. “When his fever has broken and he is better this evening and sitting up and eating his dinner, he will want to see you. You have to be patient.”

  Catalina nodded. “If I go now, do you swear that you will stay with him all the time?”

  “I will go back now, if you will walk outside and then go to your room and read or study or sew.”

  “I’ll go!” said Catalina, instantly obedient. “I’ll go to my rooms if you will stay with him.”

  “At once,” Lady Margaret promised.

  This small garden is like a prison yard. I walk round and round in the herb garden, and the rain drizzles over everything like tears. My rooms are no better, my privy chamber is like a cell, I cannot bear to have anyone with me, and yet I cannot bear to be alone. I have made the ladies sit in the presence chamber, their unending chatter makes me want to scream with irritation. But when I am alone in my room I long for company. I want someone to hold my hand and tell me that everything will be all right.

  I go down the narrow stone stairs and across the cobbles to the round chapel. A cross and a stone altar are set in the rounded wall, a light burning before it. It is a place of perfect peace; but I can find no peace. I fold my cold hands inside my sleeves and hug myself and I walk around the circular wall—it is thirty-six steps to the door—and then I walk the circle again, like a donkey on a treadmill. I am praying; but I have no faith that I am heard.

  “I am Catalina, Princess of Spain and of Wales,” I remind myself. “I am Catalina, beloved of God, especially favored by God. Nothing can go wrong for me. Nothing as bad as this could ever go wrong for me. It is God’s will that I should marry Arthur and unite the kingdoms of Spain and England. God will not let anything happen to Arthur nor to me. I know that He favors my mother and me above all others. This fear must be sent to try me. But I will not be afraid, because I know that nothing will ever go wrong for me.”

  Catalina waited in her rooms, sending her women every hour to ask how her husband did. The first few hours they said he was still sleeping, the doctor had made his draft and was standing by his bed, waiting for him to wake. Then, at three in the afternoon, they said that he had wakened but was very hot and feverish. He had taken the draft and they were waiting to see his fever cool. At four he was worse, not better, and the doctor was making up a different prescription.

  He would take no dinner. He would just drink some cool ale and the doctor’s cures for fever.

  “Go and ask him if he will see me?” Catalina ordered one of her Englishwomen. “Make sure you speak to Lady Margaret. She promised me that I should dine with him. Remind her.”

  The woman went and came back with a grave face. “Princess, they are all very anxious,” she said. “They have sent for a physician from London. Dr. Bereworth, who has been watching over him, does not know why the fever does not cool down. Lady Margaret is there and Sir Richard Pole, Sir William Thomas, Sir Henry Vernon, Sir Richard Croft—they are all waiting outside his chamber and you cannot be admitted to see him. They say he is wandering in his mind.”

  “I must go to the chapel. I must pray,” Catalina said instantly.

  She threw a veil over her head and went back to the round chapel. To her dismay, Prince Arthur’s confessor was at the altar, his head bowed low in supplication. Some of the greatest men of the town and castle were seated around the wall, their heads bowed. Catalina slipped into the room and fell to her knees. She rested her chin on her hands and scrutinized the hunched shoulders of the priest for any sign that his prayers were being heard. There was no way of telling. She closed her eyes.

  Dearest God, spare Arthur, spare my darling husband, Arthur. He is only a boy, I am only a girl, we have had no time together, no time at all. You know what a kingdom we will make if he is spared. You know what plans we have for this country, what a holy castle we will make from this land, how we shall hammer the Moors, how we shall defend this kingdom from the Scots. Dear God, in Your mercy spare Arthur and let him come back to me. We want to have our children: Mary, who is to be the rose