Philippa Gregory - The White Queen

“Listen to me.” I draw close to the bars and speak earnestly to him. “You go back to Kent and tell your fellows that they are to rise for the princes, for my boys are still alive. The duke is mistaken and the king has not killed them. I know this; I am their mother. Tell them also that, even if Edward was dead, his brother Richard is not with him but safely got away. He is safe in hiding and he will come back and take the throne that is his. You go back to Kent and, when the word comes for you to muster and march out, go with a proud heart for you must destroy this false King Richard and free my boys and free me.”

“And the duke?” he asks. “And Henry Tudor?”

I make a face, and wave the thought of the two of them away. “Loyal allies to our cause, I am sure,” I say with a certainty I no longer feel. “You be true to me, Sir John, and I will remember you and every single one who fights for me and my sons, when I am come to my own again.”

He bows and ducks back down the stairs and steps cautiously into the rocking rowboat and then he is lost in the dark mist of the river. I wait for him to disappear and for the quiet splash of the oars to fade away and then I look down into the dark waters. “The duke,” I whisper into the waters. “The Duke of Buckingham is telling everyone that my sons are dead. Why would he do that? When he is sworn to rescue them? When he is sending gold and arms to the rebellion? Why would he tell them, in the very moment that he calls them out, that the princes are dead?”

I eat supper with my girls and with the few servants who have stayed with us in sanctuary, but I cannot hear seven-year-old Anne’s careful reading of the Bible, nor join Elizabeth in questioning them as to what they have just heard. I am as inattentive as Catherine, who is only four. I can think of nothing but why there should be a rumor that my boys are dead.

I send the girls to bed early; I cannot bear to hear them playing at cards or singing a round. All night I walk up and down in my room, stepping along the one floorboard that does not creak to the window over the river, and back again the other way. Why would Richard kill my boys now, when he has accomplished all that he wanted without their deaths? He has persuaded the council to name them as bastards, he has passed an act of Parliament that denies my marriage. He has named himself as the next legitimate heir and the archbishop himself has put the crown on his dark head. His sickly wife Anne is crowned as Queen of England and their son is invested as Prince of Wales. All this was achieved with me mewed up in sanctuary, and my son in prison. Richard is triumphant: Why would he want us dead? Why would he need us dead now? And how should he hope to escape blame for the crime, when everyone knows the boys are in his keeping? Everyone knows he took my son Richard against my will; it could not have been more public, and the archbishop himself swore that no harm would come to him.

And it is not like Richard to ride away from work that needs doing. When he and his brothers decided that poor King Henry should die, the three of them met outside his door and went in together, their faces grim but their minds made up. These are York princes: they have no objection to wicked deeds; but they do not leave them to others, they do them firsthand. The risk of asking another to kill two innocent princes of the blood, bribing the guards, hiding the bodies, would be unbearable for Richard. I have seen how he kills: directly, without warning, but openly, without shame. The man who beheaded Sir William Hastings on a piece of builders’ timber would not wink at holding a pillow over the face of a young boy. If the thing was to be done, I would have sworn he would do it himself. At the very least he would give the order and watch that it was done.

All this is to convince me that Sir John from Reigate is mistaken and my boy Edward is still alive. But again and again as I turn at the window and glance down at the river in darkness and mist, I wonder if I am mistaken, mistaken in everything, even in my trust in Melusina. Perhaps Richard managed to find someone who would kill the boys. Perhaps Edward is dead, and perhaps I have lost the Sight, and I just don’t know. Perhaps I know nothing anymore.

By the early hours of the morning I cannot bear to be alone for another minute, and I send a messenger to fetch Dr. Lewis to me. I tell them to wake him and get him out of bed, for I am mortally ill. By the time he is admitted by the guards, my lie is becoming true, and I am running a fever from sheer agony of mind.

“Your Grace?” he asks cautiously.

I am haggard in the candlelight, my hair in a clumsy plait, my robe knotted around me. “You have to get your servants, trusted men, into the Tower to guard my son Edward, since we cannot get him out,” I say bluntly. “Lady Margaret must use her influence, she must use her husband’s name, to ensure my sons are well guarded. They are in danger. They are in terrible danger.”

“You have news?”

“There is a rumor spreading that my boys are dead,” I say.

He shows no surprise. “God forbid it, Your Grace, but I fear that it is more than a rumor. It is as the Duke of Buckingham warned us. He said that this false king would kill his nephews to get the throne.”

I recoil, very slightly, as if I had put out my hand and seen a snake sunning itself where I was about to touch.

“Yes,” I say, suddenly wary. “That is what I have heard, and it was the Duke of Buckingham’s man who said it.”

He crosses himself. “God spare us.”

“But I hope that the deed is not yet done, and I hope to prevent it.”

He nods. “Alas, I am afraid that we may be too late, and that they are already lost to us. Your Grace, I grieve with all my heart for you.”

“I thank you for your sympathy,” I say steadily. My temples are throbbing, I cannot think. It is as if I am looking at the snake and it looks back at me.

“Please God, this uprising destroys the uncle who could do such a thing. God will be on our side against such a Herod.”

“If it was Richard.”

He looks at me suddenly, as if this shocks him, though he seems well able to tolerate the idea of the murder of children. “Who else could do such a thing? Who else would benefit? Who killed Sir William Hastings, and your brother and your other son? Who is the murderer of your family and your worst enemy, Your Grace? You can suspect no one else!”

I can feel myself tremble and the tears start to come; they are burning my eyes. “I don’t know,” I say unsteadily. “I just feel certain that my boy is not dead. I would know if he was killed. A mother would know that. Ask Lady Margaret: she would know if her Henry was dead. A mother knows. And anyway, my Richard at least is safe.”

He takes the bait and I see his response-I see the flash of a spy looking from his melting eyes. “Oh, is he?” he asks invitingly.

I have said enough. “They are both safe, please God,” I correct myself. “But tell me-why are you so certain that they are dead?”

He puts his hand gently on mine. “I did not want to grieve you. But they have not been seen since the false king left London, and the duke and Lady Margaret both believe that he had them killed before he left. There was nothing any of us could do to save them. When we besieged the Tower, they were already dead.”

I pull my hand away from his comforting grasp and put it to my aching forehead. I wish I could think clearly. I remember Lionel telling me that he heard the servants shouting to take the boys deeper into the Tower. I remember him telling me that he was just the distance of the door from Edward. But why would Dr. Lewis lie to me?

“Would it not have been better for our cause if the duke had kept silent?” I ask. “My friends and family and allies are recruiting men to rescue the princes, but the duke is telling them that they are already dead. Why should my men turn out, if their prince is dead?”