The Death of a King

manuscripts. Hugolino, too, pressed me to stay and we have become constant companions. We discuss every topic under God’s heaven, except the English court, a subject he studiously avoids. So, Richard, I shall never return to England. I beg you to destroy all letters I have sent and to keep, as if under the seal of confession, all I have ever told you.
    Goodbye. Written at Butrio, 30 November, 1346.

Letter Thirteen
    Edmund Beche to Richard Bliton. I am sure that you of all people never expected another letter from me, but I want to write to tell what has happened, for you, my dearest of friends, have a right to know. The psalmist was certainly correct when he said, “Nothing lasts under the sun”—not even friendship. Hugolino and I settled down at Butrio, oblivious to the world and with an equally childish belief that the world had become oblivious of us. I was arrogant in my belief that I had evaded and would evade, all my pursuers. I was awakened to the stark reality on the morning of the Feast of the Purification. It was a fair day. The prior and Hugolino had drawn up a list of articles they wanted me to purchase in nearby Butrio. I ambled down to the village on the monastery’s one and only donkey and was returning past the Carafe, a small inn, when I distinctly heard a sharp English voice which cut through the hot midday air like a knife. I immediately dismounted and rushed to investigate, but all I found were four, swarthy individuals who answered my inquiries with blank looks, shrugs, and when I pressed them further, a stream of profanities which would have done justice to any denizen of the Roman slums. I began to scour the countryside. All I found were some fresh horse tracks. But whose were they? Innocent pilgrims or my pursuers from the French and English courts? Then early one brilliant morning I found the French. I came up a small hill with an olive grove scattered along the top. I saw some horses grazing aimlessly well away from where the first corpse lay face down in the grass with the garrotte cord still tight around his neck. I hurried forward into the trees. There in a clearing I found Raspale and his group lying as if in sleep, the hempen cords of their assassins wound like necklaces around them. I found a few footprints but it was obvious that Chandos’s group had struck probably the night before. They had disposed of the guard and then destroyed Raspale and his group with consummate ease.
    I returned perplexed to St Albert’s and said nothing, although Hugolino noticed that I was troubled. My fears grew a few days later when the prior bustled anxiously into my cell and reported that the brothers had begun to notice small groups of horsemen which did not hinder them, but kept the monastery under close surveillance. I pacified him, but not my own fear, which pierced my belly with red-hot needles. I went and told Hugolino all I knew. He listened quietly then, putting down the shovel he was holding, announced with great conviction, “They’re the English king’s men.”
    “Your son’s!” I exclaimed.
    Hugolino knelt down on the ground and wiped the soil from his hands.
    “No, Edmund, I said they were from the king of England, and not from my son.”
    I told him that this was not the time to draw distinctions between begetting and disinheritance. He grimaced and asked me to sit alongside him.
    “Why, Edmund,” he queried, “did the king appoint you to your task? To find me? For what purpose? The people believe that I am dead and, even if I could declare who I am, what difference would it make? The people deposed me and crowned another.”
    “The French could use you,” I interrupted, “as a figurehead against the king.”
    Hugolino dismissed this with a perfunctory wave of his hand.
    “Edmund, Edmund,” he asked, “who would believe them? No, I shall tell you why the king has sent you and others to find me. Because, Edmund, he has less claim to govern England than I. Why? Because he is not my son, but the bastard offspring of Isabella and Roger Mortimer.”
    Hugolino stopped my rush of questions with a gesture before continuing.
    “I was never sure of the relationship between Isabella and Mortimer until she joined him in France. I began to make inquiries, yes, I even used torture to get to the truth. By questioning members of her household, I found out that Isabella’s relationship with Mortimer dated back years and began during the summer of 1311, while I was in the north.