I Serve (40 page)

When the lady had finished speaking, she took the orange cloth that was in the box and bound it about Sir Potenhale’s arm. And ever after, though he was a knight of lowly parentage, he wore the wreck of the Oriflamme about his arm as proudly as if it were the symbol of the Garter Knights, and as reverently as if it were the grave clothes of Our Savior Jesus Christ.

Jeanne de Vergy would have kept him longer. She entreated him to stay till the new year. But Sir Potenhale had performed his duty to the dead and must be back to render duty to his living prince. He tarried for the night in the wayside inn, and on the morrow departed again for Calais.

*****

“
Ho there, it’s Potenhale!” said Lord Brocas waving jovially from an upper window at the weary traveler entering the streets of Calais. Sir Bernard’s merry, chestnut curls framed his face, and his face glowed warmly in the December air.

“
Well met, Brocas,” said Potenhale with a smile. “I did not think to find you in France, but in England with the prince. Have all his highness’s friends left him alone at Christmastide?”

“
Nay, it’s the other way around,” said Brocas. “He would have left me alone at Christmas—but I followed him here to Calais, like a faithful hound despite all his kicks and curses.”

“
What brings the prince to Calais?” asked Potenhale, dismounting and handing off his horse to a servant.

“
You’ve not heard the news?” asked Brocas. He smiled gleefully like a young boy who has all the sweetmeats to himself. “Come up, come up, and I shall tell you all.”

Potenhale entered the house, which he recognized as belonging to Sir Walter Manny, and removed his travel garb before searching out Brocas. He had been riding in the cold, wintry air all day, and he entreated Brocas to let him get warm before he filled up his ears with nonsense.

“
You’ll wish you’d listened sooner when you hear what ‘tis,” said Brocas knowingly, “for the news concerns you as well as his highness.”

“
Well then, tell away,” said Potenhale with a grumble. “What is it that I must hear?”

“
Why, it is namely this,” said Lord Brocas. “The king’s captain-general in France has died and gone to heaven—at least that’s what his well-wishers say. I’m inclined to think that he’s gone to a far smokier place.”

“
The king’s captain-general,” repeated Potenhale. “But that is none other than Sir Thomas Holland!”

“
Exactly,” said Brocas smacking his lips like an old woman who has just sucked the marrow from a bone. “Sir Thomas Holland is no more.”

“
How?”

“
Taken on his sickbed—as could happen to any man, even to one of such a robust constitution as Sir Thomas.”

“
And his wife?”

“
She remains in Gascony still with her children but will soon emigrate, no doubt, to the more congenial shores of our own land.”

“
The prince?” asked Sir Potenhale, hardly able to catch his breath.

“
Like a madman,” said Lord Brocas shaking his head. “First, he locks himself in his room; then he takes ship for Calais swearing he will find you and go on to see the lady in Bordeaux. And now, once he’s in Calais, he locks himself in his room again and swears he will leave you here and take ship once more back to England.”

“
So he has not seen her?”

“
Nay! He says he will not go!” Lord Brocas clenched his fist in exasperation. “And yet, how many years has he waited for this hour? If he persists in this folly, I shall take harsh measures with him.”

“
What can you do? You know him as I do. His highness cannot be cajoled.”

“
But he can be coerced.”

“
By you?” Sir Potenhale looked incredulous.

“
Nay, by his honor,” said Lord Brocas. He smiled slyly. “Wait and watch, Sir Potenhale, and you will see my wonders.”

When the prince heard that Potenhale had come, he made no move to leave his room. The newly arrived knight brought him his supper and sat down to table with him there. They talked in a desultory fashion till the meal was over. Then began Sir Potenhale, “Lord Brocas says….”

“
I’ll not hear him,” said the prince wearily. “It passes all understanding how that man’s tongue can prattle so long.”

Sir Potenhale was silent for a moment. “So we are for England, then?”

“
Aye, we leave on the morrow,” said the prince in a tone that brooked no discussion.

But, as events turned out, their voyage on the morrow was destined for a province far south of English shores. Sir Potenhale awoke from his sleep just in time to hear Brocas’s encounter with the prince in the courtyard.

“
Highness,” said Brocas. The prince would have turned away, but Brocas shouted—“Grant me at least an audience for friendship’s sake.”

“
Very well,” said the prince shortly. “For friendship’s sake.”

“
Do you remember that time at Poitiers when I doubted your leadership?”

“
Aye,” said the prince. “You would have fled the field had I not brought you to your senses.”

“
And do you remember that you swore to me that day that if you brought us alive out of that battlefield you would grant me any boon that I should ask.”

“
Aye.”

“
As God is my witness,” said Brocas, “I have never asked you anything from that day till this, and still I have a boon promised me.”

“
You speak truly,” said the prince suspiciously. “What would you ask of me?”

“
Highness,” said Brocas, cocking his head to one side. “I have grown up beside you as a boy and fought beside you as a man. We begin to grow old together, and still there are none to come after us. I have already seen thirty summers come and go, and methinks it is time that I get myself a wife.”

“
You?” asked the prince. “A wife?”

“
Aye,” said Brocas, “I have been thinking to do as much for a long time now, and I have settled at last upon the lady. But she is a great lady, and I know not whether she will accept my offer.”

“
I wish you well of it. How does this matter involve me?”

Lord Brocas looked him full in the eye. “I would have you broker a marriage between myself and the lady Joan of Kent.”

Silence fell across the courtyard, awful and mysterious like the silence of a sacred grove. Men have been struck dead for intruding into such a silence such as this, and Sir Potenhale knew better than to enter the courtyard.

“
You know not what you ask,” the prince replied hoarsely.

“
I know very well,” said Brocas. “I ask that you go to Bordeaux and plead my case with the lady there. Your cousinly persuasion will doubtless soothe any qualms the lady might have, and by Eastertide I shall be your cousin by marriage, sweet prince.”

The prince stared at Brocas. “So,” he said at last, “this is the boon you are asking of me?”

“
Aye,” said Brocas.

“
So be it,” said the prince. “You shall have your boon, my dear friend. Send a messenger to the harbor to tell the shipmaster we have changed directions. We are no longer for Dover, but for Bordeaux.”

*****

The journey to Bordeaux was pleasant so far as winter sailing may be. The prince went at once to greet his old friend the Captal de Buch. Sir Potenhale, who had been dispatched to inquire about the widow of the late captain-general, found that she had removed to the abbey at
l’Eglise de Sainte Croix
. The good monks had taken in both her and her four children until she could make arrangements to return the household to England.

The prince had made his arrival incognito, but he did not want to approach Joan unannounced. He remained behind at the residence of the Captal de Buch and sent Potenhale ahead to proclaim his presence to his cousin.

The knight found his way to the abbey with no difficulty. “Is the lady Joan here?” he asked the watchman who sat at the cloister gate.

The watchman looked Sir Potenhale up and down, disapprovingly it seemed. “Aye, she’s here,” he said, “but she is in mourning and will take no visitors.”

“
I am sure that my message will be of interest to her.”

“
No visitors,” said the watchman, pursing his lips in disgust.

“
Well then, is there a lady named Margery in her company?” the knight asked.

“
Aye,” said he in a surly tone.”

“
And is she in mourning too?”

“
Nay.”

“
Then I adjure you, my good man, tell the second lady that Sir John Potenhale is without and desires speech with her.”

The watchman grunted and left to do the knight’s bidding, but before he left, he warned him against crossing the threshold in his absence. “An’ you fear God, you’ll not set foot inside this gate!”

The knight, though sorely tempted, followed these instructions. He waited a goodly amount of time before any answer came, but when it came, it was in the form of the lady herself.

“
Sir Potenhale!” said the lady in a voice of earnest pleasure. “It has been long since I laid eyes upon you.”

Sir Potenhale smiled at her from outside the gate. “Your watchman would barely let me send word to you, and it seems I must stand outside if I wish to hold any conversation with you.”

Margery laughed and stepped forward lightly to lift the latch upon the gate. “In sooth, he is a well-meaning soul,” she explained as Sir Potenhale walked forward into the open grounds of the cloister. “No sooner had Sir Thomas been in the grave a week than a dozen suitors began buzzing around my lady like flies to honey—every swain is fain to court the loveliest lady in England. She’s had much ado to send them packing. It is out of consideration for her that the watchman has proved your foe.”

“
He’d have been wiser to fend me off more forcibly,” said Sir Potenhale mysteriously, “for I fear I’m pack and parcel with the rest who have been beating down your door.”

“
Why, what do you mean?” asked Margery, and a blush caught her ears and spread down to her ivory cheeks. “I know you too well, sir, to think that you come as a suitor yourself.”

“
You know me far less than you think,” replied Sir Potenhale. “But I shall press my suit when it suits me, and at present it does not. My errand now is as the herald of a suitor, or rather the herald of a herald.”

Margery looked at him in bewilderment. “Explain yourself, sir.”

“
The prince my master has arrived in Bordeaux and would call upon his cousin tomorrow.”

“
The prince!” said Margery eagerly. “Is he the suitor of whom you speak?”

Sir Potenhale hesitated. “A suitor of sorts,” said he.

“
He will be welcome,” she said, and ran off hurriedly to inform the widowed lady of Kent.

The prince was no laggard. He arrived on the heels of his messenger’s departure. The gatekeeper, who had been warned of his coming, admitted him with suitable courtesy.

The south of France is mild even in the winter, and the prince found his cousin sitting outdoors in the garden adjoining the cloister. Lady Joan’s golden hair was obscured by a mourning veil, but the cheerful blue of her dress and the glistening gold of her embroidery belied the magnitude of her bereavement. She rose to meet the prince and curtsied.

“
Welcome, cousin,” said she. “You are kind to visit.” Her face was older—her cheekbones had lost the roundness of youth and her eyes the naivety of earlier years—but, nonetheless, it was beautiful still. The prince stood silent a moment with his eyes upon her.

She bade him sit and they talked of Christmas, of the treaty, of Calais, and of her children. Neither spoke of the reason behind her veil of mourning, and the prince was glad of that—it is difficult to offer condolences for an event one has so long desired. When all these subjects had been exhausted, they came at last to the reason for his coming.

“
Cousin,” said the prince, “as much as I delight in your conversation, I must bid you attend to mine a little, for I have somewhat to say to you.” The Lady Joan fell silent and looked on him with shining eyes. The prince wavered a little with a trepidation that he had never felt since his first campaign. “The words are not my own,” he said. “I come as an emissary to plead a case for another.”

“
Who dares to make a diplomat out of a prince?” said Joan with lifted eyebrows.

“
A friend may dare all things,” said the prince, “and Lord Brocas is one such friend. He is the suppliant, and I come before you at his behest. If you hold me dear, sweet cousin, you will not deny his asking.”

“
I cannot deny a request that I have not heard,” replied Joan, “but neither can I grant it. Say on, dear cousin. What would the good Brocas have?”

“
He would have you,” said the prince shortly, “to wife.”

Lady Joan breathed in sharply. “Ah,” said she. “And for this purpose you are come to beg?”

“
Aye.”

She stood up suddenly and walked a few paces away. Then turning back to him, she smiled disarmingly. “Why, cousin, what folly is this! I must speak plainly, I see. I have made a vow that I shall not marry again, but shall live chaste, even as the good monks here in this cloister. I regret but that Lord Brocas must be disappointed.”