The Siege of Norwich Castle: A story of the last struggle against the Conqueror

by M. M. Blake

  CHAPTER XVII.

  HOW RALPH CAME HOME.

  'Sweet nuncle, methinks some of thy wits adhered to my cap, and that,when I put the same upon thy noble skull, they found an entrance intoit by that crack the worshipful bishop's mace rove therein, else thouhadst never assayed this mad journey! Why, thou hast scarce taken astep without giving a groan.'

  'Have I been so weak, Grillonne?' Earl Ralph asked, a faint smilebrightening his pale, worn face.

  He was on horseback, but rode at a foot's pace, and bent over the neckof his _hacquenee_ like an aged and decrepit man. He was dressed in aloose flowing Saxon blouse, and had not a link of mail on his personfrom top to toe. On his left rode Grillonne, who strove to cheer himwith loving banter; on his right the young Anglo-Dane, LeofricEaldredsson, the son of his late host in the Fenland refuge; a littlebehind came a small band of men-at-arms, a squire leading Ralph'sSpanish destrier, and a mule bearing the earl's harness, making somescore in all.

  'In good sooth,' continued the earl, 'it hath not seemed to me that mypath was strewn with rose-leaves, but only with the thorns strippedbare of flowers. Yet would I go through it seven times over to see mylady's face again.'

  'Well-a-day, nuncle! and a pretty galliard thou art, forsooth, tofigure before a gracious dame, with thy hollow cheeks and thy hawk'seyes glaring out of caverns deep eno' for pixies to bide in,' repliedthe privileged jester. 'Cogs bones! thou hadst done better to go toDenmark first as thou didst intend, there to have picked up a few stoutfollowers and a little flesh to cover thy worn framework withal. Thewomen ever love the signs of power.'

  A jealous pang flushed the earl's gaunt face with a faint hue of red.What if the fool spoke truth, and Emma should turn from him in hisdefeat, and embitter his humiliation by fresh reproaches? She had senthim forth with a doubting heart, scarce wishing him success, in that hefought against her kinsman and suzerain, William of Normandy. All hisfeudal pomp and glory, at the head of the eager army he then led tobattle, had failed to move the bosom of the daughter of WilliamFitzosbern, who, young as she was, had seen many a fair host go forthwith streaming pennons and noisy clarions. How, then, would she greetthe weary, wounded wight who crept back to his castle like a thief inthe night, with a poor remnant of faithful followers in little betterplight than himself?

  Truth is seldom palatable to men in high places, and the jester's lightwords had struck home too surely.

  'Thou presumest, Sir Fool!' quoth the earl sharply. 'Thine office dothnot establish thee a critic of mine actions!'

  'Mercy, sweet nuncle! I cry you mercy! A fool's words count fornothing!' cried Grillonne, looking into his lord's face with so muchlove in his clear, keen eyes, that De Guader instantly forgave him.

  'Thou art the best friend I have, Grillonne!' he said impulsively.

  'Nay, there thou dost wrong to a thousand stout hearts, good my lord!'answered the jester, 'noble Leofric there amongst the number. But see,thy toils are well-nigh ended. Yonder rise the white walls of NorwichCastle.'

  'St. Nicholas be praised!' exclaimed the earl fervently. 'Right gladshall I be to shelter my aching head within the towers. The nextbosquet shall serve me for tiring-room. I will show myself in harnessas befits a knight.'

  Some two hours later, the warders at the great gate of CastleBlauncheflour saw a small troop of horsemen approaching the portal at afoot-pace, amongst them a knight in mail, but without cognisance, orsurcoat, or shield, his countenance covered by his large round helmet,and, riding beside him, a motley-coated jester, whose well-known visagecaused a thrill of excitement amongst the guards, greater than thegeneral appearance of the group; for many a similar one had demandedand received admittance within the castle during the preceding days,since Stephen le Hareau had pioneered the fugitives.

  This party had little difficulty in gaining entrance, for the faces ofthe men-at-arms composing it were all more or less familiar to thewarders; and, after a short parley, the portcullis was raised and thedrawbridge lowered to admit of their passage into the courtyard of thecastle.

  The news that the earl's jester had returned spread like wildfirethrough the garrison, with the mysterious celerity that sometimes makesit seem as if intelligence was circulated by magic.

  Before the new-comers had dismounted from their horses, the countess,who was passing from the chapel to the spital, heard the rumour, andcame forth into the courtyard to ascertain if it indeed were true.

  Sir Alain de Gourin, who had been overlooking some target practiceamongst the archers in the tilt-yard, came also to receive and examinethe fugitives.

  Seeing the countess and the ladies who had followed her, glad that dutygave them the opportunity to satisfy their own curiosity, he loutedlow, and took his place beside them.

  Archers and soldiers of various arms from the guardroom, servants andothers, had swarmed from all quarters, and the courtyard was well-nighfull of animated faces.

  One new-comer after another was recognised, and, so to speak, 'passed'by De Gourin, and it came to the turn of the helmeted knight to declarehimself--most of the others wore round steel-caps with a nasal, whichleft the features visible.

  He doffed his steel headpiece silently, and looked around upon thethrong. The gaunt, pale face woke no instant response from the manyonlookers, but the countess sprang forward with outstretched arms tohis saddle-bow.

  'My lord!' she cried. 'Soldiers! do you not know your earl?'

  'A Guader! a Guader!'

  The cry resounded in the court with vigour even surpassing that of afew days before, when their Castellan's eloquence had moved them sodeeply.

  Ralph de Guader caught his wife's outstretched arms in his own, andlooked down into the fair face he had feared never to see again; andthen--not the gentle lady, but the mailed warrior swooned.

  Worn out with the terrible fatigues he had undergone, while yetunhealed of his wounds, the earl reeled in his saddle, and would havefallen, if the tender arms of his wife had not caught him in theirclasp.

  His head sank on Emma's shoulder. The fiery Oliver turned hisintelligent head and caressed her arm softly with his velvet nose, butstood without moving a limb, gazing at her with his full, bright eyes.He seemed to understand. Had he moved, the countess would have faredill.

  Emma was quickly eased of her beloved burden by the retainers around,and the insensible earl was borne within the sheltering walls of thekeep, and laid upon his own broidered, carved oak bed, in his ownspacious and luxurious room.

  Ah! how Emma wept and prayed and joyed over him, and laughed lowly fordelight that in very truth she had her warrior once more.

  How she burnt sweet essences, and bathed his lips with perfumed waters,and shuddered at the print of Odo's mace that still marked his browwith a black and sullen scar.

  Ralph, opening his steel-grey eyes upon that eager face, lost all fearlest his gauntness and humiliation and defeat should lessen wifelylove.

  'Sweetheart!' he sighed. 'Sweetheart! God be praised that I see theeagain!' The memory of his desolation on the battlefield came over himwith resistless force. His breast heaved with a mighty sob as he tookhis wife's hands again in his own and pressed them to his lips.

  'They brought me news of thy death, Ralph. But I knew better,'whispered Emma, as she bent over him, her quick tears falling on hisface. 'I knew better! Thou couldst not have died but I had known it. Myheart had been rent in twain.'

  Then Ralph told her the history of his struggle, and of the longdreadful hours when he lay 'twixt life and death upon the field; andhow Grillonne had schemed and saved him; and of the refuge in the Fens.A murmured story, told in a voice faint and weak with suffering, andreceived with many an ejaculation of sympathy and love.

  'I had planned to steal away privily by Wells on the sea, and theretake ship for Denmark,' De Guader said. 'But, sweetheart, the thoughtof thee was to me as the thought of water to the pilgrim in the desert.Thee I must see, or perish for longing. And I see thee.' He drew her tohim and feasted his eyes on her face.

/>   'And for that thou didst confront danger and difficulty and the pain ofthy sore wounds?' said Emma proudly.

  'In sooth the wounds were sore, but of danger there was little,'answered the earl. Then he sprang up from the couch into a sittingposture with a suddenness that startled his gentle leech. 'They deem mecrushed,' he said. 'So flushed are they by their victory that they arecareless to pursue it further. I found no trace of their troops as Idragged wearily to Norwich. They have gone west, I deem it, to dealwith thy brother.'

  'Alas, my poor Roger! I would we had news of him,' said the countess,her face drawn with pain. De Guader caught the change in her face withjealous quickness. The old haunting fear came back lest she shouldscorn the broken man.

  'Emma, my defeat is dire! Dost thou credit how I have come back tothee,--hiding behind bush and briar, beaten, poverty-stricken, all butalone? I, who left thee at the head of a noble army, now scattered likechaff before the winds! Dost thou not spurn me?'

  The daughter of William Fitzosbern looked in the face of the man shehad chosen for richer, for poorer, for better, for worse.

  'My knight,' she said, 'hadst thou come maimed of a hand and foot, withthy visage marred for ever and a day by the cruel daggers of thy foes,as hath happened to thy favourite squire, Stephen le Hareau, I had butloved thee the better.'

  'By the Holy Rood! has Stephen le Hareau been so foully entreated?'

  'Alack, yes! Moreover, he bore a message from the king's men, thatevery prisoner, of whatever rank and whatever nation, they might takein this struggle, should lose his right foot.'

  The earl raised himself from the couch and smote his knee with hisballed fist.

  'By the bones of St. Nicholas, I will avenge them! I will yet prevail.'He turned to Emma, fiercely seizing her hands again in his, this timewith no very tender grip. 'Hast thou courage? Wilt thou help me now inmy sore need, or is thine heart half with William? Say me sooth!'

  'It is with thee!--all with thee!'

  'God bless thee for that answer!' He passed his hand across his eyes,and then held his brow as if in pain. 'That accursed shaveling's mace!Sith he cracked my poor head with it, whenever I try to think I get apang instead of a notion.'

  'Strive not to think, mine own. Rest awhile. Where shouldst thou restif not here in thine home, or when, if not after dire fatigue?'

  'No, Emma! no rest for me till I have retrieved mine honour! Stephen leHareau, thou saidest? He fought like a Paladin beside me. The smartestsquire in my following, and the best born. I so loved the lad that Iwould have had him squire to mine own body, but that Sir Guy deLanderneau was as a father to him, and had formed him in all fitting aman-at-arms. Sir Guy dead too! Yet death is But the soldier's portion,it irks me not. 'Tis that the fiends should mutilate one of Le Hareau'sgentle blood. It beggars credence! Their own leader is of such proudlineage. Ha, ha!'

  Emma had moved softly to his side, and had enlaced her slender fingersround his mailed arm, striving to soothe him with mute sympathy.

  'Seest thou not the menace in the insult, Emma? They spare not rank.Had I been taken, my fate had been even as Le Hareau's.'

  Emma shuddered, recalling Le Hareau's awful face as she had seen it onthe day of his return. 'It bears not to think of,' she said.

  'Sweet, I must go forth! I must seek Sweyn Ulfsson of Denmark in mineown person; he dallies with my messengers. I must go to him and demandfulfilment of his pledges. I must go to Wader and Montfort and assemblemy vassalage. Hast thou courage to hold Blauncheflour till my return?'

  'I have courage for aught that profits thee.'

  Ralph gazed in her face, his eyes aflame with joyous pride. He took herfair cheeks between his palms, and bent down and kissed her brow andlips.

  'Methinks there is but little risk, my Falcon!' he said. 'They cannotturn from west to east, as the sun does, in a night. That gives metime. They will scarce attempt Blauncheflour and I not in it. If theydo, it is impregnable. Ere six weeks I shall relieve thee with a fairforce at my back.'

  Emma looked wistfully in his eyes. Her heart ached at the thought oflosing him again.

  'Courage, m'amie!' he said, mistaking the cause of her hesitation.

  'My courage fails not, Ralph,' she answered. 'I had held thy castlewhile a man would obey my orders and stand to the walls, even hadstthou been dead, as they tried to make me believe. How then should Iquail to hold it for thee living? I do but mourn that we must partagain.'

  And again Ralph took her face between his palms and kissed it.

  * * * * *

  Meanwhile Lanfranc, the Primate, sat writing in his closet; a satisfiedsmile hovered round the corners of his mobile lips and lighted up thedepths of his gleaming Southern eyes. A monk stood waiting to receivethe letter.

  It ran thus:--

  'To his lord, William, King of the English, his faithful Lanfranc sendshis faithful service and faithful prayers. Gladly would we see you, asan angel of God, but we are unwilling that you should take the troubleof crossing the sea at this particular juncture. For if you were tocome to put down these traitors and robbers, you would do us dishonour.Rodulph the Count, or rather the traitor, and his whole army have beenrouted, and ours, with a great body of Normans and Saxons, are inpursuit. Our leaders inform me that in a few days they will drive theseperjured wretches into the sea, or capture them dead or alive. Thedetails I send you by this monk, who may be trusted, as he has donefealty to me. May God Almighty bless you.'[6]

  [6] Lanfranc, _Opp._ i. 56, translated by Hook, _Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury_, vol. ii. p. 136.

  The details which Lanfranc's messenger had to give of the defeat of theEarl of East Anglia, or, as the prelate styled him, Rodulph the Count,we already know.

  Turning to the monk, the archbishop said, 'Regarding the base uprisingfavoured and headed by our lord-king's cousin, Roger, Earl of Hereford,the tidings are of like good savour. Inform our liege that the Englishprelates, Bishop Wulfstan and Abbot AEthelwig, in union with Urse,Sheriff of Worcestershire, have hindered the traitor from passing theSevern, and have taken the earl himself prisoner, whereon we pray ourliege heartily to make known his wishes how we may best dispose of thishaught prisoner.

  'Forget not to repeat likewise the stratagem by which the CountRodulph's men deceived us, so that we made not his body secure, andknow not certainly if he be dead or alive.'

  'I will forget no detail, good my lord Archbishop,' replied themessenger; and Lanfranc folded his letter, and fastened it with asilken cord, and sealed it with his official seal.

  'Naught could be more satisfactory,' he murmured to himself, as he wasperforming these small offices, 'than the manner in which the Saxonshave ranged themselves, in this matter, upon our liege's side. It was abold stroke on the part of the Lady Judith to warn us of her husband'sschemes, and to risk his rage and his danger. Sooth, it had been a direstruggle if the doughty son of Siward had taken his part, as theplotters did well intend. A turmoil raised for the sake of one woman,and foiled by another! Thanks to thee, Judith, the day is ours!'

  But not to be ended quite so speedily as the sanguine Primate supposed.A woman was to hold his best troops at bay for a space of three longmonths, and then to make terms quite other than a choice betweenimprisonment or the bottom of the sea.

  The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong!