The Traitor's Wife (17 page)

Toward York they rode at a leisurely pace, unhindered by Lancaster's men. Hugh, riding beside Eleanor's chariot, laughed as Eleanor recounted the morning's events for him. “What a spitfire you can be, my love! I did not know I was married to such a shrew.”

“Perhaps I was rude to him, Hugh, but he has caused my uncle and Margaret and Piers such grief. And I do believe that beneath all his talk of principles lies nothing more than his desire for power.”

“Probably, and as Lancaster has always borne my father enmity—I think for no reason than that my father has always been loyal to the king—I am glad you spoke to him as you did.”

“What brings you here?”

“Why, you, of course. This business worries me, Eleanor. I saw my uncle Warwick several days before I set off to find you, and he looked even more sour than is usual with him. When I asked him if he planned to go north with the other Ordainers, I thought he would take his whip to me.”

“And the others? Where are they?”

“Pembroke and Warenne are in pursuit of the king and Gaveston. Poor Warenne! He has changed sides so often, I doubt he knows from day to day whom he is trying to seize—Gaveston, Lancaster, or himself. Your brother stays behind in the south, and Hereford is in the east. Frankly, Eleanor, that is where I wish you were, far away from all this. That is why I rode here, to take you back to Loughborough.” He nodded in Isabella's direction. “With her grace's permission, of course.”

She shook her head. “I cannot leave my uncle—or the queen. He needs every friend he has, and the queen is nervous with her baby as it is. It would distress them both were I to leave.”

“Very well. Then I shall stay with you.”

Eleanor smiled. “That I like. But how dare you insult my headdress?”

“It kept Lancaster off, did it not?”

Soon they were settled into York as though, Isabella said a tad sourly, they had never left it. They were a comfortable lot there. Margaret was delighted to see her sister and the queen because, as she said, one could talk about babies with the monks for only so long. Eleanor in consideration of her pregnancy was given a chamber with her husband and no longer had to sleep in the queen's chamber at night. Hugh hunted by day and diced with the ladies at night; sometimes, though, he and Eleanor slipped off by day and went for aimless walks, enjoying what Eleanor thought was the loveliest May she had ever seen.

The king himself soon arrived in York, minus Gaveston, who had stayed in Scarborough. Edward had been confident that Gaveston would be safe there while Edward himself traveled south to muster more troops, but no sooner had the king entered York Castle than word arrived that Scarborough Castle was under siege.

Eleanor had never seen a man as distracted as her uncle during the next few days. Edward ate little and slept less. His efforts toward raising troops went for naught. Finally, a messenger brought word to the king that Gaveston had come to terms with Pembroke and Warenne. He would soon be at St. Mary's Abbey in York, where he had come but a few months before for the birth of his daughter, and there the agreement would be put before the king.

“I like this not,” said Edward unhappily, gazing at the message after having read it a dozen times or so. “Why couldn't he have held out longer?”

“There was little time to bring ample provisions in,” Hugh the elder reminded him.

“And while it might have been well stocked with weapons, they are useless with no one to wield them,” Hugh the younger said tartly. “How many men did Gaveston have there?”

“Few,” said Edward dazedly. “Very few.”

When Gaveston and his captors arrived at the abbey several days later, however, all were in good spirits, even the captive. Negotiations were to remain open until the first of August, during which time Gaveston's safety would be guaranteed by Pembroke, Warenne, and Henry Percy, a great baron who had been present at the siege. If a final concord could not be reached by August 1, Gaveston would return to Scarborough—"Of which I have such fond memories,” he said sweetly—with a garrison.

Gaveston had agreed not to attempt to persuade Edward to change anything in the agreement, and kept his promise as Pembroke sonorously explained its terms. “I see no reason why we cannot reach an agreement by August,” he concluded. “We all want what is best for the realm, do we not?”

Edward was too relieved by the agreement's terms, which were more favorable to Gaveston than he had hoped, to chafe at Pembroke's patronizing tone. “Indeed we do.”

“Perhaps,” said Hugh the elder, “Parliament should be summoned. If it took place in July, there would be ample time to finish discussions before August.”

“An excellent idea,” agreed Pembroke.

Margaret had rushed to see her husband when he entered the castle and still sat clinging to him. “In the meantime, can't he stay here?”

“I do not think that best under the circumstances,” said Pembroke. He was a thin, dark man in his early forties, and the siege and the hasty journey to York appeared to have tired him more than his captive. “Here there might be—difficulties.”

“He means that I might break my part of the agreement,” said Gaveston dryly. “Pembroke, I am dead tired, as are you. Let me retire with my wife— put a guard by my door if you wish—and we may discuss this more tomorrow, shall we?”

Pembroke, who had been taken aback to see the countess so affectionate toward her husband, nodded slowly. “Very well.”

After a couple of days more of discussion, it was agreed that Gaveston would be taken to Wallingford, where he could live on his own lands while the Ordainers were near enough to keep an eye on him. Pembroke and Warenne pledged to forfeit all of their land and goods if they did not keep their end of the bargain. Parliament was to be summoned to meet in Lincoln on July 8.

Soon after this date was set, Pembroke and Gaveston departed York, Gaveston looking nothing like a prisoner in fine clothes and mounted on the best steed the king's stables could provide. Days passed, and several letters arrived from Piers, letters that made Edward smile. “Piers is planning his defense in front of Parliament,” he told the Despensers. “What a lawyer he would have made! The points he makes here are brilliant.”

“So the earls plan to let him speak there?” asked Eleanor.

“Pembroke says they will, and Pembroke is an upright man, for all that he consorts with the Ordainers.” Edward yawned. “A pity he must go all the way to Wallingford, and then back to Lincoln, but I daresay he will prefer riding back and forth to sitting at Wallingford without company. He tells me that he and Pembroke are getting on well now, for all that Pembroke is entirely lacking in a sense of humor. Who knows, Gaveston may develop one in him.”

The king and queen, meantime, began preparing to leave York for Lincoln. All was ready, and Eleanor was taking one last walk in the coolness of an evening in late June, when she saw a messenger approaching the castle in great haste. Curious, she hastened to the great hall of the castle. It was empty. Somewhat hampered by her growing bulk, she hurried to chamber after chamber, finding the same lifeless air over all of them, until she saw a knot of people standing near an outer room that led to Edward's bedchamber. Her husband was there. “Hugh? What is wrong?”

“A messenger has brought news about Gaveston. My father is in there with the king now.”

“News? What news? Have the Ordainers not honored their part of the agreement?”

A cry came from the king's bedchamber. Never had Eleanor heard a sound like it. It was animal-like, otherworldly, yet it had to have come from a man, for it was followed by sobs. Eleanor could not have believed that a man could feel such anguish and survive. There was no need for Hugh to say the next words; she knew what had happened.

“They have killed Gaveston, Eleanor. 'Tis the work of Lancaster and my uncle Warwick.”

P
EMBROKE'S WIFE, BEATRICE, WAS FRENCH AND FAIR, AND NONE BUT A churl would have argued when Pembroke, having stopped for the night with Gaveston at the rectory at Deddington in Oxfordshire, decided to ride the few miles to Bampton to pay her a visit. He thought of taking his captive with him, but Gaveston, still feeling the effects of his illness a month before, was not as strong as he used to be, and did not look up to the ride. Moreover, turning up at Bampton with his charge might spur his wife, a proper hostess to the bone, to pull out the stops of hospitality for the Gascon, and Pembroke had been parted long enough from his bride to wish her attentions to be given to no one but himself. Shaking his minimal misgivings from his mind, he hired a fresh horse for the journey and galloped happily away, grateful for the extra hours of light the June days were affording him.

Gaveston himself ate a simple but delicious meal and retired early, pleased to see that he had been provided with a comfortable bed in a pleasant, airy room. He was dreaming a dream to match his cheerful surroundings when he heard his name called, again and again, followed by, “Arise, traitor! You are taken.”

Mother of God! it was the Black Dog of Arden, with dozens of men. Pembroke's few men, taken unawares, were themselves under guard, save for a couple who had been gravely wounded and needed none. Gaveston opened the window. “Don't bark so loud, Warwick. You disturb the neighborhood.”

“Aye, I bark. And I bite too, you fool. Dress yourself and come down.”

“Where is Pembroke? What about his oath?”

“I care little where he is, and I care naught about his oath. Come down, or you will be dragged down.”

A voice from outside the door—the rector's—said, “My lord, all is lost. Pembroke's men have been captured—one killed already—and there is a guard all around the rectory.”

“Very well,” Gaveston said, “I'll come down.”

Pembroke, having passed a very pleasant evening with Beatrice, was on the road to Deddington when he heard the news from one of his men, who after having been disarmed by Warwick's men had been left behind at the rectory. Gaveston had been stripped of his shoes and jewels and had been made to walk, wearing nothing but his shirt and hose, through the town. Only when Warwick's men tired of the slow pace this necessitated had a horse been produced for him, although the horse was such a nag the change did little to speed the procession.

Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, had worked with Warwick long enough to know that approaching him would be futile. Instead, he galloped off to Tewkesbury, where the Earl of Gloucester was staying. Gloucester was a moderate man, and second only to Lancaster in riches; if any man could save Pembroke's honor and Gaveston, it was Gilbert de Clare. But young Gilbert was not in an accommodating mood. He felt affronted, having not been consulted about Pembroke's arrangement, and through his association with the Ordainers he had grown over the years rather to dislike Piers Gaveston. It did not help matters that Gaveston was a father, while Gilbert's wife had suffered several miscarriages.