Harlot Queen

by Hilda Lewis

  ‘Slander, it seems, is in the fashion; and you, my dear, have caught the sickness! But look to yourself!’ And now he was plainly spiteful, ‘They give you a name, also. You may hear it everywhere. She-wolf of France. I trust you like it!’

  She stared at him in disbelief. This she had not heard. Her spies were everywhere; but this they had not repeated.

  ‘It is not true, nor it cannot be true!’ she cried out.

  ‘It is true. Once you were the good Queen, the beloved Queen; now you are neither. Your son’s wife with her bread-and-butter virtue has eclipsed you.’

  ‘But she-wolf!’ And now there was pain in the cry.

  ‘She-wolf!’ he said again, nodding and smiling.

  In France we hunt wolves with dogs. Her own words to Gaveston, long-forgotten, were sudden in her ears. For the first time she knew the taste of fear. She spat it from her. ‘Whoever speaks so of me shall hang from the nearest tree!’

  ‘You cannot hang all England, my dear! And she-wolf!’ he shrugged. ‘It is no bad name. A she-wolf is strong and fierce; she follows after her prey with a most dogged purpose. She has a nose to follow that prey, eyes and feet to come up with it. She has a heart that fears not to kill, a heart that is faithful to its mate. She-wolf; it suits you well!’

  Almost he saw her standing there, blood upon her mouth, blood upon her hands. It quickened his dying lust. His hands were on her tearing at her clothes. By God, if she didn’t hurry the blood upon her should be her own!

  She took in a breath of ecstasy. Let them call her she-wolf, were-wolf, what they would! So it quickened his failing desire she was content.

  XLIV

  ‘I cannot, Sir William, admit you!’ Sir Robert Holland said, ‘and you must tell my lord of Lancaster so!’

  ‘You are the governor.’

  ‘But still I cannot admit you; Madam Queen Isabella keeps the keys.’

  ‘And sleeps with them under her pillow, so I’m told. It argues a guilty conscience.’

  ‘Not so, sir; it argues fear—a very natural fear. All this scandal! I’ve seen her, poor lady, look sharp over her shoulder as though she expects…’

  ‘A ghost, maybe!’ Montague said, grim. ‘Ghost of a murdered man.’

  ‘A vile slander against the Queen…’

  ‘She is not the Queen!’ Montague reminded him very sharp. ‘Too many beside herself forget it.’

  ‘A vile slander,’ Holland began again. ‘Shame upon you, sir, to believe it! If murder there was—which God forbid—her hand was not in it. On that I’ll stake my soul!’

  ‘Beware lest the devil take you up on that! As for Madam Isabella, I see she still has power to charm. But not the people; not them any more. You know the name they give her now? She-wolf. She doesn’t get that for nothing!’

  ‘The tongue of scandal lies; it wags too loud, too cruel! So good a lady, so gracious…’

  ‘No-one ever called her a fool!’ Montague’s voice was dry. ‘Heed my warning, Holland! I know her better than ever you could do and I tell you this. As long as she and her paramour—and he is her paramour; that, at least, you’ll not deny!’

  Holland shrugged. He’d admit nothing against Madam Queen Isabella.

  ‘As long as those two hold power there’s no hope for the country. Between them they wring her dry. Inch by inch the rich lands of England come into their hands and good folk starve. If you wish well to the country, if you wish well to the King, you must stand with us!’

  And when still Holland did not answer, Montague said, ‘We could command you; we prefer your good will. Think on it, Sir Robert… and do not think too long!’

  Lancaster summoned Holland; he took up the matter where Montague had left it.

  ‘We command you, in the name of the King; we would rather your good will. We need every man; his heart as well as his right hand. Look you!’ And he led Holland to a window. The young King walked below in the garden; he looked very young, very vulnerable.

  ‘If we should fail,’ Lancaster said, ‘it’s odds but the boy will go the way of his father—sudden death, of which no man knows the truth. Do not doubt it. Let the King grow in years and power! Mortimer would never dare. If you deny me now—though you should hold yourself innocent, your hands will be stained with blood; the King’s blood.’

  ‘And what of Madam Queen Isabella? She trusts me. Shall I betray that trust!’

  ‘The man or woman who asks your help against your King is a traitor. Holland, you run grave risk of a traitor’s death.’

  And while still Holland hesitated, Lancaster said, ‘Do you set yourself against the lord Pope? He has blessed our cause. I swear it by the blood of Christ and my own hope of salvation.’

  ‘My lord, you must give me time.’ And now Holland was shaken at the heart.

  ‘There is no time. Come now, the keys.’

  ‘I cannot give them. Every night I must put them in Madam Queen Isabella’s hands. Nor would keys help you. The castle swarms with Mortimer’s men. At the first alarum they’d be in their places to pick you off as you come up the hill. And if you took us in the end—which I doubt—your losses would be too great. But…’ he paused; he said slow, unwilling, ‘There’s another way. If you swear by Christ’s blood it is truly to serve the King, then you shall take it. But, by God, I am not willing!’

  ‘I swear it!’ Lancaster said.

  ‘You could be upon Mortimer before he knew it!’ Holland said. ‘There’s a secret passage; it leads from the water—meadows south of the town. It follows the Leen; the river’s cut a channel hid by undergrowth. Some two hundred yards, before you get to the castle rock, the path goes underground and then tunnels up into the rock itself. It was made when the castle was built; the Normans knew how to build! The path’s a secret that’s been well-kept; it’s handed on from governor to governor—and every governor sworn to secrecy. Folk hereabout know it as a tale only.’

  ‘And as a tale I heard it,’ Lancaster said. ‘That it should be true—such a piece of luck I never dreamed!’

  ‘It’s hard to find—all overgrown with bramble; harder still to follow. Myself, I know it well; it’s every governor’s duty to know that path in time of need.’

  ‘There is need, now!’

  ‘The path, I must warn you, is dark; it’s slimy with water—weed and worn with the flow of water. When it reaches the rock—and that’s some eight hundred feet high—the rise is steep; in some places one in three. Underfoot the stones are loose and the roof’s none too safe. A man may easily slip to his death or bring a boulder down on his head. But it takes you into the castle itself, right into the royal lodgings. There’s a sliding panel leads into the anteroom; the Queen herself—poor lady—does not know it!’

  ‘There’s but one Queen—and that Madam Philippa! How shall we know you tell the truth? You are over-tender of Madam Isabella!’

  ‘More tender yet of my young King. I’d not have his blood upon my hands. And of Mortimer I am not tender at all!’

  ‘You go with us to point the way?’

  Holland nodded. ‘By God’s Face, I grieve for Madam Isabella. I would serve her, if in all honour I could. But my first duty is to my King!’

  Mortimer had not heeded Isabella’s warning; he carried himself to all—and especially to the King—so that every heart burned against him. The King said nothing. Between himself and Mortimer all had been said. He went his way, attending the Great Council, treating Mortimer with courtesy. He was grave and quiet; no-one, save the wife he had not brought for this bloody occasion, could have guessed at the sickness beneath that quiet face, the warring of heart and mind. At the thought of confronting those two—and both of them, very like, naked in bed together—he was all but overthrown. That he knew perfectly the nature of their association did not help; to know is one thing, to see with one’s own eyes, another. And there was danger in it too—danger as well as disgust. Mortimer was accounted the best swordsman in England; and Mortimer, when anger took him, cared for no man, not
though it were the King himself. But it was a thing he could not shirk; he must see the matter through to the end.

  Mid-October and midnight. A cold, wet night; moon and stars hidden. A good night for such a piece of work. Through flat water—meadows the little Leen crept dark and slow. Wet earth sucked at their boots as they went bent double lest they miss the path. When the path went underground they lit their lanterns and, crouching still for fear of the low roof, planted their careful feet. But for all their care they went slithering in the mud; the clang of their weapons rang so loud in that enclosed place they feared lest the watch must hear and sound the alarum. But the low roof that made a sounding board within, muffled all sound without.

  Slow-going; to them time seemed endless.

  Holland’s lantern suddenly lifted, showed them rough steps hewn in the rock steep and running with water. Immediately behind Holland went Lancaster, to his failing sight the lantern a hindrance rather than a help, at his heels Montague and some dozen gentlemen; in their midst—heart threatening to choke him with its wild beating—the King. He shook but not with fear—almost he wished it were; a horrifying repulsion shook him like a sickness.

  The steps, rising sheer in the dark tunnel, seemed to have no end; breath short in their lungs they climbed steadily. At last a glimmer or light broke the darkness. Holland put out the lantern.

  The tunnel had come to an abrupt end. The glimmer was now seen to outline in the darkness before them, a square of some hands-breadths. Holland’s fingers felt for the spring. With a tantalising care he slid the panel to one side. He stepped into the room; Lancaster followed him.

  Hugh Turpington and John Neville were spending the long hours on guard wining and dicing; they were arguing the last toss, their voices loud enough to cover the stealthy movements on the other side of the panel. They had no more time than to turn about before cold steel took them.

  It was over with them before the last of the party stepped into the room. The King, face to the wall, fought down his sickness; it was the first time he had seen a man slain before his eyes.

  The King at his heels, Lancaster burst into the Queen’s bed-chamber.

  Warned by his soldier’s sense of danger, Mortimer had leaped from the bed and stood to his defence—naked body, naked steel. Isabella, eyes dark holes with fear, sat upright, pale as the sheets she clutched to her breast to hide her nakedness.

  Montague secured the door.

  Lancaster said, ‘Your sword, sir; unless you would prefer to die under the eyes of the lady, here!’

  Mortimer’s sword went clattering. Lancaster said, ‘You are the King’s prisoner. Make yourself decent, unless you’d be taken through the streets naked.’

  They watched while he threw on some clothes. He was quiet and composed; no sign of fear; only the red sparking of the eye, as of a rat cornered, betrayed him. When he was dressed they bound him with the Queen’s girdle—a fitting cord since she had brought him to this, and led him away. He moved obedient to their hands; he moved as a man stricken. For the woman that loved him he had no word of Farewell. That he should go thus to his death, taken from a woman’s bed and bound with her girdle, he, a soldier, kept him dumb lest he turn about and curse her.

  And all the time she cried out, her voice high and thin with terror—and that terror not for herself, Pity, pity! And it was not for herself she asked. And when no answer came she reached out an arm so that her breast and thigh shone white and naked, and caught at the King’s cloak and cried to him, Fair son, pity; pity for gentle Mortimer! And when for very sickness he could not speak but must pull himself away, she cried out to Holland that had been her friend, Do no hurt to Mortimer… no hurt no hurt…

  There was no answer. They turned upon their heel. Her voice followed them fainter, thinner, as they took the prisoner away.

  She looked about the room, the silent room that so short a time ago had been loud with the feet of men; the empty room… empty of her love. His cloak lay yet upon the stool where he had cast it last night in his haste for bed; his fine bonnet lay battered upon the floor, soiled with the trampling of their feet. She bent down and brought it into bed, cradling it against her naked breast to comfort it for its fallen state… to comfort herself with something that was his. And all the time the question, What will they do with him?

  Beneath the question’s torment, she could no longer lie in the bed. In the guttering candlelight she rose, and in the disordered room dressed herself as best she might. She was not used to such work; nor was she helped by her shaking hands, nor by the tears that, blinding her, fell upon her cheeks and into her mouth. And now it was not for him alone she wept but for herself, also; herself, desolate. Without him how should she endure to live?

  What will they do to him? Again she remembered what he had done to the Despensers… and especially to the younger Despenser and bit upon her tongue to keep back the cry. Not that, sweet Christ, not that! Suddenly she remembered something else; the words they had written into the Articles of Deposition—the Queen shall rule as long as she shall live. She began to laugh, a little crazy laugh. They could not touch him without her word; and that word she would never give.

  In the midst of her laughter, her son’s face as she had seen it last, rose before her—the rigid jaw clamped down upon bitterness; in his eyes the sickness, the disgust. He had all the intemperate passion of his house, all the cruelties. Suppose she were too late? Suppose he saw to it that she was too late? All their promises would not help her then?

  She flew to the door; the hasp would not lift. She tried until her hands were bruised, crying aloud the while. There was no answer. She called again, called and called; her own voice, hoarse with calling, was the only sound. She went across to the window. Surely someone would see, someone would hear…

  She looked down into the courtyard with some surprise.

  It was morning; already it was morning and she had not known it. In the thin light servants were astir; behind her the candle flickered and went out. A man was sweeping; she heard plainly the drag of his broom on the cobbles. But when she wanted to call out to him the wind took her voice away. He went on sweeping.

  Now other sounds split into the quiet. Dogs barked, horses neighed and stamped in the chill Autumn air, voices commanded; waggons came rumbling laden with furnishings, baggage was being carried out, baskets strapped upon sumpters… food for a journey.

  Then she heard it; a quite different noise, stealing in upon the clatter of departure; a low noise, sustained… a sort of growling; the noise by which a crowd shows its anger. The noise rose, rose…

  When she understood the cause she put out both hands to save herself from falling.

  It was for Mortimer, the noise of their hatred. They were leading him out. The breath stopped in her lungs; she thought she must die. She could not look; yet look she must, see him before they took him from her sight.

  They had bound his two hands together and a fellow led him as though he were a dancing bear. They were thrusting him upon a beast of some sort… a mule? a donkey? She could not, for the blinding of her eyes, be sure; she could see only that it was a sorry sort of beast. They were strapping him upon the creature, they were handling him roughly. The animal was too low; his rider’s feet scraped upon the cobbles. And now a fellow went before holding the reins.

  A long, low moan escaped her. To this he was come—Mortimer, the King’s master, the Queen’s paragon, proudest of men! Well, but he was proud still! He held his head high; proud he was and debonair. It was they that looked mean and shabby—not only those that so rudely handled him but Lancaster and Salisbury come to watch the fun. They, and all that had had a hand in this, her son even, should rue this day! On her own soul she swore it.

  She saw the armed guard move to close him in; heard the grating of the portcullis raised, the drawbridge shut down. And worse, worse; she heard the growl of anger swell to a roar… all Nottingham gathered to spit upon great Mortimer brought low.

  The courtyard was
empty again; impossible to believe she had seen the hateful happening. But she had seen it… she had seen it! She turned back into the room, flung herself upon the disordered bed that held still the imprint of his body, the very smell of him; she laid her head upon the pillow where his head had lain. Now she was alone, forever alone! How should she endure them, the dreary procession of days lacking him?

  By God she’d not endure them! She had forgotten herself—Madam Queen Isabella that ruled England.

  She stopped weeping. She must be about her business! She crossed again to the door; this time the hasp lifted. In the anteroom a solitary waiting-woman lifted a pale, scared face; a page stared still through the narrow window though the show was over. He swung about as she came in and she bade him open the outer door. It was not locked; but a man stood either side, halberds crossed. She bade the boy run for the governor; run, run, run! For him the halberds dropped. She saw him go running.

  How long before Holland comes? How long? How long? Every moment counts, every smallest moment… and the moments are flying, flying, the precious moments!

  She beat her two hands together. Where were they taking him? Holland must tell her; she must be ready to follow on the instant. It came to her that, if she were to ride abroad, she must show herself unfrightened, debonair. She called to the tiring-woman. The woman laced her, brushed the long, tangled hair, brought water and towels, brought the paint, the unguents. When she asked for her looking-glass the woman hesitated; it was already packed she said.

  She let it pass. No time to hunt among the baggage now! No doubt she looked well enough—the woman knew her work. The woman pinned the coif brought the hooded cloak, the gloves… and still Holland did not come. Why? Why? Every moment was precious and he knew it. And there was her answer! He meant to make sure she was too late!

  She went to the outer door. Behind the crossed halberds she called his name; and when still he did not come, screamed it aloud, screamed and screamed. They were to say afterwards that the taking of Mortimer from her very bed had crazed her wits.