Edward Plantagenet

Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall, Earl of Chester, Lord of Biscay and Uridales, rested at Bordeaux with his brother Johan of Gaunt, Duke of Acquitaine and Lancaster, Earl of Derby, Lincoln and Leicester, Seneschal of England and the English army.

Edward of Wales had saved his word; he could not save Acquitaine.

He had redeemed the oath sworn before the high God that the treacherous Limoges should pay for its disloyalty. The town lay now a burning ruin; in one day three thousand men, women, and children had atoned with their blood for the falsity of Jean le Cros, Bishop of Limoges.

For Edward had sworn by his father’s soul to wipe out every life in Limoges. Chained and bare-headed the Bishop had been brought before the Prince, and had only been spared by the intercession of Johan of Gaunt, for Edward had vowed by God and St. George that the arch traitor should perish.

Yet at this he stayed his hand and came to Bordeaux, carried in a litter, his vengeance satisfied but his chivalry stained by the innocent blood of churls, an unhappy knight, ill at ease in mind and body, without money for his men-at-arms, with Acquitaine slipping from him. East and south and north the French were advancing, and he had no means to stay them.

This was great bitterness for one who had been the pattern of knighthood in Europe, who was a King’s son and the hero of the English. So he came to Bordeaux, where his family waited him in a castle above which the Leopards floated, and saw the ships in the harbour waiting to carry him back to England. At Cognac he had delegated his powers and his offices to his brother, and Johan of Gaunt had taken up the almost hopeless task; but he was ambitious, a famous knight, eager to play a great part among the Princes of Europe, also in his full health and lusty; but Edward wasted from day to day. After the feverish fury of the attack on Limoges and the ferocity of his vengeance, he fell deeper into his sickness and brooded bitterly in his mind.

When he had halted at Lormont a messenger had ridden up to meet him with word from the Princess, Jehanne of Kent. She had her two children with her, and one, the elder, was sick.

Edward said no word to this message, and so they carried him, a silent knight, into the castle.

All gaiety, all joy, all splendour of chivalry and deeds of arms, all the brightness of glory and bliss of youth seemed overclouded now.

Edward the King was old, Edward the Prince was sick and defeated, Philippa the Queen was dead, and English chivalry was smirched by the massacre of Limoges.

And the ships waited to take ingloriously home the proudest knight in Europe to rest his limbs in the Savoy and presently his bones in St. Peter’s Church at the Abbey near Westminster. When he came to the castle he asked after his little son Edward.

They carried him to a room overlooking the Bay of Biscay that lay placid beneath a pale October sky, and laid him on a couch by the window; and he asked again for his son.

Immediately the Princess Jehanne, his wife, entered the room and came to his side, and in silence went on her knees beside him.

“Ah, joli coeur!” he said, and raised his weary eyes and took her long face between his hands and gazed down into it.

“What happened at Limoges?” she asked, without a word of greeting or duty.

His hands fell to his sides and his worn countenance overclouded.

“I kept my word,” he muttered.

Tears came into the eyes of Jehanne of Kent.

“I would you had been foresworn, seigneur,” she answered, “for the hand of God is against us.”

“In what way?” asked Edward.

“In your sickness,” she said, “for, certes, I perceive you very weak–and in the illness of the child.”

“Help me up,” answered the Prince, “that I may go to him.”

He raised himself to a sitting posture and put his feet to the ground; his simple dull red robe flowed round him unbroken by a jewel, his dark thin face had the look of a man weary of himself.

With her arm round his shoulder Jehanne supported him; she was very grave, like one who had no comfort to give.

“That I should lean on you, joli coeur!” he said, and rose unsteadily, holding to her arm. “Look well to this child, Jehanne,” he added in a sterner tone, “for meseems he will wear the crown sooner than I—”

“HÈlas!” she answered tenderly.“ This is not Edward who speaks so sadly—”

“Jehanne,” he said, “I shall never wear mail again.”

She shook her head, looking up at him, and tried to smile.

“I shall no more set lance in rest nor draw sword,” he continued. “I have been useless sick so long, and now I feel death in my bones.”

“Never,” said the gentle Jehanne, “have you come back to me in this ill humour–the air of England will restore you, seigneur.”

“The air of England will be no balm to my hurts,” he answered. “Take me to the child.”

She led him gently to the next chamber, her own, where Prince Edward had lain two days in an increasing fever.

It was a tall and glooming room, hung with cloths covered with stitching in bright wools.

The two arched windows opened on to the courtyard and the distant prospect of the sea, and were crossed by the boughs of a poplar tree that shook golden and amber leaves against the mullions.

An Eastern rug spread the floor, and there was an open hearth on which some logs smouldered.

The bed stood out from the wall opposite the windows, and was hung with curtains of clean blue and white check linen; at the foot of it were two chairs, on one of which a white dog slept.

Beside the bed was a prie dieu, with an illuminated book on the rest, beneath which hung a long strip of embroidered silk, beyond that several coffers and chests, still unpacked, and a couch piled with skins and garments.

Two women and a man were talking together over the fire; they rose hastily at the entrance of the Prince, but he took no heed of them.

Aided by his wife, he came to the end of the bed and stood holding by the light rail.

Under the blue and white frill of the canopy a child lay asleep, his brown hair a tangle on the stiff white bolster, his flushed cheek pressed against his hand.

The coverlet that was worked with the arms of England on a blue ground was drawn up to his chin, his little body only slightly disturbed the smoothness of the heavy fall of the silk.

“In what manner did he become sick?” demanded the Prince hoarsely. “God wot, you might have looked to him better.”

The Princess quivered beneath his hand on her shoulder.

“Neither he nor Richard,” she answered, “has been from my sight since you left me; but there has been much sickness in Bordeaux.” The tears overbrimmed her eyes and ran down her pale cheeks. “I have been watching him these two days without sleep,” she added.

Edward of Wales did not answer her; his hollow eyes were fixed upon his heir–that third Edward who was to carry on the splendour of England and the glory of Plantagenet.

The boy had always been next his heart; Richard, his second son, was not of so kindly a nature. His father did not see in him promise of his own qualities, but his eldest born was his own copy, beautiful, brave, at six a perfect little knight.

Jehanne glanced timidly up at his bitter, stern face.

“You must not grieve,” she whispered; “he will be well in a little while. Is he not strong, and will he not be running beside you in a few short days?”

Still Edward the Black Prince did not answer; he disengaged himself from her fond support and walked heavily to his son’s pillow, then sank on his knees on the bedstep and clasped his thin hands against the coverlet.

The little face so near to his was calm and proud, the flower of English beauty, gold and rose in tint, blunt featured, strongly made, yet delicate.

Save that he was deeply flushed and his hair damp beneath the tumble of silken curls, he might have been in perfect health. The weary, sick, disappointed, and defeated knight, with that dark day of Limoges on his soul, stared with a piteous eagerness at the child’s gracious innocency.

The child who would be King of England soon, surely; it was mere chance who would live the longer, the old King languishing at Westminster in tarnished glory at Alice Perrer’s side, or his famous son who had just resigned his commands and was coming home to die. Edward himself never thought that he would be King; he felt the sands of life running out too swiftly.

That day when he had been carried through the slaughter round the church of St. Etienne at Limoges he had known that it was the last time he would look on war.

And Edward the King could not live long now.

So soon the fair child would be Lord of England and possessor of all the perilous honours and glories of his father. The Prince’s proud head sank low; the hot tears welled up and blinded him, then dripped down his cheeks as he considered his smirched chivalry.

And the Princess Jehanne saw this, but did not dare to stir from her place, for she knew that, as a shield once dented by a heavy sword can never be made smooth again, so a knight’s honour once stained can never more be cleaned, even by the bitterest repentance. For her husband to have fallen from this lofty code, which was the only code that held among those of gentle blood, was a more awful thing than the lapse of a poor obscure knight, for he had blazed so brightly in his chivalry and brought such renown to England that the whole world had echoed with his fame.

The Prince rested his cheek against the arms of England on the coverlet; he felt the lassitude of a man who sees that life is done, and that never more in this world will he perform feats of arms or guide great policies or strive with men or shine before them.

The loss of his strength had had the effect of drawing a veil between him and the world; seeing as a spectator those events in which he had once played a leading part, he had come to estimate things differently.

And now that feeling culminated; he felt like one very old, looking back on a long life, or as if he beheld the incidents of his career painted in little bright pictures on a long roll of vellum.

It was an unfinished life, a broken, defeated life, perhaps men might hereafter call it a tarnished life.

The Prince knew this, and the sense of failure was like a black cloud on his heart.

But his little son, sleeping beneath the leopard-strewn coverlet, would redeem his own unfulfilled promise.

“Ah, dear Lord Christ, and St. George,” he prayed, “let this be so–let him be a very perfect knight and a great King.”

Hearing a little movement, he lifted his head.

The child was awake; the sparkling blue of his eyes was brilliant in his flushed face.

“Seigneur!” he whispered, seeing his father; he smiled. “Shall we be going to England soon?”

“Even now they load the boats,” answered the Prince. “You wish to return to England?”

“CertÈs,” said the child wistfully. “Is the war over?” he added.

“What should you know of that?” asked the Prince, startled.

“I did hear the knights all talking of the war.”

“It is not over,” answered Edward sombrely. “Your Uncle Lancaster will finish that business.”

“HÈlas! I would I were a big knight, Seigneur,” murmured the child.

“There is time for that,” said the Prince.

His son stared at him for a moment’s silence, then said–

“When the knights showed us feats with the lance in the courtyard, Richard was afraid.”

“Nay,” replied Edward angrily, “not afraid!”

The child nodded.

“Richard has a new silk cote hardie which pleases him mightily; but when I am well I shall have a shirt of mail, shall I not?”

“Ay!” answered the Prince, “if the armourer can make one so small.”

The child closed his eyes.

“Why am I sick, Seigneur?” he muttered. “Did I do wrong?”

Edward shivered.

“You are not sorely sick?” he demanded hoarsely.

His son put out a hot hand, which the Prince clasped tightly.

“I feel so tired,” he whispered, still with his eyes closed; “but when I sleep the dragons come and crawl over the bed—”

Jehanne had crept round to the other side of the pillow.

“Let him sleep, Edward,” she whispered anxiously.

“He can sleep while I hold his hand,” answered the Prince, never lifting his eyes from his son’s face.

“Nay, but you should rest,” she insisted. “Have you not come a long journey, and are you not sick?”

“I rested at Lormont,” answered Edward.

The Princess lifted her red kirtle from her feet and crossed to the doctor, who stood between the two women on the hearth, and whispered to him, her pretty face quivering with agitation.

A wind was rising from the sea, ruffling the waves, shaking the cordage of the anchored ships and lifting the little pennons of England that struggled at the main masts. This wind beat at the diamond-shaped leaded casements and scattered the leaves from the poplar tree without in a yellow shower like golden ducats dropped by a reluctant hand across the prospect of sea and town.

The Princess Jehanne came back to the bed with the doctor; he was a Spaniard, who had been in the service of Don Pedro and was renowned for his knowledge of Eastern medicine.

He spoke in French to the Prince, with a courteous humility.

“Fair Seigneur, permit me to look to the little Prince. And for yourself, it would be wiser that you should rest.”

Edward glanced up into his cool, composed face; then rose heavily and seated himself in the stiff chair against the wall.

The doctor bent over the child, delicately touched his brow, then called, in soft Spanish, one of the women, who came with a small horn beaker in her hand.

The little Prince was moaning. When he saw the draught he tried to push it away, and shut his lips obstinately.

“Ah, par dÈ!” cried the father, “what manner of knight will you become?”

The child sat up, shuddering, but meek, and swallowed the noisome liquid without a protest.

“Is he better?” whispered the Princess Jehanne, drawing the coverlet anxiously up over him as he lay down.

The doctor shook his head.

“Not–worse?” she faltered.

“That I cannot say,” he replied. “The fever is very high.”

She glanced at her husband sitting gloomy and silent, and beckoned one of the women and whispered to her to fetch Prince Richard, who might charm the Prince out of his melancholy.

But when his second son was brought and led up to him, Edward showed no manner of interest.

Yet the child was of a neat and exact beauty and very richly dressed in brown silk and very humble in his duty.

“Were you afraid of the lance play?” asked his father.

Richard looked up in a mischievous and charming manner.

“I do prefer, Seigneur, to go in a litter to horseback,” he lisped.

“Do you not love to see the jousts?” frowned Edward.

“I like to play at the ball,” returned Richard.

“Take him away for a false knight,” said the Prince wearily.

“AhÈ, at four years old!” cried Jehanne of Kent indignantly. She came round the bed and caught the younger Prince to her bosom swiftly.

“He is my son,” flashed Edward, “and he loves not arms. Take him hence.”

The Princess gave Richard to the lady who had brought him, and as he found himself being carried away he began to wail and cry, which completed the Prince’s contempt; in truth he was angry with Richard for being well and lusty while his brother lay sick. The Princess noticed his exclamation of annoyance as the child broke into sobs.

“You are not fair to Richard,” she said, flushing.

“Pardi, you must have your favourite,” he retorted gloomily. “If you had given the care to Edward you do to Richard he might have been on his feet to welcome me.”

Jehanne turned abruptly away, smarting from the injustice of the rebuke.

“If you had spared Limoges,” she answered, “God’s judgment would not have fallen on you in this matter.”

The Prince shrank against the wall and lifted tortured eyes.

Instantly she was on her knees before him.

“Forgive me,” she said passionately.

He did not speak a word; his thin hand lightly touched the silver caul that bound her fair hair, but his eyes had moved to his son.

The little Prince slept again, though uneasily, with moans and twitchings in his limbs.

“I might have spared Limoges,” muttered Edward, “but I had sworn by my father’s soul.”

Jehanne kissed the hand that had been withdrawn from her head.

“Come away for a little while,” she pleaded, “while he sleeps.”

He rose and suffered her to lead him into the next chamber, where he lay exhausted along the couch by the oriel window and sent for his beloved brother, the Duke of Lancaster.

Jehanne sat silently by his side on a little stool, her brow furrowed and her cheeks colourless; she had never seen the Prince so silent, so weak, so troubled.

She was relieved when the magnificent Johan, still in his camail and surtout, full of vigour and energy, entered the chamber.

“How goes the lading of the ship?” asked Edward of Wales. “We sail with the first fair wind.”

“Pardi,” said the Duke in his deep voice, “I have no time to go down to the shore yet, but I do not think they will make delays.”

“Surely,” said the Prince. “I am right weary of Acquitaine.”

And he gave a sigh as if he would burst his bosom.

“Yet I must see more of it,” returned Johan, coming to salute the Princess, which he did with good will, being close in sincere friendship with this lady.

The Prince lay back languidly.

“How can you keep a foothold without money?” he asked impatiently.

Johan’s deep eyes rested lovingly on his brother’s changed face.

“By St. George,” he said, “if I can keep these fiefs no other way, I will out of my own revenues and charges support the war—”

Edward looked at him fully, and the tears washed the eyes of the Princess.

“Seigneur,” she said, “you can with a very comfortable heart return to England, knowing how loyally Johan will uphold you here.”

She felt warmly towards Johan, for she knew that it was he who had turned aside the Prince’s vengeance from Jean le Cros and saved him from the crime of taking the life of a son of the Church.

Perhaps the Prince thought of that too; perhaps he thought that the blood of the three thousand slain in Limoges was as heavy a burden to bear as the blood of a bishop.

“Ay, save Acquitaine, Johan,” he murmured, “for the honour of England.”

His eyes turned wistfully to the fading day that died beyond the oriel window. Surely, he thought, I have drunk of the last drop of bitterness. I, Edward of Wales, to return to England a useless man, leaving defeat behind for a younger knight to redeem.

The Duke of Lancaster stood watching him, with many thoughts in his heart, and presently Edward turned to him and spoke, in a voice earnest and feeble.

“Johan, when the King dies I shall be in my grave.”

The Princess broke his speech by a sharp, piteous intake of breath, and caught desperately at his slack hand.

“Oh, Jehanne,” he said, “I have flattered your fears long enough. And now I must speak straightly.”

He paused, for his breath failed him.

“Speak,” answered Johan, “for I am ready to take any charge that you may give me—”

“My son Edward will be King of England,” whispered the Prince; “and he is a young child. Stand you by him and by his mother in their difficulties.”

“I will,” said the Duke gravely.

“I entreat this of you now,” added Edward, “for it well may be that I shall never see you again. I think,” and the bitterness of his failure echoed in his voice, “that I shall die before we regain Acquitaine.”

“Be of better cheer, brother,” answered the Duke, “for I have great hopes that you will recover in England.”

“Nay, I am past mending,” said the Prince; “and were it not that I have some desire to draw my last breath in English air, I would die here and leave my bones where I have left my knighthood and my chivalry.”

“You scarcely think of me,” said Jehanne of Kent, and her eyes reminded him how much he had loved her once; lately he had seemed to fall away from the close confines of her affection.

He returned her gaze sadly.

“Yea, I think of you,” he answered, “but men’s matters fill my mind. Yet be content. You are a sweet woman, Jehanne.”

He caressed her cheek with languid fingers, and again his eyes sought the window and the pale sky beyond, and his face was moody, as if he saw passing in the windy spaces without all the pageants, battles, triumphs, achievements and glories that had gone to make his life–all the great world that was still full of feats of arms, of ambitions, of splendour, of laughter, whirling, receding, leaving him in this quiet chamber, useless, sick, and defeated.

The Duke of Lancaster, who was in command of the troops who had escorted the Prince to Bordeaux and had a hundred matters on his mind, left the chamber.

Jehanne sat silent, forgotten, unnoticed, beside the Prince, who, with his head sunk on his breast, was dreaming of the life that was past and the life he had hoped to live.

Presently candles were brought in, but he made no movement nor did the Princess, stiff and cold on her stool.

The wind, with a gentle persistence, shook the tall window-frame and lifted the arras on the wall; clouds were coming up from beyond the sea and blotting the tawny crimson streaks of the sunset.

Dark settled in the chamber and the candles winked, little points of light in a great gloom.

Pleasant, cheerful noises of horses and men came from the courtyard where the lading and unlading was proceeding; the sounds of the mules and their drivers could be heard as a long procession of them laden with baggage started for the ships.

At last the Prince spoke.

“This is a homeward wind,” he said.

As he raised his head to speak he saw the door open and the Spanish doctor enter.

Jehanne turned, and, fearful of bad news, put her finger to her lips.

But Edward got to his feet, caught her aside, and said in the voice of a strong man–

“What news of my son?”

The doctor answered steadily, without fear or hesitancy.

“The Prince is worse, Seigneur, and it were well that you should come.”

Edward of Wales bowed his head and followed the doctor into the next apartment.

The candles were lit and the curtains drawn; a smell of herbs, of wax, of incense, was heavy in the air. A priest was kneeling at the foot of the bed; the full Latin words of his whispered prayer came clearly to the Prince’s ears.

The little Edward lay on his back with his head flung upwards.

An awful change had come over him since last his father had looked on him; an expression of pain had also given him an expression of maturity, the unnatural flush had faded, leaving him bluish-white, while under his bright eyes was a purple stain.

The Prince staggered to the bed.

“Limoges, Limoges,” he muttered.

He cast himself on his knees and clutched the coverlet.

“Dear Lord Jesus, what is this coming to me!” he whispered.

Another doctor moved about; Jehanne stopped and spoke to him. He could tell her nothing save that, despite all the most approved remedies, the Prince had within the last hour become rapidly worse and finally lost consciousness.

Jehanne turned desperately to the great bed where her child lay, breathing heavily, with glazed fixed eyes and dry lips.

“Is it the plague?” she asked.

They could not tell her.

“Oh, dear, dear Lord and St. George,” prayed the Prince, “put not this loss on England; punish me not this way!”

The child turned on his side and muttered a few words, all relating to arms and horses and war; his eyes closed jerkily and then fluttered open.

Johan of Lancaster entered; he whispered to the doctors, then came lightly to the bed, walking as softly as a woman for all his great stature and bulk.

He glanced at the child, he glanced at his brother, then touched the kneeling priest on the shoulder.

“He will not die,” said the Prince; “in a little while he will wake and be well again.”

The priest rose and left the room.

A long swell of wind lifted the Eastern tapestry on the floor, fluttered the long curtains and stirred the aromatic scents and the clouds of incense that hung in the air.

Jehanne of Kent stood rigid, staring down at the pillow; her yellow hair had slipped and hung loose in the silver caul.

And her face showed hollow in the fluttering candlelight.

The little Prince turned from side to side, catching his breath in his throat.

“Seigneur …” he gasped, “let me … mount the white horse … the great horse.…”

He began to cough, and his small fingers pulled at the pillow; he stared straight at his father.

“He does not see me,” whispered Edward; “he is blind.”

“Why do you leave me alone?” complained the child; “but I … am … not … afraid–never … afraid.”

The Prince caught his arm passionately, then turned in a slow horror, for he saw Jehanne and his brother sink to their knees. He looked over his shoulder.

In the doorway stood three priests; the centre one held with upraised hands an object swathed in white silk.

The Host.

“In nomine patris, filiis, et spiritus sanctus,” he said, and drew aside the white silk, revealing the Eucharist glittering like a captured star.

“No,” began Edward, “no—”

He turned again to the bed; a light struggle shook the child’s limbs. He twisted his arm out of his father’s grasp and pressed his two hands together, pointed heavenwards.

“Saint–George—” he breathed very faintly, then “England.”

His hands fell apart and his mouth dropped into a circle; a faint quiver ran through his body, and his head sank on to his shoulder.

The Host was borne round the bed, and no one moved.

Then Edward rose, regardless of the Presence of God.

“Too late,” he said in a terrible voice. “My son, my son!”

And before the priest carrying the Eucharist the victor of Cressy sank like a felled sapling, and Jehanne caught his head on her knee, her heart motionless in her bosom.

So died the youngest of the three royal Edwards of England, a few days before the sailing from Bordeaux, and soon after the other two were both at peace in Westminster and Richard was on the throne with Johan of Gaunt for his guardian and many troubles ahead.