“For by strength no man shall prevail,” said Vincent, suddenly. “Book of Samuel.” He squeaked the spinning-wheel and Serlo got up and moved it away from him. “Now then…” he said, and began the provisos.
She was not to speak with the Empress alone at any time. The Luards’ own trusted chaplain, Felix of Coutances, would be present at the audience. She was to be away no more than a week and, in order that she should miss no chance of becoming pregnant, that week would be her next menstruation period.
Serlo was firm on this point but his agony in trying to put it politely was pitiful. He ordered Vincent out of the room as he made it.
“There will be some days, a week when… when, well, for instance, you cannot enter a church.” The week when Eve’s curse made her so disgusting that conjugal relations were discontinued and the church didn’t want her under its roof.
“Can you give me any indication, my lady, when this, um, condition, this, er, time will be?”
“Day after tomorrow,” said Matilda promptly. She’d need a day to pack. She smiled. “A happy coincidence, my lord.”
* * *
A north-westerly breeze floated seagulls above them and created a swell. To Matilda’s amusement Adeliza and five of the men-at-arms began to be sick. She stepped over their limp legs to the prow. She was enlarged. She was a hawk. No more Song of Solomon for a bit. The only smell was of sea and the only breathing the wind. She turned to Percy of Alleyn: “I’m a sailor.” He was pleased she was happy. “You’ll be a mermaid if you don’t look out.”
She staggered back to the stern and thumped down next to the Luards’ chaplain who showed signs of wishing himself elsewhere. Matilda dug him in the ribs. “This James the Lord’s brother,” she said, “was he the Virgin’s son?”
Felix forgot his queasiness in his shock. “Of course not. The Holy Mother was virgo intacta all her earthly life.”
Matilda took a deep breath of sea air, puffed out her cheeks with it and expelled it, noisily. “What about St. James?”
Felix warmed to the discussion. “Origen would inform you that our Lord’s brothers and sisters were St. Joseph’s children by a previous marriage but he, of course, was Greek.”
“St. Joseph?”
“Origen. But Jerome maintains that he who was worthy to be called the father of Our Lord remained a virgin always. And that is the view the Church adopts and why we honour St. Joseph as saint and virgin to this day.”
Matilda took in more sea air. “And St. James? The brother ofJesus?”
“We think it means ‘brother’ in the sense of kinship. He was a cousin. Or adopted.”
“You don’t know, then.”
Felix of Coutances glared at her. “It is the authority of the Fathers of the Church and not to be questioned. Certainly not by a woman.” He leaned over the boat’s side and appeared to find the sea of interest.
Matilda regarded the sky. They didn’t know. They didn’t know. These Fathers who’d never been fathers were trying to take Mary away from her. They couldn’t bear it that after Mary had given birth to Jesus virginally – as was right and proper – she had gone on to become an ordinary wife and mother. But why not? It was why Matilda loved her so much, that she understood the condition of women. Why make a freak out of her?
“They’re silly.” The thought frightened and liberated her. “They’re silly men.”
When she had reached puberty Father Alors had taught her an old Irish prayer which he wanted her to say every night: “I am Eve who brought sin into the world. There would be no ice in any place; there would be no windy weather; there would be no grief; there would be no terror, but for me.”
Even then she’d thought it was stupid. “Does Jesus want me to say that?” Father Alors had been disconcerted. “I fear Our Lord was not particularly censorious of the carnal sins. But it is Genesis and the Word of God. You are sensuous Eve, the Devil’s gateway.”
Why did they hate her so much? If God thought sex was so disgusting, why had He invented it?
“I can tell you this much,” she addressed the clouds, “I don’t like it much either. You can keep it.”
She turned with sudden anger on the chaplain. “You can keep it.” But Felix in his misery didn’t hear her. He wasn’t keeping anything.
* * *
There was no doubt the Empress intended to invade England soon. Ouistreham Harbour was crowded with ships, so was the Orne. At Caen half the population seemed to be soldiers. Their request for an audience was met with a curt, “The Empress will attend to the Lady Matilda when she has time,” which was rude and infuriated Matilda.
However, her enforced ten days of waiting were spent most pleasantly at the Abbaye des Femmes. Anywhere without Vincent in it would have pleased Matilda but the nuns were hospitable, played volleyball and hunted. And it was at the abbaye that Matilda met and formed a friendship with a namesake, Matilda of Wallingford, wife to Brien Fitz Count.
They had a lot in common, about the same age, both heiresses, both widows now on their second marriage. The difference was that Maud of Wallingford adored her present husband. Within hours of first meeting – “My Lady Matilda.” “My Lady Matilda” – they had exchanged intimate histories.
Brien Fitz Count had been brought up at the court of Henry I profiting, like everyone did, from its learning and liberality. Through his marriage he had become a great land-owner. “He owes everything to the Old King,” said Maud, “including me, of course, for whom he is amazingly grateful. He would have supported the Empress from the first, but like everyone else he’d believed Hugh Bigod when he said Henry had changed his mind on his deathbed. Of course, now that Bigod’s shown his true colours… When the Empress invades I am to hold Wallingford for my lord.” Plump, jolly little Maud was proud of herself. “I am expected to be sieged.”
“Why?”
“Don’t ask me. Because it’s on the Thames and guards the way to London from the Midlands, I suppose. I’m going to have a lovely winter sieged in the mud.”
“All in a good cause.”
“All in the Empress’ cause.” For the first time Maud of Wallingford’s voice was tart. The Empress had become her beloved husband’s holy cause, his crusade. “One is quite prepared to die for her. But the knowledge that one’s husband would shake one like a mat and put one down for the Empress to walk over is not uplifting to live with.”
The Empress became one of their main topics. “She’s not at all grateful,” Maud told Matilda. “She’s got all these splendid men rallying to her standard, Earl Robert, Miles of Gloucester, my own dear lord, of course, and she just takes it as her due. She’s even miffed they didn’t rise for her at the very beginning. And her marriage doesn’t seem much to write home about.”
“Well, I’m sorry for her,” Matilda said, “I know what it is to be married to a stripling.”
Maud of Wallingford rolled her eyes. “He may have been a stripling when she married him, but he certainly isn’t now. He’s gorgeous. Funny, intelligent and gorgeous, Angevin or not. Young Henry’s very like him, only without the looks.”
The Empress was a satisfactory subject of gossip because mystery surrounded her past. She had disappeared into Germany at the age of eight to marry the Emperor and hadn’t reappeared until fifteen years later when her childless marriage was ended by his death.
“Of course, the Germans ruined her,” said Maud. “All that solemn worship turned her stiff as a wooden saint. I shouldn’t think she and the Emperor ever did it, you know, couldn’t unbend enough. Had a funny end too…”
The story of how the Emperor had retired to bed and just disappeared never to be seen again was undoubtedly apocryphal, but the two Matildas preferred to believe it.
“What do you think happened?”
“I think she ate him.”
* * *
The Empress’ throne was on a block on the dais so that she sat higher than her advisers and had a hawk’s eye view over the hall. This was full of men but so int
imidating was the Empress’ presence that they were talking in a subdued mutter which ceased altogether when she spoke.
Felix and Matilda were asked their names and business by a chamberlain and were conducted to a group waiting at the foot of the dais. The chamberlain refused their bribe for a private audience.
Felix was disconcerted; it would be impossible to conduct negotiations as delicate as his in full view. Word would get back to Stephen in days. However, all they could do was wait – for a full hour – before the Empress noticed them.
Matilda’s dignity was affronted, but what was going on around her was so interesting that the hour was a quick one.
Every major landowner in the West Country of England, Earl Robert of Gloucester, Miles of Gloucester, Brien Fitz Count, Baldwin de Redvers, Richard Fitz Turold, the Earl of Cornwall, was in the hall. So were the nobles who had been disinherited by Stephen, their lands given to his favourites. More tantalisingly difficult to place were the secretaries, stewards, knights and chamberlains. Presumably they were representing lords who did not want to commit themselves yet, but were on the same errand as herself and Felix.
Her eyes kept going back to the woman on the dais. In this welter of multi-coloured cloaks and jewels the Empress was in grey, not a fluffy grey, but silk with the shine of steel; the circlet above her veil was of diamonds. The monochrome wrong-footed her companions into gaudiness and emphasised her dark hair and the white skin.
She was beautiful but it was a static beauty; at first one was astonished by it, then got used to it and forgot it as it was overridden by the bitterness of the personality beneath it. The Empress was a bitter woman.
Matilda noticed with satisfaction that Felix was beginning to sweat. Other emissaries like himself were presenting their masters’ respects to the Empress in speeches of uncommitted goodwill, but each one was interrupted by the same question: “Is your lord for us or against us?” which left them floundering. They were then dismissed without ceremony.
However, Matilda noticed that as each disappointed emissary turned away either the Earl of Gloucester or Brien Fitz Count would quietly lead him off for a talk. Their Empress might scorn compromise but her lieutenants were not prepared to alienate possible allies. “I must have a talk of my own with those gentlemen,” thought Matilda.
The chamberlain ushered her and Felix before the dais. Felix dropped to his trembling knees but Matilda, having curtsied, remained upright. She was, after all, a relative.
“Most glorious lady,” quavered Felix, “my Lady of Risle and her lord, Vincent of Luard, present humble greetings and…”
“Master Felix.” The cold, sharp voice quelled the murmur of the hall. “Do your lord and lady acknowledge me as Lady of England?”
Felix began to blubber: “You are the lady of our hearts, madam…”
“Do they or do they not?”
Felix slumped to the floor in a faint. Matilda caught the eye of Brien Fitz Count and jerked her head. He nodded.
As two men dragged Felix away, Matilda said triumphantly, “I’m ashamed of you.” That’d teach him to make St. Joseph a virgin.
* * *
Next morning a page fetched her to a room high in a tower where Earl Robert of Gloucester and Brien Fitz Count were waiting for her: “You had something to say to us, my lady?”
She’d been working it out all night. “My lords, I am prepared to instruct the steward of every estate under my control to give all assistance to your armies. Food, fodder, stabling, accommodation.” With her estates so extensive it was a good offer.
Earl Robert was cold: “Your lord is loyal to Stephen.”
“My lord is dying.” She saw it accorded with information they already had. But they didn’t like her any better for being truthful. Wives, even the wives of enemies, should obey their lords.
However, they were pragmatists. “Show us.” They moved away from the square table in the centre of the room to disclose its top on which was a mass of moulded mud.
“Mud?”
“A map,” said Brien Fitz Count, leaving Matilda no wiser. “We’d like you to mark on it all your estates in England.” They sighed at her incomprehension… “try to imagine you are a hawk flying over England. This is what you would see.” But to Matilda England was a castle surrounded by countryside, her house in London overlooking the Thames, travelling along a road, hunting in a forest. It was not a mud rectangle. They tried it another way. “But you know how far from, say, Arundel your manor of Holt is.”
“Seven and a half miles north-west,” said Matilda promptly. Fitz Count muttered a prayer of thanks and stuck a twig in the mud. They wanted to know everything, fortifications, fords, bridges, the state of roads, knights’ fees, the names of constables, stewards, fyrd strength. Matilda liked their efficiency.
They were especially interested in Holt’s relationship to Arundel, though they didn’t say why. Matilda gave a good guess. The Empress would land at Arundel.
She was surprised that they showed no interest in the area round her morning gift.
“Seven miles from Ramsey, ten from Ely, twelve from Wisbech.” In that section of the map Ramsey and Ely were shown side by side.
“Quagmire,” said the earl, “and impassable.”
“That’s the Fens. They’re navigable.” But they were leaving. She realised she had given away more than they had.
“Just a minute, my lords. It must be understood that my co-operation depends upon your oath that my son, Edmund, inherits all this. Also that I am never married again against my will.”
The Earl of Gloucester shrugged. “We shall discuss the matter with the Empress. If you would stay here until we come back…”
The room, now that she was left alone, seemed most peculiar. Its walls were lined with shelves stacked with manuscripts, leather books, astrolabes, an abacus, a stuffed owl, a toy horse on wheels, several spearheads and some jesses. There were bird droppings everywhere. Matilda became nervous. It might be the cell of an enchanter.
“What’s fens?” asked a voice. She clutched the table edge. There was nobody in the room. It must be the enchanter. “I believe in the one God, the Lord, the giver of life,” she said.
“What’s fens?” asked the voice again.
She crouched down to peer under the table and found herself eye to eye with a small boy. He winked at her. “I’m a wonderful hider, aren’t I?” He was a grubby child, dressed in well-worn leather and he was sitting crosslegged, like a tailor, stitching a red-suede falcon’s hood which had split. But she recognised him from the description Maud of Wallingford had given her. There couldn’t be two round-faced, grey-eyed, red-headed young devils loose in Caen Castle. This was the boy for whom Geoffrey of Anjou wanted Normandy and the Empress Matilda wanted England. If they won, the day would come when he ruled both.
Matilda never liked other people’s children much, even princes. If they couldn’t conduct an adult conversation she had no time for them. “Do you understand this map?”
“I made it.” The boy scrambled out from under the table. “I’ve talked to everyone from England and improved on the one great-grandfather made.” It was a shock to think of William the Conqueror as something so domestic as somebody’s great-grandfather. “I know everything about England. What’s fens?”
“Not quite everything, then,” said Matilda with satisfaction, but she told him, and his questions dragged out of her memory things she hadn’t been aware of knowing.
He drew up a stool and knelt on it so that he could work on the map with what she told him, extending East Anglia with his freckled hands, flattening and enlarging the area below the Wash, scoring out the River Nene from Wisbech to Ramsey with a short, black thumbnail and embedding pebbles produced from his pocket for the Causeway from Ramsey to the uplands and Ermine Street. She told him of the unexpected richness of the Fens, of the terrifying flatness, of the enormity of its sky, how incomprehensible were its people. She was surprised to find that, though it contradicted every a
ccepted standard of beauty, the thought of the place pleased her – and not just because it held her son. “It’s a good place to hide,” she said.
“If you were coming from, say Flanders, could you land here” – he arced a piece of the Wash – “and go through the waterways into the uplands and Ermine Street?”
He reminded her of someone; she couldn’t think who. “If you wanted to. But why would you want to? It’s easier to land at Dover.”
“Vegetius the Roman says that in war you must keep open alternative lines of communication. Could you land an army there?”
Earl Robert and Brien Fitz Count had discounted her opinion of the Fens as if a woman’s knowledge was worthless: this boy treated her as an ally. “You’d need a lot of boats.”
“But you could get a small party in or out without being spotted?”
“Certainly.” She had it now; he reminded her of Ramsey’s abbot; both were interested in everything, neither saw the differences made by age or rank or sex. In the presence of both she scented a mind that was not like any other she had ever encountered. “They are new,” she thought.
It was in that moment, though she didn’t realise it for some years, that Matilda made her commitment.
“There you are, then. Your Fens are a back door into the East, or the Midlands or the North. It’s a sort of postern to England. I’m a wonderful thinker, aren’t I?”
They discussed its uses. They made a plan. It was a game, but an exciting game. She no longer saw him as a child but as a credible future power. “My lord, will you have my son Edmund brought up in your court when he is seven?”
The grey eyes considered. “Does he cry a lot?”
“Hardly at all.”
“All right, then. But he must learn Vegetius. All my officers will read Vegetius. It’s going to be a wonderful court.”
“And you must promise never to give me in marriage against my will.”
The Morning Gift Page 10