The Secret Eleanor

by Cecelia Holland

  Abruptly a burst of noise resounded through the hall; people were gushing up the stairs from the courtyard, the place suddenly booming. Boys with torches ran across the room to light the sconces at the far end. Petronilla reached out and rapped Claire on the shoulder, harder than necessary.

  “And in spite of what I said, you are still dallying with Thomas.”

  The girl swallowed. “We sing. He is teaching me to sing.”

  “Oh,” Petronilla said, and laughed. “I’ve never heard it called that before. Go wherever that takes you, I suppose; we’re all in up to our necks.” The room was full of people now; she could not linger. She poked Claire again. “Go now and do as we bid. And you are forgiven, you need not cower anymore.”

  Claire was watching her, her mouth open to ask something else. But there were already too many people. Laughing, clapping, they bumped in around her. Claire dropped into a quick bow to her, and went off. Petronilla drew back into the deep shadow under the stair, to pin her veil up in place.

  Claire went down to the courtyard to watch for Thierry. The meeting with Petronilla still churned in her mind. She had expected the Queen’s sister to be angrier.

  Honest and brave, loyal and generous, she thought. If not always, most of the time.

  Brave as a hero, she thought. What they were proposing, that Petronilla ride in the procession in the Queen’s place, moved her like something from one of Thomas’s songs.

  Then, across the snowy courtyard, she saw Thierry coming, and she left these thoughts and went to put herself in his way.

  Later, sitting in the midst of the women while they readied her for the procession, Petronilla was so frightened she thought she would throw up. She felt like a piece of wood being painted, and she wished she had never agreed to this. She fixed her gaze on Eleanor, on the bed watching, and told herself she could not fail her sister; she kept thinking this, a litany, over and over.

  Eleanor wore Petronilla’s own severe white mourning gown, with the veil dangling ready by her ear. Meanwhile the other women were turning Petronilla into the image of her sister.

  Alys said, “Now, hold still, my dear.” With her finger she tipped Petronilla’s face up into the sunlight.

  Petronilla shut her eyes. The magnificent clothes felt heavy, scratchy, too loose, or too tight, she wasn’t sure, and she was already sweating, although it was cold. The women all around her staring at her made her feel naked. The brush stroked her cheek, and then Alys was daubing something on her eyelid, and under her eye, and smoothing with her thumb. She kept her eyes shut. The deft fingers on her chin tipped her face to the other side, and the brush caressed her skin again, seductively soft.

  She straightened, and Alys stepped away from her; she opened her eyes, and all around her the women gave a sharp, collective gasp, the truest of compliments. Petronilla fixed her gaze on Eleanor, before her, and Eleanor picked up a looking glass, and came over beside her and put her head beside Petronilla’s, and held the glass up before them.

  Petronilla’s mouth fell open. In the murmuring of the women she heard what she saw in the looking glass, that she and her sister were as like as two rosebuds on the same vine. Two copies of the same face looked out at her: the wide lush mouths, the gold-flecked green eyes, the flare of the cheekbones, the red hair swept back from the deep peak over the brows.

  In spite of her fears, she felt a surge of triumph. It seemed to her she had waited all her life for this. She was as beautiful as Eleanor, at last.

  More beautiful. Eleanor, going back to the bed, lumbered along, her body thick under the white drapery. “Go,” she said. “This will work. No one will know. Go now. I’m very tired.” She sank down on the bed; Petronilla heard the fretful edge in her sister’s voice, the jealousy.

  She had to work to keep from smiling. When she did, Alys said, “No, no, that ruins it—that’s Petronilla, that frown—let your face relax, child. There.” Petronilla smiled, obediently, and lifted her eyes, and Alys said, delighted, “There!”

  Marie-Jeanne, as she always did, took the crown and set it on her head. She wound the tail of the coif over it to keep it in place and tucked the end behind Petronilla’s ear. Petronilla rose, and with the other women attending her, she went out of the room and down into the courtyard.

  There already a great crowd waited, and when she appeared on the steps, a roar went up: “Eleanor!” They called it in the langue d’oc, Alienor. She raised her hands to them, as if she were a god, blessing them. She felt the blood rush into her cheeks. She held herself perfectly straight beneath the golden circle of her crown, proud as a goddess, and walked down to where the Barb waited, his tail frisking, de Rançun holding his bridle.

  She thought this was the greatest day of her life. When she rode out, the streets were packed with people, all shouting the name now hers, at least for the moment, and waving banners and boughs of mistletoe and ivy, and lifting their children up to see her. The Barb shied and sidled along, snorting at the crowds, his ears flipping back and forth. She was ready for this and knew him for a fraud anyway, with his pretended fright, knew that he was afraid of nothing, simply seeking an advantage like any other courtier.

  Ahead of her, the wagon appeared, with the big ugly statue of Saint Hilary, bishop and Father of the Church, who had preached here when the Kings of France were fur-bearing savages. She followed it through the narrow hilly streets of Poitiers, beneath the overhanging signs of merchants, by the gateways of inns, past windows stuffed with cheering people. The roar of the crowds washed over her like the sea. She smiled, and waved her hand, and had her pages run around giving away sweets, and the adulation of her people washed around her like a great warm ocean.

  Part of her felt small and cold and scared, inside this huge person everybody else was seeing. She crushed that part down. She let the excitement carry her up as she rode along, with her pages and knights ahead of her pushing people out of her way, more and more sure of herself.

  This was what it felt like to be Eleanor, she thought. And she would feel this way for days to come. Eleanor should now keep in the wagon, out of sight with her fat belly and her weariness. Petronilla had risen up into her place, and she meant to enjoy it, now, as long as she could.

  In the dark, Eleanor made her way into the confessional, sat down on the priest’s bench, and pushed the little shutter open. There was no one on the other side, which was as she had planned it; no sense in letting him see her approach. No one now, even in the dark, could mistake that this was a woman well along with child.

  She laid her hand on her belly, thinking of the baby; in spite of his inconvenience, she loved him. She dreaded what she must do when he was born.

  She dreaded bearing him, also: the pain, the blood, and the danger. Whenever a woman lay down in the straw, she faced the possibility that instead of drawing a life out of eternity she would cast herself into it. He stirred inside her, as if he caught her apprehensions. Little worm, little curl of life, little hidden prince.

  She was still brooding on all of this when someone slipped into the other side of the confessional, and Thierry Galeran’s voice said, “Your Grace. I come. Have you considered, then?”

  “Oh, yes,” Eleanor said, between her teeth. “I have considered. Hear this, evil thing—I want my freedom from this marriage. You will stop thwarting me, and urge the King to it, at once, or I shall go to Louis and tell him what you said to me in Chatellerault.”

  He gasped. Beyond the screen he was only a piece of moving darkness. He said nothing, and she went on, “What do you think he will do, when he hears what you have offered me?”

  “Your Grace.” The voice half strangled, greasy with fear. “I will deny it.”

  “Bah,” she said. “He knows you well enough to recognize one of your hatchings. He knows also I do not lie to him, whatever else happens. And at the very least, he will dismiss you. Louis is honorable. His blood is his greatest treasure. He might even condemn you for treason, for plotting to give the sacred crown of
France to a baseborn bastard.”

  Thierry said nothing, but she could hear him breathing hard, like a windbroken horse.

  She said, “Go, Thierry. Go and make ready the council that will set me free. Tell the King I should be able to stay in Poitiers in the meantime. And do not let me see you again, ever.”

  The door of the confessional banged open. He bolted away. She sat there, her hands in her lap, hot with pleasure. She waited awhile, in case he had set spies around, to see her leave, but she knew she had won. He would do as she commanded. She laid her hand on her belly. Now there was only the problem of bearing the child.

  But that would be possible, now, if she could stay in Poitiers. Anything was possible in Poitiers. She shut her eyes, tired, but pleased with herself, gathering the strength to go back to the Maubergeon.

  As she went up the steps, she found de Rançun waiting for her. He swung toward her, his eyes sharp, and put out his hand for her to lean on. “Your Grace,” he said, “I have news touching on Duke Henry’s fortunes, when you would care to listen.”

  “Ah,” she said. “I’ll listen now. Tell me.”

  He walked along beside her; she laid her hand on his arm and leaned on him as they climbed the stairs. He said, “There’s a messenger here from England.”

  She turned her gaze on him. “From King Stephen?”

  “Yes. And loose-tongued, and likes his wine.” They had reached the landing and they stopped. Several people were coming up and down the stairs, servants with tubs and bowls, and they went off to one side. She stood where she could see around them and looked quizzically at him.

  “Then Stephen and Louis are conspiring? He is Normandy’s suzerain; can he do this?”

  “No, no—the messenger is here to see Thierry.”

  Her look sharpened with excitement. This was something new. “What is it?”

  The fair-headed knight made a face. “The usual dishonorable backdealing. Thierry with his penchant for spying seems to have accumulated quite a web of them in England—ears in every house and hall. Stephen wants those names.”

  “Huh,” she said. “The cheating ball-less bastard.” De Rançun was smiling at her, her spy. She thought a list of those names would be of some use perhaps to Duke Henry. At once she saw they would be far more important to the men being spied upon. “Find out . . .” She wondered what she needed to know. “Find out all you can.”

  “I will,” he said.

  “Is there anything else? Anything of Normandy himself, for instance?”

  His smile slipped a little. “No, Your Grace.”

  She turned her eyes toward the wall, thinking. There had to be some way to make use of this. She turned suddenly, without talking to him, and went on through the door there, into her room. She felt him linger, and then go away, reliable as always, whom she could trust to do anything.

  Later, when all the others had gone to bed, Eleanor could not sleep, thinking over what de Rançun had told her. How like Thierry to sell Stephen a list of his worst enemies. If she could get that list somehow to Henry, it could be the turning point of the enterprise of England; she could place herself at the crux of his ambitions, solid as a keystone. She was sitting by the window thinking this over, wishing Petronilla were awake to talk to, when she heard Claire sneak in, well after moonrise.

  She thought she knew what the girl was doing, creeping around like this. For a moment, diverted from the bigger worry, she thought about the lute player Thomas. Fine as he was, she should get rid of him, before he ruined one of her favorite women. How to do it was the interesting thing, of course. Then the first matter rose again into her mind, and she saw them both together: the problem and the solution. She looked out the window into the blue and silver moonlight, imagining the ways northward from here.

  In spite of everything, they did have to leave Poitiers again. They were to spend Christmas in Limoges, and there was no getting out of it. Nor did the King at once announce any council, any certainty of the annulment. Eleanor chafed and paced and snapped at everybody, but two days after she had forced Thierry to his knees, they were packing up to ride off again.

  Or at least some would ride. Eleanor herself would trundle along in the wagon, like a barrel of cured meat, like some baggage. Everyone agreed that Petronilla had done so well at being Queen that now she should be Queen again, as long as need be. Eleanor set her teeth together at that, but in her heart, she was relieved.

  On the day before they were to leave Poitiers, she sat with Petronilla in the garden, passing a cup of wine back and forth. She had planned out what to do about the lute player, and she said to her sister, “What do you think of our Thomas, now?”

  “He has the voice of an angel,” Petronilla said, “but Uncle was right, he’s a devil for women.”

  Eleanor held out the cup to her. “Is he clever?”

  “What do you mean?” Petronilla drank, and set the cup down by her knee.

  “I have a task he is perfect for,” Eleanor said. “That requires him to do exactly as I tell him, and not turn me over. Will he do that?”

  Petronilla laughed, as much at her sister’s bandit talk as at what she said. “What task? You ask not cleverness but honesty; I do not know anyone that well, except for Joffre.”

  “Joffre cannot do it. We have learned—through good fortune, and some bribes and listening—Louis has entertained a messenger from England, who is going back there, now, as we go on south. He carries a letter it would be of great benefit for the Duke of Normandy to have.”

  “Hmmm,” said Petronilla. “The way to the English throne of course is bought with English nobles.”

  “Yes, I think so. To get back to England the messenger must go within reach of Duke Henry, and if he is warned in time the Duke can get that letter. I want the troubadour to go with the messenger’s train. It’s a perfect disguise; there will be many travelers, and he will be welcome enough for what he is. And the troubadour can alert Henry to the opportunity while the King’s man is still within his reach.”

  Petronilla lifted her eyebrows, her eyes considering. “A good plan. If he fails, what’s lost? If he succeeds . . . Well plotted, Eleanor. You are master of this.”

  Eleanor sat back, satisfied. Whatever the appearance, Petronilla still bowed to her. She was still the real Duchess of Aquitaine. At once she laughed inwardly, to think it could be otherwise. She sent a page for the troubadour.

  He left the next day, going north with a band of travelers of whom one was the King of England’s man, in some disguise. Unfortunately, Claire left with him, which Eleanor had not foreseen.

  The Queen and her sister and their train rode out of Poitiers very early in the morning, for once ahead of the King, because the crowds should have been less then. But when the people heard that Eleanor was leaving, although the dawn was just breaking, they flooded into the streets and cheered her all the way to the gate.

  Petronilla traveled at the center of it; she battled the frisky Barbary horse, who spooked in the surging tide of bodies, bounced and tossed his head, his ears wigwagging and his breath exploding from his nostrils. All the while she struggled to hold herself high-headed, straight and proud, the way Eleanor did, to greet the tumult gladly, as Eleanor did.

  This was becoming somewhat easier. When she could take one hand off the reins, she waved, laughing at the mobbed frantic faces screaming a name that wasn’t hers: With some relief, she realized she could do this as well as Eleanor.

  In the wagon behind her, her sister rode comfortably, protected, out of all eyes. What could be wrong in that? She knew she was doing the right thing.

  Once they left the city behind, she motioned de Rançun on ahead, to keep them to a steady pace so that the King’s procession would not catch up. The Barb anyway fussed if she tried to hold him down. Yet she dared not let him step out too freely; she could feel under her in the quick muscular shifting of his body how he would hump his back up if she gave him his head at all, and she knew he wanted more than anything
else to throw her into the nearest ditch. He played endlessly with the bit, trying to work it up between his teeth; the reins had worn blisters into her little fingers.

  Even out on the high road, she was still Eleanor, as whenever anyone saw her, people came rushing up from all sides, shouting and waving. This grew wearisome after a while. She saw ever more clearly the virtue of being only the younger sister. She felt her life seeping away into this false life. The Barb tossed his head, and she realized she was holding him too tight, and she let the reins slide a little through her fingers. He kicked up his heels as soon as he felt that. She stayed in the saddle; she had him mastered now, and he could not throw her off. She laughed, pleased.

  Twenty-two

  Thomas had a mule, and somewhere he had found a smaller, gentler one for Claire; they joined a group of people going north that got larger all through the first day. There was a Flemish merchant with his servants and some pack beasts, a tinker with his pots hanging from his belt, three monks, a Jew on a white donkey, a half dozen palmers, a man leading a string of pack mules. As they went along, some market wives joined them, walking up to the next village, one with a goose under her arm. They spent that first night in an open field, scattered apart under the far-flung stars.

  Thomas said, quietly, “Are you sorry you came?”

  She huddled in her cloak, as near their little fire as she could get without burning; they had brought bread and cheese and there was a little wine left. Across the meadow she could hear the shout of voices at the big fire, where the Flemish merchant and the monks and pilgrims all gathered and were getting drunk.

  She said, “I’m sorry I’m so cold. I’m sorry there’s nowhere to sleep but the ground.” She looked up at him. “I’m not sorry I came.”