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The King’s Intelligencer - Chapter 5
Tower Green was inviting and enticing with the fresh tang of a July night meadow after the dank enclosure of More’s cell. Behind her, the last of the courtiers fanned out across the grass, Rochester directing the setting of carpets and food, the staging of musicians, and the distribution of wine. Guards stood at the corners, watching but obviously warned by Robinson not to interfere.
Franny had done the best she could, gaining admission to the Tower. There was no chance to see the bones, after all. The only consolation for Nan was neither could anyone else, under Robinson’s watch. Now all she wanted was to go back to her apartments at St. James’s Palace and hand the legacy of the dead princes to someone else. They were not her problem, whatever Nan thought.
She wandered back to Coldharbour Gate and entered the ruins of the royal lodgings. Summer’s cloudless moon had alchemised from silver to gold, risen above the ramparts, sharpening the outline of a derelict great hall, crumbling towers, and a spectre of forgotten gardens. A distant candle flickered in a window in the Lanthorn Tower, and someone had lit the beacon at the top, a signal to ships navigating the dark river waters they had reached the safe harbour of the Tower.
Walking around the broken foundations and soaring walls, ruined ghosts of the grand residence where once kings lived and played, Franny sat on a stone overlooking the hedged bones of the privy garden and let the quiet of the ancient palace seep into her.
“Withdrew them to the inner walls of the Tower proper, ‘til at length they ceased to appear altogether.” The man’s voice breathed so close to her that she jumped up, her heart beating in her throat. It was, however, no ghost, but the very real figure of Nicholas Jameson.
“What do you mean?” Franny demanded. “And why do you come upon me stealthily?”
He stepped upon the wall and dropped lightly over to her side. “You were in deep thought. And I was simply describing the last place the princes were seen before disappearing. Don’t tell me you’re not interested.”
“I’m not.” Franny was truthful. After this evening, she really wanted to rebury the princes and be done.
“And yet you’re here, tonight, looking for them.”
“There’s nothing to look for, now they are found.”
“And yet for so long they were lost. Don’t you want to know how they vanished?” Nicholas Jameson looked up at the White Tower, his profile clear against the starlit sky. “Who was with them those last days?”
He took her hand. She stood up. Was it the darkness which made her daring? “It’s a well-known fact. King Richard murdered them.”
“As said More. I just quoted the letters of Mancini, an Italian spy in London that summer.” Nicholas stepped over a fallen beam, helped her across. “He wrote he did not know what happened to them. They simply disappeared.”
“I suppose there are many places for them to have been hidden.”
“Or killed. And buried.” Nicholas nodded towards the keep. “You were there when their bones were unearthed. You must have felt something.”
“Yes.” Franny was hesitant to share her conflicting feelings, as piebald as a magpie. Relief the princes could finally be buried in peace. Sorrow their bones had been found.
He caught her thought. “I had hoped they were not murdered. But Thomas More’s account is fully detailed.” Taking her hand, he walked further towards the keep. “Metely deep, by a staircase. He gives names, method, timing. And now, it seems, the proof, in the discovery.”
“Proof?” She tried to ignore the heat of his palm in hers.
“That an English king slaughtered his own nephews to gain the throne.”
“You are well-read in their history.” This man was mercurial in his moods. Perplexing at Westminster Abbey. Teasing as he left the balcony at Whitehall. Today, thoughtful, educated, as he talked of the bones. Unusual for a courtier to speak without jest or flattery. But then this man was not a courtier. Had contempt for them, even. She remembered Rochester’s words. “Especially for a man from the Paris court.”
“The missing princes is a story which never dies,” he replied. “Whether it is retold in England or France. And always the mystery returns to the Tower.” Still, he held her hand.
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Historical Stories of Exile by 13 popular authors Cryssa Bazos, Anna Belfrage, Elizabeth Chadwick, Cathie Dunn, J.G. Harlond, Helen Hollick, Loretta Livingstone, Amy Maroney Alison Morton, Charlene Newcomb, Elizabeth St.John, Marian L Thorpe, Annie Whitehead. With an introduction by Deborah Swift |
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Thank you for hosting Elizabeth St.John today, and for your fantastic review of The King's Intelligencer. I'm thrilled you enjoyed it so much. I can't wait to get stuck in...
ReplyDeleteTake care,
Cathie xx
The Coffee Pot Book Club
my pleasure
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