Mathilde 01 - The Cup of Ghosts (27 page)

A short while later Casales and Rossaleti joined us. The scribe brought in a sheaf of documents, wax and Isabella’s personal seal together with pen-quills and capped pots of dark blue ink. Already the number of petitions to her was growing. Licences to go abroad, pardons for crimes, remission of debts, exemptions from military service as well as pleas for legal assistance, be it against wrongful arrest or vexatious prosecution. Isabella sat at her chancery table sealing the hot wax or writing the phrase
le roi le veut
– the king wishes it – as Edward had conceded that his new wife could respond to petitions, whilst he would confirm whatever she granted. As she busied herself with these clerical tasks, Casales returned to teaching us both English. I had learnt a little with Uncle Reginald; Isabella had schooled herself. Casales now instructed us further at the king’s behest, teaching us poems like ‘Sumer is-i-cumen’, ‘The Ancient Rewle’ and even some of the bawdy songs so favoured by Londoners. He included the rather difficult words from a song composed, so he claimed, during the reign of the old king ‘A Song of the Times’, a bitter, stinging attack on corruption. I still remember some of the words:

A strange choice, but Casales, who composed his own poems, claimed it caught the spirit of the English tongue.

Both our companions had certainly changed since our arrival in England. Rossaleti was quieter, lost in his own thoughts. He’d look at me, dark eyes full of sorrow, gnawing his lip like a man who wanted to speak but had decided to keep his own counsel. Casales was brusque but more forthcoming. On that particular day he pleaded with Isabella to advise her husband to be more prudent and listen to his councillors. He waited until Rossaleti left and became even more forthright.

‘Lord Gaveston,’ Casales walked to the door, opened it and quickly glanced into the darkened stairwell, ‘Lord Gaveston,’ he repeated, closing the door and coming back, ‘must be exiled. The French court is grumbling, the great earls have issued writs of arrays summoning out their retainers, the Scottish harass the northern marches, and you’ve heard the latest news?’

‘What?’ Isabella turned sharply in the chancery chair.

‘The coronation? Tonight the king’s council discuss the date but it will undoubtedly be the twenty-fifth of February. According to the Ordo of the Liber Regalis only a premier earl may carry the crown to the high altar, but on this occasion it will be—’

‘Gaveston?’ I asked.

‘Gaveston,’ Casales agreed. ‘Clad like a king all in purple.’

Later that afternoon Edward and Gaveston, both dressed in loose jerkins, shirts and hose, cloaks wrapped about them against the cold, sauntered across to our mansion. They acted like boys released from the schoolroom, teasing each other over a pet monkey which had stolen one of Gaveston’s jewels then bitten one of his lap dogs. When Sandewic joined us they turned the teasing on him and Isabella, and despite the presence of our visitors Edward inveighed bitterly against the leading earls. Gaveston was a born mimic and the king bawled with laughter as his favourite imitated different noblemen, giving them all nicknames. Gaveston even went down on all fours, barking loudly, mocking Guy de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, whom he’d dubbed ‘The Black Dog of Arden’. Afterwards, as we played dice, Isabella tried to raise the question of the coronation, but Edward deftly turned this aside, drawing his dagger and accusing his favourite of using cogged dice. At dusk both men left, followed by Casales, leaving Sandewic, who sat with a thunderous expression on his face.

‘Tonight,’ he went towards the door, slapping his gauntlets against his hand, ‘we’ll meet, we’ll talk, but nothing will change.’ He paused, wincing at the pain in his thigh.

I insisted he stay and made him confess that the pains from the rheums in his muscles were growing worse. I prescribed some mugwort for a poultice and Abbot Strabo’s cure for the pains, the flower of southernwood, quite a precious herb. I had a small portion of it, ground, boiled and strained, and gave him two phials, warning him the taste would be very bitter so he should mix it with wine, to which Sandewic replied that he liked such cures. Once I’d finished I made my own request of him, something I’d determined on during the day, to which Isabella had already agreed. I first swore Sandewic to secrecy, then asked for an escort to accompany me into the city the following day. Sandewic looked surprised but declared it would be best if the escort was one man so we could slip out of the Tower unnoticed. He offered the captain of his own archers, a Welshman I’d met in Paris, a redoubtable, tough-faced character named Owain Ap Ythel, and I accepted.

We left just after dawn the following day, a bitterly frosty morning, the ground slippery underfoot. Ap Ythel came armed except for his helmet. Beneath his hooded cloak he wore a war-belt with sword and dagger and carried an arbalest, the pouch of bolts fastened to his belt. I’d taken a dagger, pushing it into the sheath on my waistband. Sandewic himself let us out from the postern gate and we made our way out of the Tower, through stinking, needle-thin alleyways and on to the broad thoroughfare leading into the city. I was determined to visit Seething Lane and discover who that mysterious person was and if he could help in our present sea of troubles. The Welshman whispered that we could always take a barge from the quayside, but I had not forgotten Paris and did not wish to go swimming again.

Chapter 10

 
 
We made good progress. The frost had hardened the slime and mud on the cobbles whilst the sewer channels, which cut like ribbons down the street, were thickly frozen. The city bells were ringing for prime but the market horns had yet to herald the start of trading so the shops and stalls remained shuttered. Lanterns and candles glowed at windows. The different-coloured signs creaked in the morning breeze. It was so reminiscent of Paris: the smells, that feeling of expectancy before the day begins. The wards’ scavengers and rakers were out to clear away the refuse, their great carts moving slowly down the street under banners hung out in preparation for the coronation. Dogs barked and yelped. City bailiffs, in the blue and mustard livery of the corporation, were busy stalking a pig caught wandering from its yard, a strict violation of civic ordinances. Other officials, armed with staves and halberds, were collecting the nightwalkers, strumpets, drunkards and other violators of the curfew, marshalling them into line, fettering their hands before herding them up to Cheapside and the great prison cage on top of the conduit. Beggars shivered on corners. Luckless whores called out vainly from darkened doorways or the mouths of runnels. Fritterers, the sellers of second-hand clothing, were already laying out their makeshift stalls, trying to attract the attention of workmen in their shabby cloaks and hures, caps of shaggy fustian, who were making their way noisily across the cobbles in their wooden pattens shod with iron against the slime-strewn ice.

I had told Ap Ythel where we were going. He knew the city well and advised me to stay on the broad thoroughfares and not become lost in the alleys and runnels, the haunt and hunting ground of rifflers, battlers and other violent felons. We hurried up Cornhill then into Cheapside, which was fairly deserted except for the noisy prison cage. In the stocks a hapless baker sat fastened, shivering despite the pan of charcoal pushed beneath his legs by his anxious family. The placard round his neck warned against such tradesmen putting tablets of iron in their loaves to weigh them more heavily. On one occasion I became breathless and unsteady on my feet, my wits playing tricks on me. I felt, for a heartbeat, that I was not in London but Paris, hurrying through the alleys on some errand for Uncle Reginald. Ap Ythel noticed this and insisted we stop at a cookshop which had opened early to attract workmen with the sweet smell of its baked bread and tasty pies.

We broke our fast with pots of musty ale. Sitting on a bench outside the shop, I glanced back the way we had come, searching for any sign of pursuit. I could see none, though Ap Ythel had also grown uneasy. He did not question me on what I was doing; Sandewic’s word was good enough for him, but he too kept staring back. On one occasion he rose, feet bestriding the frozen sewer channel, gazing narrow-eyed back up Cheapside. He muttered something in Welsh, but when I questioned him he shook his head, drained the ale pot and said we should move on.

We hurried along, past gloomy Newgate and into the alleyways round St Paul’s. I stopped to admire its weathercock, a huge eagle, its outstretched wings carved out of copper, or so Ap Ythel told me. The Welshman, however, insisted that I did not tarry long, explaining that the cemetery around St Paul’s was the haunt of outlaws and sanctuary men. We reached Seething Lane, a dark tunnel snaking between shabby, overhanging houses, deserted except for wandering cats, their hideous squalling echoing along the street. As in Paris, the shop, beneath the sign of the Palfrey, was much decayed, a tawdry store house with peeling paint and oiled paper covering the windows. It stood on a corner of an alleyway with outside steps along the side, a place a fugitive could easily flee from. I told Ap Ythel to wait and watch. As I went up the outside steps, they creaked ominously, proclaiming my approach. I reached the top; the door was off the latch and I pushed it open. Inside, a heavy drape billowed out, catching me in its folds. I extricated myself and stepped into the chamber, a twilight place of moving shapes. No candlelight glowed yet the air smelt of wax and incense. I glanced at the bed; its coverlet was neatly pulled up. In the centre of the room stood a table with a white cloth, a silver paten from an altar and two small candlesticks. As I stepped closer, an arm circled my neck, the point of a dagger pricked my cheek.

‘
Pax et bonum
,’ the voice whispered. ‘Who are you?’

‘Mathilde de Clairebon.’

‘The truth, Mathilde de Ferrers!’

‘Mathilde de Ferrers,’ I confessed.

‘Niece of Sir Reginald de Deyncourt?’

‘True.’

‘What rank did he hold?’

I replied. The questions continued thick and fast like a hail of arrows. I was not frightened, the grip was not tight and I recognised that same voice, loud and clear, echoing up the gloomy steps of the infirmary of St Augustine’s Priory. The man released his arm.

‘Tell your escort you are safe.’

I hastened to obey, my belly tingling with excitement. When I returned to the chamber the candles were relit and the stranger, dressed in dark fustian, a stole around his neck, a maniple over his arm, was continuing with the mass he had been celebrating. He stood at the table, head bowed, reading the canon of the mass from the small breviary open on its stand. He held up the unleavened bread, a circular white wafer, and breathed over it the words of consecration, then took the pewter cup and consecrated the wine. I knelt before the table and studied this strange priest. He was a youngish man, slender, about two yards in height. He had a long, rather severe face, slightly sallow; his nose was straight, his lips full, the mouth marked by laughter lines which also creased the most beautiful grey eyes. He had black hair, flecked with grey, parted down the middle. When I first saw him in the Oriflamme tavern in Paris it had been shorter, but now it fell below his ears. High cheekbones gave him that severe, rather ascetic look, yet when he gazed at me, those eyes would crinkle in amusement. He offered me the Eucharist, long, slender fingers holding part of the host, followed by a sip from the chalice, Christ’s blood in a pewter cup. After the ‘Ite Missa Est’, he quickly cleared the altar, placing the sacred vessels in bulging leather panniers. He plucked his cloak from a peg on the door, and also took down a thick, heavy war-belt with its sword and dagger scabbards. He looped this over his shoulder, glanced quickly round the room and came to stand over me.

Ah, sweet Jesu, the memory is as clear as yesterday. He was dressed in a cote-hardie with dark blue leggings of the same colour; his boots, slightly scuffed, were tight-fitting. He smelt fragrantly of mint and groundnut. He just stared at me. I gazed back. God and all his saints help me, I loved him then. There you have it! After Uncle Reginald, Bertrand Demontaigu was the only man I ever truly loved! You’ll dismiss such a tale as the embroidering of troubadours. Do so! I tell the truth. You might, you can, fall in love in a few heartbeats and only later become aware of it. On such occasions the heart doesn’t beat faster or the blood surge more strongly. I only experienced a deep peace, a desire to be close to him, to look, to talk, to touch. The schoolmen, when they describe the soul, talk as if it is contained within the flesh. Who says? Why cannot the flesh be contained within the soul and why cannot souls kiss and merge, become one when they meet? The minstrels sing a song, I forget the words, about how our souls are like unfinished mosaics; by themselves they are incomplete, but when they meet the other, they attain a rich fullness all of their own. Bertrand Demontaigu was mine. If he is in hell and I am with him, I shall be in heaven, and my heaven without him would be hell enough. If I close my tired old eyes he is there, serene, calm-faced, with that slightly lopsided smile, and those eyes, full of humour and rich in love, gaze on me. If I sleep he comes; even in the morning, just as I awake, he is always there. I can go through the busy cloisters, I catch a flash of colour. Is that him? On that freezing February morning, so many years ago, he touched my face as he did my soul.