For a Queen's Love: The Stories of the Royal Wives of Philip II (3 page)

The boy liked that. He wanted to know more of this Philip.

“He was called Philip the Handsome because he was beautiful. He was fair and many loved him. Your grandmother loved him very dearly …”

Isabella’s face altered when she spoke of Mad Juana, and Philip missed little. He had heard voices other than his mother’s change when his grandmother was mentioned. He wished to know more about the mystery which surrounded her, the Queen who had brought the crown of Spain to his father. But Philip did not ask the question point blank.
He already knew that if he wished to take people off their guard it was better to approach a subject by devious means.

“And Philip the Handsome died, did he not?”

“He died long ago.”

“And my grandmother … did she die too?”

There was the faintest hesitation, which the boy was not slow to notice. “Yes; she is dead, my son.”

For dead she was, thought Isabella, dead to the world, living her strange existence in the Alcázar of Tordesillas, surrounded by those who were really her keepers, frenziedly gay at times, at others lost in the depth of her melancholy.

The little boy looked into his mother’s face. One day he would discover more of this strange grandmother whose name seemed to have such an effect on everyone who heard it.

“Tell me of my father and his wars,” he said.

She was eager to tell, for she knew that his father wished him to learn quickly all that was happening on the continent of Europe.

“Your father has many enemies, my son, for when a king and an emperor is rich in his rightful possessions there are many to envy him. Through his father—Philip, your namesake—he inherited Austria, and that means that he is continually at war with the German Princes who seek to take his lands from him. Through your grandfather, your father inherited the Duchy of Burgundy as well as Milan; and in France there is a wicked king who wishes to take these from him. So, as well as the German Princes, you father has to fight this wicked French King.”

“But my father
always
wins.”

“Your father
always
wins.”

The little brow was puckered. “Why does he not kill the wicked French King and the German Princes? Then he would not have to fight them, and could be here with us.”

“Once he caught the French King and brought him to Madrid. But kings do not kill kings. They make treaties. Your father sought to make peace with the French King so that all might be well between them; but the French King did not keep his word, and when your father released him, he went back to France and his little sons became your father’s prisoners.”
Isabella smiled at her son’s eagerness to hear more of these French Princes. “Yes,” she went on; “little Francis and little Henry came to be your father’s prisoners in place of their father.”

“Your Highness,” cried Philip, betraying a little of his excitement, “if my father had been the prisoner of the King of France, would he not have taken him to France and should I not have had to go in his place?”

This was one of the moments when he betrayed his youth and his folly. His mother was looking at him in astonishment.

“Your father could never be the prisoner of anyone. Your father is the greatest ruler in the world.”

The little boy blushed a deep pink. It was so easy to make mistakes.

Now he could ask no more about the little French boys who had been his father’s prisoners. But he knew that his Aunt Eleonore had become their stepmother. He wondered if they asked their stepmother—who was his father’s sister—about
their
father.

His mother said, softening as she saw his dismay: “There is not only the King of France to plague your father; there is also the wicked King of England.”

He nodded. He had heard of that King. His father distrusted the King of England, who was making a lot of trouble by being unkind to Philip’s great-aunt, Queen Catharine.

“One day, my son, all these tasks will fall to your lot. One day you will have to face them as your father does now.”

He knew it. Always the talk came back to that. It was the recurring theme. Already, although he was not yet three years old, he must begin his preparations. Yet he could not understand why, if his father always won, he did not put an end to the strife. Why did he not kill all his enemies and thus win everlasting peace? Philip was silent; there was so much to learn.

“Now I will tell you a story,” said his mother. “Once upon a time there was a wicked man. He was a monk, and so he should have been a good man. But the Devil made him his own, and, with this monk, decided to destroy God’s Holy Catholic Church. Do you know the name of that monk, Philip?”

This was the oft-told tale. This was his nursery legend. He knew the story of the wickedest man in the world, so he answered promptly: “Martin Luther.”

She was pleased with him. “And what did he make throughout the world?”

He could scarcely pronounce the word; but he knew it and he would be able to say it for his father when he came: “Heretics.”

She took his face between her hands. “Yes, my son, this wicked monk has gone about the world preaching evil until it has spread through Germany, Holland … the Netherlands. The poor, simple people there listen to the bad man and they believe what he says to be the truth. One day it will be your task to fight these heretics. You will have to drive them from the world as your great-grandfather and great-grandmother drove the Infidels from Granada. They must not be allowed to live, because living, they spread their evil. You will drive them from the face of the Earth. You will have the might of your father to help you, all the might of the Holy Inquisition.”

He smiled, but he was tired. There was too much talk of what he would have to do in the future; he wanted to do something pleasant
now
. He wanted to play, but there was no one to play with, except his little sister Maria, and how could such a solemn boy play with a baby?

So patiently he listened while his mother continued to talk of the great tasks that lay ahead of him.

He was four
years old—a baby no longer.

They had talked to him very seriously before they made the journey to Avila.

“Remember,” said his mother, “that all eyes will be fixed upon you. This is a solemn occasion. As you ride through the city the people will shout your name; they will be thinking: There is the Prince. There is the boy born to be King and Emperor. You must show no fear. You must show nothing but calmness … dignity and pride in your rank. How I wish your father could be here.”

Father, King, and Emperor. They were just names to the boy. He did not remember ever seeing the man. He visualized a giant, towering
above all others, dressed in garments that dazzled the eyes—brave, beautiful, strong … the greatest man in the world. The thought of his father frightened him, for continually he was told that he must grow like him. How could he? He was not big enough—even for his age. He was inclined to be breathless. He was not clever enough; he asked a great many questions, but they were often the wrong questions.

He wished that he was more like his sister, who was now three years old. She laughed aloud without thought, never asking herself: Is it right for me to laugh? Everyone loved her. They shook their heads over her high spirits, for she too had her destiny prepared for her. If she knew, she did not care. She continued to laugh and play and charm those about her. “She’s all Hapsburg!” people said. “She’s her grandfather all over again.” Her grandfather was that Philip the Handsome, the husband of the grandmother whose name was spoken in whispers, the mysterious grandmother of whom Philip could discover very little.

“Leonor,” he said, “why must I go to Avila?”

“Because you are to be breeched, my love.”

“I am to wear the clothes of a man. Well, why cannot I do that here?”

“Ah, my Philip. It is because you are a prince. You have to forget you are a little boy now. You have to be the people’s Philip for a while. They wish to see you. They wish to say, ‘He is growing up, our little Prince. He is not a baby anymore.’ And they want to see the breeching done. They will be content with nothing less.”

He shivered. He hated ceremonies. He was afraid when he rode through the town on his little mule and the people stared at him and shouted his name. He was always afraid that they would be displeased with him, that they would catch him laughing or see a tear in his eye. If they did and they gossiped about it, he would be disgraced for ever.

It was summer when they set out on the journey south from Valladolid.

On his mule, whose saddle was richly jeweled, rode Philip; about him was the bodyguard of soldiers and holy monks with the nobles of the court who were not fighting with his father in the Imperial dominions. In litters hung with rich cloth rode the Queen and her ladies;
among these was Leonor, with little Maria on her lap. Oh, to be a girl and not the heir of Spain! thought Philip. That was an ignoble thought, and he would have to confess, among his other sins, that it had come to him. But how could he help wishing it as he rode past the peasants’ hovels, and the ragged people came out to look at them with strange expressions in their glittering eyes! Sometimes he felt that they were preparing to snatch his saddle from under him because they were hungry and the sight of so much riches maddened them. He felt frightened, which was wrong, for a prince must not be afraid. He felt sorry for them, which was wrong, for a prince must feel nothing but the need to preserve the dignity of his high office.

Beside him rode a boy considerably older than himself, a dark-eyed, sleek-haired Portuguese boy. Philip was drawn toward this boy because there was a look of merriment in his eyes and a dignity, which did not change when he met the Prince’s gaze. He was courteous, yet not obsequious. Philip asked his name.

“It is Ruy Gomez da Silva, Highness.”

He was all Portuguese; Philip knew that. “Keep riding beside me,” said Philip.

Ruy Gomez said: “Your Highness is gracious.” And his eyes seemed to say that it was something of a joke that a little boy of four years old should be Highness to one of his great age and wisdom.

He did look wise. How old was he? wondered Philip. Thirteen possibly, or even fourteen. A great age, that seemed; and a good age too, for he was not so old that he was a man, yet he was free from the bewilderment of babyhood, which still hung about Philip. Ruy was at the age when he had cut his way through the maze of youth and was not too old to remember the difficulties of one still struggling through it.

“Look!” said Philip. “Look at the blue hills in the distance.”

“They are several miles away yet, Highness. When we reach them we shall know our journey is almost at an end.”

Philip looked shyly at the boy; he wanted to ask what those hills were, but he must not expose his ignorance to a subject.

Ruy read his thoughts as, it seemed to Philip afterward, he did so often.

“Those are the Sierra de Guadarrama, my Prince.”

“Yes,” said Philip hastily. “Yes.”

“They seem to recede as we approach them,” said the bold boy. “Many things seem like that, your Highness.”

How was that? Philip wondered. How could things seem farther away when they grew nearer. He would not ask. He must remember that a prince does not expose his ignorance to a subject. He turned away with a hint of haughtiness, but when he looked quickly back, the black eyes smiled into his.

Avila was built on a plateau, and as they climbed toward it the inhabitants came out to welcome them. Ahead rode the standard-bearers and the procession was a dazzling one to a people unaccustomed to splendor, but all eyes were on the four-year-old boy who, tired out with his journey, his little limbs stiff through the long hours in the saddle, longing for the soft lap of Doña Leonor, sat straight, bowing his head now and then in acknowledgment of the welcome, never for one instant letting any of them guess that he was weary and more than a little frightened.

The court rested in
Avila before the great ceremony was due to take place, and during that time Philip’s friendship with Ruy Gomez da Silva began.

Never in Philip’s four years had he known such an interesting companion. Ruy was a clever diplomatist; he took charge of the Prince, while he never gave the slightest sign that he knew he was doing so.

And what tales he had to tell! They were such tales that Leonor had never heard. When they returned to the quiet of the palace in Valladolid it would be Philip who would entertain Leonor with his stories of the wonders of the world. He wondered if he might ask if Ruy could stay with him in Valladolid. He was desolate at the thought of losing him, though he would not show his grief if a parting were necessary; but how he prayed that this would not be so! Perhaps he could offer a prayer at the tomb of Torquemada or by the urn that contained the arm of St. Thomas Aquinas. Perhaps he could go to the Church of
San Vicente and pray to that saint, and if he thought of the horrible death that had befallen him, and if he suffered in thought that which San Vicente had suffered in actuality, the saint might listen and intercede for him.

In the meantime, here was Ruy attending the Prince, which the Queen and Leonor allowed, being glad that this should be so, for they had much to concern them. Maria, being so high-spirited, encroached on Leonor’s time; and the Queen had many self-imposed tasks to perform. She must let the people see her; she must visit the tombs of saints and martyrs; she must distribute alms to the beggars who cried out at the gates of the palace, exposing their sores while they wailed of their misfortunes, as she must to the water-carriers who called out a blessing on her as they forced their mules through the narrow streets.

So Ruy would come to the Prince’s apartment and bathe his feet and dress him; and all the time he talked, and his conversation was as colorful as he himself was.

“Did you see the great boulders on the road as we came along, Highness?”

“Yes,” said his Highness. “I did.”

“Did you know what they were?”

“Boulders,” said the Prince calmly, but he was excited. Nothing was as it seemed, according to Ruy.