Mathild 03 - The Darkening Glass

by Paul Doherty

  ‘I’m truly trapped, Mathilde. The case presses hard against me.’

  ‘You are, my lord, God save you. You must expect no pardon. What can I do for you?’

  Gaveston took a deep breath, still clutching my hand like a frightened child. He gave me messages for friends at court, his love for his wife Margaret de Clare and their infant daughter, his profound contrition for all or any offences against them. He fought to control his voice.

  ‘Tell my brother the king,’ he whispered, ‘that in death, as in life, I am, was and always shall be his sole comrade.’ He paused to weep quietly, then he wiped his eyes on the back of his hand and mentioned other people. His voice eventually faltered. He asked me for a set of Ave beads. I gave him my own, which he clumsily put round his neck.

  ‘And the Beaumonts?’ I asked. ‘You did not mention them!’

  Gaveston smiled, recalling the glory of the handsome courtier who had first dazzled me some four years earlier.

  ‘Give those sweet cousins my warmest wishes. Tell them I did not hurt their interests in Scotland, their precious estates.’

  I grasped the opportunity. ‘What mischief?’ I asked, squeezing his hands. ‘What mischief was planned in Scotland?’

  Gaveston just shook his head.

  ‘And my mistress, her grace the queen, you have not mentioned her.’

  ‘More subtle than a serpent.’ Gaveston echoed Rosselin’s words. When I pressed him to explain, he would say no more.

  ‘And the Aquilae, your squires, all dead. My lord, did you have a hand in that?’

  ‘Of course. I let them fly high, only to fall like Lucifer – all of them, never to rise again.’

  ‘But did you have a hand in their deaths?’

  ‘Yes and no.’ Again Gaveston refused to be drawn, saying that these were matters for the mercy seat and the shriving of a priest. He grew agitated and leaned forward in a rattle of chains. ‘Mathilde, you’ll stay with me? I mean to the end. I do not want to be alone. Please?’

  I was about to refuse, to barter for what he might still be able to tell me.

  ‘Please?’ His grip grew tighter. ‘Make sure my corpse is not treated like that of a crushed dog.’

  I promised. Gaveston was still not reconciled to death. Now and again he would return to the king, wondering if royal forces were approaching Warwick Castle. I doused such false hopes; to encourage them would have been cruelty itself. Gaveston heard me out, eyes closed, then returned to his reminiscing, recalling past glories, until a harsh rattling at the door made him fall silent. A Dominican from the nearby priory was ushered in. Warwick’s henchmen introduced him as Brother Alexander.

  ‘I have come to shrive you, my lord.’ Alexander was a stout, cheery-faced friar who refused to be cowed by either circumstance or surroundings.

  I prised my hand loose from Gaveston, rose from the stool and offered it to the Dominican. He gently asked me to withdraw, as well as the others. He must have caught my suspicion, because he fished into his wallet and produced a warrant from the prior of his house, countersigned by the Earl of Warwick, giving him licence to shrive the prisoner. I studied this, handed it back and nodded in agreement. Gaveston just crouched, fingers to his lips, a look of stark recognition in his eyes. He was going to die, and no one would save him! I could not bear that stricken look. I gestured to Brother Alexander and walked to the door; the guards ushered me out, then locked and bolted it. I meant to return to my own chamber, but the captain of Warwick’s guard made me stay.

  ‘It’s best, mistress. My lord says you must stay here until this business is finished.’

  An hour must have passed before Brother Alexander knocked for the door to be opened. Outside he grasped me by the elbow and led me away towards the main gate to the bailey.

  ‘Stay with him, mistress.’ He peered at me through the gloom. ‘Lord Gaveston has done such evil, plotted such malice.’ He paused. ‘I cannot tell you what is covered by the seal of the sacrament, but he said something strange. How you had saved him from the deepest sin.’

  I could only stare back, as mystified as he was. I returned to Gaveston. He realised death was imminent and had fallen to his prayers, asking me to join him as he recited his Aves. A short while later they came for him: Welsh archers from Lancaster’s retinue; tough, resolute men, faces bearded, their heads cowled, all stinking of leather and sweat. They strode into the death house, dragged Gaveston to his feet and unceremoniously pushed him out into the bailey, where the earls, led by Lancaster, were already horsed, hooded and cloaked against the early-morning cold. The hooves of their great destriers sparked the cobbles as if these beasts were aware of the bloody, grim business being planned. Lancaster and the rest looked like spectres from the halls of the dead, high in the saddle, black shadows against the brightening sky. Lancaster pushed his horse forward, his pinched, pale features peering from the deep cowl.

  ‘Gascon,’ his voice was filled with hate, ‘come now, come now, your fate is decided.’

  Gaveston ignored him. He stared up at the reddish glow lightening the sky. He fumbled with his chains and turned towards me.

  ‘A witch once prophesied,’ he hissed, ‘that I would die at the waking hour.’

  ‘Come,’ Lancaster repeated.

  The horsemen drew away. The guard of Welsh archers closed in around us and we left through the gatehouse, down the steep path, the trees and bushes on either side silent witness to what was happening. No retainers massed, preparing to throw filth; no jeering crowd. The earls had decided that if this was to be done it had to be done swiftly. We did not leave through the town but along a rutted alleyway snaking like a rabbit run under the overhanging houses. Signs creaked in the breeze. The rattle of horses’ hooves carried like some sombre drumbeat. If anyone heard, no one dared show it. Windows remained blackened, shutters fast shut. No door opened. No tired voice asked what evil was being plotted at such an early hour. The occasional darting shadow made me jump as a cat fled for shelter. The mournful howls of a dog echoed through the harsh calls of crows disturbed from their plundering on the midden heaps. No beggar whined for alms. No one dared approach these great ones hurrying another to summary execution.

  The smell of saltpetre and ordure grew less offensive as we reached the end of the alleyway and emerged on to a winding country lane. I was sweaty and breathless. Gaveston stumbled, only to be cruelly pulled up and hurried on. Now free of the houses, I glanced around. In the strengthening light, I glimpsed a steep wooded hill. One of the archers breathed the name ‘Blacklow’, and I gathered that this was where Gaveston’s soul would be dispatched to God. We left the track-way, going through a half-open gate. The horsemen reined in. Lancaster lifted a hand and pointed to the line of trees.

  ‘Take him – now!’

  Gaveston was given no time to object. He was bundled forward by three of the archers. I was breathless, tired and eager for rest. Gaveston turned, face pallid as a ghost through the murk.

  ‘Mathilde,’ he hissed, ‘please!’

  I followed the archers as they pushed their prisoner forward in a clatter of chains. He turned once more to ensure I followed. We entered the line of trees, a sombre, desolate place. No bird sang. Nothing rustled in the undergrowth, as if all God’s creatures sensed what was being planned. I glanced back. The earls still sat on their horses like a host of demons, watching, silent, hungry for this man’s death, eager to see his hot blood splash.

  ‘Far enough,’ one of the archers breathlessly announced. He dragged Gaveston to the ground. The prisoner crouched, praying loudly, frantically trying to recall lines from the Office for the Dead.

  ‘Mistress?’ The archer approached me. ‘You need not stay any longer.’

  ‘I know Ap Ythel,’ I whispered, ‘captain of the king’s archers.’

  ‘Ap Ythel.’ The man seemed to forget why he was here. ‘Now there’s a great archer, a true soul.’ He lapsed into Welsh.

  I replied haltingly with the few words and phrases Ap Ythel had
taught me.

  ‘Mistress?’ The archer whispered.

  I opened my purse, took out three silver pieces and gave them to him.

  ‘Let it be swift,’ I said. ‘Let him not see it.’

  The archer pocketed the silver pieces and sauntered back to Gaveston. I glanced around. I can still recall it. That haunted wood. The sky brightening through the black outline of the trees. Ghostly figures. The archers in their hoods. The creak of leather. The glint of weapons. The pervasive stench of drenched rotting undergrowth, and those horsemen silent, sombre, waiting even as Gaveston gasped out his final Vespers.

  ‘My lord,’ the archer’s voice sounded like the clap of doom, ‘you must stand up.’

  ‘So I must.’ Gaveston struggled to his feet and tapped himself under the chin. ‘Are you, sir, going to remove my head? I’m far too beautiful for that.’

  ‘True, my lord.’ The archer stretched out his hand. ‘Let me clasp yours before you go.’

  Gaveston did so. The archer moved swiftly, a blur of movement. He had secretly drawn his long stabbing dagger. Now he pulled Gaveston towards him as if to embrace him, and plunged the blade deep into his heart. Even I, who had begged for such a swift ending, was surprised. Gaveston stood, then crouched, falling back. The archer hurriedly caught him, withdrawing his dagger even as he lowered Gaveston tenderly to the ground. I went and knelt beside the stricken man. Already his eyes were clouding in death; blood was bubbling through his nose and mouth. He turned slightly, coughing, and tried to mouth the word ‘Edward’. His fingers fluttered; I grasped them. Gaveston stared hard at me, then he shuddered and fell back.

  ‘He is dead!’ the archer announced. ‘Mistress, I beg you, walk away.’ One of the other archers had produced a two-headed axe, which he’d kept in a sack. I stumbled away and stared at those horsemen, vengeful wraiths. I heard the archers whisper, followed by the rattle of chains. Gaveston’s body was straightened out, his neck positioned on a fallen tree trunk.

  ‘Now,’ the archer murmured hoarsely.

  I heard the rasp of leather, then a chilling thud. I took a deep breath and turned. Gaveston’s body, slightly jerking, lay sprawled on the ground. A little distance away was the head, the eyes half closed, the lips of the blood-encrusted mouth slightly parted. The archer picked the head up between his two hands, careful of the blood spilling out. He carried it before him, stepped past me, out of the line of trees, and held it up so that the horsemen could see. One of these, probably Lancaster, raised his hand. The archer turned, took the severed head back and gently placed it beside the trunk of the body, now swimming in blood.

  ‘Come, mistress.’ The archer seized my arm. ‘Come now, leave him here.’

  ‘I cannot,’ I whispered. I felt cold and frightened. I found it difficult to breathe; my stomach clenched. The archers talked to each other in Welsh. One produced a small wineskin, unstoppered it and forced it between my lips, making me take a gulp, then he stood back.

  ‘Mistress,’ he whispered, ‘you cannot stay here, not in the shadows.’

  ‘I have to,’ I replied. ‘I promised.’

  The archers talked amongst themselves, shrugged and bade me farewell. They left the trees, walking leisurely back to the waiting horsemen. The earls and their retinue departed. I just crouched, watching them go, wiping the sweat from both brow and cheeks. I found it difficult to move; even more so to turn and look at the horror awaiting me. The darkness faded. The sun began to rise. I stretched out on the grass, turning on my side as if I was in bed like a child, trying to control my breathing. The woods remained silent. Eventually I felt composed enough. I rose and walked back to Gaveston’s battered corpse. The blood was beginning to dry. The severed head had tipped slightly, the skin now turning a dullish grey. I moved it gently, trying not to look at those half-closed eyes. The skin was clammy cold. I had to repeat to myself that the essence of Gaveston, his soul, his spirit, had long gone to God. These were simply his mortal remains, to be treated with as much dignity as I could muster. I felt determined; I refused to be cowed by Lancaster’s brutality.

  I walked out of the wood and down to the road, where I begged for help. Eventually four shoemakers bringing their goods into Warwick agreed for a silver piece to help me. They stopped their cart, took off a ladder and followed me back into the wood. God bless them! They were sturdy men. They asked few questions, but simply put the corpse on the ladder, the head wrapped in a sack beside it, and loaded the remains on to their cart. I persuaded them to make the short journey to Warwick Castle, where I demanded entrance. Warwick himself came down, dressed in half-armour, a goblet of wine in his hand. He walked out, refusing to even glance at the grisly burden resting in the cart.

  ‘Mistress Mathilde. You cannot stay here. You cannot bring him here. This business is finished.’ He turned and walked back into the gatehouse even as I screamed abuse at him, begging him for the love of God and His Beloved Mother to show some pity for the dead.

  ‘Mistress,’ one of the shoemakers whispered, ‘we have done what we can; it is best if we take him back from where he came.’

  They turned the cart round despite my protest. We were about to leave, go back through that alleyway Gaveston had been marched along to execution, when I heard my name called. I turned. Brother Alexander, dressed in his black and white robes, stood at the corner of a street; behind him was a cart driven by lay brothers from his house. The Dominican walked over, his face all smiles.

  ‘Mistress Mathilde, Mistress Mathilde.’

  He helped me down from the shoemakers’ cart, and for a while just stood holding my hands, lips moving as he quietly recited the requiem.

  ‘My lord Gaveston’s corpse.’ He gestured at the cart. ‘You have it there. Mistress, you’ve kept your promise. You fulfilled your vow. We will now take it.’

  I could not object. What could I do? Brother Alexander called across to his colleagues. Gaveston’s remains were transferred from the shoemakers to the Dominicans. The friar turned to me, lifted his hand, sketched a blessing in the air, then left. I watched the cart rattle away.

  Brother Alexander was true to his word. The Dominicans, God bless them, took Gaveston’s mortal remains to their house at Oxford. Here they were washed, embalmed and rubbed with balsam, the head stitched back with silver twine, and placed in an open casket. If I remember correctly, it was two years before the king finally agreed to the burial of the embalmed corpse of the man he loved ‘beyond all others’.

  Chapter 10

  By God’s soul, he acted like a fool!

  I returned to Warwick Castle but was not allowed entry. A kindly chamberlain agreed to go to my chamber above the hall and brought down all my belongings. He even gave me a linen parcel of food and a small wineskin. I thanked him and took lodgings in a spacious tavern in the town. I used the gold and silver pieces stitched into a secret pocket on my belt to hire a well-furnished chamber. I also went out into the marketplace and bought some new clothes, for I felt dirty, soiled, polluted by what I’d seen. I returned to my chamber, stripped, washed, anointed my body and dressed.

  Afterwards I took my old clothing in a bundle down to a beggar at the corner of an alleyway and thrust it into her hands. I stayed at the tavern three days, resting and eating. I gave the tavern master a coin to advise me who was staying there and where they were going. On the fourth day I met a group of wool merchants travelling to York; they kindly agreed that I could join their company.

  Three days later I reached York and made my way to the Franciscan house. Father Prior made me welcome but assured me that the court, both king and queen, had now moved to the more grand furnishings of St Mary’s Abbey, though I was most welcome to stay in their guest house. Master Bertrand Demontaigu had also visited but was now absent on business elsewhere. The prior added that he was surprised at Demontaigu’s requests but had conceded to them in the hope that the mysterious deaths that had occurred in his friary church could be resolved. God bless those friars: they welcomed me as if I wa
s their sister. I was given the most comfortable chamber and savoury food. The following morning Demontaigu returned.

  We met in the same rose garden where Lanercost and all the other Aquilae had sprawled laughing and drinking when we brought the news about the massacre out on the moors. Now it seemed a lifetime away. The garden was silent, heavy with summer fragrance, a change from the stark bleakness of Scarborough, that horrid line of trees on Blacklow Hill, Gaveston’s corpse saturated in its own blood, the severed head of a once splendid earl lying in the undergrowth like a piece of pork on a flesher’s stall. I confided in Bertrand all the fears haunting my soul, the images and dreams, the phantasms and nightmares that plagued my mind. Bertrand sat on the turf seat beside me, clutching my hand, watching my face, very much like the confessor he was. Once I’d finished, he informed me of how the king was distraught at his favourite’s death yet strangely unwilling to move against the assassins of his beloved brother Gaveston. Rumours, Demontaigu confided, were flying as thick and fast as feathers in a hen coop.

  ‘God knows, Mathilde,’ he declared, ‘perhaps the king is secretly relieved that Gaveston is gone.’

  Demontaigu then referred to other matters I’d asked him to investigate on his return to York. What he told me simply confirmed my own suspicions. He had visited the friary library and, much to the prior’s surprise, had taken the ‘man of straw’, as he put it, dressed in clothes, up to that lonely haunted belfry. He laughingly described what had then ensued, and as if in gentle mockery of his words, the great bells began to toll the call to Vespers. Demontaigu waited until they’d stopped.

  ‘You know the truth, Mathilde. Will you not tell me?’

  ‘Soon.’ I gently touched him on the cheek. ‘Soon I will, when these things done in the dark have been brought to light. Eventually they will, but in the meantime, Bertrand, for your sake and that of my mistress, it is best if silence is observed. Gaveston’s death has achieved little except to define where everyone stands. The pieces have moved on the chess board and they’ll move again. A period of calm will ensue,’ I murmured, ‘until the furies gather once more. In the meantime, I follow my mistress’ advice: video atque taceo – I watch and stay silent.’