by Nancy Gebel
Chapter 11
August, 1173
Dol, Brittany
“Don’t look so glum!” boomed a hearty voice into Hugh’s ear. An arm landed heavily around his neck. “An inconvenience, that’s all! Unexpected, but we’ll take our revenge.”
Hugh continued to stare over the wall in the direction of the Normandy border. It was late evening; the sun was slowly sinking into a haze in the west and the lack of a breeze promised a night as damp and hot as the day.
“I’m not worried about that,” he answered, wishing the man would remove his arm. He shifted on his feet, but his companion didn’t take the hint.
“Oh—upset about your money and armor, then. Well, don’t be—” the arm jiggled, “—we’ll soon have it back for you.”
But it wasn’t the money. What had been lost was only a mere fraction of Hugh’s revenues and besides, he had known from the start that he risked everything—lands, titles, money; even his life—in this venture. No, it wasn’t anything material which gave him pause. It was the strong feeling that his brief period of freedom was coming quickly to an end.
Strangely enough, he felt calm as he looked back at the past and considered the future. A grievance against Henry and the desire to extricate himself from the insidious grip of Robert Bolsover’s ghost had compelled him to throw in his lot with the Young King. For months he and de Fougères had run amuck throughout Avranches and it had actually given him satisfaction to ravage his hereditary lands, the lands where his ancestors, all loyal servants of the dukes of Normandy, had been born. It was a revolt against his past as much as against the king.
It seemed to him that all his life the important decisions had been made for him. He was the earl of Chester by birth. His family history obligated his adherence to Henry II. Robert Bolsover had wooed him. Even his damned wife had been chosen for him. When he’d made up his mind to join with the Young King, an immediate thrill had pulsed through his veins. He’d felt free.
But all that was to change now. He was certain of it in a calm, fatalistic way. Riders had hurtled into the fortress only a few hours before with the news that Hugh’s convoy of weapons, gold and perishables had been set upon by knights from Pontorson who were led by the king’s bastard son, William Longsword. The escort, with the exception of a swift handful, had been massacred and the wagons confiscated. It had been completely unexpected and judging from the reactions of de Fougères and his men was as great a shock to the rebels at Dol as it had been for the guard of the convoy.
De Fougères looked almost pleased by news of the ambush. He’d boasted loudly and interminably at the supper board that he was glad someone had at last made the decision to meet the rebels’ challenge in the west. He was tired of Louis and Flanders getting all the attention. He didn’t know much about this William Longsword except that the Bastard was barely past youth and couldn’t match the battle experience of the men at Dol. He couldn’t know the wily strengths of Ralph de Fougères. Still, this taunt by Longsword would not go uncontested. If the king’s bastard thought his mere presence would send the rebels scurrying into submission he was dead wrong. De Fougères had burst out laughing at his little joke. ‘Dead wrong’. The Bastard and his puny band would all soon be dead.
Hugh had remained quiet as usual. He hadn’t eaten much and had drunk even less. Neither did he, he thought, have as much battle experience as the Bretons. He wasn’t afraid of testing himself in a real skirmish, however; he was confident he could swing a sword as well as the long-haired, long-nosed, middle-aged, pot-bellied man sitting next to him and ripping apart meat and bone as though he might never eat again. Did the fool truly believe they could hope to beat Henry? In retrospect, Hugh supposed that once he, too, must have believed it possible but then it had been secret messages and clandestine plots. Now reality was staring them in the face and Henry seemed invincible as ever.
De Fougères’ arm jiggled around his neck again and roused Hugh from his thoughts. He didn’t care much for his partner in rebellion, considering him crude and loud, but the Breton obviously liked him well enough. Haworth had said it was because Hugh, although the much more important magnate, permitted him to do all the talking. As long as de Fougères treated him with respect, Hugh was satisfied with the arrangement. But that damned arm was maddening.
“…sundown tomorrow, we’ll have the castle surrounded!” de Fougères was saying, his voice excited.
“A siege?” questioned Hugh slowly. “I thought you were of the opinion that a siege is a waste of our resources.”
“It is! If we just wait them out, it is. But I have a feeling we won’t have to wait. The Bastard wants to make his mark and meeting our challenge is how he’ll do it.”
“Surely he wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave the security of the fortress to take on an army three or four times his size!”
The arm squeezed Hugh’s neck. “Exactly! This is the beauty of my plan, Chester—the army the Bastard will see from Pontorson’s towers will only be a fraction of the whole. We’ll put forty or fifty men in the field, draw the loyalists out of their sanctuary and the rest of us will swoop down on them from our hiding place in the forest and slaughter the lot of them!”
Hugh shrugged noncommittally. It all sounded too simple to him. What if the Bastard didn’t rise to their bait and stayed put behind the walls? But he didn’t make any objection. After all, it didn’t matter what they planned; Henry would make short work of them.
“Are you married, Chester?” asked de Fougères so abruptly that Hugh turned his head sharply to look at him, uncertain if he’d heard correctly. The movement had the effect, at last, of causing the Breton’s arm to slide off his neck.
“Married? No, not now. I was, but just before last Christmas, my wife lost her wits and wandered into the hills beyond the castle. She never returned.”
De Fougères sucked in his breath. “What a tragedy!” he murmured, sounding too concerned for genuine sentiment.
“Yes; a tragedy,” said Hugh drily. The Bolsovers had an unlucky talent for dying young. “Her cloak was found by my men after a lengthy search, ripped and torn as though a pack of wild animals had got to her.”
“Wolves,” nodded de Fougères knowingly.
“Yes; wolves,” said Hugh. He stared blandly at the other man. “Why do you ask?”
“Well, it’s just that we’re getting along together so well that I thought I might bring my daughter up to meet you. Sixteen years old, ripe for marriage.” De Fougères gave a little laugh. “What an honor it would be for her to meet such a powerful and respected man as yourself! But perhaps the death of your wife is still fresh in your mind.”
De Fougères had two sons with him at Dol, one just on either side of twenty, whom Hugh was more interested in meeting than another colorless daughter of another poor knight. But while he didn’t respond to de Fougères’ probing last comment, he didn’t wish to alienate his ally.
“It would be my honor to meet her, I’m sure,” he said. “Perhaps when the situation in Normandy has been resolved in the Young King’s favor you might bring her here.”
The Breton beamed. “Yes, yes—when we have finally crushed that witch’s son, Henry, and demolished his empire! When Brittany is finally released from its servitude!”
Hugh breathed an inward sigh of relief. Good, he thought; he wouldn’t be subjected to the girl any time soon.
Hugh met with his knights to inform them of de Fougères’ plan without detailing his own misgivings. Back at Chester, he’d been somewhat surprised when, to a man, his vassals had chosen to support him rather than remain loyal to the king. He knew he was not a charismatic leader like Henry (despite Haworth’s fervent assertion), but he also knew he wasn’t as demanding an overlord as the king. Apparently, just as he did, his tenants preferred to keep things the way they were.
Over the course of several months in early spring, nearly three score of the knights who owed him service made their way to Dol. Others were sent to Chester, because the rebels’ pl
an was to create as much violent turmoil as possible, not only in Normandy but in England as well. With his money, he had purchased the services of mercenary knights, most of whom had come from Flanders and Brittany. It was difficult to find Norman mercenaries; these men were fiercely loyal to Henry.
With Hugh’s force and de Fougères’ men, the rebels in eastern Normandy presented a formidable army and if all went according to the Breton’s plan, they’d have no problem wiping out the garrison at Pontorson along with William Longsword and his tiny band of would-be saviors. “The only trouble is,” said Hugh with a wry smile to Haworth after the meeting, “part of de Fougères’ scheme depends on there being an overwhelming amount of stupidity in the Pontorson camp. He’s the fool, Roger! Does he truly imagine that the Bastard, who is well aware of our numbers, will be tricked into rushing out of the fortress when he sees only forty men cavorting on the road? No! He’ll just have his bowmen make mincemeat of them!”
“In that case, we’d better make sure our men are the ones among the trees,” Haworth answered seriously and Hugh laughed. Robert Bolsover would have said the same thing but meant it as a joke. But there was something comfortable and familiar in Haworth’s humorless personality.
He eased himself up from his chair and moved to the side table for a cup of wine. He was twenty-nine now and beginning to feel the creaks of his bones and the soreness in his muscles the day after hard exercise. At least he had so far escaped serious illness. It seemed to him that sooner or later everyone caught some dreadful scourge from which he might not recover. The king himself had been so afflicted three years ago, to the point where he’d made his Will and confirmed the Young King as duke of Normandy and king of England. If only he’d died then, Hugh thought, they would have been spared making this rebellion. He’d be home at Chester planning the next day’s hunt rather than sitting in some drafty chamber discussing the shortcomings of Ralph de Fougères’ scheme to take a royal castle.
And Eleanor would still be alive. He had felt only relief when the messenger had come from Chester. Poor Miles de Gournay had sent a letter devoid of his usual pretentious phrases and intricate sentences which ran on so long that Hugh had to read through them two or three times before he was able to understand what the hell his steward was trying to tell him. This letter had been plain and nearly hysterical in tone. He begged the earl to believe that he had done everything possible to find her and it wasn’t fear of what Hugh might do or say to him which prompted his wrenching sentiment; the steward had been genuinely fond of his mistress and keenly felt the guilt of his silent condonation of her treatment by Hugh. For days every available man in the castle had scoured the countryside and even the townspeople had been alerted and pressed into service until, the letter read, “...On the fifth day, my lord, we came upon her cloak, known to us by its color and the dyed fox fur border, which we discovered to be horribly mangled as if it had been pulled this way and that by a pack of savage animals. It was found in the woods, a few miles from the church of St. John the Baptist where she had gone to pray. My lord, I bitterly regret allowing her to go but she had beseeched me very humbly; she wished to ask Our Lord in the house in which you and she were married to send her a child so that she might be a good wife and fulfill her duty to you. How could I refuse? She went with an armed escort which, as it was a cold day, she induced to visit an alehouse while she prayed. When they returned, they waited outside the church until it started to grow dark. When one of them went inside to fetch her, he found the place deserted but for the priest’s servant, who was lighting candles on the altar. The man had not seen anyone.
“My lord, you cannot imagine the anguish from which I have suffered these past weeks. I accept full responsibility for the Countess’ disappearance and her untimely demise. I knew she had not been herself since the summer. Obviously, her mind was so unhinged that she simply wandered away from the church and the escort, unaware of what she was doing. I still cannot sleep from thinking of the horror which befell her in the forest...”
Hugh had looked up from the letter, which he’d been reading aloud to Haworth, and grinned. “De Gournay sounds as though he won’t rest easy unless I have him dragged face down through the mud from the back of a horse.” He scanned the remainder of the missive. “He humbly awaits my judgment on his crime. Well, what do you think, Roger? More land? Another estate?”
“She was never the same after we got rid of that troublesome slut of hers,” Haworth had answered.
“Another job well done.” Hugh had clapped him on the shoulder and laughed. “I wonder if it was the same pack of wolves that got the both of them.”
Yes, if the rebellion hadn’t come to pass, he’d still be at Chester and Eleanor would still be alive. At least some good, then, had come out of this otherwise fruitless endeavor.
As he stood there musing, idly swirling the wine around in his cup, Haworth came up very close behind him. “We are to march at dawn, my lord?” he said softly into Hugh’s ear.
Hugh turned his head slightly and looked at him. “That’s the plan. Do you approve?” he asked with an amused smile.
“It isn’t for me to approve or disapprove, my lord.” Haworth’s breath tickled Hugh’s ear and a delicious shiver ran down his spine. “I only thought that we should have an early night.”
“Do you mean to say you don’t want to sit and drink yourself into a stupor in the hall while de Fougères embarks on another one of his never-ending stories?”
“No, my lord.”
That was as far as Haworth would go: an unspoken invitation. Occasionally Hugh wished he’d be more forward physically but knew Haworth would be appalled at the idea of a servant seducing his master. “Hm!” he said. “Neither do I.” He tilted his head and kissed Haworth’s yielding mouth. “Amazing that such a soft thing can be surrounded by so much prickly beard,” he murmured. “Aren’t you worried that we’ll exhaust ourselves for the march tomorrow?”
“No, my lord,” Haworth whispered, his dark eyes burning as he stared at Hugh. “It will strengthen us.” He reached a hand to touch the side of Hugh’s face.
Hugh put down his wine cup.
But they needn’t have worried about the long march to Pontorson because when the men of Dol woke up the next morning and looked out of guard towers and stretched and yawned before unshuttered windows, they saw arrayed before them on the open field the army of William Longsword.