The She Wolf of France (40 page)

Orleton nodded his head but made no reply.

`And a written order, Mortimer went on, `may fall into other hands than those for which it is intended; it can even be used by those who carry it out against those who gave it. You understand me?'

Orleton smiled once more. Did they take him for a fool?

`In other words, my lord,' he said, `you wish to send the order, yet not send it.'

`I would rather send an order which would be clear to those for whom it is intended, but obscure to those who should know nothing of it. It is on this I wish to consult you, for you are a man of resource. If you will give me your help, that is.'

`And you ask that, my lord, from a poor Bishop who has no throne, nor even a diocese in which to plant his crozier?'

It was Mortimer's turn to smile.

`N
ow, now, my Lord Orleton, let us talk of these things no more. You have vexed me very much, you know. If you had only told me what you wanted. But since you are so intent on it, I will no longer oppose you. Worcester is yours, I promise it. And you're still my friend, you know that too.'

The Bishop nodded his head. Yes, he knew it. He felt as friendly as ever towards Mortimer; their recent quarrel had changed nothing, and they had only to come face to face to be aware of it. They were linked by too many memories, too many conspiracies as well as a sort of mutual admiration. And this very
evening, for instance, when Mortimer, having at last dragged the long-awaited consent from the Queen, found himself in a difficulty, who did he send for? The Bishop with the sloping shoulders, the duck-like walk, and eyes that were short-sighted from too much work on manuscripts at Oxford. They were such great friends indeed that they had forgotten the Queen, who was staring at them with her huge blue eyes and feeling unhappy.

`It was that fine sermon of yours on the text "Doleo caput meum", and everyone remembers it, which made it possible to get rid of the bad King,' said Mortimer. `And it was you again who obtained his abdication.'

Here was a return of gratitude. Orleton acknowledged the compliments with a bow.

`And now you want me to finish the task,' he said.

There was a writing-table in the room, with pens and paper. Orleton asked for a knife because he could write only with a pen cut by himself. It helped him to think. Mortimer did not interrupt his reflections,

`The order need not be long,' said Orleton after a moment.

He was staring straight to his front, with an amused air. He had clearly forgotten that the death of a man was in question; he was feeling the pride and satisfaction of a writer who has just solved a difficult linguistic problem. With his eyes bent close to the table he wrote a single phrase in a clear handwriting, sanded it, and handed the paper to Mortimer, saying: `I will even seal the letter with my own seal, if you and Madam the Queen think it better not to apply yours.'

He seemed very pleased with himself.

Mortimer went close to a candle. The letter was in Latin. He read rather slowly: "Eduardum occidere nolite timere bonum est."' Then, looking at the Bishop, he said. 'Eduardum occidere, I understand that all right; nolite: do not .. -, timere: fear ... Bonum est: it is good ...'

Orleton smiled.

`Which is it: "Do not kill Edward, it is good to fear, asked Mortimer, 'or: "Do not fear to kill Edward, it is a good thing"? Where is the comma?'

`There isn't one,' replied Orleton. `The Will of God will be made plain to the understanding of the letter's recipient. But no one can be
blamed for the letter itself.'

Mortimer was somewhat perplexed.

`The fact is,' he said, `I don't know whether Maltravers or Gournay understands Latin.'

`Brother William; whom you asked me to send to them, understands it well enough. And then the messenger can say, but say only, that all action resulting from this o
rder must remain without trace
!
"

'And are you really prepared to seal it with your own seal?' asked Mortimer.

`I shall do so,' said Orleton.

He really was a good friend. Mortimer accompanied him to the bottom of the stairs, then came back to the Queen's room.

`Sweet Mortimer,' said Isabella, `don't leave me to sleep alone this night.'

The September night was not cold enough to make her shiver so much.

9. The red-hot poker

COMPARED TO the huge fortresses of Kenilworth and Corfe, Berkeley was a relatively small castle. Its stones had a rosy glow and its dimensions made it habitable. It lay immediately next to the cemetery that surrounded the church where the gravestones, in a very few years, became covered with a small green moss, fine as a silk cloth.
44

Thomas de Berkeley was a decent enough young man, who
bore his neighbour no ill-will. Nevertheless, he had no reason to
show any particular kindness to ex-King Edward II, who had kept him in prison at Wallingford for four years, together with his father Maurice de Berkeley, who had
died
during their imprisonment. Moreover, he could not but be devoted to his powerful father-in-law,
Roger Mortimer,
whose eldest daughter he had married in 1320. He had followed: him through the rebellion and had been freed by him the year before. Thomas received the considerable sum of a hundred shillings a day for lodging and guarding the fallen King. Nor were his wife, Marguerite Mortimer, and his sister Eva, the wife of Maltravers, wicked people.

Edward would not have found his stay there altogether intolerable had he had to do with no one but the Berkeley family. Unfortunately his three tormentors were there too, Maltravers, Gournay and the barber Ogle. These gave Edward no respite;
their minds were fertile in cruelty; and there was a sort of competition between them as to who could add the greatest refinements to his tortures.

Maltravers had had the idea of imprisoning Edward in the keep, in a small circular chamber only a few feet in diameter in whose centre was an old dry well, an oubliette. One false step and the prisoner would fall into this deep hole. Edward had to be constantly on his guard. He was now forty-four, though he looked over sixty. Arid here he had to live, lying on an armful of straw, his body edged close up against the wall. Whenever he fell asleep, he would wake again at once in a sweat, afraid he had moved nearer to the well.

To this torture of fear, Gournay had added another, that of smell. He had the stinking carrion of dead animals gathered from all over the countryside, badgers taken in their earths, foxes, polecats, and rotten dead birds,' These were all thrown into the oubliette so that their stench tainted such little air as the prisoner had.

`Here's good venison for the fool!' the three torturers cried each morning when the load of dead animals was brought.

Their own noses were not over-delicate, for they sat, or took turns to sit, in a little room at the top of the keep staircase which commanded the wretched chamber in which the King was growing ever weaker. Nauseating gusts would sometimes reach them; but they were merely a subject for ribald jokes.

`How the old fool stinks!' they cried as they shook the dice-box and drank their pots of beer.

The day Adam Orleton's letter arrived, they had a long discussion. Brother William translated the message, leaving them in no doubt as to its real meaning, but pointing out the clever ambiguity with which it was phrased. The three rascals slapped their thighs for a good quarter of an hour, repeating: 'Bonum est ... bonum est!' and roared with laughter.

The rather dim-witted courier who had brought the letter had faithfully delivered the oral message: `without trace.'

And this was the subject of their discussion.

`These Court people, these bishops and lords, really do ask you to do some odd things,' Maltravers said. `How do they expect you to kill someone without its being apparent that you've done it?'

How were they to set about it? Poison left the body black; besides, you had to get the poison from someone and he might talk. Strangling? The mark of the cord would show on the neck and the face turned blue.

It was Ogle., once barber in the Tower of London, who produced the stroke of genius. Thomas Gournay suggested a few improvements to the plan, and tall Maltravers laughed aloud, showing his huge teeth and all his gums.

`He'll be punished where he has sinned!' he cried.

The idea seemed to him positively brilliant.

`But it will need four of us,' Gournay said. `Your brother-in
-
law Thomas will have to give us a hand.'

`Oh, you know what Thomas is like,' Maltravers replied. `He takes his five pounds a day all right, but he's a sensitive fellow, he might well fail us halfway through the job by going off in a dead faint.?

'I think that big Towurlee would help us willingly enough, if we promised him a good reward,' said Ogle. `Besides, he's so stupid that even if he does talk no one will believe him.'

They waited till evening. Gournay had a good meal prepared for the prisoner in the castl
e kitchens: a rich pasty, small
birds roasted on a spit, and an oxtail in gravy. Edward had not had such a supper since the evenings at Kenilworth with his Cousin Crouchback. He was astonished, and to begin with a little anxious, but was soon comforted by the unaccustomed food. Instead of merely bringing him a bowl to his straw bed, they set him a stool in the little room next door, which seemed to him a marvel of comfort; and he enjoyed the food, whose taste he had almost forgotten. Nor was he deprived of wine; they gave him a good claret which Thomas de Berkeley got from Aquitaine. The three jailers winked at each other as they watched him eat.

`He won't even have time to digest it,' Maltravers whispered to Gournay.

The huge Towurlee stood in the doorway which he filled completely.

`You feel better now, don't you, my lord?' said Gournay, when Edward had finished his meal. `Now we're going to take you to a good room where you'll find a feather-bed.'

The prisoner with his shaven head and long trembling chin looked at his jailers in surprise.

`Have you received new orders?' he asked.

His voice was humble and afraid.

'Oh, certainly, we've received orders. And we're going to treat you properly, my lord,' replied Maltravers. `We've even; ordered a fire for you where you're going to sleep, because the evenings are turning cooler, aren't they, Gournay? Oh, well, it's seasonable; we're already at the end of September.'

They led-the King down the narrow staircase, then across-the grassy courtyard of the keep, then up on the other side within the thickness of the wall. His jailers had told the truth; there was a bedroom, not a palace bedroom of course, but a good room, clean and whitewashed, a bed with a thick feather mattress, and a sort of brazier, full of burning embers. It was almost too hot in the room.

The King's mind was in a state of some confusion, and the wine was making him feel a little giddy. Was merely a good meal enough to make him start enjoying life again? But what were these new orders? What had happened that he should suddenly be treated so well? A rebellion in the kingdom perhaps; Mortimer fallen and disgraced. Oh, if that could only happen! Or was it simply that the young King had become concerned at last about his father's fate and given orders that he should be treated more humanely? But even if there was a rebellion and the people had risen in his favour, Edward would never agree to return to the throne; never, he vowed it to God. Because if he became King again, he'd begin committing errors again; he was not fashioned to reign. A quiet monastery was all he, wanted, and to be able to walk in a pleasant garden, and be served with the sort of food he liked. And pray, too. And then to let his beard grow again, and his hair, unless he kept the tonsure; though perhaps the razor going over his skull each week would evoke memories that were too appalling. What spiritual neglect and what ingratitude not to thank the Creator for the simple things that are enough to make life agreeable: savoury food, a warm room . . . There was a poker in the brazier ...

`Lie down, my lord! The bed's a good one, you'll find,' said Gournay.

'And indeed the mattress was soft. To have a real bed again; what a joy! But why did the other, three remain in the room? Maltravers was sitting on a stool, his hair hanging over his ears, his hands between his knees, and he was staring at the King. Gournay was poking the fire. The barber Ogle had an ox-horn in his hand and a little saw.

`Sleep, Sire Edward, and don't worry about us; we have work to do,' Gournay went on.

`What are you doing, Ogle?' the King asked. `Are you making a drinking-horn?'

`No, my lord, it's not for drinking. I'm just cutting a horn, that's all.'

Then, turning to Gournay, and marking a place on the horn
with his 'thumbnail, th
e barber said: `I think that's
the right length, don't you?'

The red-headed man, whose face was like a sow's, looked over his shoulder and replied: `Yes, I think that'll do. Bonum est.

Then he went on fanning the fire.

The saw grated on the ox-horn. When he had sawn through it, the barber handed the piece he had cut off to Gournay, who took it, looked at it, and inserted the red-hot poker. An acrid stench suddenly filled the room. The poker emerged from the, burnt point of the horn. Gournay put it back in the, fire. How did they expect the King to sleep with all this going on round him? Had they removed him from the carrion in the oubliette merely to smoke him out with burnt horn? Suddenly Maltravers, who was still sitting there staring at Edward, said: `Was that Despenser you loved so well endowed?'

The other two burst out laughing. On hearing that name mentioned, Edward felt as if his mind were being torn asunder and he suddenly knew these men were going to kill him within the hour. Were they going to inflict on him the same atrocious death as had been suffered by Hugh the Younger?

`You're not going to do it? You're not going to kill me?' he cried, suddenly sitting up in bed.

`Kill you, Sire Edward?' said Gournay without even turning round. `What makes you think that? We have our orders. Bonum est, bonum est...'

`Go on, lie down again,' said Maltravers.

But Edward did not lie down again. His eyes, starting out of his bald, emaciated head, turned like those of a trapped beast from Thomas Gournay's red neck to the long yellow face of Maltravers and to the barber's chubby cheeks. Gournay had taken the poker from the fire and was looking at the red-hot end.

`Tow
urlee!' he called. `The table!'

The giant, who was waiting in the next room, came in carrying a heavy table. Maltravers went to the door, closed it and locked it. What was this table for, this heavy plank of oak that was normally placed on trestles? For there were no trestles in the room. And of all the strange things that were going on round the King, this table carried in a giant's arms seemed to him the strangest and most terrifying. How could you kill a man with a table? It was the King's last clear thought.

`Come on!' said Gournay, signing to Ogle.

They came up, one each side of the bed, threw themselves on Edward and turned him over on his stomach.