They nodded and dutifully left the room. Seeing that Isabel was consoling Lizzie and that the rest were bearing up as well as could be expected, Hugh stood. He was so tired from his vigil by his mother's deathbed that he felt lightheaded, but he needed fresh air more than sleep. As he made his way out of Hanley Castle, he noted that all the servants, even those with whom he had been on the most informal terms, were suddenly treating him with extreme deference. He could not put his hand on a door without having one or sometimes two people spring ahead of him and hold it, and someone must have guessed intuitively that he would want to ride, for no sooner did he ask for a horse than his favorite palfrey stood saddled before him. Any remark any of them made to him was prefaced by “my lord.”
The ride to Emma's was a short one, but he took it slowly because of his fatigue. Word of his mother's death had reached her household before Hugh did, for the servants’ faces were somber, and they bowed deeply to Hugh when he rode up. Emma herself, when she came out to greet him, had put on black robes. “My lord,” she said, and curtseyed.
“Not you too,” he protested, and kissed her cheek. “Will you go for a ride with me?”
She nodded, and soon they were seated together in a secluded spot on a hill where on other fine summer days they had often brought a meal, ate it off a blanket they spread, and then kissed to their heart's content. Today, however, there was nothing but talk between them. “I’ve wished so often to come into my inheritance, Emma. But I didn’t know what I was wishing for! She was only forty-four, you know. I’d give anything to have her back now. I feel so guilty.”
“All heirs dream of getting their land, Hugh, I think. You have no cause for guilt. And you were a good son to her. I visited her a time or two while you were away, and I asked if there was something I could do to help her. She always said no, that you had made sure she had all she wanted or needed.”
“Little enough.”
“Enough to make her content and at ease, as much as she could be, poor lady. It was a mercy she did not linger; she was in dreadful pain sometimes, Hugh, in places where she would probably not tell a man. She was a brave lady.”
“Yes,” said Hugh, and crossed himself, as did Emma. “I loved her dearly. I’ll miss her.”
For a time they sat still together, Hugh brushing at his eyes from time to time as Emma let him grieve in silence. Finally, he stood and looked at the valley below him, dotted with fat sheep. They were his sheep now, as was everything he could see. And over in Wales lay Glamorgan, the acquisition of which had enriched and destroyed his father in a few short years. Now it too had become his. It was both a tragedy and a marvel, he thought, how the ceasing of a human heartbeat could change so much in so short a time. He cleared his throat. “Lord of Glamorgan, Emma, whether I like it or not. Do you think I’ll be a good lord?”
“The best,” she said, and patted his cheek. Hugh retained her hand for a minute, then brought it to his lips. “I’d better get back to my castle,” he said.
The next few months passed in a flurry of firsts. His first expedition to Scotland as a banneret, his first summons to Parliament. Hugh had not entirely expected the latter, having half assumed that as a Despenser his chief duty in Parliament would have been to stay a hundred miles away from it. Yet the summons came nonetheless, and as no self-respecting lord could come to Westminster without a full contingent of followers, he was trailed by a dozen men when he rode into the city.
Emma came with him too. With William being educated at Glastonbury, Lizzie boarding with the nuns at Wix, and John serving as a page in the queen's household, Hugh's own household was empty of brothers and sisters. Emma had begun to live openly with him, though nominally she had her own chamber to which to retire at night. Hugh's confessor had shaken his head at this sin on his master's part, but he contented himself with the reflection that now that Hugh had come into his lands, he would surely marry someday and that a marriage on Emma's part would duly follow. It was lucky, the confessor often thought, that no bastard had resulted from the affair.
On his last visit to London, Hugh had stayed at a cramped inn. His fortunes having changed since then, Hugh had leased a handsome house overlooking the Thames for his stays in the city. It was a large house for a single man to rattle around in, and after consideration he had asked Emma to join him there. By doing so, he knew, he was in effect proclaiming her his official mistress, for although she had traveled with him before, it was only between his own estates, where none but the locals paid attention to their lord's comings and goings and to the question of with whom he came and went. Now, as he would be visited by some of the friends he had gradually acquired over the years of fighting side by side, Emma could not remain hidden away. Besides, Hugh was proud of her. With her unusual but striking looks and the elegant robes and handsome jewels Hugh had insisted on presenting her with when he came into his inheritance, she was the match of any countess. If only he could marry her! But as dearly as he loved her, he was at heart a realist, and he knew that such a marriage would do nothing to bolster his improving fortunes.
One Parliament followed another. All during this time, the English and the French had been tweaking each other's noses, daring the other to begin a war, and in the summer of 1340, near the harbor at Sluys, each side got a taste of what was to mark the next hundred years to come. Hugh, master of his own ship now, would never forget those hours in the English Channel. Men fought hand to hand, the decks on which they stood slippery with blood and rocking madly from side to side. From another ship, a group of English ladies, brought to stay with Queen Philippa in Flanders, watched in terror as men toppled into the sea, some dead, some dying, some frantically hoping to escape. When it was over, though, it was the English who were able to make the joke that if the fish in the sea could speak, it would be French that came out of their mouths.
The king took a nasty wound on the thigh and spent some days recuperating on the cog Thomas, where Hugh was rowed over to join him one evening. After wishes for the king's speedy healing had been expressed and some business matters had been discussed, Edward said, “I’ve been considering your marriage, Sir Hugh.”
“My marriage?”
“About time you thought of it yourself, isn’t it? Now, see here. William de Montacute has a daughter. Several, as a matter of fact, but the girl in question is thirteen or so, I believe. A marriageable girl; indeed, she's a little widow. High time she married again. A good alliance for you. She's not an heiress, of course, but she’ll bring her dower from her Badlesmere marriage, which is ample, very ample. Montacute will like the idea too, once he gets out of France.” William de Montacute, the Earl of Salisbury, had been a prisoner there for several months. “They’re not in a position to argue with a reasonable ransom now that the sea is full of Frenchmen, so I think he’ll be home soon. He’ll like it, I daresay, making his little girl Lady of Glamorgan. So what of it, Despenser? Why not marry the Montacute girl? Oh, and she's a pretty thing, so you needn’t concern yourself on that score.”
Hugh stood open-mouthed. Marriage to an earl's daughter, and that earl the king's closest confidant? He could hope for no better a match, he knew. Only a fool would say no to such a proposition, even if it had not come from the king himself. And yet at that moment, he could think of nothing but Emma. For nine years they had been all in all to each other.
Yet it was she herself who had left him free for such a match on that July day when they had first come together in her bed. He gulped and knelt. “I would be honored to marry the young lady, your grace.”
After Hugh awoke from his nightmare, he tried to obey Emma's advice by going back to sleep. Instead, he lay there, listening to her breathing beside him and reflecting that it would be the last time they lay together. It had been nearly a year since his conversation with the king, but all was at last settled. William de Montacute had been released from captivity and had given his consent to the marriage, after which the Pope had duly granted Hugh le Despenser and Elizabeth de Mont
acute a dispensation to marry. So later that morning, Hugh would be setting off to Tewkesbury to await his bride.
Emma would be going back to her own home. Though there had been nothing meretricious about her relationship with Hugh, he had nonetheless given her many gifts over the years, and the possessions that she had accumulated in the chamber that had become known as hers had taken longer to pack than either she or Hugh had anticipated. Watching his servants place her worldly goods into their coffers and load them onto a cart, Hugh had realized that there would soon be no sign in Hanley Castle, or any of his other residences, that Emma had ever lived there. His only keepsake from her was a ring that she had given him a couple of years before. Hugh wore it on the same hand as a ring that had belonged to his father, his one tangible reminder of the man other than his tomb at Tewkesbury Abbey. As he watched the rings glisten side by side, he wondered if Emma might as well be just as dead to him.
But she was stirring next to him, and he reached for her and held her close until she fully awoke. “Hugh, you hadn’t had your bad dream for years until just now. Is something troubling you?”
“Only you leaving. That's enough, I suppose.”
“Hugh, I must leave. I am no—”
“I know. You’re no adulteress, and I’m not a knave, as much as I wish at the moment we could be both. Christ, I’ll miss you, though.”
Parting upon his marriage to Bess had been a mutual decision, though Hugh knew only too well that he could have been talked out of the notion had Emma been less principled. But she had said, “I love you, Hugh, but I will not lie with a married man, even one whose bride is too young to be a full wife to him just yet. We must part now and live the rest of our lives as friends only.”
“Friends only,” Hugh had agreed, and his new chaplain, William Beste, had heartily approved when a less enthusiastic Hugh told him of the plan. Infidelity, he had reminded Hugh, had been the first of his father's great sins, and it was one Hugh should strive in particular to avoid. “But he was unfaithful with the old king. So what if I just avoid our king's bed?” Hugh had suggested. “I wouldn’t have a problem there at all. Neither would the king, I’m sure.”
Beste, whom Hugh had chosen for other virtues instead of a sense of humor, had merely shaken his head.
Emma said, “I will miss you too, Hugh. But we have been separated before, when you have gone off to fight. It will be hard, but I will get used to it.”
“You can think of this as a very long fight, perhaps?” Hugh smiled in spite of himself. “Emma, I wish you’d consider this. Let me find a husband for you. Someone who will be good to you, who will protect you. Someone not liable to drop dead next week, perhaps. Someone such as Sir—”
“You would pass me to someone else?”
“Good Lord, no, not like that! But it will be lonely for you, and I thought that with—”
“No, Hugh le Despenser!”
Emma never called him “Hugh le Despenser” except when she was irritated with him. Hugh obediently subsided. Then Emma broke the silence herself. “I know you meant well, Hugh.”
“I did, Emmy, truly. I thought only that otherwise you might be tempted too, and with a husband—”
“I have a stronger will than you realize, Hugh, after all of these years. But yes, perhaps, one day I may be able to contemplate getting married to someone else. But it is not a step I can take now. You are not that easily replaced, for one thing.” She sighed. “I do wish we had had a child together, though.”
“I do too, now,” Hugh admitted. In the early days of their relationship, after their first few heedless couplings, he had fretted over the possibility of getting Emma with child. He had gone so far as to try to withdraw himself from her just in time, but she had not allowed it. “I want your child, Hugh,” she’d whispered. “Please.” Hugh, despite some misgivings, had acquiesced, as there was no danger, after all, that their child would go hungry; he or she could marry respectably or find a congenial spot in the Church. It appeared, though, that all of his misgivings had been for naught, for in all their years together, Emma had never missed a monthly course, only been late a time or two. Emma had decided that her barrenness was a punishment for her sin, though Hugh had been secretly relieved. His own mother had borne him and nine other healthy babes safely, but not all women were so lucky, and it would have been a terrible burden had Emma died giving birth to his child.
He thought of suggesting to Emma that she might be blessed with issue were she properly married, but wisely decided against doing so. Instead, Emma said abruptly, “What is your bride like, Hugh? You’ve said little about her except that she's the Earl of Salisbury's daughter and almost fourteen.”
“Bess, as she hates me to call her? A bit spoiled by Papa Montacute, it would appear, and not at all pleased with the idea of having a Despenser for a husband, if I’m not mistaken. She's a pert little thing. When she's displeased with something I say, which so far has been quite often, she wrinkles her little nose, like this.” Hugh's own nose was not one that easily wrinkled, but he demonstrated as best he could. “It's quite fetching, actually.”
“You sound half in love with her already.”
“I could be, I suppose. Whether she comes to like me is another story altogether.”
“Of course she will, Hugh.”
He shrugged and reached for her again, but it turned out that neither of them, on this last possible occasion for them to make love to each other, was truly interested in doing so. Instead, they lay in bed holding each other for a while, then dressed and saw to the details of their day's business; Hugh to that of trying to forget his misery, Emma to that of moving her last things out of Hanley Castle. By mid-morning all of her goods were packed and headed in a cart toward her house. Then it was Emma's turn to leave also. She and Hugh walked silently out to where Emma's horse, a present from Hugh, had been saddled for her. Emma's own manservant stood well away as Hugh stepped up to help her onto her palfrey. “I know you can take care of yourself, you always have,” he said. “But you know you can always turn to me if you need assistance. Me, or any of my household.”
“I know, Hugh.”
“I love you.” He swung her up on the horse.
She bent and kissed him on the forehead. “I love you, Hugh.”
He watched as she rode away, traveling the same path that he had ridden to her house on that summer's day nearly ten years before. Around him, men were coming in from the fields for their dinner, men were loading things in carts to be transported to his manor at Tewkesbury, men were waiting to see him with business and petitions. Yet as Hugh stood there in the midst of all of them, on the eve of his marriage, he had never felt more alone in his life.
iv
* * *
June 1341: Tewkesbury
IN BETWEEN LAST-MINUTE FITTINGS OF BESS'S WEDDING apparel, the Countess of Salisbury was taking the opportunity to give Bess some womanly, and motherly, advice. She had begun with the subject of the Marital Act, which as Bess understood it from her mother was something that could be reasonably enjoyable to women but which was something that men could not bear to be without. Hugh, it seemed, would be no exception to this rule. “Men are not faithful by nature, though many are,” Katharine told Bess. “You must accept it if Hugh strays occasionally. And at his age, and with you not of a condition to lie with him just yet, you must expect that he will have known women before, and may continue to do so after your wedding. As long as he does not flaunt them in front of you, you must bear this patiently.”
“What if he does flaunt them in front of me? Can I get the Pope to annul our marriage?” Bess had happy visions, all of a sudden, of Hugh bringing a stable of whores to dine at table with him and of a suitably furious Pope tearing their marriage contract in two. She could almost hear the satisfying rip the parchment made.
“I doubt he would do so,” said Katharine most unhelpfully. “Hugh is a decent man, after all, and not a fool. I’ve no doubt that he will treat you with all due resp
ect.”
Bess scowled. A worrisome thought came to her then. “Mama, does Papa stray?”
“Certainly not, and it would be a sorry day for him if he did,” said Katharine.
Leaving Bess to puzzle over this inconsistency with the advice she had just been given, Katharine turned her attention to the casket of jewels sitting nearby. They had been brought to Bess the day before, an early wedding present from Hugh. Philippa, Sybil, and Agnes, Bess's younger sisters, had been goggle-eyed when they were taken out, and Bess herself had been impressed, though she’d tried to not seem so. “Have you decided what ones to wear yet?”
“I hadn’t thought of it. I thought to wear just the ones that Papa gave me.”
“And offend Hugh? Besides, child, they are magnificent.” She opened the casket and lifted a ruby brooch in one hand and a sapphire bracelet in the other. “His mother's, I suppose, and some of them perhaps his grandmother Joan of Acre's. The first Edward's daughter, you know.” Katharine held the ruby brooch up against Bess's wedding dress. As a consolation for her marriage, Bess had been allowed to select the silken fabric herself; it was a dusky rose trimmed with gold that shimmered as she moved. “It will go beautifully with your gown.”
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