Harlot Queen (11 page)

‘God grant it!’ the young Queen said.

He sat again in his place; he wore the great robes, the crown he had put from his weary head. To the indictment against himself he listened; he thought it all a great nonsense, but still he must listen. Granting some of their unjust demands he might yet save Piers.

They were censuring him, their King, together with all his officials, his household and his friends for wilful, wanton extravagance. By God’s Face it was hard to take; no King had ever been so insulted! Yet take it he must if he hoped to save Piers.

‘The King has impoverished the Kingdom with wrongful gifts to his friends…

‘The King has perverted justice; he has used the privy seal to pardon criminals…

‘The King has taken into his own hands the customs due to the State…’

Well he’d expected that; they hadn’t lost much time about it!

‘All such customs shall, in future, be paid straight into the Exchequer and a sufficient allowance made the King.’

Sufficient? What was sufficient? Who was to judge? On and on the indictment; on and on the restrictions to cage a free, crowned King.

The King must not leave the realm without consent of his Parliament; without that consent he must not go to war…

The King must no longer choose his own officials, great or small; appointments both in the royal household and in the state to be made by the barons in Parliament. All present appointments—and, in particular, Keeper to the Wardrobe—must be reviewed. Every official high or low, sheriffs, magistrates and judges must take the oath to observe the Ordinances.

He listened; he listened. They lied in their throats. He was the King to reward, to appoint his household officers, and his officers of State; to elect his judges and sheriffs were his inalienable rights. To make war as he chose—not that he ever would choose—was his inalienable right. But for all that he’d bargain with them, give up rights and freedoms so he could save Piers.

They had made an end of speaking; they were waiting for his reply. He rose in his place.

‘My lords, those things I have done are within the King’s rights; and have been his rights from immemorial time. Yet time moves on and makes his changes. To these Ordinances I will consent; but upon one condition. And one only. You shall make null and void the sentence you have passed upon my lord earl of Cornwall, restoring to him every honour, land and due.’

He saw by their faces they were going to refuse: he lost his head entirely. He burst into a frenzy of speech. Pardon Gaveston and he’d sign anything; anything at all. If not—then nothing, nothing, nothing!

And still they sat, dark faces of stone.

Lancaster came carrying the parchment, carrying the quill. The King dashed it aside; in direst grief flung himself out. They hated Piers, all, all! And the wife that should give a man comfort—she was the bitterest hater of them all! That he had given her cause, and cause enough, he did not consider. Suddenly he remembered one person’s kindness, one person’s truth.

Into Queen Margaret’s closet he burst distraught.

‘Their demands—endless, endless!’ He threw out shaking hands.

She nodded, grave.
Of course endless; like his abuses, endless
.

‘It is not the law they seek to change, but me, me the King. Nor is it the people they mean to better, but themselves, only themselves. These
Lords Ordainers
!’ He was bitter with contempt.

She thought there was some truth there. The barons had much right on their side but would they use it rightly? They were, she had long thought it, looking less to the welfare of the country than to the increase of their own power.

‘Me and my household censured! And first and foremost—Piers!’ He leads me into evil ways, if you please! What am I—a child? As for evil ways! They should talk! There’s more than one of these same loud-mouthed bullies has his pretty chamber-boy. But let them burst for all I care. Piers and I—we’re not the public business; we’re our own private business!’

‘The King has no private business.’ And would he never learn, this foolish, headstrong, beloved stepson of hers? She hesitated; she went steadily on. ‘Indeed, sir, this business between you and Gaveston is very much public business. It concerns the Queen… and the lack of an heir.’

This he would have taken from no-one else; yet furious as he was, bitter and harassed, still he knew her for his friend.

‘You must expect some bitterness against him on that score alone; but there are other accounts, also!’ She grieved to add to his hurt; yet she must spare him nothing to make him see more justly and so save him. ‘They say Gaveston lays hands upon the royal treasure—and God knows we’re poor enough! They say he’s sent it across the sea to Gascony!’

‘It is his. I gave it to him. He has the right.’

‘But was it yours to give? Was it not rather yours to hold in trust?’

‘It was mine—the King’s!’ He was obstinate.

She let the point go. ‘You gave; but a true friend would not have taken.’

‘Piers is myself; between us there’s no giving and taking! But there’s no accusation too absurd. They say he’s turned my heart from the people; that’s not true!’

‘No,’ she agreed, ‘it is not true!’ His heart had never been with the people. True it pleased him to measure his skill against a humble fellow here and there, to seek their company. But for their welfare he gave no thought; for his craftsmen, his merchants, his gentry—he cared nothing, save as he might get money from them. He must mend his ways if… she stopped shaken by a thought;
if he hopes to keep his crown
. She looked at him with pity for the fate that made him a King. He would have done well enough in the unremarkable life of a country gentleman. He loved country ways and country crafts. But fate had pushed him—a square peg into a round hole.

‘They say he led me into war without consent of Parliament. Well
what
war? None of my making! For that you must blame my father, the hero that saddled me with war and all the debts of war. Me! I hate war! But this Parliament of mine! No way of pleasing them—none!’

He didn’t seem to understand that he had never tried to please them; never tried to please any but himself… and Gaveston.

‘They say… they say! Does it matter
what
they say? White’s black and black’s white—as it shall serve their turn. For their jealousy, their spite, Piers is to be banished. Out of the country by All Saints’ Day! Well, well see… we’ll see!’

‘What shall we see?’ she asked grieved with his grief, his helplessness. ‘If he should delay—he’ll die… a traitor’s death.’

His hand went to his throat to thrust down the sickness.

‘I tell you there’s no fault in Piers!’ And now his voice came out heartbroken rather than angry. ‘But he’s a foreigner; there’s the top and bottom of his offending. Out with the foreigner!’

‘There’s more to it than that!
I
am a foreigner; and the Queen is a foreigner. Yet we have met with nothing but love and respect. No, sir, it is the man himself! The pride that admits no man his equal—scarce even his King; and the strange value you set upon him. Sir… my son; do not, I beseech you, stand against your Parliament in this. On my knees I implore you!’ And would have knelt save that his hand stayed her. ‘You could split the country into a most bloody war.’

He looked at her unbelieving, yet stricken, so that she longed to give him comfort, were it but a single word. But comfort there was none—save what he might make for himself.

He would not desert Piers. Was it so ill a thing for men to love passing the love of women? So it had been with David and Jonathan—and the holy writings had found no fault.

Again and again he came into Parliament. With a patience new to his high Plantagenet spirit he listened to their complaints, their scarce-veiled abuse of himself; he said no word in his own defence. He swore upon his kingly word to grant them anything, anything at all, so they showed grace to Gaveston.

He abased himself in vain.

‘He has no shame!’ Isabella told Madam Queen Margaret. ‘He accepts all insult, all humiliation that he may keep his whore!’

‘Gaveston is more than that to the King; much more. You should respect faithfulness.’

‘Faithfulness! Does he keep faith with his country or with his barons? Or with me? No, we may all go hang ourselves so he may keep his bawd. All Christendom is laughing; and by God I could laugh too… if the fool were not mine!’

‘Pity him; pity him rather. He must lose his friend.’

He could not desert Piers… but in the end he was forced to desert him.

‘I will never let Piers go!’ he cried out in the quiet of his closet, a Despenser on either hand. ‘Let the barons cut each other’s throat, let the country swim in blood, they shall not touch a hair of his head. I can no more forsake him than I can forsake my own soul!’

‘Sir,’ the older man said, ‘there’s a time to give way and a time to stand firm. If you do not give way now it is not only your friend you may lose… but your crown, also!’

He was forced to smile at that. ‘Even my great-grandfather—and there was a bad King for you!—didn’t lose his crown.’

‘No, sir. But there was Magna Carta; he was forced to sign it!’ the old Despenser reminded him. ‘And, if he didn’t lose his crown it was because he lost his life in the midst of an evil war—such a war as the barons will bring upon us now!’

‘Sir—Ned!’ It was the younger Hugh now, arm about the King’s shoulder. ‘If you would keep Piers, let him go… for the present. Even a King must shelter from the storm; when the storm is over you shall send for him again!’

The old man nodding, smiling; the young man whispering, promising… and both of them hoping the sun would never shine again for Gaveston, hoping for that light to fall upon themselves.

‘You are my good friends!’ the King said at last, and took a hand of each. ‘You two I trust; to you I must listen. But to part with him even for a little—it is like parting with my own life!’

He had signed and the decree proclaimed the length and breadth of the land. At Paul’s Cross and in every market-place, the people heard it with joy. There were some that did not know the nature of the love between Gaveston and the King; but all had felt the pinch in their bellies and knew whence the pinch came.

‘All Saints’ Day!’ Isabella made a little dancing-step, skirts lifted above long-toed shoes. She counted the days upon her fingers. ‘Let him linger beyond the time but one little, little day—and he suffers the fate of all traitors.’

‘Would you see him hang, drawn and quartered?’ Margaret asked, grave. The girl had reason enough to rejoice, yet there should be, if not pity, then at least some decorum.

‘I ask no more but that he should go. If he disobey?’ she shrugged. ‘I’ll not quarrel with the sentence. The man’s a traitor to the King and to the State. For what is he but a traitor that prevents the King getting a lawful heir. Even when the King is so obliging as to lie in my bed, his mind is forever on his friend; we cannot come together to get us a child. And once—and for shame I have never said it—the fellow came bursting into my bedchamber to drag the King from my bed. And the King went with him!’ She stopped, choking with shame. ‘I tell you he casts a spell upon the King. In France they burned his mother. The son, I swear it, inherits her filthy spells!’

Margaret said, unwilling, ‘That he has bespelled the King is true; but there’s no witchcraft in it. Have you thought… that much of the trouble lies within the King himself? We’re none the worse for facing the truth. And here’s a truth you may have to face. How, if Gaveston gone, the King find another such; or worse?’

‘There can be no worse; nor yet another such! Let me be rid of Gaveston and I’ll thank God forever.’

‘For ever’s a long time!’ the older woman said.

Gaveston must go, but there was all of two months for the King to show his love. Piers should have safe conduct from the north to come to his King. These last weeks they should have together; not a moment to be wasted day… or night.

Gaveston was back in Westminster and no man could say him nay. The barons, detesting this thumbing of noses, made no complaint; the limit of time had been set. Gaveston, himself, gave no sign of impending doom. Easy optimism buoyed him up. There was time yet—the King was the King. But if go he must he’d not break his heart. There were pleasures enough in the courts of Christendom; to pay for them he’d sent gold out of the country… and the King would always send him more. To tell the truth he’d not be too sorry to part with Edward; the man was cloying in his affections and the atmosphere about them far from pleasant. He’d not be sorry to part with his wife, neither; women were tiresome creatures. To live free of friend and wife—the prospect was far from uninviting. So he carried himself arrogant as ever, his tongue wagged as sharp; there was no sign of grief upon him.

The Queen kept her apartments and counted the golden autumn days. She sat with her ladies; Gaveston’s wife she had excused from attendance.

‘The man is shameless,’ she told Madam de St. Pierre. ‘Still he flaunts himself in my jewels, still he urges the King to greater extravagance. And the King, knowing they must part, cannot enough aid and abet him. God knows what parting gifts the fellow will take with him!’

‘There’s a courage in both of them, Madam. It is hard for you; but never grudge them this last, short time together.’

‘Who knows
how
short? Twice has Gaveston been banished and twice returned. God knows what trickery those two hatch together.’

‘You may leave my lords the barons to deal with it. Sure it is the man must go and the King cannot follow him. And Madam, may I speak that guided you as a child and would die to see you happy? Be gentle with the King. Let him remember your gentleness in his sad time and cherish it!’

Useless for the Queen to keep to her room. In Gaveston would come lounging with the King; and, remembering her governess’s advice, she would receive him with courtesy. He had not lost his old habit of teasing and, in spite of anger against him, she found it not wholly unpleasing; there were times when she must laugh at his wicked wit. He was at his old game of nicknames; and the King encouraged him.