The She Wolf of France (31 page)

For the first time since his escape Roger Mortimer was not dressed in black. He was not wearing a full suit of armour with a closed helm, but merely the harness for forays, a helmet without visor to which was attached the mail camail which hung down over neck and shoulders and a mail hauberk over which floated
his surcoat of red and blue brocade, embroidered with his emblems.

The Queen was similarly attired, her fair slender face framed in steel; her skirt trailed to the ground but beneath it she was wearing greaves of mail like the men.

And young Prin
ce Edward was: also dressed for
war. He had grown taller these last months and almost begun to look like a man. He was watching the seagulls which, so it seemed to him, were the same, and with the same hoarse cries and greedy beaks, as those that had attended the
departure of the fleet from the
mouth of the Meuse.

The birds reminded him of Holland. Indeed, everything, the grey sea, the grey sky with a, few faint lines of pink, the
quayside' with its little brick
houses,
where. they were soon to land,
the green, rolling country with its lakes behind Harwich, all reminded him of the Dutch countryside and made him turn his thoughts back to Holland. But h
ad he come
to a desert of stones and sand under a flaming sky, he would still have thought, by contrast, of the landscapes of Brabant, Ostrevant and Hainaut which he had so recently left, The fact was that Monseigneur Edward, Duke of Aquitaine and heir to the throne of England, had fallen in love in Holland at the
age of fourteen years
and nine months.

And this was how it had come to pass and how
these notable events came to be scored on young Prince Edward's memory.

When they had fled in such, a hurry from Paris in the early hours of that morning when Monseigneur of Artois, shouting in his loud voice, had dragged them all from their beds, they had made all speed, travelling by forced marches, to the territory of the Empire; and one night they had reached the castle of Sire Eustache d'Aubercicourt, who together with his wife had extended a kindly and hospitable welcome to the little English company. And when he had seen to the comfort of their unexpected guests ' as b
est they
could, Messire d'Aubercicourt had mounted his horse and gone off to inform the good Count Guillaume, whose wife was cousin-german to Queen Isabella, at his capital city of Valenciennes And the following morning the Count's younger brother, Messire Jean de Hainaut, had come to see them.

Jean de Hainaut was an eccentric; not so much in his appearance, which was physically solid, with a round face set on a strong body, round eyes and a short, snub nose above a small fair moustache, but eccentric in the way he behaved. For, as soon as
he came into the Queen's presence, and before he had even taken off his boots, he fell on one knee on the flagstones, and cried with his hand on his heart. `Madame, here is your knight, ready to die for you even if the whole world fails you. And I shall do everything in my power, with the help of your friends, to take you and Monseigneur your son over the sea to your realm of England. And everyone I can collect will place his life at your service, and we shall have enough men-at-arms, if it please God.'

The Queen, to thank him for so sudden an expression of assistance, made to kneel before him; but Messire Jean de Hainaut prevented her by seizing her in his arms. Clasping her to him and breathing in her face, he went on: `May it please God that the Queen of England shall never kneel to anyone. Comfort yourself, Madame, and your charming son also, for I shall keep my promise.'

Roger Mortimer was beginning to look a little glum, for he thought that Messire Jean de Hainaut was a little too eager to place his sword at ladies' service. Really, the man seemed to take himself for Lancelot of the Lake, for he had suddenly declared that he would not sleep the night under the same roof as the Queen for fear of compromising her, as if he were unaware of the fact that there were at least six great lords about her! He had beat a somewhat sanctimonious retreat to a neighbouring abbey, only to return early in the morning, after mass and breakfast, to fetch the Queen and conduct the whole company to Valenciennes.

Count Guillaume the Good, his wife and their four daughters, who lived in a white castle, were excellent people. Their marriage was a happy one; it could be seen in their expressions and heard in every word they uttered. Young Prince Edward, who had suffered from childhood from the spectacle of the discord between his parents, looked with admiration at this united couple who were so kind in every way. How lucky the four young Princesses of Hainaut were to have been born into such a family!

Good Count Guillaume had offered his services to Queen Isabella, less eloquently however than had his brother and after making certain inquiries so as to be sure of not bringing down on himself the fury of the King of France, nor that of the Pope.

Messire Jean de Hainaut spared no effort. He wrote to all the knights of his acquaintance praying them to come in honour and friendship to join him in his enterprise and because of the vow he had made. He created such excitement in Hainaut, Brabant, Zeeland and Holland, that good Count Guillaume became anxious; Messire Jean was in process of raising the whole army of his
states and all his chivalry. He therefore advised moderation; but the other would not hear of it.

`Messire, my brother,' he said, `I have but one death to die, and that will be as God wills it, but I have promised this fair lady to take her to her kingdom, and this I shall do, even if I must die for it, for every knight is bound to give loyal assistance, and to the utmost of his power, to all ladies and maidens in sorrow and distress whenever they have need of it.'

Guillaume the Good was also concerned for his Treasury, for all these bannerets who were being set to polish
up their armour would have to
be paid; but on that score he was reassured by Roger Mortimer, who seemed to, have enough money from the Lombard banks to maintain a thousand lances.

They therefore
stayed three months at Valenciennes, living the life of the Court while every day Jean de Hainaut announced that someone of importance had rallied to them, as it might be the Sire Michel de Ligne or the Sire de Sarre, or the Chevalier Oulfart de Ghistelles, of Perceva
l de Semeries, or Sance de Bous
soy.

They went in a family party on a pilgrimage to the church at Sebourg where were kept the relics of Saint Druon, which were much venerated since Count Guillaume's grandfather, Jean d' Avesnes, who was suffering pain from a stone, had gone to
ask for a cure. In the presence
of his whole Court and the people of the town, Count Jean d'Avesnes and Hainaut had knelt on the tomb and recited in a loud voice a prayer remarkable for its humility and faith; and hardly had he finished praying when he ejected from his body three stones each the size of a nut, and his pain had disappeared, never to return.

Of Co
unt Guillaume's four daughters;
the second, Philippa, had immediately taken young Prince Edward's fancy. She was red-haired, chubby and covered with freckles,' her face was wide and her stomach' already conspicuous. She was a typical little Valois with a strong tinge of Brabant. It so happened that the two young people were perfectly matched in age; and everyone was surprised to see Prince Edward, who normally never spoke, going about as much as he could with the fat Philippa, and talking, talking, talking for hours on end. That he was attracted by her was evident to everyone. Silent people never can dissemble when they do abandon their silence.

And Queen Isabella and the Count of Hainaut had very soon agreed to affiance their children since they showed such a great inclination towards each other. For Queen Isabella it was a

means of cementing an alliance which alone could help her re cover her throne of England, while the Count of Hainaut, as soon as it became clear that his daughter would one day become Queen across the sea, saw nothing but advantage in lending his knights.

In spite of the formal orders of King Edward II, who had forbidden his son to become affianced or to allow himself to be made affianced without his consent," the necessary dispensations had already been asked of the Pope. It really seemed to be decreed by Destiny that Prince Edward should marry a Valois. His father, three years earlier, had refused one of the younger daughters of Monseigneur Charles for him, a fortunate refusal as it now turned out, since the young man could marry that same Monseigneur Charles' granddaughter, with whom he was in love.

The expedition had
at once taken on a new urgency
for Prince Edward. For, if the invasion succeeded and his uncle of Kent and Roger Mortimer, with the assistance of his cousin of Hainaut, managed to expel the wicked Despensers and take their place beside the King, he would
be forced to agree to the mar
riage.

Besides, people now talked openly in the boy's presence of his father's morals; he was horrified and aghast. How could a man, a knight, a king, behave in this way with a lord of his Court? The Prince determined, when it came to his turn to reign, never to tolerate such depravity among his barons, and with his Philippa he would show the whole world what a fine, loyal, true love of a man for a woman, of a king for a queen, could be. This fat, round, red-haired girl, who was already very feminine, and seemed to him the most beautiful girl in the world, had a reassuring effect on the Duke of Aquitaine.

It was, therefore, the right to love the boy was going to win, and this disguised the painful, if not odious, circumstance that he was marching to war against his own father.

Three months had subsequently b
een spent in this happy manner,
and they were without doubt the most agreeable Prince Edward had ever known.

The assembly of the Hennuyers, for this was the name by which the knights of Hainaut were known, had taken place at Dordrecht on the Meuse, a pretty town curiously intersected by canals and basins, where every street crossed a waterway, and ships fro
m all the seas, as well as flat-
bottomed barges without sails, which were used on the rivers, were moored even in front of
the churches. It was a wealthy merchant city, where the lords walked about the quays, making their way between bales of wool and crates of spices, where the smell of fish, both fresh and salted, tainted the air about the markets, and in the streets of which watermen and dockers ate fine white soles, which could be
bought at the stalls all hot from the frying-pan. And the inhabitants, when they came out of the huge brick cathedral after mass, could go and gape idly at the great war-like array, such as had never before been seen, moored at the very foot of the houses. The swinging masts of the ships were taller than the roofs.

It had taken much time, effort and shouting to load the ships, which were as round as the clogs all Holland wore, with the equipment of the cavalry: cases of arms, chests of armour, food, kitchens, stoves and a farrier's shop, which would employ a hundred men, with its anvils, bellows and hammers. Then the great Flanders horses had to be embarked, those heavy chestnuts which, with their coats looking almost red under the sun, their paler,
almost
faded manes
flowing,
their large hooves covered with hair, and their huge, silky, quarters, were proper mounts for knights. For, without tiring them, you could load them with a high-cantled saddle, heavy steel horse-armour, as well a
s a fully armed man, altogether
some four hundred pounds to carry at a gallop.

There were a thousand or more of these horses, for Messire Jean de Hainaut had kept his word and assembled a thousand knights together with their squires, varlets and servants, making a total of 2,757 men on the pay-roll, according to
the register kept
by Gerard de Alspaye.

The sterncastles of the ships had been arranged to accommodate the most important lords.

They had set sail on the morning of September 22nd so as to take advantage of the equinoctial currents and had spent a whole day navigating the Meuse before reaching their anchorage off the dykes of Holland. The seagulls had circled crying round the ships. Then, next day, they had set out to sea. The weather had seemed fine, but towards the end of the day the wind had become contrary and the ships had found difficulty in making headway against it; then the sea had got up, and the whole expedition had been very sick and very frightened. The knights vomited over the rail when they had the strength to reach it. The crews themselves had been far from happy, and the horses, tossed about in the deck stables, stank appallingly. The storm was even more terrifying by night than by day. The chaplains had set themselves to pray,

Messire Jean de Hainaut had shown great courage and alacrity in comforting Queen Isabella, indeed a little too much perhaps, for there are occasions when a m
an's attentiveness may be impor
tunate to a lady. The Queen felt rather relieved when Messire de Hainaut also became seasick.

Roger Mortimer alone seemed unaffected by the storm; it is said that jealous men are never seasick. On the other hand, John Maltravers was in a pitiable state by the time dawn broke; his face was long and more yellow than ever, his hair was hanging down over his ears and his surcoat was soiled; sitting with his legs spread wide against a coil of rope, he seemed to expect death, . with every wave. '

At last, by the grace
of Monseigneur Saint
George, the sea had fallen, and everyone had been able to clean himself up a bit. The lookout men had seen the shores of England only a few, miles south of where they had expected to make their landfall. Then the navigators had made for the port of Harwich, wh
ich they were now entering, and
where the royal vessel, its oars shipped, was already coming alongside the wooden mole.

Young Prince Edward was staring dreamily about him through his long fair lashes, for everything he saw seemed red or pink and rounded, the clouds driven by the September breeze, the low, bellying sails of the last ships, the rumps of the Flanders chestnuts, the cheeks of Messire Jean de Hainaut, and they all reminded him invincibly of the Holland of his loved

As he s
et foot on the quay at Harwich,
Roger Mortimer felt exactly like his ancestor who, two hundred and sixty years earlier, had disembarked on English soil beside the Conqueror. This was clear from his air, the tone of his voice and the way he took everything in hand.