A Tapestry of Treason - Anne O'Brien

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personal attack. While we awaited Dickon’s return I had visions of flight to one of our distant estates if Henry showed any leaning towards the ultimate punishment. Joan and I could make our escape, perhaps to the staunch walls of Conisbrough, before the royal guards reached us. Or, as Dickon had so flippantly suggested, to my estates in Glamorgan. How extreme this all sounded, fleeing for our lives. Meanwhile Joan returned to her sewing. Her wrists were thin and fragile, but she wielded her needle with energy, despite her professed hatred of it. The greyhound settled down at her feet since, for once, Joan was not accompanied by one of her grey cats. I remained at the window, watching the busy ravens, waiting for some sort of sign of good or ill fortune. Until Joan looked up at me, addressing me with an unsettling question.

      ‘Does your brother of Aumale ever consider his own closeness to the throne? Richard recognised the Duke of York as his heir, which would make Aumale next in line after his father. An excellent reason for Henry to rid himself of your brother.’

      ‘My thanks, Joan. You have just stoked my anxieties threefold. So it will matter not whether John Hall gives evidence against Edward. Henry will sign his death warrant.’ I bared my teeth against the awful prospect. ‘As long as he does not sign mine. You know that I’ll fight to the death to save us all from ignominy.’

      When Joan at last abandoned her altar cloth, folding it, then placing her hands neatly on top, she tilted her chin and smiled at me, a sharp-toothed little smile.

      ‘I think I would not like you as my friend, Constance. But I would like you even less as my enemy.’

      I bristled, on the defensive. ‘It is fortunate then that you are unlikely to have me as either.’

      ‘Who’s to say, in the future, you might even need me as a confidante?’

      ‘Why would I?’

      ‘You have no female friends, I think.’

      No, I had not. A little silence fell between us, broken only by the hound twitching in its dreams and a soft fall of ash in the fireplace. I had never had female friends, nor had I felt the lack of them. Why would I need to bare my breast to another woman who would gossip and prove less than trustworthy? Better to keep my own counsel.

      ‘I have no need of them.’ I eyed her, resenting what could only be criticism. ‘Nor do I see you surrounded by a flock of admiring Court women.’

      ‘Ah, but I have sisters.’

      Her smile was infuriatingly complacent, and I would have responded with even more astringency. But I did not.

      ‘Listen,’ she said.

      I realised that every one of my senses had been held in tension. Throughout all our conversational meanderings I had been straining for the first intimation of Dickon’s return.

      The door was flung back and Dickon entered, bringing with him an excitement that caused the greyhound to leap up and bark as our spy gathered enough breath to announce:

      ‘It’s not good news. Not for any of them.’

      ‘Then tell us…’

      He paused to gulp in air. Now beneath the excitement and flush of exertion I could see the suppressed horror, the pale skin around his mouth as if his lips had been pressed hard into silence. Whatever it was, it had been enough to shake Dickon’s engrained shallow heedlessness. His words fell over each other.

      ‘It’s this. The valet John Hall has been brought from Newgate, on the King’s orders. He is being questioned about the death of our uncle, Thomas of Woodstock, about what he knows and what he saw. But that’s not the worst of it. The King has summoned the Lords to meet with him.’

      I shook my head, unable to dispel the dull beat of fear that Dickon’s news had delivered. ‘To what purpose? I presume that our family is still safe.’

      ‘You might say that. But not for long, I’d say.’ A feral expression twisted his face into that of a malign imp. ‘The King’s excluded from his audience with the Lords those accused by Bagot. The Counter-Appellants. So our Dukes of Aumale, of Surrey and of Exeter are all left to cool their heels in an antechamber while the rest give their counsel.’

      The fear roared back into life with the agility of the hound that still leaped up against Dickon as he pulled its ears.

      ‘What about Thomas?’ I asked. ‘What about our father? Are they too banished from the King’s presence?’

      ‘I don’t know.’ Dickon subsided to sit on the floor almost at my feet, his back against the window seat, arms clasped around the hound, chin tilted. ‘What I do know is that the King is asking the Lords for advice. Should these maliciously evil counsellors named by Bagot be put under arrest?’

      Worse than I thought, but Edward had warned me.

      ‘Who tells you this?’ I demanded.

      His grin widened to accompany a self-deprecating shrug. ‘I have my informants.’

      ‘And what does your informant say? Will the Lords push for imprisonment?’

      ‘It’s still being discussed, but voices in the chamber were raised. Even I could hear them. There is much throwing down of hoods, I was told, which is bad, but no one has yet drawn his sword, which is good. The King is being circumspect and has made no decision so far but tempers are high.’ Dickon’s eyes gleamed. ‘I can go back, if you give me more coin.’

      I considered a sharp refusal, but with this unforeseen twist knew that I must send him. The axe falling on our combined necks might just become reality.

      ‘Try not to find it all so enjoyable, Dickon. The outcome here can endanger us all.’

      ‘I know. But the atmosphere in Westminster buzzes like a beehive disturbed by a badger’s claw. Do I go back?’

      Joan allowed a second stream of small coin to fall into Dickon’s outstretched hand, watching it disappear into his clenched fist. By now, as Dickon departed, Joan’s stitching was abandoned on the floor.

      ‘I don’t think there is any hope that the Lords will lean towards mercy,’ I said. There was nothing to be gained from wishing for the unobtainable.

      ‘But we don’t know,’ Joan fretted.

      ‘I think we do.’ And no point at all in trying to bolster her spirits when all pointed to a disaster.

      But Dickon, who returned before the end of the day, flushed with his efforts, eagerly snatching the cup of ale from me and gulping it down, seemed on the surface to be more hopeful.

      ‘They’re still free. But that’s all I can tell you.’

      ‘Is that not good?’

      The question was drawn from me, because for the first time there was a crease between the lad’s brows to match my own. ‘It all hangs in the balance, as I see it. It’s being said that the Counter-Appellants were charmed foster-children of King Richard, and they had incited the King in his vengeance. Since the foster-father was now locked in the Tower, so should his foster-children be condemned to join him there. There are those who are demanding execution.’

      I ignored Joan’s intake of breath. This was no time for excess emotion. ‘So it is revenge.’

      ‘Not revenge. Not in the eyes of the Lords. To them it’s common justice.’

      And so it would be in the eyes of many, as I knew.

      ‘I must pray,’ Joan announced. ‘I will be in St Stephen’s Chapel. Will you come?’

      ‘No. What good will that do?’

      ‘How do we know? Better than standing here,

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