ASilverMirror (16 page)

“I hope you are right,” Alphonse replied, but his mind was
clearly elsewhere, his eyes passing around the garden, deserted now except for
them. He asked suddenly, “Why are we alone here? I do not know English ways,
but when the French court is coming to a town, the place is full long before
Louis himself arrives. In France an inn like this would be bursting at the
seams four days before the king’s arrival.”

“It should be the same here,” Barbara assured him, and
mentioned her uneasiness about how quiet the roads had been. “Half the country
should be in Canterbury applying for writs for the king’s court.”

“Not if they do not trust any judgment that would be given
when the king is under duress,” Alphonse remarked.

“More likely they would not come because Leicester is known
to be in Wales,” Barbara riposted. “The king’s judgments are notoriously based
on favoritism rather than justice, and many prefer Leicester’s.”

Although the answer was sharp, her voice held more challenge
than anger and Alphonse laughed. “Not when an appeal to Leicester’s judgment is
likely to get the favored suitor hanged when the king takes power again, but—”

“
If
such a thing should happen—” Barbara interrupted.

She was interrupted in turn. “Sorry.” Alphonse raised a hand
in a fighter’s gesture for temporary truce. “Let us not argue about what may
happen. I am more interested in what is taking place now. Remember how I needed
to show Montfort’s seal at the gate? Can the guard have been told to turn away
anyone who does not have a direct invitation?”

“It is possible, but I do not believe it,” Barbara replied.
“Would there not be a camp near every gate, full of those who had traveled here
and been stopped? Even if the guard bade them be gone, most would only move
farther out along the road, waiting to importune those of power as they
approached the city. And I do not think Leicester would give such an order.”

“Then no court has been announced,” Alphonse said. “There
will be no pleadings of justice. Those who are wanted for the negotiations with
Louis have been summoned, no one else. Of course.” He nodded with satisfaction.
“I should have thought of that. To announce holding a court now might draw
defenders away from the coast.” He smiled. “We should have no trouble finding
lodgings.”

Barbara was sure the smile was false, a cover for some idea
he did not wish to express, but she gave no sign of her suspicion. She had not
the smallest desire to argue with Alphonse about this political situation. To
him “king” meant a man like Louis of France, whose faults were too great
seriousness and attention to his duties, not carelessness and favoritism and
moral cowardice. If they stayed long in England, Alphonse would learn what King
Henry was.

However, Alphonse’s guess about lodging proved only partly
accurate. After an excellent dinner, a question to the innkeeper provided
directions to only two merchants who held the living quarters above their shops
free for rental. Most lodgings, the innkeeper said, were being held by servants
for their masters.

Without giving a reason, Alphonse shook his head at the
first place they visited, which was only a few doors south of the inn. Barbara
protested that it was a most inviting chamber, large and cool and well lit by
several windows. And the horses could remain in the inn stable. Alphonse
smiled, lips tight against his teeth, and she said no more. They took the
second place, the solar of a grocer’s shop on St. Margaret’s Lane, diagonally
across from the church. This house was also near enough to the inn to leave
their horses there, and the large chamber had a walled-off section at the back,
furnished with a handsome bed.

Barbara felt like bursting into tears when she saw the place
and saw Alphonse nod curtly at the landlord. The separate bedchamber deprived
her of any excuse to seek a lodging with the White Friars. She peeped in at the
doorway, stared at the bed with dilated eyes, and then backed up precipitately
to stand with hands clasped before her near the empty hearth. Alphonse did not
seem to notice her odd behavior, although the merchant did glance at her
uneasily once or twice.

Alphonse recalled his attention sharply by bargaining hard.
The result was that he paid three silver pennies for a week’s lodging, which
included the use of the apprentice for any light chores of fetching and
carrying and of the merchant’s own maid for cleaning as Chacier and Clotilde
should direct, as well as the right to rent for the rest of the month at the
same rate.

Once the merchant had departed, Alphonse bade Chacier and
Clotilde bring their baggage from the inn. As soon as he saw them in the street
below the front window, he shut the door rather hard and turned on Barbara.

“What the devil is wrong with you?” he snarled. “You made
our landlord think that getting into bed with me is equal to being sent to a
nether hell. And even if it were, do you expect me to fling you down and force
you if you should approach a bed in my presence?”

Barbara barely strangled the hysterical laughter that welled
up in her. What she feared was exactly the opposite, that some word or gesture
would escape her to betray her own impulse to fling
him
down on the bed.
Not that she expected to have to force him. From what she had heard in the
past, Alphonse had never failed a lady in need. More comical yet was the fact
that Alphonse’s pride had been injured because her behavior made the merchant
think he was a brutal or ineffectual lover. And funniest of all was Barbara’s
own deep regret that he, who would enjoy the jest so much, could not be invited
to share it.

“I am so sorry,” she whispered. “I do not fear you.”

“Do you not?” he asked. “Then I beg you to tell me what game
you are playing with me.”

“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 she 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.”