Michael Jecks - The Templar, the Queen and Her Lover

When the barons finally grew so disaffected with the repellent Gaveston that their rage could not be controlled, and he wasslaughtered, it was to her that the king turned for sympathy and comfort. And for a while, for a little while, they were trulyhusband and wife, a fruitful union that gave her four children — the princes Edward and John, and then Eleanor and littleJoan, her darling. In those years Isabella had felt her life was fulfilled. She had a merry companion in her king, and a contentedlittle family.

But then the King developed a passion for this latest favourite, Sir Hugh le Despenser.

The man whom she would wish to see dead.

‘Your highness, your servants.’

She smiled at her husband’s men, the men whom Despenser had selected to watch her every step of her way on the return to her homeland, and managed to fit a graceful smileof welcome to hide her revulsion.

New Palace Yard, Westminster

‘So what do we do about him, then?’

Ricard looked at Adam with exasperation. ‘Look, I’m not going to leave him behind with someone I don’t know. Poor bratchet!’

‘Be a bleeding sight poorer if he comes with us to France and dies from the food or something,’ Adam said.

‘He comes.’

‘Fine. You thinking to use him to replace Peter?’ Janin asked reasonably.

‘Come on! Peter was good with the tabor, I know, but we don’t need a man with a tabor to make our music.’ Ricard looked downat Charlie. The child was resting in the crook of his arm as they spoke. He seemed a remarkably contented little boy. ThankGod he hadn’t seen his parents in that state, even though he had been scared enough of something to bolt from the house andhide in the hutch. Was it the noise of Ric and his mates turning up late at night? They hadn’t been that loud, had they? Butthey’d all slept through the murder of the man and his wife. They’d been pretty ruined, then. And this little boy had beenwoken by them, probably, and sought the only safe place he knew, somewhere he played regularly, no doubt.

‘It was his harp I’ll miss most,’ Janin was saying. ‘You remember how he used to be able to get that crispness from his strings?Very good.’

‘He was all right,’ Ricard conceded, stung. ‘But I think I can play my gittern well enough to make up for it.’

‘I didn’t mean …’ Janin protested hopelessly, but there was no point apologising. Ricard was upset, but so were they all.‘I just miss him, that’s all.’

‘We all do,’ Philip said.

‘And tomorrow we’re off?’ Adam asked again.

‘That’s what the comptroller said,’ Ricard acknowledged.

The day before, he had been taken to William de Bouden, the Queen’s Comptroller.

‘We shall be leaving in two days. Prepare your men to be in the New Palace Yard at dawn with all their instruments packedfor a journey.’

‘Where are we going?’

De Bouden was a square-set man for a clerk. He had a gruff manner, with steely eyes that brooked no nonsense. ‘You honestlymean to say you’ve been walking about the palace with your ears closed? The whole place is discussing the Queen’s missionto her brother. Are you deaf?’

‘I just wasn’t sure where in France we’d be going.’

‘To see the King. But perhaps I was mistaken. Have you been to France?’

‘Um. Well, no.’

‘But you can read a map of the land? You know where towns are?’

‘Um.’ Ricard grinned helplessly.

‘Then why do you want to know? You will be travelling with the Queen, that is all. And you will be careful to ensure thatyour other musicians are well behaved and don’t misbehave on the way. We have letters of safe conduct, but they won’t protecta randy stallion who tries to mount a French filly. Is that clear?’

Ricard could still remember that freezing stare, as though the man was gazing through his flesh at all his innermost desires.Someone must have told him about the way the men had behaved last time they’d played before the Queen. He could kick Peterfor what he had tried. Poor bastard. ‘They’ll be-’

‘Good. Now go! I have a thousand little matters to sort before we leave.’

Ricard shook his head now at the memory. The man had dismissed him with a wave of his hand and turned away instantly as though refusingto become concerned with any matters relating to the musicians. Hardly surprising. The fate of Ricard’s motley little groupwas irrelevant to him. He had provisions, travel arrangements and route planning for a group of thirty to forty men and womento see to, as well as the headache of all the horses, wagons and carts which would be needed to transport the necessary victualsand other supplies to Dover or wherever they were going to sail from.

There was nothing much else for them to do just now. All their instruments were here with them, as usual. His old citole wasbeside him, ready to be wrapped first in a soft cloth, then in an oiled blanket to protect the strings and the wood.

He had always been inordinately proud of the device, ever since he had first seen it. It had been in a small workshop backin his home town of Bromley, and his eyes had been drawn to it immediately. The wood had a lovely sheen to it, giving thebody a golden glow. It had the shape of a young woman’s figure, with the broad hips at the base, with a slender waist andnarrow upper section. From here the neck projected, leading to the large head in which the four keys holding the strings wereinserted. He stroked the neck gently. The instrument had been with him for almost fifteen years now, and it was still hisproudest possession, which was why he would never take it to a tavern like the Cardinal’s Hat. Too much risk of some drunkenarse trying to break it in a place like that.

Carefully setting Charlie down on the bench beside him, he picked it up and started to strum. He always found that music aidedhis thoughts, and just now his thoughts were black — as he knew his friends’ were.

Peter the Waferer had never been a particularly close companion of his. The man was always a little over-arrogant about his position in the King’s household — a man who could command an income with the kitchen staff and still earn a littlemore from his ability on the tabor was, so he thought, a man of some substance. He didn’t make too much of it, but every sooften he would make some little comment or other, and Ricard usually felt that it was directed at him. It pained him to hearit.

A man shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but Peter was, truth be told, probably the one from the band whom he would miss least.He was always thinking of his family — fair enough, true, but no good for a team like theirs. And he wasn’t that essential.There were only a couple of tunes where they needed his kind of drumming.

‘What’s that tune?’ Janin asked, eyes narrowed as he listened, his head set to one side like a hound.

Ricard hesitated. In truth, he didn’t know what he was playing. Perhaps a mixture of songs he had heard or played in his life,or something he’d heard so long ago it was outside his memory. ‘Call it “Peter’s Tune”, or “The Waferer’s Biscuit”,’ he saidwith a grin.

‘That’ll do for me,’ Philip said, tapping his knee in time to the music as Ricard began to play again.

Janin eased his hurdy-gurdy out of its leather bag and set the rosin to the wheel. Soon the three were playing, and Adam drewa grimace and reached inside his tunic, pulling out his little whistle to join in.

As usual, a small gathering formed about them as they played. Music was always a comfort to those who had little else to helpthem relax. A pair of young women lifted their skirts and started to dance to the music, and one carter held out his elbowsto them both. They linked arms, and were soon swinging around together, laughing and shouting as they whirled about.