‘Sir William charged me with showing his lady the sights but after a few visits in the town I thought it best to bring my lady here before she bought up the entire cloth market and bankrupted the English treasury.’
Edward laughed. ‘It’s just as well you rescued her. But you can leave now. I’ll take charge of her. I’m sure you have better things to do than act as a lady’s maid.’
‘Indeed I have, my lord,’ Thomas bowed his head to Edward, recognising a dismissal when he heard one. To me he said, ‘My lady, doubtless I shall see you tomorrow.’
With a slight frown furrowing his forehead, Edward watched Thomas ride away.
‘Do you know Holand well?’
I tried hard not to blush. ‘He is my husband’s steward. He dines in our hall.’
‘Odd choice. Holand is a clever man and had plenty of offers. He could have picked any one of them and yet he chose Montagu.’
‘He’d been of service to William’s father; perhaps he felt some loyalty to the family.’
Edward looked disbelieving.
‘I’m well aware he was the earl’s steward but to serve the son is very peculiar. Montagu hasn’t received his title yet so he’s next to nothing. If Holand wants to advance, and it’s obvious he’s an ambitious man, then he’d have done better to choose someone else. Why Montagu? What’s the attraction?’
‘Perhaps he wanted a position which wasn’t too demanding,’ I said lamely. ‘It must be difficult with his eye. It seems to have been a vicious wound.’
Edward threw back his head and laughed. ‘Has he been spinning you that old tale? You know he can see perfectly well, don’t you? There’s nothing wrong with him but a slight scratch. He told me people let down their guard when they think he’s a wounded hero of the campaign. He said I’d be surprised what he’s learned. It’s the same trick men used in the Scottish wars. I remember my father telling me.’
‘Well he hasn’t fooled me,’ I said stiffly.
It was cold within sight of the sea and despite my warm cloak, I shivered, half-wishing Thomas hadn’t gone without me. Now I would have to wait on Edward’s pleasure and that might be a very long wait indeed. The other men nudged their mounts alongside and tried to engage me in conversation but, with the practised ease of one well-used to serving his prince, John Chandos drew them away leaving me alone with Edward.
‘I’m glad you came, Jeanette.’ Edward’s voice was warm. ‘I hoped you would.’
‘Your father commanded the wives of his men to accompany your lady mother,’ I said, lowering my lashes. ‘It was my duty.’
He made an impatient sound and shook his head as if his father’s command and my dutiful obedience didn’t interest him, only his desire for my presence. I noted his beautifully shaped lips, the long straight nose and the arrogant eyes of a born prince and thought once again how handsome he was.
‘I see you brought Blanchefleur,’ he said.
‘Of course I did,’ I said, stroking her warm neck. ‘I would never be parted from her. She is the loveliest of animals.’
For a moment he just gazed at me, saying nothing. His eyes flickered but his voice, when he spoke, was guileless.
‘You heard of our success?’
‘How could I not have heard?’ I said calmly. ‘They were shouting your praises at every market cross we passed. The victor of Crécy they called you.’
‘You should have been there to see it, Jeanette. By God it was wonderful. Two days of fighting and we had the battlefield strewn with bodies. We killed nine princes of the blood and Christ knows how many others. I stood on a mound of French dead and thought I had gone to Heaven. It was glorious.’
We walked our horses slowly along the path.
‘Did you hear how the King of Bohemia fell?’ he asked.
‘William told me.’
‘He was shouting his war cry as he went down. What a chevalier! Think of it: a blind man riding into the thick of battle. What courage that must have taken.’
He was flushed by his success as if it was his first kill. I remembered the tremulous excitement of a six-year-old Edward on that winter hunt all those years ago and was surprised the blood of the King of Bohemia wasn’t smeared across his face. He might have been fast growing into manhood and learning a taste for war but in many ways he was still a boy.
‘And what now? More battles? A great marriage?’
‘Ah Jeanette, Jeanette. You know I won’t marry if I can’t have you.’
‘Edward, I am married to William,’ I said primly, wondering if, despite our idle flirtation, I would really have wanted to marry Edward.
‘He doesn’t deserve you,’ he said stoutly. ‘My father should never have agreed to the marriage. I told him so. The earl was a great man but the son is dross.’
‘Edward! You mustn’t speak to me of my husband in that way.’
‘I can speak of him in any way I like. You’re not a fool, Jeanette. You know the sort of man they married you to. He’s grudging; he makes mistakes and then whines it is someone else’s fault. The men have no regard for him. They want their captains to have blood in their veins, not piss.’
I recognised his description of William and knew he was right but William was my husband and deserved my respect.
‘Your father will want you wed,’ I said.
‘My father may carry on trying to find me a bride but His Holiness will frustrate him at every turn if he can. I don’t care. I’m not interested in having a wife, I’ve got better things to do.’
After the feast of Candlemas, the days grew warmer but with the warmth came rain. The myriad of streams which ran through the marshes swelled and overflowed and the islands where the hovels stood became swamped by rising water. I longed for an English spring, not this miserable existence on the outskirts of Calais. Several women I knew had already left, disliking the incessant damp and complaining that six months of campaigning had turned their husbands into brutes. But I was determined to stay. Despite William’s occasional disagreeable moods and the constant awkwardness of being in close contact with Thomas Holand, I enjoyed Villeneuve. The last thing I wanted was to be sent back to Bisham.
On the final day of the Shrove feasting I was invited to the Arundel’s house and it was there, in Lady Arundel’s spacious and elegant chamber, I first heard the news about Isabella. She was to marry sixteen-year-old Louis de Male, the new Count of Flanders. The betrothal ceremony would take place shortly at Berghes, a little cloth town across the border into Flanders.
‘This marriage is going to anger the Duke of Brabant very much,’ Eleanor Arundel sighed, gazing round the circle of ladies as if we personally should be able to pacify the irascible duke.
‘Surely he doesn’t want the Lady Isabella for himself?’ I said, remembering the sour-faced duke who had once been our friend but now, it seemed, was our enemy.
Everybody laughed as if I had said something very amusing.
‘No, no,’ said Lady Arundel smothering a smile. ‘The duke doesn’t want the Lady Isabella. He’s after Count Louis; he wants him for his daughter.’
‘I thought our prince was to marry the Duke of Brabant’s daughter,’ said Alice who was seated rather uncomfortably beside Elizabeth, on the padded settle.
‘No,’ sighed Lady Arundel. ‘That betrothal unravelled and now the duke has his eyes on Count Louis.’
‘So the count is very desirable,’ said Alice, blinking in her efforts to understand this tangled web of potential marriages.
‘Yes,’ smiled Lady Arundel. ‘He is the hereditary ruler of Flanders and however much the great men of the towns pretend they hold power, without the count they have no legitimacy. Of course he is desirable.’
‘I wasn’t aware he had expressed a wish to marry the Lady Isabella.’ The Countess of Warwick roused herself from her study o
f the Arundel’s musician strumming his lute in the corner, and rather belatedly joined our discussion.
‘He hasn’t. It is rather the opposite,’ said Lady Arundel. ‘He was raised at the French court and says he won’t marry the daughter of the man who killed his father.’
‘I thought as much,’ said the Countess of Warwick, picking a fig from the bowl. ‘So why is he marrying our Lady Isabella?’
‘It isn’t his choice,’ replied Lady Arundel, clicking her fingers for more wine to be brought. ‘Lord Arundel tells me the great men of Flanders make all the decisions and they want the English marriage. They have the count close-guarded and the council packed with their own men so if the count values his neck, he’ll do as he’s told.’ She leaned closer and said in a voice not much louder than a whisper. ‘It’s said he is watched day and night and can’t even piss without a dozen guards in attendance.’
There was a horrified shriek at this ultimate indignity and a snorting giggle from one of the younger maids who should have known better than to be listening.
‘Poor man,’ I laughed. ‘Has he no friends?’
‘Only the Valois king and he’s in no position to help.’
‘So the count is ours for the taking?’
‘He is, and the king is determined to have him.’
‘I don’t imagine he’ll make a very happy husband,’ said the Countess of Warwick, shifting herself and making her chair creak. ‘Let’s hope the Lady Isabella will be able to manage him.’
‘Of course he’ll be happy,’ snapped Elizabeth who didn’t like the Countess of Warwick any more than she liked me. ‘Why wouldn’t he be?’
I had never seen Isabella look as beautiful as she did on the day she was betrothed to sixteen-year-old Count Louis. Her robe of heavy green silk, embroidered all over with the finest of silver threads and studded with jewels, suited her dark colouring and the delicate golden tissue of her veil accentuated the high cheekbones and delicately reddened lips of a girl who was now on the brink of womanhood.
As I waited in the unbearably overcrowded hall in Berghes where the gift-giving ceremony was taking place, I felt the lightest of touches on my waist.
A familiar voice whispered in my ear. ‘I’ll lay you a wager he bolts. Given half a chance he’ll be down the privy chute.’
Thomas Holand!
I suppressed a giggle at his vulgarity and glanced to make sure William hadn’t heard.
Certainly Louis, the young Count of Flanders, didn’t look like a man embracing marriage joyfully. He had a thin, intelligent face and his body, beneath the glittering finery, was lean and made for sport, but his eyes were hollowed pits. They told you nothing of the inner man and I thought the Countess of Warwick’s warning was timely.
‘The king should have had them wedded and bedded today,’ continued the voice.
I turned my head slightly and whispered back. ‘It’s the season of Lent. The king’s daughter cannot marry in Lent.’
‘People do, as you should well know, my lady.’
I felt the blush rise in my cheeks as I remembered the Lenten dish of dried fish he had once offered me.
I bit my lip and tried to keep my voice steady. ‘The count will honour his word, Sir Thomas. No man would leave his betrothed waiting at the church door.’
‘I hope you’re right,’ he said, ‘because there’ll be a high price to pay if you’re wrong.’
And wrong, I was.
News of the count’s disappearance came two weeks later just as the last seed pearls were being stitched onto Isabella’s magnificent wedding gown.
‘Down the privy chute?’ I gasped in horror.
‘Out hawking,’ said Thomas grimly. ‘The messenger said his masters were sitting idly by, congratulating themselves on having ensnared the English king, while the young man put his falcon up after a heron, shouted “Hoie” and was off across the fields. They fear he has escaped into France.’
In the royal lodgings in Villeneuve the jilted bride screamed with rage and collapsed sobbing onto the floor, while in Flanders Count Louis’s bastard half-brother was accused of plotting rebellion with French money.
‘They say the Flemings wanted him tortured to death in the public square,’ declared our youngest page, his eyes alight with joy at such things.
I gulped and the clerk of the wardrobe gave the boy a swift cuff on the ears. ‘It’s alright, my lady,’ he reassured me. ‘The Margrave of Juliers put a stop to that. Said some respect was surely due to the man’s birth.’
‘What happened?’
‘They took an axe to him. Cut off his head.’
Almost immediately, hostilities broke out as the English and the Flemings attacked French towns on the Flemish border and for three whole months the town of Villeneuve became a stew of rumour and counter-rumour. Reinforcements from England poured across the beaches in their thousands and by the time a pale summer sun began warming the marshes, we faced the possibility of an attack. The Valois had taken possession of his holy flag and was said to be camped with his army a mere ten days’ march to the south.
I wasn’t afraid. I knew we were invincible. Gascony was now ours and only yesterday we heard our men in Brittany had captured the nephew of the Valois king. God’s blessing was with us and nothing could possibly go wrong.
But somewhere in the darkness, Dame Fortune had stretched out her bony fingers and, as if to teach me a lesson that nothing should be taken for granted in this life, had given her wheel the slightest of turns.
Today was the first day of sunshine for many weeks. The sky was a rain-washed blue with a few puffy white clouds floating gently overhead. But I wasn’t deceived and knew it wouldn’t last.
There were two armed men in front of me and two behind as I rode through the town gate with that ever-present reminder of things I would rather forget, Thomas Holand, at my side
My maid clung to the belt of one of Sir Thomas’s lads, yelping foolishly every time the youth’s horse increased the length of its stride. We must have resembled a pretty little cavalcade as we trotted gently along the causeway to the east of the town, waving happily to the men with the vegetable wagons lumbering slowly towards Villeneuve.
Where the road was rutted it was full of puddles and there was still a feeling of damp in the air. Despite the sun, the breeze off the sea was sharp and carried with it the usual smell of salt and various disgusting bits of flotsam. Perhaps there had been a time when these beaches had been smooth and pleasant, washed clean by the swirling waters of the Narrow Sea but the arrival of our army and the constant presence of thousands of men had changed all that.
I had been sitting with my clerk of the wardrobe toiling dutifully over my accounts when Thomas had arrived. He apologised for disturbing our labours but informed me my horse was saddled and the escort waiting so if I would please hurry and call my maid to bring my cloak. I had no idea why he was there as, with the French advancing north, our daily expeditions had long since ceased. I presumed it was at William’s command.
We hadn’t gone far when we turned off the road down a sandy track towards the sea. Blanchefleur slowed as her hooves encountered soft ground. I looked about me but could see no reason why we were heading along this narrow path banked on either side by great dunes of sand and tussocks of grass with only the sound of the gulls and the sea to keep us company.
When we emerged onto the open beach, Thomas commanded the others to remain at the head of the path while he and I walked our horses slowly across the firm sand.
‘Where is Sir William?’ I said, my words blowing away on the wind.
‘Round at the harbour with the Earl of Warwick.’
‘But I thought…’
‘Did you?’ He smiled, but not, I noticed, with his eyes.
‘Are we not going to see Sir William?’
‘No. We are going to take a walk on the beach.’
The look on his face was serious and I wondered what he wanted. I didn’t trust him when we were alone with no other company.
‘Why the beach? Surely we could walk in the town.’
‘I need to talk to you and what I have to say is better said here where we cannot be overheard or interrupted.’
‘What could you possibly have to say to me which requires a windy beach with sand blowing in my eyes?’
He laughed and slid from his saddle. ‘Come down here and we’ll go and sit among the dunes. It’ll be warmer there and out of the wind.’
I looked doubtful and didn’t move.
‘I promise you’ll be perfectly safe.’
‘Oh very well,’ I said most ungraciously.
He lifted me down, holding me a moment until I was steady on my feet and then offered me his arm.
I certainly wasn’t going to touch him, not here with the inviting privacy of the dunes just ahead and our escort out of earshot.
‘I prefer to walk on my own, thank you.’
‘As you wish.’
He led the horses a short way into the dunes where we couldn’t be seen by anyone. In a little hollow, he took off his cloak and spread it on the ground, indicating that I should sit. I was very suspicious of his intentions and felt a slight frisson of something which I thought might be the cold, but it wasn’t and I knew it wasn’t.
I sat at the outer edge of the cloak about as far away from him as I could. He smiled at my deliberate decision, measured a distance with his foot and sat down at the other side.
‘Comfortable?’
‘Yes, thank you.’
‘Warm enough?’
‘Yes, thank you.’
In truth I felt rather uncomfortable, sitting here alone with a man who wasn’t my husband. If William knew he would justifiably be very angry indeed.
‘I know you have much to occupy your thoughts, my lady,’ said Thomas Holand, ignoring my lack of interest, ‘but have you ever wondered where my brother, Otho, is?’
The Fair Maid of Kent Page 25