r two or
three months, and then died.

Clarence was convinced that she did not die a natural death. He
believed that her life had been destroyed by some process of
witchcraft, such as has been described, or by poison, and he openly
charged the queen with having instigated the murder by having employed
some sorcerer or assassin to accomplish it. After a time he satisfied
himself that a certain woman named Ankaret Twynhyo was the person whom
the queen had employed to commit this crime, and watching an
opportunity when this woman was at her own residence, away from all
who could protect her, he sent a body of armed men from among his
retainers, who went secretly to the place, and, breaking in suddenly,
seized the woman and bore her off to Warwick Castle. There Clarence
subjected her to what he called a trial, and she was condemned to
death, and executed at once. The charge against her was that she
administered poison to the duchess in a cup of ale. So summary were
these proceedings, that the poor woman was dead in three hours from
the time that she arrived at the castle gates.

These proceedings, of course, greatly exasperated Edward and the
queen, and made them hate Clarence more than ever.

Very soon after this, Charles, the Duke of Burgundy, who married
Margaret, Edward and Clarence's sister, and who had been Edward's ally
in so many of his wars, was killed in battle. He left a daughter named
Mary, of whom Margaret was the step-mother; for Mary was the child of
the duke by a former marriage. Now, as Charles was possessed of
immense estates, Mary, by his death, became a great heiress, and
Clarence, now that his wife was dead, conceived the idea of making her
his second wife. He immediately commenced negotiations to this end.
Margaret favored the plan, but Edward and Elizabeth, the queen, as
soon as they heard of it, set themselves at work in the most earnest
manner to thwart and circumvent it.

Their motives for opposing this match arose partly from their enmity
to Clarence, and partly from designs of their own which they had
formed in respect to the marriage of Mary. The queen wished to secure
the young heiress for one of her brothers. Edward had another plan,
which was to marry Mary to a certain Duke Maximilian. Edward's plan,
in the end, was carried out, and Clarence was defeated. When Clarence
found at length that the bride, with all the immense wealth and vastly
increased importance which his marriage with her