Harlot Queen

by Hilda Lewis

  The young King looked at his wife. Were he and she forced to part with a young child they would grieve, all three. He supposed he should grieve for his mother, unloving as she was! Her love for Mortimer he was too young, too new to love, too prejudiced to admit. With her it was lust; lust only; greed and the itch to power.

  The late lord King was done to death; and in that business his wife’s hands not clean!

  Yet another rumour to lend new horror to an old tale. Upon so foul a slander the young King turned a deaf ear; but, as it grew ever louder, he found himself forced to listen. Was this why the people had let her ride in silence? Could there be any truth in the rumour, any slightest foundation? He did not know what to think. He was beginning to believe that, although of herself she would have had no part in so appalling a wickedness, under Mortimer’s influence she was capable of any crime. And then, having in his heart accused her, he must believe her innocent. How should one believe any rumour; any rumour whatsoever? For now that other rumour cried louder than before, Edward of Carnarvon is not dead. Even now, he held in his hand a letter from an unknown priest, written from some place unknown.

  The priest had heard the dying confession of a man who knew, beyond all doubt, that Edward of Carnarvon lived and another buried in his place. The dying man had been the gaoler privy to the King’s escape. For proof the priest sent papers written by the King in prison—writings that had been put into the man’s hand by the King himself, with the request that they be taken to the lord King his son. The good man had fallen sick of the plague but the papers delivered, according to his promise to the young King.

  It was a poem; in his father’s well-known hand and written in the French tongue he had loved so well. And, for further proof the title. The song of King Edward, son of King Edward that he himself made….

  My winter has come; only sorrow I see.

  Too often, too cruel, Fortune has spoken.

  Blow after blow she rains upon me,

  Heart, hope and courage, all, all she has broken…

  Reading it, grief rose like a sickness within him. This, this his father had suffered!

  When he came to the lines concerning his mother—a faithful wife turned to deceit—he bit upon his lip to keep back anger and grief. That, at least, was true; he knew it for himself. Reading of his father’s humiliations and his acceptance, he felt his own heart break. But when he came to the prayer for himself,

  Keep him Jesus, son of Mary

  From traitors…

  and the prayer that the young King should shine in honour, then the tears ran down his cheeks and would not be stayed. And though the heart was broken within him, there was pride in him that, in such bitterness of grief, his father had thought for his son, prayed for his son. To weep for such a father was right and proper… a boy’s heart is not made of stone.

  Tears dried at long last, he strode into his mother’s room to find, as usual, Mortimer carelessly lounging. He thrust both letter and poem at her; Mortimer he ignored. ‘Read it, Madam!’ Her brows went up at his air of command; she judged it best to humour him. Her eye went quickly over the papers. Of the priest’s letter she said, shrugging, ‘Some madman or jester!’ Of the poem, ‘This is not your father’s work. He was no poet—not even a poor one. He could scarce put two words together!’ It was a lie. He still had his father’s letters commanding him home from France; and she, herself, had received letters more than enough!

  ‘My father could write very well…’ he began.

  ‘Even so!’ Mortimer’s coarse laughter lifted in the room. ‘How could he write—unless like the blind he wrote in the dark? And with what would he write? His finger dipped in his heart’s blood? There’s no blood here! He never wrote this stuff!’ He flicked it away with a contemptuous hand. ‘Be sure he was allowed neither light nor paper nor pens nor ink!’

  It was out; out at last, the appalling cruelty of his father’s prison. They had lied. All the time they had lied. Liars, liars both. He felt the sickness come into his throat; the gay colour of his mother’s chamber swung in dizzy arcs, himself swung with them, swinging, swinging. He put out a hand to steady himself. He turned and all-but ran from the room lest he vomit there, in theft presence.

  When he was sufficiently recovered he sent for Lancaster.

  ‘Shut in the dark. Like a felon, a madman, a wild beast! My father. A crowned King and my father. And all the time the lies about the comforts he enjoyed. Comforts! Deprived of light, of pen and ink. Deprived of what else, God alone knows! Deprived of life, also, maybe! That’s not so hard to believe. Yes, yes it follows. They murdered him those two, Mortimer—and God pity us all—she, my mother!’

  ‘I have believed it this long while!’ Lancaster said. ‘Your father was strong; how should he die in so short a time? And yet … murder. There was no mark upon him.’

  ‘Is it possible he lives still?’ The boy’s heart was torn for the pitiful prisoner, violated at the horror he had conjured against his mother.

  ‘I cannot think it. This verse proves nothing. We do not know when it was written. It need not have been at Berkeley. It could have been at Corfe or Bristol or Kenilworth, even!’

  ‘Not Kenilworth; there he lived like a King…’

  ‘Save that he was not free. Sir, to the prisoner all light is dark, all comfort bitter. I cannot think he’s still alive! Your uncles Kent and Norfolk are hopeful in the matter; myself I have no hope!’

  ‘By God’s Face we must search into the matter, no clue unfollowed, no stone unturned. While there’s still doubt I cannot endure the sight of my mother’s face. As for the crown—I have no heart for it; the way it came… too soon. I need time, cousin. I am too young, too little-wise to be a King.’

  Lancaster was a troubled man. The second Edward, with every fault, had not wrought so much evil as those two that once the country had hailed as saviours. These days he sat with the Council, watchful and withdrawn. He had no mind to associate himself with its policies. For Mortimer, though he had lost goodwill, had still a tyrant’s power. Before one could strip him of that power one must deal with Madam Queen Isabella. From such a bitter farce as the Council Lancaster had wished to withdraw. He was growing old and his eyes troubled him. ‘Yet stay, cousin,’ the young King besought him, ‘I must have one heart faithful to my service.’

  Kent and Norfolk were yet more troubled. Not only did they grieve deeply for the country’s plight; conscience smote them to the heart. For this bad Queen they had taken arms against their brother and King. Greedy, lascivious, she let nothing stand in the way of her shameless pleasures. She cared nothing for the welfare of the people. She had put down the Despensers to set an even bloodier tyrant in their place. And now this new rumour—that her hand had been in the murder; a rumour her behaviour made only too likely! Now they must ask themselves whether they were not fratricides and regicides. Now they must remember that Edward had been a most kind brother and to their mother a devoted son. From a lean purse he had made offerings for joy of their birth—so she had told them. And now they had, in all likelihood, helped to kill him. Edmund—more heart than head—was the more affected. Until he had found out the truth of the matter his wits were in danger of being overthrown. If Edward still lived, if that sacred blood were not upon his own head, he would wear his knees to the bone in thanksgiving. But, if Edward had been murdered, then the murderers, whoever they might be, should pay the penalty!

  XLI

  ‘I believed in her,’ the young King said. ‘When I was a child I believed in her as in a saint. When I grew older I knew no saint walked the earth—not even you, my darling!’ He took Philippa’s hand and laid it against his cheek. ‘But still I believed her the best of women. Even the things she said against my father, I believed. I loved him; but still I believed her. When I went to France I believed her still… until I found out about her and that man! I believed my father was cruel, I believed that he robbed her, I believed she stood in danger of her life. She—from him!’ His laugh was
bitter.

  Philippa said, ‘The things she told you were not all lies. Her life was never easy, nor your father always kind. And he did keep her poor; when she came to us in Hainault, I doubt she had a silver piece in her pocket.’

  ‘She soon found the way to fill it! Where’s the dowry your father gave you? We should have it to ease us now—God knows we’re poor enough! And where’s your English dower—the Queen of England’s due? Where the rents, the incomes, the jewels and the lands? She has them all. Nothing left; not even to pay for your crowning—and that grieves me most of all.’

  She said, gentle, ‘You must learn to weigh and to reason. Once you thought no word could tell your mother’s goodness; now you think there’s none too bad. And the truth, I fancy, must lie somewhere between the two. That your father came to a violent end, I do fear is all too true. But that your mother had a hand in so foul a thing I cannot believe.’

  ‘You are too good, too innocent.’

  ‘Neither the one nor the other. Nor yet a fool, neither.’

  ‘Her greed, at least, you cannot deny. I am the poorest King in Christendom.’

  ‘We have enough for our needs.’ And she would not let him know how she must pinch and pare and was yet behind with her debts; nor how come from the richest court in Christendom, she longed for some allevation of her poverty. ‘The rest will come.’

  ‘I’ll not wait for that. It is time you were crowned; time and time enough. I’ll speak to Lancaster.’

  Lancaster raised the matter in Council and then in Parliament. Madam Queen Isabella heard of it with anger; Mortimer added it to the score of his hatred against Lancaster.

  Lancaster’s protest did not go unheard. Parliament knew well the wrongs the young Queen had suffered. Fifteen thousand pounds a year had been promised in the marriage contract; it was little enough for a Queen of England. Yet not one penny of it had she seen. Expenses of the Scots war had been high, already taxes were heavy; there was little money about and the extortions of Isabella and Mortimer had made that little, less. As for the lands and incomes due to the Queen, Isabella held them fast; not one yard nor one penny would she let go.

  ‘If Madam Queen Isabella would content herself with less of what is not truly hers, then Madam the Queen would have more of her rightful dues!’ Lancaster said so plainly in Parliament.

  ‘She to have more—the chit; and I less!’ Isabella’s eyes were jade-hard beneath the winged brows.

  ‘I’ll not forget this,’ Mortimer’s teeth gritted jaw on jaw, ‘any more than I’ll forget it was Lancaster that set himself against me in the matter of the Gloucester title. I’ve had enough of your precious uncle, my dear! I mean to force him to his knees, teach him a lesson he’ll not soon forget!’

  ‘He’s not worth your anger. He’s old; older than his years. And he’s near-blind. He’ll not live long to plague you. The first strong wind will carry him away—so much rubbish. Patience, a little patience…’ ‘Patience is a vice of the old—you are overpatient, my dear!’

  She swallowed in her throat. He forever pricked her with fear of growing old. She needed no prick from him on that score; her mirror spoke plain enough of lines that marred her beauty; lines that came not from time alone. A woman cannot fight to the edge of endurance but the mark of the struggle is left. Still less can she breathe the very air of murder—though herself innocent—without it leave its mark. But Mortimer was a man and his conscience not over-fine, success had added to his looks, put a gloss upon the man; he was handsomer than he had ever been. It did not make him easier to live with; his kindness was ever harder to come by. He had never much tenderness for women; for her now it was less than ever. And, for all she loved him to the point of idolatry, still she must face it—gratitude was not in him. But for all his gibes he still enjoyed her body; yet were he refused it, he’d soon enough find consolation; nothing would be hurt save his pride. And there, at least, she had him! When her body no longer attracted him she could still keep him by his pride, his ambition; an uneasy way. the only way…

  From her troubles there seemed no respite. It was not only Mortimer’s fading desire nor Lancaster’s interference; nor was it the open enmity of Kent and Norfolk, and the common people’s clear dislike that weighed her down. All these; and more. Rumour tossed her from one horn of her dilemma to the other—the rumour that branded her with murder; the rumour that her husband still lived. To that later rumour details were constantly added so that she sickened lest, in the killing, an error had been made, and he would come back. He had been seen, they said; actually seen. Archbishop Melton of York that had known him from boyhood had recognised him in a monk’s habit at Gloucester. Gravesend, bishop of London that knew the King’s face as well as he knew his own, had also recognised him beneath a monk’s hood.

  It is not true; nor it cannot be true. Sweet Christ, let it not be true! She prayed, all unaware of blasphemy.

  Archbishop and bishop summoned by Mortimer denied the tale. ‘But my lord,’ the archbishop said, ‘I tell you plain, times are not good and there are many to wish the old days back!’

  And the bishop. ‘It is the friars. The late King favoured them; they grow impudent! They go about the country spreading their lies. It puts dripping on their bread and, with luck, a piece of meat!’

  ‘It is those two themselves that spread the mischief!’ Mortimer said when they had bowed themselves out. ‘Give me time and I’ll deal with them. But first we deal with Kent; he’s the heart of the trouble, prime mischief-maker of them all. He swears his brother’s alive; swears he’s actually seen him. He never had the best of wits; he doesn’t see the net he’s spreading for his own feet.’

  ‘He’s honest enough, the fool!’ Isabella said. ‘And there lies the danger. He believes this tale because he must. He took arms against his brother; if that brother still lives—why Kent washes away best part of his guilt! To believe his brother lives—that’s no crime.’

  ‘Not yet.’

  She looked up startled. Yet more bloodshed? She was weary of it. Shed blood if she must; shed needless blood—no!

  He read her more easily than a book; he was no scholar—save in women. He cast a look upon her so that she was conscious once more of yellow cheeks and wrinkles beneath the high paint. He stretched himself that she might more admire the body she doted upon.

  She tried to cover up her weak moment. ‘Kent could do more harm dead than alive. He’s well-liked. Shew him no mercy and we may regret it!’

  ‘Only fools shows mercy to fools! Strange that great Edward should beget fools!Your husband was one and paid for it. Kent’s another and he, too, must pay. To the wicked you may, if it suit your book, show leniency; to the fool, never—and especially the honest fool. He must be put down before he bring the world crashing upon our heads!’

  ‘My brother is alive. I have seen him!’ Edmund of Kent said, as he had said half-a-dozen times before.

  Henry of Lancaster shook a weary head. ‘He’s dead, for him all is finished. And for you, if you persist in this, all will be finished, too!’

  ‘I’ll not close my eyes upon the truth. If you cannot believe me, then ask the friar Dunhevid; he knew my brother well!’

  ‘A man you’d be a fool to trust!’

  ‘A true man; he tried to rescue my brother from prison.’

  ‘Had he minded his own business your brother would be living now.’

  ‘He does live I tell you!’ Kent’s handsome face flushed with excitement.

  ‘I’ve seen him with my own eyes; seen my brother!’

  ‘A piece of deception; trickery—if nothing worse.’

  ‘I saw him. I tell you, I saw him. I went with Maltravers.’

  ‘Cousin, what have you done? Maltravers is Mortimer’s man.’

  ‘No longer. He’s my man; my brother’s man.’

  Lancaster peered at him with pitying eyes. Kent went happily on. ‘Maltravers told me that Edward was alive. Shut up in Corfe castle; I could see him for myself. It wouldn�
��t be easy he said, but he’d manage it. And so he did. We went to Corfe together, he and I. And it was not easy. But see my brother I did. Through a window. There he was, as I’ve often seen him, the bright hair falling about his cheeks; he was writing—his very self!’

  ‘Oh cousin, how are you misled! His hair was grey, grey. It began to turn the day they took Despenser; already at Kenilworth it was grey. Believe me, Kent it was not your brother!’

  ‘I know my brother’s face.’

  ‘Did you see him close?’

  ‘Close enough!’

  ‘The time of day?’

  ‘Twilight.’

  ‘Light failing. They meant to mislead you—and they did!’

  ‘It was light enough; light enough for me to know him. How should I not know my own brother? We are going to raise his standard, Maltravers and I, drum up an army, take him from prison, Maltravers has promised it.’

  ‘Cousin, cousin. Maltravers is Mortimer’s brother-in-law! Mortimer puts a rope about your neck; pray God your own hands haven’t tightened it. Fly. Fly the country at once; take passage for France. Edward lies in his grave. Fly lest you go down to your own. Forget what you think you saw. You can help no-one now; none but yourself.’

  ‘Forget? Run away? Finished? It is beginning, I tell you; beginning! And your advice comes too late. I have written…’

  ‘To whom have you written?’ Lancaster’s voice was the voice of doom.

  ‘To Maltravers. I sent him a letter for my brother, telling him…’

  ‘Telling him—what?’

  ‘That I shall rouse all England to set him free. That I shall hang Mortimer higher than ever man hanged yet; higher than he himself hanged the Despensers.’