We both lay on the floor for a while, momentarily winded and eclipsed, even the great Duke.
‘Oh my God … are you all right, sire?’ asked the Marshal.
He was mortally afraid. It was not good to kill a Duke of Normandy. I could feel the Duke under me examining himself as best he could. At the same time I could hear Juliana struggling with the weapon for a second shot. For some reason I could not move and thought myself struck.
‘I’m alive,’ he said at last, ‘but tell this great lump of a Latiner to move so I can get up. And take that crossbow away from my daughter.’
It takes some time to load a crossbow, even for an experienced archer. Juliana was not going to do it in a hurry. It is near impossible for a woman.
‘Are you all right, Latiner?’ asked the Marshal.
‘I … I’m not sure,’ I replied. ‘I can’t move.’
He looked concerned and examined me more closely, then he laughed.
‘That’s not very nice,’ I said, ‘to laugh at a wounded man.’
‘You are transfixed like a stag by your coat,’ he said.
And so I was. There was no extracting the bolt from the floorboard, so my coat had to be torn. The bolt was left where it had penetrated, still imperceptibly quivering. The Marshal walked across to Juliana where she stood, still struggling to re-load, and reached over to take the crossbow from her.
‘I don’t think you will be needing this any more, my lady,’ he said.
She let him take it, but shot instead a look of pure and furious hatred at her father who had struggled to his feet beside me. It was she who found words first.
‘Get out,’ she said, ‘you and your men, before I find some more reliable way of killing you.’
No one had spoken to the Duke like that before.
‘It is I who should be killing you, Juliana,’ he said, breathing deeply and reddening in the face. ‘You have offended against all the laws of nature, religion, and your country. You have tried to kill your father and liege lord, and would have done so were it not for your Latiner here.’
‘A curse on him,’ she cried. ‘Had he left it a moment later, I would have rid our country of a monster. Basely done, Latiner. Do not speak to me again.’
I had acted instinctively, and now I was indeed regretting it.
‘Marshal,’ commanded the Duke, ‘you see how things are and the depths to which loyalty is fallen here. I command you now to take the Comtesse prisoner and escort her to the dungeons.’
‘No!’ I exclaimed.
The Duke barely glanced at me; he had already forgotten that I had saved his life.
But the Marshal too had his loyalties. He shook his head.
‘No, sire,’ he said, ‘that I cannot do for I would be betraying my loyalty to this house. The lady and her children have suffered grievously at the cruelty of your servants, and it is right that she should feel – as we all felt here – that you had gone too far. This is the castle of the Comte de Breteuil and his lady, and she shall not be arrested in her own home. You came with but few men. I advise you to leave. If you wish to return with your soldiers, so be it. You have seen the warlike spirit of the lady of the house. I promise you we shall show you what the rest of us can do.’
The Duke listened to the Marshal with growing impatience and anger.
‘Traitor,’ he cried. ‘I have you marked now. When I return, which I shall, and take the castle back – for it was mine and will be mine – than I shall have you swinging from the battlements, and I shall tell all who ask that this was a marshal who forgot his duty.’
The Marshal listened to him and smiled.
‘You mistake, my lord Duke,’ he said. ‘Had I been in front and not behind the Latiner, I would have done as he did. We do not wish you dead, but if I cannot show loyalty to my lady, how can you expect me to show loyalty to you?’
‘Chop logic, chop logic,’ said the Duke. ‘By our Lord’s death, you will see some disputation when I return.’
With that he turned on his heel and went back to the hall, calling his several knights around and bidding them leave their dinner and follow him outside. They rose mid-mouthful from the table and proceeded to the marshalsea where their horses waited, still saddled. Soon they could be seen riding at full gallop out of the gatehouse and on towards the road that led to Damville and Ivry.
Juliana turned and without a word or any sign walked into the hall and mounted the great stairs. I did not think it the right moment for me to join her. I smiled at the Marshal.
‘That was brave of you,’ I said.
‘Or bloody stupid.’
‘But you could not have got her beyond the hall. The knights would not have it. There would have been a fight and the Duke’s men, perhaps the Duke himself, really would have been killed. The Duke has a fierce temper, but a little reflection will surely tell him that you did the right thing.’
‘He will return’ said the Marshal. ‘He always wanted this castle back.’
‘And what about Comte Eustace? Will he be back to defend Breteuil?’
‘I do not think so immediately. He has Amaury de Montfort at Pacy, drinking and plotting and talking war. We shall be alone here and cannot match the Duke, but we will fight him while we can. Tomorrow I shall call a muster and we will prepare the castle for siege order.’
‘He wouldn’t really hang you from the battlements?’
‘Oh yes, he would. I saw him do that to Luc de la Barre. Oh no. I mistake. He would have blinded him but Luc jumped from the battlements without a rope round his neck before it could be done. He’ll string you up too, Latiner, if he finds you here when he attacks. You had better make yourself scarce.’
‘I shall remain at Breteuil,’ I assured the Marshal, ‘as long as you and my lady are here.’
‘But the two little girls must go,’ he replied. ‘We can’t have them here, frightened by a little war and, if we are overpowered, at the mercy of the Castellan’s thugs.’
‘True enough. I will speak to the Comtesse and see what she thinks. It would be best if they joined their father for the moment at Pacy. He will see no harm comes to them even if he was the cause of their ruin.’
I left him and went up to Juliana’s chamber. I found her sitting in a chair, still fiddling with the crossbow, and I told her what the Marshal had been saying.
‘The die is cast,’ she said. ‘It is war now. I will not have finished with that man until I have killed him.’
‘Come, Juliana,’ I told her. ‘You cannot kill the Duke. He is the King. If he were simply your father you might do it, but there are too many people, good people, who depend upon their Duke.’
‘Good people like that castellan?’ She laughed derisively.
‘No, but people like my father and the Comtesse Matilda, and many more who are loyal to him, churchmen and yeomen, who value what he has done to bring peace to the country.’
‘I will be revenged on my daughters.’
‘You must first dig two graves. It is another Sicilian saying,’ I said, recalling the words of Brother Paul.
‘Well. So be it. I will die in the attempt if necessary. Who else is to fight their battle?’
‘You should take the girls away to safety,’ I told her, mindful of the Marshal’s advice.
‘I will not leave here until I have faced my father in battle.’
‘It is a battle that you will lose. He has many more men.’
‘I am ready for that.’
I saw that it would be futile to argue further.
‘Let me at least take the girls to Pacy where they will have a nursery and their old nurse to look after them.’
‘And their father to bully them.’
‘He will not do that,’ I told her. ‘Not now.’
‘Are you deserting me, then?’
Before I could answer this, perhaps the most difficult question ever put to me, there was a cry of consternation from somewhere below. Juliana went to the door, I ran to the window, opened it wi
de, and looked down.
Almost immediately beneath me, in the bailey below, lay two little figures spread-eagled on the ground. They were still holding each others’ hands.
‘What is it?’
Juliana finding no answer at the door was looking across at me, the intimation of what I was looking at spreading across her face like the shadow of a cloud racing across the landscape. She knew before I spoke.
‘It’s the girls,’ I said.
I could have done nothing, said nothing, to soften the blow. She sprang to the window, thrusting me aside even as I moved, and took in the scene below. And then she let out a sound that I have only once ever heard since – the noise of a man being drawn, quartered and finally castrated. Half howl, half groan; a sound telling of the deepest pit into which the human animal can fall. I could not face her anguish. I turned and ran downstairs and out into the bailey
Servants were already gathering there. The Marshal’s valet, a knight called Jasper, Ralf the page, a man I had seen before in hall distributing bread, a laundress who had come in from the town with some shirts. It was good to see a woman there among all the men in that place.
I knelt and examined the girls. They were both dead. A sentry appeared, distraught, from his guard duties on the roof.
‘The little girls came up there often. I never thought they could do such a thing. I turned to look at a horseman on the road. And then suddenly they were up there. I ran to stop them, but they were too quick!’
‘You let this happen?’ It was Juliana, raving madly at him. She seized hold of him and beat at his face with her fists until the blood ran. The Marshal did nothing to defend him. Finally, I interposed myself as best I could.
‘It is not his fault,’ I told her. ‘They were going to do it anyway.’
Of course, that was what they had had in mind all along. Their supposed games had all been about escape. They had traced the castle with their hands, and though they were blind, their plan was clear, so clear I should have seen it. I knew the girls. They were intelligent; they could see the life ahead of them. They had no future except sitting by the fire listening to small talk. Their lives had been snatched from them by cruel men, and there was no recourse. There was nothing anyone could do to give them back what they had lost.
So they had decided. They were not going to be pitied, they were not going to be a burden, or an irritation, or have children point at them in later years and talk about the two old piggies in the corner. They were going to go out, holding hands, while people could still remember who they were, the Ladies Marie and Philippine of Breteuil, almost as lovely (people said) as their lovely mother. They had found the place they wanted, the highest point of the battlements, and while the guard commander was handing over to the new squad – inspecting men, checking weapons, passing the time of day, looking at horsemen on the road – they jumped.
They were not held up tiresomely by angels or carried to safety on the back of the castle ravens. No, they plunged to earth, holding hands all the way, and died immediately they hit the Breteuil turf, not even twitching. They were dead, and the best was yet to come.
XLIX
Juliana refused to send news of the girls’ death to her husband or to her father.
‘They have killed my daughters,’ she said. ‘You don’t send funeral invitations to murderers.’
There was something in what she said. We held a little private service in the chapel conducted by the aged temporary Chaplain, and the girls were buried quietly at the southern end of the bailey, in the herb garden, where Juliana put a rosemary bush on each little grave. I wept for them, hiding my tears behind the postern doorway, hoping that no one would come out and see my unmanly distress. Juliana maintained, throughout the funeral, a face as fixed and impervious as the Caen stone of Château Ivry.
Strangely, the girls’ death seemed to lighten the mood within the castle. It was almost as if their presence, alive, was too much to bear. It wasn’t of course. I would far rather they had lived; I know that we could have made their lives worthwhile and interesting. I think that is true.
Juliana did not mention the girls once in the following days but busied herself with the defence of the castle. She carried that crossbow everywhere she went and in her spare moments, primed it, unloaded and primed it again. Her thoughts were on her father and she had him in her sights. She was the equal of any Flemish mercenary.
‘He will not wish to destroy or burn Breteuil,’ she said. ‘He is too greedy to own it again. It will be hard won. And I will wing him if he gets within bowshot this time.’
The Marshal and I exchanged thoughts about the coming siege when she was out of hearing.
‘We cannot hope to hold the bailey,’ he said. ‘Even if we had our full complement, it would be hard, but if we go back beyond the moat to the castle itself, we have some chance of holding out. Sooner or later, the Comte and his friends must come to our aid.’
‘And fight against the Duke?’ I asked. It seemed like treason.
The Marshal laughed. ‘Why not?’ he said. ‘Everyone else does.’
And then he looked serious. ‘I think the women should go,’ he said.
‘Surely the Duke would not permit any outrage?’ I asked.
‘The Duke is in a fury, and the Castellan is not to be trusted. He hates the Comtesse who he thinks blinded his boy.’
‘This feud will go on and on,’ I said. ‘How can we stop it?’
‘It will only be stopped when the final thing happens.’
‘What is the final thing?’
‘The terrible thing that makes anything further pointless.’
‘I will speak to her later about leaving,’ I promised him.
I visited Juliana that evening in her chamber where she was attended by Alice. Seeing them together, one so dark and one so fair, I was reminded of the happy times I had had with them both, and I was unable to speak, because sometimes desire takes you like that. I wondered whether Juliana knew that I had kissed Alice; obviously Alice knew about me and Juliana. She was fiercely loyal to Juliana, but she saw something in me that she wanted, God knows why. She was a naughty girl, and ambitious in her way.
‘The Marshal and I think you should take your women and leave,’ I said. ‘If the Duke’s soldiers take the castle, it could be dangerous for you.’
Juliana raised her chin and looked at me haughtily.
‘Who is going to rape the Duke’s daughter?’ she asked.
‘The Castellan, for a start. I have been in the dungeon’s there. Juliana. They are cruel men.’
‘It may have scared you, little man, but nothing will move me out of here except six pieces of wood.’
‘That was unjust, Juliana.’
‘What do you think, Alice?’ she asked. ‘Am I unjust?’
‘I am not the Duke’s daughter,’ Alice said, thoughtfully, ‘and I would not like to be raped, but at the same time, you are my lady and I shall stay with you. Perhaps we should send the rest of the ladies away, though.’
‘Very well. Tell the Marshal to make arrangements, Latiner. They can go to Pacy and twitter away at Eustace.’
It was a measure of the new Juliana that she should be so derogatory about her people. Once, she might have said it in private, but never in public. All the sensitive, perceptive, amiable parts of her seemed to have closed up. Her armour was on and her visor was down.
Alice gave me an amused, alarmed look. We would be besieged together. The bad news was that we would very likely be killed or worse. There was nothing we could do. The die was cast.
‘What is the final thing?’ I asked Juliana. ‘Whatever you have in mind. Don’t do it?’
I took my leave, and went in search of the Marshal. As I lay in bed that night I wept because I still loved Juliana, and somewhere underneath all that hatred and remorse, I knew she still loved me. Alice, now – she was another matter.
L
Next day, I worked with the Marshal to put the castle into a state of de
fence. The cook was sent into the town to buy extra stores and the assistant-steward rode round the castle’s farms collecting pigs and cattle. Inevitably, news travelled swiftly around the town that the castle was preparing for a siege.
A siege always alarmed the townsfolk because the visiting army would raid it for subsistence and there was always the chance that a raid would spin off into looting, rape, arbitrary punishments, and arson. I don’t say it made the town hostile to us, but it tended to encourage them to hedge their bets.
Breteuil was at a crossroads where the road from Paris to the west crossed the route from the south, from Poitou and Anjou. There was passing trade and regular trade and money to be made from local lace and livestock.
A smokery had been set up in town at the instigation of Juliana, adding to the brewery, lacery, apothecary, tannery, bakeries, butchers and tallow-makers. There were five inns and a brothel. Wars and fighting spoilt the serious business of making money. I noticed little groups of burghers in the streets and marketplace, nervous but purposeful. In one group was the mayor, a fussy little man, but not without his following.
‘We shall have to let them in,’ I heard him say.
I didn’t blame him. The town walls and gates were strong enough to keep out brigands and bogeymen, but it was only a strong castle that could hold out against a determined siege for long. I relayed the general drift of conversation back to the Marshal as we walked together round the bailey
‘The Duke will use the town and the town will use the Duke. No doubt they will wring some concession out of him,’ he said. ‘We will fare better inside the castle itself, once the drawbridge has been pulled up. The moat is deep – all this water around here has its purposes.’
The White Ship Page 25