Joanna (59 page)

She choked the rest of it off. Even in the midst of her grief it was impossible to mention to her second husband what she had endured in the loss of her first man. Ian knew, of course. He had loved Simon himself enough to give that name to his own firstborn son. Still, it was not a thing to be said aloud between them. Alinor dashed the tears from her face.

“What a stupid thing to say. I must bear it, so I can. Come, beloved, sit down.” She pressed him into a chair and brought him a goblet of wine. “Why cannot his body be found?” she whispered. “Others have been named as dead, even many of the lesser men, have they not? How could he be overlooked? Oh, Ian, is there no hope?”

He could not let her cling to hope and transmit that hope   to Joanna. That would mean months, perhaps even years of agonywaiting, fearing, begging and praying for news that could never come. Tears oozed out under his closed lids.

“They did not look for him at once,” he said, very softly, his voice breaking. “Salisbury did not regain his senses until late in the night and even after that he was wandering in his wits for most of the next day. After the battle, after Philip’s men had withdrawn with their own dead and woundedAlinor, believe me, just believe me. There is no hope. Do not make me say more.”

He did not need to say more. Indeed, he had to leap to his feet to catch his wife whose eyes had rolled up in her head at the unbearable idea he had conveyed to her. Alinor knew of the scavengers who crept out onto a battlefield to rob the deadand to kill those who clung to a thread of life so that they could also be robbed. Geoffrey had not been found because his armor and sword were rich. The carrion pickers had doubtless stripped him naked. Perhaps his face had even been battered in so that it was unrecognizable.

Alinor did not actually faint. Ian carried her to the bed and made her sip some of the wine she had brought to him. Then he sat down beside her and took her hand in his. They did not speak. There was nothing to say. One thing Ian had not told his wife, one little thing, that made his agony more intense because it would not allow his hope to die. Geoffrey’s shield had not been found either. It puzzled him. Even if the shield had been torn away to make it easy to strip the body, it should have been there, close to the naked corpse. The vultures who scavenged battlefields were often embittered enough to mutilate the bodies, but they had no use for shields. Mail and weapons could be sold or even melted down for their metal, but a shield was too large and heavy to make the small amount of metal on it worth the effort of carrying it away. Many poor despoiled corpses were identified by the shields left beside them.

It was not a thing he would mention to Alinor. If that little, wounding, stinging hope, which would not allow him to grieve in peace and accept his grief, ever should bring on a   fever of joy, Alinor would not blame him for keeping his secret. Joy heals all. Dinner hour passed, but neither of them moved. Hunger did not touch them. Slowly, the long evening of late August darkened into twilight.

Just before full dark, the latch on the door made a little sound. Ian’s head snapped around; he got to his feet with his hand on his sword hilt. The form that crept fearfully in at the door was no threat, at least no physical threat.

“Lady Alinor?”

“I am here,” Alinor replied. “Who is it?”

“Lady Elizabeth.”

Alinor sat up. Lady Elizabeth was one of the queen’s attendant women. She had been a minor heiress, and John had given her in marriage to his stupid, gross bastard son, partly because it was a cheap way to provide for the boy and partly because he wanted to enjoy the girl himself. The virtual loss of her property and the total loss of her virtue had in no way embittered Lady Elizabeth, who took the king between her legs as merrily as she took any other man who offered. She was not particularly attractive, except for her unfailing good nature and, according to repute, her equally unfailing lust and inventiveness in sex play. It was said, laughingly, that she even serviced her husband with perfect good humor, although she was not quite sure which one he was.

Lady Elizabeth’s morality was her own affair, and Alinor had nothing against her. She was no cause for jealousy. Elizabeth might cast longing glances at Ian, but certainly she was no temptation to him. Alinor had very little contact with her. Because she had no regular duties about the queen, Alinor came only when she was specifically summoned, on those occasions when Isabella felt in the mood for Alinor’s wit and tales of traveling in strange lands.

“I am very sorry,” Alinor said unsteadily, “I cannot go to the queen now. IPlease tell her I am ill.”

There could be no other reason for Lady Elizabeth to seek her out, Alinor thought, but the young woman shook her head. Alinor could barely make out the gesture.   “I do not come from the queenoh, yes, I do, but I mean I do not come to summon you to her. II must speak to you, Lady Alinor.”

The voice was trembling. Could Lady Elizabeth have lost someone also? From what was said about her she could not differentiate one man from another, but what was said in Isabella’s court was not always true. Alinor got off the bed and fumbled on the table for flint and tinder.

“Of course,” she said. Perhaps the little whore had a heart; perhaps she only thought she had a heart. In any case, at this moment Alinor could not have been unkind to the devil himself if he were grieving. “Let me light the candles. Do not be alarmed. Ian is here, but he will go if”

“NoOh, I do not know. I have something to tell you, but I think it is very dangerousveryoh. I know you will not betray me Lady Alinor, butbut Lord Ian”

“To whom is this dangerous, Lady Elizabeth?” Ian asked softly.

“To me. Oh, dear, I should hold my tongue. I know I should. It cannot matter now, and yetwhat if it did? He was so kind, you see. He neverAnd he was so respectful of me, even after”

“I assure you if the danger is to you I will not betray you,” Ian said. If he could have laughed at anything, he would have laughed at this silly little hen, thinking she was important enough for him to tell tales of her.

“Oh, I know you would not do so on purpose, but you will be so angry, you see, and you will show itbecause gentlemen are not very goodmost gentlemenat hiding such things, and then she will want to know how you found out. She is
very
stupid, far stupider than I, but I was the only one there because she had sent the maids away. She thought I would be glad of it. She thought I was angry because he stoppedBut I understood that. It was only in fun. We never cared for each otheronly
liking
. And I showed him thingswhat to touch and how”

“Forgive me, Lady Elizabeth,” Alinor said gently, “but   you have begun in the middle. We do not know who ‘he’ is or who ‘she’ is. Will you not sit down? If you think Ian should not stay, he will not.”

“But Lord Ian must know. He is the one who will have toThat is, if”

This might go on all night, Ian thought. He glanced at Alinor and saw that, although she was still dreadfully pale, the worst of this spate of grief was over. It might recur, probably it would, but not for a little while, not while Lady Elizabeth held her attention. “I will go,” Ian said firmly, walking toward the door. “If there is something I must do, Lady Elizabeth, my wife will tell me. That way I can truthfully say you told me nothing and all will be well.”

It was the best thing he could have done. Clear of the distraction of Ian’s too-handsome person, for it was that as much as fear that had been unsettling Lady Elizabeth, she came to the point.

“It is about Lord Geoffrey,” she whispered.

“Geoffrey?” Alinor quavered, her eyes filling.

“I am sure it is too late, butbut if there is any chance II want him to have it.”

The tears did not fall. They seemed to be sucked back to their source as Alinor’s every sense came alert. Plainly, Lady Elizabeth knew of Geoffrey’s death, yet she hinted that, had he been alive, there was some danger to him fromwell, it could only be from the queen. Alinor urged her visitor into a chair and sat down close beside her. She wondered briefly whether this was some device of the king’s, but no one had ever accused Lady Elizabeth of anything beyond an overgreat willingness to couple. Her good intentions and good nature were proverbial.

As if she had seen Alinor’s doubts, the young woman said, “Please understand, Geoffrey and I
liked
each other. To me he waswhat?a child to be taught and leda star pupil? I took him to my bed because,” she lifted her head defiantly, “you may laugh at me if you like, but it was because he was sweet and good and I did not wish him to be embittered. The ladies of the court all made up to him and   then asked for favors from Salisbury. I wanted him to know that a woman can be with a man for pure pleasureasking nothing but the exchange of joy.”

“That is a good thing to teach a young man,” Alinor murmured. “Perhaps my daughter has much for which to thank you.” There was a silence as both women realized that now Geoffrey no longer was at all.

“Is it true that his body has not been found?” Lady Elizabeth asked.

Alinor sobbed, choked it back. “Yes, it is true.”

“Then I must speak,” Lady Elizabeth sighed. “I know it is very likely he is dead, but if there is the smallest chanceYou see, he was the only one whowho remembered. I taught others also, butbut after they found aa better partner”

“I am sure they could not find a better,” Alinor said impulsively. “No one could be kinder.”

Lady Elizabeth cast Alinor a grateful glance but was not deflected from what she had been saying. “The others did not think me good enough to spit on when I had no more to offer. Geoffrey was different. He was never ashamed to talk to me, no, nor ‘too busy’ to come to me when I wanted him, even when he had another mistressuntil he married. Then he came no more, but I understood that. We were
friends
you see. He still” She broke off again.

“He was of very sweet and tender heart,” Alinor sighed, tiredly wiping away tears, “always kind.”

“I did not come to increase your grief or to ease my own heart by talking of him,” Lady Elizabeth said apologetically. “I am Isabella’s lady, and I really like her. She is stupid, many say, but I suppose so am I. We suit each other, and usually she is very good to me. You know this. That is why I spoke of Geoffrey and me. I wanted you to understand why I seemed to be betraying the queen. To speak the truth, I do not know why she has this hatred for Geoffrey. She is a
good
woman. I have never known her to hate anyone before.”

Because she is so selfish she cannot be bothered to feel   much about anyone, Alinor thought, but she said nothing. If Lady Elizabeth was happy with her mistress and had seen no deeper into Isabella’s nature after all the years she had served her, there was no need to try to change her mind or teach her better.

Lady Elizabeth drew a deep breath, as if bracing herself, and said, “The queen told me that it was very fortunate Geoffrey was killed and his body lost at Bouvines because that saved her a great sum of money. When the news of Salisbury’s capture came, she secretly sent a’message back to Philip with the herald offering double Geoffrey’s ransom for his
dead
body if he had been taken prisoner.

“What?” Alinor gasped, frozen into her seat.

“Isabella said she wished to make the same offer for Salisbury’s corpse, but that the king would never help her to pay
that
bribeso I must assume that John knows of what she has done andand approves it. You can look for no help from the king.”

The paralyzing horror that had gripped Alinor when she heard what the queen had done receded slowly. The blaze of hope that sprang up in its place also receded, but it did not disappear completely. If so great a sum to be paid for Geoffrey’s corpse had not been claimed, it could not be for lack of searching. Probably that only increased the possibility that Geoffrey’s stripped body had been cast into a common grave at Bouvines, but perhaps there was some chance

“Thank you, Lady Elizabeth, thank you,” Alinor stammered.

The young woman shrugged. “I do not suppose it matters. He must have died on the field and been lost among the other bodies. Nonetheless, if he is lying sore hurt in some serf’s hut or by some miracle is somewhere in France or Flanders still alive, I thought that his friends should know the threat that still hangs over him. I will go now. Above all, I do not wish to be discovered here.”

At the door Alinor thanked her again, but when she had closed it she wondered whether the thanks were merited. Hope warred with desolation in her, making it impossible   even to sit still. Above and beyond her own unease was the problem of what to say to Joanna. Dared she even offer a hint of the hope that tormented her? Such a hope would be ten times worse for Joanna. Then her pacing stopped short. What an idiot I am, Alinor thought, wondering what to tell Joanna. I must tell her. She must be prepared to pay. First, however, we must counter the queen’s offer. Ian must somehow get a message into France that Geoffrey’s wife will pay three times, five times, ten times his ransom to have him returned safe and well.

Lady Alinor need not have feared the effect of her letter upon her daughter. Joanna was already aware of everything Alinor wrote except for Isabella’s offer. That added a trifle to her cup of bitterness, but not much. Anyone who would murder a helpless prisoner out of greed would be just as willing to keep him alive when a greater bribe was offered, and Joanna was aware that the news of the greater bribe was already abroad in France.

Joanna had been apprised of her husband’s almost certain death at nearly the same time her mother’s messenger had taken ship for England. King Philip of France was not, generally speaking, a cruel man. He could be immoderately vengeful when he believed himself to have been slighted or injured, but he was not baselessly vicious. Thus, he was not unkind to Salisbury, whom he knew well from John’s sojourns in the French court in the past. When the distraught father pleaded with tears for news of his son, Philip had commanded that an earnest search be made for Geoffrey. He had even permitted Salisbury to write to his bereaved daughter-by-marriage the sad news that Geoffrey had not been taken prisoner and must be presumed dead, although his body could not be found. Perhaps if Philip had not been so sure the young man was already dead, he would have prevented the circulation of Isabella’s double ransom offer, but under the circumstances he did not see why he should not oblige John’s wife. He might want a small favor from her some day.