He looked downcast for a moment, but then he said, “Since you are more than aware of my king’s behavior, chérie, you should be in no danger. Crispin tells me that your mama is a good friend of both your king and your queen. Would it not be of value to you to make a friend of France’s king?”
Philippa laughed. “To what purpose, Guy-Paul? If I do not allow myself to be seduced I shall offend King Francois. And I most certainly would not allow myself to be tempted by any man other than my husband, who is your cousin. Do you think that Crispin would approve of your pandering his wife to the king of France?”
The comte de Renard looked deeply offended at her words. “One never knows, madame,” he said, “when one will need a friend in high places. If not for yourself, then for your family. You will have children one day. And Crispin tells me that your mother is involved quite successfully in the merchant trade. Are not your friends her friends? Could having a king of France as an acquaintance not be of help to you one day?”
“I would say you speak wisdom, were I not suspicious of your motives, Guy-Paul. Why on earth would the king of France want to meet me except for the purpose of seduction? And why would you offer up your cousin’s wife to him?”Yet, Philippa thought, if she could make a friend of this king without compromising her virtue it might be of value to her family one day Would it really hurt to attempt such a thing? She didn’t have to succumb to a seduction, after all.
“Madame, you are far too suspicious of me, and I am hurt that you would be. I offer you, an English country girl if the truth be known, the opportunity to meet a king of great renown. What stories you will have to tell your children and your grandchildren one day. That a king of France admired you. That he sought to seduce you, and you resisted, yet kept his friendship. And yes, my king will owe me a small debt for bringing him the beautiful woman he admired. But he would never put your refusal at my door. He is not that kind of man. And you, I believe, are clever enough to keep his amity and goodwill, which cannot do harm to Crispin.”
Philippa was forced to laugh. “You are, I think, a very bad man, Guy-Paul St. Claire. You reason as well as Thomas More, although he is far more godly than you are or will ever be. If I agreed to meet King Francois, when and where would it be?”
The comte de Renard struggled to contain his glee. He had believed that by appealing to her intellect and her devotion to her family he would eventually bring her around to his way of thinking. Yet there was a moment he thought she might refuse him.
“I will not meet him at night,” Philippa quickly said. “And it must be sometime when Crispin is otherwise occupied. He would forbid me, as you are well aware. Then I would be angry, and probably do something foolish,” she finished with a small smile. “Better I tell him after the fact than before it that I have met your king. And he might be angry at you, Guy-Paul. Have you considered that?”
“Perhaps one afternoon after the jousting, and before the evening’s entertainment,” the comte suggested helpfully. He ignored her other words.
“Aye, that would be a good time,” Philippa answered him. “Crispin is usually with his gentlemen friends then.”
“I shall arrange everything,” Guy-Paul said smoothly. He quickly took her hand and kissed it. “Be as charming with him as you have been with me, and King Francois will be enchanted by you, ma chère cousine.”
“I do not wish him to be enchanted,” Philippa said. “I shall meet your king privately, say the right things, and then remove myself from his presence lest he gain the wrong idea of why I am with him. Now go away, for the queen, I can see, is curious as to why we have been in conversation so long. I can hardly repeat our words, now can I?”
While the French king had been visiting Queen Katherine, King Henry had gone to visit the French queen, Claude. He was equally amused, diverted, and dined. Returning home, he met Francois along the way. The two kings stopped for a few moments, each praising the other’s wife, and saying how well they had been treated during their visit. Then, embracing, they continued on their way.
More banquets followed, with Henry celebrating the French knights and Francois entertaining the English knights. One night the two kings dined together in a hall lined in rose-pink silk brocade. On another night Cardinal Wolsey hosted a great feast in honor of the French queen dowager, Louise of Savoy. She was actually far more powerful at the French court than her quiet daughter-in-law, Queen Claude. When the French king was not jousting, or feasting, or flirting with other beautiful women, he was with his mother. He greatly valued her judgment. She considered him a Caesar for this age in which they were now living, and spurred him on in all his ambitions.
The banquets were lavish, with a huge variety of fresh foods and excellent French and Italian wines. The Venetian ambassador was quite shocked by the great capacity that the English women seemed to have for wine. The royal cooks on both sides of the valley worked hard to outdo one another in their menus. Those at the high board, however, usually dined before arriving at these banquets in order that they might talk among themselves during the meal while their courtiers feasted.
Each day was filled with jousting upon a great field that had been created for just this event. It measured nine hundred feet by three hundred and twenty feet in size. On either side of the field grandstands for the royalty and their guests had been built. Two trees of honor, one bearing the hawthorn emblem of King Henry and the other the raspberry leaf emblem of King Francois, were set up. Each of these delusory trees stood thirty-four feet high. Each day the knights entering the lists hung their shields upon these trees, with each king’s shield hung at exactly the same level to show their equality. The rules of protocol had been agreed upon by a council of French and English knights. Swords and lances would be blunted. Even the style of armor was agreed to beforehand.
Stablemen, armorers, and blacksmiths were in the employ of both sides of combatants. They were kept busy repairing the damaged swords and broken lances of the knights who tilted and jousted each day. And in between these jousts, the knights and their squires engaged in all manner of games. By some miracle there was no violence between the English and the French except on the playing field.
It was agreed that the two kings would run the same number of courses and break the same number of lances, although it was decided before the games began that Henry and Francois would not compete against each other. The jousting was so wild and turbulent that at one point sparks flew off of King Henry’s armor. He sprained his hand, and a horse died under him. King Francois managed to get a black eye in his own fray.
Diplomacy was almost lost on the afternoon of June thirteenth when, at a wrestling match between men from the Yeomen of the Guard and some Bretons, Henry challenged Francois to a similar bout. He was thrown by the French king, and while honor demanded that Francois offer Henry another round, his own courtiers wisely prevented it. Henry, however, regained his dignity that afternoon, besting his French rival several times during an archery contest. Francois was no archer, but Henry was quite expert at the sport. Still Francois was aware that Henry, while smiling and charming, was not placated quite yet. Accompanied by two of his own gentlemen, he arrived at the king’s tent several days later before Henry arose, and offered to serve his fellow monarch as valet.
The English king was well pleased by this seeming mark of respect. He complimented Francois, saying the Frenchman had shown him the kind of trust that they should both have in each other. He gifted his fellow monarch with a great collar of bloodred rubies, and received in return a bracelet of diamonds worth at least double. Everyone’s feelings were now well and properly soothed.
The weather had turned unusually hot for mid-June, and on several days the winds blew fiercely. The uninvited were beginning to cause problems, wandering drunkenly about the English encampment, vomiting their surfeit of wine, and collapsing by the fountain from which it poured. The crowds coming to watch the jousting every day grew huge, numbering over ten thousand at one point. It was a dangerous sit
uation, but the provost marshal of the field was unable to control it.
It was on one of those fearsome hot afternoons that Guy-Paul St. Claire greeted Philippa as she stepped from the grandstand where the English sat. “Are you free to walk with me?” he asked her cordially
“Your highness, this is my husband’s cousin, Monsieur le Comte de Renard,” Philippa said to the queen. “If you do not need me I would stroll with him.”
“Of course, my child,” the queen replied. Her eyes briefly touched the Frenchman, and she barely nodded. “I will see you at the banquet tonight.”
Philippa curtseyed. “Thank you, your highness,” she replied, and then taking Guy-Paul’s arm, she moved off with him.
“I wonder if the earl of Witton knows he has a French cousin,” one of the queen’s women said meanly. “He is well named, for he looks like a fox.”
The other women laughed.
“He is indeed the earl’s cousin,” the queen said quietly. “Philippa has told me of him. She was not aware of her husband’s French relations until they arrived here. I think, Alice, that you need to spend more time at prayer asking God and his blessed Mother to help you in curbing your wicked tongue. Of all the ladies who have ever served in my household, only two can be said to be truly virtuous, and one of them is Philippa Meredith. Confess your sin to one of the priests, and do penance, Alice, before you come into my presence again.” Then the queen turned her back on the woman.
Philippa meanwhile found herself escorted through the crowds that had come to watch today’s contests. Her companion discreetly ushered her into the tent the French king used to prepare for the jousts. There Francois, bare-chested and in his haut-de-chausses, was being sponged down by a servant as he sat upon a three-legged stool. He looked up as they entered, smiling somewhat toothily, Philippa thought.
“Madame la comtesse, it is kind of you to come and visit me,” he said. He stood up, and the water sluiced down his broad chest. He was very, very tall. Very masculine.
Philippa took a step back. “Monseigneur le roi.” She curtseyed. “You fought well today, and I see the eye is healing nicely.” Out of the comer of her own eye she could see that Guy-Paul had disappeared, and she knew that she had been foolish to allow him to goad her into coming. What had she been thinking? She knew better than to expect that a brief rendezvous with anyone could be of value to her or her family. Now she stood in danger of doing damage to herself and her husband. She had allowed Guy-Paul to taunt her into this foolishness, and now she must find a way out of the situation.
The French king waved his servant away and took Philippa’s hand in his, raising it slowly to his lips, kissing it, but not releasing it. “I singled you out that day at the queen’s banquet. Of all the English ladies you were the most elegant. Why do your countrywomen dress so dowdily? Do they not wish to be admired?” His black eyes plunged into the shadowed valley between her breasts.
Philippa felt almost violated by the look. She could feel the heat in it, but she knew better than to disclose her feelings. “I have been fortunate in having a relation who has a great flair for style. He has taught me how to dress, although he says I have the proper instincts for garb and for color. I do not know what I should do without the good counsel of my uncle Thomas. Few women could wear this particular shade of yellow.”
“And this oncle has also taught you about jewelry?” He touched the pearls she was wearing. “These are most fine, madame la comtesse.” And his fingers casually brushed the tops of her breasts, lingering just a moment too long.
“Uncle Thomas says I have an instinct for good jewels as well,” she said with charming understatement, fighting back a shudder of distaste. This king repelled her.
The French king laughed. “And what other instincts do you have, madame?” he purred at her, as his arm snaked out to draw her against him.
His body was damp. His male scent filled her nostrils. His dark eyes were mesmerizing, and her own eyes widened at his quick attempt at seduction. Philippa suddenly felt like a little rabbit cornered by a rather large hound. She swallowed hard and then, putting her palms against the king of France’s bare chest, she pushed him gently but firmly away. “Oh, monseigneur,” she said, “you are so strong, and I am but a weak woman. Yet I am newly wed, and I would not shame my husband. Forgive me!” She quickly fell to her knees and looked up at him, her hands held out imploringly. “I should not have come, but the honor of having been noticed by your majesty rendered me, I fear, foolish. I am really just a country girl, monseigneur. And I am ashamed that I shall have to confess my wicked behavior to my mistress, the queen’s, priest.” Her head drooped, and she managed to squeeze a tear from her eyes.
“But not to your husband?” Francois murmured, amused.
“Ohh, I dare not!” Philippa cried. “He would surely beat me.”
“If you were mine, madame la comtesse, and looked at another man, I think I should beat you too,” the king remarked. Then he raised her. “Go back to your husband, madame, but rest easy that your unfortunate inclination towards chastity has kept you from any real sin. I have never found it necessary to force a woman.” He kissed her lips quickly, chuckling at her surprise. “I could not resist, chérie, and I shall claim a dance from you tonight as compensation for my great disappointment.” He bowed to her.
Philippa curtseyed prettily and fled the tent, silently thanking her lucky stars that she had been able to escape him unscathed. What a little fool she had been to even consider a tête-à-tête with the French king. The man’s reputation as a lover more than preceded him. But Guy-Paul had been correct. She was clever, and her little performance had indeed fooled the king. She had escaped with her virtue still intact. And then she stopped. Where was she? She hadn’t paid a great deal of attention to where they were going when Guy-Paul brought her from the spectator’s seat. She was lost. And although it was late afternoon and the sun would not set for several more hours, the light between the tents was not strong. And the wind was blowing the dust up again, making it nearly impossible to see where she was going.
Well, she thought, if she walked to the end of the row of tents surely she would be able to see the field, and then she might find her way back to the English side. The line of tents seemed to go on forever. She came to the end of the row only to find another row before her, and the path straight before her ended. Should she go right? Or should she go left? She tried to remember in which direction the camps had been placed. The English camp was set to the west. She turned left, and continued walking. When she came to the end of this corridor of tents she was faced once again with the decision of which way to turn. She stopped to consider it very carefully. This was worse than any garden maze. Right! She should turn to the right. She could hear the noise of the crowds still milling about the field, and all she wanted to do was reach that field. These damned tents couldn’t go on forever even if it seemed they did. She was a woman alone, in the opposite camp. Damn Guy-Paul! He should have waited for her, but then he had thought his master would be successful in his seduction. She would never speak to him again! But she would have to, if she was to keep this unfortunate incident she had created from her husband’s knowledge. But should she? God’s bloody wounds! Where was the jousting field? What if it got dark? How would she find her way then?
Finally she saw the field ahead of her, and relief poured through her veins. But there was a group of knights standing talking to one another. Caution bade her move over just one row in order to avoid passing them. They were French, and she didn’t choose to place herself in the position of being accosted by a group of ordinary knights. Especially when she had just turned down their king, Philippa considered with a small chuckle. Then she saw a smaller group of men ahead of her. They were clustered in a small knot, but they were not knights. She wondered if she should consider them dangerous. She thought she should be safe, especially with the knights just a row over. The wind was higher now, and the dust began to blow. Philippa had to stop, for she cou
ld see nothing ahead of her now in the yellow brown haze. She knew she was practically upon the men ahead, yet she was suddenly fearful of moving forward under the circumstances.
And then her brain focused, shocked at the conversation she overheard. They were planning to kill someone. They were planning to kill Henry Tudor! She froze, terrified, for a long moment. What had she stumbled upon, and what could she do about it? And then Philippa realized that she was in the gravest danger of being killed herself. She would have to be extremely clever to extricate herself from this dangerous situation.
Her throat was so tight she didn’t think she could swallow. She was in fact barely breathing. Her legs felt like jelly beneath her. Philippa forced herself to be perfectly still, and then she drew a long, deep breath. And another. And another. Her aching throat eased and opened, allowing her to swallow. She had to be brave if she was to get through this and warn the king. Pressing herself back into the shadows of the tent, Philippa listened carefully.
Chapter 17
She could not see the men who spoke so easily of murdering King Henry. And fortunately they could not see her. But when the dust storm subsided and they did see her, would they realize she had overheard them? She listened more closely. Her French was excellent, but these men spoke it with some sort of local dialect. She could understand them, but only barely.
“It is agreed then?” a rough voice said.
“It is agreed. They will all be there in the same place at the same time. It is too good an opportunity for us to pass by, mes amis. We shall never again have such a chance. Instead of the cursed English always troubling us with their claims on France, we shall claim England. With the upstart Tudor, his pious Spanish wife, and the fat cardinal out of the way, our king will take custody of the princess Marie who is betrothed to our own Dauphin, and England will be ours in the chaos that follows these deaths. When the king learns what we have done for him we will all be well rewarded.”
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