The Conqueror (18 page)

She knew little of what happened after that. She saw Raoul later, alone, and he kissed her hand, and promised her a fair end. She looked blankly at him. Perceiving her bewilderment, he said: ‘Lady, be not dismayed. You will find great joy in this union.’

There was a gentle look in his eyes that comforted her alarm. She said in a low voice: ‘Messire, I do not know why I said what I did. I am afraid.’

‘Madame, put such thoughts away from you. If you have seen the stern side of my master you shall soon see another very different mood in him. Have you no message to give me for him?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘What message have I from him?’

‘No words, lady, but this.’ Raoul opened his hand, and let her see the massive ring that lay in his palm. ‘This he bade me set upon your finger in his name, but I would not until I might see you alone, for it seemed to me you were put about, below in the hall, too hardly pressed, maybe.’ A smile lit his eyes. ‘Come; lady: it is his own.’

She let him take her hand. She saw that the lions of Normandy were wrought on the ring; as it slid over her knuckle a shiver ran through her as though she felt some lingering retention of the Duke’s power clinging to the golden circlet in the way a subtle perfume might cling to a discarded glove. She said, trembling: ‘It is too great for me, too heavy.’

Raoul laughed. ‘Madame, I will tell Duke William that he sent you a ring that fits your finger very ill.’

‘Yea, tell him that, messire,’ she said.

She did not see the envoys again. In the morning they were gone, and all that remained to tell of their visit was a man’s ring that weighed heavy on a lady’s shrinking finger.

In a very short space the bower-maidens were busy with bride-clothes. Tongues wagged over flying needles, and the Countess Adela tossed over piles of linen and sendal. As for Matilda, she felt that matters had slipped beyond her control. She sat apart, hedged by her reserve, twisting Duke William’s ring.

She had thought he could come to Brussels in person, but he sent only the customary gifts and stilted letters writ in Latin, and signed ‘
Ego Willelmus cognomine Bastardus.
’
Scrutinizing the signature she flushed, wondering whether he inscribed himself thus to taunt her. She learned later that he used no other signature, and laughed involuntarily, thinking that it was like him to cast his birth in men’s teeth so fearlessly. No other signs came from him; since he held himself coldly remote she must suppose his passion to have burned itself out. Her pride was whipped up by his attitude, and when at length the bridal party set forth for the Norman border, her litter carried a guarded lady, cool and perilous, holding herself in hand.

The Duke had sent an escort to fetch his bride to Eu, where the marriage was to take place. Peeping between the curtains of her litter, the Lady Matilda saw a blaze of mantles, a glitter of steel. Count Baldwin’s cortège was cast in the shade by the splendour of the Norman cavalcade. The Lady Matilda blinked at the lavishness of her escort, almost purred at it. Cold he might wish to appear, but Duke William was displaying magnificence to his lady as a peacock might spread his feathers to impress his mate.

At Eu a great company met them. Matilda kept her face veiled and preserved a meek demeanour, but for all she did not seem to raise her eyes overmuch there was nothing escaped her. The Castle was alive with a multitude of noble lords with their ladies; with knights and stewards, pages, valets, ushers. Matilda’s head swam; she was thankful when they led her to the apartments set aside for her.

There her own maidens, looking askance on the grand ladies appointed by the Duke to wait upon their mistress, bathed and dressed her in readiness for her first meeting with the groom. She suffered them to robe her as they chose. She looked out of the narrow windows upon a landscape grey in the dusk, and thought how bleak and grim was Normandy.

She was led down to supper by the Countess Adela, who had come to her chamber to be sure the tirewomen had done well by her daughter. The Countess conversed pleasantly with the Norman dames; her light voice sounded sinister to Matilda, sick with a leaping apprehension.

They walked along endless galleries from whose tapestried walls stitched faces looked down at Matilda. The Countess led her daughter by the hand; before and behind them went the ladies in procession, their trains rustling over the stone floor.

It seemed to Matilda that the vast banqueting hall was lit by a thousand candles. The little flames dazzled her; she could see only their yellow tongues as she passed up the hall to the dais set under the high windows, at the end. She mounted the dais; she heard her father’s voice, and then a voice deeper than his which made her start under a stab of recognition. Her hand was given into a strong hold, which for all its strength was not quite steady; her blurred sight perceived vaguely the Duke’s face as he bent to kiss her fingers. He spoke a formal phrase or two, and almost immediately let go her hand. She sat beside him at table, but it was FitzOsbern, upon her other side, who talked to her. The Duke seemed to be much occupied with Count Baldwin and his lady; when he addressed Matilda he spoke as he might speak to a stranger, yet he could not keep his eyes from her face.

Under this treatment she began to recover. Her sight cleared, she observed all that went on very intently, and was gracious to FitzOsbern, coolly self-possessed towards the Duke. She noticed that she was served off golden plate, and had rare dishes offered her. She partook of them sparingly, drank little, and soon retired with her mother and her train of attendants.

The Countess was delighted with Eu, and looked forward to the visit to Rouen, with all its promised festivities, which was to follow the marriage. She approved the Duke’s magnificence, and wished Matilda joy of a noble suitor.

Matilda lay lost in a great bed all hung about with stiff curtains, and said quietly: ‘I am well content, madame.’ She watched her mother go out, and wondered what the Duke’s coldness betokened. It was long before she slept, and then her slumber was uneasy, and she woke many times in the night, troubled by frightful dreams.

Upon the following day she did not set eyes on the Duke until she was bound to him in wedlock in the cathedral church of Notre Dame of Eu. Her father escorted her in procession between ranks of staring people who had all flocked to Eu to witness the bridal. She was dressed in a long robe encrusted with jewels, with a train of many ells, carried by her bride-maidens. When she entered the church her eyes sought and found William, awaiting her by the altar steps, attended by his half-brother of Mortain, and other lords whom she did not know. He was dressed in purple and gold, armed, with his sword at his side, and a coronet round his helmet. His mantle streamed back from his shoulders and touched the ground behind him; it was lined with gold that shimmered whenever he moved.

Odo, the young Bishop of Bayeux, performed the ceremony, assisted by the Bishops of Coutances and Lisieux. In despite of the fact that she was a widow, and no maiden, four knights held a veil over Matilda’s head.

After the marriage-vows were exchanged, and the blessing bestowed, and the wedded pair crowned with flowers, there was a banquet held at the Castle, with miming, and tumbling, and minstrels playing sweet music. A muzzled bear was led round on a chain with a monkey bestriding it; it walked on its hind-legs, and performed a shuffling dance to the sound of a tambour. Then a party of tumblers ran in, both men and women, and a minstrel sang a laudatory ode to the Duchess, accompanied by a harp and a cornicinus which set a flourish to the end of every line.

Since cock-crow the Count of Eu’s servants had been busy slinging garlands of flowers from beam to beam; fresh rushes strewed the floor, subtleties which had taken the master-cooks three days to prepare were arranged on all the tables. They were not meant to be eaten, but to be admired. Some were dyed red with alkanet; others were covered with gilt leaves beneath sprays of silver. On the high table the bridal cake stood before the Duchess, crowned in allusion to the desired issue of the marriage with the figure of a woman in childbirth. A peacock in full plumage stood in the place of honour; no one looking at the ordered feathers could suppose that under them the bird was roasted and carved ready for serving.

A boar’s head lying in a field and hedged round with roses was carried in shoulder-high to mark the beginning of the banquet; a scroll depended from its mouth, bearing a poem in praise of the pride. A Viand Royal followed it, venison in broth, and a subtlety that drew cries of appreciation from the Duke’s guests. The cooks had fashioned the emblems of Flanders and Normandy in foyle, and linked them together with a seal which bore the inscription: ‘Be all joyous at this feast, and pray for the Duke and the Duchess and all theirs.’

Pages were kept busy running to and fro with flagons of wine; men hailed the Duchess in a shout, and a hundred cups and more were raised to her. She sat on a throne beside the Duke, and smiled, and spoke mechanical words, and ever and again stole a sidelong look at the unyielding profile beside her. Once, feeling her gaze upon him, William turned his head, and looked down at her. There was a glitter in his eyes, the hint of a fierce, triumphant smile. ‘I have you now, wife,’ he said between his teeth.

She looked away, feeling the colour flood her cheeks. Had he married her with revenge in his heart? Was love dead in him? Mother of God, have pity if he looked like that!

She spurred up her fainting courage. Count Robert of Eu was speaking to her.

‘Lady,’ he said, ‘how did it happen that you were brought to consent to a marriage with my cousin when he had so brutally used you?’

On her mettle, she replied lightly: ‘Why, Count, it seemed to me that he must be a man of great courage and high daring who could venture to come and beat me in my own father’s palace, and therefore a fitting mate for me.’

‘Well said, cousin!’ he applauded.

She glanced up to find the Duke looking at her. He had heard her answer to Count Robert, and there was a look in his eyes that might have been admiration. His hand moved as though to clasp her, but was checked, and gripped the arm of his chair instead. Her spirits rose; she believed she could read him at last. With a liveliness that made her new subjects like her at once, she went on talking to the Count of Eu, and to Robert of Mortain, who sat staring at her in undisguised appreciation.

The banquet lasted many hours, and the company grew merry. At last, with laughter and with jesting, the women surrounded Matilda and bore her off to the bridal chamber.

She went smiling; the last sight she had of the hall was of many light-hearted gentlemen lifting their cups in a health to her, and of William standing by his chair, watching her under his black brows.

They undressed her, and laid aside the heavy bridal robes; they unbound the glory of her pale hair and combed it till it hung about her in a shining veil. She was put into the Duke’s bed with whisperings and fondlings. Voices were heard outside, and the tread of footsteps. The ladies clustered to the door, and threw it wide to admit the bridegroom. He was escorted by a laughing company of his friends; at the door they left him; the ladies went out; and the door was shut behind the Duke.

The voices grew fainter; the footsteps retreated in the distance. The Duke stood for a moment, staring at his bride in pent silence. There was a blazing light at the back of his eyes; his mouth was set hard, as though he curbed himself. He came across the room to the bedside. ‘So, madame wife!’ he said on a gloating note. ‘How stand your barriers now?’

Her eyes glimmered. All desire for revenge on him had left her. Smiling, she said: ‘My lord, have you taken me for love or for hatred? I would know.’

He folded his arms across his chest, shutting himself in. ‘I have taken you because I swore to have you, madame, because I do not fail. I will break you to my hand until you learn to know me for your master, by God!’

She slipped from under the ermine skins that covered her, and stood before him, slim and white against the dark bed-hangings. ‘I think you have no joy in this conquest, husband,’ she said, holding his eyes with her own. ‘My barriers are down, but can you reach my guarded heart?’

She was so close to him she thought she could almost feel the struggle that raged in him. He grasped her shoulders through the golden mesh of her hair. ‘God’s death, Mald, I have sworn you shall find no softness in me!’ he said unsteadily.

She said nothing; her smile lured his heart from his breast. He snatched her up into his arms, holding her cruelly close, kissing her eyelids and her lips till she gasped for breath. She yielded to him, her ice melted, her body aflame. Half swooning on the tide of his passion, she heard him whisper: ‘Eh, I love you! Heart of Christ, there is no more than that, my dear desire!’

Part III

(1054–1060)

THE MIGHT OF FRANCE

‘The French have braved our chivalry: let them deplore the venture.’

Speech of the Norman Herald

One

When Hubert de Harcourt saw his son enter the Castle of Beaumont-le-Roger he had a sudden impression that Raoul had grown in stature, yet when he looked more closely and saw him stand beside his tall brothers he perceived that he had been mistaken, and wondered how this could have happened.

Roger de Beaumont – he who had helped Raoul to the Duke’s service seven years before – greeted him with great kindness today, and brought him into the hall with a hand on his shoulder, so that Hubert feared Raoul would be growing puffed up in his own conceit. But just then Raoul saw his father, and he went towards him at once, and knelt to get his blessing as meekly as you please, smiling up at him with that unshadowed sweetness in his eyes which always made Hubert think he saw his dead wife live again in her son. Hubert felt a surge of tenderness rise up in him as he laid his hand on Raoul’s neat head, but he did not show this. He said something in a gruff voice about Raoul’s scarlet mantle, calling it a popinjay’s cloak, but all the same, he was pleased to think that his son wore even more splendid raiment than young Richard de Bienfaite, who had been summoned from his neighbouring lands to meet him. As Raoul rose up from his knees Hubert shot a look past him, and observed with satisfaction that he had come to Beaumont-le-Roger with as dignified an escort as befitted the Duke’s envoy.

Everyone knew why Raoul had come into the Evrecin bearing the Duke’s mandate. For weeks past the crows had been quarrelling in the tall trees round Harcourt, and even without this omen of war all Normandy had known since the siege of Arques that the French King was planning an invasion to lay Duke William low. Chapmen and vagrants out of France brought news of great preparations afoot there, and although no one could be certain how strong a force the King was mustering, everyone had heard rumours that even princes in Gascony, and Auvergne had joined him. Far from being alarmed the barons were proud to know that Normandy’s might had inspired her neighbours with such jealousy; they asked nothing better than to meet all these haut princes in battle, so that when, presently, Raoul made the Duke’s plans known to them looks of dismay were exchanged, and expressions of frank disgust.

Raoul sat at the head of the long council-table with Roger de Beaumont beside him, and the other seigneurs of the Evrecin seated in two rows below them. He gave Roger the Duke’s letter, but Roger was a poor scholar, having passed his youth in forays rather than in learning, and he suggested, to all the older men’s relief, that Raoul should read the letter aloud to them, and be done with it. So Raoul opened the packet, and showed them the Duke’s seal, at which they nodded wisely, and read slowly through from the opening address to the Duke’s ‘
ames et foyables
’
to the last greeting that ended the despatch.

Then he folded the sheets and laid them down on the table, and lifted a rueful eyebrow in Gilbert d’Aufay’s direction.

Gilbert and Edgar the Saxon stood apart from the conference because they had accompanied Raoul only for friendship’s sake, and had nothing to do in the delivering of the Duke’s message. Gilbert whispered: ‘They don’t like it, our good thick-heads. Raoul will break out laughing if you look at him, so keep your eyes
this way.’

‘Well, I may be also a thick-head,’ said Edgar, ‘but if I were Duke of Normandy the French should not set so much as a foot inside the country unless they stepped across a field of slain.’

‘Of course you are a thick-head,’ said Gilbert cheerfully. ‘The French will outnumber us three to one, so Raoul thinks.’

‘You know very well you like the scheme as ill as anyone in Normandy,’ Edgar said. ‘I heard you say so.’

Gilbert considered this for a moment. ‘That’s true enough,’ he admitted. ‘Of course, if I were ordering this campaign I should meet King Henry on the border, because I’ve never heard of winning a war in any other way than that of fighting it out hand to hand. But I do believe in William. You have never seen him in war. He has all manner of odd notions and plans, and they always seem to end just as he says they will, though everyone else thinks them folly. So even when you don’t see that he is right, it is really much safer to follow him and do as he says.’

‘I call it a craven way of fighting,’ said Edgar scornfully. ‘Who has ever heard of retreating before the enemy without so much as a blow struck?’

Gilbert was secretly so much in accord with this point of view that he made no answer, but only nudged Edgar into silence so that they could hear what was going on at the council-table.

It was Hubert who found his tongue while his over-lord remained silent. ‘But what is all this?’ he demanded. ‘The Duke cannot mean that we are to let the French come!’

‘Why, it is counsel for nithings, not for men!’ exclaimed Richard de Bienfaite. ‘Is the French King to be allowed to march into Normandy without so much as one serf to say him nay?’

Eudes, who was sitting beside his father, close to Raoul, leaned across Hubert to say with a hand shielding his mouth: ‘I’ll wager you’ve misread the orders, you young fool, for all you are held to be such a fine scholar. Let someone else see the letter!’

Hubert said: ‘Hold your peace! What do you know of the matter?’ because however badly he thought of the Duke’s orders he was not going to permit Eudes to criticize either them or Raoul.

Raising his eyes from the board, Roger de Beaumont said slowly: ‘These are strange tidings to me, I don’t deny. What do the Duke’s councillors say?’

‘At first, seigneur,’ said Raoul carefully, ‘they did not like it, but they saw presently that this war will be no Val-es-dunes, but a more serious affair, calling for greater cunning.’

‘Is it cunning to retreat?’ inquired Baldwin de Courcelles, with elaborate sarcasm.

‘You shall judge of that when the war is ended,’ answered Raoul politely.

‘Let the King come into Normandy?’ mused De Beaumont. ‘Well, this is a new way of war for old warriors to learn.’

‘It is rather lure the King into Normandy,’ corrected Raoul. ‘He comes in two divisions, the one to march under Prince Eudes, entering Normandy on the right bank of the Seine with intent to overrun Caux and the Roumois; the other, with himself at its head, to come west of the Seine and march up through the Evrecin to join Prince Eudes in Rouen. With Eudes come the men of Rheims and Soissons, of Amiens Meulan, and Brie, and all the host of Vermandois. I think Count Guy of Ponthieu will march under his banner, and perhaps Ralph de Montdidier and Renault de Clermont, the King’s favourite.’

‘What, is Ponthieu to lift up her head again?’ cried Henry de Ferrières. ‘Count Guy had best remember what befell his sire at St Aubin last year!’

Richard de Bienfaite interrupted with a question. ‘Messire Raoul, you have told over a great host of men already, and do you say that is but half the force against us?’

‘That is Prince Eudes’ division. I cannot tell what other princes will march with him, but it is certain that the Hammer of Anjou stands against us, and that the Counts of Champagne and Poictiers and the Duke of Aquitaine will fight in one or other of the French divisions. The King is to lead the men of Bourges, and Berry, and Sens, all those from the lands of the Loire, and from Perche, and Montlhéry.’

A rather shocked silence fell upon the company. After a moment or two Roger de Beaumont said: ‘If this is indeed the truth we shall need all the Duke’s cunning to withstand such a force. But how do we know all these things? Is it what chance travellers say, or has the Duke sent spies into France?’

Raoul smoothed out a crease in the despatch. ‘Well …’ He paused, and looked up with a smile. ‘To be honest, messires, I have just come back from France myself.’

Hubert sat up with a jerk. ‘You?’ he said incredulously. ‘What should you be doing in France, boy?’

‘Oh, I went to learn what I might,’ Raoul explained. ‘It was not very difficult.’

Richard de Bienfaite looked at him curiously. ‘God’s dignity, was it not?’ he said. ‘I am sure I would not have ventured. How did you go, messire?’

‘As a pedlar,’ Raoul answered. ‘But that is nothing. Only you may be certain that the King’s forces are very much as I have described, and he means to crush Normandy as you might crack a nut.’ He drew his scarlet mantle closer about him, for a chill draught swept through the hall. ‘Now, messires, you see that we dare not oppose King Henry at the Frontier with reinforcements at his back. You have heard the Duke’s will. Let the serfs drive the cattle into the woods; let all the fodder and the corn be moved out of Henry’s line of march so that he may come upon no forage for his men. The same will be done on the east of the Seine: De Gournay has it in hand. When we have the two armies trapped in our midst the Duke will strike. If we fight on the Frontier we must fight as Henry chooses, in his good time. The Duke will rather choose his own time, and his own ground.’

‘But the French will lay waste all the south of the Evrecin!’ objected De Courcelle, thinking of his own fat acres.

‘Of course they will lay it waste,’ said Raoul with a touch of impatience, ‘but if we follow your plan of meeting them on the Frontier they will ravage the whole Duchy, and we shall be no more.’

Someone midway down the table began to say: ‘All very well, but in the time of Richard Sans-Peur –’

‘I cry your pardon, messire,’ said Raoul, ‘but this is not the time of Richard Sans-Peur.’

Rebuked, the reminiscent seigneur fell silent. Roger de Beaumont said: ‘We shall obey the Duke in all his behests. We know him to be wise in war, and if De Gournay upholds him – why, that is enough for us!’

Raoul’s eyes
cautiously sought Gilbert’s, and dropped again demurely. Gilbert said in Edgar’s ear: ‘If old De Beaumont only knew what De Gournay said when he heard the orders!’

‘Also, messires, the Count of Eu, and the Lord of Longueville,’ murmured Raoul.

These names carried weight. Gilbert whispered irrepressibly: ‘Of course Walter Giffard always says what the Duke wants, but they don’t know that.’

‘At least the Count of Eu really does believe in the plan,’ Edgar pointed out. ‘He was the only one. What lies Raoul is telling!’

Raoul was speaking now of the Duke’s Council, and it seemed from what he said that even FitzOsbern, who was accounted a hot-head, was at one with the Duke over the French campaign. From the smile that lurked in Roger de Beaumont’s eyes Gilbert judged that this lord had a very good idea of the real state of affairs, but the others seemed to gain heart with Raoul’s words, and after some more discussion the plans were finally accepted, if not quite approved. It was learned that the eastern division was to be commanded by the four chief seigneurs of the district: De Gournay would lead the men of Brai and the Vexin; Giffard of Longueville and William Crespin of Bec, those of Caux; and the Count of Eu, all the men of Eu and Tallou. The Duke would command in person the western division confronting King Henry, and with him would march not only the men of Auge and Hiesmes, but all the forces of the Bessin under Tesson of Cingueliz, and the barons of the Côtentin headed by the gay Chef de Faucon. Hubert de Harcourt began to blow out his cheeks as the sum of names was told over, and the council ended presently with the company in a sanguine mood, expectant of victory.

Dinner followed the conference, and my lord’s lady came down from the bower with her daughters, and with Gisela, Gilbert de Harcourt’s dame, who was of kin to Roger de Beaumont, and had cajoled Gilbert into bringing her along with him this day. Gisela sat beside Raoul at the table. She was perhaps the only person present who did not want to talk about the coming war. While Gilbert de Harcourt argued pugnaciously with Edgar over the proper ordering of the campaign, and old Geoffrey de Bernay explained to his neighbours how Duke Richard Sans-Peur had managed his wars, she asked Raoul questions about my lord Robert, the infant heir to the Duchy. She had two sons herself, and was childing again in a few months, so that when Raoul admitted that my lord Robert had been troubled lately by coughs she was able at once to tell him of a remedy which the Duchess Matilda (being a foreigner) might not know.

‘You must pluck a sprig of mistletoe grown over a thornbush,’ she said earnestly. ‘This being soaked in the milk of a mare and given to my lord Robert to drink it, he will cough no more.’

Raoul made a polite response. Gisela began to eat of a Lombardy leach, flourished and served with a sober-sauce, but she did not eat much of it because her quick eye had observed all manner of delicate dishes on the board, and she meant to taste of as many as she was able. She glanced round her, and wondered aloud whether the Lady Adeline would instruct her in the way to make appulmoy, and whether it were well to put a dash of cubebs in a blank desire. One of the scullions had just brought in a dish of curlews. Gisela finished up what was left on her platter in a hurry. The curlews were served with chaldron, and Gisela was occupied for some time in trying to make up her mind whether this was flavoured with canelle, or powder-douce. Raoul could not help her, but she presently decided that there must be a dash of each in it, and perhaps a few grains of Paradise, as well. She became aware of Raoul’s silence suddenly, and saw him staring down at the dregs of his hippocras in the abstracted way that had always tantalized her. He seemed to be withdrawn, guarding his thoughts. Gisela looked wistfully at him, and as though he were conscious of her regard he raised his eyes and smiled at her. Gisela had married Gilbert, who was a proper man with mighty thews and the strength of a bull, but Raoul’s smile tore at her heart. Ashamed of such thoughts, she turned her face away, aware of his remoteness. It gave her a tiny heartache, but she knew that she was really very happy with Gilbert, and understood him far better than she could ever understand Raoul. She stifled a sigh, and began to talk to Eudes, who sucked his greasy fingers and grunted occasionally in response.