The Sun in Splendour - Plaidy Jean - Страница 66

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It was Richard's turn to be silent. Edward caught his arm and looked at him earnestly.

'Brother, promise me this. You will be there. You will look after my sons. You will see them safe on the throne.'

'You are going to live for a long time. Young Edward is twelve. Why, in only six years he will be of an age to govern.'

'He will need help and what I want to be assured of is that you will be there to give it.'

'I will be there,' said Richard. 'But put these thoughts from your head. It is unlucky to speak of death. I am certain, brother, that you will not meet it for many years to come.'

'You are a comfort to me, Richard. Were you not always?'

'I have served you faithfully all the days of my life. Remember that.'

'I do remember it and it sustains me.'

'Now, have done with this talk of death. I want to speak to you about Scotland.'

After Christmas the Court went to Windsor but was back in Westminster by the end of February.

Edward had done nothing to change the household of the Prince of Wales. He knew that it would be difficult to explain to Elizabeth. It was still presided over by Anthony Woodville who was constantly with his young nephew. Anthony, disappointed of his marriage to the sister of the Scottish King, had now taken an heiress whom Elizabeth had found for him. This was Mary Fitz-Lewis whose mother was daughter of Edmund Beaufort, second Duke of Somerset. So there was not only money but good family there. However, in spite of his marriage he continued to live at Ludlow with the Prince. Elizabeth would not hear of those arrangements being changed. If Edward had had a shock, so had she and she was more determined than ever that if there were a new king he would be hedged in by Woodvilles.

There would have to be change, Edward supposed. He would see to it in due course.

At the Parliament which was called in January money and supplies were voted for an army which should go into Scotland and the King bestowed on Richard the Wardenship of the West Marches so that he was now indeed the Lord of the North.

February and March were very cold months and towards the end of March Edward went on a fishing trip with some of his friends. The wind along the river bank was piercing and the fishermen in due course decided to abandon the day's sport and return to a warm fire.

The next day the King was ill. He had pains in his side which made it impossible for him to lie comfortably.

The physicians came to him and declared themselves alarmed by his condition. He had lived so indulgently that he had used up his energies they said and lacked the strength to withstand this violent cold he had caught. It attacked his lungs.

April had come with warmer weather but the King remained in his bed for his condition did not improve. He knew he was dying and that the seizure just before Christmas had been a warning.

Time was slipping away and there was so much he should have done. He was leaving a son, a child little more, vulnerable in a situation which he, in his carelessness, had allowed to arise.

There would be warring factions. There were so many who hated the Woodvilles. While he was there he had kept the peace but what would happen when he had gone?

What must he do? What could he do?

Richard was far away in the North. He wanted Richard here but he did not send for him. He was following his old practice of turning away from what was unpleasant. He was not dying, he told himself. He was going to survive this as he had that other attack.

He would not admit that he was facing death.

He was only just forty years of age. That was not old and he had always been in such good health. Until the seizure no one had thought of him and death in the same moment. He was going to get well.

But in his heart he knew that Death was close and that he must hurry to set things right. Conflict, which seemed inevitable, must be avoided. He sent for those nobles whom he thought might quarrel together. Chief among them was Dorset, his stepson, and Hastings, his greatest friend.

Dorset was on one side of his bed, Hastings on the other and

with them were those men who supported them. They looked coldly at each other across the bed and with a gnawing anxiety Edward was aware of their hostility towards each other.

'My friends,' said the King, T beg of you forget your differences and work together for the good of my son. He and his brother are but children. They need your help. I beg you give it to them. For the love you have borne me and for the love I have borne you, and for the love that the Lord God bears to us all, I beg you love each other.'

He could not sit up and collapsed on his pillows and the sight of this great strong man thus, moved everyone present to tears.

He begged Hastings and Dorset to clasp hands and to promise as they did so that they would remember their King's dying wishes.

Hastings was overcome with emotion. There were so many memories he had shared with the King, and to see Edward lying there while life slowly ebbed from him filled him with a sad emotion—not only for the past and the good times they had shared, but for the future. He well understood Edward's fears for his son.

The boy would have to be protected . . . against the Woodvilles.

'Remember,' went on the King breathing painfully and finding the utmost difficulty in speaking, 'remember they are so young, these little boys. Great variance there has been between you and often for small causes.'

He closed his eyes. He was young himself to die. Not yet forty-one years of age and having reigned for twenty-two of them.

But this was the end. There was nothing more he could do.

So on the 9th of April of the year 1483 great Edward died. The news spread through the city of London and on through the country to the blank bewilderment and dismay of the people. They had looked up to him—the great golden King, the rose-en-soleil, the sun in splendour. And now that sun had set.

What next? they asked themselves.

For twelve hours he lay naked from the waist that the members of the Council might see that he was truly dead. Then he was

taken to St Stephen's Chapel where mass was celebrated every morning for a week, and after that to Windsor and there buried in St George's Chapel in the tomb which he had had prepared for himself.

The country was stunned. He had been with them so long. They looked to him. They relied on him. He had been among them for so long—their brilliant, splendid, magnificent King.

And what would hapf)en now?

They waited in consternation to discover.

t

SUNSET

THE KING AND PROTECTOR

When he awoke that morning there was nothing to suggest to the thirteen-year-old Edward that this was going to be any different from another day. Time glided along smoothly at Ludlow. He had come to regard the great grey castle as home and when he rode out in the company of grooms and very often with his uncle. Lord Rivers, he was always delighted to come back to the square towers and the battlemented walls guarded by the deep wide fosse. He loved the Norman keep and large square tower with ivy clinging to it. In the great hall Moralities were performed at Christmas and when his mother came special balls were arranged. He loved to ride out into the town which itself stood on a plateau overlooking hills and dales of considerable beauty. It would be hard, his uncle Rivers had said, to find a more beautiful spot in the whole of England.

The most important person in his life was Lord Rivers, Uncle Anthony, who was so eager to be with him and explain everything to him and was such an agreeable companion. They hunted together, played chess together, and he had been very much afraid when his uncle had recently married—for he had been a widower—that he would lose him.

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