The Traitor's Wife (14 page)

The king did fight the Ordinances, but it was of no use. In the end, fearing civil war, he grudgingly acceded to all of the Ordinances but the one concerning Gaveston, and eventually he was forced to accede to that one too. Though Gaveston left from London, not Dover, and on the fourth of November, not the first of November—the minor discrepancy a source of some small satisfaction to the king—he still left, with his pregnant bride remaining in England.

Isabella de Vescy had left the court before Gaveston, though only for her lands in Yorkshire. “Don't fear, your grace, I'll soon be back,” she promised the queen. “Fool barons!”

The king, Margaret, and Eleanor had gone to the side of the Thames to see Gaveston off. Eleanor had never learned whether the rumors about Gaveston and the king were true, but as the years had passed by, she had ceased to wonder about them. Margaret and Piers seemed as happy as most couples she knew, and it was not like Margaret to keep her complaints to herself if she had any. She'd wanted to join Gaveston in his exile, but he had not wanted her to travel by sea in her condition.

Edward was making no effort to control his emotions as he embraced his friend to say good-bye, and Eleanor tactfully took a great interest in the unloading of a nearby merchant ship. Then Gaveston turned his attention to Margaret, whose bulk prevented him from holding her as close as he had the king. “I know I can trust you to take care of my wife, Nelly,” he said at last, tapping her on the shoulder to unfix her gaze from the merchant ship.

“I will do everything possible for her, Piers. But where shall you go?”

“Where life takes me, as has always been the case.”

“But you cannot be so careless once you have had your child, you know.”

He laughed. “Your earnestness delights and instructs me as always.” He drew her into a hug. “Good-bye, Nelly. Where is Hugh? Traveling as ever?”

“No. He is back at court for the moment.” She frowned, for Hugh had greatly irritated her that fall by borrowing her carts and sumpter horses without warning, forcing Eleanor's elderly chamberlain to scramble about to hire some for her own travels with the queen. Isabella had had a great deal to say about Hugh's presumption, and Eleanor had found herself agreeing with much of it. Even after the horses and carts had arrived back in their designated place in the royal stables, and Hugh had apologized, Eleanor still remained a little piqued.

“Someday, my dear, you and I will have a chat about Hugh's travels, but not today. If I run into him abroad, I shall tell him you have taken a French lover and have no need of him.”

“Piers!”

“Very well. A plain old Englishman.” He turned to embrace Margaret again, then the king, and turned to board his ship. Only when its sails went out of sight did the three of them turn away. Eleanor could see from the king's and Margaret's slumped shoulders that they were both dejected; what surprised her was how dejected she was herself.

Immediately after Christmas, Eleanor and her father-in-law were summoned to attend the king in York. Eleanor was disappointed, for life at Loughborough had been extremely agreeable. Philip's health had improved so much that he had married, and he and his new bride had come for the holiday festivities. Isabel de Hastings, whose second son had been born a few months earlier, did not visit, but sent good reports of her family; she and her husband had just returned from Gascony. Margaret le Despenser came home from some great house where she had been improving her manners and conversation, as was the custom among girls her age, and all at Loughborough agreed that she was duly improved. Hugh the elder had his eye out for a match for her.

Hugh her husband was there too, of course. It had snowed a few days before Christmas, and he and Eleanor and their three-year-old son had had a delightful time throwing snowballs at each other. Even Margaret had temporarily abandoned her fine manners to join in, ganging up with little Hugh and his nurse against his parents. Eleanor had been freezing cold afterward, and Hugh had taken her inside and helpfully removed her sodden clothes, which had led to an even more delightful time. She'd then forgiven him entirely for so highhandedly taking her sumpter horses.

“York!” she asked now. “Why York, this time of year?” Hugh the elder said, “It can mean only one thing, my dear. He is bringing Gaveston back to England.”

“York! This time of year! We just came from York. I do not intend to go back there.” Isabella looked around her at the comforts of Westminster, where she and the king were spending Christmas. “I will not go there.”

“Then you may stay. I go to York.”

“Edward. You cannot be contemplating having that Gaveston return.”

“I am not contemplating it. My messenger has already given Piers his instructions. He is to make his way to York immediately.”

“Edward, are you mad?”

“Certainly not. Only a madman would consent to be treated the way I have been treated, being told whom I can have around my own court. Do you think for an instant my father would have tolerated this? I did a short while, but 'tis past.” He glanced at his seething young wife. “But there is no need for you to hurry, as you may join us at York at your leisure. We shall travel slowly too, for we must stop at Wallingford and bring my niece Margaret with us. Traveling with a pregnant woman will slow us down, but Piers will like to see his child, and Margaret is of hardy stock. Piers's old nurse, Agnes, and Lady Despenser shall go with her.”

“You take my own lady now, without informing me?”

“I am informing you now, Isabella, and is it not natural that Eleanor should attend her younger sister in childbirth? When the child is born, Eleanor shall return to her duties with you. In the meantime your household will not much feel the diminution by one, I imagine.”

“You forget that my lady Isabella de Vescy has also been forced from me.”

“By those Ordainers you find so irritatingly sensible at times, my lady, not by me. They seek to control you as much as me. Shall I read you the Ordinances again?”

“You need not. I am having them transcribed for me.”

He laughed and said, with genuine approbation, “I have always admired your inquisitive mind, Isabella.” He glanced at Isabella's figure, now entirely that of a woman, and smiled. “Shall Piers be alone in his fatherhood, my queen, or shall we give him a rival? We have not made any efforts in that regard lately, I think. I must leave in the morning.”

She nodded and dutifully let him lead her toward her bed.

Eleanor, having had a fairly easy time in childbirth herself, had hoped that Margaret would be similarly blessed, but hours had gone by with Margaret no closer to giving birth than she had been when a boy awoke Eleanor from a deep sleep to bid her to attend her sister.

“Did he say he would come?” Margaret whimpered between spasms.

Eleanor said gently, “I know only what the king told me, and the king says he will soon be here.”

“I want him, Nelly. I miss him.”

“I know you do, Meg.”

“I don't care what they say about him and the king. He loves me, and I love him. I am so scared, Nelly. What if I die before he comes?”

“You will not die,” said Eleanor. Though women did every day, of course. Yet their mother had borne four babes from Gilbert de Clare and four more from their stepfather, and their grandmother Queen Eleanor had borne even more. Neither had died from childbearing. “You are a Clare, and we are from strong stock.” She cast her mind back on what her own midwife had told her. “Breathe. Like this.”

Margaret was in between pains. She said loftily, “I know well how to breathe, sister.”

Three more hours had passed, and Margaret had at last gone into hard labor. Only then did she remember that she had packed a relic to clutch at as she gave birth. Eleanor, relieved to be out of the room and away from Margaret's yelps for a short while, went to find her trunks to unpack it.

Exhausted and dizzy from bending over her sister, she scarcely noticed the men sauntering toward her. Then she started. “Uncle! Piers!”

“Nelly. How fares Meg?”

“Well as can be expected, but Piers, she is in the worst stage, and it would help her so much if she could see you. You must go to her.”

“Go to her? In childbed? But Nelly, no man goes there.”

“This is special.” She tugged at Piers. “Get you there now!”

“Nelly! What a fierce little creature you are. Quit yanking at me, and I will follow you to wherever you wish. But what if I collapse?”

“If you can stand battle,” said Eleanor, “you can surely stand this.”

Gaveston followed her back to the birthing chamber, where the midwife—a local woman who had said no more than a dozen words in so many hours— stared at him in horror. “Sir! No man comes in here.”

“It is all right,” said Eleanor, pushing him forward. “I asked him to come. Meg, look who is here.”

Margaret was in such intense pain that her face was contorted, but her eyes lit up when she saw her husband. “I am so glad to see you,” she panted when she could speak. “Now get out!”

“Women,” said Gaveston as Eleanor escorted him briskly out of the room. “Where shall you drag me now, Nelly? To a nunnery?”

“I knew she would be happy to see you,” Eleanor said softly. “Wait nearby. It won't be long now.”

A half hour later, Margaret was delivered safely of a daughter, and Eleanor dispatched her sister's youngest, gawkiest page to give the message to Piers and to the king, knowing that the lad would get a handsome reward for his short walk. The midwife cleaned the baby, while Agnes and Eleanor made Margaret pretty to see Piers, who was regaling the unenthusiastic king with his very brief glimpse of a childbed.