The Traitor's Wife (37 page)

The Earl of Hereford had also received a letter, an order by the king to appear at Gloucester to discuss the assemblies that were being held in the Marches. His reply arrived in the person of the Abbot of Dore, who clearly wished himself back in Dore after he delivered his message to the king, privately. The king returned to his chamber to report to Hugh. “They propose, dear one, that you be put in the custody of Lancaster—Lancaster!—until a Parliament can be summoned, where you and Hereford can put forward your complaints. Lancaster! My God, Hugh, do they think me an utter fool? After what happened to Gaveston—”

He broke off, shuddering, and Hugh, who was alone with him, put his arms around him and kissed him on the cheek. “Does the good abbot await a reply?”

“Yes.”

“Then let's give him one. I'll answer whatever I am asked in Parliament, but I have been charged with no crime, have I? Then to commit me to Lancaster's custody would be groundless and contrary to Magna Carta, common law—”

“And my coronation oath,” said the king, taking heart.

“And the Ordinances. Let us not forget the Ordinances. That'll irk Hereford and Lancaster—you know full well Lancaster is behind this—to no end, to be accused of violating their own Ordinances.”

Edward laughed. “You think of everything, dear one. Find a clerk and dictate our reply.”

“Hugh! Uncle!”

Eleanor leapt from her window seat in her chamber to greet the two men coming toward her. Hugh embraced her, then stepped back to look at her. “How healthy you look now, love.”

“It is beautiful here, and I have been able to go riding every day for weeks now that the weather is so pleasant. But what a lovely surprise!”

“We are on our way back to Westminster, and thought we would stay a night. What of it, my lady? Can you manage to entertain us?”

Eleanor laughed. “I shall endeavor to do my best, your grace. Now tell me. What am I missing at court?”

Hugh paused for only a second or so before replying smoothly, “Have I told you Pembroke is back? No? Well, he is, and he has chosen himself a new French wife, Marie de Saint-Pol, a count's daughter. They are only waiting for the Pope's dispensation, as they are related within the fourth degree.”

“That is good; he was so fond of his first wife. What do you know of her?”

“Only that she is young and fair, and being virtuous, time will have to tell if she is fertile.”

“And the queen?”

The queen was expecting a fourth child in July. Edward said, “Doing well. She plans to have this one in the Tower, of all places.”

The children having gotten wind of their father's appearance, they soon straggled into the chamber, and for the next hour or so they dominated the conversation, Edward enviously speculating on the life his brother Hugh must be leading as the king's squire, Isabel bringing her new puppy, Joan wanting to know when
she
could have a wedding, and Nora evincing the greatest of interest in pulling the king's beard. When Eleanor could get a word in edgewise, she idly asked whether things had quieted down in Wales, and Hugh assured her that they seemed quiet enough. Then Eleanor remembered that Hugh had never seen the castle, and the children had to take him on a tour, Eleanor and the king following behind. At last, all the children were stowed in bed, and the king took himself off to the fine chamber and steaming bath that had been made ready for him. “Would you like a bath too, Hugh?” Eleanor asked as they entered their own chamber. “I can order one.”

“No.” Hugh tipped her face up to his. “Remember the vow I made at Caerphilly? I haven't kept it.”

It had been months since they had made love. Among Eleanor's fears since Philip's death had been one, pushed to the back of her mind, that she might no longer be able to respond to Hugh as she had in the past, or worse, that he might no longer find her desirable. Now with his wiry body pressing against hers, she found she had been wrong on both counts. She had also feared that she would be unable to conceive a child. On that point she would turn out to be wrong also, for when she and Hugh finally went to sleep, she was pregnant once more.

It was early May. She was to join Hugh at Westminster in a few weeks. Worcestershire was obviously agreeing with her, Hugh said, and it would be a pity to send her to sweltering London too soon when the fresh country air was having such a beneficial effect. It and her as yet undiscovered pregnancy certainly made her sleep more soundly, for she was deep in slumber late one night when she was shaken roughly awake. “Lady Despenser! Get up. There is no time to lose.”

“Up?” Eleanor stared groggily at her chamberlain as he yanked the bed curtains back and pulled her to a sitting position.

“We have to get out of here, all of us. Have you got her clothes? Good. I will get the children up.” The chamberlain sped away.

“Gladys, what is it?” She shrugged her way into the gown that her damsel was pushing onto her head.

Gladys stood her up and began lacing her gown with unprecedented roughness. “Your lands in Wales are being laid waste. Several men have been killed, and many more have been captured. One of your men from there escaped and reached here a few minutes ago. He thinks they are headed this way, or that more may be coming from another direction, and if those whoresons found you here alone—”

“Good God, no! Hugh thought—”

“Hugh was dead wrong,” Gladys said heavily. “They say they have hundreds of men at arms and thousands of foot soldiers, all of them looting what they can carry off and burning what they can't.”

Eleanor was surprised to hear her own voice so flat. “Who are they?”

Gladys put her arm around Eleanor. “Your brothers-in-law, Audley and Damory. Roger Mortimer of Wigmore and his old uncle. Hereford. Mowbray. Lord Berkeley. Sir John Maltravers. Many others whose names I don't know.”

From a distance the chamberlain's voice called, “Lady Despenser! The children are in the carts, ready to go. Are you?”

Eleanor stared at the fastenings of the cloak Gladys threw over her as if she had never seen them before. “Yes,” she said dazedly.

Several days later, dirty, exhausted, and aching all over, Eleanor and her household arrived at Westminster. Though no one appeared to have been pursuing them, they had not dared to go east at a more leisurely pace, their progress already being slowed by the children's needs. Save to feed them and to rest for a few hours at nightfall, they had not stopped.

“Eleanor! Thank God you are safe.” Hugh held her tightly, then pulled back to survey the children, covered with dust from the road. He kissed them one by one. “What poor little ragamuffins. Are they all right?”

“They are fine. They are merely bewildered, like I am. How did it come to this, Hugh?”

Hugh shook his head. “We underestimated the whoresons, didn't we? But let us go to the king now, love. He has much to say to us.”

In his chamber, the king sat with Hugh the elder, Pembroke, and Arundel. Eleanor was shocked at her father-in-law's appearance. Though he had long since lost most of the hair on his head, he had otherwise escaped the ravages of age—he was close to sixty—and could have passed for a man ten years younger. No more. He looked weary and stooped and chilled as he sat by the fire, but he managed a smile when Eleanor entered the room. “Daughter.”

Edward said quietly, “Seeing as you have no home at the moment, Niece, this shall be your home now.”

“No home?”

“They are still ravaging our lands,” said Hugh the elder, looking out the window. “Killing our men, imprisoning others, burning, looting. We cannot possibly return to them at this time.” He looked at Hugh. “This is your doing, boy. Are you satisfied?”

“Father, I have said—”

“You have expressed your regret, very well indeed. But what of my lands, that my grandfather saved from forfeiture in King Henry's time to give to my mother?”

“Good God, Father, we shall get them back! The damage can be fixed! New livestock can be bought, new crops planted—”

“And what good will that do us in exile?”

Pembroke coughed. “One hopes it will not come to that.” He turned away from the Despensers to the king. “Your grace, I know you and the Lords Despenser want revenge. Pray forbear. Your grace has not the men at present to fight, and a full-scale war would devastate England. We are only now beginning to recover from the famine, the Scottish wars.”

“Then what is your advice?”

“Summon Parliament, let the barons' grievances be aired in the manner of civilized men. At worst, it will buy you time.”

“There is sense in what you say,” admitted Edward. He looked toward the window seat where Eleanor sat. “I will summon my council and discuss the matter further. Hugh, look to my niece. The poor lass is crying her heart out.”

Eleanor swatted a fly as the queen grimaced her way through a contraction. The pain passing, she grumbled, “Really, Lady Despenser! Cannot something be done about this leak?”

With singularly ill timing, the queen's labor had coincided with a heavy rainstorm and with the roof in her chamber springing a leak. “Not without bringing some men in here, your grace, and I am not sure who would find that more disagreeable, you or they. But we could certainly move you to a more suitable chamber, and it seems as if there would be plenty of time to do so.” She swatted again. “Maybe one with fewer flies.”

The queen shook her head. “I intend to give birth in my own chamber, not in borrowed lodgings. Really, Eleanor, this is your husband's fault, you know. If he were not so stingy with the king's money, save when his own self is concerned, this leak would not have sprung.”

Eleanor counted to ten, then to twenty. “The king is well pleased with my husband's work as his chamberlain, your grace, and it seems we are quite comfortable here except for the leak. They will occur in a building this old. But what if we moved your bed a foot or two? Then this bucket would catch the leak, and you would be well out of harm's way.”

“Very well.”

Eleanor had not wanted to attend the queen in her childbirth, but as the alternative was sitting in her chamber worrying, she had agreed to accompany her to the Tower, where Isabella regularly held forth on the shortcomings of Eleanor's husband. The king, following the advice of Pembroke, had summoned Parliament to meet on July 15, but the opposition—all carrying royal standards—had continued to devastate the Despensers' estates throughout May and June. Soon they would be on their way to London, and rumor had it—as the elder Despenser had predicted—that the king's opponents would be content with nothing less than the Despensers' exile.