The Traitor's Wife (51 page)

“One thing is constant in the world, Bishop Stapeldon. The world is an inconstant place.”

Not a little pleased at this aphorism, Hethe was settling back, perhaps to deliver himself of another, when a large black dog ambled into the room. The Bishop of Rochester looked at the Bishop of Exeter. “Yours?”

“No. I've no dog.”

“Well, look at him.”

The dog had stopped to sniff Hethe's outstretched hand, but this had only slightly delayed its progress toward Stapeldon. Reaching the Bishop of Exeter's feet, he settled down at them, head contentedly on paws. Hethe laughed. “It seems you have a friend.”

“It looks that way, doesn't it?” Stapeldon bent to scratch the mutt's ears, then stopped when he caught sight of the faces of his squires, William Walle and John de Padington. “What ails you?”

“'Tis an omen of ill,” whispered William Walle.

Stapeldon, a man in his sixties, had lived too long to be particularly superstitious. “'Tis my meat, which I have not touched. Here.” He began throwing scraps to the dog, but even after the food was gone, the beast remained at the bishop's feet.

Meanwhile, the king's party had split, the Earl of Winchester heading toward Bristol Castle, where the king's daughters were also staying. The king, Hugh the younger, and Hugh's son continued into Wales. On October 15, 1326, they were at Tintern Abbey. That was the day London, and Eleanor's world, exploded.

Even from his chamber in the Tower, where Edward le Despenser was attempting to conjugate some tricky Latin verbs, he could tell that something was afoot outside. People were running in and out of the courtyard below, and in the streets beyond the Tower, there seemed to be an unusual hum of activity.

He stood at the window, considering. If he told his tutor or his mother that he was going out alone to see what was happening, he would certainly be told not to go, for Bishop Hethe was not the only person worried about London these days. On the other hand, his father had instructed him to take care of his mother, and shouldn't his duty, logically, extend to making sure she was well informed? Besides, he had yet to get a satisfactory explanation from any adult as to why the king and his father were at war with the queen, and if the commotion outside had anything to do with their quarrel, it would be a chance, perhaps, for enlightenment.

Edward wished his brother Hugh was here, for he was a fount of information. It was Hugh who had done much to explain the mysterious, fascinating topic of Woman to him, and surely he would be equally informative on the subject of the Queen's Little Tantrum, as his father called it. If only they'd had a chance to talk before Hugh went away! But Hugh had been too busy the night before they left.

Making up his mind, he wrote a note (in Latin, as a sort of penance), stating that he had gone to take a walk, and left the chamber. As he headed toward the Tower gate, he heard a guard muttering something unintelligible about Hamo de Chigwell, the mayor of London. He also heard his own name called, but feigned that he had not, and hurried on.

Once he was outside of the Tower grounds, he remembered what he had heard about the mayor and decided to turn his steps in his direction. Just as he reached the Guildhall, he saw the crowd outside it turn in unison and rush down the twisting streets to Walbrook. The crowd contained almost every description of Londoner—rich merchants, small tradesmen, lawyers, physicians, barbers, clerks, craftsmen, bakers, butchers, servants, tavern keepers, apprentices, beggars, thieves—and it was armed with almost every sort of implement imaginable, from swords to clubs to bread knives.

With a shock, Edward recognized the handsome house they stopped at, for he had been there the previous June. It had been one of the happiest mornings of his life, one of those rare and special occasions when he and his father went out together, just the two of them. Their first stop had been the Smithfield horse market, where Edward, having solemnly listened to all of his father's lessons in what to look for in a horse, had walked round and round, sizing up all of the mounts for sale, until he had finally settled on a handsome chestnut with three white feet that he named Arthur on the spot. Then he and his father had ridden Arthur and Hugh's horse to this very house in Walbrook to dine with John le Marshal, who handled much of Hugh's London property for him. The men had mostly talked business while Edward sat quietly by his father's side, but John had remarked toward the end of the meal, “Fine lad you have there, Hugh. You must be proud of him.”

Hugh had draped an arm over his shoulder. “Yes,” he said, with none of the usual mocking tone that edged his conversation when he spoke to almost anyone besides his own family and the king, “I am, very much. He'll be a fine knight someday.”

And now, at this house where Edward had received this ultimate in compliments from his father, the crowd was not waiting at the door, but was shoving its way in. Then the nightmare began. Screams and shouts, the sound of breaking items and objects being thrown, and suddenly John le Marshal, his face bloodied, was being dragged out of the house, fighting fiercely but to no avail. Instinctively, Edward tried to push his way to help this servant of his father, but as a slight twelve-year-old with no weapon, there was nothing he could do; so far back was he, and so wild the crowd, his futile efforts to break through were not even noticed.

“Where shall we take him, Despenser's spy?”

“Cheapside!”

Roaring its approval, drowning out Marshal's curses, the mob ran to Cheap-side, pushing Edward with it, and stopped at the great cross on Cheap. “What do we do with Despenser's spy, mates?”

“Kill him! For the queen!” called a rough voice.

“Kill him!” agreed the mob. “For the queen!”

“God keep her, Isabella the Fair!”

“Our queen!”

The men who had been dragging Marshal pinned him to the ground, and a man wearing a butcher's apron pushed forward and set a knife to Marshal's neck. After an endless interval, his dripping head was lifted into the air to cries of ecstasy.

Edward retched, again and again. Two boys, older than he by a few years, looked at him with amusement. “Soft, are you?”

“Mama's boy? Don't get out much?”

“Come on, mate! There's more fun to be had!”

The cry was going again. “Where to, mates?”

“Stapeldon's house! Despenser's bishop!”

“The bishop who took the queen's land!”

“Spied on her!”

“Get him!”

To Temple Bar the crowd ran, Edward being dragged along by his new acquaintances. But the bishop's doors were barred. The crowd groaned; then someone produced a torch. The bishop's doors were flaming, and then the crowd was in the bishop's house, some running from room to room in search of the bishop, others running from room to room grabbing any valuable they could lay their hands on. “Where is the traitor?”

“Not here!”

Edward's companions, goggle-eyed at the sight of a quantity of plate, suddenly released him, and Edward, forgotten, pushed his way out. Someone had to warn the bishop, but how? He had several houses in and around London; he could be in any of them, or in someone else's house. Then he remembered his mother mentioning that morning that Bishop Stapeldon had promised to look in on them that afternoon. So he might be riding to the Tower! Panting, he ran in that direction, but the mob, having carried off everything in sight worth carrying and torched what was not, was right behind him. Then the mob saw its quarry: the Bishop of Exeter.

Stapeldon saw the mob and galloped off in the direction of St. Paul's, followed by his two squires. When all that lay between him and sanctuary was one door, one damned door, the mob pounced. Stapeldon and one of his squires were dragged off their horses, through the streets, to Cheapside, to the great cross. There the awful chant went up again:

“What shall we do with him, mates? With Despenser's tool?”

“Kill him!”

“For the queen!”

But the butcher, having collected so much booty that he deemed it prudent to carry it home, had left, and it was a baker's apprentice who produced a bread knife. Edward, shoved near the forefront of the crowd, could hear the bishop's dying words, commending his spirit into the Lord's hands. He saw the head being raised, saw Stapeldon's squire being beheaded with less fanfare, heard the crowd bay in glee as the second squire, who had managed to get as far as London Bridge before being captured, was brought back and killed in like fashion.

“Where to now, mates?”

“Despenser's money! The House of Bardi!”

The crowd pressed on toward the great Florentine bankers' house, but this time Edward was able to get free. Somehow he stumbled alone toward the Tower, retching and crying.

“It is all true, what the boy said, Lady Despenser. Four men dead within an hour, and God knows what will follow. But they are just looting now, it seems.”

Eleanor crouched in the constable's hall at the Tower, cradling Edward in her lap. He had been given a potion by the Tower physician and had at last fallen asleep in her arms after sobbing out a barely coherent account of the morning's events. “The poor child,” she whispered. “The poor, poor child. To see what he saw. And if they had found out whose son he was…” She shivered, then composed herself and looked at John de Weston, the Tower constable. “They will be here next. Will they not?”

“It is only a matter of time. And Lady Despenser—your husband left the Tower well fortified. But some of our men deserted today. That armed crowd will outnumber us ten to one.” He shook his head gloomily. “It can only get worse until they wear themselves out. The mayor and the responsible men of the city are powerless to stop the whoresons. This morning, before the murders, the mayor was taken to the Guildhall by force and made to kneel and swear an oath that he would stand with the city against all of its enemies. Others were made to swear the same oath. Archbishop Reynolds has fled the city, using Bishop Hethe's horses, they say. Poor Bishop Hethe has followed on foot. Justice Geoffrey le Scrope has left the city too. No one knows for sure where Bishop Stratford has gone, but they think he has gone to join the queen.”

Eleanor said, “They won't hurt John of Eltham, surely, for the queen's sake. But the rest of us…” She looked at Edward in her arms, imagining him lying in the dirt at Cheapside with the others. “Let me put him to bed. Then I shall think what to do.”