The Commons were concerned because they were to be asked to consent to new subsidies, and to ratify new taxes on wool. But where did all the money go?
How had Mortimer used the thirty thousand pounds of the Scottish indemnity? Had that hard campaign of three years ago been fought for him or for the kingdom? And why had the melancholy Baron Maltravers, over and above his pay as Seneschal, been given a thousand pounds as his salary for guarding the late King, if it was not a payment for murdering him? For in the end things always came out, and Treasury accounts cannot be kept secret for ever. These were the purposes to which the revenues from taxation were put. And Ogle and Gournay, Maltravers’ assistants, as well as Daverill, the Governor of Corfe Castle, had all received similar sums.
Mortimer, whose progress along the road to Nottingham was accompanied by so splendid a train that the young King himself seemed merely to be part of his suite, was no longer really supported by more than some hundred partisans, all of whom owed their fortune to him, were powerful simply because they served him, and would be in danger of disgrace, banishment or even death, the moment he fell.
He believed himself obeyed because a network of spies – there was even John Wynyard in the King’s entourage – kept him informed of all that was said and so prevented conspiracies. He believed himself powerful because his troops made him feared by the Lords and Commons. But troops may march to another man’s orders and spies may betray.
Power, without the consent of those over whom it is exercised, is a fraud that cannot long endure, a delicate balance between fear and rebellion, which may suddenly be overset when enough men become aware that they all think alike.
Riding on a saddle embroidered with gold and silver, surrounded by an escort in scarlet uniforms bearing his pennon on their lances, Mortimer was travelling over a very muddy road.
During the journey, Edward III noticed that his mother seemed ill, that her face was drawn and wan, her eyes tired and less bright than usual. She was riding in a litter and not on her white hackney as she normally did; the litter had to make frequent stops, for its movement made her feel sick. Mortimer’s manner towards her seemed at once attentive and embarrassed.
Perhaps Edward would not have noticed these signs so much had he not seen the same in Madame Philippa, his wife, earlier in the year. Besides, servants talk during journeys; the Queen Mother’s women gossiped with Madame Philippa’s. At York, where they lay for two days, Edward could no longer doubt that his mother was pregnant.
He was overwhelmed with shame and disgust. The jealousy of an eldest son increased his resentment. What had become of that splendid and noble image he had made of his mother in his childhood?
‘It was on her account I hated my father, because of the shame he inflicted on her. And now she’s disgracing me. At forty she’ll be the mother of a bastard who will be younger than my own son.’
As a king, he felt humiliated before his realm, and as a husband before his wife.
In their room in York Castle, unable to sleep, restlessly turning from side to side between the sheets, he said to Philippa: ‘Do you remember our wedding here, my love? Oh, what a sad reign I’ve brought you to!’
Philippa was placid and sensible, and felt less passionate about the matter; nevertheless, her sense of propriety was outraged.
‘Such a thing could never happen at the Court of France,’ she said.
But this infuriated Edward.
‘Oh, my love, what about your cousins of Burgundy who all three deceived their husbands? And what about your poisoned kings?’
It was as if the French dynasty had suddenly become Philippa’s own family.
‘In France people are more courteous,’ replied Philippa, ‘less blatant in their desires, less cruel in their rancour.’
‘They dissemble better and are more secretive. They prefer poison to steel.’
‘You’re less civilized here.’
He fell silent. She feared she had offended him, and reached out a soft round arm towards him.
‘I love you very much, my sweet,’ she said, ‘because you’re not like them.’
‘And it’s not only the shame,’ Edward went on, ‘but the danger, too.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that Mortimer is perfectly capable of killing us all, marrying my mother so as to get himself recognized as Regent and then claiming the throne for his bastard.’
‘You can’t think that; it would be madness!’ said Philippa.
Indeed such a plot, which meant the denial of every religious and dynastic principle, would have been quite unthinkable in any firmly established monarchy; but anything was possible, the wildest venture conceivable, in a kingdom that was torn by the struggle between rival factions.
‘I shall talk to Montacute about it tomorrow,’ said the young King.
When they reached Nottingham, Lord Mortimer showed himself particularly irritable, autocratic and impatient, because John Wynyard, though he had been unable to overhear what was said, had reported to him that there had been much converse between the King, Lord Montacute and several other young lords during the latter part of the journey.
Mortimer began by taking to task Sir Edward Bohun, the Vice-Governor, for the lodging arrangements he had made; in accordance with custom he had intended to put the great lords in the castle itself.
‘By what right,’ cried Mortimer, ‘have you disposed of these apartments so close to the Queen Mother’s without reference to me?’
‘I thought, my lord, that the Earl of Lancaster …’
‘The Earl of Lancaster, and all the rest of them too, must be lodged at least a mile from the castle.’
‘And yourself, my lord?’
Mortimer frowned as if he found the question offensive.
‘My apartment will be next to the Queen Mother’s, and the Constable will hand her the keys of the castle each evening.’
Edward Bohun bowed.
Too many precautions can sometimes be disastrous. Mortimer wished to avoid comment on the Queen Mother’s condition; above all, he wanted to isolate the King, but he merely gave the young lords the opportunity to meet and make plans with each other, far from the castle and his spies.
Lord Montacute assembled his most trusted friends, young men between twenty and thirty for the most part: Lords Molins, Hufford, Stafford, Clinton, as well as John Nevil de Horneby and the four Bohun brothers, Edward, Humphrey, William and John, the last of whom was Earl of Hereford and Essex. These young men formed the King’s party, and had Henry of Lancaster’s blessing, indeed more than his blessing.
As for Mortimer, he was living in the castle with the Chancellor Burghersh, Simon Bereford, John Monmouth, John Wynyard, Hugh Turplington and Maltravers, consulting with them as to how best to counter the new conspiracy he guessed was being hatched against him.
Bishop Burghersh felt the wind was changing and was far from eager for severe measures; he hid behind his ecclesiastical dignity and advised negotiations. In the past he had been nimble in changing from the Despensers’ party to Mortimer’s.
‘We’ve had enough of arrests and blood-letting,’ he said. ‘Perhaps some gratifications in the form of lands, money and honours …’
Mortimer silenced him with a glance; his eyes, half-hidden behind the straight line of the lids under the massive brow, could still make people quake.
At that very hour Lord Montacute was having a private conversation with Edward III.
‘I beseech you, my noble King,’ he said, ‘no longer to tolerate the insolence and intrigues of the man who ordered your father’s assassination, beheaded your uncle, and corrupted your mother. We have sworn to shed the last drop of our blood to free you from him. We’re ready to go to any lengths; but we must act quickly and, to do so, we must be able to enter the castle in large enough numbers, for none of us are lodged in it.’
The young King thought for a moment.
‘I know now, William,’ he replied, ‘how well I love you.’
He did not say ‘how well you love me’. His was a truly royal mind, for he never doubted that people would wish to serve him; for him, the important thing was to give his trust and affection to the right people.
‘You will go on my behalf to the Constable of the castle, Sir William Eland,’ he went on, ‘and pray him, on my orders, to obey you in everything you ask of him.’
‘May God help our cause, my lord!’ said Montacute.
Everything now depended on Eland being won over and being loyal; if he revealed Montacute’s plan, the conspirators were lost, and perhaps even the King himself too. But Sir Edward Bohun guaranteed that he would be amenable, if it were only because Mortimer had treated him like a mere servant ever since his arrival in Nottingham.
William Eland did not disappoint Montacute, for he promised obedience to the utmost of his power, and swore to keep the secret.
‘Since you are with us,’ said Montacute, ‘give me the keys of the castle tonight.’
‘My lord,’ replied Eland, ‘you must know that the gates and doors are locked every night and that I have to give the keys to the Queen Mother who sleeps with them under her pillow till morning. And I must also tell you that the usual castle guard has been relieved and replaced by four hundred of Lord Mortimer’s personal troops.’
Montacute thought that all his hopes were dashed.
‘But I know of a secret entrance leading into the castle from the fields,’ went on Eland. ‘It’s an underground passage dating back to the Saxon kings, who had it made so that they could escape from the Danes when they ravaged the countryside. Queen Isabella, Mortimer, and their people know nothing of this passage, for I have had no occasion to reveal its existence to them. It leads into the very heart of the castle, into the keep,19 and you can enter by it without a soul being the wiser.’
‘How shall we find the entrance in the fields?’
‘I shall be with you, my lord!’
Lord Montacute had a second, hasty conversation with the King; then, during the course of the evening, together with the brothers Bohun, the other conspirators and Sir William Eland, he took horse and left the town, openly declaring that they thought themselves in danger in Nottingham.
Their departure, which looked so like flight, was immediately reported to Mortimer.
‘They know they’ve been unmasked and have given themselves away. I shall have them seized tomorrow and brought before Parliament. At least we shall have a quiet night, my dear,’ he said to Queen Isabella.
Towards midnight, on the other side of the keep, in a granite-walled room lit only by a night-light, Madame Philippa inquired of her husband why instead of coming to bed he sat on the edge of it, wearing a coat of mail under his royal surcoat and with a short sword beside him.
‘Great things may happen tonight,’ Edward replied.
Though Philippa looked calm and placid enough, her heart was beating fast; she remembered the conversation they had had in York.
‘Do you think they’re coming to assassinate you?’
‘That may happen, too.’
There was a sound of voices whispering in the next room, and Gautier de Mauny, whom the King had ordered to stand guard in his anteroom, knocked discreetly at the door. Edward went to open it.
‘The Constable is here, my lord,’ he said, ‘and others with him.’
Edward went to Philippa and kissed her forehead; she seized his hands, gripped them for a moment and murmured: ‘God keep you!’
Gautier de Mauny asked: ‘Am I to come with you, my lord?’
‘Bolt the doors behind me and watch over Madame Philippa.’
In the grassy courtyard of the keep the conspirators had assembled round the well in the moonlight, shadows armed with swords and battle-axes.
The young men had bound rags about their feet; the King had failed to take this precaution and his footsteps were the only ones to echo down the flagstones of the long corridors. Their progress was lit by a single torch.
There were servants sleeping on the floor. If they half-awakened, someone murmured: ‘The King,’ and they stayed where they were, drew a little closer together and wondered at this passage of armed lords in the night, yet content not to know too much.
There was no trouble till they reached the antechamber to Queen Isabella’s apartments, where the six men posted by Mortimer refused them entrance, even though it was the King who demanded it. The battle was brief; and only John Nevil was wounded by a pike-thrust in the arm. Surrounded and disarmed, the guards were made to stand with their backs to the wall. The struggle had lasted no more than a minute, but behind the heavy door they heard the Queen Mother scream and then the bolts being shot home.
‘Come out, Lord Mortimer!’ Edward ordered. ‘Your King has come to arrest you.’
His voice was clear and strong as it was in battle, and also as the crowd at York had heard it on his wedding day.
There was no reply but the sound of a sword grating as it was drawn from the scabbard.
‘Come out, Mortimer!’ the young King shouted once again.
He waited for another few seconds, then seized a battle-axe from one of the young lords, swung it high and drove it into the door with all his might.
With this axe-blow, he at long last firmly asserted his royal power; it was the end of his humiliations and the curbs on his will; and it was also the freeing of his Parliament, the restoration of honour to the Lords and of law to the realm. It was not on his coronation day that Edward III’s reign began, but now, at this moment, when the bright steel bit into dark oak and the noise of splintering wood echoed through the vaults of Nottingham Castle.
Ten other axes attacked the door, and the heavy oak soon yielded.
Roger Mortimer was standing in the middle of the room; he had had time to don his hose; his white shirt was open to the waist and he held a sword in his hand.
His flinty eyes gleamed under his thick eyebrows, his greying, uncombed hair hung down about his rugged face; there was still an impressive strength about him.
Queen Isabella stood by his side, tears pouring down her face. She was shivering with fear and cold; her little naked feet made two white patches on the flagstones. The rumpled bed could be seen in the next room.
The young King’s first glance was at his mother’s stomach, at its shape as revealed by the nightdress. He would never forgive Mortimer for reducing his mother, who was so beautiful, so gallant in adversity, so cruel in victory and always so royal, to this weeping woman, who stood there groaning and wringing her hands because they had come to take her man from her.
‘My son, my son, I beseech you, spare my dear Mortimer!’
She had come forward and was standing between her son and her lover.
‘Has he spared your honour?’ said Edward.
‘Don’t hurt his body!’ she cried. ‘He is a gallant knight and our beloved. Don’t forget you owe him your throne!’
The conspirators hesitated. They wondered if there must be a struggle and whether they would have to kill Mortimer under the Queen’s very eyes.
‘He has had rewards enough for hurrying me to the throne! Go on, my lords, seize him!’ said the young King, pushing his mother aside and waving his companions forward.
Montacute, the Bohuns, Lord Molins and John Nevil, his arm bleeding though he paid it no attention, surrounded Mortimer. Two battle-axes were raised above his head, and three swords were held with their points to his chest. Then a hand seized his arm and made him drop the sword he held. He was pushed towards the door. As he crossed the threshold, he turned and said: ‘Goodbye, Isabella, my Queen; we have loved one another well!’
And it was true. The greatest, most spectacular and most devastating love of the century, which had started merely as a chivalrous exploit, but had stirred all the Courts of Europe as well as the Holy See, whose passion had assembled a fleet, equipped an army and been consummated in tyranny, bloodthirstiness and power, was now come to its end amid the battle-axes and by the
light of a smoky torch. Roger Mortimer, eighth Baron of Wigmore, former Justiciar of Ireland and first Earl of March, was led away to prison, while his royal mistress, clothed only in a nightdress, collapsed at the foot of their bed.
Before dawn broke Bereford, Daverill, Wynyard and Mortimer’s other principal supporters had been arrested; Seneschal Maltravers, Gournay and Ogle, Edward II’s three murderers, were in flight and being pursued.
In the morning the populace crowded into the streets of Nottingham to shout their joy as the escort went by, taking Mortimer away in chains and a tumbril, the supreme disgrace for a knight. Wryneck, his head resting on his shoulder, was in the front row of the crowd and, even though his tired old eyes could barely see the procession go by, he danced with joy and threw his cap in the air.
‘Where are you taking him?’ people asked.
‘To the Tower of London.’
3.
To the Common Gallows
THE RAVENS IN THE Tower live to a great age, to over a hundred they say. The same huge, sly, persistent bird, which seven years ago had tried to peck the prisoner’s eyes out through the bars of his dungeon window, had once again taken up its post in front of it.
Were they mocking Mortimer in giving him the same dungeon as before? Where the father had kept him shut up for eighteen months, the son now held him prisoner. It occurred to Mortimer that there must be something in his character, some quality in his nature which made him intolerable to the royal authority, or made that authority unbearable to himself. In any case, a king and he could not live together in the same country, and one or other of them had to die. He had destroyed one king; and now another was going to destroy him. It is a great misfortune to be born with the soul of a king if one is not destined to reign.
The Lily and the Lion Page 16
