“Aye, Milady,” Agnes said. “The earl returned from the crusade with King Edward.” Her words tumbled out. “All the servants are talking about it. He’s very angry about what has been happening in his forest! But then,” Agnes added, shaking her head, “he’s always been angry. The Wykeham servants and even his marshal and chief forester have been dreading his return.”
“I’ve heard that, too,” Eleanor said.
“You know, Lady Eleanor, that some whisper he was even the cause of his wife’s death, because of his anger at her betrayal,” Agnes said.
“Agnes,” Eleanor answered, “you know well that gossip can fly faster than a fire through a thatched-roof village, and I can’t believe such a terrible rumor. Hugh would be a calloused man, indeed, to murder a wife for faithlessness!”
Eleanor herself could not even imagine what it would be like to be unfaithful. Despite her extreme distaste for Edgar, the thought of bedding anyone else had never even entered her mind. She was wed, although in name only, and so she would be loyal—she couldn’t even think of being otherwise. In this Year of Our Lord, 1272, with King Edward having just ascended the throne and many at court vying for his favor and jockeying for position, loyalty was at a premium, and Eleanor never discounted it. She knew some raised their eyebrows at her trust of others, calling her naïve, but she was more careful than they thought about where she placed her trust. She’d learned a hard lesson about whom to trust or not with the revolting Edgar, she grimly remembered.
Eleanor sat up straight and took a deep breath. She unsealed the letter with its florid W seal and read the jagged scrawl. His handwriting even looked angry, she thought.
Lady Eleanor:
Upon my return from the Holy Land, I have discovered that criminals and brigands have been poaching my game in my chase and breaking the Law of the Forest, established by the King. Your forest borders mine and I have good reason to believe the thieves are being given safe harbor in your chase. I am losing good income because of your neglect. I demand you apprehend and arrest them immediately, or I will hunt them down myself on your land. Look to Osbert de Fraunceys, your chief forester, for the cause of these poaching crimes. To him, I shall show no mercy.
I remind you that there is no excuse for not accepting responsibility for the good stewardship of the forest you hold in the name of William, Earl of Litchfield, your liege lord. I am quite sure William will not be pleased to hear of your poor management.
I will meet with you Tuesday next to take into custody those you have arrested, and I expect to deal with Osbert myself.
Hugh, Earl of Wykeham
The nerve! Eleanor thought. How could he? This Hugh of Wykeham’s letter was hardly the way to begin an acquaintance with one’s neighbor! Even though Wykeham Castle was a day’s ride away, their forests bounded one another, and good relations were important. This letter was like a slap in the face—and a challenge—a challenge she most certainly did not welcome.
She creased the letter in half and frowned. He wrote of William of Litchfield. What would this Hugh say to William about her? Since Edgar’s death, Eleanor now owed allegiance to William and he had control of her future, and she definitely had to stay in his good graces. Eleanor winced.
In fact, she had just received a letter from William a fortnight ago, saying that he would be coming to survey his lands at Strathcombe, and he would expect to stay for three days’ time. William had often visited Strathcombe, both when Edgar was alive and since his death on the Crusade two years ago, and she had always thought William a wily man, one without honor. Her father had thought the same, and had often told her to beware of him.
His visit, which should begin Wednesday next, would prove to be difficult, as usual. It would be even worse if this Hugh told him that Eleanor was incapable of managing the Strathcombe forest any longer. She could lose her chase entirely. Eleanor ran her thumbnail across the fold of the letter, creasing it into a knifelike edge. She had enough trouble with William as it was.
“What is it?” Agnes asked, wringing her hands and peering at Eleanor as if to try and read her thoughts.
“Lord Hugh thinks that the poachers are my sole responsibility and that Osbert is somehow involved,” Eleanor said, hotly. “He writes to me as if I were some sort of child!”
“He treats all with disdain,” Agnes said. “He trusts no one, not even his own household.”
Eleanor thought back. Her late husband had spoken of Hugh but rarely. There had apparently been bad blood between them. “A pompous swine’s head,” Edgar had pronounced him, when she and Edgar had first ridden together out into their portion of the forest and gazed through the trees across at Hugh’s chase bordering theirs.
Eleanor tightened her mouth. In truth, she had thought of Edgar himself as a pompous swine’s head, and, when word had come to her of his death at sea on the way to join Prince Edward for the Crusade, she had done the required mourning for what had been a loveless marriage, filled with unhappiness, and had felt an immense relief. He had not even died in combat, Eleanor snorted to herself, but had fallen overboard in a drunken stupor. Someone might have even given him a little push, Eleanor thought, seeing that he was most certainly not the most
