The Poisoned Crown

by Maurice Druon

  The King had sent two councillors, Guillaume Flotte and Guillaume Paumier, to counsel appeasement and negotiate a new conference at Compiègne. The allies accepted the conference in principle, but hardly had the two Guillaumes left the meeting than an emissary from Robert of Artois arrived, breathless and sweating from his long gallop. He brought the barons news: Countess Mahaut, surrounding her journey with great secrecy, was coming to Artois herself; and would be at the Manor of Vitz, staying with Denis d’Hirson, on the following day.

  When Jean de Fiennes had made this news public, Souastre cried, ‘We know now, my lords, what we have to do.’

  That night the roads of Artois rang with the sound of horses’ hooves and the clank of arms.

  2

  The Countess of Poitiers

  THE GREAT TRAVELLING COACH, carved, painted, and gilded, trundled beneath the trees. It was so long that it sometimes had to manoeuvre to turn the corners, and the men of the escort had often to dismount to push it up the hills.

  Though the huge oaken box was springless, the jolting of the road was not too uncomfortable because of the heaped rugs and cushions. There were six women inside it, almost as if in a room, gossiping, playing at knuckle-bones, or riddles. The low branches could be heard scraping along the leathern hood.

  Jeanne of Poitiers drew aside the curtain, which was embroidered with fleurs-de-lys and the three golden castles which were the arms of the Artois family.

  ‘Where are we?’ she asked.

  ‘We are skirting Authie, Madam,’ replied Beatrice d’Hirson. ‘We have just passed through Auxi-le-Château. Within the hour we shall be at Vitz, at my Uncle Denis’s, who is expecting us and will be delighted to see you again. And perhaps Madame Mahaut will already be there with your husband.’

  Jeanne of Poitiers gazed out at the countryside, the still green trees, the fields in which the peasants were making a thin gleaning under a brilliant sun, for, as often happens after wet summers, the weather had turned fine towards the end of September.

  ‘Madame Jeanne, I implore you, don’t look out of the coach all the time,’ Beatrice went on. ‘Madame Mahaut has strongly advised you not to show yourself while we are in Artois.’

  But Jeanne could not help it. To gaze about her was all she had done during the eight days since she had come out of prison. As starving men stuff themselves with food, thinking that they can never have enough, she was once more taking possession of the universe through her eyes. The leaves on the trees, the fleecy clouds, a church steeple rising in the distance, the flight of a bird, the grass on a bank, all appeared to her in a guise of surpassing splendour because she was free.

  When the doors of the Castle of Dourdan had opened in front of her, and the captain of the garrison, bowing low, had wished her a good journey and said how honoured he felt to have had her for guest, Jeanne had been seized with a sort of vertigo.

  ‘Shall I ever get used to being free again?’ she wondered.

  In Paris she met with a disappointment. Her mother had had to leave hastily for Artois. But she had left her the travelling coach, several ladies-in-waiting and numerous servants.

  While tailors, dressmakers, and embroiderers rapidly reconstructed her wardrobe, Jeanne had taken advantage of the several days’ delay to enjoy the capital in Beatrice’s company. She felt like a stranger who had arrived from the other end of the world, and was astonished by all she saw. The streets! She never tired of the spectacle of the streets. The booths in the Mercers’ Gallery, the shops on the Goldsmiths’ quay! She longed to touch everything, to buy everything. While still maintaining the somewhat distant, controlled manner which had always been hers, her eyes shone, and her body reacted with sensual pleasure to the touch of brocades, pearls, and gold knick-knacks. And yet she could not forget that she had wandered among these same booths with Marguerite of Burgundy, Blanche, and the brothers Aunay.

  ‘In prison I often swore that if ever I were free I would not waste my time upon frivolous things,’ she said to herself. ‘Besides, in the old days I did not really care for them so much! What has caused in me this sudden, uncontrollable urge?’

  She gazed long at the women’s dresses, taking note of the new details of fashion, the shape head-dresses, gowns, and surcoats had assumed that year. She sought to read in men’s eyes whether she was still capable of pleasing them. The unspoken compliments she received, the way young men turned their heads to gaze after her, were utterly reassuring. She found a hypocritical excuse for her coquetry. ‘I need to know,’ she thought, ‘whether I still possess the power of charming my husband.’

  And indeed she had come from her sixteen months of imprisonment physically unimpaired. The regimen at Dourdan was in no way comparable to that of Château-Gaillard. Jeanne was a little paler than she used to be, but this was in a sense an improvement, since her freckles had disappeared. Under the false tresses coiled about her ears – ‘Women with poor hair always wear them,’ Beatrice d’Hirson had told her reassuringly – her neck, the most beautiful neck in the Kingdom, still supported with all its old grace the little head with the high cheekbones and the blue eyes slightly tilted towards the temples. Her walk had all the supple grace of the pale grey-hounds of Barbary. Jeanne did not much resemble her mother, except in her robust health, and in appearance took after the family of the late Count Palatine, who had been a most elegant lord.

  Now that she was almost arrived at the end of her journey, Jeanne found her impatience increasing; these last hours seemed to her longer than all the past months. Were not the horses going more slowly? Could not the postillions be urged on?

  ‘Oh, Madam, I long to get to the journey’s end too, but not for the same reason as yours,’ said one of the ladies-in-waiting, sitting at the other end of the coach.

  The lady, who was called Madame de Beaumont, was six months gone. The journey was becoming painful to her; from time to time she lowered her eyes to her stomach while uttering so heavy a sigh that the other ladies could not help laughing.

  Jeanne of Poitiers asked Beatrice in a low voice, ‘Are you sure that my husband has formed no other attachment during all this time? You haven’t lied to me?’

  ‘No, Madam, I assure you. And moreover, had Monseigneur of Poitiers turned his attention towards other women he could no longer think of them now, having drunk the philtre that will make him entirely yours. You know it was he who asked the King for your freedom.’

  ‘Even if he has a mistress, I shan’t care. I’ll get accustomed to it. A man, even if one has to share him, is better than prison,’ Jeanne said to herself. Once again she drew back the curtains as if this might of itself quicken the pace.

  ‘I beseech you, Madam,’ said Beatrice a second time, ‘don’t show yourself so much. We aren’t much liked in this neighbourhood at the moment.’

  ‘And yet the people seem friendly enough. These peasants saluting us look charming,’ replied Jeanne.

  She let the curtain fall back into place. She did not see that, as soon as the coach had passed, three of the peasants who had bowed so low ran into the undergrowth to get their horses and gallop away.

  A moment later the coach entered the courtyard of the Manor of Vitz; the Countess of Poitiers’s patience was put to a new test. Expecting to fall into her mother’s arms, and above all prepared to greet her husband, Jeanne was met by Denis d’Hirson with the news that neither the Countess of Artois nor the Count of Poitiers had arrived but were waiting for her at the Castle of Hesdin, fifteen miles to the north. Jeanne turned pale.

  ‘What does this mean?’ she said to Beatrice apart. ‘One might suspect a feint so as not to see me?’

  Suddenly she was assailed by acute anxiety. This journey, the pint of blood that had been taken from her arm, the philtre, the respect paid her by the Chief Gaoler at Dourdan, were they not all part of an act in which Beatrice was the chief villain? After all, Jeanne had no proof that her husband had sent for her. Were they perhaps not in process of simply moving her from one prison to an
other, while surrounding this transference, for reasons peculiar to themselves, with all the appearance of freedom? Provided they had not – and Jeanne trembled at the thought – decided to assassinate her, having taken the precaution to show her free and pardoned both in Paris and in Artois. Beatrice had told her the circumstances in which Marguerite of Burgundy had died. Jeanne wondered whether they were not going to make away with her too, merely surrounding her death with different circumstances.

  This was so much on her mind that she could not do justice to the meal that Denis d’Hirson set before her. The happiness of the last eight days had been suddenly replaced by appalling anxiety, and she tried to read her fate on the faces of those present. The beautiful Beatrice and the Treasurer, her uncle, seemed to have a perfect understanding between them; their embraces at meeting had endured longer than was normal even between relations. And there were two lords there, the squires of Liques and Nédonchel, who had been presented to Jeanne as her escort as far as Hesdin. They appeared somewhat embarrassed. Were they perhaps not also charged with some frightful deed to be carried out on the road?

  No one spoke to Jeanne of her imprisonment; indeed, everyone affected to ignore the fact that she had ever been in prison, and this in itself she found scarcely reassuring. The conversation, of which she understood but little, was entirely concerned with the situation in Artois, with the ancient customs which were at stake, with the conference at Compiègne which the King’s envoys had proposed, and with the insurrection fomented by Souastre, Caumont, and Jean de Fiennes.

  ‘Madam, did you notice any excitement on the road or any assembly of armed men?’ Denis d’Hirson asked Jeanne.

  ‘I noticed nothing of the kind, Messire Denis,’ she replied, ‘and the countryside looked perfectly peaceful.’

  ‘Nevertheless, I have information of activity yesterday and throughout the night; two of our provosts were attacked this morning.’

  Jeanne was more and more inclined to believe that these were only words uttered to dispel her fears. She felt as though an invisible net were being drawn tightly round her. She wondered how she might escape. But where should she go? Who could help her? She was alone, appallingly alone, and she gazed round upon the assembled company without seeing anyone who might be a possible ally.

  The pregnant lady-in-waiting was eating with extraordinary greed and still continued to sigh heavily as she contemplated her swollen stomach.

  ‘I assure you, Messire Denis, that the Countess Mahaut will be forced to yield,’ said the Lord of Nédonchel, who had long teeth, a yellow face, and stooping shoulders. ‘Use your influence on her. She’ll have to compromise. Difficult though it is to say it to you, she will have to part with your brother or at least pretend to, for the allies will never treat with her so long as he remains Chancellor. And, I assure you, we’re risking everything in being faithful to the Countess while pretending to act with the other barons. The longer she delays, the more her nephew Robert will gain ascendancy over people’s minds.’

  At this moment a sergeant-at-arms, breathless and bare-headed, came running into the dining hall.

  ‘What’s the matter, Cornillot?’ asked Denis d’Hirson.

  Sergeant Cornillot whispered a few abrupt words in Denis d’Hirson’s ear. The latter immediately turned pale, dashed away the cloth which covered his knees, and leapt from his bench, saying, ‘One moment, Messeigneurs, I’m called away.’

  He dashed through one of the little doors in the hall, with Cornillot hot on his heels. He was heard shouting, ‘My sword, bring me my sword!’

  Then he was heard running down the stairs.

  A moment later, while the diners were still lost in surprise, a great clamour rose in the courtyard. It was as if a whole army had galloped into it. A dog, whom someone had doubtless kicked, was howling lugubriously. Liques and Nédonchel rushed to the windows, while the Countess of Poitiers’s ladies-in-waiting took refuge in a corner like so many guinea-hens. Only Beatrice d’Hirson and the pregnant lady, who had turned ghastly pale, remained near Jeanne.

  ‘It’s a surprise attack,’ Jeanne of Poitiers said to herself. Seeing how Beatrice had drawn close to her and how her hands trembled, Jeanne realized that she was certainly not in league with the attackers. This, however, did not materially improve the situation, and in any case there was but little time for thought.

  The door flew open and twenty barons, with Souastre and Caumont at their head, entered with drawn swords, shouting, ‘Where’s the traitor? Where’s the traitor? Where’s he hiding?’

  They stopped, somewhat disconcerted by what they saw. There were several reasons for their surprise. In the first place Denis d’Hirson, whom they had been certain of finding, was absent. He seemed to have disappeared as if behind a magician’s veil. Then the crowd of screaming, swooning women, all herded together and certain of being raped. And above all, the presence of Liques and Nédonchel, whom they believed to be on their side; at Saint-Pol the day before, these two lords had been among those summoned, and now they found them here, seated at dinner in a house belonging to the opposite camp.

  The turncoats were grossly insulted; they were asked what they had made out of their perjury, whether they had sold themselves to Hirson for thirty pieces of silver; and Souastre hit Nédonchel’s long yellow face with his iron gauntlet so that he bled from the mouth.

  Liques made an attempt to explain matters and to justify himself.

  ‘We came here to plead your cause; we wished to avert useless death and destruction. We could have achieved more by the spoken word than you can achieve with your swords.’

  They swore at him and forced him to be silent. From the courtyard came the clamour of the other ‘allies’ who were waiting there. They amounted to at least a hundred.

  ‘Don’t mention my name,’ Beatrice whispered to the Countess of Poitiers, ‘because it’s my uncle they’re in search of.’

  The pregnant lady had a fit of hysterics and fell back upon her bench.

  ‘Where is the Countess Mahaut? She must listen to us! We know she’s here, we followed her coach,’ cried the barons.

  Jeanne of Poitiers began to realize that these insurgents were not looking specially for her, and that it was not her life they sought. Her first feeling of terror passed, anger took its place; in spite of the sixteen months she had spent in prison, the Artois blood boiled once more in her veins with all its inherited violence.

  ‘I am the Countess of Poitiers and it is I who have been travelling in my mother’s coach,’ she cried. ‘And I take exception to your entering so noisily the house in which I happen to be staying.’

  As the insurgents did not know that she had come out of prison, this unexpected announcement temporarily silenced them. They were meeting with surprise upon surprise. Those who had had the opportunity of seeing Jeanne in the past now recognized her.

  ‘Would you please tell me your names,’ Jeanne went on, ‘for I am not accustomed to speaking with people whose names I do not know, and I find it difficult to recognize you beneath your harness of war.’

  ‘I am the Lord of Souastre,’ replied the leader with the thick red eyebrows, ‘and this is my comrade Caumont; and here are Saint-Venant and Jean de Fiennes, and Messire de Longvillers; and we are looking for the Countess Mahaut.’

  ‘What!’ interrupted Jeanne. ‘Do I hear the names of gentlemen! I would not have expected it from your manner towards ladies, whom it would behove you better to protect rather than attack! Look at Madame de Beaumont, who is in the last stages of pregnancy, and whom you have sent into a swoon. Aren’t you ashamed of yourselves?’

  A certain indecision became apparent among the barons. Jeanne was a beautiful woman, and they were abashed by the way she confronted them. Besides, she was the King’s sister-in-law and seemed to have regained his favour. Arnaud de Longvillers assured her that they wished her no harm, that they had a grudge against Denis d’Hirson alone, because he had sworn that he would deny his brother and had not kept his oath.
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  In fact, they had hoped to catch Mahaut in the trap and coerce her by force; and now they felt somewhat sheepish that their plan had misfired. Some of them, remounting their horses, went off to search the countryside for the Treasurer, while others, to avenge their discomfiture, sacked the house.

  For an hour and more the Manor of Vitz resounded to the noise of banging doors, splintering furniture and breaking china. The tapestries and hangings were pulled from the walls; they looted the silver from the tables.

  Then, somewhat calmer though still threatening, the insurgents made Jeanne and her ladies get into the great golden coach; Souastre and Caumont took command of the escort, and the coach started down the road to Hesdin surrounded by the clanking steel of the warriors’ coats of mail.

  Thus the allies were certain of reaching the Countess of Artois.

  As they left the town of Ivergny, which was about two and a half miles on their road, there was a halt. They had caught Denis d’Hirson as he was attempting to cross the Authie among the marshes. He was covered with mud, wounded, bleeding, and laden with chains on hands and feet. He was stumbling along between two barons on horseback.

  ‘What are they going to do to him? What are they going to do to him?’ Beatrice murmured. ‘How they’ve ill-used him!’

  And in a low voice she began to repeat curious prayers which made no sense either in Latin or in French.

  After a good deal of argument, the barons agreed to keep him as a hostage, and shut him up in a neighbouring castle. But their murderous fury had need of a victim. They had no difficulty in finding one.

  Sergeant Cornillot had been taken at the same time as Denis. It was his misfortune that, ten days earlier, he had himself arrested Souastre and Caumont. As his life was worth nothing in ransom, it was decided to put him to death on the spot. But it was necessary that his execution should serve as an example and give all Mahaut’s agents pause for thought. Some wanted to hang him, others to break him on the wheel, others again to bury him alive. Rivalling each other in cruelty, they discussed the manner of his death in his presence, while Cornillot, upon his knees, his face pouring with sweat, screamed that he was innocent and besought them to spare him. Souastre found a compromise to which everyone, except the condemned man, could agree.