Harlot Queen (36 page)

Through Monmouth, through Ledworth to Kenilworth rode the King. Fresh-clad, well-horsed, Lancaster attentive by his side, he might, indeed, have been an honoured guest… save that he rode under guard. And, as they went, he might have seen for himself that it was not London, alone, that had turned against him; for through every town and village he rode in silence, silence broken now and then by hisses and foul words. But he noticed nothing; he was in bitter grief for his friend.

Kenilworth at last, where Lancaster saw to it that his charge was comfortably lodged and courteously served. But though he allowed the King all bodily comfort, Lancaster granted him no peace of mind; for he spared the King no detail of Despenser’s last, dreadful journey.

Despenser had been taken to Gloucester, to join the Queen’s train. They had chained him hand and foot; and strapped him upon a sorry nag so low that the man’s legs scraped the ground.

So they did with Piers
. It all came back to the King clear as yesterday. He remembered the end of Piers. To that Hugh should never come; weeping, he swore it.

To taunt Despenser still further they had put upon him a tabard emblazoned with the arms of Gloucester—reversed; a taunt upon his hope of that earldom, he that had no blood of the Clares. And to jeers, foul words and filthy missiles, he that had sat so high went upon his last journey.

That this could be the last journey the King, deceiving himself as was his way, would not admit. ‘When I am in London,’ he told Lancaster, ‘I shall set him high again!’

‘We shall set him higher still!’ Lancaster promised. And even now it did not occur to the King that he, himself, stood in some danger.

Trumpet and drum and banners flying, the Queen left for London. Before her, alone, as though he were a leper, rode the prisoner—first object of all eyes; before Mortimer, before the Queen, before her even. Eyes closed against the hatred of the mob, its hatred yet reached him; his ears he could not close to their screams of fury, of derision. He heard, too, as he passed, cheers for Mortimer and blessings upon the Queen that together had rid the country of his father and himself.

Day after day the dreadful journey. Mercifully a man may endure so much—and no more. As they neared Hereford, though still the crowds cried their insults, pelting him with filth, the prisoner knew nothing. He lay slumped across the nag and would have fallen save for the straps that held him. Since he had been taken he had eaten nothing; now he let the nag carry him and did not stir from his dreaming. When it rained he did not know it; nor that his bare feet—his shoes cut to pieces dragging upon the road—bled. Outside noises filtered through his dreaming… He was riding with the King; the crowd must cheer whether it would or no.

He was all but senseless when at Hereford they took him down and thrust him into a cell.

‘He will die before we reach London,’ Mortimer told the Queen. ‘If we are to taste the full sweetness of his death we must hang him at once!’

She hesitated. She was a woman and there was mercy in her. The man was suffering most bitter punishment. If he died beneath it—though he died senseless—she was satisfied. She had no further desire for revenge. She said, ‘He is beneath contempt.’ And since Mortimer was a soldier and within his rights, added, ‘Do with him what you will!’

On the twenty-fourth day of November, Hugh Despenser stood before his judges that already had judged him. Some wag had crowned him with nettle that stung whenever he moved his head. But so dimmed he was with fear, with fatigue and with hunger, he felt no pain nor understood much of what they said to him. The long list of his crimes flowed over his all but senseless head.

‘We’ll bring him to his senses soon enough!’ Mortimer promised. Isabella’s eyelids flickered. Revenge might be sweet; but of revenge she had had enough. She looked with distaste upon the poor broken thing that had been Hugh Despenser; she was weary of the whole affair.

‘The sentence is just,’ Mortimer reminded her. ‘And you must be present to see it carried out.’

She wanted to cry out
No!
This death the man deserved; but from the sight of so hideous a dying she should be protected. But, let her falter now and she lost Mortimer’s respect; and with it his love for ever.

She nodded.

The gallows, forty feet high and the greatest ever seen, stood waiting. Naked the prisoner was led forth; and still he moved as in a dream. But soon—as Mortimer had promised—he was brought back to his senses. The traitor’s death was enlivened by little tricks of Mortimer’s devising. Despenser had been the King’s lover; now his member was torn from him. The air was rent with his screaming.

‘Now he comes to his senses!’ Mortimer said. Isabella sent him a sidelong look; he was clearly well-satisfied. She bit upon her lip to thrust down the sickness. She held it back while the screams came fainter and then died. She was thankful the man was dead before the disembowelling; thankful for her own sake rather than for his.

She held back her sickness until she reached her closet; and there the vomit burst forth. She drew the bolt upon the door and sponged her hands and face; her women must not see a chicken-hearted Queen.

She was herself when she faced Mortimer again. She was more than herself. She had not shirked one moment of that hideous dying; she was stronger now than ever before… stronger and more woman. And so Mortimer found her when he came to her that night. A new lust stirred in her blood.

The King wept for his love and would not be comforted. As always his grief flowed into words. ‘She shall pay for it! By God’s Face she shall pay! A woman present at his death—and such a dying! From such a dying God preserve all good men.’ He crossed himself. ‘A woman?
No woman but a wolf——he
said that, Hugh. And he said right. Wolf she is and those that trust in her shall rue it. She… she…’

The words died in his throat. He stood there, his body shaken with long shuddering sighs, his face purple with the congestion of blood. Lancaster thought he would take a fit—and could not but wish that he would. Better the King fall senseless never knowing the thing they purposed against him.

‘She… she…’ The hot wrath of the Plantagenets burst through, drying his tears. ‘By God I’ll make an end of her! If I have no knife I’ll tear her with my teeth!’

‘Sir, leave such talk. Should it reach the ears of Madam the Queen, it could do you no good!’

‘Good? What good from her, she-wolf that she is! And what evil can she do me now? She has murdered my only friends. Hugh was a father to me—more loving than my own father, that man of stone. And his son was a brother to me—truer than my own false brothers. He was both brother and son; a better son than my eldest that stands with his mother to betray me! Now I am alone, alone. Well—’ and in his grief he screamed aloud, ‘what more evil can she do me, what?’

It was clear he had no notion of the evil intended—the taking of his crown.

‘Comfort yourself, sir,’ Lancaster said. He had come to some unwilling pity; the man was, after all, his cousin and his King. He treated the King with kindness, allowing him every freedom he might. Though guards were posted on wall and gate the King might walk in the gardens at his will; he dined with his host and, when the royal mood allowed, they played chess together. A pleasant enough prison… but still it was prison; it was prison.

Feverishly the King waited for news; but for him it was always bad. Those that had followed their King had come, all of them, to a traitor’s death.

‘They stood by their allegiance; to follow his King is a man’s bounden duty!’ the King cried out. ‘And yet they died as traitors—and no trial; no word allowed in their defence. It is against the law!’

‘It is the law; the Despensers made it!’ Lancaster said and thought of his brother.

It is against the law
. It was not the King alone that cried out upon these executions; everywhere men were saying the same thing. Those that loved the Queen said,
It is Mortimer! Mortimer rules the armies and gives his orders—Mortimer and not the Queen!
And those that feared lest the future be worse than the past said,
Shall King Mortimer reign over us? And shall he be more merciful than the Despensers? Have we exchanged a hard yoke for a harder?

Shut within Kenilworth the King had time to think. The whole country, it seemed, hated him. Why? What had he done? Lancaster told him.

‘Cousin, it was your friends. You did not protect us from the Despensers, their cruelty, their greed; you did not see to it that the people, high or low, had simple justice. Why should they love you?’

‘But hate. Such hatred! They murdered my good Stapledon for no reason but that he was my friend. And for that London shall suffer, the whole city. I’ll forgive them, never!’

And he doesn’t understand, Lancaster thought half-pitying, half-angered, that London wants no forgiveness from the King, nor any truck with him. Finished. Finished with him for ever!

The slow months went by. Autumn was golden in the land. The leaves fell and cold winds blew. Soon it would be winter.

Anger against Mortimer was growing; his arrogance, his harshness, his greed a continual exacerbation. He openly played King, yes, even in the Queen’s bed. Opinion in that matter was changing also; he befouled her name. Even in London some remembered with regret the imprisoned King. In himself he had been well enough—an easy good-natured fellow for the most part; a kind way with simple folk. The Despensers dead, he might, with good counsel, yet do well. Surely he had learned his bitter lesson.

No-one quicker than Isabella to catch the slightest changing of the wind.

‘The King must not be allowed to make his peace with London!’ she told Mortimer. ‘Be very sure his first condition would be your death!’ She closed her eyes against the thought of that beloved head rotting upon London Bridge. ‘We must summon Parliament at once. It must depose him—the useless King, and put my son in his place!’

Walter Reynolds, primate of England and tool to whatever man sat in power, had already given the matter some thought.

‘Madam, without the King’s assent you can do nothing. So long as he lives he is still King; and, unless he give his consent, cannot be deposed. You must send to him, Madam, on behalf of the whole realm, to summon Parliament, and himself attend it. Of deposition—no word! Say merely that it is needful for him to discuss and dispose of… certain difficulties.’

Let him ride the countryside! Let him show his handsome face in London.
With the ever-growing anger against Mortimer who knew what might not happen? She was too clever to speak her fear; he too clever not to guess it.

‘Madam, he’ll not come,’ Reynolds told her. ‘I know him well! He’ll not come; but we must
send
: and those we send must speak for the whole country—barons and bishops and citizens from every shire.’

The archbishop had prophesied truly. The King refused to summon Parliament—much less attend it. ‘I have no truck with traitors!’ he said.

Back it came, the grand representative embassy. ‘The King is filled with that same evil purpose as in the past!’ they reported; and nipped the tender buds of affection beginning to unfold towards the King.

The Queen smiled, and herself called Parliament. Early in the new year of grace thirteen hundred and twenty-seven Parliament met.

Anger had turned once more against the King; anger more deep, more bitter and more lasting than before. He had refused to meet his Patliament, he had denounced the country’s embassy as traitors! Now every man that entered London, were it but for an hour, was made to swear upon holy relics to take his stand with the Queen.

De Bettoyne, Mayor of London, put into high office by the Queen herself, petitioned barons, bishops and citizens throughout the land to beseech Parliament depose the King and set the Prince of Wales upon the throne.

Things were moving… moving.

January the thirteenth. The princes of church and state riding to Guildhall to hear my lord bishop of Winchester make public accusation against the King. The good bishop had been one of the embassy to Kenilworth and smarted still.

The King’s offence lost nothing in the telling. Ugly the tale and cunningly he played upon his listeners. With one voice they swore to support the Queen and her son; to fight for them to the death. One by one they came forward to pledge their faith—bishops, barons and knights; judges, mayors, sheriffs and chief citizens. And, the news spreading, people came posting in from the country so that the swearing-in took three whole days.

That first day, Orleton, striking while the iron was hot, preached against the King on Tower Hill to a congregation of humbler folk—a congregation larger than ever a church could hold. He took as his text,
A foolish King shall ruin the people
. Every foolishness, every weakness was held up to hatred; of any real kindliness, any real goodness—nothing! An eloquent preacher this Orleton, that knew well how to stir the people! And stir them he did so that they cried out in hatred
Away with the King!

The second day Winchester, also, preached on Tower Hill. He took as his text
My head is sick
. ‘When the head of a kingdom is sick beyond curing, then that head must be taken off!’ The crowd roared its delight.

The third day of the swearing, my lord the primate of England preached in the great hall of Westminster; his audience consisted, for the first time, of all three estates—the church, the peers, and, represented by their members in Parliament, the commons. He took as his text
Vox populi vox dei
flattering them that the voice of the people was indeed the voice of God. ‘And now that voice has declared that the King must be put from the throne never to rule again. Therefore, in the name of the people, we, bishops, princes and commons do renounce our homage. And, in that same name, are agreed together that his first-born son shall wear the crown in his stead.’

And with one voice the congregation roared its assent.

They had reckoned without the boy—the Prince of Wales. He hated Mortimer, he did not wholly trust his mother… and he loved his father. The outcry against the Despensers he perfectly understood. But they were dead, they had paid for their sins. His father, he knew, was not a wise King nor even a wise man; but he was, for the most part, kindly; and, if he heeded his council could make a good enough King. Any way you looked at it he was a better person than Mortimer; and
he was the King
, the King crowned and sanctified.