Chapters (58)
They step along gravelled walkways between herb beds that will live again, in a month or two.
‘I’m sorry not to see it in summer,’ says Marguerite.
‘Summer will come to you in England,’ Cecily tells her. ‘And there are better gardens there, for certain. At Windsor and especially at Greenwich, by the river.’
‘And are we likely to see you in England soon?’
‘As the King wills it. Richard’s term of office here is up before the year’s end.’
‘Does he wish for home?’
Cecily thinks hard before she answers. Marguerite’s questions are never idle. ‘Your coming has been the crowning glory of all he has achieved here.’ She smiles. ‘But I think he’d like to stay a while. It would be a very different thing to govern here in peacetime and would suit his talents better. Richard is not a warlike man.’
‘Yet he wishes to govern still. England in France, as ever. My countrymen suffer for it. My father himself is Count of Anjou, though he is kept from it by an English garrison that answers to your husband.’
‘Who governs it on your husband’s behalf.’ She takes a breath and dares. ‘Your Grace, if I may. When we marry we must balance new loyalties with old.’
When Marguerite stops and looks thoughtful at her, Cecily turns and holds her gaze.
After a breath, two, three, Marguerite nods and walks on. ‘It is good advice.’ Then, moments later, ‘Ah. We are no longer alone.’
From beyond the hedge that borders the herb garden come childish squeals and the sound of women’s voices. They pass through an arch to a terrace and look down on to a lawn. Annette, who has rule of all Cecily’s nursery now, has bundled her charges in warm clothes and brought them into the air. Five-year-old Anne paces quietly, clutching the skirt of a young attendant in whose arms her baby sister is parcelled. Edmund toddles along, holding determinedly to his nurse’s fingers and the encouragement of her words. Edward, brighter than the sun in Cecily’s eyes, runs squealing between them, brandishing two-handed a miniature sword.
Cecily laughs. ‘Shall we go down and join them?’
‘No, let’s just watch.’
Marguerite has kept her distance from the children in the time she has been here. They’ve been shown to her, of course, but she did not pet them or coo as other young women might. It’s understandable perhaps. Like Cecily, Marguerite is the youngest of a brood. Babes that came after, and too many that came before, died early. Such things will weigh on any woman’s mind, especially as she goes to her wedding.
‘Your son is very tall.’ Edward is attacking a newly planted apple tree that shivers at his blows. ‘And, unlike his father, seems very warlike.’
