The Conqueror (7 page)

Absurd words thrummed in Raoul’s brain: ‘Redder yet, God wot! Redder yet!’ The shifting mass of riders passed like phantoms before his eyes. Sometimes one phantom would come close, and he struck it mechanically. Once he saw Guy of Burgundy’s face in the thinning press; it was livid, and the eyes glared, but it vanished, and new faces swam before his vision, always changing, as faces change in uneasy dreams. Now and then the shrill scream of a wounded horse rose high above the uproar; sometimes one voice rang out in a rallying call.

The men of Cingueliz, holding off until the first jarring charge was over, had spurred forward at a well chosen moment, and fallen upon the rebels’ flank. They were mingled with the Duke’s troops now, and ever and again that ferocious yell of ‘Turie!’ sounded above the cries of ‘Dex Aie!’ and the deep ‘Montjoie!’ that came from the French lines.

Ranulf, the Viscount of Bessin, was the first to leave the field. As the heap of slain that littered the field grew, and the ducal troops pressed on, mowing down the rebels, he lost heart. William’s dark face seemed to trouble his over-wrought mind. He fought on doggedly, but when Hardrez, his beloved vassal, fell before the Duke, terror seemed to possess him. With a dreadful cry he cast his shield and lance from him, and rode away like a madman, bending low on his horse’s neck, urging him faster, and faster still across the reeking plain.

Beside Raoul, withdrawn from the now desultory fighting, the Duke laughed suddenly. Raoul started: the sound of the Duke’s laugh seemed to recall him to himself. He drew a shuddering sigh; the red glare went out of his eyes; he looked with a touch of horror at the man who could laugh in the middle of such carnage.

The Duke was pointing with his wet sword towards the flying figure of Ranulf. ‘God on the Cross! – like a goose with neck outstretched!’ he said. He glanced at Raoul, amusement gleaming in his eyes.

Reaction all at once came to Raoul; he began to laugh in helpless gusts. He pulled himself together as the Duke’s horse moved forward, and rode after, biting his lip. He found that he was shaking like a man in the grip of an ague. For the first time, now that he had done with fighting, he became aware of the smell of blood, and was seized by a fit of retching.

Guy of Burgundy followed Ranulf next, riding with the remnant of his men, and trying as he went to twist his scarf round his blood-boltered arm.

Néel de Saint-Sauveur alone of the rebel chiefs fought on with a kind of grim desperation. Hamon-aux-Dents lay dead on the field, spread-eagled where he had fallen. He it was who had killed his second horse under the King, but even as Henry sprang clear Hamon went down before the lance of a Norman knight.

‘Splendour of God, I have a place about me for such a man as that!’ the Duke cried, watching with kindling eyes the invincible figure that fought on under the azure gonfanon.

The Méance was already swollen with the corpses that drifted down its current. Man after man, casting spear and shield away, took to the river, some to struggle to the further bank, others to drown miserably in the tainted water. The Viscount of Côtentin was forced at last to own himself beaten. He drew off, rallying his men round his standard, and rode from the field, orderly even in retreat.

Some Norman and French chevaliers would have followed to cut him down. The Duke rose in his stirrups. ‘No!’ he thundered. ‘By the living God, I charge you let that man go!’

God be thanked there are to be some still left alive! thought Raoul, trying not to look at the body that lay at his feet. It drew his gaze irresistibly. Once it had been a man, with a face for laughter or for tears. It had no face now: only a battered horror that had been crushed and torn by the hooves that had plunged over it.

The Duke saw Raoul staring, and glanced down to see what held his gaze. His brows twitched together, and that was all the sign he gave either of repulsion or of pity. ‘Come!’ he said briefly, over his shoulder, and rode on to meet the King.

Henry was flushed and breathless. ‘By my faith, you are cool, cousin!’ he exclaimed as the Duke saluted him. ‘Nobly done, Normandy. Yours is no virgin sword this hour!’

The Duke wiped it on a corner of his torn mantle. ‘Nay, I have blooded it,’ he said.

Henry took off his helmet, and passed his hand over his hot face. ‘I have work for you, Normandy!’ he said.

‘I am your grace’s vassal,’ William replied formally.

‘We will speak of this when we have rested,’ the King promised. ‘Sacred Face, my belly is parched!’

‘By your leave, sire, I have no time now for resting,’ said the Duke.

The King stared at him. ‘Holy God, have you not had enough?’

‘I have a fox to smoke out of his earth,’ William said. ‘Guy of Burgundy has surely fled to his hold at Briosne. I like to finish my work, sire.’ He smiled at Count Robert of Eu, who had ridden up. ‘Do you follow me, Robert?’

‘Yea, to hell’s mouth,’ the Count said gaily. ‘Let us at all costs cut the Burgundian off from his supplies. It is well begun, but must be better ended.’ He beckoned Hubert de Harcourt forward. ‘Cousin, here is one who holds for you a prisoner you will be glad to shackle.’

Hubert uncovered his head, and showed a red sweating face and bloodshot eyes
.
‘Lord Duke, it is the contreytour Grimbauld,’ he said. Raoul grinned to hear the note of respect in his bluff voice.

‘Ha! Is it so indeed?’ William cried. ‘Let Hugh de Gournay carry him in chains to Rouen.’ He nodded at Hubert, and said jovially: ‘Your family serves me well. Be sure mine is no short memory.’ He turned again to the King, and raised his hand to his helmet. ‘Give me leave, sire. When I have finished my work, call on me for your need. I shall not be slow in answering. Raoul, follow me!’ He wheeled about, and rode back to the body of his army.

Hubert stared after him, blowing out his cheeks; then with a ‘Haro!’ and a slap on his destrier’s steaming neck, he cantered after William, saying with a deep chuckle: ‘Ha, God! We are away again! Then haro, haro! follow this Fighting Duke!’

The Count of Eu, riding beside him, laughed, and said: ‘Is that your mind, old war-dog?’

‘By God, it is!’ said Hubert.

The King of France was left stroking his beard. ‘You are hot, you are hot,’ he muttered. ‘Yea, but your brain is cold, by the Face! I see my way. Be sure I shall call upon you, Normandy; be very sure of it.’ He became aware of Saint-Pol, blinking at him. ‘What, are you there, Count? How do you say? Shall I pit Normandy against Anjou?’ He laughed soundlessly.

Saint-Pol turned it over in his slow mind. ‘That is to breed enmity between them,’ he said. ‘Geoffrey Martel is a vengeful man.’

‘Yea, why not?’ the King said sharply. ‘Let the Norman wolf aid me against the Angevin fox. I perceive there is a cold devil in that man. Let the fox harry the wolf after. Thus the wolf grows not too great.’ He saw that Saint-Pol was plainly at a loss, and twitched the Count’s mantle. ‘Look you, Count, I want no puissant wolf upon my Frontier,’ he said.

Five

They smoked the Burgundian fox out of his earth at length, but the affair was not so quickly settled as might have been hoped. The donjon at Briosne was no hill fortress, but it was none the less a safe hold for that. A square squat hall, it stood upon an island in midstream, and kept watch over the Risle. The Duke came, frowned, bit his whiplash with his strong white teeth, and gave out certain brisk orders. In a little space the besieged looked from the loop-holes at two wooden castles, one to the east, the other to the west. The Duke had sat down on either bank to starve his cousin into submission.

It was said that Guy of Burgundy let a great laugh, and counted himself saved already. The donjon could hold against a blockade until the winter; he may be pardoned for supposing that William’s patience would wear out sooner. But he mistook his man. The Fighting Duke knew when to act in fiery haste and when to hold his impetuous temper in on a tight rein. If Guy counted upon fresh disturbances in Normandy to lure William from his post he was disappointed. Néel de Saint-Sauveur had retired into Brittany, and was pronounced a wolf’s head, and his estates confiscated; Ranulf of Bayeux had fled no man knew whither; the Lord of Thorigny was dead at Val-es-dunes; and Grimbauld du Plessis rotting in a dungeon at Rouen, soon to die also, in his fetters. For the rest, Normandy wanted time to catch her breath. She began to know her Duke, and lay low for a while, licking her sores.

It is believed it was the Duke’s relentless patience that prayed upon Guy’s nerves. He began very early to be in a fret, and was often seen to chew his nails right down to the quick. He was prepared for assault, confident he could withstand it; but his volatile temperament writhed under the torment of slow waiting. There were anxious hearts at Briosne these days, and men stared over the river at the ducal camps, and each day courage ebbed, and hope died a lingering death. When winter crept on, and bones pressed through covering skins, despair stalked through the dark castle, and men crouched apart in corners, hugging their cloaks round them against the bitter cold. No one spoke any longer of the raising of the siege. Only his friends besought Guy on their knees to render up the keys of the castle. Guy screamed at them in a wild fury that they wished him dead.

‘Nay, lord, nay; but here we die like rats in a hole.’

Guy huddled on his bed, gripping his mantle round him with twitching fingers. ‘
Gayter la mort
,
gayter la mort!
’
he muttered. His eyes, fever-bright, peered at the men about him. He gave a cracked silly laugh. ‘Eh, do you mock me, skeletons all?’ He was taken by a fit of shivering. ‘Skeletons from Val-es-dunes!’ he said, panting. ‘I know you, by God’s death! What, do you fleer at me? Dead men! dead men!’ He hid his face, and broke into hard sobbing.

They succoured him as they could. He lay still on his bed, staring up at the rafters, heeding none, but raving to himself in a monotonous, dreadful voice that stretched the nerves of those who heard him to snapping point.

Snow covered the ground and thin ice floated on the river when the end came. They brought the keys of Briosne to the Duke on the end of a lance, abasing themselves before him. He said only: ‘Let Guy of Burgundy come before me.’

Guy came, carrying a saddle on his back in token of submission. He walked with difficulty, staggering under a load too heavy for his wasted limbs to support. At the Duke’s feet Galet brayed, and said: ‘Turn your ass out to grass, brother: it is a galled beast.’

He was kicked sprawling. ‘Hold your peace, fool!’ the Duke said with a rasp in his voice. He strode up to Guy who knelt, awaiting judgment, and lifted the saddle from his shoulders, and heaved it away with a crash. ‘Stand up, cousin, and hear what I have to say to you!’ he commanded, and set his hand under Guy’s elbow, and raised him.

Guy’s followers crept up to kiss the Duke’s hand when he had done speaking; the sentence was one of mercy: pardon for the lesser men; no more than confiscation of his lands for Guy, who was declared to be no longer a vassal of Normandy, but bidden, in a gentler voice, consider himself still the guest of his cousin.

Guy found it hard to speak; he moved his lips soundlessly; a tear rolled sluggishly down his cheek. The Duke summoned up FitzOsbern with a jerk of his head. ‘Take him away,’ he said. ‘Let him be housed with all honour.’ He clapped Guy lightly on the shoulder. ‘Go, cousin,’ he said. ‘You have nothing to fear from me, I promise you.’

Later, when opportunity served, Raoul kissed his hand, kneeling.

William looked down at him with a smile lifting the corners of his mouth. ‘How now, Raoul?’

‘Beau sire, I have seen your strength, and your justice, but now I see your mercy.’

William pulled his hand away. ‘Pish! Am I a cat to worry a dead mouse?’ he said disdainfully.

Guy of Burgundy stayed till spring in the Court at Rouen, but it was plain he wished himself otherwhere. When the last snow melted on the hungry fields he craved leave to depart out of Normandy, and this being granted went away to his own land, a disappointed man.

With the spring came the promised call from King Henry. King Henry sent to summon his vassal to aid him in a war against Geoffrey Martel, Count of Anjou.

His need was urgent. A man labouring always under the conceit that his deserts were greater than his holdings, Martel had already caused some disturbance amongst his neighbours. The Counts of Chartres and Champagne could bear witness to this, and did so, with a great deal of noise. Maine, Normandy’s neighbour, lay under his heel, for he was guardian to the young Count Hugh and exercised his right to the full. Having vanquished and imprisoned for a space the noble Counts of Chartres and Champagne, he took it into his head he might become greater yet, and set about the matter very drastically. In the spring of the year he renounced his homage to King Henry, and followed up this gesture of defiance by marching into Guienne and Poictiers. After several engagements he seized the persons of both Counts, and held them prisoners until such time as they should be forced to agree to his demands. These were extortionate, but there was no hope for the Counts but in surrender. It was thought a significant thing when the Count of Poitou died four days after his release. Guienne survived: maybe he drank from another cup. Martel asserted claims to Poictiers and married – by force, some said – a relative of the dead count. Thus matters stood when King Henry sent for the Wolf of Normandy.

At the head of his chivalry Duke William marched over the Frontier into France. Once more men who lived for little else put on their harness, and swore by the Mass that if that was the Duke’s temper he was a ruler after their own hearts.

What King Henry made of it he kept carefully to himself, but it was surely now that he conceived his undying jealousy of his young vassal. If he had called on William only to fight under his direction he was soon to find who was the real leader of the expedition. It was Willam’s word that carried the day; it was he who laid an unerring finger on weak places in the King’s plans, and did not hesitate to condemn schemes that seemed a waste of time to his soldierly mind. King Henry might hide his chagrin under a silken smile; the French barons might glower their jealousy: William was left unmoved. They came to hate him, those proud Frenchmen, for his quick brain that outstripped theirs; for his clear foresight; for his reckless daring in the field, which cast the bravest of them in the shade; and most of all for the uncomfortable personality he had. All through his life men were to fear him and find it hard to meet the direct stare he bent upon them. Thus early the French were made aware of the ruthless strength of his will. The truth was he never swerved from his purpose, and would go to any lengths to achieve it. Own him master and he would be your good friend; oppose him and there could be only one outcome.

‘Jesu, he is stark!’ Roger de Beaumont said. ‘What shall come of it? I fear him, I promise you. Yea, I fear greatly. He is like no other man I have known. When is he weary? When does he ail? Bones of God, when will he fail of his purpose? Never, I believe! Eh, but he is hard!’

But they were proud of him, the men who fought under his gonfanon. Prowess in arms was the surest road to a Norman heart, and feats beyond their imaginings William showed them. His men boasted of him, and told how he was first through the breach at Meulan, slaying with his own hand no less than three stout warriors in his impetuous rush; how he lost his bodyguard in a wild chase through dim forests, and how they found him after frenzied search, accompanied by four knights, and driving a score of prisoners before him. His fame spread. King Henry suggested with gentle concern that he risked his life too often. He spoke to deaf ears. A demon of recklessness possessed this Fighting Duke.

When the war was ended, and Martel had slunk snarling back to his kennel in Anjou, King Henry hid his jealousy beneath a smiling front, and very warmly thanked Normandy for his aid, speaking fair words, and embracing him right cousinly. Maybe he guessed that Martel was already planning vengeance on the stripling who had done so grievously by him, and so was able to smile with a good grace. They parted with expressions of friendship; the Frenchman went home to nurse his spite; and the Norman marched back to his Duchy to find it exultant over his victorious return and very ready to live at peace with him.

His fame had spread over Western Europe. From Guienne and Gascony, even from kings in far Spain came gifts of splendid destriers, and messages that were panegyrics on his skill and his courage. In one short trial of arms the Bastard of Normandy was become the hero of Europe.

For a space peace reigned in Normandy, but Martel was not the man to let injuries go unavenged. Suddenly, without declaration of war, he struck a shrewd blow at Normandy’s pride. Marching up through Maine he seized the castle of Domfront, built by Duke Richard the Good, invested it, and swept on over the Frontier to the Norman border town of Alençon on the Sarthe. The town made no resistance, the Castle very little. Martel left a garrison there, laid waste the surrounding country, and returned home in triumph, carrying his plunder.

This time Duke William asked no aid of France. Leaving Alençon to the east of him he did what no one had expected, and appeared before Domfront a full week before they had thought to see him there. Such swift methods shocked the garrison: they contrived to send word to their Count, and looked down uneasily from their craggy height at the Duke’s preparations for a siege.

There was no taking Domfront by assault. High on its rocky hill it stood, scowling over the valley of the Mayenne, impregnable and massive. The garrison took heart of grace, and talked of the day that should see Martel advancing to their relief.

Meanwhile the Duke established a blockade, and occupied his time between riding out to intercept supplies trying to reach the castle, and hunting in the forests near by. It was upon one of these expeditions that he was cut off by a party that had made a sortie from the castle for that purpose.

‘Treachery, by God!’ FitzOsbern cried.

‘Very like,’ said William. ‘We will try our strength against these bold chevaliers.’

Roger de Montgoméri blurted out: ‘Beau sire, they outnumber us five to one.’

A challenging look was directed at him. ‘Ha, do you fear them?’ asked the Duke. ‘Who follows me?’

‘If you must go, beau sire, be sure we all follow you,’ growled De Gournay. ‘But, before God, it is madness!’

‘If we do not scatter this rabble, trust me never!’ said William, and led them over the wooded ground at the gallop.

Scatter the troop they did. They fell upon the Angevins almost before they were aware, and fought with such fury that the troop broke before their onslaught, and was chased back to the very foot of the castle hill.

‘Was it madness, Hugh?’ the Duke said, with a twinkle.

‘Beau sire, I am very sure that a devil rides you,’ De Gournay answered frankly.

‘I am very sure,’ murmured Raoul, ‘that the Count of Anjou thinks so, and fears it. Still he comes not!’

But the reason for Martel’s delay was otherwise explained. At dusk one evening word was brought to the Duke’s camp of a troop seen approaching at the gallop, led by one who waved an azure and argent gonfanon.

The Duke’s eyes narrowed. ‘Néel de Saint-Sauveur,’ he said. ‘Well.’ He looked at FitzOsbern. ‘I shall see now whether I was mistaken in my man. If he comes in peace bring him in to me, William.’

FitzOsbern went out, agog with curiosity. The Duke looked at Raoul. ‘I want this man,’ he said. ‘Now we shall see if I can win him to me or no.’

There came the long winding of a horn, the trample of hooves, and presently the sound of voices, and of footsteps.

The tent-flap was swung back; the Viscount of Côtentin came in briskly with a swirl of his blue mantle, and dropped on his knee before the Duke, looking straight into his eyes.

For a moment the Duke returned the gaze, saying nothing. Then he spoke: ‘What now, Chef de Faucon?’

‘Seigneur, I bring you two hundred horse out of Penthièvre,’ Néel answered. ‘I come from Anjou, hot-foot.’

‘What made you there, Néel the Rebel?’

‘Ill work for Martel, seigneur,’ Néel said, with the flash of a smile.

‘So!’ said the Duke. There was a gleam at the back of his eyes; the corners of his mouth began to lift.

‘Seigneur, a year back I did you grievous wrong. I have sought to repay.’