Anne O'Brien - The Scandalous Duchess

I smoothed my hand down the silk damask of my skirts. When the Duke’s stern eye swept over his assembled household, he had registered with the barest glance the quality and condition of my garments, taking note of my obedience to his demand that I clothe myself with appropriate richness in honour of my new position. So my trailing skirts were in Lancaster blue, the close-fitting bodice, exquisitely fur edged, patterned in blue and white. Out of some female caprice, I had chosen to wear the coral rosary, ostentatiously looped over my girdle.

Now, waywardly volatile, strangely defiant, I wished I had not.

He had not even found the time to speak to me. I was merely one of many in the household. How could I have expected more?

Duchess Constanza trod the shallow steps to the Great Hall, her furs trailing and spiked with wet, her robes plastered to her body. Her pleated hair clung to her head and neck beneath her sodden veiling, the ruffles on her cap sadly limp. I could only imagine her discomfort in spite of her being tucked back into her litter after the welcome. But in spite of it all, yes, I acknowledged, she was beautiful. Not like Blanche, fair and so very English, smooth and pale as a pearl. This young woman was as sharp as a pin. Magnificent eyes, dark and secretive as beryls, were turned on her new surroundings and were not uncritical, and there was a pride in the thin nose, the arched brows. Perhaps her pride was to be expected, given the difficulties of her birth and young life.

Lady Alice had sniffed her disgust of gossip but Alyne had answered my curiosity as we completed the stitching on that same altar cloth that would be used for the Mass to give thanks for Duchess Constanza’s safe arrival amongst us.

‘Constanza is illegitimate, to all intents and purposes…’ she whispered. ‘Her father got three daughters and a son on a whore whilst his wife was still alive.’

‘But he claimed to have married her—the whore, that is,’ interposed Lady Alice who, in the end, could not resist the delectable lure of scandal.

And so, between them, I received the strangely horrifying history of my new mistress whose father King Pedro of Castile had imprisoned his rightfully wedded wife in a dungeon, while he continued his disreputable liaison with Maria de Padilla, whom he claimed to have wed before his marriage to the ill-fated legal wife Blanche of Bourbon. He was a man of persuasive tongue and his children by Maria had been recognised as legitimate by the Castilian Cortes, and so were heirs to the throne.

‘Pedro had his wife poisoned, so they say. Died in mysterious circumstances,’ Lady Alice stated with extravagantly raised brows.

Alyne added in counterpoint: ‘Constanza’s father is also dead, so she is Queen of Castile by right.’

‘Except that the Crown has been usurped by King Pedro’s bastard half-brother Enrique.’

‘Which means that Queen Constanza has no kingdom to rule over.’

‘Only a claim that Enrique will never honour.’

So there was the skeleton of Constanza’s lineage. It was an unenviable position for the young woman, whom I now assessed as, chin lifted, she approached the Duke. No wonder she held to her pride like a mouse to the last ear of corn during a bad harvest. She had little else. Owning the title of Queen of Castile certainly gave her a presence, despite the outmoded gown of red velvet with its strangely fashioned blue kirtle. The creation of veils and frills and buckram that covered her hair was a monstrosity.

‘Castilian fashion!’ Lady Alice murmured. ‘I doubt it will catch on.’

The Duke bowed low. We all made appropriate obeisance.

‘You are right welcome, my lady.’

When the Duke held out his hand, she placed hers there, her stark gaze at last come to rest. He smiled, saluted her fingers and then her cheek, her lips. I noticed that although there was no reticence in her response, she did not return the smile. Perhaps she was overawed by the splendour of her new home. Compared with the hovel rumour said she had been reduced to occupying in a village in Bayonne—even worse than Kettlethorpe, Lady Alice had informed me with a wry smile—this palace in the very heart of London must seem to her like paradise.

‘You will never be in danger again,’ the Duke assured her. ‘Nor will you ever again live in poverty. This is your home.’ Then turning to the ranks of his household: ‘I would introduce to you my wife. Queen Constanza of Castile.’

We bowed, curtsied.

The Queen of Castile sneezed.

The Duke was immediately solicitous, for though it was undetectable, we all knew that beneath those voluminous robes the lady carried his child. ‘Your hands are cold. Forgive my thoughtlessness.’ He beckoned to Lady Alice: ‘My wife needs our consideration. The English winter has not been kind today. I’ll leave her in your efficient hands.’

The welcome was thus cut short out of concern for her health and that of her child, and she was handed over to her new household. To me. I found myself directed by Lady Alice, since I had not yet settled into any routine of duties for my new mistress, to conduct the lady to her accommodations, help her disrobe, organise her bathing and then put her to bed with a pan of hot coals and a cup of warm spiced wine. And to instruct her handful of Castilian ladies who were looking apprehensive and as wet as she.

‘You know how we go about things here. None better,’ Lady Alice murmured. ‘And next week, God willing, your sister can take over when she has wished her husband farewell. She can soothe the Castilian fears, and you can concentrate on the welfare of the coming child—as well as giving me a hand with the clutch of growing children in my care.’ She sighed as she observed the Castilian retinue and clicked her tongue. ‘They look frightened to death. Do they think we will eat them?’

I curtsied to the new Duchess, who glanced rather wildly at the Duke, but she followed as I led the way, lingering in every antechamber, every room, to take in the furnishings, the painted ceilings, the glowing tapestries. Even though she shivered with cold, she found a need to take in every aspect of her new home, until I decided that enough was enough when she sneezed again.

‘To take a chill, my lady, would not be good for your child,’ I advised firmly. Subtle deference, I sensed, would not pay with this young woman. ‘It would be better for you and the baby if you were out of those clothes immediately.’

She blinked as if she had not expected me to speak, or did not understand. Perhaps that was it, I realised. How good was her understanding of the French that we habitually spoke at court?

‘You are cold,’ I said clearly, slowly. ‘You need to be dry and warm.’

She nodded and quickened her steps.

‘Ah! Good!’ she said at last. For as we arrived at her private chamber, a wooden bath, the staves held in place by brass mounts carved with fish and dragons, had been manoeuvred before the fire to accommodate the water, steaming and fragrant with herbs. It was, I realised, the first word she had spoken since her arrival.

I stood back to allow her to enter, then, closing the door on the last empty bucket, followed her as the Castilian ladies stood around helplessly.

‘Find your mistress’s garments,’ I chivvied, seeing that some of her coffers had already been placed in the room. ‘A shift, a robe. Some soft shoes…’ I pointed at the bath. ‘Now you must bathe, my lady.’

And under my eye the maidservant I had brought with me began to strip the fur and matted velvet from the Castilian queen’s slight body, releasing her hair from its confinement so that it snaked, damp and tangled, over her shoulders. The Duchess simply stood and allowed it to happen.

‘Clothes for your mistress,’ I snapped again at the damsels, thinking that my sister Philippa, with all her experience in Duchess Blanche’s household, would find it a hard task to help me beat these women into some sort of order. They had clearly not served in a noble household before. Then I addressed the Duchess, who was standing shivering in her embroidered under-gown. ‘How do I address you, my lady?’