Joanna (24 page)

“You will go if the king summons you for a war with France?” she asked quietly.

“Oh yes, most gladly. It would serve many purposes.”

“Even if it leaves England naked to whomever wishes to attack?”

Geoffrey bent his head to look down at her. “Who would be left to attack England? Philip will be busy enough. Boulogne will either be allied with us, if the men are faithful to Renaud, or under Philip’s command. No one else has any claim on England. Besides, many will not go. There will be men enough to defend this land.

The answer was logical and perfectly true, but it brought no comfort to Joanna. She had not been thinking of the danger to England. That was only an excuse to protest Geoffrey’s eager acceptance of still another war.

“If your hopes are satisfied,” she said tightly, “I am likely to be a widow before I am a wife.”

Instead of replying, Geoffrey bent his head still further and kissed her. He had meant to offer comfort and reassurance, but in a moment he was quite ready to put aside all matters of state. War and rebellion could wait a while; this was a more important matter to which he must attend. Remembering how he had sensed her indifference in the garden at Whitechurch, Joanna resolved not to respond to him. It was not, she discovered to her surprise, a thing one could decide with one’s mind. Under the tender warmth of Geoffrey’s mouth, her lips parted and grew fuller; her skin began to take on that tingling sensitivity which gave so much pleasure and was a precursor to a rush of warmth to the loins. Angrily, Joanna wrenched her head away and pulled herself free of Geoffrey’s arms.   “You do not care what I suffer or what I fear so long as you can kill men,” she spat.

The bitter, jealous words conceived in Geoffrey’s heart by Joanna’s action, died in his throat. He stared at her, his mouth open a little with surprise. Then he got slowly to his feet. “My love,” he said very gently, “you never gave me any reason to think you would suffer for my hurt or fear for my loss.”

Color mounted into Joanna’s face. “Silent suffering is the natural state of a wife, is it not?” she asked defensively.

Geoffrey struggled against a desire to smile, which he knew would be disastrous. It was far from the natural state of most wives in King John’s court. For the most part, they would have thought it a rare treat to see their husbands hung by the thumbs. But Joanna would know nothing of that. Geoffrey thought of the women she knew wellher own mother, who looked as if she would eat her husband every time she laid eyes upon him; Isobel, countess of Pembroke, who watched the breath in and out of her William’s mouth lest he utter a sigh she might miss; Ela, his own stepmother who, for all her loud complaints and constant whining, would cut out her own heart and hand it to Salisbury if he wanted it.

“Do not blame me for what is doubly not my fault,” he pleaded, when he saw her eyes still bright with anger. “I am a man, and I have been bred to war. Would you rather I sat cowering, fearing to live each day lest I be called to bear arms? Also, the wars are none of my making.”

Joanna dropped her head and did not resist when Geoffrey drew her back into his arms. It was true. She would have hated him if he were a coward. It was unreasonable, then, to blame him for taking pleasure in what he had been trained for all his life. When he lifted her face to his, she yielded, meeting his lips willingly. After a moment her arms went up around his neck and her lips parted, opening the warm haven of her mouth to his questing tongue. Geoffrey’s hands slipped down her back to her buttocks, pressed her against him, relaxed, pressed her close again. Unconsciously, Joanna’s arms tightened and relaxed in the same rhythm so that her firm, high breasts, their nipples very protuberant now, were squeezed against his chest.

Very soon it was not enough. By mutual consent their mouths came apart. Geoffrey took a step toward the bed, turning Joanna in his arm so that she would not need to walk backward. She came with him, one step and then another, and then stopped.

“If my mother and Ian remain in Ireland,” she whispered, “we cannot marry. Geoffrey”

“Does it matter so much to you, Joanna?” he pleaded softly.

She looked at him, her eyes clouded with desire. “I do not know,” she sighed. “Why could we not be married before they left? Why were we only betrothed?”

“It was to protect usto protect you,” Geoffrey assured her. “They had no other purpose than making it easier for you to repudiate me if, after we were together as we have been, you found me distasteful.”

Wide-eyed, Joanna stared at him. She was by no means as innocent as she had been before this recent sojourn at court. She knew men in the throes of passion might say anything, tell any lie, to bring about the satisfaction of their desire. In general, Geoffrey was truthful, but he was no better than any other man with other women. With her? Joanna did not trust him in this, and she was even more distrustful of her own treacherous body, in which the fading thrills of pleasure only recalled and begged for a renewal of his caresses.

For Geoffrey the word “repudiation” had brought something to mind that cooled his ardor considerably. If he took Joanna now, she would not come as a maiden to her marriage bed. There would be only clean sheets to show in the marriage ceremony on the morning after their supposed first mating. That was the purpose of the ceremony, that a groom could repudiate his bride if she were not a virgin, and the proof of that virginity was bloodstained sheets. He would know, of course; there would be no question of repudiation,   but it was not a good thing to smirch the reputation of one’s own wife. All her life that piece of slander would stain her, and Geoffrey was not sure, even with his private knowledge of her virtue, that he could endure the sly looks and ugly hints that would follow. He sighed and loosened his grip on Joanna.

Equally desirous yet fearful of renewing their love play, they stared somberly at each other until, with a tiny shiver, Joanna slid out of Geoffrey’s embrace entirely. For both there was the sense of something very sweet slipping away, and they swayed back toward each other.

“My lord, my lady,” Lady Mary said softly from the doorway, “dinner is ready to be served. Will you come?”  
p.

At first as September ended and October lay golden across the land, Joanna wondered whether Geoffrey had been right. A profound peace enwrapped England and the three countries John had conquered. In that peace a fine crop was harvested and pigs and cattle fattened on the gleanings among the stubble. Even the normal petty battles between one landowner and another seemed to have been suspended. Wherever Joanna traveled there was no sign of war, no burnt-over houses and fields, no dead men, no weeping women.

Only in the high halls of the nobility where Joanna was a guest was there the slightest hint that all was not perfect. No one grumbled aloud. No ill word was said of the king. Nonetheless, there was a sense of unease, of waiting, as if the men were perched on the edges of their chairs ready to seize a bared weapon and leap into action. Among her own people, Joanna spoke openly of the dangers Geoffrey had envisaged. And amid all that peace, to her surprise, no one laughed at her. From the older men in particular, she had sighs of relief and sage noddings of the head.

“The young lord is wiser than his years,” Sir Giles of Iford said, “and you also, my lady, in that you see his wisdom. You need not fear me. I have reason, perhaps, not to love the king, but I will be loyal to your lady mother in any path she and Lord Ian choose. More especially if the worst befalls us and men are absolved from their fealty, it will behoove us to cling together to preserve ourselves from a world run mad.”

Sir Henry of Kingsclere did not understand nor pretend to   understand. “Your mother set me in this keep to guard it for her,” he said simply. “I will obey her order and fight for the kingor against himas she or you bid me.”

Matters were not so straightforward on the great estates of Mersea. Joanna had gone there first because it was farthest away. Sir John did not laugh, but he was not convinced of the coming danger. Moreover, Mersea was powerful in herself, not so likely to be snapped up by a larger neighboring landowner and, thus, in less need of protection from the overlady. Perhaps it rankled Sir John, who was a young man, to have to bow down to a woman. Joanna did not press the point, merely asked how the merchants and fishing fleets were dealing with Philip Hurepel to remind Sir John of the warning she had sent him and that changes had already taken place. He was somewhat more thoughtful after that. He could hold his own on his lands, but he had no ear or eye at court and might be badly hurt without news from his overlady about what went on there and in the world at large.

Thus, when Joanna paid a second visit toward the end of November, Sir John made no bones about the fact he had changed his mind. He had scarcely lifted her from her mare when he drew her into an alcove in the great hall. “Have you had the news yet?” he asked, and, not waiting for her reply, “Lord Geoffrey was right. I did not think the pope would do it. He has absolved all men of their fealty to the king, all men from princes to serfs are bid to avoid John at table, in council, or in converse on pain of their own excommunication and are free of any allegiance to him.”

It was no shock to Joanna. She had already heard of the sentence passed by the pope from the merchants of Roselynde town. Nonetheless, she felt an inner hollowness and she needed to fight back tears. She wanted Geoffrey or, lacking him, her mother and Ian. But she knew she could have no support from any of them. Owain had sent a secret message to Geoffrey warning him that Lord Ian must
not
return to England. He was not specific in his reasons, but there was no doubt in Geoffrey’s mind or in Joanna’s that   the Welsh were making ready to cast the English out of Wales once again. And Geoffrey himself was frantically busy.

He had not had the largely enthusiastic response from Ian’s vassals that Joanna had had from Alinor’s. It was not that the men wished to be free of their overlord. Ian was deeply respected by his men and even loved. The trouble was that the king was so much hated that a strong conflict was aroused in them. They argued loud and long that, if Ian was absolved of his vows, he above all men should turn his back on the king. John had tried to have him killed more than once. John hated the lord and the lord’s lady. It was mad, flying in the face of providence, to cling to one who was not only a bad king but a personal enemy.

“There is no one else,” Geoffrey said wearily. “There is no one else. Would you rather have French Philip? Some man must be king or worse will befall us than John’s hate.”

“There is young Henry,” one baron answered, “young Henry with a council to guide him”

“Do not dream of it,” Geoffrey snapped, maintaining his countenance with some effort. “You know as well as I what that would mean. Instead of the exactions of one man we would have a whole flock of crows plucking at us.”

“Perhapsperhaps not. But if it is God’s will that the king not be king”

Geoffrey had been in the south with Adam when Joanna sent him word that the sentence against John had been published on the Continent. It would not be officially published in England, of course; John could prevent that. However, he could not prevent the information from leaking out unofficially. Geoffrey made one swift round of Adam’s southern keeps, then returned the boy to Leicester on his way north. He had a letter from Ian to show the vassals and he wanted the news and Ian’s letter to reach them at the same time. If the news preceded him, there was more chance that the men would commit themselves to some lord opposed to the king before he could fix their interest and loyalty.

Thus, Joanna was on her own. Her fears did not show on   her placid face, and her hands and voice were steady when she said, ‘‘Well, my lord, then you are come to a point of decision. Will you stand with us, or must I tell my mother that the son of her dear friend and most trusted vassal, your father, has chosen to desert her?”

The situation was deliberately phrased in the ugliest possible way that still carried no threat. Shock and revelation showed in the young man’s eyes.

“I never said that,” Sir John replied indignantly. “I only said I did not believe the pope would go so far. My vow to your mother is nothing to do with hers to the king.”

Since she had succeeded in making Sir John see where his thoughts were leading him and there could be no doubt that, having seen that path he had turned aside from it, Joanna put out her hands and took his. “Do not be angry with me. Forgive me that I misunderstood you. You know it is not out of great love for the king or blindness to his faults that we are determined to stand with him. Whatever offense the king has given the pope, the Holy Father is not considering us, also his children, I fear. He is ready to take away our king, but he has nothing to offer us in exchange. However much your head hurts you, it is better to keep it than to have it chopped off.”

It was well worth a few days to confirm Sir John in his decision and Joanna spent them gladly, using the opportunity to warn her vassal about the possibility that Philip would invade England. She pointed out that this time the French king might have allies from the Low Countries, who would know well how to negotiate the bogs that protected Mersea from most invasions. However, she did not prolong her visit more than necessary. Partly this was because she did not wish to seem suspicious or to be watching Sir John, but mostly it was because Joanna was frightened and longed for the security of the great walls of Roselynde keep.

It was all very well to circumvent slyly the interdict by the pope. It was also all very well to drag a simple priest off her land at her horse’s tail. Joanna was no credulous serf to be awed by the ability to read and write and chant in Latin   into the belief that a priest was any more than a man. For that matter, she knew that bishops and popes were also men, and she had no hesitation in expressing her doubts of their good sense, not to mention their infallibility. But Joanna
did
believe in God and the Devil,
did
acknowledge the active participation of the Highest Good and the Greatest Evil in the affairs of men.