And, muttering between his teeth so that no one should hear but the young Earl of Norfolk, he added: ‘My head may be set askew on my shoulders, but I’d rather keep it where it is.’
‘You must admit,’ Edward went on, his hand fluttering, ‘that it’s simply snapping his fingers at me to escape by piercing the walls of a tower I built myself especially so that no one should escape from it.’
‘Perhaps, Sire my Husband,’ the Queen said, ‘when it was building you were more preoccupied with the charms of the masons than with the solidity of the stonework.’
A sudden silence fell over the company. The insult was flagrant, and most unexpected. They all held their breath and stared, some with deference, some with hatred, at the rather fragile-looking woman who sat so upright and lonely in her chair, and held her own like this. Her lips drawn back a little and her mouth half-open, she was showing her fine little teeth; they were clenched, sharp, carnivorous. Isabella was clearly delighted with the blow she had dealt, whatever the consequences might be.
Hugh the Younger was blushing scarlet; Hugh the Elder made a pretence of not having heard.
Edward would certainly have his revenge. But what means would he adopt? The retort lagged. The Queen watched the drops of sweat pearling her husband’s brow. And nothing disgusts a woman more than the sweat of the man she has ceased to love.
‘Kent,’ cried the King, ‘I’ve made you Warden of the Cinque Ports and Governor of Dover. What are you doing here? Why aren’t you on the coast you’re supposed to be guarding and from which our felon must inevitably take ship?’
‘Sire my Brother,’ said the young Earl of Kent, somewhat taken aback, ‘it was you yourself who ordered me to accompany you on your journey …’
‘Well, now I’m giving you another. Go back to your county, have the towns and countryside searched for the fugitive, and see to it personally that every ship in port is visited.’
‘Send agents on board the ships and apprehend Mortimer, dead or alive, if he embarks,’ said Hugh the Younger.
‘Sound advice, Gloucester,’ Edward approved. ‘As for you, Stapledon …’
The Bishop of Exeter stopped gnawing at his thumbnail and murmured: ‘My lord …’
‘You will make haste to London and go immediately to the Tower on the pretext of checking the Treasure, which is in your charge. Then, furnished with an order under my seal, you will take command of the Tower and supervise it till a new constable is appointed. Baldock will make out the commissions at once, so that you will have the necessary powers.’
Henry Crouchback, his eyes turned towards the window and his ear propped on his shoulder, seemed to be dreaming. He was calculating that six days had elapsed since Mortimer’s escape,9 that it would take at least eight days more before these orders could be executed, and that unless he was a fool, which Mortimer most certainly was not, he must already have left the kingdom. He congratulated himself on having joined with the greater part of the bishops and lords who, after Boroughbridge, had succeeded in obtaining a reprieve for the Baron of Wigmore. For now that Mortimer had escaped, the opposition to the Despensers might well find the leader it had lacked since the death of Thomas of Lancaster, and a stronger, cleverer, and more effective leader than Thomas had been.
The King’s back bent sinuously; Edward pirouetted on his heels and came face to face with his wife.
‘What’s more, Madame, I hold you entirely responsible. And, in the first place, let go that hand you’ve been holding ever since I came into the room. Let go Lady Jeanne’s hand!’ cried Edward, stamping his foot. ‘It’s going surety for a traitor to keep his wife so ostentatiously at your side. The people who helped Mortimer to escape well knew they had the Queen’s support. Besides, you can’t escape without money. Treason has to be paid for. Walls aren’t pierced without gold. But the conduit’s evident: the Queen to her lady-in-waiting, the lady-in-waiting to the bishop, the bishop to the rebel. I shall have to look more closely into your privy purse.’
‘Sire my Husband, I think my privy purse is already sufficiently controlled,’ said Isabella, indicating Lady Despenser.
Hugh the Younger seemed suddenly to have lost interest in the discussion. The King’s anger was turning at last, as indeed it usually did, against the Queen. Edward had found an object for his vengeance, and Hugh felt all the more triumphant. He picked up a book that was lying near by and which Lady Mortimer had been reading to the Queen before the Count de Bouville had come in. It was a collection of the lays of Marie of France; the silk marker signalled this passage:
En Lorraine ni en Bourgogne,
Ni en Anjou ni en Gascogne,
En ce temps ne pouvait trouver
Si bon ni si grand chevalier.
Sous ciel n’était dame ou pucelle,
Qui tant fût noble et tant fût belle
Qui n’en voulût amour avoir …10
‘France, it’s always France. She never reads anything that doesn’t relate to that country,’ Hugh thought. ‘And who’s the knight they’re dreaming of in their thoughts? Mortimer, no doubt …’
‘My lord, I do not superintend the charities,’ said Alienor Despenser.
The favourite looked up and smiled. He would congratulate his wife on that remark.
‘I foresee I shall have to give up my charities too,’ said Isabella. ‘I shall soon have no queenly prerogative left, not even that of charity.’
‘And also, Madame, for the love you bear me, of which everyone is aware,’ Edward went on, ‘you must part with Lady Mortimer, for not a soul in the kingdom will understand her being near you now.’
And now the Queen turned pale and sank back a little in her chair. Lady Jeanne’s long pale hands were trembling.
‘A wife, Edward, cannot be held responsible for all her husband’s actions. I am an example of it myself. You must believe that Lady Mortimer has as little to do with her husband’s errors as I have with your sins, supposing you commit any.’
But this time the attack was unsuccessful.
‘Lady Jeanne will leave for Wigmore Castle, which from now on will be under the supervision of my brother of Kent, and will remain there until I have decided what to do with the property of a man whose name will never again be mentioned in my presence except to sentence him to death. I believe, Lady Jeanne, that you would prefer to go to your house of your own free will rather than be taken there by force.’
‘I see,’ said Isabella, ‘that you wish me to be left utterly alone.’
‘What do you mean by alone, Madame?’ cried Hugh the Younger in his fine, well-modulated voice. ‘Are we not all your loyal friends, being the King’s? And is not Madame Alienor, my devoted wife, a faithful companion to you? That’s a pretty book you have there,’ he added, pointing to the volume, ‘and beautifully illuminated; would you be kind enough to lend it to me?’
‘Of course, of course the Queen will lend it to you,’ the King said. ‘I am sure, Madame, that you will do us the pleasure of lending the book to our friend Gloucester?’
‘Most willingly, Sire my Husband, most willingly. And I know what lending means when it’s to your friend, Lord Despenser. I lent him my pearls ten years ago and, as you can see, he’s still wearing them about his neck.’
She would not surrender, but her heart was beating wildly in her breast. From now on she would have to bear the daily insults all alone. If, one day, she found means of revenging herself, nothing would be forgotten.
Hugh the Younger put the book down on a chest and made a privy sign to his wife. The lays of Marie of France would go to join the gold buckle with lions in precious stones, the three gold crowns, the