The Wolf at the Door Read online

  Turning slightly to gain his wife’s tacit support, he said, ‘I cannot accept your reasoning. If the Lusignans reject the summons – and only you say they will – they’ll be branded as cowards throughout the West.’

  ‘On the contrary,’ Marshal told him, ‘they’ll be praised for their damn good sense.’

  ‘Oh, not by Philip, they won’t. His own words to me in Paris: “I have no wish to intervene in your dispute, so long as there is the chance of your being reconciled with Hugh le Brun.” Philip has encouraged this hearing from the outset—’

  ‘As part of his strategy.’

  ‘—and, if the Lusignans stay away, he’ll disavow them, nobles who are afraid to face justice.’

  ‘That’s another word out of keeping,’ Marshal sighed. ‘The King of France would not disavow Satan himself, if there was a profit to be made from the alliance. He has not intervened yet, because he’s waiting to see the nature of your summons. You promised him a fair hearing for the Lusignans, but I doubt if you mentioned the diversion you have planned for them in the forest.’

  ‘So you think I’ve been led along, do you? You see them hand-in-hand, Philip and the Lusignans?’

  ‘They’ve been hand-in-hand all year. But I’m more worried that, unless you abandon your scheme, we shall see them horse-by-horse on English soil.’

  Isabelle came forward abruptly from her chair. ‘Now the Zephyr blows chill. Listen to him long enough, and he’ll have Philip knocking on the gate. God knows it, the French have no need to raise an army. Marshal will do their work for them, with his forecasts of doom. I say we should issue the summons. Neither Hugh nor Ralf are as fainthearted as Pembroke believes. They’ll come.’ She glared up at Marshal and with sudden spite told him to walk the walls again. ‘You might see the enemy fording the Vienne.’

  John escorted her from the chamber. In the doorway he glanced back, but it was impossible to gauge his expression, for he had one hand raised, his fingers splayed across his head.

  * * *

  So the selection took place. It continued for three days, though Queen Isabelle could stomach no more than the first bloody morning. Whatever stirrings of excitement she may have felt were quickly curdled by the horrors of the scene, and she was led from the clearing with vomit on her gown. John had warned her not to expect an entertainment, but not even he had imagined the carnage that would come.

  The Sparrowhawk’s sudden departure had brought the contest to a standstill. From the start, her presence at the board fence had embarrassed the participants. It was no place for a lady, and King John should have realized it. However, it seemed unlikely she’d return, so perhaps they could get on with the job they’d been brought here to do. They waited for the sergeant to rap the shield.

  He did so as John nodded assent, and two fully accoutred knights lumbered forward from opposite corners of the clearing. Their dress was as anonymous as that worn by the ambushers near Moncontour – enclosed helmets, plain tunics, commonplace swords and bucklers. The arms and armour had been supplied by the king. The contestants had merely been required to find their way to the ruined monastery, from whence they had been taken to different parts of the forest. There, attended by one of John’s barons, each of the arrivals had been installed in a crude shelter and told to await his summons. The men were not the type to complain about their lodgings; they had food and wine and the promise of reward, and all they had to do for it was fight.

  Isabelle’s departure had delayed the start of the fourth individual bout, so it was clear that her revulsion had arisen from one of the previous contests. Perhaps the first, when a man had leaned down and, with his left hand, scooped up the sliced-off fingers of his right. Or the last, in which one of the unidentified warriors had had his head wrenched back, leaving space for his opponent’s blade to go in between helmet rim and circlet. The onlookers agreed that the winner had made a messy job of it, for his victim had flailed about with half a sword’s length in his windpipe. By the time the man had accepted death, the queen had vomited and fled.

  The fourth duel was a give-and-take affair. The contestants were too well matched, too stubborn to surrender, too greedy for reward. They swung at each other in a dull carillon, trading blows in rhythm. Blood seeped through their armour and ran from beneath their helmets, and their clumsy movements showed that bones had been shattered. The onlookers had witnessed grislier sights than this, though it was obvious that neither man would be chosen, and they shouted at the sergeants to stop the fight. Then, before he could do so, one of the combatants tore his helmet from his head and croaked surrender. His face was so badly battered that even now he was unrecognizable.

  Physicians climbed through the fence to tend the disfigured warriors, while the barons turned their gaze to the king. The bloody spectacle had been his idea. Bejewelled and embroidered, he was the one who’d dreamed up the plan. It was Softsword who had decided to summon the Lusignans to a fair hearing, then challenge them to a trial-by-combat, and it was he who had secretly invited the twenty mercenaries and brigands to prove themselves in the arena. The best of these would be his champions, meting out his special version of justice. The truth unearthed with the edge of a pitted sword.

  Emboldened by wine, the king forced himself to attend the subsequent bouts. He asked Marshal to keep him company, but the earl refused and his absence acted as a magnet on the spectators. By the time the last blow had been struck, two days later, there were more physicians than barons at the fence. The king chose his champions, paid off the others, and returned, sickened, to the castle. The boards were left to rot.

  * * *

  In the third week of March, Hugh of Lusignan and Ralf of Exoudun received their summons. No mention was made of a trial-by-combat, but they had already learned what lay in store for them and immediately took their complaint to King Philip. He registered astonishment at John’s deceit and sympathized with the indignant brothers.

  ‘The Plantagenets were always unpredictable,’ he told them. ‘My father would not trust King Henry out of his sight, and for my part I doubted Coeur-de-Lion, whether I could see him or not. He was known as Yea-and-Nay when he was younger, and I always thought it a more suitable name than Lionheart.’

  Escorting the Lusignans on a tour of the Louvre Palace, he continued, ‘Of them all, John is the worst, for he’s more cunning than Henry or Richard ever were. And, something else to bear in mind in one’s dealings with Softsword – he has never been restricted by pride. The feeling’s unknown to him.’ He took Hugh and Ralf by the arm, flattered them with his touch, then guided them through the newly-built cloisters that abutted the palace. The three men stepped carefully, for the flagstones had not yet had time to settle. In a week or so the masons would go around with mallets, tapping the flags into the beds of sand. Gardeners too would periodically check the open, central area to make sure the transplanted bushes had taken root. A year from now, and the cloisters would make a welcome retreat for monarch and monks.

  ‘This trap of his,’ Philip said, ‘it runs counter to everything the world demands of a king, yet it fits his character like a key in a lock. If the information is correct, and, as I say, it has the click of truth, then it’s intolerable that you should be lured to Chinon to face paid felons. I know you are anxious to defend your honour, but I cannot allow you to submit yourselves to his terms.’ He glanced at them, aware that they were both greedy for praise, yet touchy on the subject of courage. They must not think they were being protected, least of all from Softsword and his mercenaries. It would never do if the lords of Lusignan and Exoudun believed they were being denied a fight.

  ‘There is not the slightest doubt,’ Philip larded, ‘that you’d each win your contests, no matter who Softsword sent against you. But, if we descend to his level – if we accept that trial-by-combat is proof of guilt or innocence – then we give power to monsters. Speaking for myself, I would not last a moment in the arena, and I have no intention of proving my worth against baseborn soldiers.�
� He paused, seeking the word, then said, ‘For men such as you, men of nobility, it would be unfitting. You will stay with me, messires, whilst we plan a proper response.’

  At thirty-five, the Capetain King of France was two years older than John. He was taller, even without high-heels, and almost totally bald. He was also blind in one eye, a disability that had left him with an expression of amused scepticism.

  King Richard had spoken of him as a cold fish, his good eye as bleak as his bad. But the Lionheart’s opinion had been distorted by his own uncontrollable desires, and his advances towards Philip had been rebuffed. After that he would hear nothing good of the Frenchman. The fish was a bloodless schemer, whose only ambition was to enlarge the pond of his kingdom. Oh, he knew what Philip was about, let no one doubt it. Encircled by Flanders, the German states and the Angevin empire, France was anxious to spill over its banks and wash its neighbours into the nearest sea. And how the French fish would love it, if he could then turn his single eye on England.

  With the bitterness of the spurned lover, Coeur-de-Lion had denied Philip’s patience and tenacity, his unrivalled skill as a diplomat, his ability to make the most outlandish demands sound reasonable. But worse, he had instilled his prejudices in brother John, ensuring that the historic enmity between France and England continued unabated.

  Philip Augustus was now in the twenty^:^second year of his reign. King Henry had managed to hold him at bay, but Richard had found himself out-manoeuvred time and again. With the accession of John, the Plantagenet chain had reached its weakest link, and Philip prepared to snap it. Or, in terms that Softsword would more readily understand, the fish was about to make a splash.

  Chapter Three

  Mirebeau

  April 1201–August 1202

  John seemed genuinely surprised when the brothers rejected his summons. Their emissary informed him that the lords of Lusignan and Exoudun had learned of his duplicity and would on no account present themselves at Chinon. Unless, of course, the king chose to don armour and personally engage Hugh Ie Bran in single combat—

  ‘That day may come,’ John snarled. ‘Once he’s been tracked to his midden heap.’

  – whereupon the said Hugh le Bran would respond with alacrity –

  ‘Yes, and ten thousand traitors.’

  – at a place to be mutually agreed. The King of England’s attempt to lure Lord Hugh and Lord Ralf into his trap followed too closely upon that same king’s unwarranted invasion of La Marche and his clandestine abduction of the Lady Isabelle of Angoulême. The world viewed with disfavour the secret and deceitful manner in which John of England –

  ‘And of Lusignan! And of Exoudun!’ He gestured irritably at his guards. ‘Take that man out of here. I go to priests if I’m in need of admonition; I do not accept it from the messengers of traitors.’

  As the emissary was being herded towards the door, John shouted after him, ‘Tell your masters our patience is off the leash! It is we who will respond with alacrity. And then let’s see who’s out of favour!’

  He was heartened by the murmur of approval from his barons. They had doubted the wisdom of the ambush and, still more, the ill-conceived business in the clearing. But now, at last, the king had issued an open challenge to the troublemakers. If a punitive expedition could be mounted – yes, with alacrity – and the Lusignans tried and hanged, it would deter other would-be rebels and give the French fish pause for thought.

  However, there were a few, among them a tight-lipped William Marshal, who heard another, more ominous sound – the satisfied chuckle of Philip Augustus.

  During the past few months English spies had reported a growing state of preparedness within the French army. Mercenaries had been recruited from as far afield as Spain, Sweden and the distant principalities of Poland and Galicia, and Philip was not the type to squander money on idle soldiers. They had been hired for a purpose and, if the latest reports were to be believed, still more were being hired.

  But for what purpose? Neither Flanders nor Germany posed any immediate threat to France, so Philip must be anticipating trouble from the west. Was he then expecting an Angevin invasion and merely strengthening his defences, or was he himself about to launch an attack?

  Marshal listened as the murmurs swelled to cheers. He could remember only one other occasion on which John had been so noisily acclaimed; his coronation, when his stewards had thrown money to the poor.

  The earl pushed his way through the Long Hall, not caring who he bruised with his elbows. Of the seventy assembled barons he counted ten as personal friends and knew that another twenty or so would give him support. But the word would soon be out; exaggerated as always. ‘King John rides in pursuit of the traitors! The Lusignans are at bay!’ And then further contingents would rally to the royal standard, and even the moderate barons would be swayed, and Philip would have the pretext he needed.

  As Marshal saw it, events had now gained the momentum of an avalanche. No one could say exactly when the slide had started; perhaps when the Lusignans had detained Queen Eleanor and forced her to surrender La Marche. John had immediately demanded restitution and their vow of allegiance, and then, failing in both, had abducted the child Isabelle.

  A dangerous sequence, though not yet disastrous. Pebble for pebble, until the king had turned his captive into his queen.

  And then the brothers had risen in open rebellion, and John had invaded their territories, and both sides had appealed to France. The pebbles had dislodged stones, disturbing rocks, which had in turn loosened the slabs. The landslide had gathered weight and force and speed, and the spectacle had begun to draw the crowds. Armed crowds that sailed from England, or marched from Cilicia.

  And what next, now that Softsword’s patience was off the leash? The Lusignans would once again appeal to Philip, demanding that he help them regain their honour and their lands. And from Hugh le Bran a special plea; the rescue and return of Isabelle.

  At Chinon the militant barons would insist that John kept his word and tracked the brothers to their lair, be it a midden heap or the Palais du Louvre. To the devil with Philip’s warnings that any incursion would be taken as an attack on France. If he chose to give sanctuary to traitors— well, he must expect the consequences.

  What concerned Marshal was his growing conviction that the far-sighted half-blind Frenchman did expect the consequences, and was inviting them. It made the earl strike out harder as he elbowed a path to the door.

  * * *

  The following months were given over to vicious border skirmishes and the constant exchange of threats. John wisely stopped short of invasion, but continued to demand the surrender of Hugh and Ralf. Marshal urged his fellow barons to contain their impatience, though by doing so he left himself open to charges of timidity and failing powers. The once great William Marshal would never have been seen at Chinon, counselling caution. He’d have been in Paris by now, his sword-arm aching. Age had dampened his fires, that was the trouble, and only his contemporaries could remember how brightly he had blazed. As more barons rallied to the cause, more of them asked why the court paid so much heed to the Arab. God’s eyes, he didn’t even look like a Christian.

  The winter saw more emissaries on the road, riding east and west with letters of complaint, appeals for reason, counterclaims and denials and fresh accusations. English soldiers had raped ten women at Blois, tying them down in the main square, their wrists and ankles pinioned to market weights. French mercenaries had struck deep into Touraine, disembowelling innocent peasants and throwing firebrands into every house en route. The English swine, the French carrion; the French, the English, carrion and swine.

  It was Philip who added fresh ingredients to the pot.

  The border conflict was costly and, so far, neither side had made any significant gains. The moderates were frustrated in their attempts to bring the adversaries to the table, whilst the militants grew increasingly restive. If the situation was not resolved, one way or the other, swords would soon turn inw
ards. It was time to thicken the stew, or let it cool.

  He reminded his courtiers of the year-old dispute between the Lusignans and King John, then summoned John to Paris to defend himself against charges of abduction, the illegal seizure of La Marche, and of insulting the distinguished lords of Lusignan and Exoudun. The accusations had already gathered dust, but they provided the platform from which to issue his real challenge.

  The underhanded ambush at Moncontour, the undeclared invasion of La Marche, the unsprung trap in the clearing near Chinon – these were all indications that John could not be trusted. Therefore his presence at the French court would no longer be enough. He would have to offer a more tangible token of good faith; say, the massive fortresses of Falaise and Chateau Gaillard.

  It was a brilliant and wholly unacceptable demand. Château Gaillard was a border stronghold and the very gateway to Normandy. It had been the brainchild of Richard Lionheart – his Insolent Castle – and the barons would no more have parted with it than with the crown of England.

  Philip knew this, which is why he made the demand.

  Falaise was much older – the handiwork of William the Conqueror – but for many years it had been deep within Angevin territory. Again, there was no thought of surrendering it to the French. If they hung their banners from the walls of Falaise, why not from Dover? Why not the Tower of London?

  Philip knew this too, and awaited John’s reply.

  When it came – an angry rejection of the summons – it confirmed all French suspicions. Softsword had no intention of seeking peace. The very thing he claimed of the Lusignans was true of him; he dared not face justice. Give him his secret clearings and he would prowl about, like the wolf he was. Let him send his pack to lurk in ambush and delight would drip from his fangs. But call him into the open, and he was nowhere to be seen.