Harlot Queen

by Hilda Lewis

  She was beginning to understand why the King did not come to her bed.

  That passionate affairs existed between men, young as she was, she had long known; one couldn’t live at her father’s court without knowing. But that a King should so demean himself filled her with shame; that such a one should be given her for husband filled her with fear. Turn him from Gaveston, win him for herself she must. Fear and shame whipped her on.

  ‘Patience,’ Madam Queen Margaret said. ‘Time is young and the King is young; and you, niece, youngest of all.’

  ‘Twenty-four; I cannot think him over-young!’ Isabella said hurt and stubborn. ‘As for me, I doubt Gloucester’s wife has much advantage in age; nor Gaveston’s neither. Fourteen is the right age to bed with a man. And time? It is not so young, neither. Six weeks married; it is time enough!’

  ‘Yet still be patient; time is on your side!’ Margaret said and prayed that her words prove true.

  Time is young… time is on your side. But time went by and things grew no better. The King was kind—when he remembered her existence; behind his kindness she sensed his indifference. She was ready to love him—if he would let her. But she saw him at board only—and then his face was turned from her to Gaveston; in bed she saw him not at all. It was that she found hardest to forgive. He shamed her not only as a Queen but as a woman.

  Madam Queen Margaret spoke to him on the matter.

  ‘Sir,’ she said; and then, ‘Son; things are not good between you and my niece. Oh you are kind enough—when you remember! But my niece should receive from you more than kindness. She’s your wife.’

  ‘A child!’ He shrugged.

  ‘She’s no child. At fourteen many a girl’s a full woman. She’s a Capet—and in us passions run high. And she is, besides, of Navarre; there girls ripen early and blood runs hot. Your wife is a full woman; you may believe it!’

  He threw out his hands in rejection. The idea of bedding with a woman was at no time pleasing; but to bed with so young a girl, to teach her the business of marriage! The thing repelled him. He could not do it.

  ‘You have hurt her pride. She has been well-taught her duty and is ready; the more so that she sees others as young as herself not only wedded but bedded. You shame her in her own eyes and in the eyes of her father; he’ll not take it kindly. Well, by God’s grace it is not too late. All this time she has asked nothing but to give herself; and, believe me, she has very much to give. But, mark it, son; hers is not a nature to standstill. If you do not take her now she is hot, she’ll grow cold. Go to her; show yourself man to woman! Let her grow cold and she’ll turn against you. And then, I know her nature and her stock—you had best beware!’

  ‘You make too much of the matter. I tell you the girl’s too young!’

  ‘It is not my niece you consider in this. You do not want her or any woman. Your heart’s elsewhere…’

  He swallowed in his throat. ‘If you mean Piers, then say so!’

  ‘I do mean… Piers.’ Her mouth was distasteful about the name.

  ‘You cannot divide us!’ He was suddenly passionate with hot Plantagenet anger, ‘We are one.’

  ‘Then,’ she said, ‘I cannot think which of you three I pity most. I think it is you, my son.’

  IV

  Preparations for the crowning were going on apace; Gaveston had complete charge. In the short time she had been in Westminster she had not only seen enough of Gaveston, she had heard more; more than enough. They were saying everywhere that the King was mad to entrust any sort of ceremony to him, let alone a crowning. They were saying that Gaveston looked to make a pretty penny out of the affair. They were saying another thing too—that the best part of the wedding-gifts, not the King’s alone but her own, too, had already come into his hands. That her father’s gifts to the King should be lightly handed over to another she found hard to believe; that her own personal possessions should be given away—and no word to herself—that she found incredible.

  She began to use her eyes. The great S. chain her father had given the groom she saw adorning Gaveston; he wore—her father’s gift also—the gold clasp of fleur-de-lys. That she had coveted for herself but had not dared to ask; now here it was fastening Gaveston’s cloak.

  ‘You wear our lilies, my lord?’ she asked cold as snow.

  ‘I love whatever comes out of France, Madam!’ he said, very quick, and raked her head to foot with that long impertinent stare.

  She turned a furious back upon him. She went straight to her rooms to demand her jewel-casket. When she unlocked it with shaking fingers she found it half empty.

  ‘My lord King had the keys of me,’ Madam de St. Pierre said, distressed. ‘It is but two days or three. It was wise, he said; women are careless with keys.’

  She went storming into the King’s closet; Piers was there, elegantly lounging.

  ‘Sir!’ she cried out and in her anger did not wait for his nod nor go down upon her curtsey.

  ‘Madam the Queen forgets her devoir to the King,’ Piers said, insolent.

  Of him she took no notice. ‘Sir,’ she cried out again, ‘some thief has been at my jewels.’

  ‘Then you had best question your household.’

  ‘Sir, I have. I am told, that you, sir, took the keys.’

  ‘Why so I did; and returned them again. But that is not in question. I am no thief, Madam, since what is yours is mine; and what is mine I do with as I choose.’

  She saw the small smile lift Gaveston’s lips; he put up a hand as if to hide it; and there upon the little finger shone the great ruby ring—her mother’s parting gift. He saw her whiten. He said, bowing, ‘I told you, Madam, I love all things that come out of France.’

  His smiling, his false courtesy was the last straw. In that moment, hatred for him was born.

  She turned her back upon them, defying etiquette, she went stumbling upon the long points of her shoes; the long train, also, threatened to trip her, but she gave it no thought. She could not quickly enough reach the shelter of her own chamber. In the solitude of her private closet she put her face into her hands and wept. Her tears surprised her; she did not easily weep. Anger got the better of her tears. She would stay to be insulted no longer. She would write to her father, tell him of the insults they had put upon her—those two; tell also, of the insult put upon himself—that even now his gifts were adorning the favourite. She asked advice of none. Madam de St. Pierre, she knew, would stop her, saying it was unwise for so young a bride to complain thus quickly; and certainly Madam Queen Margaret would say the same. In hot blood the letter was written and despatched before either lady knew of it.

  The first Madam Queen Margaret heard was when the King came storming into her apartments the day the messenger arrived from France.

  ‘A toad, a snake, a wife that knows no loyalty!’

  ‘She is scarce your wife,’ she reminded him.

  ‘Nor shall be until she learns to behave herself!’

  Isabella had done herself little good. She had angered her husband to no purpose. Her father’s remonstrances were politely answered—and there it ended save that a strain had been put upon the friendship between the two Kings; the new precarious friendship. She must learn, she saw now, to go more secretly, more subtly about her business.

  Her anger was no longer a child’s; jealousy and humiliation were turning her, all too soon, into a woman. And it was the more hurtful because she could not look upon her husband’s high and handsome looks, his elegance, his grace, without a quickening in all her blood. Had he meant to torment her with jealousy he could have found no better way.

  One consolation she had. In hatred of Gaveston she was not alone. Save for the King there was not one that did not hate him; and greater even than hatred was scorn. He was a foreigner and his birth humble. Let him declare his birth gentle; what was he but a country squire and poor with it? Compared with the peers of England he was, for all his new earldom no more than the dirt beneath their feet.

  She was beg
inning to learn them—these earls, these barons; beginning to know how to flatter them.

  ‘Henry de Lacy, he’s earl of Lincoln—our premier peer, and of course older than the rest. He’s honest to the core but slow to move!’ Madam Queen Margaret said, not dreaming that her niece was weighing each word for her own use. ‘A kindly man that considers well before he acts.’

  The girl nodded. Show myself patient and gentle and helpless… win his heart for the ill-used little Queen.

  ‘He has no son of his own. His son-in-law Thomas of Lancaster is his heir.’

  And he hates Gaveston. The King’s cousin he may be; but he’s my own uncle, my mother’s brother.

  ‘A man of contradictions,’ Queen Margaret said. ‘He’d like to lead the earls, he’d like to rule the Council; he’d like to rule the King. He can’t wait for his father-in-law to die that he may step into his shoes. He opposes the King in everything good or bad; and the King hates him. He’s an angry man, Thomas of Lancaster, and bitter. The whole world’s his enemy; and the one he hates most, more even than Gaveston, is de Warenne.’

  ‘I dislike him myself; a stupid brute of a man.’

  If I want Lancaster and Lincoln I must keep clear of de Warenne. But never offend him; the pricked bull is dangerous.

  ‘I like Pembroke best,’ Isabella said.

  ‘And may well do so! He’s the pick of the bunch. He has a quickness to think and to understand that most of the others lack. He’s no angel though! Self-seekers all; but he’s the best.’

  ‘Gloucester I find charming.’

  ‘Charming he is; but more than that he’s honest and generous and kind. He takes after his mother—the King hasn’t got over her death yet. Gloucester’s going to be important one day; he’s too young at present, not above sixteen.’

  She was thoughtful leaving her aunt’s chamber. Lincoln, Lancaster, de Warenne, Pembroke and Gloucester—she’d got them clear in her mind. The others—Arundel, Richmond and Hereford—she knew little about them, except that they were the King’s friends; indeed she scarce knew them apart. There remained Warwick; no forgetting him! Sour mouth, shifty eyes and chin like a rock. A man to watch. A clever woman would know how to use him. She was not clever enough yet; she was clever enough to know it.

  To all of them she would show herself sad, brave and ill-used… the gentle little Queen.

  She felt anger growing steadily against the King; and hid her own. The top and bottom of his offending was Gaveston. Gaveston had been recalled against the old, good King’s expressed wish. Gaveston had royal honours heaped upon him. And Gaveston’s tongue had a cutting edge that spared no-one. Their own personal affronts the barons scarcely mentioned; they took a nobler line. The Queen’s dignity had been insulted. She must take second place to the foreign upstart—if any place at all. He wore her jewels, he treated her with an abominable rudeness, he kept the King from her bed. Their resolve went forth. As long as Gaveston remained at court they would not attend the crowning. The King should have a week to consider of the matter.

  Not attend her crowning! She had not meant them to go this far! In after years mightn’t it be forgotten that anger against Gaveston had kept them away? Might it not be put down to some offence within herself?

  Fear sent her flying to her aunt’s chamber; and there she found them both—Gaveston restless with annoyance so that he could neither sit nor stand but must wander fingering this and that; and the King, blue eyes ablaze and the rest of him white and cold… cold as death.

  ‘Let them stay away!’ Gaveston was crying out, his voice thin and shrill. ‘What odds as long as we find a bishop to crown you. What can they add to the business, the loud-mouthed bullies?’

  ‘It is unthinkable they should be absent!’ Madam Queen Margaret said.

  ‘I care not how long we postpone it, I’d liefer have Canterbury do the job; but he’s in Rome. Give him a week and he’ll be back. As for absenting themselves—let them do it till Kingdom come. I’ll give up Piers—never!’

  Isabella stood pale and silent; some inner voice warned her to silence.

  Margaret said, ‘I cannot think it good to put off the crowning, sir. To my mind it’s a bad beginning. Get yourself crowned as soon as may be. This is a trial of strength between you and your lords; to put it off from day to day—that’s no policy at all. No! Meet them friendly, listen to their demands; some demands are best met.’

  ‘They make no demand save that I give up Piers; and that I never do! Send my brother from me? Never!’ And his arm went about Piers’ shoulder.

  ‘There are other complaints,’ Margaret said, ‘and some are just. The debts for instance; and nothing to meet them! That’s scarce your fault—left as you are with debts from your father and his father before him. But you have added to them—considerably. You might,’ and now she spoke slowly, ‘perhaps spend a little less.’ And her eye rested on Piers.

  She saw the King’s jaw go rigid and knew it for anger. She said, ‘If you cannot meet their complaints, tell them it is because time is short, that you can do nothing before the crowning. When you are crowned—and if they come seemly to your crowning—you will listen to their requests.’

  But not grant them! Isabella caught the sly smiling between those two, Piers and the King.

  ‘Sirs,’ the King told his peers assembled, ‘You would slight your King, willing though he is to listen to your demands when this present press of time is over. But, are you willing to slight Madam the Queen that has offended no-one?’

  ‘Sir, we are not!’ Henry of Lincoln spoke for them all, his son-in-law Lancaster adding in a whisper that could not but reach the King, ‘Before God she has slights enough!’

  ‘Sir,’ Lincoln said, ‘we will come to the crowning, we will renew the oath of allegiance. But afterwards let the lord King keep his promise.’

  It was by no means the end of the trouble.

  Edward came striding into his step-mother’s bower: he was bone white, leper-white.

  ‘They dare!’ And the voice choked in his throat. ‘They seek to alter the oath; the oath the King makes at his crowning!’

  Something of this she had heard. She sat quiet above her stitching and let him speak.

  ‘Always the King makes his own promises; in his own words he makes them. It is our custom. But they would bind me with their promises; make me speak their words! Am I less than my father?’ and he screamed in his rage.

  She could have told him; she bit back the words.

  ‘Here, in England, the oath has never been exact—so much is true,’ she said. ‘Now the barons would have it set down, the self-same words handed down from King to King. It is nothing against you…’

  ‘Is it not?’ he cried out, passionate. ‘I’ll take no oath but of my own devising!’

  But they knew both of them he would repeat the oath his lords devised—exactly worded, exactly promised.

  V

  February the twenty-fifth, in the year of grace thirteen hundred and eight, the King and Queen went to their crowning. A grey and sullen day to match the King’s mood; he was coldly, viciously angry. It was for the King to promise, freely to promise; not to repeat, obedient as a child, the words put into his mouth. With this oath they struck at the heart of majesty.

  But for all his sullen anger he looked handsome beyond all men Isabella thought; and she herself, in cloth-of-gold, the mantle lined with ermine matched him well. Gaveston appeared and her good humour broke. He was dressed finer than any prince of them all, finer than the King—the King that was to be crowned. He drew every eye with his fantastic splendour. She shut her eyes against him and his magnificence.

  They had spent the night in the Tower; now they were to ride through London to Westminster to show themselves to the people. Already the King had broken his fast; Isabella caught the wine on his breath. To eat before the sacrament of crowning! So wanton a challenging of God struck at her careless young heart.

  And now the procession was about to start. First cam
e the priests and monks, crosses held high and chanting, leading the princes of the church in gold embroidered copes, jewelled croziers lifted before them. Upon their heels rode the peers of the realm led by Thomas of Lancaster and his brother Henry by right of close kinship to both King and Queen; and between them Henry of Lincoln premier baron of them all. Behind them the Queen’s uncles from France led the foreign princes. Now came the royal family—the princess Elizabeth of Hereford and Mary the nun, followed the King’s half-brothers Thomas of Brotherton and Edmund of Woodstock riding to right and left of their mother. Gallant boys and good to look upon; at the sight of all three a cheer went up, for Margaret the good Queen was well-loved.

  And now, by themselves, the King and Queen. At the sight of those two, so handsome and so young, his weaknesses forgotten, the cheering swelled to a roar. It reaches to the sky, Isabella thought; the whole world is full of joyful sound. Her heart beat high.

  Her joy was all too soon cut short. For there was Gaveston, riding from his place and pressing close to the King—Gaveston handsomer than any man has the right to be, more insolent than any man has the right to be. In that split second she felt the mood of the people change… He will turn all hearts from the King. Angry, a little frightened, she bent her young head, smiled her gracious thanks.

  Through garlanded and be-ribboned streets the slow procession passed; and all the way the sweet of the people’s welcome was spoiled for the Queen by Gaveston; and through the whole of this great day the thought of him came pricking.

  At Westminster the King and Queen alighted and into the palace they went while the procession rearranged itself to enter the abbey. All were in their places when hand-in-hand the King and Queen came forth to walk—according to custom—beneath the blue silk canopy ajingle with bells.

  Within the abbey it was not the peers alone that waited, but their ladies with them. The King had commanded their presence also. It was the first time the wives of peers had been summoned to a crowning; the King had thought of it in one of his gracious moments—a charming gesture to do greater honour to the Queen. And, for this she was ready to forget all slights, to love him again.