SirenSong (41 page)

“It is none of my business,” Raymond said quickly, hiding
his amusement at what he believed to be Alys’s innocence.

Sexual purity was not a matter of importance to him, except
in his wife, of course, and Alys’s naïve remark pleased him. In any case, he
was more concerned with the question of whether and how he could use his true
status to protect her father. This captured her attention at once, although she
was as quick as he to see that he could not go before they were ready to resist
an attack.

“If all is quiet when we are ready,” she said, after a
thorough discussion of who would be most susceptible to Mauger, “perhaps we had
best tell Papa who you are. Then you could go to London. Perhaps there you
could find out to whom Mauger has appealed. And it is not so very far.”

Raymond bit his lip. It was horrible to be torn between two
necessities. If Marlowe should be attacked after he was gone, William would
have to lead the defense, and Raymond did not think he would be strong enough.
On the other hand, if it should take Mauger a long time to reach a major
vassal’s ear, he might be able to get to the man and discredit Mauger before
any attack was started. And what of Richard of Cornwall? Could he finish his
business in Scotland in time to help?

Chapter Twenty-One

The next morning, as soon as it was light enough to see,
Mauger left for London, reasoning that, if the king was not there or at his
favorite palace in Westminster, one of the officials permanently established in
London would know where he was. He left Hurley sealed shut in the care of his
master-at-arms with orders that no one, especially not his wife, should be
allowed to enter. Mauger intended to ask Theobald of Hurley to get him a
private audience with the king.

All the way to London, Mauger tried to devise a tale that
could not be proved untrue and would make William out to be a sufficiently
dangerous man for the king to send troops with Mauger to destroy him. The loss
of Mauger’s wife would not induce Henry to act. That was merely the overt
reason for Mauger to complain. The exercise was of value, for it fixed the
“facts” into Mauger’s mind so that he could reel them off in any context, but
the ground for his success had been laid in Scotland before Henry had brought
his troops south again.

In general, the Scottish affair had been a brilliant success
in Henry’s opinion. There had been only one small unpleasantness. When it was
clear that the danger of Alexander’s attacking was over, Richard had urged his
brother to take his hired troops and clean out Wales once and for all. Henry
said loftily that it would be an affront to the Earls of Hereford and
Gloucester if he came with an army and took away the task he had given them,
seeming to set their efforts at naught.

Richard did not think so, and said it, pointing out that he
had never scorned help from anyone when he was at war. Because Richard was
tired from arguing with “unreasonable” Scots, he suggested a little sharply
that Hereford and Gloucester would be the best judges of what would affront
them. At least Henry should send a messenger to ask whether they desired his
help. But Henry was celebrating his escape from fighting a war. He did not even
wish to contemplate another. This, too, he refused to do.

Henry was right, although neither he nor Richard knew it.
What he should have said was that the Welsh would disappear into the hills and
that the Flemish mercenaries, accustomed to fighting pitched battles in flat
country, would be more nuisance than benefit. Moreover, a large army would be
difficult to supply in such rough country. Richard might have been contented
with a military reason for refusing even if he did not agree with it.

Unfortunately Henry did not know a reasonable excuse for
refusing existed. He had enjoyed his bloodless victory and was basking in the
admiration of his northern vassals. He did not wish to risk his current status
as victor in a contest with the unpredictable Welsh. This was not owing to
personal cowardice. If Henry could have settled the war with a personal battle
against David ap Llewelyn, he would have leapt at the chance. Such a thing was
out of the question, and Henry’s memories of being a war leader in Gascony and
France were bitter and full of the humiliation of defeat.

It was those memories that had induced the king to go to the
highly unnecessary expense of hiring the Flemish, which Richard had not
approved but had understood and accepted without argument. Now that the money
had been spent, however, Richard wanted to get some good out of it. Since there
had been no war in Scotland, let the hired troops go to Wales and clean it out.

Thus, when Henry refused even to consider using the men in
what Richard believed was a sensible fashion, Richard lost his Angevin temper.
There was some excuse. He was short on sleep from many late nights and had an
aching head from drinking too much good Scottish
usquebaugh
. He told
Henry he was an extravagant fool who did not know how to use the expensive tool
he had purchased. He told him he was lazy and luxurious, which had only enough
truth in it to hurt because neither fault was developed enough to be a vice. He
said a few other immoderate things also, all at the top of his lungs, before
stamping out of Henry’s presence without asking or receiving leave to go.

The next day they made it up. Richard was contrite for his
bad manners, and after talking to some of his older vassals, Henry had the
right reasons to offer for refusing to lead the army to Wales. Richard did not
agree, he would have liked to try to bring the Welsh to heel, but he conceded
that Henry might be right and begged pardon handsomely. Henry forgave his
brother and kissed him fondly.

The trouble was that Henry knew Richard’s outburst was
caused by disappointment in him rather than by any real fears of the Welsh or
the Flemish mercenaries. As a small boy, Richard had seen his big brother, the
powerful and glorious king of England, as a hero. He knew better now, at least,
his head knew better. In his heart, however, that glowing hero lived. When the
real Henry—weak, vacillating, ineffective as a leader except for his disarming
charm—appeared at the wrong moment, Richard’s childish heart overpowered his
adult head, and he flew into a rage of disappointment.

Henry did not understand enough, was not himself adult
enough, to accept his own and his brother’s weaknesses. He made the mistake of
trying to ignore them. Thus, when he saw the disappointment and hurt under
Richard’s rages, when Richard tried to mold him by force into the hero he
wanted him to be, the pain was greater than if his brother had wished to do him
harm. Henry could not salve himself by believing Richard hated him and hating
Richard in turn. He knew it was not true, and, besides, family ties were sacred
to Henry. Thus, he sought a cause for Richard to hurt him.

Although all was well on the surface, inside the king his
brother’s outburst still rankled. He was made even more uncomfortable by
receiving a letter from Hereford. The earl did not openly ask for help but
suggested that the army could be used to wage a different kind of war in Wales
than he had attempted with the limited forces at his disposal. They could,
Hereford wrote, as Henry’s father John had once done successfully, capture all
the cities and keeps. In the past that had often failed, but David did not have
the kind of control over his people that Llewelyn had had. David needed his
castles, and taking them could bring him down.

By then, however, Henry was only a few miles from London,
from the comforts and beauties of the castle at Westminster, from the arms of
his beloved Eleanor and the totally undemanding worship of his adorable baby
son. He did not want to go to Wales. There was no reason, he told himself, to
rush off to another primitive wasteland. It was ridiculous that a king should
need to attend to these minor disturbances. Henry dispatched Hubert Fitz
Matthew with three hundred knights and their attendant footmen to Hereford’s
aid and tried to put the matter out of his mind.

He did not send the mercenaries—somehow that was connected
in his mind with going himself. And he told himself that he
had
done all
that was necessary. Certainly Richard would not want him to be miserable,
therefore, someone had put the idea into Richard’s head. Henry could not see
that Richard was not oppressed, as he was, with fear of failure and was not
made miserable by going to war. Richard rather enjoyed war, Henry did not. But
he did not think of that. He only wondered who was turning his brother against
him again, and could find no answer to that question—not until a trusted clerk,
Theobald of Hurley, begged an audience for the abbey’s knight in fee, Sir
Mauger of Ilmer.

The clerk could read Henry’s irritability in his sharp
gestures and periodic inattentiveness. He had already delayed several days in
asking for the audience. At last, more to be rid of Mauger than in any
expectation that Henry would agree to see the man, Theobald made his attempt.

“Sir Mauger has been sore injured by a treacherous
neighbor,” Theobald hastened to explain, “by that same Sir William whom I once
overheard—”

“Richard’s favorite!” Henry exclaimed. The whole thing was
now fresh and clear again in his mind, although events had obliterated it for
months. Henry remembered sending Eleanor’s nephew to Sir William. Good God,
they had never heard one word from him since he left! The king remembered also
receiving a letter from Raymond’s father and replying that Raymond had been
with them briefly but had left the court without saying where he next intended
to go. The king’s face went pale with anxiety and then red with rage.
Everything was falling into place. Richard had received a letter from Sir
William, who was serving in Wales, just before he had begun to urge him to take
the army there.

“Certainly I will see Sir Mauger,” the king exclaimed. “I
will see him now, if he can be fetched to me.”

Since Theobald knew his master and was aware of Henry’s
impulsive nature, Mauger was very close. He was in the small closet where Henry
conducted private business almost as soon as the clerk was out of it. He began
to speak of his gratitude that Henry was willing to listen to his troubles, but
the king cut him off with a gesture to ask about Raymond and whether he had
come home safe from the Welsh war.

Henry had sent Raymond away with the thought of the joke
they were playing on Raymond’s mother uppermost in his mind. It had all seemed
a merry lark. They had agreed that Eleanor should not be told her nephew would
probably be engaged in a war. Eleanor was almost as silly about war as Raymond’s
mother and would not see the jest. Right now, Henry did not see the jest
himself and wondered if he had been mad. How would he ever explain to his wife
and to her sister-by-marriage if harm had come to Raymond?

His relief when he learned that the young knight was home
safe made him miss a great deal of the garbled story Mauger was telling him. He
did not realize that once he had identified Raymond as his wife’s nephew,
Mauger had hastily revised and twisted the business of the merchants and various
threats against Raymond into an elaborate plot concocted by William. Although
he was very ready to believe almost anything against his brother’s favorite,
Henry was no fool and smelled something rotten somewhere.

“But what for?” the king asked at last.

“Because once William discovered who Raymond was, he
believed he could use him—perhaps as a hostage, perhaps in some other way—to
obtain a divorce for my wife and have her lands given to him instead of my
holding them for my son to whom they belong by right.”

That made sense. Henry could not believe that any minor
knight, even Richard’s favorite, would dare harm the queen’s nephew. No, of
course not. Raymond was Richard’s wife’s nephew also. Damn! No wonder the tale
sounded idiotic, Henry thought, not knowing that Mauger had woven in all the
threats of death to cover himself in case Egbert had been successful. Henry
merely thought Mauger was a provincial fool, seeing things from his own petty
point of view. Sir William was not any physical threat to Raymond. Sir William
was trying to do to Raymond what he had already done to Richard—he was trying
to turn Raymond against his own flesh and blood! Henry ground his teeth with
rage. How could he have been such a fool as to send a young, impressionable man
into the hands of one experienced in twisting and warping people to his own
purpose?

“My lord,” Mauger quavered, terrified by Henry’s expression,
“I did not mean—”

“Be still!” the king snapped, rising and starting to pace
the small room. “Let me think.”

First of all, Raymond was in no physical danger, that was
certain. Doubtless Sir William was as tender of him as a father. Also
doubtless, Raymond would come back to London singing Sir William’s praises. He
would be no use at all in raising the incubus from Richard. Probably he and
Richard would sit together and croon praises of the detestable man. It was
useless trying to collect evidence to convince Richard that Sir William was a
snake, a venomous worm like that which had tempted Eve to sin. Such a creature
should be killed outright. There was no other way to stop him spreading his
corruption further and further.

Yet, if Richard heard his brother had any hand in… But
Richard was in Scotland, and if the thing was done quickly enough, it would be
all over by the time he returned. And here was this puling fool raving about
his wife and a thimbleful of land. What better excuse could there be? A man
whose wife is reft away has a right to avenge himself. So, if Sir Mauger led a
force—which would actually be managed by experienced mercenary captains to
avoid any mistakes—against Marlowe and killed the man who had cuckolded him,
that could not be blamed on the king. Why should a king even have heard about
such a minor disturbance?