Harlot Queen

by Hilda Lewis

  Madam de St. Pierre said nothing. But… She is right, she has suffered too much. Now bitterness darkens the clear mind. Dear God, let it not destroy the good within her, or what shall be the end of this?

  January in the year of grace thirteen hundred and twenty-two, trumpets shrilling, banners flying, the King left Cirencester, a Despenser riding at either hand; at Shrewsbury he crossed the Severn. He must face them, the strong men, the once loyal men that had kept his marches safe. Now, because of those unjust gifts to the Despensers of Welsh land and marcher land, the dispossessed lords and those that feared dispossession, must stand against him—at their head, the Mortimers.

  ‘I do not fear the outcome,’ he had said, bidding the Queen Farewell. ‘The best of my lords are with me. As for these marchers lords, they know what to expect. From Cirencester to Westminster I punished the rebels.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘Yes.’ But they were not there to punish. It was the women and the children you punished, defenceless… ‘All men fear my name.’

  The Mortimers do not fear you. You will never defeat them! And it was of the younger Mortimer she thought.

  At Cirencester she waited for the King’s defeat. His spurt of courage could not last; she prayed it could not last. Once more he was in the hands of evil counsellors; and into those hands he would deliver her also. Wretched the wife that must pray for her husband’s defeat! Yet if he should win she was ruined and all England with her. Victory to the King.

  She sat upright in her chair. Stone-faced she took the news; the unbelievable news.

  Now I face a life of endless insult. For even should the paramour die—and why should he, being young and strong?—the King being the thing he is, there’ll always be another till he lies in his grave.

  Till he lies in his grave. The second time the thought, the thought unbidden. The first time she had considered his death as an event to be desired but an event in the nature of things, not to be reckoned a possibility as yet; and it had gone as soon as come. Now she considered it again. No hope of it. He was young, he was strong; and in battle he kept from danger. She put the thought from her without pleasure or regret.

  Within a few days she had the whole story.

  The marcher lords had submitted without a fight; they could do no other.

  ‘And, Madam,’ the messenger said, ‘the lord Lancaster did not send the men he promised. The rebels had not the men and so they must submit. And now, since God gave the victory, the Mortimers are taken prisoner, they and the rest of the rebel lords.’

  She sat very stiff making her mouth to smile; she remembered to thank the messenger, even to reward him. When he had gone she set to pacing the room… up and down, up and down, as though she would never rest again. For the first time she thought not of herself, but of the Mortimers; of one Mortimer.

  He was in prison—if not already dead… She stopped transfixed by a thought; it was as though an arrow had pierced her to the heart.

  The fault is mine; as much as any man’s, mine. I demanded punishment for the Badlesmeres—the thrice-damned Badlesmeres, forever pricked the King to my revenge. Through me the rebel lords returned. But for me he could not have fought, nor the Mortimers been taken. The fault is mine… mine…

  The Mortimers were in the Tower.

  The Queen nodded, indifferent, it would seem; but against the bony cavern of her skull the thoughts went beating. Almost she put up a hand to stop them.

  The Tower; most dreadful of prisons. I sent him there…

  She longed with passion to save him. It was not love that drove her, nor even any affection for the man. To help him was her responsibility and her need. Such responsibility, such need, she had never known before. In this dangerous court, all need had been for herself. Now she must help another’s need. How she did not know. She knew one thing, only. She must show no interest, ask no question.

  No need for either. The messengers told her all—the black and stinking cell, the cold, the damp, the near starvation; the certainty of a shameful death—like the lowest felon hanged, drawn and quartered. Revenge was sweet to the King, so much was clear; revenge for that long-ago jealousy because of that love between the oldest and the youngest palace boy—Gaveston and Mortimer.

  No longer did she pity herself alone; her pity was equal for him—for the proud, strong man shut from the light of day within a cruel prison. Death, so it were not shameful, she knew he could face; he was a soldier. But a death of shame following upon a sapping of strength of hope she did not think any man could endure. Pity and guilt bound her to him like a cord.

  He was forever in her mind, forever in her dreams. She saw him clear as though he stood before her—thickset and strong; pale eyes wary and cold, mouth brutal, sensual. Sometimes, half-awake, she would wonder what it must be like to feel that mouth coming down upon her own and, so wondering, feel her body open to desire. Then, finally awake, she would remember that without her help, his mouth would never touch a woman again. Sleepless she would lie there scheming, planning, rejecting her plans, making others. And never once did she think of Mortimer’s wife that had been her friend. The thing was between Mortimer and the Queen.

  The King turned his back on Shrewsbury; he had punished it well. Through the winter weather he was marching; marching triumphant, for Hereford. Success to his arms, success everywhere. The fall of the Mortimers had struck fear into the hearts of rebels everywhere. Castles and towns had fallen to the King; and those that had held them he punished with death. Triumphant he put from their places sheriffs and judges he did not trust and set his friends in their stead.

  He had publicly upbraided the bishop of Hereford, Adam Orleton.

  The Queen permitted herself a small and secret smile.

  Would he never learn discretion this foolish King; which man he might safely humiliate and which it was wise to let go in peace? This bishop was one to be handled with care. The King had been lenient to stop at words; wiser to have made an end of him altogether—the bishop was a Mortimer man, hand-in-glove with them. But to humiliate this proud bishop of unchristian spirit, to humiliate him before his own flock! It was a thing Orleton would never forgive, never forget!

  Her mind took a sudden leap.

  This bishop devoted to the house of Mortimer, shamed and full of rancour; a tool, a tool in my hand… if I can find the way to use him.

  And still victory for the King, victory all the way. Every day brought more rebels in to his banner; and the Despensers, with every fault, were able men. The elder kept a careful eye upon men, upon arms, upon horses and provisions; the younger upon plans and strategies. Upon the King’s success hung their lives.

  And what of Lancaster? Back once more in Westminster the Queen must pray for his success; not for her own sake but for Mortimer’s. Lancaster in arms could save him; Lancaster alone.

  The King was once more on the march. Lancaster made no move. From him, shut in Pontefract, no sign.

  Why? Why? It was not the Queen alone that asked.

  ‘He cannot fight. He has lost the best part of his friends!’ the older Despenser said.

  ‘He has lost more than friends. He’s lost his wits and his nerve!’ And the younger Despenser laughed.

  Let him move dear God before it is too late! the Queen prayed, desperate for Mortimer.

  Lancaster was marching at last; at Burton-on-Trent he halted. His forces were small but sufficient to keep the bridge. The King should come no further!

  The King had reached Burton. Hated Lancaster held the bridge. Before him flowed the wide, deep Trent. He could go no further. His men were many, Lancaster’s few; but for all that, he could not force the Bridge. Again and again his men attempted the task. Some were shot and, swimming, threw up their arms and drowned; some in boats, weighed down by their gear, sank like stones; others that managed to reach the bridge fell twisting and spinning to their death.

  Lancaster, triumphant, looked across the river pearl-pale in the early morning light. Most of the King’s
forces had withdrawn, those that were left were making no further attempt; it looked, indeed, as though they were striking camp.

  ‘He has run away as usual, the brave King!’ Lancaster said and laughed.

  The King and the best part of his forces had indeed gone. Under cover of night they had slipped further down the bank where the river ran shallow and was easily forded.

  Lancaster had laughed too soon. Even while he laughed the King was attacking from the north; and those apparently idle men were suddenly seen to be full-armed. Lancaster’s men were surrounded, forced from the bridgehead. Where all had been calm confidence there was confusion and panic. When the men turned to their leader for orders, there was none to answer. Lancaster, great Lancaster had fled the field.

  The Queen put out a hand to steady herself. Lancaster defeated. Lancaster! Now she must smile, offer public thanksgiving, grace the feast. She alone, in the midst of the rejoicings careful lest in some way she betray her grief.

  At Pontefract Lancaster would have made a stand—so much of valour he had left; but yet more of his captains had deserted, confidence in him was gone. Northwards he fled, the remnant of his forces with him; and northwards followed the King’s armies relentless in pursuit. It was March before they came up with him: at Boroughbridge he must turn and face them. Southward he could not go; young Kent and de Warenne that grim enemy, blocked the way. Northward he could not go—the King’s northern armies cut him off.

  A fierce and bloody battle. Lancaster’s sparse forces suffered cruelly. Here young Hereford died and Clifford fell so severely wounded he could not drag himself to his knees. And now the very men refused; what use to fight against such odds? Lancaster, himself, would have fought to the death—a better death than he must suffer if taken; but his captains for the most part dead or taken, and the men refusing, he must ask for truce until morning.

  Come morning-light the most part of his men had deserted. And there was the sheriff of York to take his prisoners—Lancaster, Mowbray, wounded Clifford and many others. And to Pontefract they were carried; to Pontefract, Lancaster’s proud castle.

  Again the Queen must take the news with a joyful face. Now she could hope no longer. The end for Lancaster. And, save for her own wits, the end for Mortimer.

  The King had chosen Pontefract for judgment—a streak of cruelty, the Queen thought, a refinement of torture. He did not mean to spare Lancaster anything; long and long he had nursed his anger against the murderer of Gaveston.

  There was no trial. The King himself recited the tale of treason. Lancaster wanted to speak—and was not allowed to speak; there was too much he might have said. The death sentence was spoken—and not one of the seven judges raised a voice to claim the prisoner’s right to speak. You are condemned, he was told; the words of the condemned are of no profit.

  Isabella heard the full story, the messenger kneeling before her; and sickened. Refinement of torture she had expected; but brutality crude and vulgar—that she had not expected of the King.

  ‘The judgment was no sooner spoken, Madam, when they led him to his death; they feared he would still speak those things better not to hear. They set him upon a broken-down jade; white she was with age and the ribs sticking out beneath her skin, and so low she was the man’s feet dragged in the dust…

  And when she rebuked him that he had omitted the great titles, the messenger said, ‘Madam, it is forbidden. The lord King has sequestered titles and lands. And, Madam, as he sat, the crowd laughed…’

  Laughed at great Lancaster! She was ashamed; ashamed for the King. He could have taken full payment without so shaming Lancaster, so shaming himself. He should have remembered that Lancaster was a great prince, his blood as royal as the King’s own. He should have remembered that, in his time, Lancaster had done the King some service. She felt anger sharp as pain, bitter as poison.

  ‘Madam, they came to the place of execution. He would have knelt to pray… but it was not allowed.’

  Denying the dying man his last prayer! Of all vile things, this was surely the vilest! For the first time she was pricked with hatred for the King.

  ‘He has long and long enough to consider his sins! the lord King cried out. And then the headsman—and God knows where he learned his trade!—made three false strokes or four and ended life and prayer together. And, Madam, as the axe fell, the lord King, so I am told, was heard to say, The measure you yourself measure out shall be measured to you again.’

  Pray God it be so! Startled she heard her thought clear.

  ‘What, Madam, did my father mean?’ Young Edward plucked at her sleeve. She had forgotten he was there; now he stood staring with wondering eyes.

  ‘That, my son, is hard to say.’

  ‘And so my uncle of Lancaster is dead.’

  ‘He is; God rest his soul.’

  ‘Was he a bad man?’

  ‘Your father thinks so. But each must judge for himself. When you are older you, also, will judge.’

  ‘All that offend against the King, must die!’ he said.

  She stared at him, so young and so certain. Years later she was to remember his words.

  XXIV

  End of Thomas, royal Lancaster, earl of Lancaster, of Leicester, of Derby, of Lincoln and Salisbury. Dead in his middle years, honour and honours alike forfeit, his blood, only, saving him from the shameful rope.

  The Queen wept; but not too much—he had failed her. Tears, were she one to weep, must be for herself condemned to enduring insult from the Despensers; tears, too, for Mortimer in the dark cell awaiting death. Lancaster’s death was Mortimer’s death; in the pressure of events she must keep her eyes clear of tears.

  The Despensers were riding higher, higher; lords as well as commons heard the whistle of their whip. The King allowed it all—and not only because he was besotted with his sweetheart; those two gave him, the flattery, the assurance he longed to hear. They would make him absolute—they swore it; but it was not the weak and wilful King they meant to make absolute.

  Maytime, in the year of grace thirteen hundred and twenty-two. Lancaster had been dead six weeks and already the country regretted him. Forgetful of his sullen selfishness, they remembered only his hatred of the Despensers and the way he had stood out against the King. From all over England men and women—simple folk for the most part—were making pilgrimages to his burying-place. They were offering prayers before the high altar at Pontefract where the monks had hurriedly buried him before the King could stop them; prayers and thanksgiving. They were spreading the legend of miracles worked at the tomb. To simple folk Thomas of Lancaster bade fair to become a saint. The King, for all his anger, could not stop it; and in her chamber the Queen smiled her secret smile. Uncle Thomas dead, looked to be more useful than Uncle Thomas alive. Alive he had stood out against the Despensers; he stood so still, with all the added moral force of the martyred dead. The people were discontented, discontented and disappointed. Had they hoped for anything? This new Parliament, she thought, must show how vain the hope… It jumps to the crack of the Despensers’ whip. No single reform, no single thought for the welfare of the people. Nothing but obedience to the demands of the King, which are the demands of the Despensers…

  Herself, she had expected little enough, God knew! But even she could scarce believe that Parliament had repudiated the Ordinances.

  All things ordained by the Lords Ordainers shall henceforth and forever cease. The laws and statutes made by our lord the King and his ancestors shall remain in force.

  The Ordinances cast aside! The thing for which the barons had fought and bled and died. The safeguard of the people. The King digs his own grave! She heard the thought as clear as though she spoke aloud.

  The King’s death. Again the thought; for the third time the thought. It shocked her no longer. As long as he kept the Despensers about him, so long he built up hatred against himself. And where might not such hatred end?

  It was not, at first, the repeal of the Ordinances that angered the people;
such news takes time to be fully understood. It was the immediate shock of the gallows springing up all over the land, hung with foul fruit—fruit the people could see for themselves, smell for themselves—obscene orchards to feed their bitter anger. For the King had shown himself merciless. His rebel lords he had hanged—as many as he could lay hands upon. But they, at least, had been the leaders, and they had escaped the full sentence—the drawing of their entrails while yet they lived. Common folk that must obey their betters did not escape so lightly; everywhere from tree and gallows men hung gutless.

  ‘Cruelty grows in the King like a sickness,’ Isabella told Madam de St. Pierre. ‘I sicken at the sight of men dangling. In one hanging alone I take my pleasure. Badlesmere dangles from his rope; would to God that his shrew dangled with him!’

  Her own fierce demand for punishment of those that had offended against her, Théophania thought, should warn the Queen of that same cruelty like a sickness within herself.

  ‘But God be praised, many have escaped to France!’ and Isabella sighed to think of the prisoner that had not escaped. ‘France where I would give much to be! Would God I might escape, awhile, from my own griefs and those of this unhappy land!’

  And unhappy the land was! Cruel in punishment the King was madly lavish in reward; the Despensers, indeed, did not wait for reward—they rewarded themselves. Their estates and revenues were swollen with wealth sequestered from their victims; their strong rooms could not hold the half of their ever-growing treasure, nor their dungeons the half of their prisoners. The elder Despenser was my lord earl of Winchester now; but the younger, though he had honours enough, was not earl of Gloucester.