For the King's Favor (24 page)

“Thank you,” she said simply. Her gaze dwelt on Hugh and she stroked his hair with the tips of her fingers.

Roger gave a strained smile. “Just don’t make a marriage for this one with any likely heiresses without consulting me.”

Ida also forced a smile. “I could have done that today,” she murmured. “Isabelle de Clare would be a likely catch, do you not think?”

They were moving away from dangerous ground and it was like seeing a thunderstorm rumble off into the distance. With the sleeping child between them, they could not be intense. His presence brought balance and focus to their conversation. “Indeed, she would,” Roger said, “and still of child-bearing age when he is old enough to father them.” He sobered. “Not that he has much chance unless she comes to widowhood. Isabelle de Clare is very wealthy and as beautiful as an April morning. Henry will dangle her as bait in front of every hungry unwed knight and baron and make them all work and wait.”

“You could have held out for her instead of me,” Ida said, a note of challenge in her voice.

Roger shook his head. “She is handsome and wealthy, I grant you, and she will make some man a fair prize, but why should I want her when I have you?”

“The heart is not usually the first concern in such matters.”

He shrugged. “I would not have married where I could not be content. I have seen enough of the other side to not want it in my own household. Was your heart not involved? Was all you wanted an escape—a convenient bolt hole?”

Ida gasped and her head came up. “No, husband! Never think that!”

“Then what should I think when you say such things?”

Her eyes filled again. “You twist my words. People wed out of duty to their family and their lands. It is good if there is harmony…and love, but it is never the first thought—for the man anyway. A woman has no say unless she is a widow and can pay a fine to have her will. I chose you because I thought you strong and good and honourable; I knew I could love you, but you did not immediately seize upon the match. You had other considerations.”

“Even so, I would not have made it without a whole heart.” He rubbed his forehead. “Ah, Ida,” he sighed, “tonight I am as bad as my son. I am being chased by bears and all of my own imagining. Let us sleep. The morning will bring a better light for us all.”

Ida nodded and swallowed. “Yes.” She wiped her eyes, her chin jutting resolutely.

Roger leaned to kiss her, snuffed the candle, and lay listening to the soft breathing of his son and the shallowly inhaled silence from himself and his wife.

Woodstock, Autumn 1187

Seven-year-old William FitzRoy fixed his nurse with a solemn stare. Her name was Jueta and she had long, dark curly hair. She concealed it under a wimple in the public rooms, but in private she wore it in a simple, unadorned braid, which he liked. She had brought him bread and honey and a cup of milk.

“Why do I have no mother?” he asked.

Jueta laughed and tousled his hair. “Ah, my young princeling,” she said. “Of course you have a mother! Indeed, you are greatly privileged because you have many.” She gestured at the other women in the domestic chamber. “We’re all here to look after you and we all love you; after all, you are a king’s son.”

William frowned. He knew he was the son of the King and that his brothers were royal. But they were much older than he was and their mother was Queen Eleanor who didn’t live at court. He had another brother, also much older, who was trained for the priesthood and was their father’s chancellor. He didn’t appear to have a mother either, but since he was a grown man, it didn’t seem quite so strange. He had heard tales from the older boys in the household about how babies came about. He hadn’t been sure about believing them at first, but had come to think they were right. He had seen horses and dogs mating, but had never particularly associated such things with people until prompted by the boys’ sniggering discussion.

“Did you…” He frowned and used the same term as the boys, even though he knew it was not a polite one. “Did my father futter you?”

Jueta flushed scarlet to the roots of her hair. “Oh dear me, no!” she gasped. “Who put such a thought and such words in your head?” Her voice grew brisk. “Come, eat your bread, drink your milk.”

“Then where did I come from?”

She wrapped her hand around her braid in the way she did when she was agitated. “You’re the son of the King, that’s all you need to know. I told you, we are all your mothers.”

His frown deepened, but he knew he wasn’t going to get much further. Perhaps he could ask his father, but he wasn’t sure he had the courage. His brother John might tell him, but John often told lies for the fun of upsetting people and couldn’t be trusted. Although he did as Jueta bade him and attended to his food, he stowed the question at the back of his mind, as if he were putting something he needed on a shelf—out of the way for now, but waiting to be picked up again. He had vague memories of another dark-haired woman who smelled of jasmine; of being sung to and cuddled; but whenever he tried to grasp that memory, it evaporated. Was she his mother? But in that case where was she now? Having all these “other mothers” was well and good, but it didn’t compensate for not having the one.

***

Roger eyed his son’s seat in the saddle with an approving eye. Hugh was sitting up as straight as a lance and had such good control of his dappled pony that Roger had unclipped the leading rein. Hugh’s posture was natural; he wasn’t having to think about it as, straddling his mount, he stared out across the Thames towards the suburbs on the Southwark bank. He was a coordinated child, swift of hand and eye, already capable of fastening the toggles on his shoes and the ties on his braies and hose. Remembering how rough and disparaging his own father had been, Roger was determined that Hugh would not suffer in the same way. He made a deliberate effort to spend time with the boy, to teach him things, and create bonds every bit as strong as the cord that had bound Hugh to Ida in the womb. He would rule Hugh with love, not the rod.

The sound of the rhythmic thud of a pile driver operated from a barge on the water, a little way out from the bank, carried to father and son. Hugh’s blue eyes were bright with curiosity. “What are they doing?”

“Constructing platforms for the masonry bridge piers,” Roger said.

“Why?”

“Because the timber bridge is rotting away and won’t last much longer. There’s too much traffic coming and going on it and too much weathering. London needs a stone bridge to stand firm for many years. They’ll drive stakes into the river bed and infill them with rubble to make a foundation.” Roger and Hugh watched the men haul on the pulley to draw the piling stone up, then release it to smack down on the head of an elm stake and drive it into the river bed. “The King had declared a tax on wool so that there is money to pay for it to be done.” Roger grimaced. Taxes were the order of the day of late.

“When will it be finished?”

“Oh, not for a long time yet.” Roger shook his head. “I expect you’ll be a grown man with children of your own before it’s done. Things like this take a long time and much effort.”

Hugh wrinkled his nose. “But the old bridge might fall down before then.”

“I expect they’ll keep repairing it until it’s time to use the new one.”

A barge arrived with a cargo of more elm palings, and another one with barrels of pitch. Father and son watched for a while longer, then Roger gestured to Hugh and they turned for home. A priest approached them from the wharfside, striding with the vigour of an artisan rather than the decorous walk of a cleric, his cloak blustering out behind him. Peter de Colechurch was the overseer of the building work, as he had been for the construction of the earlier timber bridge. Roger drew rein and greeted the priest with courtesy, remarking that the work seemed to be progressing well.

De Colechurch made a face. He had lugubrious features with deep creases in his cheeks and strong weather lines at his eye corners. “For the moment, my lord Bigod, it is, but that is because the weather is holding and the tides are gentle. Come the storms of true winter, the work will slow down. There’ll be repairs needed to the old bridge too and we must pray that a high tide doesn’t sweep away the work we have done.”

“Indeed not.” Knowing what was expected, Roger unfastened a small leather pouch from his belt and gave it to the priest. “To hasten the work.”

“My lord, you are generous,” de Colechurch replied with a gracious dip of his head. “Your gift will be most useful. Who knows how long the wool taxes will continue to support the building work now that Jerusalem has fallen into the hands of the infidel. Revenues will have to be found for a crusade.”

Roger stared. “Jerusalem has fallen?”

De Colechurch gave him a sombre look. “You did not know, my lord?”

Roger shook his head. “No, I did not. I had heard the army of the King of Jerusalem had suffered a serious defeat, but not that the Holy City itself had been taken.” He crossed himself.

“I had the news this morning from a Venetian trader. The city was besieged and could not hold out against the Saracen with half its fighting men dead in the desert. To regain Jerusalem will take a deal of effort and much money.” He opened his hand. “What is a bridge when set against rescuing the city that holds the tomb of Christ?”

Roger rode home to Friday Street in thoughtful mood. Hugh peppered him with questions, which he answered with half his mind. Two years ago, the Patriarch of Jerusalem had come all the way to England to offer King Henry the throne of Jerusalem. The Patriarch had told them that the young King of Jerusalem was a leper and would not live for much longer. They needed a leader, someone of calibre to succeed. Henry had summoned a great council and asked advice of all his bishops and tenants-in-chief. Should he leave England to his sons and take up the throne of Jerusalem as his own grandfather had once done? His advisers had said he should not. The cynics remarked that Henry had called the meeting in order to obtain a refusal for which he could not be blamed personally. Those less world-weary thought that Henry was showing due care for decision-making and a commendable natural caution.

There would have to be a new crusade now. A vast mustering of effort and resources as de Colechurch had said…and that might mean opportunities too. In judging cases on the Bench, Roger had learned one had to look at matters from all angles and find the one that showed the best way forward. He had a deal of thinking to do.

***

Gundreda watched her eldest son pace the room like a wild boar in a small enclosure. He reminded her uncomfortably of his father when he did that. He had the same belligerence; the same deep scowl between his eyes. “What good will taking the Cross do?” she asked him.

“It’s better than sitting here waiting for nothing,” he snapped. If naught else I can get nearer to the King than you and my ‘kin’ seem able to do.” His disparaging glance took in his stepfather, sitting near the fire studying various unrolled parchments, holding them out at arm’s length now and again to squint at them.

“It takes time and patience,” said Roger de Glanville. “Roger Bigod is no closer to obtaining his desires from Henry than we are.”

“And that is supposed to be a comfort?” Huon kicked a stool out of the way, knocking out one of its legs in the process.

“No,” said his stepfather. “Not at all, but it is the way it is. You taking the Cross will make no difference to the King’s decision about your inheritance. He may have shown Roger Bigod favour but he will only go so far. I have it on good authority that your half-brother offered the King a thousand marks of silver to be granted the earldom and have the third penny restored.”

Gundreda turned towards her husband. “Where did you hear this?”

He waved his hand. “I forget,” he said airily, thereby informing her that he had his spies out and about. “The King said he would think about it, but told him to be prepared to triple the amount first.”

Gundreda’s lips curled with sour satisfaction.

“Serve the bastard right,” Huon growled.

“The King wasn’t being vindictive,” said his stepfather, “just shrewd. He knows how much the man has in his coffers and how much he’s worth. He also knows how much revenue the third penny brings in.” He gave Huon an astute look. “The King has sworn a vow to liberate Jerusalem, but if he fulfils it, I’ll burn my parchment and quills. Henry isn’t going anywhere.”

“But Richard has sworn, and he will,” Huon said fiercely. “He is his father’s heir. If I bring myself to his attention, he will look upon me with favour.”

Gundreda watched her son and felt his frustration. She too wanted to scream at how slowly everything was progressing, and how, despite what her husband said, Roger was being shown favour, while they were left out in the cold. Their connection to the justiciar through their stepfather gave them some influence but not enough. It had been a clever ploy on Roger’s behalf to marry a former, still favoured concubine and the mother of the King’s son.

“My son, taking the road to Jerusalem is no guarantee of success, and it is dangerous,” she said.

“It’s better than sitting here like a constipated peasant; at least I’ll be doing something. You’ll still have Will if anything happens to me.” He cast a brief glance towards his younger brother who was sitting by the fire poking the flames with a branch of firewood. “My life cannot be more wasted than it is now.”

Gundreda shook her head and looked to her husband for support. In his usual methodical way, he arranged the parchments one on top of the other before him until not one edge strayed beyond the boundaries of another. “There is time to consider this,” he said. “The crusade has to have money, men, and resources. They do not happen overnight. My brother tells me a tithe is to be raised on all revenue and movable goods other than a knight’s core equipment. By the time that is done and all matters organised, I do not foresee an expedition to the Holy Land setting out before September of next year at the earliest. A great deal can change between then and now.”

“I don’t see why, because it hasn’t done so in ten years!” Huon snarled. “I’m no closer to an inheritance than I was when my father died. And don’t tell me to have patience because that particular barrel is scraped to the bottom!” He stormed from the room, calling for his horse.

Gundreda rubbed her forehead, feeling weary to the point of exhaustion. He would ride the beast too fast and too hard and she feared he would take a fall, or his mount would founder and crush him, as had happened to one of her husband’s messengers last week. Huon didn’t have the mental staying power or temperament to argue from a rational viewpoint or think matters through. Everything in his head was dense, solid, and fixed; arguing with him was like putting one’s shoulder to the flank of an ox. Her husband said that Huon was like her, but it wasn’t true. In the matter of her rights she was an ox, because she had to be, but she had the control her son did not and she was better able to assess a situation and cope with it. Then again, she was a woman, past her flowering, and he was still a relatively young man caught in limbo. The Holy City was bound to dazzle his eyes. At least Will would remain at home, she thought, watching her second son poke the fire. Perhaps being without ambition was a blessing in disguise.

***

William Marshal grinned at the sight of young Hugh Bigod playing a game of peep with his littlest sister Marguerite, using a blue-and-white embroidered dapifer’s towel to hide his face. “They are fine children,” he said to Roger.

“Indeed,” Roger replied, giving his guest an amused glance as the family prepared to dine. “I would not insult you, messire, but you have a look that I have more often seen on the faces of women when they watch infants at play than on men of your reputation and standing.”

William smiled a trifle wistfully. “You are not so wrong, my lord. Seeing yours and their lovely mother, any man would be envious.”

“From what I heard at Westminster this morning, you may not be envious for long,” Roger said with a twinkle. “Denise de Châteauroux, so the rumour runs?”

William chuckled and said nothing beyond raising an eyebrow. He took his seat at the place of honour on Roger’s right-hand side. The children were led away to a separate table by their nursemaids, there to eat in the vicinity of the adults and learn their manners, but without causing too much disruption to high table conversation.

Lent being over and it not being a fast day or a Friday, Roger’s board was well supplied and elegantly presented. The linens were snowy and the sustenance was prepared to a standard well above that in the royal household, particularly the wine, which at court was frequently undrinkable.