“I cannot.”
Barbara gulped down another gust of hysterical laughter as she spoke the literal truth. She had wondered how to make herself seem remote and mysterious, but she did not even need to try. Alphonse was creating a strange simulacrum of her all by himself. Then the impulse to laugh died. His dark face had grown even darker as blood rose under his skin and his eyes looked suffused.
“Then you do not intend to marry me at all!”
“I do! I do! I swear it!”
He stood staring at her and then said, very softly, “Go into the bedchamber, Barbe, and close the door, and do not come out again until your maid comes to fetch you.”
Chapter Ten
Alphonse was gone when Clotilde came in, rather wide-eyed and more silent than usual, to tell her mistress she was free to do as she pleased. Barbara could guess where he had gone and spent the remainder of the day alternately feeling sorry for the pain she had caused him and suppressing giggles. She was not jealous of his easing his need on a common whore of the town. He was too proud and too fastidious to be interested in any woman who sold her body to keep food in her mouth and a roof over her head. Alphonse, she thought, grinning, would be outraged. He was more accustomed to being offered bribes for his favors than having to pay for use of a woman. He knew his own worth.
Meanwhile, she was rather grateful for his absence, which gave her the opportunity to have the lodging cleaned carefully, particularly the bed. She was pleasantly surprised to find that it was not as badly infested with lice and fleas and other biting pests as she had suspected, but she bought larkspur powder and chamomile and a potpourri of sweet-smelling herbs to work into the bedding before she would allow Clotilde to put her own linens on the bed and pillows. While the bedding was being treated in the garden, the maid was summoned to scrub the frame and leather straps and then to sweep and help Clotilde move a chair and small table to the window in the large chamber.
There, as the afternoon darkened into evening, Barbara sat with her embroidery and ate her evening meal. As she plied her needle, setting a pattern of golden doves perched on a fantastic tree into a wide, dark blue band that would adorn the neck of her shimmering blue silk wedding gown, she regretted that she had not pointed out to Alphonse that she and Clotilde were preparing her wedding dress as fast as they could sew. While the reminder could not have eased the need of his body, it might have cured his doubt. Then she shook her head and reminded herself severely that she did not wish to ease his doubt. If she yielded to her impulse to give him everything he wanted, he would soon not want her.
The reminder was sobering. It would not be easy to quell her generous impulses. When one loves, one wishes to give, Barbara thought, and sighed. She did not linger long after the candles were lit but retreated to the bedchamber. It would be better, she thought, to be able to feign ignorance that Alphonse had been out all night if he did not return.
This thoughtful peace overture was frustrated, however, because he had not come back when she finally rose to break her fast, even though she deliberately lay abed far later than usual. At first she was amused and rather touched, thinking he was deliberately staying away to make her jealous, but by the time she had eaten dinner alone and he still had not returned, she began to feel worried. He was, after all, a stranger in England. It was possible that he had gotten into a fight or fallen afoul of some dangerous thieves.
Barbara had never heard of much crime in Canterbury, where strict watch was kept on those who sold entertainment because the prosperity of the town depended partly on the safe coming and going of many visitors. Some visitors were sincere pilgrims to the shrine of Saint Thomas and would avoid sin, but many did not. They were curiosity seekers on pilgrimage more for change and excitement than for the sake of holiness, and some drank and gambled and lay with women, seeming to feel that the pilgrimage itself would absolve them of sins.
Still, Alphonse dressed more richly than most, which might be an irresistible temptation to those who lived in the underbelly of the town. And the fact that he could not understand any English at all might mark him as a foreigner and increase the temptation. Then Barbara told herself it was ridiculous to worry. Chacier was gone too and must be with his master. She knew she would not be so silly if her father had disappeared for a day. She would have assumed he had been so drunk he was still too sick to show his face.
The strictures did not help much. She felt anxious and uneasy, unable to settle to her work although Clotilde was making good headway on the pale cream-colored tunic that would go under her blue wedding gown. She glanced idly around the chamber and her attention fixed suddenly on the special basket that held Alphonse’s mail and curie, which was set near the empty hearth. His helmet sat atop the basket and his shield was propped between it and the wall, but his sword was gone, she noted with relief.
Barbara blinked and looked at the shield again. There was something different about it. She had thought she knew that shield better than her own face and was sure she could pick it out among a hundred others on a field of men battling in a melee. Or, four pallets gules, yes, that was right. Those were the arms of Raymond-Berenger, still carried by Queen Eleanor as well as by Berenger’s other daughters. The black bend sinister over the red and gold stripes was right too. Alphonse’s father had been Raymond-Berenger’s bastard. But the bend carried a tilting spear, and that was not right. There had been a crescent, marking Alphonse as the second son… But, of course, his father had died, so he was no longer a second son and could choose his own device to difference the family arms.
Barbara stared uneasily at the tilting spear. Her silver mirror had been a tournament prize. She had seen Alphonse win it while carrying her token and still remembered the excitement mounting almost to madness, she had felt each time she watched him fight. Her preux chevalier. But she had been so young then, too young to believe anyone she loved could be hurt. Since then she had learned better.
That tilting spear together with her betrothed’s pride and her knowledge of how often he used to fight in tourneys implied an explanation for Alphonse’s full purse that sent a chill of fear through Barbara. He always said his living came from his brother, whom he served at court by keeping the interests of Aix before the king and by warning Raymond of any political events that might affect his estate. But now she thought it would be most unlike Alphonse to beg for money to pay for his wine and his gambling and his gifts to women. Barbara realized suddenly why Alphonse understood the rules of ransom so very well. It was because he made the extra money that way—by defeating men at the jousts and in the melee and taking from them horse and armor ransom.
Oh, there was no dishonor in it. In fact, men of high rank would seek out and defer to a conqueror on the tourney field. But Alphonse was no longer a young man. He was over thirty, in his middle years. He should no longer be fighting to fill his purse. Sooner or later he would fail…and men had been killed on the tourney field. Then Barbara took a breath and smiled. If he fought for money, the income from Cruas would solve the problem. Her dowry would pay for wine and moderate gambling—and he would make no more gifts to women if she could bind him tight enough.
That brought her mind back to his absence. He would not have gone out if she had agreed to lie with him. For the tenth time, she laid aside her embroidery and went to lean out of the open window and stare up and down along the street.
Clotilde looked up from her own sewing but only folded her lips in a hard line and said nothing. Was her mistress so foolish as to expect Sieur Alphonse to turn celibate because he had been betrothed? Surely she must know that every servant in the French court had called him Le Grand Sillonneur, and if she would not provide the earth for his plow he would find another field to furrow.
“If only Chacier spoke some English,” Barbara said, coming back to her seat. “With no one to explain what he wants, Alphonse might lose his temper.”
“Ah!” Clotilde exclaimed, enlightened and relieved that her mistress was not jealous. Then sh
e frowned, also concerned. “You fear Sieur Alphonse has had an accident or is lost—”
“I fear he has behaved like a jackass with too much pride,” Barbara snapped, “and has got himself into a fight he could not win.”
“I will go out and see if there is news of trouble,” Clotilde said, laying aside her work.
“In God’s name,” Barbara warned her, “do not take any chance that he will discover I have been enquiring about him.” And despite her worry she began to laugh. “I do not know whether he would beat me to death or stay away every other week just to teach me a lesson.”
At first, Barbara could not settle to work again but watched out the window, fearing she would see Clotilde running back from the cathedral or the hospital Saint Thomas had erected to tell her that Alphonse’s body was laid out or that he was dying. After an hour, however, her anguish changed to irritation. By then Clotilde must have asked in all the likely places for news of a corpse or an injured foreigner. If she had heard nothing yet, the likelihood was that Alphonse was at ease in a tavern or brothel and planning to remain there either out of spite or because he was enjoying himself.
Clotilde returned at dusk, wariness of her mistress’s mood covering a sly amusement as she reported that she was certain, wherever he was, that le sieur had come to no harm. She erupted into open laughter when Barbara grinned and said, “Now how can I best put his nose out of joint? Shall I pretend not to have noticed his absence at all, or should I thank him warmly for his thoughtfulness in keeping out of my way?”
She did neither, however, because when she returned to the lodging late the next morning after attending mass at the cathedral, breaking her fast at the inn, and spending a few leisurely hours examining the wares in the market and shops, she found her father as well as her betrothed waiting for her. The low rumble of male voices in easy conversation had warned her as she began to climb the stairs that Alphonse was not alone, so she came up very quietly and paused a moment on the landing to look in. A single alert glance and the few words she heard told her that all was well between her menfolk, and she entered the room with a small cry of joy.
“How glad I am to see you, Father!” she exclaimed, giving Alphonse a brilliant smile before she hurried to kiss the hand Norfolk held out to her. “Pray tell me you are not angry with me.”
“Not over having accepted Alphonse,” Norfolk said, “but I could have used a word of warning. I almost dropped dead with surprise when my clerk read your letter. After trying for seven or eight years to find a man to suit you, I send you off to France, and in one day there… I could not believe my ears. Poor Thomas. I clipped him on the head and called him a dolt and made him read that letter twice more before I believed it said you were betrothed.”
Norfolk’s voice was amused, but there was a tightness to the skin around his eyes, and Barbara dropped to her knees beside his chair and took his hand. “I was not forced, Papa, I swear it, but everything did happen very fast, too fast for me to hope to get a letter to you.”
She was wondering how to explain more fully without saying more than she wanted Alphonse to hear, when he got to his feet. “I will go order dinner for us,” he said. “I have not forgotten what you said to me about King Louis, Barbe. You had best speak to your father alone.”
Barbara looked after Alphonse as he left the room, blessing her good fortune in having set her heart on so clever a man. But she turned back at once to ask, “Have I hurt you, Papa?”
“Do not be a goose,” Norfolk retorted. “I have been worried sick over what would happen to you when I died. I was certain you would never marry. If Louis did not thrust d’Aix down your throat, I am glad.”
Barbara felt her breath catch. Why should her father suddenly speak of dying? Her quick glance assured her that he showed no sign of ill health. Could he be that worried about the political situation? To ask a direct question about that would be useless, so she smiled and said, “Oh, Papa, did you not guess that Alphonse is the reason I would not marry? I always wanted him. You chose him to protect me when you left me in France. Do you not remember?”
“Of course I remember, but that was business. His brother is overlord of much of the land near Cruas, and I felt he would know the laws and customs of that area.”
“And so he did, I am sure, and he did his best for me. But I was a silly little girl and I thought you had chosen him to be my husband. Then King Louis suggested that to settle Cruas without a battle I should marry Pierre, and you agreed, and Alphonse advised me to obey. I did, of course.” She smiled up at him. “But then Queen Marguerite had taught me to read, and my head was full of those romances you always growl about. I am afraid that I had already given my heart to Alphonse.”
Norfolk snorted cynically, but the tension Barbara had seen in him had eased. She laughed and shrugged. “He was my preux chevalier. Papa, he offered to be my knight and fight to protect me from Guy de Montfort. Well, you need not look at me like that. I had to give him some reason for coming to France after all those years. And when I said you would protect me, he said he loved me and offered me marriage—and I said yes. You do forgive me for taking him without your permission, do you not?”
He pulled a curl of hair that had escaped confinement and lay against her cheek. “He is a good man, Barby, and King Louis took care that you had a fair settlement in the contract.” Then he sighed and stroked her face. “And, times being what they are, I am not sorry that you will go back to France.”
So it was true that her father was expecting serious trouble in England, but from whom? Was it Leicester he feared or was it Queen Eleanor’s silly invasion? Barbara took a breath to tell him about the disorganization and inefficiency of those who were planning the invasion then changed her mind, saying instead, “But I will not go at once, Papa. Not before my wedding. I want you to be at my wedding.”
Worrying about the invasion could do her father no harm, whereas assurances that there would not be an invasion could do harm if she was mistaken. Besides, she needed more information. If it was Leicester he feared, an invasion might not be so unwelcome to him now as in the past.
Norfolk laughed aloud at her plea. “I would not miss your wedding for the world, chick, and I do not think Alphonse cares where he marries you so long as it be soon. I will see about making arrangements.”
“Can it be in the cathedral, Father?” Barbara asked, and Norfolk laughed again.
“Certainly,” he said. “I do not believe the chapter will refuse my request even though their bishop is fled. Chichester will marry you, or London.”
“Both!” Barbara exclaimed.
“Why not?” Norfolk agreed, still chuckling. He always enjoyed it when Barbara behaved in what he thought of as a typically womanish fashion, and he did his best to satisfy her desires. “It will be a pleasant change for them, a wedding at which everyone is in agreement.”
Although he was still smiling, there was a tinge of bitterness in his last words and Barbara hastily asked, “When can it be?”
He looked arch, and Barbara was already preparing an answer for his expected remark on how eager she seemed to change her state. Before he could speak, however, they heard footsteps on the stair. Gratefully, Barbara rose to meet Alphonse at the door. “You are come most aptly to the time,” she said. “My father says he will arrange for our wedding to be held in the cathedral and for the Bishops of Chichester and London to perform the service. We were just about to decide on the date.”
“Tomorrow,” Alphonse said.
“The bishops will not arrive until the twelfth,” Norfolk pointed out, grinning, “and neither of them is young. You will have to give them a day to catch their breath.” He laughed lewdly. “Hold it in your hand for a little while longer, Alphonse. Let us say the fourteenth—to allow for delays on the road.”
“No, the fifteenth,” Barbara said. “I do not think my gown will be ready sooner. And also, one cannot forget an event that takes place on the ides of the month.”
“I wi
ll not forget our wedding no matter what day—” Alphonse began.
Laughing, Norfolk cut him off. “For God’s sake, man, do not hand the girl a whip with which to beat you. She is hard enough to manage when she does not hold any advantage. You will make her outrageous.”
Alphonse also laughed and said something about using a feint to draw in an opponent. Clearly Norfolk was joking, and that was a tremendous relief. Alphonse had not been at all sure what he would find when he returned. He had half expected that Barbe would complain to her father that he had taken unfair advantage of her and that Norfolk would have him expelled from the country. The sensible half of him trusted her, and had been right. Whatever she had said had calmed her father admirably, but Alphonse was more puzzled than ever. What game was she playing? And why?
Alphonse had found Norfolk at the castle when he went there the previous evening, not knowing where else to go and thinking that he might be better off if he was locked up. Despite the years since they had seen each other, he had recognized Norfolk at once and been recognized too. The earl had demanded his daughter furiously as if he feared she was being kept from him. No one could doubt he was very fond of Barbe. As soon as he heard that she was in lodgings and Alphonse offered to take him there, he calmed down and said he would wait until morning, since Barbara had probably gone to bed. But he had asked questions half the night about how Alphonse thought a wife should be governed, had almost threatened him about what would happen if any harm should come to his girl, and had finally said outright that he would accept his daughter back if she had any complaint about her husband.
He had made Alphonse swear up and down and back and forth that King Louis had not forced Barbe to accept him. Alphonse had sworn with his courtier’s smile in place, thanking God that Norfolk had been fixated on Louis’s interest in settling Cruas and had not asked if he himself had used some unfair device to make Barbe accept him. He had also sworn that he loved Barbe, had told the whole story of when and how he learned he cared for her and why he had not earlier asked for her hand. That seemed to impress Norfolk, and when Alphonse explained why he had left the lodging, the earl had at last relaxed enough to roar with laughter. Nonetheless, Alphonse was sure that if Norfolk had not been very uneasy about the future in England, he would have been even more disagreeable about the marriage.
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