Authors: Roberta Gellis
“As soon as the prior’s guest house is ready, I will come
for him,” Leybourne murmured.
“First send the infirmarian to dress his wound,” Barbara
said. As Leybourne nodded and went out, she gestured to Clotilde to shut the
door, then knelt down beside the king. “Will you allow my maid and me to help
you out of your armor, sire?”
Henry looked at the closed door of the chamber, at Barbara
on her knees, at Clotilde, who was curtsying. “Why did Roger Leybourne bring me
here, away from my son?” he whispered.
Barbara smiled, although her lips felt stiff. Dazed and
confused as he was, it was apparent that Henry only remembered a long-ago
quarrel between Leybourne and Edward, which he had made worse, and that for a
short time Leybourne had become Leicester’s supporter. He seemed to have
forgotten that the quarrel had been settled.
“Leybourne is a most faithful servant to you now, my lord,
and a loyal friend to Prince Edward,” Barbara said. “Perhaps you did not hear
how Lord Edward came to escape from Leicester, but Roger Leybourne was among
those who helped. And he has loyally fought for Lord Edward since May. Truly
you may trust him.”
“Leicester, my own brother-by-marriage, wanted me dead,”
Henry said. “Whom, then, may I trust?”
Part of Barbara felt so exasperated she could have screamed.
Did Henry not remember the many offenses he had given Leicester? Did he expect
to be loved despite his insults, his efforts to deprive his sister of her
dowry, his accusations of treachery? But tears of pain and fatigue and
bewilderment rolled down the king’s face, catching in glittering points on the
gray stubble of his unshaven beard. That Henry, who was always so particular
about his appearance, should be unshaven told how hard the old man had been
driven. Despite herself, Barbara almost wept for him, despite her knowledge
that he was the cause of all the trouble, the cause, perhaps, that her husband
might be bleeding out his life in the mud. No, Leybourne had said Alphonse was
well, and Henry’s blue eyes looked into hers like a lost child’s. Barbara put a
hand on his.
“Oh, no, my lord,” she soothed. “I cannot believe that
Leicester wished any harm to come to you. I do not say he has not been wrong in
how he acted, but that is because he deceived himself that he was doing what
was best for your safety and honor. No one wishes to harm you. I am sure the
earl gave you plain armor to save you from being seized by this one and that
one and becoming the center of the battle, where you might be hurt.” She patted
his hand. “Come, my lord, let us take off your armor. You will be more
comfortable.”
He agreed faintly, and Clotilde helped lift him while
Barbara pulled the skirts of the hauberk out from under him. Then they had to
lift the mail shirt over his head, easing it carefully over his cut shoulder.
Barbara had just repeated the process with the arming tunic when a scratch on
the door heralded the arrival of a breathless infirmarian. Barbara stepped back
to allow him to look at the wound, and in a few moments he began to assure the
king that the hurt was small and would soon be well, but to dress it properly
he would prefer that the king be carried to the infirmary.
Although Henry looked very frightened and clutched at
Barbara’s hands when Clotilde opened the door, he relaxed as soon as he saw the
Cistercian habit and endured the monk’s examination patiently. When the
infirmarian wished to move him, however, he looked anxiously at Barbara, who
could not resist the appeal. She asked if she might be allowed to accompany the
king. This drew a spate of apologies from the infirmarian, who explained that
women were not allowed in the infirmary, even that portion segregated for
guests.
In his excitement at having a king as a patient, his desire
to do exactly what Henry wanted, his conflicting fear of breaking the rule, and
his distress at being in the women’s dormitory, the infirmarian spoke so
quickly and disjointedly that Henry did not understand and became even more confused.
At that moment Leybourne returned. The king grabbed Barbara’s hand and would
not let go.
Eventually Barbara and the infirmarian accompanied Henry to
the prior’s guest house, arriving not a moment too soon. As they left the
dormitory, three brilliant flashes of lightning split the sky, making the
courtyard brighter than the sun at noon, and as they reached the door of the
guest house, came a crash of thunder so loud that all, even the warrior
Leybourne, cried out. All hurried within as a cascade of water, like a river
tumbling over a cliff, fell from the sky. In the bedchamber one lay brother was
tending a small but lively fire while another was warming the sheets of a
large, handsome bed. The infirmarian’s novice was also waiting, and the crowd
of clerics seemed to calm the king so that he agreed to allow them to undress
him and put him to bed. While that was being done, Leybourne drew Barbara down
the stairs to the chamber below.
“I will go back now,” he said. “I have left a troop who will
defend the priory against stragglers if any should try to enter. You need have
no fear. Leicester’s army is destroyed. The battle was all but over when I
left.”
“Over—” Barbara began, but Leybourne had turned on his heel
and walked away.
She followed for a step or two, her hand outstretched,
unable to unlock her voice. If the battle was over, why should Leybourne ride
back when one could scarcely see through the pouring rain? Why had not Alphonse
come if the battle was over? The fear swelled so that her knees shook too badly
to walk, and she had to stop. When it receded, she still went no farther.
Leybourne would not even hear her if she called to him, the noise of the storm
was terrible. And even if he heard her, he was unlikely to wait in the rain to
explain. Besides, what could he tell her if he did wait? He had already said
Alphonse was “enjoying himself”.
Enjoying himself? Did that mean he no longer wished to
return to France soon but would seek out more wars to fight in? Barbara stood
staring at the empty doorway until the infirmarian’s novice approached and
asked her to come to the king. She followed without thinking, sank into a
curtsy, and murmured something proper and meaningless.
“It is very strange of your father to bring you to a
battle,” the king said querulously.
“My father is not here, sire,” Barbara replied, only half
absorbing what was said to her. “I was with my husband, Alphonse d’Aix.”
Vaguely she recalled that the king had been confused when
Leybourne brought him into the priory, and she thought he had forgotten she was
married. She lifted her head as she spoke and saw that though Henry was still
pale, he seemed perfectly composed. And the half-smile he wore, the sidelong
glance he cast at her under the drooping eyelid, set off alarm bells in her head.
Before she could say more, he told the second lay brother to bring her a stool
so she could sit and talk to him. As Barbara rose from her curtsy, Henry said
he was hungry, and the lay brother replied that he would bring some warm soup
and went out.
The delay had given Barbara time to think. A closer
examination of Henry’s face as he sat propped among pillows made her doubt that
the extra droop of his eyelid was owing to slyness. More likely, she thought,
remembering the way his hand trembled when he gestured her to rise and the
querulous voice, the slackness was owing to exhaustion. If he wished to talk,
however, her long training as a court lady bade her never to lose an
opportunity to lay an obligation on royalty.
“Alphonse was one of those who helped Prince Edward escape,”
Barbara went on as soon as the servant was gone. “For safety he sent me to
Evesham Abbey, but I took fright when I heard that Leicester was coming there
and—and fled here to Cleeve.”
Henry’s expressive face grew sad and he put out his shaking
hand to grasp hers. “How dreadful for you, my poor Barbara, to have your
husband on one side in a battle and your father on the other. And how dreadful
for them if they should have met on the field.”
Barbara was touched by the sincere sympathy and murmured,
“You are very kind, sire,” before she remembered how often she had railed
against the way the king’s warmth seduced those who should have known better,
and a wave of irritation replaced her gratitude. Simultaneously the sense of
what Henry had said about her father caused a new clangor of alarm bells, and
she added quickly, “But your kindness is wasted. My husband and father could
never have met. My father did not answer Leicester’s summons and took no part
in this battle. You must know, sire, that he has never approved of much that
Leicester did and was very angry when he heard the terms of the Peace of
Canterbury.”
“But he did not repudiate the Provisions of Oxford,” Henry
said, withdrawing his hand.
“My lord, you yourself approved the provisions in their
first form. It is the Earl of Leicester who has distorted them into something
different from what was first intended.” Barbara felt a pang of guilt over
those words, but she knew no power on earth could reconcile Leicester with the
king now. It was better that the earl bear the onus and that her father, who
also had the good of the realm at heart, should be free and restored to power
so that some good might be salvaged from the wreck of Leicester’s plans. “You
know my father loves you,” she went on. “I cannot tell you how often he has
told me of your mischief together as boys and how your kindness saved him from
his father’s anger. There was something about a horse, but I have forgotten
exactly how it came about…”
She let her voice drift away invitingly and hid her sigh of
relief under a chuckle as Henry promptly began to retell the well-known story
with details and embellishments that Barbara had not heard before. By the time
the king’s soup was brought, Henry was more relaxed. Barbara served, holding
the bowl so the king could eat in comfort, presenting the napkin when it was
necessary, and talking gently of great state dinners in happier times. Now and
again she managed to insert a reminder of occasions when her father had
supported Henry, but she was careful that the remarks seemed to be made only in
passing. If Henry noted what she said, he gave no sign of it, and when the bowl
was empty and Barbara had held a basin for him to wash his hands, he dismissed
her. He said only that he wished to rest, but he smiled warmly at her, patted
her hand, and called her a good girl.
At first as she walked down the stairs, Barbara was
disappointed, rethinking the conversation and wondering whether she should have
been more direct in her father’s defense. By the time she reached the outer
door, she felt less dissatisfied. Had she harped on her father’s break with
Leicester, every suspicion in the king’s devious mind would have wakened to
combat her claims. And to have pointed out her father’s reasons for supporting
Leicester would have forced her also to point out the king’s mistakes—a very
foolish thing to do at any time.
No, she had done just right, she thought. She had soothed
the king, made him feel safe and happy, and made clear that her father had
withdrawn his support from Leicester—whether or not that was true, it would betrue now. Best of all, she had tied her father’s absence from this battle
to his love for the king, and Henry always wanted to be loved. If anything
could ease the king’s spite against a man who had opposed him, it was the
notion that the opposition had ended out of love. She could trust her father to
say and do what was proper as soon as he knew— Barbara drew in a sharp breath.
She had to send him the news of Leicester’s defeat and what she had said to the
king at once.
Becoming aware of her surroundings, Barbara found she was
standing at the door of the prior’s guest house, looking into the courtyard.
Now she saw with relief that the rain had diminished to little more than a
drizzle, although there were still distant flashes of lightning and rumbles of
thunder. She ran hurriedly across the courtyard to her own chamber in the guest
house. There she wiped dry her hair and gown while Clotilde ran out to buy from
one of the lay brothers two quills, some ink, and a sheet of parchment. Taking
a candle to the guests’ refectory, she sat down to write her letter while Bevis
and Lewin made ready to carry it to Norfolk.
The light grew brighter as she wrote, covering the parchment
tightly with every detail of her conversation with Henry after writing the news
of Leicester’s defeat. The storm was passing, but Barbara was too intent to
notice the change in the light even when she had to move her head to avoid the
last rays of the setting sun which glanced in through the narrow window. She
reread her letter, adding a small point between the lines or in the margin,
while the shaft of sunlight disappeared as the sun sank below the priory wall.
The light from the window was so strong now that she absently pushed the candle
aside.
All Barbara was aware of was a growing sense of relief. She
had realized that being among the first to know of Edward’s victory would give
her father time to gather his strength as well as to make peace overtures. If
the king did not insist on punishing Norfolk—and she felt strongly hopeful that
she had laid a ground for forgiveness there—the rest could be left to Edward’s
good sense. The prince knew he would have to come to terms with most of those
who had supported Leicester. Since her father had not fought at Lewes or
Evesham, the prince would be willing to accept a new oath of fealty from
Norfolk and perhaps a minor fine instead of waging a war to disseisin so
powerful a man. Barbara closed her eyes for a moment as she breathed a prayer
of thanks. She was sure her father’s peril was over, but another point came to
mind and she opened her eyes to add that information to the letter.
A shadow fell across the table. Barbara looked up, about to
order sharply that her man stand out of the light. Instead she sprang to her
feet so quickly that she knocked over the bench she had been sitting on. She
stretched frantically over the table, but could not reach Alphonse, who was
standing behind the bench on the other side, staring at her as if he could not
remember who she was or could not think what to say.