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‘Look at him now,’ Thomas whispered. ‘He is all over the man like a cheap tabard!’

Edmund could not help but agree. The King was sickeningly demonstrative. It had been the same with the previous favourite, Piers Gaveston, until the barons could no longer stomach their obvious sodomy and executed Gaveston. Perhaps, with luck, the same would happen to Despenser — except that Sir Hugh had too tight a grip on the Realm’s powers, and on the King. He would not allow Edward to put himself into any form of danger. And as for journeying to France … well, Despenser would be more likely to suggest that he should fall on his own sword as let the King go there. That was what Charles demanded, though. And Despenser knew that he must do something — find some alternative to the King travelling to Paris. Because as soon as Edward was over the water, Despenser’s life would become forfeit.

‘He’ll never let the King go to France,’ Edmund scoffed.

‘But he may permit the Queen to go,’ Piers said.

Thomas glanced at them. ‘Eh? What was that?’

‘I have suggested that your brother might benefit from showing himself a better guardian of the realm than the good Sir Despenser.’

‘And how do you expect him to do that? The daft sod can’t even persuade a wench who’s thrown herself at him, to join him in his bed!’

‘That is not funny, Thomas.’

‘It’s true, though, Edmund. Mabilla was teasing your tarse for days, and as soon as you gave chase, the bitch screamed like a virgin. Virgin, my arse!’ Thomas snorted loudly at the joke, turning and walking away.

It was true enough, but that didn’t make Edmund any happier to hear the tale repeated, especially not in front of his servant, but before he could respond, Piers was already speaking.

‘My Lord, I think that there is one way in which you might defeat Sir Hugh.’

‘How, in God’s name? There is nothing better suited to my tastes than to see him on the ground and squirming!’

‘I think that, were you to espouse the Queen’s cause more strenuously, you might injure him. Perhaps you could suggest that, before she were to leave these shores to become Ambassadress to France, she should be reestablished in her former position?’

Earl Edmund curled his lip scornfully. ‘And how is that going to affect the Despenser swine?’

‘If the Queen has her lands and rights returned to her, so that if she were to go to France to negotiate with the French King, he could see that our King was treating her honourably, and that her letters to him detailing her suffering were not entirely correct, it may heal the rift between the English and French Crowns. And then a more equitable truce could be arranged. Perhaps the King might even travel to France, and all the glory of the achievement would redound to your honour, my Lord.’

Earl Edmund frowned. ‘You are sure of that?’

‘Nothing is so uncertain as life in a royal court,’ Piers said with a chuckle. ‘But let me put it to you like this: if there is one thing the Despenser would not care for, it would be for the Queen to go to France with the King. The King trusts Despenser, not his wife. But she has borne him children, and were she to have his ear for a long journey, Despenser might find his star beginning to wane …’

Jack was at the river as soon as the light faded. The sun began to set when he was sitting in the tavern on the road west, and he finished his drink at a leisurely pace. There was no point getting there in daylight, and letting all and sundry see him.

The view was unchanged from the previous night. He squatted down happily enough, eyeing the guards on the walls, and carefully watching at the base of the walls to see whether there could have been a trap laid for him, but saw nothing to alarm him. Next, he walked to the bridge at the southern gate, and squatted again, staring fixedly at a point just above the bridge to catch any stray movements, listening with his mouth open for any strange noises — but there was nothing again.

At last, when he was content that all was well, he committed himself. He crossed the little timber bridge.

The wall to the Abbey reared up overhead, and he glanced up, feeling a curious sense of the height of the place, before carrying on along the base of the wall to the corner. Here he stopped and waited, all senses alert. There were steps along the upper walkway over his head, and he listened carefully as the man spat over the edge. A gobbet of phlegm landed on his shoulder, and Jack looked at it without distaste as it ran down his breast and upper arm.

When the steps moved away, he crouched silently. The steel of the culvert was as rusted as he had thought, but it was still strong enough to make manipulation difficult. He must kneel and wrench at it to make it give enough to leave space for him to crawl inside. Working slowly so as not to attract attention, he was relieved when he heard singing begin, and with that he felt he could work a little faster. Being out here in the open was alarming.

There was a snick as a post of steel snapped — and he froze at the sound. However, there were no running footsteps, no bellows for attention. Nothing. He pulled himself nearer and peered at the metal. The bar had a shiny section where the bright metal had broken from its fitting in the wall. He took mud and carefully smeared it over both gleaming edges, drawing in his breath as the sharp metal sliced into his finger. He ignored the stinging pain and continued. One bar was broken. Now he set to work on the next, waiting until that too was broken, and then smearing that with more mud, this time more careful not to cut himself.

When all was done, he painstakingly withdrew the frame a short distance from the wall, and wriggled himself over it and into the drain itself.

The drain, thank God, was not so noisome as it might have been. Recent rains had washed away much of the filth. Fortunately, the majority of the monks’ waste would have been captured in the cesspit, ready for spreading over their fields as manure. There were other places he had entered which had been a great deal worse. He wriggled his way along the short tunnel, and peered out into the main yard.

There was a large building on his right, another directly in front of him, and the main Abbey buildings loomed monstrous and black against the sky in the gap between the two.

A step. He slowly withdrew his head into the culvert before he could be seen, and listened intently. There: a man’s pacing up overhead. How had he not spotted the guard? Perhaps there was a trap set for him, and there were more men waiting here to catch him as soon as he tried to break in. But the steps moved on, and he began to breathe more easily.

He took hold of his knife and made sure that it would move in its sheath, then he slipped out into the yard, sliding his back along the wall in the shadows. The walkway above him was not high, only about three feet over him, and reaching it should be easy enough. He saw that there were coils of rope and blocks of masonry stashed beneath it, as well as ladders. There had been a disaster of some sort, he reckoned, looking at the ravaged buildings. All to his advantage.

The choice — to continue now, or to wait and reach this far again some other night. Better by far to get the matter over and done with, he decided. He glanced up at the walls again, and then made for the nearest coils of rope.

On the rough palliasse set out for Piers near the King’s chamber, not far from Earl Edmund’s snoring body, the adviser totted up the money he had been paid so far.

He didn’t understand the game Sir Hugh le Despenser was playing, but so far as he was concerned, the main thing was the money, and that was reaching him regularly. For now, Sir Hugh wanted the King to view the Queen as a potential representative for him in France. However, the King had listened to Despenser when he had poured verbal poison into the King’s ears about his wife. Queen Isabella was disloyal, treacherous. She could not be trusted.