Читать онлайн «The Darkening Glass»

Paul Doherty

The Darkening Glass

Prologue

He who loses the most. . is judged the more brave and the stronger.

I awake. The dark fell of night presses down. I lie and seethe against the dying light in my own life. Shadows shroud the mountains and deep valleys of my soul, all peopled by ghosts of yesteryear. I listen to the patter of feet as the sacristan and his escort, lanterns in hand, keep strict vigil between Compline and Matins here in the Priory of Grey Friars, nestling like some bird beneath the soaring glory of St Paul’s. If I rise and peer out of the window, I can glimpse the jutting belfry of the cathedral, its beacon light glowing above the night-shadowed lanes and trackways of Cheapside, with its cross, tun and standard. The busy heart of the buzzing beehive of London. Bells, echoing sombrely, mark the passing of the hours and the creeping approach of dawn. When the call for Matins is proclaimed, I leave my bed and wash fastidiously. I dress in my heavy tunic and linen shift, with thick wool stockings over my old legs, dark leather sandals protecting my feet. Over all I put my anchorite gown to cloak myself like one of the good brothers. My hair, now white as snow, I hide behind a tight-fitting pale-blue wimple, then, vanity of vanities, I stare into a mirror of polished brass. I glimpse my face as it is now and I remember how I was when life blazed in me like a fiery torch. The ghosts of the past cluster around me, drifting up from so many, many years ago, when I was clerica medica atque domicella reginae camerae — clerk, physician and lady of the chamber — to Isabella, wife of Edward II. A time of chaos, when God and his angels slept.

A hurling season when fortune’s wheel spun dizzyingly, bringing down kings and princes, a veritable litany of names of those who met horrid death on the battlefield, in lonely dungeons or high on some public scaffold.

I, Mathilde de Clairebon, Mathilde de Ferrers and Mathilde of Westminster, wake to greet these memories. The good brothers shelter me here deep in their cavernous priory. When I slip like a ghost along its vaulted passageways, the gargoyles and babewyns grin down at me as if they know why I am really here. Edward of England, third of that name, son of Isabella the so-called ‘She-wolf ’ and her fox-like mate, has ordered me to be immured here. He calls it a living death. He does not want me to wander abroad like some fey creature with a stone in her head, babbling all my secrets. The Iron King, with his dagger-like eyes and that once beautiful face, his golden hair now streaked a dirty grey, desired to hear my confession. I refused. The sea will give up its dead before I share my secrets. God knows he has tried to seduce my loyalty with his tray of baubles, but I’m content to be locked away. I observe the long holy hours from Matins through Lauds to Compline song, but at least I’m with her, Isabella. She lies interred in the choir of Grey Friars church, an exquisite table tomb that contains the remains of her beautiful body, garbed for burial in its wedding dress, close to where Mortimer, the great lord of her heart, also lies buried. Mortimer the Warrior, who ended his brief span of glory dangling naked for three days at the Elms. I eventually cut his cold cadaver down and brought it here for the good brothers to sheathe in its silken shroud. When was that? Oh, so long ago — thirty years and more!