William Marshal Guardian of England- The Complete Series

by Richard Woodman

  He was surprised to see among the soldiery another knight in his surtout, a tall man of his own stature, which was over six feet, who seemed occupied in a similar task to William’s though he just then bent over a camp fire, speaking to a flame-lit group of upturned faces who seemed to regard their interlocutor in awe.

  It was unusual for William to encounter any nobleman so employed at this hour on such a task and curiosity drew him towards the bivouac. One of the men on the far side of the fire saw him and nudged his neighbour so that the nobleman turned at the distraction and straightened up. William knew him instantly. Though they had never had previous discourse the tall man revealed himself, the firelight flickering over the leopards of England and Normandy.

  ‘My Lord Duke.’ William inclined his head.

  ‘Ah, William FitzMarshal’ Duke Richard said.

  Richard smiled and held out his hand. ‘I have heard much of you and am glad to meet you…and aptly in the company of these good fellows.’ Richard gestured at the men round him, some of whom seemed uncertain whether or not they should be on their feet in the presence of the Duke and King’s Marshal. ‘I told them not to rise for the day’s march has been long and we shall require all their energies on the morrow.’

  ‘Quite right, my Lord Duke. The horses have all been fed and there is no more to be done this day but rest.’

  ‘God be praised,’ said Richard crossing himself, as did the men about the fire. He smiled at them then turned to William. ‘Will you walk with me, or have you yet to finish your rounds?’

  ‘I have as good as finished, if you came from the Flemings, then between us we shall have settled all.’

  Duke Richard was ten years William’s junior but he had all the commanding presence of his mother. ‘I have not seen you since you were in attendance upon the Queen, my mother,’ he remarked conversationally. ‘I understand you stand high in brother Henry’s opinion.’

  ‘I could not say, my Lord. I am, or was, His Grace’s military tutor. I hope that the present campaign will prove the point.’

  Richard chuckled. ‘And how think you this campaign will go?’

  ‘My Lord?’

  ‘Come, you heard my question.’

  ‘Matters hang in the balance. The King, your father, is in the south where, I understand, the country is unquiet…’

  ‘And only awaits our incursion into Normandy to hasten north to strike at us,’ Richard said in a tone of voice that suggested he relished the prospect of the coming fight. ‘But you are anxious…’

  ‘Aye, my Lord.’ William was silent for a moment as if considering his words carefully. ‘ ’Tis a matter I have long pondered and arises from my experience in the tournament…’

  ‘The tournament? How so?’

  ‘In war we settle matters from the acquisition of castles, towns, places of strength. We burn and destroy as we have been doing on the road from Aumale and will do around Neufchâtel-en-Bray and, probably Driencourt. Such a mode of warfare is slow…’

  ‘But it consolidates our position,’ retorted Richard, ‘every place taken is to be bargained with, and every village burned depletes our enemy’s revenues.’

  ‘In theory, yes; in practice it merely leads to greater extortion of the villeins. Were we to move faster, isolating places of strength and attacking our enemy directly, there would be less cost and quicker recovery.’

  ‘Isolate places of strength? But their garrisons might ride out in our rear…’

  ‘And accomplish what, my Lord Duke? No, most chatelains and constables will remain doggedly holding their posts. That they are sworn to. It is only necessary to encircle them and starve them of provision. What is the point of destroying a fortress that, once taken or exchanged, requires rebuilding at the expense of treasure. No; isolate them, they can then be dealt with later, or the matter settled at any negotiation held to restore peace.’

  ‘But suppose a relieving force is sent…’

  ‘You strike at the enemy’s heart and give him no time to organise such a thing,’ William said with a ruthless simplicity. ‘I do not say a siege is bad policy, or never a necessity, but I do say when a great matter weighs upon the outcome, then the fast strike may have the better consequence.’

  Richard was silent for a moment, stopping and turning towards William who also stood still. Night had now fallen and with it a heavy dew. They were approaching the large tents of the nobles and could smell roast boar and hear the merriment of the lords and magnates as they sat down to board.

  The Duke stroked his young beard and nodded. ‘You would prosecute war on the model of the tourney, then, the chevauchée being pre-eminent?’

  ‘Aye.’ William nodded, his faith in the hot pursuit, the riding down and destruction of the enemy being, in his eyes, far more effective than the slow, methodical but wearying investment of a castle. Even such a flimsy structure as his father’s Steward had thrown up at Newbury had delayed King Stephen for weeks and sucked the King’s resolve; how much more the delay before the ramparts of a Tancarville or Henry’s great fortress of Verneuil?

  ‘And have you schooled my brother in this?’

  ‘No. It is contrary to the methods of his present principal military advisers, My Lord of Boulogne and Flanders, and it would be foolish to interrupt a plan concerted with the King of France. We have a common objective. In this case it is only necessary for us to reach Rouen before the King your father, to cause him grievous harm. I speak of general principles, strategies in which I believe you have an interest.’

  Richard nodded. ‘You have given me food for thought, Marshal,’ he said solemnly. ‘And I am grateful to you. Much will hang on the outcome of the coming weeks but as for tonight,’ Richard’s voice changed in tone, ‘tonight we must eat…’

  *

  To start with the campaign went well. The two columns advanced into the Vexin and Normandy, laying waste and investing the major strongholds and the Young King’s army invested Neufchâtel-en-Bray. In the west Brittany was in open revolt and first invited the Old King’s attention then, far to the south, rebellion broke out across Aquitaine and beyond. Among those again in the field against their feudal lord were the brothers Lusignan who, with other greater magnates, claimed Henry’s treatment of their Duchess, Eleanor, gave them cause to overturn his own rule. She meanwhile, was sent by her husband into Normandy, shifted from one castle to another so that none might know where she was while he, at the head of an army of mercenaries from the Brabant, did to the counties of Poitou and Touraine what his enemies were doing to the Vexin and eastern Normandy.

  Backed by a rich war-chest, keeping both England and Holy Church on his side, the Old King remained wary, sending his savage mercenaries to do his bidding. Personally avoiding a pitched battle, Henry’s forces were ruthless and while he never properly pacified more than the few square miles his army occupied, the savagery of his methods drew the teeth of the rebels, leaving them supine. Eventually, picking his own moment, he stormed into Normandy to confront his main and most organised enemies, the forces of King Louis and his own son.

  Meanwhile in their attempts to conquer Normandy the allies were confounded by division and bad luck. The Young King’s attack had stalled as his army sat down and invested Neufchâtel-en-Bray. Matters went ill, although siege-engines battered the walls and sappers under-mined the bastions of the fortress. William mused on the vicissitudes of war; this place had given him his first real taste of battle when he had been fighting in its defence. Now he was involved in attempting to seize the fortress and town that huddled in its shelter and it was proving time-consuming and tedious, just as he had told Duke Richard such operations would. Then everything changed: Matthieu of Boulogne was struck and mortally wounded by a bolt from a cross-bow and when news of his brother’s death reached Philippe of Flanders, the Count raised the siege of Verneuil, withdrawing into his domain and taking his war-host with him. King Louis took over the siege of Verneuil and had barely grasped the lines of saps and under-mining
there, than he learned that King Henry was advancing to the relief of the great fortress. Louis took fright, called for his horse and, followed by his army, retired on Paris.

  What had begun in high hopes, ended in disaster and the pell-mell retreat towards Louis’s capital had the appearance of a rout. Within a week King Louis’ retreat had drawn after it the portion of the allied army encamped before Neufchâtel-en-Bray.

  Side-lined during this siege, during which the Young King had stalked the lines, full of bravado in the company of Matthieu of Boulogne until the fatal cross-bow shot laid him low, William now found himself alongside Duke Richard in command of what amounted to a rear-guard as the army retreated over the border towards Paris.

  ‘We shall soon be found by my father’s heralds,’ remarked Duke Richard conversationally as the two rode side-by-side, ‘for Louis’ will have reached him long since.’

  William said nothing beyond agreeing that this was likely to be the case. Privately he thought that King Henry of England Aquitaine and Anjou should have fallen upon the rabble of Louis’ army as it wandered through the Vexin, maintaining itself by the cruel and casual plundering of the peasantry.

  *

  The late September sun shone from a sky of peerless blue and surrounding the two separate encampments the pennons, banners and devices fluttered in the light autumnal breeze that carried the comfortingly domestic smell of wood-smoke from the town of Gisors, not a mile away. The glint of lance-points and silver helms, the twinkle of scoured mail and the gloss on the necks and haunches of scores of magnificent horses was backed by the striped and conical tents of the three Kings, their great lords and magnates, as they assembled for the parley.

  On both sides the heralds had blown their trumpets, calling the two parties to conference beneath the boughs of the great elm tree that stood beside the road on the border between the Angevin and Capetian lands, a spot that had become the traditional meeting-point of the Kings of France and the Dukes of Normandy.

  William stood among the magnificent gathering of the lords and nobles attending King Louis of France, his heir Philippe and the Young King Henry of England - with them but not of them. Beside him stood Robert de Salignac and both were aware that their futures depended upon the outcome of the parley and watched as the principals came from both camps to meet under the old tree as its leaves assumed the glorious golden colour of the season.

  Of those coming from the far side he recognised with certainty only the Old King, the man so many called ‘Curtmantle’ for the brevity of his scarlet surcoat, its golden leopards across his breast seemingly alive in the sunshine as he walked towards the elm. Shorter than his sons, but powerful and still energetic, the recent campaign had astonished his enemies for it had seemed they fought a far younger man. Despite his recent illness, Henry had made a forced march from Dol in Brittany across the length of Normandy to Rouen on the Seine in little more than a day. The fact had not been lost on William.

  Going out to meet them led by the slightly wistful, blue-clad, blond figure of King Louis, were three of the Old King’s sons. The Young Henry whose handsome frame seemed to William’s keen eye to move with a degree of discomfort in approaching the physical presence of his formidable father. He was flanked by the tall and impressive Duke Richard, his hair the same flaming red-gold as his father’s had once been, Richard strode with no such diffidence as his elder sibling. On the Young King’s other side walked Geoffrey, Count of Brittany, and the sight of him prompted comment from William’s companion.

  ‘They say he is the craftiest of the Angevin leopard cubs,’ murmured Robert de Salignac confidentially. ‘Methinks little good will come of all this,’ he gestured round them and fixed William with a knowing look. William’s shrug was almost imperceptible. He would wait and see, but the conviction in De Salignac’s voice disturbed his thoughts. Despite his years of service, or his presence on this field of chivalry, he was yet a no-body. The tournament field had yielded him some small riches and his place in the Young King’s mesnie provided a degree of prestige, but little more. True he had acquired a small mesnie of his own, some four knights and half-a-dozen squires, including young Odo, a number of mounted men-at-arms that enabled William independent command of twenty-six lances, but they, like the three servants, his clerk an armourer and even a falconer, were all maintained at the expense of the Young King’s Treasury. Without lands of his own, he could derive no income other than that earned by his lance, at war or at tourney, his father had seen to that. His was no independent status, not that of a knight banneret who funded his followers from his own, personal largesse. As for at least one of the knights, Jean de Laon was a Frenchman and a spy in the pay of Louis, though an agreeable enough companion in the tourney and at table, whose ways with his lute were pleasing, if one liked that sort of thing.

  ‘See, they are arguing already,’ commented Robert de Salignac dismally, drawing William’s attention back from his self-contemplation to the parley beneath the old tree. He saw the Young King stamp his right foot and guessed his tempestuous spirit was being stirred-up.

  De Salignac sighed. ‘I hear Henry Curtmantle has transferred all his affections to his son John who must be, what, eight years of age?’

  ‘Aye, I had heard the same. The lad is not yet old enough to make trouble.’

  ‘If he follows his brothers it will not be long before he does. Methinks the devil’s blood courses through these Angevins,’ De Salignac remarked with a hint of bitterness and William recalled the reason for his dislike of Henry the Old King. He had not told De Salignac of his own birth-mark.

  ‘I heard too,’ William soothed, ‘that Henry favours his bastard, the other Geoffrey who stands with his father.’ William had worked out who at least one of the Old King’s retinue was. He ordered his thoughts and was about to shy away from dwelling on a lack of paternal favour, having had so little of it himself, but he was not obliged to because the parley seemed suddenly to be at an end.

  Duke Richard had turned and was walking away when Henry called him back; he hesitated and turned. They could hear raised voices, then Louis lifted his hands as if acting the peace-maker, whereupon Geoffrey of Brittany leaned forward and whispered something in the Young Henry’s ear which led to another explosion of choler. But by now tempers were fraying on the other side. William heard the Old Henry’s voice and watched as Richard resumed his retreat to his own lines, shaking his head.

  ‘Richard!’ called Henry Curtmantle, but the Duke ignored him and was soon back among the French-led party shaking his head, his expression angry and his jaw clamped tight shut. The Young King was the next to break away and for a few more moments Louis appeared to be temporising until Geoffrey swept him away with an exaggerated courtesy, whereupon the Old Henry could be seen flying into a rage, both fists clenched to his bare head as he too turned back to his own camp and the waiting men there.

  ‘We are at war again,’ said De Salignac with a sigh.

  William considered the matter; it was better for him that the war continued. He was unmarried, unlanded and had yet to find himself some honour beyond mere words.

  *

  A second attempt was made that same day to bring the two parties together again but the sun set on mutual antagonism and half a dozen exhausted heralds. After the parley at Gisors both sides fell back on their own armies and prepared for a renewal of hostilities. In the hours that followed William gradually learned of the rejection of King Henry’s terms. Aware that although he had the upper hand, it was never in the Old King’s interests to punish his rebellious sons; to do so would undo his life’s work and his empire would soon fall apart. He was all too well-aware that this was King Louis’ sole intent in offering support to the young cubs in their rebellion.

  In an attempt to woo them from Louis’s side the Old King had made generous offers to Dukes Richard and Geoffrey, particularly the former, who was to enjoy half the revenues of Aquitaine but have no hand in its governance. Nor was the Young King to get a penny-
weight of political power, his chief grievance; he must be content with everything as it was, including the loss of castles to his brother John. A handful of fortresses elsewhere were offered, but Louis counselled the inadequacy of such provisions and since Curtmantle would not contemplate the slightest relinquishing of the reins of power, the matter rested upon the Old King’s treatment of Queen Eleanor. Their mother, Henry told his sons, was a she-devil who was chiefly responsible for the blasphemy of an anointed monarch’s sons rising against him. Most shameful of all was that the Young King had been turned from the absolute loyalty that he owed his father by the blandishments of a scheming woman. His wife, Henry, told them, would remain confined at his pleasure and none of them should forget that the responsibility for this lay with them. It was at this point that Richard, Eleanor’s avowed favourite, had abandoned the argument.

  Following this grand diplomatic failure, the general mood in the camp of King Louis and the Young King was apprehensive. The Old King’s forces had moved up to the borders of the French Vexin and much of the strategic advantage had been lost to him unless the Angevin provinces rose again in his rear.

  Then news came that King William the Lion of Scotland had invaded Northumberland, a province taken from him a dozen years earlier by Henry Curtmantle. The Scots, it was widely rumoured, were acting like beasts, laying waste the land, seizing women and ripping the unborn from the wombs of their mothers. Soon too came further encouragement when it was bruited about that a large army of Flemings, commanded by the Earl of Leicester, had landed in Suffolk and was marching inland, laying waste the country. Old Hugh Bigod, the treacherous Duke of Norfolk, had joined Leicester and suddenly the fortunes of the Old King’s sons seemed transformed.