Vanora Bennett - The People’s Queen

Walworth, who no less than Chaucer is a master of smoothing out difficulties in relations, looks as handsomely appreciative as he’s supposed to, and clucks warm, admiring praise. It is very fine work.

‘Mistress Chaucer’, Chaucer says, with more warmth than he feels, ‘is greatly loved by the royal family. My lady of Lancaster won’t think of letting her go…’ He raises rueful hands to the sky, and shakes his head, making a comedy of Philippa’s distance from this new life in London. ‘To my great sorrow, of course. I will miss her, and our children; who more?’

Both the men have found a way out of the moment of awkwardness by now. They’re leaning towards each other, smiling slightly too much (Chaucer can already feel his jaw muscles begin to ache), waving their arms a little; the picture of affability. Philippa, meanwhile, is drawing back, politely making space for them to talk together. The vague, uninterested look is still on her face.

‘Of course,’ Walworth replies unctuously, accepting, with apparent delight, the dish of oranges cut into decorative shapes that Chaucer is passing. ‘Of course. The price of a good wife is far above rubies. And one who’s also as beautiful as your lady is to be treasured most of all.’ He and Chaucer laugh at this charming compliment till their eyes fill with tears, then pat each other’s hands. Walworth eats a slice of orange. ‘Mm,’ he mumbles, with mouth full, as Philippa, the hardly noticed object of the compliment, takes the opportunity to slide off her stool and slip away from the table to give the servants some whispered order. ‘Delicious, my dear Chaucer. You and your lady wife have done us proud today.’

Yet Chaucer can’t help noticing that it’s Mistress Perrers whom Walworth seeks out with his eyes as he pays that last compliment.

After the dinner, when the guests have begun to walk around a little, moving to fireplace or window, stretching their legs, Chaucer finds himself at the window with Mistress Perrers, looking out at the golden streaks in the afternoon sky over the quiet fields east of London. He’s so full of tender gratitude to her by now that he’s only too happy to murmur agreement when she says, ‘Isn’t it lovely?

‘It always gets me right here,’ she goes on reflectively, tapping her heart, ‘this view. But then I was born in Essex. So I suppose it’s only natural.’

Bewildered, and a little disappointed, Chaucer looks again at the shadowy flatlands, the shabby villages. He hadn’t realised she was talking about Essex. He thought she meant the sky. There’s nothing remarkable that he can see about those fields and forests, the road stretching off into the dusk, the sheep. He’s enough of a Londoner that, to him, fields and forest mean boredom, an absence, a place of spectral, hag-faced men and women with skin-covered bones: dead-eyed, earthsmelling, earth-eating, with heads of clay and dung.

‘You’re from Essex?’ he replies, feeling stupid to sound surprised. ‘But I thought…’ He pauses. He really can’t remember who the merchant husband could have been, but London is so clearly where Alice feels at home. ‘Weren’t you married in London, long ago?’ he finishes lamely.

She laughs a little, looking down at her hands. ‘Oh, husbands,’ she says coyly. Then she flashes a quick, mischievous look up at him from under her lashes. When her eyes meet his, he’s surprised, after her coyness, by the transparency in them – as if she’s looking into his soul, or inviting him to look into hers. ‘But, yes, I did have a couple of London husbands,’ she adds quietly, still with a little smile on her lips. ‘And yes…long ago. I was twelve when I took the first one.’

A couple of husbands, Chaucer thinks, dazed. He’s only got the one wife, and that’s been enough to make his feelings about the married state frighteningly complex. But she sounds so casual.

‘They say you should only have one master in life, don’t they? Since Christ only went to one wedding in Galilee?’ she teases. She knows what’s on his mind, he thinks, and feels his cheeks get hot. She adds, even more lightly, ‘But, you know, Chaucer, all the Bible actually says is that God told us all to go forth and multiply. It has nothing at all to say about bigamy, or octogamy, either, not that I’ve heard. Except that, if you think about it, wise old King Solomon gave himself a generous margin when it came to wives, didn’t he? More than any of us would take on?’ She grins at him. Her hands are on her hips. There’s a glint of challenge in her eyes.

Trying to get the right bantering tone, he replies, with a forced chortle, ‘So you’ve had eight husbands, have you?’

As soon as his words are out, he realises he probably hasn’t got it right. She shrugs and looks faintly weary for a moment. ‘To hear them talk, you’d think I’d had dozens,’ she says. ‘I’ve certainly heard people say five.’

For a moment, their eyes meet. There is candidness in hers, he sees with relief. She’s sharing her exasperation. As if forgiving him his clumsy remark, she smiles.

‘Even one marriage is more than I bargained for,’ Chaucer observes, settling for honesty himself, looking out again. His cheeks are warm. ‘Sometimes.’

‘Experience,’ she says lightly. ‘That’s what you need; give you the upper hand.’ And she flashes her eyes at him again, and makes to move away into the throng.

‘Well, my experience hasn’t taught me much,’ he mutters, a little rebelliously, as she picks up her skirts, ‘except quite a lot about the woe there is in marriage.’

She turns, and for a moment seeks him out again with eyes in which he thinks he sees surprise, and the beginning of amusement. But all she says is a gentle, ‘Oh, Chaucer,’ and away she goes.

A short while later, Chaucer flits back to Walworth, who’s standing with his two friends and fellow-magnates Brembre and Philpot, picking at the candied fruits the servants are setting out along the now-empty table, and laughing regretfully. The future Mayor of London leans towards Chaucer to include him in the wry conversation too. ‘We’re wondering how big the loan I’m about to be asked to make the King will be, Master Chaucer,’ Walworth confides without any visible bitterness. ‘The price of office, I know…every new Mayor gets asked…but with the way the war’s been going…’ Then, with a half-laugh: ‘We’re guessing, maybe…£15,000?’ He raises an enquiring eyebrow Chaucer’s way.

Chaucer, who has no idea, who’s never even imagined the possibility of being part of a conversation like this, can only shake his head and try and keep the saucer-eyed look of an innocent off his face. There is loud, though kindly, laughter from the three merchants. ‘Ah,’ says Brembre wisely, ‘you’ll learn.’

Maybe it’s an instinct of gratitude that makes Chaucer glance around to find Alice Perrers. Maybe he half wants to bow his thanks to her again for helping him make friends with these men so easily. Whatever the reason, he does look around for her. He finds her standing not far away, talking quietly to Lord Latimer, and to Lyons, the florid Flemish merchant. And Chaucer forgets bowing and displaying gratitude. He’s too aware of the way they stop what they’re saying to listen in to what Brembre and his friends are talking about. There’s something a little too furtive in the way they all look as they listen. Then they start their own quieter conversation again, just the three of them. Alice says to Lyons, quietly, hardly moving her lips, as if she doesn’t want to be noticed speaking, ‘He’d be ready for twice fifteen thousand, at a better rate, too, if you only gave him your promise. I’m telling you.’ Her eyes are fixed on Lyons’. Behind her, Latimer’s also nodding towards the Fleming. He obviously agrees. He obviously also wants to persuade Lyons to do whatever it is that Alice wants him to do. Lyons looks quickly from Alice Perrers to the chamberlain and back again. He’s thinking. Then he also nods. There’s something secret and satisfied on his face when he’s done.