The Passionate Enemies (11 page)

‘My eyes, my precious eyes,' muttered Luke. ‘I will never never part with them until the day I die.'

The Earl sought to comfort him but what comfort was there for a man who must for ever after grope his way through darkness?

They led him to the scaffold. The people of Rouen had gathered to watch the agonies of this man whose quarrel with the King had become notorious.

Luke de Barré, tall, handsome, his hands bound behind his back, his eyes wild and staring as though they were trying to miss no tiny detail of any scene before their light was put out.

On the scaffold was the brazier; there were the red-hot irons.

‘Oh, God, help me,' prayed Luke de Barré. ‘Thou knowest I cannot live without mine eyes.'

He spoke in loud tones to the men who guarded him. ‘Tell the King,' he said, ‘that I shall never forget him, and he will never forget me.'

Then with a sudden cry he ran from his guards. They followed him but not with any concern for his hands were bound behind his back and escape was impossible for him. There were many in that crowd come to witness the agony of the King's enemy who felt sorry for the poet. Some of the women would have sheltered him could they have done so, for even now that he was no longer young there was about him undeniable charm.

‘Hold him,' cried the guard, but no one moved. Then Luke de Barré faced the crowd and said: ‘I cannot say farewell, my eyes, for thee and I must never part.'

Then running fast forward he lowered his head and thrust it against the stone wall.

There was a groan from the crowd as the blood streamed from his head and again and again he threw his head against the wall.

He lay on the ground. The guards bent over him.

Luke de Barré was dying but there were a few moments of consciousness left to him.

He was heard to murmur: ‘He could not take my eyes from me. I see . . . I see while life remains, I see.' And then: ‘He shall never forget me . . . never while he lives.'

And so died Luke de Barré before the King's order could be carried out.

When the news was brought to the King he was greatly disturbed.

Henry dismissed depressing thoughts. He had brought the trouble in Normandy to a temporary standstill. There still remained Fulk of Anjou, quiet at the moment because the time
was not ripe for attack but smarting from the news that the Pope had given judgement against the marriage of Clito and his daughter.

Henry knew that if he left Normandy the rebels would immediately return. Clito was still free. Anjou was biding his time. So what could he do but stay here?

The news from England was not of the best. The war with Normandy had proved even more costly than Henry had calculated. There had to be taxes which the English loathed.

The crime of debasing the coinage had increased. Often a pound was so reduced by clipping that it was worth only half its value in gold. Henry drew up laws of even greater severity to be used against offenders. Mutilation was the greatest deterrent. No one wanted to lose a hand, a foot, a nose, his ears, or most of all his eyes for the sake of money.

But he was wise enough to know that these measures were unpopular and although the English realized that he had brought a law and order to the land which they had not enjoyed under his brother Rufus, there was a limit to what they would endure.

Life was turning sour for him and it had all begun with the loss of the White Ship. There he was back at the old theme. Adelicia was barren. He was never going to get a child – let alone a son – from her.

Sometimes in the quiet of the night a great depression descended upon him. God had forsaken him . . . not in all matters. He gave him victory; He gave him wealth; and these were important to him; but He denied him comfort; He would not give him a son and his sins weighed heavily on him.

He had started to think of the old days before he had become King, when he was a penniless Prince, the youngest son of the great Conqueror who had had nothing to leave him but five thousand pounds of silver while his brothers Robert and Rufus had Normandy and England. ‘But,' prophesied his father, ‘have patience and you shall excel your brothers in wealth and power.'

And that had come to pass. Yet here he was a melancholy man. He had lived fifty-six years and for twenty-four years he had been King of England. His father would not have been displeased with his endeavours. There was a similarity
between them although Henry's lechery was quite alien to the Conqueror's austerity. Henry's father had been a cold man, a faithful husband, who spent so much time at war that there had been little time for love.

Perhaps, thought the King, when a man reaches my age, melancholy is often his companion.

He thought of Adelicia in England. A pleasant, meek creature who had always tried to please him. He remembered how she had interested herself in the animals in his Zoo when she, poor child, was afraid of half of them. She was determined to please him and do all that was required of her which was admirable in a wife. Also, there was one thing she could not do for that was not within her power. And that was all I wanted of her, he thought angrily.

He was finding it hard to sleep at night. He would go to bed exhausted and find even so that sleep would not come.

When it did it would be light, uneasy sleep.

One night he awoke startled because he thought someone stood by his bed. He sat up sweating. He saw a face there . . . a laughing face with eyes that glittered oddly.

‘Ah, Henry, but you remember me. I have sworn that never, never shall you forget me.'

‘Luke,' he said. ‘Is it you, Luke?'

He stared out of bed, but there was no one there.

He went back to bed uneasy. Was Luke de Barré going to haunt him for the rest of his life?

THERE WAS ANOTHER
who was tormented by remorse. This was the Emperor Henry V. Matilda, who was the recipient of his nocturnal monologues, daily expected that he was going mad.

She often wondered what would happen then. Would they put him away? And what of her? She was without children so
she would not be the mother of the new Emperor; she would be of no importance without her husband. If he went mad then she would have no standing at all.

Popular she had been with the people for they were unaware of her arrogant nature as she had always taken care to appear gracious in public. Looking at the senile old man she often thought how unfairly life had treated her. Had her father known that her brother William was to die and he be unable to get legitimate sons he would never have sent her so far away. Would he have married her to Stephen? They were cousins. Bah! Who cared for that? She laughed when she heard that the Pope had refused the Clito permission to marry Anjou's daughter on grounds of consanguinity. There was one law for the powerful and another for the less powerful in such matters.

And now Adelicia was barren and if Matilda became a widow her father would recall her to England, and who then should he appoint as his successor but his own daughter! A woman! She laughed. Let her go to England, let her show the people the stuff of which she was made and they would realize that a woman could be as great a ruler as any man.

But because of this senile old fool she must remain in Germany, a prisoner if ever there was one. It could not go on.

It was by night that his growing obsession became more apparent. Then he would ramble on about his sins, and how he had betrayed his father. It was a common failing. So many rulers lived ruthlessly during their youth, trampling underfoot all those who stood in their way and then when old age began to overtake them repentance set in. They became worried about the life hereafter and wondered how best they could placate God for their sins and win a place in heaven. To achieve their ambition on Earth they went forth with fire and sword; to reach it on High they went with bare feet and hair shirt on pilgrimages of repentance.

Matilda at twenty-four years of age could laugh at them. She was not yet of an age to fear death or seek repentance.

Her great-grandfather, Robert the Magnificent, after usurping the throne from his brother, and some said murdering him, had become a saint by going on a pilgrimage to the Holy
Land and dying there. It was simple. Do what you liked in your youth. Pillage, burn, snatch the crown from your brother's or your father's head. All was well as long as you repented in due course, suffered a few scourgings, irritated your skin with the hair shirt and walked barefoot to the shrine of Jerusalem. The only catch was that you must do it in time. And if you were a warrior it might well be that death came too swiftly and suddenly to give you that time. Then, presumably, you were doomed.

Her grandfather – that man whom she had never known because he had died before her birth but who was a legend in the family, the greatest of them all, not excluding Duke Rollo the founder of the Normans or her father Henry I who was known as the Lion of Justice – was one who had never made a pilgrimage to save his soul. He had been too great, too sure of the righteousness of his causes; he had not taken the diadem from father or brother; he had merely snatched it from Harold Godwin of England who many said had no more right to it than he had. She admired her grandfather. She dreamed that one day she would be a Queen as great as any King and the people would say her name in the same breath as that of her father, the Lion of Justice, and her grandfather, William the Conqueror.

In the meantime she was married to this stupid old man and while this was the case she was a prisoner condemned each night to listen to his ravings. She had acquired the habit of murmuring sympathetically when she had not heard a word.

It was always the same! An account of the tricks he had played on his father; he and his brother Conrad had risen against their own flesh and blood. ‘What greater crime is there, Matilda, tell me, than that of the son who takes up arms against the man who sired him?'

She would answer vaguely: ‘It was a great sin, but many have done the same.'

‘I feel the burden of my sins heavy upon me. What can I do to gain repentance, Matilda, what can I do?'

She would sigh and murmur something. ‘Don't distress yourself so. You will be ill.' And all the time she would be wondering what was happening in her father's Court and
whether perhaps after all Adelicia was pregnant.

‘I can know no peace . . .' the droning voice went on.

Nor I, she thought, while you are here to plague me.

‘There must be a way. There must be a way.'

How much longer can he live?

He looked frail and his eyes were so wild. Surely his ministers must notice it. They did. They looked at each other significantly.

‘Try to sleep,' she whispered soothingly.

‘There is no sleep . . . no peace. Heavily my sins weigh upon me.'

She would pretend to be asleep but he went on muttering.

If he were dead would my father send for me? she wondered. If he did not I should ask him to.

How strange it would be to go home. Her father would have changed. So much had happened since she had gone. Her mother had died; then her brother; and the King had a new wife. Adelicia, meek barren Adelicia. Remain barren, dear stepmother. It is very important to me that you should.

His mutterings had stopped. Thank God, he was sleeping at last.

She too slept and dreamed that her father had sent for her and once more she saw the green fields of England.

Her cousin Stephen was waiting to hold her horse as she dismounted; he caught her and held her fast as she did so.

She awoke startled. There was a lighted candle in the room. She did not speak but lay quietly watching. On the wall was a long shadow of an ancient man like an evil spirit. Henry? she thought.

He was standing by the bed breathing heavily; his head was bare and he had put on a shapeless garment such as pilgrims wore.

He picked up a staff and she saw him clearly as he walked to the door. His feet were bare.

Where was he going?

At the door he blew out the candle and set it down. She heard the door open quietly and she was alone.

He cannot have a mistress, she thought, and laughed at the notion. He had gone completely mad, she was sure of it. He
was walking about the palace in his shapeless garment, his feet bare. Someone would see him, they would bring him back; they would talk to her very discreetly. ‘The Emperor is mad,' they would imply.

And they would put him away and there would be a new Emperor and she would be of no importance because she had no son.

She lay still, thinking.

Could it be that he often made these nocturnal wanderings? Perhaps some of his servants knew it and they kept it from her. He must be imagining that he was a pilgrim. Walking round his palace deluding himself that he was in the Holy Land!

There could be no doubt that he was mad.

She lay awaiting his return. He did not come and at last she slept.

When she awoke he had still not returned.

His ministers told her the Emperor was dead. He had been taken ill in the night. Death, all knew, had been creeping gradually upon him.

She thought of the poor old man rising from his bed and walking barefooted from the room.

‘Where is he?' she asked.

They took her to a small room. It was dark, for very little light came through the slits of windows and there were no candles. There was a bed on which lay what appeared to be a body covered over with a cloth.

‘It is indeed the Emperor?' she asked.

They told her that it was. He had died in the night. They had been expecting it. The funeral should take place without delay. There were secrets in their eyes and their looks were furtive, but she did not ask for explanations. She did not wish to know.

The Emperor was buried with accustomed pomp and she arranged for a monument to be erected to him in Spires Cathedral.

She asked to be left alone to mourn.

It pleased her to play the stricken widow. She shut herself in her apartments asking herself what would happen next. She
knew and she rejoiced in it. What she had thought of as her days of bondage were over.