They had really committed one fault for which Isabella could not forgive them; they had caused her allowance to be curtailed, and no one ever offended her without paying dearly for it.
She had ceased to be lovable to the king, and so had lost her hold on him; but for this also she blamed the Despencers. Then she was deprived, by their advice, of her French servants and of all her possessions in England. She and her husband quarrelled to such an extent that at last they refused to see each other at all.
But Isabella was not meek enough to stand ill-treatment, so she complained to her brother, King Charles, who had succeeded to the throne of France. He wrote a very indignant letter to Edward, declaring his intention of seizing all the provinces of the French crown held by England. But Edward was not prepared for war, and neither he nor his ministers dared to go to France to face the angry brother of Isabella.
[[A.D. 1325.]] In this dilemma the queen volunteered her services as peace-maker, providing she might be allowed to go to Paris herself. Edward was only too happy to have the matter so easily settled, and the Despencers were delighted at the thought of getting rid of her. Isabella had a little plan of her own which she { 198}intended to carry out. The first step was a treaty of peace, which she arranged on her arrival in France, between her brother and the King of England. She was not at all surprised when the Despencers, who feared her influence over the weak mind of Edward, had dissuaded him from crossing the channel with her, even after his arrangements had been made. In fact, this was exactly what she had desired, because it enabled her to propose that her son, the Prince of Wales, should be invested with certain powers which she named, and sent in his father's stead. Both the king and the Despencers fell into the snare, and Isabella got the heir to the throne of England into her own hands.
As soon as Isabella found herself safe in France with her son, she laughed in her sleeve at the way she had hoodwinked her husband and his despised favorites. She was just where she wanted to be, and had no intention of returning to England until affairs there had changed to her complete satisfaction. She and her brother, King Charles, had concocted a treaty, it is true, but it was so written as to be almost incomprehensible, and to leave much matter for dispute between the two sovereigns.