Edward flung himself into Henry’s chair of state, swung a long leg over the lacquered arm-rest. “What would you do if the drawbridge were closed to you, Uncle? You’d look for a postern gate, no? Well, so shall I.”
The New Temple of the Knights Templar lay beyond the city walls, between Fleet Street and the River Thames. The Templars, “soldiers of Christ,” were the most martial of the religious orders, and the wealthiest, for although they had originally been founded to fight the infidel, they had in time become the financiers of Europe, money-lenders and bankers for the Crown, the Church, prosperous merchants, the trade guilds. Their London preceptory looked at first glance like a small city in and of itself, but a city without denizens, for the knights retired at Compline. Edward had known this; he and his men passed through the gateway into a world of cloistered silence and deepening summer shadows, a world of deceptive, timeless peace.
“I am Brother Raymond.” The warden was irked at being roused from bed, for he would have to rise in just a few hours for Matins. “How may I be of service, my lord?”
“I regret intruding upon you at such an hour, Brother Raymond, but I am here at the behest of my mother, the Queen. A few months past, she gave up some of her jewels as security for a loan, and the recent unrest in the city has made her fear for their safety.” Edward smiled at the Templar, man to man, and shrugged. “Foolishness, I know. But she’ll not rest easy until I have seen for myself that her qualms are for naught.”
The warden was not surprised that Eleanor should be behaving so capriciously; he held Henry’s willful Queen in no high esteem. “So be it,” he said reluctantly. “If Your Grace will accompany me, I shall take you to the treasure-house. I would ask that your men maintain silence, though, for the knights’ hall lies above it, and my brothers are abed.”
The undercroft of the hall was as dark and damp as a crypt, just as foreboding. Following the feeble glow of their lanterns, Edward’s men advanced cautiously, weaving their way amidst the heavy coffers. The warden glanced back, saw that Edward had stopped. “Ah, no, my lord, those are the treasuries of the city guilds. The Queen’s caskets are over here.”
He was never to be sure exactly what happened next. He thought he heard Edward say, “But this is what I’ve come for, Brother Raymond.” Bewildered, he started to retrace his steps. If Edward signaled, he never saw it. But someone shoved him forward, causing him to stumble, and then a hand was clapped roughly over his mouth. He struggled, to no avail, within moments was overpowered. Bound and gagged, he lay helplessly on the floor, watching in appalled rage as the men produced hammers from beneath their mantles, muffled them in burlap, and set about smashing the locks on the guild coffers.
They were very efficient, moving systematically from coffer to coffer, emptying the contents into large woven sacks. “Enough,” Edward said at last. “We can carry no more.” As they began lugging their booty toward the door, he bent over the warden, set a lantern on the closest coffer. “You’ll pass an uncomfortable night, I fear. It cannot be helped, though.” There was sympathy in his voice, but no trace of shame. Although his face was in shadow, the Templar would later swear he was smiling.
Edward’s raid on the New Temple netted him a thousand pounds. He prudently did not linger in London, made a hasty withdrawal to Windsor Castle. It was a wise move, for as word spread of the theft, outraged Londoners spilled into the streets. Within hours, the city was in turmoil. Enraged mobs roamed about, setting fire to the houses of prominent royalists, assaulting foreigners. When the tumult did not subside, John Mansel and the Queen’s uncle, the Archbishop of Canterbury, fled to Dover, where they took ship for France. To the reformers, Mansel was Henry’s evil genius, and Richard’s son Hal brashly sailed in pursuit. Much to Richard’s dismay, Hal was captured in Boulogne by a French lord rumored to be acting at the English Queen’s behest. Richard withdrew to his castle at Berkhamsted, where he labored to bring about his son’s release and attempted to stave off civil war, imploring Simon to meet with him at Twyford Bridge.
But Simon was not yet ready to negotiate. He swung east, avoiding London, and was given an enthusiastic welcome in the towns of the Cinque Ports. The Bishops of London, Lincoln, and Chester were dispatched to Henry, bearing Simon’s terms for peace: that Hal be set free at once, that Henry again swear to uphold the Oxford Provisions, that he expel his foreign mercenaries and surrender Dover and other castles of strategic importance to the barons. Simon then assumed control of the port of Dover, thus severing all communications with the continent. Trapped in the Tower, Henry was forced to face the most bitter of facts, that it had taken Simon just six weeks to reduce England’s King to utter impotence.
“Are you certain you know where the man lives, John?”
John de Gisors glanced back at his companions. “Somewhere along Bishopsgate Street, not far from St Helen’s nunnery.” Reining in his horse, he beckoned to a passing youth. “You there! Where will we find the house of Mayor Fitz Thomas?”
De Gisors was known on sight to most Londoners; he’d been a city alderman for nigh on thirty years, three times Mayor. The boy hastily doffed his cap, offered to act as guide, and after escorting them through the wide, wooden gateway of the Fitz Thomas manor, he was not disappointed. De Gisors was that rarity, a wealthy merchant who spent freely; he flipped the lad a silver half-penny.
De Gisors’s nephew hastened to help him dismount, for his uncle was no longer young and his girth, as much as his fine woolen tunic, proclaimed him a man of means. “Thank you, Clement,” he said, heaving himself from the saddle. A servant came from the stables, and as he led their horses across the courtyard, Clement looked about with considerable interest.
“Fitz Thomas might pander to the rabble, Uncle, but he stints himself little. A baron would not scorn to shelter here,” he said admiringly, and de Gisors grunted.
“Fitz Thomas does not lack for money. He’s a draper by trade, deals in only the finest wools and silks. He comes from one of London’s most distinguished families, Clement, is nephew to a former Mayor…which makes his behavior all the more despicable, for he is betraying his own.”
They were admitted by a young serving maid. Within moments, a woman was crossing the hall toward them. She was neatly dressed in a bright blue gown and snowy white wimple, but her hands and apron were streaked with flour. Unselfconscious, she smiled, explaining, “We’ve a new cook; I was showing him my favorite eel pasty recipe.”
“Dame Cecilia.” De Gisors bowed over a slim, flour-dusted hand. “I believe you know Augustine de Hadestok. This gentleman is Richard Picard, like myself a court vintner, and this is my nephew, Clement, newly come to London.”
“I’ll send a servant to see to your comfort whilst I inform my husband that you are here. He may not be able to see you at once, for he is meeting in the solar with Sir Thomas Puleston.”
Clement had a sharp eye, caught the expressions of distaste that flickered across the faces of his companions. As soon as they were alone, he queried, “Who is this Puleston? I gather you like him not, Uncle.”
“Indeed not.” De Gisors lowered himself onto a cushioned bench. “Puleston is not one of us, even though he did marry into one of London’s better families. He comes of Shropshire gentry, is a royal justice…and a born conniver. He and de Montfort are two of a kind, arrows shot from the same bow. He’s the Earl’s sworn man, cares not who knows it. He—”
Cutting himself off abruptly, he got stiffly to his feet. Clement turned in time to see a figure emerging from the corner stairwell. While it was obvious that this dapper, youthful man was their host, he so little resembled de Gisors’s lurid characterization that Clement could only stare, mouth ajar. As Fitz Thomas drew near, he saw that the Mayor was not as young as he first appeared, but he could still more easily have been taken for an Oxford student than a merchant in his mid-forties. Of slight build, with fine, flaxen hair, Norse-blue eyes, and a friendly, ingratiating smile, he seemed so innocuous to Clement that he found himsel
f doubting his uncle’s judgment, wondering how they could possibly see this mild-mannered draper as Lucifer’s henchman.
Thomas Fitz Thomas greeted them affably, as if they were friends, not political rivals, bade them be seated, and promised to be with them shortly. Clement held his tongue until Fitz Thomas disappeared into the stairwell, and then blurted out, “That is the firebrand Mayor? Jesú, Uncle, he looks like a clerk!”
De Hadestok gave a derisive snort, and de Gisors said grimly, “Appearances can mislead, lad. To look at the magpie, you’d not think a bird with such beautiful plumage would be a thief, a scavenger that feeds upon other birds’ eggs. Fitz Thomas may indeed look like a church deacon, but he has the soul of a pirate. He has a diabolical ability to stir up a crowd, has turned the Folkmoot into a dangerous weapon and learned to unleash the London rabble at his will.”
“The Folkmoot? Is that not a public meeting of London freemen? I thought it had fallen into disuse, was little heeded nowadays.”
De Gisors nodded. “That is what makes Fitz Thomas so formidable a threat, Clement. He has resurrected the Folkmoot, made of it his own creature, serving his ends. Had you but seen him yesterday noon—” He broke off, shaking his head. “The Folkmoot met, as always, at Paul’s Cross, but never have I seen such a gathering. So many men turned out that there was not a foot to spare in all of the churchyard, and they cheered lustily as Fitz Thomas preached them a fire-and-brimstone sermon. To hear him tell it, the Oxford Provisions were like Holy Writ, and when he finally put it to a vote, asking if they supported Simon de Montfort and the Provisions, the simple fools shouted their ‘yeas’ to the heavens, as if they’d been asked to acclaim Christ the Redeemer!”
“John…” Augustine de Hadestok gave a warning cough, and de Gisors spun around. If Fitz Thomas had heard the last of this harangue, it did not show on his face; his smile did not waver. Another man had followed him out of the shadows of the stairwell. Clement knew this dark, saturnine stranger must be the hated knight Puleston. Unlike Fitz Thomas, the wolf in sheepskin, Puleston at least looked the part; he could have been the reincarnation of every pilgrim’s fears, the wicked brigand lurking in every dark woods, around the bend of every lonely road. Puleston had a rakish, sardonic grin and penetrating black eyes; Clement had a sudden irrational conviction that they could see into his very soul, and he flushed, looked hastily away.
After an exchange of ice-edged greetings, Puleston made an unhurried departure. Fitz Thomas wandered over to the trestle table littered with sealing wax, pens, letters, and parchment scrolls. They were in disorder, for Augustine de Hadestok had been riffling through them, and when Fitz Thomas glanced up at his guests, his smile was knowing, ironic. “What may I do for you, gentlemen?”
“Do you still mean to go to the King, demand that he accept the Provisions?”
“Demand, no. Urge him, yes. He must realize that support for the Provisions runs deep in London. Our last Folkmoot—”
“—was a farce,” de Hadestok said indignantly. “You’ve given a voice to the lowest elements in the city, whilst utterly ignoring the views of men of consequence, men of property. And when we sought to rebut you, we were shouted down!”
Fitz Thomas shrugged. “It is unfortunate,” he said, “but not surprising, that rudeness ofttimes follows apace of revolution.”
De Gisors gasped. “You admit, then, that you seek to foment a revolution?”
Fitz Thomas looked at them. “Do you not know, Master de Gisors,” he said softly, almost gently, “that you are even now living through one?”
Richard Picard, hitherto silent, now blistered the air with an embittered oath. “I told you we were wasting our time, John. Let’s be gone from here.”
“Not yet.” De Gisors moved toward the Mayor. “You are no fool. You must realize the danger in what you are doing. In courting the rabble, you imperil the entire social order. Why are you doing this? What do you seek to gain?”
“ ‘The rabble’?” Fitz Thomas echoed, no longer amused. “I suppose by that you mean the men of the craft guilds. I’ll grant you that the fishmongers, the cordwainers, and potters do not enjoy the same stature as the trade guilds—the shipping magnates like you, Master de Hadestok, or the vintners like you, Master de Gisors. But the members of the craft guilds are decent, hard-working men, men entitled to a say in the government of their city, and that you have denied them.”
De Gisors was shaking his head. “Nay, you wrong me. We may have been often at odds with upstart craftsmen, but I would not call them ‘rabble.’ It is not their influence I fear. It is the journeymen, those who work for wages, the riffraff, the baseborn. Can you deny that such men are fickle, untrustworthy, ever on the edge of violence?”
Fitz Thomas leaned back against the table. “During my term as sheriff,” he said, “I often attended inquests. The verdicts were varied, ranging from murder in a street brawl to death by mischance to the most common cause, river drowning. But when it came to the disposition of the dead man’s property, again and again the finding was the same: ‘Goods and chattels had he none.’ When men have nothing to lose, gentlemen, when they are given no stake in what you call the ‘social order,’ is it truly so surprising that they do not share your belief in the sanctity of the law?”
“If I wanted to hear a sermon on the plight of Christ’s poor, I would be at Mass,” de Hadestok jeered, and Picard chimed in, no less mockingly. De Gisors and his nephew were silent, the former looking tired and troubled, the latter intrigued in spite of himself. Clement no longer wondered why so much controversy swirled around Fitz Thomas; the man’s passion was contagious.
“What do you hope to accomplish?” he asked, not to bait the Mayor but because he truly wanted to know. They all sensed his sincerity; he earned himself glowering looks from his companions and an honest answer from Fitz Thomas.
“On more than ten separate occasions, King Henry has seized control of the city’s government. I want to make sure that never happens again. In the past, aldermen have abused their office, getting special tax exemptions, brazenly favoring their friends and family. That, too, I would stop. I would protect our city’s rights against the encroachments of the abbey at Westminster. I would gain recognition for the craft guilds.”
He paused, his eyes flicking from face to face, and then burst out laughing. “What did you expect me to say—that I meant to sell my soul to the Devil, my city to the Saracens? That I yearned to be a kingmaker? My aims are more modest than that. I want to protect the welfare of my city. I want to see the Oxford Provisions accepted by all men, its reforms carried out. If I would also like to become London’s most memorable Mayor, what harm in that? I said my aims were modest. By the grace of God Almighty and the Earl of Leicester, they are attainable, too.” He smiled suddenly. “I think, gentlemen, that is what frightens you so much.”
“I was wrong,” de Gisors snapped. “You are indeed a fool. All this talk of the common people, the craftsmen, apprentices, beggars. What do they mean to a lord like Leicester? He will make use of you as long as it serves his purposes, but he’ll never see you as an ally, an equal. He’ll—” He paused, for Fitz Thomas was laughing again.
“Of course the Earl of Leicester believes in the supremacy of blood; what lord does not? You are right when you say the Earl does not see me as his equal. If one of my sons sought to wed his daughter, I daresay he’d be greatly affronted.” He moved forward, stopped in front of de Gisors.
“Leicester might deny my son a highborn bride, but he would not deny him justice. You asked why he would care about the fate of a fishmonger, a tanner? Because even the lowest wretch is deserving of God’s mercy, the protection of the King’s laws. He believes that, you see. I’ve never known another lord who did, but Simon de Montfort truly does. I’ll not deny that self-interest colors his views; what of it? Only a saint is deaf to that voice. But the Earl has a heartfelt vision of the way the world should be. I like his vision, Master de Gisors, I like it well. So do the citizens of Lo
ndon.”
“Come away, John,” Richard Picard urged, and this time de Gisors heeded him. He turned, followed the others across the hall. But at the door, he stopped, glanced back at the Mayor.
“You do not understand,” he said tautly, “do not realize what is at stake. There’ll be no going back. England will never be the same!”
Fitz Thomas nodded. “God willing,” he said, “indeed it will not.”
On July 13, Henry capitulated, sent Simon de Montfort word that he would abide by the barons’ terms. But his belated recognition of reality was not shared by his outraged Queen. Telling Henry that if he lacked the backbone to resist these rebels, she did not, Eleanor announced her intention of joining their eldest son, Edward, at Windsor Castle. Henry, his nerves raw and bleeding, angrily bade her go, and within the hour, her bargemen were rowing away from the Tower, heading upstream.
Her ladies were obviously ill at ease as the Queen’s barge struggled against the current, for Beatrice and Auda would bear the brunt of Eleanor’s temper on the twenty-mile journey to Windsor. Moreover, both women were fearful of river travel, and Eleanor’s anger had propelled them out onto the Thames less than an hour after the cresting of high water. They sat stiffly upright, clutching the edge of their seats, dreading the moment when their barge would have to shoot the bridge. If Eleanor shared their misgivings, it didn’t show. In high dudgeon, she was railing indiscriminately, heaping verbal abuse upon her husband, Simon de Montfort, the Earl of Gloucester, Londoners in general and Mayor Fitz Thomas in particular. When she began to berate their boatmen for their clumsy piloting, her ladies exchanged glumly resigned glances; this was going to be a very long trip.