The Iron King

by Maurice Druon

  More than his words, the King’s expression and his beauty delivered Isabella from her weakness.

  ‘I could only have loved a man who was like him,’ she thought, ‘and I shall never love nor shall I ever be loved, because I shall never find a man in his likeness.’

  Then, aloud, she said, ‘I am glad that you should have reminded me what I owe to myself. It is not to weep that I have come to France, Father. I am glad too that you have reminded me of the self-respect proper to people of royal birth, and that happiness for us must count for nothing. I only wish that everyone about you should think the same.’

  ‘Why did you come?’

  She took a deep breath. ‘Because my brothers have married whores, Father, and I have discovered it, and because I am as anxious as you to uphold our honour.’

  Philip the Fair sighed.

  ‘I know very well that you do not care for your sisters-in-law, but the difference between you …’

  ‘The difference between us is the difference between an honest woman and a whore!’ said Isabella coldly. ‘Wait a minute, Father! I know things that have been concealed from you. Listen to me, because I am not only bringing you words. Do you know the young Messire Gautier d’Aunay?’

  ‘There are two brothers whom I always confuse with each other. Their father was with me in Flanders. The one you mention married Agnes de Montmorency, didn’t he? And he is with my son, the Count of Poitiers, as equerry.’

  ‘He is also with your daughter-in-law, Blanche, but in another capacity. His younger brother Philippe, who is at my uncle of Valois’ house.’

  ‘Yes,’ said the King, ‘yes …’

  A deep wrinkle, a very rare thing with him, showed upon his forehead.

  ‘Well, he is Marguerite’s, whom you have chosen to be one day Queen of France! As for Jeanne, she apparently has no lover, but this may merely be that she conceals the fact better than the others. At least it is known that she is a party to the pleasures of her sister and her cousin, that she covers the visits of the gallants to the Tower of Nesle, and appears to be adept at a profession which has a name all its own. And you may as well know that the whole Court talks of it, except you.’

  Philip the Fair raised a hand.

  ‘Your proofs, Isabella?’

  Isabella then told him about the purses.

  ‘You will find them at the belts of the brothers Aunay. I saw them myself upon the road. That is all I have to tell you.’

  Philip the Fair looked at his daughter. It seemed that under his very eyes she had changed both in face and character. She had brought her accusation without hesitation, without weakening, and there she sat, upright in her chair, tight-lipped, with something stern and icy at the back of her eyes. She had not spoken from wickedness or jealousy, but from justice. She was in truth his daughter.

  The King rose without replying. For a long moment he stood before the window, and still the long deep wrinkle showed upon his forehead.

  Isabella did not move, awaiting the consequences of what she had unleashed, ready to give further proof.

  ‘Come,’ the King said suddenly. ‘Let us go to them.’

  He opened the door, passed through a long dark corridor and pushed open a second door. Suddenly they were in the grip of the night wind, which made their full clothing flow out behind them.

  The three daughters-in-law had apartments in the other wing of the Castle of Maubuisson. From the tower, where the King’s study was, their apartments were reached by a covered rampart. A guard dozed by each loophole, short gusts of wind shook the slates. From below the smell of damp earth rose up to them.

  Without speaking, the King and his daughter followed the ramparts. Their feet rang out in time upon the stone, and every twenty yards an archer rose to his feet.

  When they came to the door of the Princesses’ apartments, Philip the Fair paused for a moment. He listened. Laughter and little cries of pleasure came from beyond the door. He looked at Isabella.

  ‘It is necessary,’ he said.

  Isabella nodded her head without replying, and Philip the Fair opened the door.

  Marguerite, Jeanne and Blanche uttered a cry of surprise and their laughter came to an abrupt end.

  They had been playing with marionettes and were amusing themselves by recapitulating a scene they had invented and which, produced by a master juggler, had much diverted them one day at Vincennes, but which had much irritated the King. The marionettes were made to resemble the principal personages of the Court. The little scene represented the King’s chamber, where he himself appeared sleeping in a bed covered with cloth of gold. Monseigneur of Valois knocked on the door and asked to speak to his brother. Hugues de Bouville, the Chamberlain, replied that the King could not receive him and had given instructions that no one was to disturb him. Monseigneur of Valois went away in a rage. Then the marionettes representing Louis of Navarre and his brother Charles knocked at the door in their turn. Bouville gave the same answer to the two sons of the King. At last, preceded by three sergeants-at-arms carrying maces, Enguerrand de Marigny presented himself; at once the door was opened wide and the Chamberlain said, ‘Monseigneur, you are welcome. The King much desires to speak with you.’

  This satire upon the habits of the Court had very much annoyed Philip the Fair, who had forbidden a repetition of the play. But the three young Princesses paid no attention, and secretly amused themselves with it all the more because it was forbidden.

  They varied the dialogue and improved upon it with new mockeries, particularly when they manipulated the marionettes which represented their husbands.

  When the King and Isabella came in, they felt like schoolgirls caught out.

  Marguerite quickly picked up a surcoat that lay on a chair and put it round her to hide her too-naked throat. Blanche smoothed back her hair which had become disarranged in simulating her uncle Valois in a rage.

  Jeanne, who remained calmer than the others, said vivaciously, ‘We have just finished, Sire; we have just this moment finished, and you might have heard it all without there being anything to wound you. We shall tidy it all away.’

  She clapped her hands.

  ‘Hallo, there! Beaumont, Comminges, my good women!’

  ‘There is no need to call your ladies,’ the King said curtly.

  He had barely noticed their game; it was at them he was looking. Eighteen, nineteen and a half, twenty-three; all three pretty, each in her different way. He had watched them grow taller and more beautiful since they had come, each at the age of about twelve or thirteen, to marry one of his sons. But they did not seem to have grown more intelligent than they had been in those days. They still played with marionettes like disobedient little girls. Was it possible that what Isabella said was true? Was it possible that so much feminine wickedness could exist in these beings who seemed to him still children? ‘Perhaps,’ he thought, ‘I know nothing of women.’

  ‘Where are your husbands?’ he asked.

  ‘In the fencing-school, Sire,’ said Jeanne.

  ‘Look, I have not come alone,’ he went on. ‘You often say that your sister-in-law does not love you. And yet I am told that she has given you each a really handsome present.’

  Isabella watched Marguerite’s and Blanche’s eyes fade, as if their brilliance had been doused.

  ‘Will you,’ Philip went on slowly, ‘show me the purses you received from England?’

  The silence that followed seemed to separate the world into two parts. On one side was Philip the Fair, Isabella, the Court, the barons, the kingdom; and on the other were the Iron King’s three daughters-in-law, on the point of entering a realm of appalling nightmare.

  ‘Well?’ said the King. ‘Why this silence?’

  He continued to look fixedly at them with his huge, unblinking eyes.

  ‘I have left mine in Paris,’ said Jeanne.

  ‘I too, I too,’ the others at once assented.

  Slowly Philip the Fair went towards the door that gave upon the corridor,
and the wood of the floorboards could be heard creaking beneath his feet. Lividly pale, the three young women watched his every movement.

  No one looked at Isabella. She was leaning against the wall, at some distance from the hearth; her breath came quickly.

  Without looking round, the King said, ‘Since you have left your purses in Paris, we shall ask the young Aunays to fetch them at once.’

  He opened the door, called one of the guards and ordered him to fetch the two equerries.

  Blanche’s resistance gave way. She let herself fall upon a stool, the blood had drained from her face, her heart seemed to have stopped, and her head fell to one side, as if she were about to fall prostrate upon the floor. Jeanne seized her by the small of the arm and shook her to make her regain control of herself. Marguerite was mechanically twisting in her little brown hands the neck of the marionette representing Marigny, with which she had been playing but a few moments before.

  Isabella did not move. She saw the glances Marguerite and Jeanne cast upon her, looks of hatred which emphasised the role of informer she was playing, and suddenly she felt an enormous lassitude. ‘I shall play this out to the end,’ she thought.

  The brothers Aunay came in, eager, confused, almost falling over each other in their desire to make themselves useful and to show their worth.

  Without leaving the wall against which she was leaning, Isabella stretched out a hand and said only, ‘Father, these gentlemen seem to have divined your thought, since they have brought my purses attached to their belts.’

  Philip the Fair turned towards his daughters-in-law.

  ‘Can you tell me how these equerries come to be wearing the presents that your sister-in-law gave you?’

  None of them answered.

  Philippe d’Aunay looked at Isabella in astonishment, like a dog that does not understand why he is being beaten, then turned his eyes towards his elder brother, looking for protection. Gautier’s mouth was hanging open.

  ‘Guards!’ cried the King.

  His voice sent cold shivers down the spine of everyone present and echoed, strange and terrible, through the castle and the night. For more than ten years, since the battle of Mons-en-Pévèle to be exact, where he had rallied his army and forced a victory, the King had never been heard to shout. Indeed, everyone had forgotten that he might still have so powerful a voice. Moreover, it was the only word that he produced in this fashion.

  ‘Archers! Send for your captain,’ he said to the men who came running.

  There was a sound of heavy feet and Messire Alain de Pareilles appeared, bare-headed, buckling on his belt.

  ‘Messire Alain,’ said the King, ‘seize these two men. Put them in a dungeon in irons. They will have to answer at the bar of justice for their felony.’

  Philippe d’Aunay wished to rush forward.

  ‘Sire,’ he stammered, ‘Sire …’

  ‘Enough,’ said Philip the Fair. ‘It is to Messire de Nogaret that you must speak now. Messire Alain,’ he went on, ‘the Princesses will be guarded here by your men till further orders. They are forbidden to go out. No one whatever, neither servants, relations, nor even their husbands, may enter here or speak to them. You will answer to me for any breach of these orders.’

  However surprising the orders sounded, Alain heard them without flinching. The man who had arrested the Grand Master of the Templars could no longer be surprised by anything. The King’s will was his only law.

  ‘Come on, Messires,’ he said to the brothers Aunay, pointing to the door. And he ordered his archers to carry out the instructions he had received.

  As they went out, Gautier murmured to his brother, ‘Let us pray, brother, because this is the end.’

  And then their footsteps, lost amid those of the men-at-arms, sounded upon the stone flags.

  Marguerite and Blanche listened to the sound of the footsteps dying away. Their lovers, their honour, their fortune, all their lives were going with them. Jeanne wondered whether she would ever manage to exculpate herself. With a sudden movement, Marguerite threw the marionette she was holding into the fire.

  Once more Blanche was on the point of fainting.

  ‘Come, Isabella,’ said the King.

  They went out. The Queen of England had won; but she felt tired and strangely moved because her father had said, ‘Viens, Isabelle.’ It was the first time he had addressed her in the second person since she was a small child.

  Following one another, they went back the way they had come. The east wind chased huge dark clouds across the sky. Philip left Isabella at the door of her apartments and, taking up a silver candelabra, went to find his sons.

  His tall shadow and the sound of his footsteps awoke the guards in the deserted galleries. His heart felt heavy in his breast. He did not feel the drops of hot wax that fell upon his hand.

  8

  Mahaut of Burgundy

  IN THE MIDDLE OF THE night two horsemen rode away from the Castle of Maubuisson. They were Robert of Artois and his faithful, inseparable Lormet, who was at once servant, squire, travelling companion, confidant and general factotum.

  Since the day that Artois had selected him from among his peasants at Conches and attached him to his own person, Lormet had become, so to speak, his perpetual shadow. It was a marvel to see how anxiously this fat little man, already grey-haired but still hale and hearty, attended his young giant of a master on all occasions, closely following him in order to protect him. His cunning was as great and effective as his devotion. It was he who had pretended to be the ferryman for the brothers Aunay on the night of the trap.

  Dawn was breaking as the two horsemen reached the gates of Paris. They put their smoking horses into a walk and Lormet yawned a dozen times or so. At over fifty, he was still able to stand long journeys on horseback better than any young equerry, but he was inclined to suffer from lack of sleep.

  In the Place de Grève they came upon the usual assembly of workmen in search of jobs. Foremen of the King’s workshops and employers of lightermen moved among the various groups and hired assistants, dockers, and porters. Robert of Artois crossed the Place and turned into the rue Mauconseil where lived his aunt, Mahaut of Artois, Countess of Burgundy.

  ‘Listen, Lormet,’ said the giant, ‘I want this fat bitch to hear from me the extent of her disaster. Here begins one of the greatest and happiest days of my life. No beautiful girl in love with me could give me greater pleasure to see than the hideous phiz of my aunt when she hears what I have to tell her about the happenings at Maubuisson. And I want her to come to Pontoise and accelerate her own ruin by braying to the King; I hope she dies of vexation.’

  Lormet yawned hugely.

  ‘She’ll die all right, Monseigneur; she’ll die, you can be certain of that; you’re doing everything you can to bring it about,’ he said.

  They came to the splendid town-house of the Counts of Artois.

  ‘To think that it was my grandfather who built it; to think that it is I who should be living here!’ Robert went on.

  ‘You’ll live here, Monseigneur; you’ll live here all right.’

  ‘And I’ll make you doorkeeper with a hundred pounds a year.’

  ‘Thank you, Monseigneur,’ replied Lormet as if he had already acquired that high position and had the money in his pocket.

  Artois leapt from his percheron, threw the bridle to Lormet and, seizing the knocker, banged it hard enough to break down the door.

  The noise echoed from top to bottom of the house. The wicket-gate opened and a huge guard came out, wide awake and carrying in his hand a cudgel heavy enough to fell an ox.

  ‘Who goes there?’ demanded the servant, indignant at the row.

  But Robert of Artois pushed past him and entered the house. There were plenty of people in the corridors and upon the staircase; a dozen valets and housemaids doing the morning cleaning. There was anxiety upon every face. Robert, creating disorder in his wake, went up to the first floor, to Mahaut’s apartments, and cried ‘hullo’ lo
ud enough to make a row of horses rear.

  A terrified servant ran up, a pail in his hand.

  ‘Where’s my aunt, Picard? I must see my aunt at once.’

  Picard, his head bald and square, put down his pail and replied, ‘She’s having breakfast, Monseigneur.’

  ‘Well, I don’t care! Tell her I’m here and hurry up about it!’

  Having organised his face into an expression of dolour and anguish, Robert of Artois, making the floor tremble beneath the weight of his feet, followed the servant to Mahaut’s room.

  The Countess Mahaut of Artois, Regent of Burgundy and Peer of France, was a strong woman of fifty, solid, massive, strong-limbed. Under a covering of fat, her face, which had once been beautiful, still preserved an expression of assurance and pride. Her forehead was high, wide and bulging, her hair still largely black. There was too much down on her lip, her mouth was red and her chin heavy.

  Everything about the woman was on a large scale, her features, her limbs, her appetite, her anger and her avarice, her ambition and her lust for power. With the energy of a warrior and the tenacity of a lawyer, she moved from Artois to Burgundy, from her Court of Arras to her Court of Dôle, superintending the administration of her two counties, exacting the obedience of her vassals, setting limits to the power of others, and pitilessly destroying her known enemies.

  Twelve years of fighting with her nephew had taught her to know him well. Whenever a difficulty arose, whenever the Lords of Artois proved refractory, whenever a town protested against her taxes, she could be certain that Robert was behind them.

  ‘He is a savage wolf, a big cruel false wolf,’ she said when speaking of him. ‘But I am more intelligent, and he will end by destroying himself through going too far.’

  They had hardly been on speaking terms for many months and never saw each other except by necessity at Court.

  That morning, sitting at a little table set at the foot of her bed, she was eating slice after slice of a pâté of hare, the first course of her breakfast.

  As Robert took care to feign distress and emotion, she for her part assumed a natural and casual manner when she saw him come in.