Michael Jecks: The Bishop Must Die

Her early life had been so privileged, it was hard to believe that her status could have sunk so low. Poverty was a hard lord. She had loved her first husband, Peter Crok, with all the fervour and excitement that a young woman’s heart could feel. A tall, fair man, with the slim, aquiline features and blue eyes that were so uncommon about here, he had set all the ladies a-twitter. However, it was she, Isabella, who had snared him. And their marriage had been entirely happy. When little Roger was born, he was the cap to their bliss.

And then all began to fall apart. Peter fell from his horse and died almost immediately. An awful tragedy, but natural. As a widow, Isabella was well provided for, and her dower was a pair of rich manors: Berwick and Olveston in Gloucestershire. She and her five-year-old son were sad to lose him, but were not destitute.

Later, marrying Henry Fitzwilliam had seemed a good idea, too. Henry was a kindly fellow, warm hearted and jolly, without the aloofness of so many other knights of his rank. He was an important man, a retainer of the powerful Maurice Berkeley, but none would guess it to see him. He was welcoming, generous and honourable. Which was why he had been killed.

It was that evil year, the year of Boroughbridge, when the king threw off all pretence of courtesy or chivalry. He had marched against the Lords Marcher in support of his lover, the foul Despenser. Sir Hugh le Despenser despoiled all, taking whatever he craved. Where he passed, all were impoverished. No man’s lands, castles, treasure or even wife were safe from the intolerable greed of the Despenser.

The dispute of the Lords Marcher was with him — not with the king. They were no traitors, nor were they willing to hold up arms against the king and his standard. So when confronted with Edward’s host, all the honourable men among the Marchers laid down their weapons.

Most were captured and sentenced with exceptional brutality. Even Lancaster, the king’s own cousin, was beheaded. Others were thrown into irons and hanged outside their own towns and cities as visible demonstrations of the king’s authority. Never again would he agree to having his power restricted or his decisions questioned. It was clear that all those who attempted to thwart him would suffer the same punishment.

Henry was captured, like so many. It was a source of some little comfort that he did not suffer the undignified death of execution like his friends: he died in Gloucester gaol before he could be attainted. But he had waited so long for his death: thirty-nine weeks. All that while in a tiny cell, without warmth or comfort. Waiting until death might come and take him. She had mourned him as a widow even while he lived.

And when he was dead, the men tried to capture her darling Roger. To this day she had no idea what had happened to him. In truth, she prayed he was safely abroad. At least Henry’s own son Ranulf was alive, sent to live safely under the protection of the Church.

To lose both husband and son was unbearable. But her pain was soon to be compounded.

Because her husband had been arraigned as a traitor to the king, her manors were both taken into the king’s hands. She had lost all rights to them because Sir Henry was found to have supported the rebels, even though he died before his guilt was proven. Her husband’s lands, her son’s and her own, were all forfeit.

Except she was told that they couldn’t take her dower. These lands were of the free tenement of her first husband, so they weren’t eligible to be confiscated. And Isabella had had nothing to do with the rebels, other than being wife to one and mother to another. However, when she had been discussing her affairs with her man of business, she had heard a shocking story — that the Bishop of Exeter, Walter Stapledon, had been asking about her and her manors. There were tales that Bishop Walter had grown to covet her manors, and that it was he who had told the king that she supported the Lords Marcher. It was also he who then advised that all her dower lands were forfeit, along with those of Henry Fitzwilliam. And the bishop had taken her lands into his hands on the first Friday after the Feast of the Ascension in the sixteenth year of the king’s reign. *

Her son, dear Roger, was gone. She did not know where. Both husbands were dead, and all her dower stolen, all to satisfy the insatiable greed of the bishop.

She cursed him to hell.

Second Sunday before Candlemas, nineteenth year of the reign of King Edward II **

Near Kirby ***

Sir Roger Belers knew this land, all right. He rode along like the experienced knight he was, rolling with his palfrey as the beast walked steadily along the muddy road, a strong man in his prime, hair still black apart from two wings of white at the temples, his eyes heavily lidded and inattentive. Why should a man be wary so near to his own home? This road was well used and known to be safe, for it was the main road from Melton Mowbray to Leicester, and this fellow was aware of all the efforts to keep it clear of murderers and other felons.

‘Keep steady!’ was the quiet whisper as the small cavalcade approached.

Richard de Folville nodded, his breath sounding loud and raw in his ears. He was a rector, of the church of Teigh in Rutland, and the thought of joining a band of outlaws had been the furthest thing from his mind. And yet here he was, crouched behind a tangle of undergrowth, gripping his sword. They were in a small stand of trees, he and his fellows. At the other side of the road, more men waited, their weapons ready, for the moment when a call would draw them out to capture this man, this fiend .

Belers, he was named! Sir Roger Belers of Kirby Bellers. A name to drive fear into the heart of any man. Once a sworn ally of Earl Thomas of Lancaster, he had deserted that cause as soon as he saw how the wind was changing, and even as the earl was murdered by his cousin the king, Belers was scurrying off to curry favour. He was welcomed with open arms by the king and Despenser, and by the middle of the year, had been made a baron of the Treasury.

Avarice. The word could have been exemplified by a picture of Belers. There was no one in the whole of the shire who would regret his passing. For him, Richard Folville, this baron of the Treasury was nothing more than a thief who stole with the king’s consent. No better than the foul Despenser himself.

Belers was highly favoured by the king for his change of heart before the Lords Marcher rode to defy Edward’s favourite, Despenser. After the Battle of Boroughbridge, which saw the king’s enemies defeated, Belers was made a commissioner of the lands of those who had stood with the Lords Marcher. And soon he began to throw his weight around, making an enemy of all those who lived in the county. He had no friends here.

There was a sudden burst of sound. Belers’s palfrey had smelled something, and now it neighed, tossing its head, unnerved. Woken from his reverie, Belers glanced about him even as Richard’s brother Eustace roared, ‘Now!’ and leaped forward. Richard scrambled to his feet, but he was already too late. His brothers and the others were quicker — more used to ambush and fighting.

Richard thrust himself through the brambles and hollies: before him was a mass of struggling men, and the air was loud with hoarse cries and screams, swords clattering against knives, knives against cudgels, cudgels against staves. All his learning rebelled at the sight and sounds — but he was thrilled, too. He saw a short man with a steel cap fall under a flurry of blows from his brother Walter and Ralph la Zouche, blood spraying up and over the three. A man-at-arms was flying away, darting along the road like a rabbit with a hound after him, and Richard’s other brother Robert sprinted off after him, pulling him down and sliding his sword into the man’s kidneys, while the fellow shrieked and thrashed about.