MY FAIR LADY: A Story of Eleanor of Provence, Henry III's Lost Queen

by J. P. Reedman

  “Enough!” I said, attempting to assert my authority. How this man unnerved me!

  De Montfort bowed; he was standing so close I could smell the dust on his garb, the faint scent of sweat and horses. “I will do my best, Madame,” he said, and his eyes were locked with mine, unflinching, mesmerising as a serpent’s unwavering stare. Was that how the Serpent in the Garden stared at Eve? “I just pray the result will be to your liking.” He gave a deep chuckle as if at a private joke.

  And then he was gone, leaving me leaning against the castle wall, surrounded by the tender May time flowers, breathing heavily as if I had just run a race. A race indeed. But had I won or lost?

  Simon de Montfort did as he promised. Most of the barons despised the Lusignans as much as I did. In Oxford, during the sitting of parliament, they voted almost unanimously to seize the Lusignans’ lands and castles. When Guy, one of the King’s half-brothers sprang up to protest, Simon faced him down with a threat, “Yield your castles or you will all lose your heads!”

  The Lusignans fled for the nearest port, even Bishop Aymer…

  But what a hollow victory for me. De Montfort had more on his mind than expelling the Lusignans. Once they were dealt with, he proceeded to establish a new council filled with his own cronies. An Act called the Oxford Provisions was passed and Henry, Edward, Uncle Peter and me were all compelled to swear that we would abide by this Act (Richard was abroad in Germany and escaped, while his son pleaded that he was too young to swear). The Provisions stated that Henry must bring any matter of import to the council before it could be acted upon; essentially, it made the King a figurehead and nothing more. Once again, the spectre of Henry’s father John rose before us all, defeated as a ruler, inept, bound by the terms of the Great Charter forced on him by his barons.

  The strictures on King John had brought war…What would the Provisions of Oxford bring?

  As de Montfort departed the hall of Oxford castle, he passed in front of my seat, smug, swaggering, wearing garments as rich as any king’s. Our eyes met briefly; I broke eye contact first, calling upon my ladies in waiting to attend me. Simon smirked. I detested him in that moment. And feared him more than any man living. And to think at one time I had begun to warm towards him. Now he chilled my blood.

  Earl Simon was hardly foremost in my mind, however. Edward was a greater problem. He was furious at the loss of his Lusignan uncles and shouted at me for wanting them out of the country. But it was more complex that a tantrum over losing his ill-mannered kin. He also had a close friendship de Montfort’s two sons, his cousins through their mother Nell, and they held much influence over him. Whilst he was angered that he had been forced to swear to uphold the Provisions of Oxford, he noisily exclaimed that he agreed with many of the barons’ concerns. This was tantamount to speaking against his father’s rule—a dangerous, inflammatory situation.

  I decided to smooth things over, to make certain Edward’s friends were not of equally baneful influence to the exiled Lusignan lords. My son was a prince; he could not be permitted to fall under de Montfort’s unwholesome spell and maybe be urged by unscrupulous men to rise against his father.

  Urgently, I called him before me at Windsor.

  He procrastinated…but then sent a message. He would come.

  Edward arrived, scowling, still wearing the stained clothes from his morning’s hawking foray in the Great Park, possibly to show that he disregarded my opinions, that he found his entertainments more important than my concerns. “Is it an emergency, mother?” he snapped in clipped tones. “I was…busy. I see no reason to come here, otherwise.”

  “I deem it an emergency,” I retorted. “I must warn you about de Montfort. Take great care, my son, lest his strong beliefs bring about war and ruination in this kingdom…a kingdom that will be yours one day, provided no ill befalls.”

  His eyes widened, then narrowed; cold blue ice in his bronzed face. “I am twenty years old, Madame,” he said stiffly. “I have my own household. I can—and will—choose my own friends.”

  I wanted to tell him that twenty summers he might be, but at this moment, his behaviour was that of an impudent boy of thirteen…but I restrained myself. Such chiding would only rile him further. “Your duty is to your father before all,” I said in a quiet voice.

  “When have I ever been undutiful?” he flared, his fists clenching at his sides. “It is you, Madame, who have been undutiful to your husband. Promoting your own relatives at the expense of his. Hating his family when they outshine your own. The whole country is abuzz with your behaviour…how Eleanor the Queen hands grants out to her foreign relatives and no others.”

  I gasped.

  “Yes!” Edward cried, thrusting a long, impertinent finger in my direction. “Hear me, mother. They also talk about this ridiculous bid for the throne of Sicily for Edmund! Oh, how they talk…calling it folly. Sheer folly. And they are right!”

  “Do not speak so of Edmund, your own brother! How can you resent him a crown?”

  “I do not, lady! But he should not have one if this crown is to bankrupt England and cause friction with the Pope! Do you want interdict passed upon us again, as in my grandfather’s day? When the dead could not be buried, and lay stinking in crowded churchyards? When no baptisms could take place or any sacraments be given, even to the dying who begged for them? Would you see such horror again? Be sensible! Edmund will never rule Sicily; why can you not admit it? It makes me cringe when father calls him ‘King of Sicily’; you can see the courtiers smirk, for they know it is a hollow, meaningless title!”

  I longed to argue with him…but my tongue would not move; deep in my heart, I knew he was right.

  “Mother, with this recent parliament, I fear you have reaped the whirlwind,” he said, his tone bitter, “I am not talking about just the Lusignans.” He gave me a curt bow, and then stalked away, back to his bright young men and their hunting and hawking, leaving me staring at his retreating, sword-straight back with sinking heart.

  After he had departed, I hurried to Henry’s chamber; my husband was sitting on a brocade-covered stool by the narrow window, leaning forward as if a great exhaustion had enveloped him. He looked suddenly very old; the light picked out silver flecks in his beard and hair. Shadows hovered like nightmares under his unhappy eyes. His drooping lid hung lower than ever with weariness and strain.

  “Henry,” I said sharply. “We must go.”

  “Go?” He raised his head and gazed blearily at me.

  “Yes, go!”

  “Where?”

  “From England!”

  He looked horrified. “What are you suggesting? We cannot abandon the people. There was famine in the country but last year, and this year a promising harvest was wrecked by floods! Plague had struck in the city!”

  “We are not abandoning anything, husband…but I deem we must lie low until recent troubles abate. We will go to the court of my sister, Marguerite. She will help us, and so will Louis, now that he is your friend. It will not be shameful to seek solace there—you have that Peace Treaty that is due to be signed between you. Knowing of the treaty, men will laud you and not whisper that we have made a coward’s retreat when the country is in need.”

  Henry’s face brightened and he stood. “Yes, yes, perhaps you are right, Eleanor. Edward can be in charge when we are away. Things will settle with the barons and with the Pope. One thing though…” He licked his lips, looking sheepish.

  “What is troubling you?” I said impatiently. My mind was racing with all I must do if we were to sojourn abroad.

  “As usual, we have no coin. The treasury coffers are close to bare—the worst I have ever seen them. The barons won’t allow us to take the remainder with us, due to their accursed Provisions.”

  I sighed. “No matter, no matter. I will take all my jewels. They will tide us over, if need be.”

  Within the month, we were sailing across the Channel towards France. My heart gladdened as the tall white bastions of England’s shore sa
nk into a haze of mist and spray and disappeared from view.

  Chapter Nine

  It was wonderful to see Marguerite again. With my sister as my companion, I could forget my woes in England and think on other things. We compared gowns and fashions, and I sighed over all the wonders of the Parisian dresses. We also worked on a match for my dear daughter, Beatrice. We decided a suitable husband would be John, Duke of Brittany and set the date of the wedding for January. Henry wrote to the King of Navarre, anxiously reminding him to turn over lands he owed to the Duke. We had to make sure our daughter was well provided for.

  “A January wedding might be cold,” I frowned, though my mind was filled with delightful thoughts of colourful brocade and silk, and miniver and marten and fox fur hoods and ruffs. I glanced outside the window of my sister’s palace; it was snowing now, small flakes twirling down from a steel-blue heaven.

  “Maybe,” Marguerite said cheerfully, “but think of the joy a wedding will bring to our hearts in these dull months of winter! The promise of new alliances and new life!”

  I embraced her. “Joy. Yes, we all need more joy in all our lives right now. We will smile again soon, and the world will be put to rights.”

  I do not know if some devil, some mischievous minion of Satan, heard my hopeful words that day and laughed at Marguerite and me, before casting a cloud of darkness in our direction. Misfortune soon fell, like a sharpened sword falling upon the vanquished on a battlefield.

  Christmas had passed and Henry and I were dwelling at the Abbey of St Denis, preparing for Beatrice’s wedding, when a messenger arrived from my sister’s court. The man’s face was skull-white, drawn; he wore mourning clothes with the lilies of France pecked out on the breast in white seed pearl, like bones upon a black shroud.

  My heart flipped-flopped in my chest as he walked down the abbey cloister towards us, the heels of his tall boots making a sharp, unnerving rat-tat-tat upon the flagstones. He was the bearer of bad news—I knew it instinctively. Was it Marguerite? My mother? The French King?

  “Your Graces.” The messenger sank down on one knee on the tiled floor of St Denis’s abbey. “There is ill news from the Palace.”

  “Tell us,” commanded Henry. “Do not dither, man. If a blow must come, let it be delivered swift and sharp.”

  “It is Prince Louis, the Crown Prince. Shortly after the Christmas festivities, he fell ill with a fever. Yesterday, he went from this evil earth into God’s light.”

  “Christ have mercy on the poor young prince’s soul!” I cried in sudden anguish. “And may Blessed Mary send sweet balm to my sister in her grief.”

  I began to weep, as the messenger was dismissed, leaving me alone with Henry in the cloister. Monks peered anxiously from nooks and alcoves in the distance. I had only met Marguerite’s eldest son a few times, so knew him but little, yet I knew what a loss it must be to his parents. He had only been fifteen at his death and he was heir to the throne, schooled from birth to be king. Marguerite had another son, Philip, who would fill his shoes, but young Louis had been his mother’s bright star, born after ten years of barrenness. It seemed so cruel.

  “We must postpone Beatrice’s wedding for at least another week,” I told Henry. “It would be inappropriate when the heir of France has died.”

  Henry nodded. “Yes, we must don the colours of mourning and join in the grief of our kin of France.”

  The prince’s funeral cortege wound through the winter-bitten streets of Paris out into the bleak countryside around the abbey of Royaumont, where the unfortunate royal youth would be interred. Marguerite and I rode solemnly in a chariot draped in mourning blue; Henry had offered to help carry the prince’s coffin on at least part of the journey. With trepidation, I watched him slipping and sliding in the mud and melting snow. Above, the sky was a livid bruise, the hue of a dead man’s face. I clutched Marguerite’s ice-cold hand and thought of my own lost daughter, little Katharine, lying forever asleep beneath her silver effigy in Westminster.

  “Eleanor…” I heard Marguerite’s voice, weak and heavy with her sorrow.

  “Yes, my sister?” I clutched her fingers even tighter.

  “I know it is not good between you and Edward right now. That he behaves foolishly and irks you and the King, even frightens you with his wayward behaviour. Well…I bid you, try to reconcile with him. No, I do not bid you…I beg you. I have lost a son to the cold hand of death…Do not lose your son because of stubbornness or pride.”

  I thought on her words; solemnly I let my gaze travel to Henry’s hunched shoulders, bowed beneath their heavy load. Snow was falling again, alighting in his hair, turning it hoary.

  Edward was our star, our hope. Marguerite was right. We must not lose him through stubbornness, either his or ours. All we had ever dreamed of depended on him. And England, which he would rule one day, depended on the right choices too.

  The Treaty of Paris was signed. Henry had to do homage to Louis, kneeling before his throne and placing his hands between those of the French king—a humiliation of sorts—but there was no helping it, if we were to have peace…and French assistance.

  The treaty completed, my husband and I began gathering up a force with which to take England, paying for it with the jewels I had brought overseas with me. Marguerite procured a loan, and Louis made sure all our hired soldiers were paid. Fierce mercenaries as interested in blood as money joined our cause; uncomfortable men to be around, but unavoidable...and useful.

  In the spring we sailed, a flotilla of loaned ships spread out upon the slate-hued waves of the Channel. As the Kentish mainland appeared in view, I strained my eyes to see if any enemy army thronged the white headlands, waiting for us. There was no one.

  Unchallenged, we entered Dover harbour, with our loyal subjects cheering from the quayside. No de Montfort…but no Edward either.

  Heartened, we marched on toward London, sending messages to Richard of Cornwall and Uncle Boniface as we hastened down the road. We pray you see to the Lord Edward. Convince him to come to us and rejoin his family. The prince must not be set apart from his father and mother….

  We reached London. The river curled before us; the Tower loomed, a skull-like head in the mist. The bells were ringing, heralding our arrival. Richard of Cornwall had ridden in from his distant estates; he came before us with a grim smile playing upon his features. “It has worked, my brother,” he said to the King. “Good news at last. Edward is on his way to London, and he will repent of his former deeds and swear loyalty to you.”

  An emergency session of parliament was scheduled, high in the stern bastions of the White Tower, where gulls shrieked as they wheeled in off the Thames. Having newly reached the capital, Edward entered the council chamber still wearing his mud-stained travelling cloak and went dramatically on his knees before his father’s high seat.

  “Edward, my son, what have you to say to us?” Henry asked sternly. “Rise, and speak to all those within his room.”

  Edward got to his feet, standing head and shoulders above those men clustered near him. “I ask your forgiveness, my lord father…my King.”

  There was still a certain sulkiness in his tone and in his face, but his words were the ones we longed to hear.

  “I never meant to bring grief to my august parents, and I shall endeavour never to do so again. A man cannot serve two masters, as the Bible tells us. I have chosen whom I must serve. The rightful King of England. The Queen, his wife. My esteemed father and mother.”

  Edward was divested of his dripping mantle, and still with stony visage took his place amidst the King’s counsellors, and eventually attention drifted away from him—focusing instead on Simon de Montfort, who was accounted one of their number, perhaps the greatest and most influential of them all. It seemed to me that in the months we had been away Simon had blown up like a great puff adder, dark and deadly. An air of danger had always clung to him, but now his ferocity and disdain was open.

  This man, of noble but not royal blood, whose lif
e had consisted of audacious feats, considered himself as important as a King. Indeed, maybe he saw himself as a candidate for kingship, winning an unrightful crown by deceit and by threat of armed force.

  The King was focused on him too, his countenance dark with displeasure. “I see de Montfort is with us. I am surprised he has dared show his face here today, upon our triumphant return to our kingdom.”

  Simon bristled with ill-contained rage from his seat amidst the barons. “I am on the council; it is my right to be here.”

  Henry leapt out of his seat, making a strangled noise. “Right? I doubt your right! You are untrue and disloyal to the crown! You treated me with great discourtesy when you laid out those abominable Oxford Provisions and forced me to agree to them!”

  A sneer curled Simon’s upper lip; he was like a beast, cornered and immensely dangerous. “You treat your people with great discourtesy, your Grace. You and the Queen. You spend the country’s money on your relatives, and on obtaining a worthless foreign crown for your younger son. England is nearly bankrupt, my lord…because of your wastefulness. Your rule is corrupt, as was your father’s before you!”

  A gasp rippled through the throng. Edward’s lips tightened to lines but he stared at his toes and did not rise to defend his father.

  Henry’s face suffused with blood; his eyes started from his sockets. De Montfort muttered an oath beneath his breath and started to move towards the council chamber door, but two halberdiers intercepted him, crossing their weapons before his face. Motionless, he stood staring at the honed blades as they glinted dully, threateningly, a few inches from his nose. “Let me pass.” His voice was a growl.

  Richard of Cornwall left his bench and stalked to the King’s side, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Brother, be at peace. Let de Montfort go,” he urged.

  “Why should I? He forgets his place!”