"Sharon K. Penman - The Sunne In Splendour" - читать интересную книгу автора (Penman Sharon K)

he'd ever seen, as beautiful as the Queens of Joan's bedtime tales. All in gold and black, like the
swallowtail butterflies he'd chased all summer in such futile fascination. Her eyes were huge and black,
blacker even than the rosaries of Whitby jet so favored by his mother. Her mouth was scarlet, her skin
like snow, her dark hair covered by a headdress of golden gauze, her face framed in floating folds of a
glittery shimmering material that seemed to be made from sunlight;
he'd never seen anything like it, couldn't keep his eyes from it, or from her.
"Where is your husband, Madame? Surely he'd not abandon you to pay the price for his treason?"
Richard loved the sound of his mother's voice, clear and low-pitched, as musical to him as chapel chimes.
The Queen's voice was a disappointment, shrill and sharply edged with mockery, so strongly flavored
with the accent of her native Anjou that he distinguished her words with some difficulty.
"My husband swore oath of allegiance to His Grace the King and has held true to that oath."
The Queen laughed. Richard didn't like the sound of it any more than he had her voice. He unobtrusively
edged closer to his mother's side, slipped his hand into the sleeve of her gown.
With a sudden shock, he realized those glittering black eyes had come to rest upon him. Frozen under
her gaze, he stared up at the Lancastrian Queen, unable to free his eyes from hers. He was accustomed
to having adults look at him without seeing, accepted that as a peculiarity of adult vision, that children
were so little visible to them. He saw now that this was not true of the Queen, that she saw him very
clearly. There was something very cold and queerly measuring in her look; he was frightened by it without
exactly knowing why.
The Queen was now looking at his mother. "Since your husband and your sons March and Rutland have
so courageously fled the consequences of their treachery, it remains for you, Madame, to stand witness in
their stead. Mark you well what price we exact from those disloyal to the crown."
Cecily's response was both immediate and unexpected. She stepped in front of Marguerite's glossy
ebony mare.
"These people are good people, God-fearing people, loyal to their King. They owe Your Grace no debt
of disloyalty, I do assure you."
"Madame, you bar my path," Marguerite said softly.
Richard saw her leather riding crop cut the air above his head. The mare lunged forward, and for a
moment of heartstopping horror, he thought his mother would fall beneath the animal's hooves. She'd
seen enough of Marguerite's face to be forewarned, however, and sprang clear in time, kept on her feet
by the most alert of Somerset's soldiers.
Richard brushed past the soldier, pressed against his mother; George had already reached her. She was
trembling and for a moment leaned against George as if he were a man grown.
"Send my sons from the village," she said huskily. "I do implore Your Grace. . . . You, too, are a
mother."
Marguerite had turned in the saddle. Now she jerked at the reins,
guiding the mare back toward the cross. "Yes, I am a mother. My sot was born six years ago today ...
and almost from the day of his birth there have been those who would deny his birthright, those who
dared say that my Edouard is not the true son of my husband, the King. And you do know as well as I,
Madame, the man most responsible for such vile slanders . . . Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick.
Warwick . . . your nephew, Madame! Your nephew!"
This last came out in a hiss, in a surge of scalding fury, followed by a burst of French, too fast and furious
to be decipherable. Pausing for breath she looked down in silence at the ashen woman and fear-frozen
children Very slowly and deliberately, she removed one of her riding gloves finely stitched Spanish leather
furred with sable. She saw Cecily Neville raise her chin, saw Somerset grin, knew they both expected
her to strike Cecily across the face with it. She flung it, instead, in the dust at
Cecily's feet.
"I want this town to learn what befalls those who give support to traitors. See to it, my lord Somerset,"
she said shortly, and not waiting for his response, brought her riding crop down again upon her mare's
flanks wheeling it about in an eye-catching display of showy horsemanship and then swinging back down