“Mother.” She dances on the spot with fear. “Should we not wait, should we not consult the Privy Council? Should we not wait here for Baby? What if Duke Richard is just bringing Baby safely to us? What if he is doing as he should, as lord protector? Protecting Baby?”
“He is King Edward to you, not Baby anymore,” I say fiercely. “And even to me. And let me tell you, child, that only fools wait when their enemies are coming, to see if they may prove to be friends. We will be as safe as I can make us. In sanctuary. And we will take your brother Prince Richard and keep him safe too. And when the lord protector comes to London with his private army, he can persuade me that it is safe to come out.”
I speak bravely to my brave girl, now a young woman with her own life blighted by this sudden fall from being a princess of England to a girl in hiding; but in truth we are at a very low ebb when we barricade the door of St. Margaret’s crypt at Westminster and we are alone-my brother Lionel, Bishop of Salisbury, my grown son Thomas Grey, my little son Richard, and my girls: Elizabeth, Cecily, Anne, Catherine, and Bridget. When we were last here I was big with my first boy, with every reason to hope that he would lay claim to the throne of England one day. My mother was alive, and was my companion and my greatest friend. And nobody could be afraid for long when my mother was scheming for them, and making her spells and laughing at her own ambition. My husband was alive in exile, planning his return. I never doubted that he would come. I never doubted that he would be victorious. I always knew that he never lost a battle. I knew he would come, I knew he would win, I knew he would rescue us. I knew they were bad days but I hoped for better.
Now we are here again, but this time it is hard to hope. In this season of early summer, which has always before been my favorite, filled with picnics and jousts and parties. The shade of the crypt is oppressive. It is like being buried alive. In truth, there is not much cause for hope. My boy is in enemy hands, my mother is long gone, and my husband is dead. No handsome tall man is going to hammer on the door and block the light as he comes in, calling my name. My son who was a baby then is a young boy of twelve now, and in the hands of our enemy. My girl Elizabeth, who played then so sweetly with her sisters when we were last confined, is now seventeen. She turns her pale face to me and asks what we are going to do. Last time we waited secure in the knowledge that, if we could just survive, we would be rescued. This time there are no certainties.
For nearly a week I listen at the tiny window set into the front door. From dawn till dusk I am peering through the grille, straining my ears to hear what people are doing, for the sound of the streets. When I turn from the door, I go to the river and look out on the boats passing by, watching for the royal barge, listening for Melusina.
Every day I send out messengers for news of my brother and my son, and to speak to the lords who should be rising to defend us, whose liveries should be arming for us. And on the fifth day I hear it: a rising swell of noise, the cheering of the apprentice lads, and another sound beneath it, a deeper sound, a booing. I can hear the rattle of harness and the sound of many horses’ hooves. It is the army of Richard, Duke of Gloucester, my husband’s brother, the man he trusted with our safety, entering my husband’s capital city to a mixed reception. When I look out of the window at the river, there is a chain of his boats around Westminster Palace: a floating barricade, holding us captive. Nobody can come in or out.
I hear the clatter of a cavalry charge and some shouting. I start to wonder: If I had armed the city against him, declared war in the first moment, could I have stood against him now? But then I think: And what about my boy Edward in his uncle’s train? What about my brother Anthony and my son Richard Grey, held hostage for my good behavior? And yet again: perhaps I have nothing to fear. I simply don’t know. My boy is either a young king, processing in high honor to his coronation, or a kidnapped child. I don’t even know which for sure.
I go to bed with that question haunting me like the beating of a drum. I lie down in my clothes and I do not sleep at all. I know that somewhere, not far from me tonight, my son is lying sleepless too. I am restless, like a woman tormented, to be with him, to see him, to tell him that he is safe with me again. I cannot believe, daughter of Melusina as I am, that I cannot squeeze through the bars of the windows and simply swim to him. He is my boy: perhaps he is afraid, maybe he is in danger. How can I not be with him?
But I have to lie still and wait for the sky to turn from deepest black to gray in the small panes of the window before I allow myself to rise up and walk down the crypt to the door and open the spy hole to look out and see the quiet streets. Then, I realize that no one has armed to protect my boy Edward, no one is going to rescue him, no one is going to liberate me. They may have booed as the lord protector marched in at the head of his army with my son in his train, they may have raised a little riot and fought a little running scrap; but they are not arming this morning and storming his castle. Last night, I was the only one in all of London wakeful, worrying about the little king for all the long hours.
The city is waiting to see what the lord protector will do. Everything hinges on this. Is Richard, Duke of Gloucester, the beloved loyal brother of the late king, going to fulfill his brother’s dying command and put his son on the throne? Is he, loyal as ever, going to play his part as lord protector and guard his nephew till the day of his coronation? Or is Richard, Duke of Gloucester, false as any Yorkist, going to take the power his brother gave him, disinherit his nephew, and put the crown on his own head, and name his own son Prince of Wales? Nobody knows what Duke Richard might do, and many-as always-want only to be on the winning side. Everyone will have to wait and see. Only I would strike him down now, if I could. Just to be on the side of safety.
I go to the low windows and I stare down at the river which flows by so close that I could almost lean out and touch it. There is a boat with armed men at the water gate to the abbey. They are guarding me and keeping my allies from me. Any friends who try to come to me will be turned away.
“He will take the crown,” I say quietly to the river, to Melusina, to my mother. They listen to me in the flow of the waters. “If I had to put my fortune on it I would do so. He will take the crown. All the York men are sick with ambition and Richard, Duke of Gloucester, is no different. Edward risked his life, year after year, fighting for his throne. George put his head in a vat of wine rather than promise never to claim it. Now Richard rides into London at the head of thousands of armed men. He is not doing that for the benefit of his nephew. He will claim the crown for himself. He is a prince of York. He cannot help but do it. He will find a hundred reasons to do so, and years from now people will still be arguing over what he does today. But my bet is he will take the crown because he cannot stop himself, any more than George could stop being a fool or Edward stop being a hero. Richard will take the crown and he will put me and mine aside.
I pause for a moment of honesty. “And it is my nature to fight for my own,” I say. “I shall be ready for him. I shall be ready for the worst that he might do. I shall prepare myself to lose my son Richard Grey and my dearest brother Anthony, as I have already lost my father and my brother John. These are hard times, sometimes too hard for me. But this morning, I am ready. I will fight for my son and for his inheritance.”