Joanna (62 page)

“I have a message for you if you will let me see your hair.”

Any other time, Joanna would have been furious. Now, trembling with eagerness, she undid her wimple and exposed the bright braids beneath her headdress. The only reason for such great need to be sure of her identity must be to avoid any chance of news of this message coming to the wrong ears. Then the message must be from Geoffrey oror about him.”

“The message,” she urged with burning eyes, “what is your message?”

Instead of replying, the priest drew a roll of parchment from the bosom of his gown and handed it to her. Joanna broke the seal without even looking. It was too easy to take the ring from a dead man’s hand, and if the seal was someone else’s the priest would tell her. What she saw within the roll in a single glance made her clutch the senseless skin to her breast and cry aloud.

“He is alive! Thanks be to God, he is alive!” and then, tremblingly to the priest, “Thank you, oh thank you, Father, thank you.”

“Perhaps you had better read what is written before you are so full of thanks.”

The color that had rushed to Joanna’s face drained away again. “But it is in his hand,” she stammered, “in his own hand! Is he not alive?”

“Yes, yes. I did not mean to frighten you. Lord Geoffrey is alive and well cared for and whole of limb and wit,” the priest assured her kindly, “but”

Back came Joanna’s color and she laughed aloud. “Then I care for nothing else. All else I can contrive for, even if it be to move the earth, so long as he lives and is safe.” She seized the priest and kissed him and then she kissed Sir Guy. But when Joanna tried to question the priest about Geoffrey, she received little satisfaction. He had seen her husband only twiceonce, when Geoffrey was first   brought to the keep and Lady Gilliane thought he would die, the priest had been called to administer the viaticum. But Geoffrey had recovered, the priest said hastily, and this last time, when the letter was handed to him, Geoffrey was sitting up in a chair.

“He has not been to mass?” Joanna asked. She was really inquiring about whether he was too weak to walk to the chapel, but she saw the priest’s eyes shift uneasily and fear touched her again. “What, is he imprisoned?” she cried. ‘‘He is an honorable man. It is not needful to lock him in like a wild beast.”

“It is for his own good,” the priest replied severely. “If ‘the king’s agents had found him, he would
not
be alive and well now.”

It might be true, Joanna knew, but there was something else that was not being told her. She turned anxiously to the precious letter she held in her hand.

“Considering the disaster that has overtaken us,” Geoffrey wrote after a tender salutation, “my situation is none so ill, but I am afraid that it will cost you high to have me back. Isabella has offered twice my ransom to obtain my dead body, and I have promised that Sir Louis of Baisieux, who took me prisoner, will lose nothing by his kindness in preserving my life. This I hope will not be difficult.”

There followed a long passage describing what might be expected from the strongboxes of Geoffrey’s various keeps. Joanna scarcely glanced through this. She had no intention of wasting time going from one place to another all over England to collect jewels and money when she could take what she needed from Roselynde. The sum could be restored to her mother from Geoffrey’s coffers when he was home safe.

That came to an end and the next line caught and held Joanna’s attention. “There is another matter, however, that may give you some trouble. Lady Gilliane’s husband, that Léon of Baisieux whom I wounded and ordered spared because of his great spirit on the ships in Damme, is held for ransom by Sir Walter of Halfand in East Sussex. It is necessary that you ransom him and send him with my ransom to Baisieux keep. Sir Léon’s mother has, for some reason unknown to me, a great distrust of us. She seems to believe that harm has befallen her son and no news of this has been sent here because Sir Walter hopes to collect the ransom even though his prisoner is dead. There is some slight reason to fear this because no word has been received here from Sir Léon since news of his capture and ransom was sent. I think, myself, that Sir Walter may be with the king or that it was considered unwise to send a letter to France in view of the animosity that existed between John and Philip. I hope this is so.”

Joanna reread the last few lines several times. She was mistress of herself again, and little sign of the new fear that racked her showed, except that her color faded and her hands began to tremble. Geoffrey had been very careful, but it seemed to Joanna that he was implying a frightful threat. If Sir Léon was not brought home, Geoffrey would be killed and the double ransom collected from Isabella.

There was little more to readGeoffrey’s love, but somewhat strained and stiff as if, Joanna thought, he expected that the letter might be read by others. That was almost certainly so, but it was of little importance. This was no time for words of love. That would come when they were together. Now was time to act. She turned to Sir Guy.

“From where did Adam write that note of sympathy?” she asked.

“He was up by Hansey, but I believe he must be back in Kemp by now.”

“Bid a messenger to make ready. I will write to Sir Walter, but my man is to ride to Adam, who knows Sussex and will send on someone who knows where this Halfand is. There is no sense in my man wandering around seeking an unknown place. Tell the messenger that I will ride forth tomorrow at my best speed, and if he is not well ahead of me, he will ride nowhere ever again.”

“But where do you go, my lady? And why?”

Joanna looked surprised and then realized Sir Guy did not   know the contents of the letter. She informed him briefly of her purpose. The priest gaped, both at the manner and the intention. He was even more surprised when, to Sir Guy’s protests that there was no need for her to go, she replied sharply, “Do not be a fool. Why should Sir Léon be brought back here? I will take ship with him as far east as possible. The less time we are in the narrow sea, the less chance a French ship will come upon us. I will take as little risk as I can. And for that same reason, I wish to land in Flanders rather than a French port.”

“Lady Joanna,” Sir Guy groaned, “you are not going to France. I beg you to think again. We are still at war with Philip. There is no treaty, not even a truce as yet. If you are taken”

“I do not intend to be taken. Do not waste my time. I have much to do before I leave with the sun tomorrow.”

“My child,” the priest expostulated, “whence is this haste? And, indeed, it is not safe” His voice cut off, If Satan had been female, just so must have the AntiChrist looked when thrust out of heaven. A face of blazing beauty, surrounded by the red flames of her hair, but every feature marked with such pride! Such fury!

“He is mine!”

Sir Guy shuddered. How had he ever deluded himself there was a hair of difference between the mother and the daughter? He had heard that cry before. Well, he would argue no more. If she said she would go to hell, he would do his best to get her there safely.

“He is mine,” Joanna repeated more softly, looking significantly at the priest, “and I do not choose that my lord should be in the power of any other person for one day, one hour, one minute longer than is absolutely needful.”

The priest said nothing; Joanna’s jaw set hard. Lady Gilliane wanted her husband, did she? Well, Geoffrey would come safe away first or Sir Léon would return to his wife in a set of basketsfingers and toes in one, arms and legs in another, and so forth. She turned away and gestured servants to her and the orders flew like hail. The maids ran to   pack clothing; the men to make ready the mistress’s tent and arrange the little furniture necessary; the cooking pots and bedding, to go into packs that could be fitted on horses and mules. Sir Guy raised his eyes to God for a moment, but he started away to call a messenger and choose the men-at-arms that would ride with them.

Well before dawn the next day they were on the road, and by midafternoon were approaching Kemp. Before they reached the castle, where the men hoped to at least dismount and stretch their legs, Adam met them in the road. Joanna’s messenger, spurred by his mistress’s threat, had arrived with the dawn. Then Adam, no more dilatory than his sister and galvanized by the news of Geoffrey’s safety, sprang into action. He had ridden to Halfand himself, astride one of the great, swift gray stallions. It was no more than twenty miles, and he was back at Kemp in time to meet Joanna with disappointing news.

“He is not there,” Adam called as soon as he identified Joanna surely.

She laid her whip on her mare so violently that the tired beast closed the gap between herself and her brother in a few strides. “Dead? Oh, my God, do not say he is dead!”

“No, but Sir Walter gave him as a surety for a debt to FitzWalterof all people.”

Joanna closed her eyes for a moment, but when she opened them her jaw was set hard. “Do you know where FitzWalter bides?”

“I have done better than just find that out,” Adam assured her. “I know where Sir Léon himself is, and Sir Walter has already written to the man who holds him that you come to redeem his debt and that Sir Léon is to be given into your hands. If you have the money, we can go at once.”

“I have the money,” Joanna said, “but what do you mean ‘we’ can go at once?”

Adam’s bright hazel eyes darkened. “You know how mama can sometimes ‘smell’ trouble coming? Well, this time I smell it.”

“Sir Walter?”   “I think not. He seems a simple, honest man. I do not know what troubles me, only, I will not let you go alone onto the land of one of FitzWalter’s vassals. You know FitzWalter has long coddled the Braybrooks, father and son, and young Henry loves you notor too much, whichever you prefer. The father is with John, but Henry and FitzWalter were both in London when I was there scarce a week ago.”

“What were you doing in London?”

“Do not be such a ninny,” Adam replied, laughing. “Do you think I am a fool like John to meddle with my vassals’ wives and daughters? Nor do I have a taste for serf girls, at least, not as a steady diet.”

“Oh,” Joanna said faintly, and looked at her “baby” brother with clearer eyes.

Even in the saddle he towered over her, head and shoulders. He had gained considerably in height and bulk since Joanna had seen him, and he had been large even then. In the last six months, it seemed he had changed completely from a boy to a man. Not that his sexual activities made him a man. Joanna was aware that Adam was very attractive and had been sexually active since he was about fourteen. The mention of his attitude had merely made the difference in him visible to her. Adam was unconcerned with her revelation and had reverted to the main problem.

“I do not see why FitzWalter’s castellan should even apprise him of the matter,” Adam grumbled. “After all, Sir Léon is of no personal importance as a prisoner. He is only surety for a debt. Nonetheless, Horndon on the Hill is only a little more than twenty miles from London. I think it better to take no chance. If we change horses and go at once, we can take Sir Léon and be well away before FitzWalter even hears he is to be ransomed and by whom.”

“I agree with all my heart,” Joanna responded, “but FitzWalter is a hard master and his castellan might not wish to do anything, even so reasonable as this, without his yea-say.”

“I realize that now,” Adam said furiously, “but I did not   think of it when I should have. Instead of letting Sir Walter’s messenger go, I should have taken the letter myself. But let us start. We can decide what is best to do on the way.”

“It cannot matter,” Joanna soothed as they rode toward Kemp to change horses. “If he will not release Sir Léon without FitzWalter’s permission, it would not matter whether he knew ahead of time or we brought the letter ourselves.”

“Except then we would have been withinand he would have found it very difficult to deny us anything,” Adam remarked grimly.

“That might still be arranged,” Joanna said suddenly, and smiled nastily. “Sir Guy,” she called over her shoulder, “ride forward here with us.” When his horse had been prodded level with theirs, she went on, “I have fifty men. How many can you bring from Kemp, Adam?”

“If I strip the keep, a hundred and fifty or so, I suppose. That is not enough to”

“We do not even need so many,” Joanna interrupted. I will go forward alone, with only ten or fifteen. You know since Winchester and Pembroke have ruled here that most lawlessness has been put down. It is not unreasonable that I should take only a few men as escort on a journey. Even if he does not intend to give me Sir Léon, the man can scarcely refuse me a night’s lodging, so I will be taken within. You will stay hid with the rest of the men near as possible. If he gives us Sir Léon, I will make some excuse to leave at once. If he refuses, Sir Guy will make shift to open the gates for you and the men. Well, Sir Guy, can this be done?”

“Now my lady, my lord, you know this is not wise. What can a few days’ delay while FitzWalter’s permission” His voice faded. FitzWalter had an old spite against Joanna’s stepfather. Moreover, it might seem to him that Lady Joanna was completely without protectorsher husband was thought to be dead; her father-by-marriage was known to be a prisoner; her stepfather was in France. FitzWalter   would not count Adam as a dangerthe more fool he, Sir Guy thought, glancing at that redoubtable young man. It might seem the ideal time to grab a prize.

“Yes,” he said, nodding firmly, “it can be done easily enough.”

Expecting approval, Joanna looked at Adam and was surprised to see a worried frown still fixed on his face. She felt a twinge of exasperation. Could Adam have become so manlike that he was going to say it was too dangerous for a woman? Ian was always trying to keep her padded with feathers and Geoffrey was getting that way too since they were married.

“It is a most excellent plan,” Adam said slowly and then, almost absently, “be sure if you are denied Sir Léon to take a real knife to bed with you, Joanna, not that jeweled toy you eat withand do not like an idiot fall asleep.” He looked around suddenly. “Why in hell did you not bring Brian with you?”