THEY WERE close to land now, and had been for at least a day. The harsh cries of gulls, as other seabirds, sounded continually through the bulwarks, and the smell of the sea was different. Sometimes Margaret would hear distant voices, as if sailors on passing vessels shouted out to them.
This morning—and she had no idea which day it was, for all time seemed to have halted in this vile world of the cabin—Margaret lay crammed into one of the bunk beds with Mary. They were both thin enough now that, lying on their sides and tight together, they could share the precious mattress. It was just after daybreak: faint light filtered through the planks of the decking, and the boots of the sailors had been tramping above their heads for at least an hour.
Although Margaret could not see her face, she knew Mary was awake.
“Mary?” she whispered, and laid her hand on Mary’s rib cage: the woman was taking rapid shallow breaths.
For a long time Mary did not answer. Then she sighed, and shuddered, and said, “I think I am finally losing this child, Margaret.”
Margaret held her tightly, and wept. After a while she raised herself and, with one of the other women, did for Mary what she could.
It was not much, for, as with her previous pregnancy, what Mary passed into the salty morning air was hardly human at all. It was a blackened mass of flesh with one or two hairs and what might, or might not, have been a single eye at one end of its pulpy mass.
The woman aiding Margaret made a face at the sight of it but, at Margaret’s silent directions, bundled the dead flesh into a large cloth and hustled it out of the way.
As she did so, Margaret made Mary as comfortable as she could—at least the bleeding had stopped with the birth of the horrid thing!—then sat down by her and stroked her cheek, trying to give the woman as much comfort as she could.
“He will be so angry with me!” Mary whispered, staring at Margaret with great, pain-filled eyes.
“He will not be angry.” Margaret said, knowing the truth of what she said. Hal would be glad.
He did not want an heir. Not from Mary’s body.
“I wanted so much to give him this child,” Mary said. “Was it… was it… ?”
“Yes,” Margaret answered, not knowing truly what she was saying “yes” to, but knowing it was what Mary wanted to hear.
Mary’s mouth trembled, and she began to cry. “Why can’t I be a good wife?” she whispered.
Margaret was suddenly, violently angry with Hal. “You are the best of all wives,” she murmured, “Hush now, and rest while you can.”
NEVILLE STOOD with Bolingbroke on the deck of the vessel, thankful beyond belief that their sea journey was soon to end. It should have taken many days less, but the master of the vessel had apparently lost his way and had sailed up and down the coast of Flanders several
times until he’d found his home port.
If he hadn’t been the only vessel sailing to Flanders on the day they’d had to leave .
The fresh wind blowing off the land exhilarated Neville, and he tipped back his head and closed his eyes, allowing it to wash over his face and tug at his hair.
After a moment he looked back at Bolingbroke, staring at the jumble of boats tied up at the wharf of the small port. “How far from here, Hal?”
Bolingbroke pointed to a small headland which curved to the west of the wharf; at its foot was the silvery wash of a river mouth. “See? The city is only a few hours gentle barge ride up that river.”
Neville nodded, grateful that at last he could see the final leg of the journey. They were headed for the great city of Ghent, capital of Flanders. There Lancaster had been born—thus the corrupted “Gaunt” of his popular name—during his mother’s travels about Europe with Edward III. The Count of Flanders had ever been a friend of the Lancastrian family, and Bolingbroke knew he would receive a friendly welcome there.
It would be the perfect place to wait for the wounded hawk’s wings to heal.
“My lord?” It was Salisbury, Courtenay with him. “The master says we may bring the ladies up. It will be only a few minutes until we dock.”
“What? He leaves a few minutes where sea monsters can attack?” Bolingbroke said.
Neville shot him a dark look. “I’ll take Roger and Robert,” he said. “We should be able to manage a lady apiece.”
WHAT NEVILLE found shocked him beyond all imagining. The crowding and stench in the cabin he’d been forced to inhabit had been bad—but nothing compared to the thick, sickening atmosphere of the hellhole these women were crammed into.
For a long minute after he opened the door he simply stared, appalled.
All the women were gray, gaunt-eyed hags, crouching over pails and bowls.
Hardly a one of them looked up as he opened the door.
It took Neville a minute to cope with the stench, and then another to find the Bolingbroke women.
Agnes, Rosalind in her arms, was the first he saw in her place just by the door. Neville reached over, took Agnes by the elbow and helped her to rise. She staggered once she got to her feet, and Neville took Rosalind from her, giving her a quick hug before he handed the child to Courtenay.
Courtenay made a face at the girl’s stench, but took her firmly enough before stepping back to give Agnes room to move through the door.
“Take them above,” said Neville, and Courtenay nodded, relieved to be able to get back to the fresh air so quickly.
“Tom?”
Margaret! Neville turned back into the cabin, squinted into the dim light, and finally made out Margaret sitting on the edge of a bed.
“Sweet Jesu, Meg!” he said, shocked by the sight of her. “Are you well?”
“Nay,” she whispered, “but Mary is even worse.”
“Jesu,” Neville murmured, for now he had caught sight of Mary lying on the bed. He pushed through the other women, not caring that he stepped on at least two of them to get to Margaret and Mary. He cupped Margaret’s face in his hand, looking deep into her eyes.
“Can you walk?” he said.
She nodded. “Mary… please … she has lost her child, and now I think she wants to lose herself as well. Get her out of here.”
Neville helped Margaret to her feet, holding her to him briefly as she rose, then aided her to the cabin door, handing her into the care of Salisbury.
Salisbury took one look at her, and without the slightest hesitation swung her into his arms and turned for the ladder to the deck.
Neville bent down to Mary. He would have thought her dead save for the gentle rise and fall of her breasts, and he winced as she cried out when he lifted her into his arms. He stepped over the other women, telling them that they should follow him into the sunlight, and made for the deck with as much haste as possible without jolting Mary.
“Shush, sweet lady,” he whispered as Mary whimpered when they rose up the ladder to the deck. “I will take good care of you.” He paused, long enough to give her the very slightest of hugs, then climbed the final steps.
Bolingbroke was waiting for him as soon as he emerged onto the deck.
“Sweet Jesu,” Bolingbroke said, taking Mary from Neville.
He sat down on a wool sack, cradling Mary in his arms.
“She has lost the child,” Neville said gently, and Bolingbroke averted his face for a moment, and held Mary tightly to him.
“How ill is she?” he said finally, looking to where Margaret sat by the railing of the deck.
“Ill enough,” she said, and then Neville sat down and wrapped his arms so tightly about her that she could say no more.
That was as well, for Margaret didn’t want Hal to see her tears.
THEY STOPPED that night at a hostel by the river where a physician saw to the women and Rosalind. He was a good man at his craft, as only the Flemish could be, and Margaret, Agnes and Rosalind soon revived from the tonic he gave them. Now, he said, assuring a worried Neville that Margaret’s unborn child seemed well enough, it was only a matter of rest and good food.
But the physician shook his head over Mary, and said that the loss of the child had sapped her of far more than strength. He did what he could for her, and Mary was pathetically grateful for the relief he gave, but later the physician told Bolingbroke privately that Mary had something else wrong with her.
“A grayness,” he said, “about her mouth.” He hesitated. “And I did not like what I heard described of the child she miscarried. Perhaps there is something wrong with her womb…”