The Ringed Castle - Dorothy Dunnett [65]
From Roger Ascham, Philippa already knew a good deal about this shrewd, scholarly, quick-witted girl whom he had taught five years before in that merry household at Chelsea, and later at Cheshunt and Hatfield. The girl who at fifteen was already fluent in Italian, French, Latin and Greek; who was arrogantly proud of her likeness to her father, King Henry; and who had lost her mother to the block when she was three, and sworn Princess of Wales.
But lively though her curiosity might be, Philippa was too considerate to join the ladies who melted from the antechamber when the rattle of horse-hooves was heard, and hers was not one of the peering faces behind the mullioned windows. Pressed by her household officers, the Queen had at last decided upon the room for a nursery, and, once involved, had extended herself to see to each detail. Mistress Clarenceux had brought to her the gifts already arriving of clothes and of toys: she selected those to be kept, and gave orders for their storage, and made decisions about the infant clothes which her ladies, Jane and Philippa among them, had long since begun embroidering.
When her sister Elizabeth arrived, the Queen was in the nursery, with its dais holding the draped wooden cradle and its broken-backed legend, admirable only in piety: The child whom thou to Mary, O Lord of Might has send, To England’s joy, in health preserve, keep and defend. The Queen stayed there all afternoon, with Jane and Philippa attending her, and Mistress Clarenceux massaged her fingers, when she complained of cold hands. Unwelcomed, Madam Elizabeth was received into the palace, and placed in the Duke of Alba’s former apartments, close to those of King Philip, while in the Queen’s rooms, the long evening passed.
It was an evening Philippa never quite forgot. The Queen left the nursery: her ladies returned. The Bishop of Winchester and Sir William Petre called and were given a long weighty audience. The King came for half an hour before supper, and was entertained by the Queen, while Philippa played on the virginals and listened, unashamed, to the conversation in Spanish.
‘Sir Robert Rochester tells me Milady Elizabeth is safely installed,’ the Queen’s husband said. ‘When will it be your pleasure to receive her?’
There was a little silence, which Philippa discreetly bridged with an unexpected coda to Jannequin. The Queen said, in her deep, uneven voice, ‘My lord, I have no plans to receive her. She is here so that if I die in childbirth, she and her adherents will prove no threat to your Majesty’s life.’
He was in a cajoling mood, Philippa saw. Instead of the sober, elegant dress he preferred, he had put on one of the puffed and slashed and gem-studded doublets which his wife and aunt publicly favoured. Stretching now from his chair, he took her square, powerful hand in his white one. ‘God is good: you will not die. Instead you will give me and England a strong and beautiful prince, and it is fitting that all should rejoice. When the babe is born, show her your favour. It will please your people to show yourself magnanimous.’
‘When the babe is born, I shall show her what kindness she has deserved in the meantime,’ said the grim, broken voice. ‘Meanwhile, she is to see no one and communicate with no one outside these walls.’
After supper he left. The Queen prayed late that night, and it was Jane, waiting to attend her undressing, who first heard the cry from the prie-dieu. When they reached her, she had fallen forward, clutching her stomach, and it was with some trouble, considering her smallness, that they carried her somehow to her bed. Before they got her there, Mistress Clarenceux had already sent pages flying to rouse the King and the Councillors,