“And my sometime Lord of Warwick,” said I, “was no saint likewise, or I mistake.”
“Therein,” saith she, “have you the right.”
“Well,” pursued I, “all they be gone: and soothly, I had hoped there were no more such left.”
“Then should there be no original sin left,” she made answer; “yea, and Sathanas should be clean gone forth of this world.”
The rest of the converse I mind not, but that last sentence tarried in my mind for many a day, and hath oft-times come back to me touching other matters.
We reached Loure on Saint Martin’s Day (November 11th), and Paris the next morrow. There found we the Bishops of Winchester and Exeter, (Stratford and Stapleton), whom King Edward had sent over to join the Queen’s Council. Now I never loved overmuch neither of these Reverend Fathers, though it were for very diverse causes. Of course, being priests, they were holy men; but I misdoubt if either were perfect man apart from his priesthood—my Lord of Winchester more in especial. Against my Lord of Exeter have I but little to say; he was fumish (irritable, captious) man, but no worse. But my Lord of Winchester did I never trust, nor did I cease to marvel that man could. As to King Edward, betray him to his enemies to-day, and he should put his life in your hands again to-morrow: never saw I man like to him, that no experience would learn mistrust. Queen Isabel trusted few: but of them my said Lord of Winchester was one. I have noted at times that they which be untrue themselves be little given to trust other. She trusted none save them she had tried: and she had tried this Bishop, not once nor twice. He never brake faith with her; but with King Edward he brake it a score of times twice told, and with his son that is now King belike. I wis not whether at this time the Queen was ready to put affiance in him; I scarce think she was: for she shut both Bishops out of her Council from the day she came to Paris. But not at this time, nor for long after did I guess what it signified.
November was nigh run out, when one morrow Dame Joan de Vaux brought word that the Queen, being a-cold, commanded her velvet mantle taken to her cabinet: and I, as the dame in waiting then on duty, took the same to her. I found her sat of a chair of carven wood, beside the brasier, and two gentlemen of the other side of the hearth. Behind her chair Dame Elizabeth waited, and I gave the mantle to her to cast over the Queen’s shoulders. The gentlemen stood with their backs to the light, and I paid little note to them at first, save to see that one was a priest: but as I went about to go forth, the one that was not a priest turned his face, and I perceived to mine amaze that it was Sir Roger de Mortimer. Soothly, it needed all my courtly self-command that I should not cry out when I beheld him. Had I followed the prompting of mine own heart, I should have cried, “Get thee gone, thou banished traitor!” He, who had returned unlicenced from Scotland ere the war was over, in the time of old King Edward of Westminster; that had borne arms against his son, then King, under my Lord of Lancaster; that, having his life spared, and being but sent to the Tower, had there plotted to seize three of the chief fortresses of the Crown—namely, the said Tower, and the Castles of Windsor and Wallingford,—and had thereupon been cast for death, and only spared through the intercession of the Queen and the Bishop of Hereford: yet, after all this, had he broken prison, bribing one of his keepers and drugging the rest, and was now a banished felon, in refuge over seas: he to dare so much as to breathe the same air with the wife of his Sovereign, with her that had been his advocate, and that knew all his treacheries! Could any worser insult to the Queen have been devised? But all at once, as I passed along the gallery, another thought came in upon me. What of her? who, knowing all this and more, yet gave leave for this man—not to kneel at her feet and cry her mercy—that had been grace beyond any reasonable hope: but suffered him to stand in her presence, to appear in her privy cabinet—nay, to act as though he were a noble appointed of her Council! Had she forgot all the past?
I travelled no further for that time. The time was to come when I should perceive that forgetfulness was all too little to account for her deeds.
That night, Dame Tiffany being appointed to the pallet, it so fell out that Dame Elizabeth, Dame Joan, and I, lay in the antechamber. We had but began to doff ourselves, and Dame Elizabeth was stood afore the mirror, a-combing of her long hair—and rare long hair it was, and of a fine colour (but I must not pursue the same, or Jack shall find in the hair an hare)—when I said to her—
“Dame Elizabeth, pray you tell me, were you in waiting when Sir Roger de Mortimer came to the Queen?”