Philippa Gregory - The White Queen

For a powerful woman she does not seem much disheartened by her husband taking all her wealth and all her lands into his own hands, and imprisoning her in her house, swearing that she shall never write another letter and never stir another plot. She is clearly right not to be too disheartened, for here she is, writing to me and plotting again. From this I think I can assume that Stanley “Sans Changer” is faithfully and loyally following his own best interests as perhaps he has always done-promising fealty to the king on one hand, letting his wife plot with rebels on the other.

Your Grace, dear sister-for so I should call you who is mother to the girl who will be my daughter, and who will be mother to my son, she starts. She is flowery in style and emotional in life. There is a smudge on the letter as if she has overflowed with tears of joy at the thought of the wedding of our children. I look at it with distaste. Even if I did not suspect her of the wickedest of betrayals, I would not warm to this.

I am much concerned to hear from my son that your son Thomas Grey thought to leave his court and had to be persuaded to return to them. Your Grace, dear sister, what can be the matter with your boy? Can you assure him that the interests of your family and mine are the same and that he is a beloved companion to my son Henry? Please, I beg of you, command him as a loving mother to endure the troubles that they have in exile to make certain of the rewards when they triumph. If he has heard anything, or fears anything, he should speak to my son Henry Tudor, who can put his mind at rest. The world is full of gossips and Thomas would not want to appear a turncoat or fainthearted now. I hear nothing, locked away as I am, but I understand that the tyrant Richard is planning to have your older girls at his court. I do beg you not to allow them to go. Henry would not like his betrothed to be at the court of his enemy, exposed to every temptation, and I know you as a mother would feel such revulsion to have your daughter in the hands of the man who murdered your two sons. Think of putting your girls in the power of the man who murdered their brothers! They themselves must be unable to bear the sight of him. Better to stay in sanctuary than force them to kiss his hand and live under the command of his wife. I know you will feel this as I do: it is impossible. For your own sake at least, command your girls to stay with you quietly in the country if Richard will release them, or peacefully in sanctuary if he will not, until that Happy Day when Elizabeth shall be queen of her own court and my beloved daughter as well as yours. Your truest friend in all the world, imprisoned just as you are, Lady Margaret Stanley

I take the letter to my Elizabeth and watch her smile broaden until she laughs outright. “Oh my God, what a crone!” she exclaims.

“Elizabeth! This is your mother-in-law to be!”

“Yes, on that Happy Day. Why does she not want us to go to court? Why do we have to be protected from temptation?”

I take back the letter and reread it. “Richard will know that you are betrothed to Henry Tudor. Tudor announced it so that everybody knows. Richard knows that will put the Rivers affinity on Tudor’s side. The House of York follows you now. You are our only heir. It would be in his interest to take all you girls to court and marry you well within his own family and friends. That way Tudor is isolated once more, and you York heiresses are married to commoners. The last thing Lady Margaret wants is you dancing off with some handsome lord, leaving her Henry looking like a fool, without his bride and without your supporters.”

She shrugs. “As long as we get out of here, I am happy to live with you in the country, Lady Mother.”

“I know,” I say. “But Richard wants you older girls at court, where people can see you are safe in his keeping. You and Cecily and Anne shall go, and Bridget and Catherine will stay with me. He will want people to know that I allowed you be with him, that I consider you safe in his care. And I would rather you were out in the world than cooped up at home.”

“Why?” she asks, turning her gray gaze on me. “Tell me. I don’t like the sound of this. You will be plotting something, Lady Mother, and I don’t want to be in the center of plots anymore.”

“You are the heir to the House of York,” I say simply. “You will always be at the center of plots.”

“But where will you go? Why won’t you come to court with us?”

I shake my head. “I couldn’t bear to see that skinny stick Anne Neville in my place, wearing my gowns cut down to her size with my jewels around her scrawny neck. I couldn’t curtsey to her as Queen of England. I couldn’t do it, Elizabeth, not to save my life. And Richard will never be a king to me. I have seen a true king and loved him. I have been a true queen. These are mere imposters to me-I cannot bear them.

“I am to be put in the charge of John Nesfield, who has guarded us here. I will live at his manor of Heytesbury, and I think it will suit me very well. You can go to court and you girls can get a little court training. It is time you were away from your mother and out in the world.”

She comes to me like a little girl, and kisses me. “I shall like it better than being a prisoner,” she says. “Though it will be so strange to be away from you. I have never been away from you in all my life.” Then she pauses. “But will you not be lonely? Won’t you miss us too much?”

I shake my head and draw her close to whisper, “I won’t be lonely, for I hope that Richard will come home. I hope to see my boy again.”

“And Edward?” she asks.

I meet her hopeful gaze without evasion. “Elizabeth, I think he must be dead, for I cannot see who would have taken him and not told us. I think Buckingham and Henry Tudor must have had both of the boys killed, not knowing that we had Richard safely hidden, thinking to open their way to the throne and put the blame on King Richard. If Edward is alive, then pray God he will find his way to me. And there will always be a candle in the window to light his way home, and my door will never be locked, in case one day it is his hand on the latch.”

Her eyes are filled with tears. “But you don’t expect him anymore?”

“I don’t expect him,” I say.

My new home of Heytesbury is in a pretty part of the country, Wiltshire, in the open rolling countryside of Salisbury Plain. John Nesfield is an easy guardian. He sees the benefits of being at the side of the king; he doesn’t really want to play nursemaid over me. Once he was assured of my safety and judged that I would not attempt to run away, he took himself off to the king at Sheriff Hutton, where Richard has established his great court in the north. He is making a palace fit to match Greenwich among the people of the north who respect him and love his wife, the last Neville.

Nesfield orders that I am to run his house as I please and very quickly I have the furniture and things around me that I request from the royal palaces. I have a proper nursery and a schoolroom for the girls. I am growing my favorite fruits in the gardens, and I have bought some good horses for the stables.

After so many months in sanctuary I wake every morning with a sense of utter delight that I can open the door and walk out into the air. It is a warm spring and to hear the birds singing, to order a horse from the stables and ride out is a joy so intense that I feel reborn. I set duck’s eggs under the hens and watch the ducklings hatch and waddle about the yard. I laugh when I see them take to the duck pond with the hens scolding on the bank, fearful of water. I watch the young foals in the paddock and talk with the master of horse as to which might make a good riding horse and which should be broke to the cart. I go out in the fields with the shepherd and see the new lambs. I talk with the cowman about the little calves and when they should be weaned from their mothers. I become again what I was once before, an English country lady with her mind on the land.