The Star of Lancaster - Plaidy Jean (бесплатные онлайн книги читаем полные TXT) 📗

He wanted to go home. He wanted to share in the triumph. This was the end of this dull and pointless life. A wild exultation took hold of him. Everyone was showing respect, even Humphrey. Heir to the throne. The words kept ringing in his ears.

'What news of my father the King?' he asked.

'Orders, my lord, that you and Duke Humphrey are to leave at once for England,' was the answer.

'Come Humphrey,' cried Harry. 'Let us lose no time.'

Nor did they. They would leave at once. There would be a ship waiting for them. His father had seen to that. He wanted his heir with him with all speed. He would be made the Prince of Wales, that was certain. A glorious life lay before him.

Humphrey was more cautious and very thoughtful.

Poor old Humphrey, it would make little difference to him. He was already the Duke of Gloucester and he could not go much higher than that. Still, he would have the distinction of having shared exile with the Prince of Wales.

When they were alone Humphrey said: 'Harry, don't hope for too much.'

'What do you mean? Hope for too much! I'm heir to the throne, am I not?'

'It must be very insecure as yet.'

'Insecure! Depend upon it, my father had made it very secure.'

'For one thing young Edmund Mortimer is the true heir.'

'That's not a serious claim.'

'You have to see things as they are, Harry. Edmund is descended from Lionel who was older than your grandfather.'

*I know. I know. But he's only a child.'

'Age makes no difference.'

'Oh yes it does. My father has the people behind him. He is the one they want. They want no more child kings.'

'Not even if they are the rightful heirs?'

'Enough, Humphrey. Remember ...'

*To whom I speak. The heir to the tottering throne. Don't hope for too much, Harry.'

*Will you stop it or ... or ...'

'You'll send me to the Tower and have me lay my head on the block? You'll be a vindictive king, Harry, but you won't last long if you don't look the truth right in the face and accept it for what it is.*

Harry seized him and the two of them wrestled together on the floor of the chamber as they loved to do. Harry often scored in these bouts although he was several years younger than Humphrey.

The tussle ended up in laughter as it always did and Harry cried: 'What are we doing, wasting our time? Come, we must return to the scene of action with all speed. I am no longer a hostage, Humphrey. Think of that.'

'I can think of nothing but how glad I am to leave this damp unfriendly land.'

'Come, then, let us make ready. To England.'

Within a few days they left Ireland. The crossing was rough and during it Humphrey became ill. Harry chaffed him and told him he was a poor sailor and commented that it w^as a mercy they were not going into battle. Humphrey smiled wanly and said he could never remember feeling so strange.

'You'll be well again as soon as you set foot on dry land,' Harry promised him.

But this was not so and the crossing w^as so rough that it seemed at one time that they would never make it. It was a great relief when they were able to land in Anglesey. Oddly enough Humphrey w^as no better and it soon became clear that his malady had nothing to do with the sea.

He was in a fever and wandering in his mind. They had come to an inn which was nearest to the spot where they had landed and Harry had thought that after a brief rest there Humphrey would be himself again.

Hum^phrey was rambling about his father. He thought he was himself in an inn in Calais instead of Anglesey and that what had been done to his father would be done to him.

'Nonsense,' cried Harry. Tm here with you, Humphrey. We're in Wales ... soon w^e shall be with my father. We are not Richard's prisoners any more.'

Humphrey was soothed but he did not improve. In fact he was growing worse and a cold fear suddenly touched Harry.

Was this some sort of a plague which had attacked his companion?

He should ride on. His father was impatiently awaiting him, but he was not going to leave Humphrey.

That was to prove a sad homecoming for Harry in spite of the glory which awaited him. Within a few days of their landing Humphrey had died of the mysterious illness which had attacked him so suddenly.

When the Duchess of Gloucester heard of the death of her only son she was overcome with melancholy.

It was difficult to recognize in this grief-stricken lady the forceful Eleanor de Bohun who had once been so pleased with herself when she had married Thomas of Woodstock, and together they had planned to get their hands on the entire fortune left by her father.

Then she had had dreams of greatness. Becoming royal through marriage with one of the sons of Edward the Third she had been so proud. And when her son had been born and he had been given that good old de Bohun name of Humphrey she had doted on him.

Her only son! Her Humphrey! She had known what it meant to love something other than riches and power when he had been born, although she had never ceased to value those things and wanted them for Humphrey.

When her husband had been murdered that had been the end of her ambition for him and she had turned her thoughts more and more to this precious son.

He had accompanied his cousin Harry to Ireland at the command of Richard but it had not occurred to her that any harm could come to her son.

And now this news had shattered her. She had been robbed of that which was the meaning of life to her. She had three daughters; but it had been on Humphrey that her love and devotion was centred.

She went about Fleshy silent-footed and mournful. Her attendants watched her anxiously.

'She will die of a broken heart,' they said.

She would sit in the window seat and look out across the country to where the grey walls of the convent rose and she thought of those days long before Humphrey's birth when her

sister Mary was here and had made her journeys to and from the convent. How they had urged her to take up the life of the nun. And she might have done so had it not been for that meeting with Henry Bolingbroke—contrived of course by John of Gaunt. They had wanted Mary's fortune ... well so had she.

How different everything would have been if Mary had entered the convent. Harry of Monmouth would never have been born.

'Oh Humphrey/ she mourned, 'never to see you again ... Humphrey, my son, my boy ...'

She was tired in body and in mind. She had nothing now to live for.

Then she saw again the grey walls of the convent and it seemed to her that they offered peace. Could it be that she, Eleanor Duchess of Gloucester, who for years before had tried so hard to persuade her sister to enter that convent, should now be considering ending her own life there?

It was strange what peace the thought brought her. She could almost hear her own arguments with which she had bombarded Mary. The quiet. The peace. The life lived to a pattern of service to others.

There was comfort in it.

It was ironical that the Duchess, who had thought the convent life so suitable for her sister, should now want to embrace it herself.

As the days passed the more firm became the decision and finally she took the step.

She did not live long. She found that she must mourn her son within the convent walls as bitterly as she had in the castle.

She died very soon after entering the convent. Of a broken heart, it was said.

Harry realized that Humphrey had been right when he had talked about the insecurity of the new King's position; and none was more aware of this than Henry himself.

He was delighted to receive his son and to see that he was in good health, though somewhat melancholy still owing to the sudden death of his cousin.