Daughters of Spain - Plaidy Jean (читаем книги онлайн бесплатно полностью без сокращений txt) 📗

The thought was so intoxicating that she threw off her lassitude and leaped out of bed.

She shouted to her attendants: ‘Come! Help me to dress. Dress me for a journey. I am leaving today.’

The women came in. They looked different, a little furtive perhaps. She noticed this and wondered why.

‘Come along,’ she ordered. ‘Be quick. We are leaving today. You have much to do.’

‘Highness, the Queen’s orders were that you were to rest in your apartment today.’

‘How can I do that when I have a journey to make?’

‘The Queen’s instructions were …’

‘I do not obey the Queen’s instructions when my husband bids me go to him.’

‘Highness, the weather is bad.’

‘It will take more than weather to keep me from him. Where is the Queen?’

‘She left for Segovia, and she has given all here these instructions: We are to look after you until her return, and then she will talk with you about your journey.’

‘When does she return?’

‘She said that we were to tell you that as soon as her State duties were done at Segovia she would be with you.’

‘And she expects me to wait until she returns?’

Juana was pulling at the stuff of the robe which she had wrapped about her when she rose from her bed.

‘We fear, Highness, that there is no alternative. Instructions have been given to all.’

Juana was silent. A cunning look came into her eyes, but she composed herself and she noticed that the attendants showed an immense relief.

‘I will speak with the Queen on her return,’ she said. ‘Come, help me to dress and do my hair.’

She was quiet while they did this; she ate a little food; then she took her seat at the window, and for hours she looked out on the scene below.

By that time the melancholy mood had returned to her.

It was night. Juana woke suddenly and there were tears on her cheeks.

Why was she crying? For Philip. They were keeping her from Philip when he had asked her to return. They made excuses to keep her here. Her mother was still in Segovia. She did not hurry to Medina del Campo because she knew that when she did come she must make arrangements for her daughter’s departure.

It was a plot, a wicked, cruel plot to keep her from Philip. They were all jealous because she had married the most handsome man in the world.

She sat up in bed. There was pale moonlight in the room. She got out of bed. She could hear the even breathing of her attendants in the adjoining room.

‘I must not wake them,’ she whispered. ‘If I do they will stop me.’

Stop her? From doing what?

She laughed inwardly. She was not going to wait any longer. She was going … now.

There was no time to waste. There was no time to dress. She put a robe about her naked body and, her feet still bare, she crept from the room.

No one heard her. Down the great staircase … out to the hall.

One of the guards at the door gasped as though he saw a ghost, and indeed she looked strange enough to be one, with her hair flowing wildly about her shoulders and the robe flapping about her naked body.

‘Holy Mother …’ gasped the guard.

She ran past him.

‘Who is it?’ he demanded.

‘It is I,’ she answered. ‘Your Sovereign’s daughter.’

‘It is indeed. It is the Lady Juana herself. Your Highness, my lady, what do you here? And garbed thus! You will die of the cold. It is a bitter night.’

She laughed at him. ‘Back to your post,’ she commanded. ‘Leave me to my duty. I am on my way to Flanders.’

The frightened guard shouted to his sleeping companions, and in a few seconds he was joined by half a dozen of them.

They saw the flying figure of their heiress to the throne running across the grounds towards the gates.

‘They’re locked,’ said one of the men. ‘She’ll not get any farther.’

‘Raise the alarm,’ said one. ‘My God, she’s as mad as her grandmother.’

Juana stood facing them, her back against the buttress, her head held high in defiance.

‘Open the gates,’ she screamed at the Bishop of Burgos who had been brought hurrying from his apartments in the Palace to deal with this situation.

‘Highness,’ he told her, ‘it is impossible. The Queen’s orders are that they shall not be opened.’

‘I give you orders,’ shouted Juana.

‘Highness, I must obey the orders of my Sovereign. Allow me to call your attendants that they may help you back to your bed.’

‘I am not going back to my bed. I am going to Flanders.’

‘Later, Your Highness. For tonight …’

‘No, no,’ she screamed. ‘I’ll not go back. Open the gates and let me be on my way.’

The Bishop turned to one of the men and said: ‘Go to Her Highness’s apartments and get her women to bring warm clothes.’

The man went away.

‘What are you whispering?’ cried Juana. ‘You are jealous of me … all of you. That is why you keep me here. Open those gates or I will have you flogged.’

One of her women now approached.

‘Highness,’ she wailed, ‘you will die of the cold if you stay here. I pray you come back to bed.’

‘You want to stop me, do you not? You want to keep me away from him. Do not think I cannot understand. I saw your lascivious eyes upon him.’

‘Highness, please, Highness,’ begged the woman.

Another woman arrived with some warm clothing. She tried to slip a heavy cloak about Juana’s shoulders. Juana seized it and with a wild cry threw it at them.

‘I’ll have you all flogged,’ she cried. ‘All of you. You have tried to keep me from him.’

‘Come inside the Palace, Highness,’ implored the Bishop. ‘We will send immediately for the Queen, and you can discuss your departure with her.’

But Juana’s mood had again changed. She sat down and stared ahead of her as though she did not see them. To all their entreaties she made no reply.

The Bishop was uncertain what to do. He could not command Juana to return to her apartments, yet feared for her health and even her life, if she remained out of doors during this bitter night.

He went into the Palace and sent for one of his servants.

‘Leave at once for Segovia. You cannot go by the main gates. You will be quietly conducted through a secret door. Then with all haste go to the Queen. Tell her what has happened … everything you have seen. Ask her for instructions as to how I shall proceed. Go quickly. There is not a moment to lose.’

All through that night Juana remained at the gates of the Palace. The Bishop pleaded with her, even so far forgot her rank as to storm at her. She took no notice of him and at times seemed unaware of him.

The distance between Medina del Campo and Segovia was some forty miles. He could not expect the Queen to arrive that day, nor perhaps the next. He believed that if Juana spent another night in the open, inadequately clothed, she would freeze to death.

All through the next day she refused to move but, as night fell again, he persuaded her to go into a small dwelling on the estate, a hut-like place in which it would be impossible for them to imprison her. There she might have some shelter against the bitter cold.

This Juana eventually agreed to do, and the second night she stayed there; but as soon as it was light she took her place at the gates once more.

When the news of what was happening was brought to Isabella she was overcome with grief. Since her arrival at Segovia she had been feeling very ill; the war, her many duties, the disappointment about Catalina and the persistently nagging fear for Juana were taking their toll of her.

She would return to Medina at once, but she feared that feeble as she was she would be unable to make enough speed.

She called Ximenes to her and, because she feared his sternness towards her daughter, she sent also for Ferdinand’s cousin Henriquez.