‘And I in yours, Donnina Visconti,’ he replied. He had consistently refused to address her by her married name.
Hawkwood regretted the exchange had taken place. He admitted to himself that, for some months now, he had been aware of his own shortcomings as a father. His daughter Antiocha must be – what? – almost ten by now, and he had never seen her, never even corresponded with her. What must she think of him? Indeed, did she think of him at all? Did she even know who her father was? Or, for that matter, where he was and what he did?
Time and again, his thoughts turned to England. Would he ever again see the country of his birth? Would he ever see Hawkwood Manor again? Had England changed as much as he himself had changed?
These and similar questions could not be answered by the scant reports received at third hand from new recruits to the Company. What could those recruits know of the England he had known and loved?
Windsor Castle
22 May 1369
Edward III, King of England and aspirant to the throne of France, stood at the window and looked out over Windsor Great Park, reflecting on his life and times.
He had been on the throne since 1327 when, as a mere stripling of fourteen, he had been obliged to step into his father’s shoes on the latter’s abdication. But his reign had not started in earnest until three or four years later, when he had at last cut himself loose from his French-born mother Isabella’s apron strings and rid himself for good of John Mortimer, Earl of March, who had conspired against Edward’s father and been an instrument of the latter’s overthrow.
Edward sipped from a goblet of his favourite claret as he recalled the highs and lows of his reign. By the grace of God, he thought, it had all started so well. He had brought the perfidious Scots to heel at the battle of Halidon Hill in 1333, paying them back in their own currency for the ignoble defeat suffered by his father at Bannockburn. Yet he harboured a strong suspicion that his judgment might have been flawed when he decided to move against the French some four years later. God knows, he told himself, I had reason enough at the time: the Gascon question had been a perennial thorn in England’s side, Brittany was a bone of contention gnawed in turns by England and France, and Flanders was, well, Flanders – a land which owed allegiance to the French crown yet was dependent for its livelihood on imports of English wool and vital exports of textiles to England.
He could not understand his father’s attachment to the Capetian Queen Isabella, but that union had provided a convenient peg on which to hang his own pretensions to the French throne and contest the claim of Philippe of Valois. If nothing else, his declaration of war on France had fired the popular imagination. The fleur-de-lis of France still adorned his heraldic device, despite the fact that, deep down, he now doubted that his bid for the French throne would ever bear fruit.
In the early days of the French war, things had gone very much Edward’s way. In 1340, English ships had sent an entire French fleet to the bottom at the battle of Sluys off the Flemish coast and, in 1346, French armies under Philip VI had been virtually annihilated at Crécy. The latter had been a very good year, both at home and abroad. His armies had halted the Scots as they advanced on Northumbria and probed further south in support of the French. That was also the year when he had captured Scotland’s David II, son of Robert the Bruce. And then – and then – had come the glory of Poitiers in 1356 and the valiant rearguard action fought by his pride and joy – and his successor – Edward, Prince of Woodstock, Prince d’Aquitaine, Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester.
His Edward, his Black Prince.
But it had all turned sour. The Black Prince’s victories in the field had been more than offset by a series of crises. The situation in Aquitaine was spiralling out of control. Two years ago, in 1367, the Black Prince had fought a campaign which had culminated in a resounding victory at Najéra but which had ruined the Prince’s health and drained Edward’s coffers. The prospects of sustained English rule in Aquitaine were now bleak. It was reported that the nobles and prelates had appealed to Charles V of France to intervene and Edward had some difficulty in suppressing a chuckle as he recalled the Black Prince’s response when summoned by Charles to appear before the parliament in Paris only two months ago: ‘Gladly, but with sixty thousand men at my back.’
To be sure, it was a reply worthy of a future king, but it was also a reply as hollow as it was spirited.
Meanwhile, the Black Death had ravaged the whole of Europe and had inflicted irreparable damage on Edward’s realm. The balance of power in the kingdom had shifted – and shifted for good, it seemed – as the long-established feudal order was usurped by a new social reality where bloodlines were substituted by new-found wealth and property, and where commoners now vied with princes and kings. The ranks of the Church had been severely reduced by the plague and the Church as an institution had been greatly diminished in terms of its hierarchical power, spawning the likes of John Wycliffe and his ‘mumblers’, Lollards who preached the salvation of all believers.
England had needed a focus again and Edward III had attempted to supply that focus by redoubling his efforts against the French. War was a great unifier. Lately, however, it seemed the Commons had lost its taste for war and was set to oppose him at every turn.
True, war was a costly business. Gone were the days when armies could be mustered as of right and as a matter of feudal obligation. Now everything had its price. Edward III needed to raise money if he was to continue his crusade against the French. That meant only one thing: going cap in hand once again to those accursed Florentines.
Château de Vincennes
22 May 1369
Charles V of France sat in his library in the Château de Vincennes. Like his counterpart across the Channel, he was taking stock.
It was almost thirteen years since his father, King Jean, had been taken hostage by the English following the battle of Poitiers; Jean had since died unransomed in London. While still Dauphin of France, Charles – Jean’s eldest son and successor – had weathered a number of storms, including a full-scale rebellion spearheaded by the States General under the leadership of merchant-provost Etienne Marcel, not to mention a series of peasant uprisings in north-eastern France – the so-called ‘Jacquerie’ – in protest against swingeing dues levied to pay for the refortification of Paris at a time when companies of mercenaries were systematically pillaging the French countryside.
Though a mere twenty-year-old, Charles had risen to these challenges. By 1358, he had quashed the uprisings and, by 1360, he had made short shrift of the ringleaders. Even before his accession to the throne in 1364, he had every reason to believe he had acquitted himself well. But there was much still to be done. He had great plans: for a new defensive wall round Paris, for the beautification of the Château de Vincennes, for the construction of a bastille, and for the furtherance of the arts and natural sciences in France to rival those of the Italian city states.
The perennial thorn in France’s side was England. And King Edward’s obsession with the French crown. Charles knew Edward was in dire need of a popular war with France to keep in line the malcontents among his subjects. He also knew that war had so depleted the English exchequer that Edward would be decidedly unpopular if he could not post another outstanding victory. Charles was determined such a victory would not be forthcoming. Accordingly, he had decided to temporise, alternating protracted negotiation with a campaign of discreet attrition directed at the remaining English presence in Calais and in Aquitaine.
Charles also needed to build alliances on the diplomatic front. He hoped his brother-in-law Galeazzo Visconti might prove an invaluable ally in Milan.
The burdens of kingship are at times intolerable, thought Charles. He turned to the other man in the room, Gilles Malet, a distinguished academic recently appointed Keeper of the King’s Books and commissioned to draw up an inventory of the royal library to be housed in a remodelled Louvre palace.
‘There is no honour in the Englis
h soul,’ said Charles.
Malet looked up from his annotations. He thought it prudent to agree.
Florence
3 July 1369
‘It is a matter of honour,’ said Hawkwood.
‘No, it is a matter of necessity,’ replied Giancarlo Boninsegna. ‘You have many mouths to feed. You have friends, but you have made enemies, too. There are those who fear you and those who respect you. Some do both. You must choose and you must choose wisely. You have served Pisa well. You would serve Florence equally well.’
Hawkwood had to concede Boninsegna’s point. For five years now, he had served first one master then another. He had been for a time in the pay of Milan, then in that of Florence and its allies against Milan. He had fought against Captal de Buch and alongside him, against the Germans of the Company of the Flower and together with them.
‘It is a matter of honour,’ insisted Hawkwood. ‘I have given my word. In all conscience, I cannot enter into an exclusive contract with Florence at this time. I will not bear arms against Pisa and I fear that is the longer-term intention of Florence. I shall look south to Rome and to service with the Pope – or, if need be, against him.’
With the Pope – or, if need be, against him? Hawkwood had spoken with such detachment, thought Boninsegna. This Hawkwood was a fighting man pure and simple, whose loyalty was routinely bought and paid for and whose allegiance was transferred with the casualness and insouciance others might exhibit in the choice of a new pair of breeches.
Boninsegna fought back a sudden surge of anger at the credo by which these itinerant mercenaries lived. They sold themselves with impunity to the highest bidder, supremely confident that the ‘battles’ they fought were rarely conclusive but, increasingly, more often than not little more than set pieces, in which one company of freebooters squared off against another, taking pains to avoid serious injury, let alone death. They were only too aware that today’s enemy might well be tomorrow’s comrade-in-arms. Prisoners were taken, ransoms claimed, menaces uttered and stipends demanded; but, in the long run, the threat posed by the mercenaries was not so much to one another as to the city states they served.
Boninsegna saw there was little to be gained from pointing out to Hawkwood that the typical mercenary profited less by waging war than by extracting vast sums not to do so. Hawkwood’s continuing loyalty to Pisa was certainly commendable, but Boninsegna knew that loyalty to be in part expedient and self-serving. Pisa was a safe haven to which Hawkwood could return time after time, irrespective of his exploits elsewhere. It was a convenient and secure location to bind his wounds, regroup and re-provision.
‘I would gladly persuade you that your better interests may now lie not in Pisa but elsewhere’
Hawkwood hesitated and Boninsegna pressed the point home. ‘When all is said and done, your original condotta was concluded with Tommaso Gracchi and the then Council of Guilds rather than with that pompous ass Giovanni Agnello.’
Boninsegna knew Hawkwood secretly despised the self-annointed and self-appointed Doge of Pisa, who had somehow – God alone knew how – contrived to cling to his position for so long. But the Englishman had shown few if any scruples when it came to exploiting Agnello’s protection, political leverage and so-called friendship. It would be interesting to see how Hawkwood would react now that Agnello had been deposed: the initial signs were that Agnello’s successor, Pietro Gambacorta, had little taste for Hawkwood’s continued presence in Pisa.
One day, thought Bonsinsegna, Italy – a united Italy – will be free of them all. We have done ourselves a great disservice by allowing them into our midst and affording them such free rein. But one day – one day – we shall rid ourselves of them for good.
‘Florence has no pressing need for my services at this time,’ said Hawkwood. ‘You have a surfeit of Genoese, French and German stipendiaries to do your bidding.’
For that and other reasons, Hawkwood could not understand why Boninsegna consistently courted his Company and his friendship. After all, they had started out as enemies and he had since campaigned both directly and indirectly against the armies of Florence, most recently at the siege of San Miniato – a fortified town which Hawkwood, temporarily in the pay of Milan, had wrested from an inept Florentine commander, Giovanni Malatacca, only for it to be retaken not long after. Yet Boninsegna appeared to bear no grudge.
Boninsegna’s reluctant admiration for Hawkwood was rooted exclusively in the fact that, all things considered, the Englishman was the finest mercenary of them all. Politically inept at times, perhaps, but a thoroughgoing professional.
‘It is for you to know where your own best interests lie. I command your prudence in that regard and bow to your decision,’ said Boninsegna. He did not add that he believed that Hawkwood would eventually be conscripted into the permanent service of Florence. ‘I would rather you be with us, however, than against us,’ he added for good measure. There, thought Boninsegna. I’ve said it.
Hawkwood was not as naïve as Boninsegna believed. For Hawkwood, the prime consideration was that the trade of war should be profitable. The cost of maintaining the White Company in the field was considerable, but so too were the stipends and ransoms he collected. Although much of the revenue accrued to Hawkwood’s seconds and his fighting men, a large portion went to Hawkwood himself. As a result, he had accumulated a substantial fortune over the years.
This was a subject Boninsegna had long been anxious to broach. He was well placed to know of Hawkwood’s finances and felt the time was right to counsel him in that respect.
‘It is time to invest, Sir John.’
‘I know little of such matters, and care even less.’
‘But I venture to assure you that I know all there is to know – and more besides. Much of the splendour you see around you was underwritten by profits generated by Florence’s finance houses. We Florentines have long been Europe’s bankers. We accept deposits for safekeeping. We deal in coin and bullion. We issue bills of exchange. Our fiorino is the known world’s most stable internationally-traded and internationally-accepted currency. We know our business. And it is out business to make fortunes grow.’
‘I have heard tell of the Bardi family, the Peruzzi and others,’ said Hawkwood grudgingly.
‘Then you must know that their collapse some two decades ago was caused not by their own incompetence but by the dishonourable behaviour of King Edward – your English King Edward – who defaulted on his debts and drove the Bardi and Peruzzi into bankruptcy.’
Hawkwood merely nodded. That was in another life now, yet he was still reluctant to speak directly either against or in defence of Edward. Perhaps, he thought, I am still very much an Englishman at heart …
‘A great banking tradition does not die out with one or two families,’ continued Boninsegna smoothly. ‘There are many, many others in Florence with experience and expertise. My own bank among them.’
Hawkwood hesitated. He had already given this some thought, prompted by his obligations to Donnina and, not least, to his daughter, Antiocha.
‘What do you propose?’ he asked.
‘That you consign your assets to us for safekeeping. At your discretion, you may also wish to assign to us an entitlement to make such dispositions on your behalf as we consider appropriate to increase your fortune.’
‘I should wish for guarantees.’
‘You do well to think thus,’ said Boninsegna. ‘I warn only that you may gain from such investment but may also lose – that is in the nature of things. As to guarantees, I can suggest two. The first is that you be elected without delay to the governing council of the Banking Commission of Florence in order that you may help oversee and approve the uses to which your funds are put.’
‘And the second?’
‘Come, come, Sir John. You have the Company at your disposal. We in Florence would not wish to meet again with your displeasure. What better guarantee could there possibly be?’
‘What better guarantee, indeed?’ said H
awkwood after a moment’s deliberation. ‘But there is one further surety I require.’
‘Namely?’
‘Namely that, in the event of my demise, whether or not as a friend or foe of Florence, my fortune be disbursed in equal portions to my Company, to my daughter Antiocha, and to my dearest friend, the Lady Donnina Visconti.’
‘That you should make such generous provision for your Company and family is most commendable, Sir John,’ said Boninsegna with no trace of irony. ‘Papers will be drafted to that effect.’
‘Then you shall have my authority and my signature tomorrow.’
Giancarlo Boninsegna was pleased with himself. He had come one step closer to binding John Hawkwood’s destiny to that of the city state of Florence.
Florence
5 July 1369
Karl Eugen strongly counselled against it and Donnina was incensed, not only at Hawkwood’s refusal to listen to reason but also because she regarded his intentions as reckless and, perhaps even worse, as a blatant affront to tradition. She appealed to him to reconsider, but he stubbornly refused, pointing out over and over again that he had given the matter considerable thought. He was in the prime of life and in excellent physical condition. It was an opportunity to do what he had long dreamt of doing.
Karl Eugen pleaded with him in private. This would by all accounts be no leisurely pas d’armes conducted for the sheer pleasure of it, but more like a combat à outrance fought to the point of disablement or death.
‘Nonsense,’ said Hawkwood. ‘Would you deny me a moment of glory?’
‘I seek to deny you nothing,’ said Karl Eugen, ‘but this is madness. You have no place there, I say. Siena is a hostile city and you, sire, are a marked man.’
‘Sienese tradition assures me of safe conduct,’ countered Hawkwood. ‘Siena will be celebrating the Festival of Our Lady of the Assumption and is declared an open city during the festivities. We are at liberty to come and go for such peaceful purpose as we please. None may challenge or hinder us. Nor would they dare, with the Company at our backs.’
Condottiere: A Knight's Tale Page 16