The King's Concubine. Anne O'Brien

and carved bone on the stones before her.

      ‘Help me to my feet …’

      And because it seemed the obvious thing to do, the only thing to do, I stretched out my hand, and took hers in mine. I froze, my breath held hard. To take the hand of the Queen of England on sheer impulse? I would surely be punished for my presumption. I fell to my knees beside her as she gripped me as hard as she could. There was not much force in it, but she groaned as the skin covering her swollen flesh tightened with the effort.

      ‘Blessed Virgin!’ she murmured. ‘The pain is too much!’

      The tension around us, the shocked stillness, held for a moment. Then all was movement and sound: the lady-in-waiting lifting Her Majesty to her feet in a flutter of anxiety; the Queen’s feverish clasp of my hand broken; the distress of her laboured breathing deepening. Looking up from where I was still on my knees, I discovered Queen Philippa in the midst of all the fuss regarding me. Once those eyes might have sparkled with happiness but now their rich brown hue was strained with years of suffering. I could not bear to see it, and lowered my gaze to where the rosary still lay on the floor. She was quite unable to stoop to recover the beads for herself, even if a woman of such rank would deem to pick up her own belongings.

      So I picked it up for her.

      I lifted the rosary and held it out, startled at my temerity, even without the sharp warning murmur of Mother Abbess, who was approaching, her habit billowing with the speed of her passage like a cloak in a gale, intent on snatching the rosary from me.

      ‘Thank you. I am very clumsy today, and you are very kind.’

      Incredibly, the Queen’s words were for me. I felt the touch of her fingers on my hand. For a brief moment the devastation in her face was overlaid by a softness of gratitude.

      ‘Accept my apologies, Majesty.’ Mother Abbess directed toward me a look that boded ill for me in Chapter House the following day. ‘She should not have pushed herself forward in this manner. She has no humility.’

      ‘But she has come to my aid, like the good Samaritan to the traveller in distress,’ the Queen observed. ‘The Holy Virgin would honour such help to an old lady …’ She cried out, more sharply than before, one hand spread across the damask folds over her abdomen. ‘I need to sit down. My room, Isabella—take me to my room.’

      And her attendant, with a fierce frown and a firm grip, lifted her to her feet.

      ‘I am so sorry, Isabella.’ The Queen’s voice caught on a sob.

      ‘You’re tired, Maman. Did I not say this was too much for you? You should listen to me!’

      ‘I am aware, Isabella. But some things needed to be done, and I could not wait.’

      For the first time I did more than give passing cognisance to the Queen’s companion. So this was her daughter, the Princess Isabella. A tall, fair young woman with a sprightly demeanour and a barely disguised expression of utter boredom. How could I have ever mistaken her for a mere attendant? The Queen might be clothed in muted colours, but the Princess proclaimed her position in every embroidered thread and jewel from her gold crispinettes to her gilded shoes.

      ‘Some things could be left until you are recovered,’ Princess Isabella remarked crisply. I watched with pity as the little group made their way along the nave. At the Abbey door the Princess looked back, briefly, over her shoulder. Her gaze landed on me.

      ‘Don’t just stand there. Bring the rosary, girl.’

      ‘Something will turn up,’ I had said to Greseley. I did not need telling twice.

      In spite of her daughter’s determination, the Queen refused to be put to bed.

      ‘I’ll be in my bed long enough when death takes hold of me.’

      I stood inside the door of the Abbess’s parlour as the Queen was made comfortable in a high-backed chair with sturdy arms that would give her body some support. I could have put the rosary down on the travelling coffer beside the door and left, invisible to all as Isabella issued orders for a cup of heated wine and a fur mantle to warm the Queen’s trembling limbs. Stay! my instincts urged. So I stayed. If I stayed, perhaps the Queen would speak to me again. The kindness in her voice had stirred me, and now as I saw the woman behind the face of royalty, my heart hurt for her. She was ill, and her suffering was not only that of physical pain but also of grief. She was worn with it: black-cloaked death seemed to hover behind her shoulder. Never did I think to feel sorrow for a Queen, but on that evening I did.

      ‘Don’t tell the King, Isabella,’ she ordered, her voice harsh with exhaustion.

      ‘Why not?’ Isabella took her mother’s hand and pressed the wine cup into it.

      ‘Don’t speak of this. I forbid it. I do not wish him to be worried.’

      Her eyes might still be closed, her voice a mere thread, but her will was strong. My admiration for her was profound, and my compassion. Did the King still love her? Had he ever loved her? Perhaps it was not expected between those of royal blood whose marriage had been contracted for political alliance. What must it be like to feel old and unwanted? And yet the Queen would protect her husband from concern over her pain.

      It was as if she sensed the direction of my thoughts. Impatiently pushing aside Isabella’s hand with the cup, she straightened herself in the chair. And there it was after all. There was royalty. There was authority. In spite of the pain she could give her attention to me and smile. Her face warmed, the harsh lines smoothing, until she became almost comely. Had I thought her broad features lacked charm and beauty? I had been wrong.

      She stretched out her hand with difficulty. ‘You have brought my rosary.’

      ‘Yes, Majesty.’

      ‘I told her to.’ Isabella poured a second cup of wine and drank it herself. ‘We were too busy with you to worry about a string of beads, if you recall, trying to prevent you from falling on the floor before a parcel of ignorant nuns.’

      ‘Nevertheless, it was well done.’ The Queen beckoned and I came to kneel before her. ‘A conversa, I see. Tell me your name.’

      ‘Alice.’

      ‘You have no desire to become a nun?’ Putting a hand beneath my chin, she lifted it and studied my face. ‘You have no calling?’

      No one had ever asked me that before, or addressed me in so gentle a manner. There was a world of understanding in her eyes. Unexpectedly, unsettlingly, tears stung beneath my eyelids.

      ‘No, Majesty.’ Since she seemed interested, I told her. ‘Once I was a novice. And then a servant—who became a wife. Now I am a widow. And returned here as a lay sister.’

      ‘And is that your ambition? To remain here?’

      Well, I would not lie. ‘No, Majesty. I will not stay longer than I must.’

      ‘So you have plans. How old are you?’

      ‘Almost seventeen years, I think. I am not a child, Majesty,’ I felt compelled to add.

      ‘You are to me!’ Her smile deepened momentarily. ‘Do you know how old I am?’

      It seemed entirely presumptuous of me to even reply. ‘No, Majesty.’

      ‘Forty-eight years. I expect that seems ancient to you.’ It did. It seemed to me a vast age, and suffering had added a dozen more years to the Queen’s face. ‘I was younger than you when I came to England as a bride. Yet it seems no time to me. Life flies past.’

      ‘Take another drink, Maman.’ Isabella replaced the cup into the Queen’s hand, folding the swollen fingers gently around it. ‘I think you should rest.’

      I expected to be dismissed, but the Queen was not to be bullied.

      ‘Soon, Isabella. Soon. But you, Alice. Have you no family?’

      ‘No, Majesty.’