The Passionate Enemies (16 page)

‘Madness?'

‘You know full well the Emperor was mad. His usurpation of his father's crown preyed on his mind. He could talk of nothing else. All through the night he would ramble. You cannot know what I suffered with him. He was mad, I tell you. I knew. His ministers knew it. All those close to him knew it. And I verily believe that he either left the palace to become a pilgrim or was spirited away by those who realized that they could not leave the Imperial crown in the hands of a madman.'

The King was staring at her in horror. ‘This cannot be true.'

‘You know full well that it could be true.'

‘Why did you not demand to know the truth?'

‘Because I did not want to. I had endured that insane old man long enough. I wanted to come home to my true inheritance.'

‘If he has been buried he can be deemed dead, and there's an end to it.'

‘And if I married? If I had children and if my first husband were alive what would these children be but bastards?'

‘God's death,' said the King.

‘I tell you this,' went on Matilda, ‘that if I were sent to a thirteen-year-old boy I might well refuse him because, since I know not whether my husband be dead or alive, I am in no position to become a wife to another and bear children who would be the heirs to England.'

‘So you refuse to marry Geoffrey of Anjou?'

‘I have told you my reasons. You will admit they are good ones.'

‘Nay,' thundered the King. ‘I do not call them good ones. You are a widow. Know that.'

‘How can I be when . . .'

‘Because I say so.'

A scornful smile curved Matilda's mouth but the sight of her father's cold fury made her suppress it. She was ruthless but no more so than he was. He had married her into Germany when she was a child; he had brought her back because he wished to make her his heir; and now he was determined on her marriage to Anjou. She knew that if she defied him she would do so at her peril. He had not the same love for her as he had for Robert of Gloucester. She was his legitimate daughter but his love children were closer to him. Her strength was in her legitimacy, not her father's love. Stephen could take the crown, for he was near enough in the succession and the people would prefer a man to rule them rather than a woman.

She must be careful or it might be that she, like the poor Emperor, might be spirited away.

She was playing a very dangerous game.

So she was silent and lowered her head so that her father might not see the speculation in her eyes.

‘You have much to learn,' he said, and the coldness of his tone showed her the calculating depth of his anger. He would stop at nothing, she knew. ‘I am the King. There are many years left to me – a fact which may disturb you.'

‘Nay, nay,' she cried and tried to simulate real emotion.

He went on: ‘I
will
be obeyed. You will have heard what happens to those who disobey me.'

‘I know that you are just and never hesitate to punish the unlawful.'

‘No matter who they be,' he added. ‘Understand this, my subjects obey me unquestioningly. You may be my daughter but you are also my subject.'

‘I know that, Father.'

‘Rather think of me as your King. What you have told me is disturbing. But I know full well that the marriage I have chosen for you and which will bring much good to your country is distasteful to you. I believe it may be that you have invented this wild story because you do not wish to marry the man I have chosen for you.'

‘That is not so, Father. The story is a true one.'

‘That I shall discover. In the meantime you will do as I say. You will mention this to no one and to make sure that you do not, you will not mingle with the Court.'

‘You are sending me away?'

He was thoughtful for a moment. ‘I cannot do that. But you are going to need nursing and I shall ask the Queen to care for you in her apartments; and there you will stay with her until I give you permission to emerge.'

‘Please, Father, I promise that I will not say a word of this . . .'

‘There is one thing you must quickly learn, Matilda. Methinks your years in a foreign court have made you forget that I am the master here. Wait here until I return.'

He left her. She sat down on the faldestol; she was trembling. What had she done? She was going to be a prisoner here, perhaps. The Queen's prisoner! But perhaps at least she had saved herself from marriage with that odious boy. She was sure he was odious. Thirteen years old. The thought was revolting. To go away from England to Anjou, to leave everything she had come home for . . . power . . . and Stephen!

But had she done the right thing?

The King returned and the Queen was with him. Poor silly Adelicia, thought Matilda, she looked alarmed. And well she might be with such a husband.

‘I have told the Queen that I wish you to have a rest. She will look after you in her apartments. Adelicia, my dear, take care of my daughter. See that she is undisturbed. I want her to be kept from everyone. You will be her constant companion. Then I am sure in due course she will recover her health.'

Adelicia was smiling shyly; and Matilda had no recourse but to go with the Queen to her apartments since the King accompanied them and made it clear in a quietly sinister way that she was his prisoner.

Matilda sat at the window and looked out on the courtyard. They were celebrating Christmas at Windsor but she was not down in the great hall. She must stay up here with only the Queen for company.

In the great hall they would be thinking of her, if they dared not talk of her. They would be careful not to arouse the
King's displeasure. What were they thinking? His only daughter just returned from Germany; all the powerful men of the kingdom had been commanded to swear allegiance to her; and now she was shut away from the Christmas festivities although she was in the castle.

It must be a great mystery.

Stephen would be down there with his wife, that other Matilda. Was he thinking of her? But of course he was. Suppose he had been a bold lover caring only for his lady's weal, like those of whom the minstrels sang, would he not have risked all to come to her?

But Stephen was not of that kind. She would have despised him if he had been. Had he attempted to come near her he would have incurred the King's displeasure with who knew what dire consequences. She, whose ambition was to wear a crown, could understand and respect a like desire in Stephen. Oh, the pity of it that they had not married them when they were young. She would have been the Queen and he her consort. Always she would have made him aware of who was the ruler. But what a wonderful life they would have had together!

Dreams! she thought contemptuously. All dreams.

And so she must pass her days with Adelicia and the best thing she could say of her was that she was kind.

There Adelicia would sit over her needlework – Matilda was not interested in such feminine accomplishments – while Matilda paced up and down, or sat looking out of the windows, or talked endlessly of the wrong which had been done to her.

Adelicia always tried to soothe her and to tell her that everything the King did was for his daughter's good. How that made Matilda want to scream. Everything the King did was for his own good, she replied, to which Adelicia made the comment, which was perhaps not unwise, that what was good for the King was good for his daughter, for she would one day rule the country after him.

Adelicia talked of the Emperor for whom she had some affection, she said, because he had helped her father to recover Lower Lorraine.

‘He was good to my father,' said Adelicia.

‘Remember this,' retorted Matilda cynically. ‘Sovereigns are never good to others. They are only good to themselves. You may depend upon it that it suited the Emperor to help your father and it was for this reason that he did so.'

Adelicia shook her head and said she believed there was a great deal of kindness in the world.

Such a companion for me! thought Matilda. Oh, why did not Stephen come to see her?

Everything had gone wrong. A horrible premonition came to her that she might never become Queen of England.

What if her father discovered that the Emperor was not dead? What had they done with him? Imprisoned him somewhere? Supposed he lived for years and years until she was too old to bear children?

What if she never came to the throne after all? Who would? Stephen? She laughed at the thought. She would never allow that. Robert of Gloucester? That was what the King would like but even he knew that the people would never accept his bastard. But her grandfather the Conqueror had been a bastard, and before he became known as the Conqueror he had been called ‘the Bastard', often slightingly. His father, Robert the Magnificent, had forced his vassals to accept him as their Duke. And what had been the result? Wars throughout his life. And those wars had ravaged Normandy ever since.

It was a horrifying thought.

It must never come to pass.

It was more than eight weeks since she had been placed in Adelicia's apartments. Spring had come; she watched the buds on the trees from her window and heard the mating songs of the birds.

Her father came to the apartment. He sat down and looked at her gravely.

‘I'll swear you have had enough of these walls,' he said.

‘I am sick unto death of them.'

He smiled. ‘And in a mood to be wise mayhap.'

‘I would prefer anything I believe to staying here.'

‘I am glad to hear it, for you are going to leave these rooms.'

‘I am to be received back at Court?'

‘I cannot keep my daughter shut away indefinitely.'

‘People must think it strange,' she agreed.

‘Well, you are recently a widow and in mourning. They will believe that for a time you wished to be alone. But now that period is over and it is time for you to emerge. There will be a grand celebration at Whitsuntide to mark the occasion of your betrothal.'

She caught her breath and waited. He paused for a few moments before adding: ‘To Geoffrey of Anjou.'

He waited for the storm of protest, but it did not come. She knew that it was useless to protest.

He watched her for a few seconds, guessing her thoughts, then he nodded with approval. At least she had learned one lesson.

‘So this boy agrees to take me,' she said.

‘His father insists that he does.'

‘Poor child, he has no more say in the matter than his bride.'

‘It is the way with royal marriages. You will have the satisfaction of knowing that you have saved many lives which would otherwise have been lost in the battles for Normandy.'

‘I and this boy must pay the price I daresay.'

‘Oh, it will be amusing enough. You can school him. You will, do what you will with him.'

She shrugged her shoulders. It was useless to do anything but accept. And in truth she was so weary of being shut away that she welcomed any diversion.

So once again there was a gathering in the great hall and there she was solemnly betrothed to Geoffrey of Anjou. Her eyes flashing, her head held high, she took her oaths and there was a burning resentment in her heart.

If her father but knew how she hated him he would be alarmed. He must die, she thought, before I can come back, and I hope that day will not be long delayed. To wish a father dead, that was surely a wicked thing; but not when that father first bartered her to a man forty years her senior, because he needed an alliance with Germany, and now having served that sentence, here she was, being handed to a boy ten years younger than herself. It would be understood that she
had little love for such a sire. He wanted only the advantage she could bring him and was ready to sacrifice her to attain it; she too wished only for the advantage he could bring her and only his death could give her what she wanted.

So she was betrothed to Geoffrey of Anjou and was to leave almost immediately for Rouen where the marriage would take place.

Once more she received the homage of the principal men of the kingdom. They must accept her as the lady of England and Normandy.

She was glad of an opportunity to have a word with Stephen before she left.

‘I trust you have missed me, cousin,' she said.

‘More than I can say.'

‘You knew I was in the Queen's apartments.'

‘Ay, I knew.'

‘And made no effort to see me.'

‘It was against the King's wishes.'

‘Some might have defied those wishes.'

‘Not the wishes of Henry of England.'

‘Are you such a coward then?'

‘I trust I am brave enough. But I would keep myself comely in my features, for dearly as I should have loved to see you I could not have endured for you to turn away in horror when later you saw me.'

‘My father is a harsh man, Stephen.'

‘He is a King who will be obeyed.'

‘You know I am to go away, very soon. Only a few days are left to me here. I'm to be married to a . . . child, Stephen.'

‘He is the luckiest child on earth.'

‘Oh, Stephen . . . are you thinking what I am?'

‘I think so. If they had married you to me how wise they would have been.'

‘And how happy we should have been! Good-bye, Stephen.'

‘You will be back ere long.'

‘And when I come?'

‘Who knows – everything may be different then.'

In a few days time she left. The King had appointed Robert, Earl of Gloucester, and Brian Fitzcount to accompany her.

Alas, thought Matilda, that Stephen had not been sent. How she would have enjoyed that. But how dangerous that would have been! Always fear of what would happen to them had kept them apart. There were some who would risk all for love. Not Matilda, not Stephen. And Henry would have no mercy on either of them.

She must forget Stephen for a while. At least she had seen him again; she knew that the flame of desire could still flare up between them. It was a comforting thought.