The Wolf at the Door Read online

  The one bound for Angers would go by way of Fontevrault, so that Eleanor could be delivered safe to the abbey.

  The next, commanded by Marshal, was destined for Mortain, where some twenty of the captives would be lodged. But Marshal’s journey would not finish there, for he was to conduct his remaining twenty-five prisoners to Barfleur, and thence across the Channel to England. And even that was not the end of it. The ship would dock at Portsmouth, or wherever the winds and currents allowed, and the prisoners would then be taken along the coast to Corfe Castle in Dorset.

  With no one to praise him, John praised himself. How many times had the Arab expressed the desire to visit his family? Once a week for a year? Well, now his wish had been granted. He could take his wife to bed, romp with his, and boast to his heart’s content of how he had disarmed the venomous Ralf of Exoudun; There was no need to hurry back to the court. He deserved a respite. Say until Christmas. Or better, until spring. His friends would miss him, of course, but it was enough to know that he would be back, with the warm weather.

  So they went their ways; the dowager queen to Fontevrault and the ministrations of the nuns; Marshal to the small, heavily defended castle of Mortain, and then to Barfleur and a bout of sea-sickness; King John to Falaise, with Hugh and Ralf and Arthur riding in his wake, their wrists lashed to the pommel of their saddles. They had been spared the indignity of chains, but it was not compassion that had led John to put them on their horses. It was simply that, with all the dust rising from the path, no one would have recognized them if they’d been chained to the tail of a cart.

  * * *

  Among the European monarchs of the time, Philip Augustus remained the most equable, the most far-sighted. He was not without a temper, and had more than once cleared the court, but he would rather his opponents were convinced than cowed. Nor was his vision unimpaired. Physically he was blind in one eye, but he could also fail to see reason.

  The disaster of Mirebeau blinded him, and he panicked. In the month of August he raised the siege of a dozen Angevin castles, including Arques and Driencourt, withdrew his troops and hovered on the borders of his kingdom, stunned by the brilliance, the totality of John’s success.

  He had met the Butter-Cutter; he knew the Angevin. He also knew the Lusignans, and the arrogant young Arthur, and he found it inconceivable that the one should have so easily outwitted the others. But the reports were consistent. Arthur and the brothers had been taken by surprise, disarmed without striking a blow, then led away, tied to their mounts. The inconceivable was true, and the credit belonged to Softsword.

  The French had long suspected that the Angevins were the descendants of Melusine, one of Satan’s many whores, and that the devil’s powers passed with his seed from woman to woman. From Melusine through the female line to Eleanor of Aquitaine… They had proof that Eleanor was possessed, for she had married Philip’s father, King Louis, and twice turned into a bat before his eyes. She was old now, and her powers were fading, but John was not old, and it did notthe imagination to see them huddled together, mother and son, glowing with the ghastly light of transfusion. It must have been done like that, with Eleanor bequeathing her evil powers to John and warning him to store them against the day when they would do the most good, the most harm. How else could one account for the hardening of his blade?

  For years John had masqueraded as a weak and petulant prince – leathered and feathered, as someone had described him – aglow with jewels and rustling with silks. He had not dared risk his precious store of diabolism until, yes, until his mother lay trapped at Mirebeau, her enemies at the door.

  And then the king had mouthed some special spell and flown in an instant from Le Mans to her side. The Lusignans had been frozen where they stood, unable to resist, unable to blink, petrified by the thinned-out powers of Melusine.

  It must have been like that. Otherwise the intelligent Philip of France would be forced to admit that he had underestimated and misjudged his high-heeled rival. But that was not possible, for one could not diminish the irreducible. It was magic, not the monarch.

  * * *

  The reports were spurred to Falaise. Throughout that month messengers arrived with news of another French retreat, another siege abandoned, another village spared. The enemy were withdrawing all along the front, and those few prisoners who had been taken spoke of nothing but the Angevin devil and his power. He could be wherever he chose at the click of a finger, and the French had already barred the gates of Paris. But little good it would do them, for John had only to click or clap and his army would alight in the very centre of the city!

  There had never been a more propitious moment in which to strike. Who cared if that joyless moderate William Marshal was bundled in bed at Pembroke? He had proved his worth in the past, but the Angevins did not need him now, for not even the Arab had struck such terror in the French. All they needed was John, or the rumour that John was about.

  The news delighted him and, with his three special prisoners safely locked away in Falaise, he rode down to Le Mans to collect the Sparrowhawk. She had already sunned herself in the fight of his victory, and now here he was as much a king as Richard had ever been, and far more a man.

  The courtiers at Le Mans roared their approval. They came forward to petition him, not for favours but merely to acknowledge the songs and poems they had commissioned in praise of their courageous king and his beautiful queen. Some mistakenly assumed that John was too proud to accept a gift and, instead, asked his permission to present Queen Isabelle with some trifle or other, usually priceless. He managed a smile, content with their admiration and his wife’s intimate inventions.

  The happy couple spent half the month at Le Mans and half at Falaise. At no time did the English army move to consolidate its position, or take advantage of the French retreat. They believed what Philip had believed. King John possessed supernatural powers. He would land the French fish whenever it suited him. He’d wake up one morning and snap his fingers and Philip would be in chains, with a hook in his mouth. Mirebeau became the word of the moment, the rallying-cry for England. Shout Mirebeau loud enough, and the enemy would flee.

  However, by the end of August the King of France had come to terms with events. Reason prevailed and he accepted the dramatic reversal, and with it the loss of his three most powerful allies.

  Hugh and Ralf could be replaced, though it would be difficult to find another pair with such a personal grudge against the Angevin. There were many who loathed him, but only the Lusignans felt cheated of their lands, their titles and, in Hugh’s case, his betrothed.

  As for Arthur of Brittany, he was irreplaceable, for no one else had such a claim to the English throne.

  During Queen Eleanor’s thirty-seven-year-long marriage to King Henry of England, she had borne her husband five sons – William, Henry, Richard, Geoffrey and John. Of these, only John was still alive. And of these, only Geoffrey had sired a son, Arthur of Brittany. By doing so, Geoffrey had resurrected the historic problem of inheritance. Who had the better claim to the throne, the younger brother or the son of the older brother? If Richard had been a father, would England have looked to the Lionheart’s whelp or to the lupine John?

  It was a problem that had never been satisfactorily resolved, and one that had given Philip Augustus the chance to make Arthur his protégé, his candidate for the crown of England. There were those who had supported John, and secured his coronation. But there were many who thought Arthur had the more direct claim, not least among the people of Brittany and France. If John could be deposed, and Arthur crowned in his place, then the Bretons would be paramount at court, and the French given their due. It was Philip himself who had knighted the young Arthur and promised him his daughter in marriage. And, in return, Arthur had sworn that, on the day he was crowned, he would give the French king possession of Normandy and Touraine. Both men would prosper, and the world would be rid of the tottering Softsword.

  It was an excellent plan, save that Arthur was
now in chains at Falaise…

  Nevertheless, the long summer month was time enough for Philip to still his superstitions and regain his self-control. He no longer probed for weaknesses in the Angevin defence, but launched an all-out assault along the border, not only against his human enemies, but against the agent of the devil. There was nothing to fear, for Eleanor’s offspring had failed to take the initiative, which meant his powers were sapped dry.

  ‘Don’t look for him in the clouds,’ Philip told them. ‘His wings have withered. Search him out on the ground if you want him. He’s reverted to a wolf, and he’ll take an arrow through the chest like the rest of them. There’s nothing special about King John. Mirebeau was the first thing he ever did well. And the last.’

  * * *

  The messenger had been given a purseful of coins and a head start. With these he was to travel from Mirebeau to Pembroke, where he would inform Isabel de Clare that her husband was on the way. An easy task, so long as his horse ran true, and he found a boat to take him across the Channel, and there were no storms on the water, and he safeguarded his money – his master’s money – and did not allow himself to be waylaid by gamblers or women.

  He did enjoy one serving-girl en route, but his guilt was sufficient to bring him awake, terrified that he had overslept. There was no way of telling if night had just fallen or if dawn was about to rise. The girl mewed in her sleep, then instinctively fumbled for the coins beside the bed. They were there and she sank back, leaving her nervous lover to creep downstairs, find his way to the stables and saddle his horse.

  Three hours later he dismounted and huddled under a tree.

  * * *

  It was still dark, if anything darker than when he had fled, and he was aware that he had undressed, made love to the girl, closed his eyes, opened them, dressed again, and deserted her, all in the space of an hour. Poor value, he decided, but better that than to arrive late at Pembroke. The girl would understand, but not so William Marshal.

  In the event, the emissary reached the castle several days ahead of the warlord. He had already heard about Isabel de Clare and, like many others, was in love with what he had heard.

  At the age of nineteen she had married the royal champion and presented him with her dowry of lands and titles. The couple had not met until a few days before the wedding; King Henry had promised her to Marshal as a reward for his long and loyal service, and the heiress had had no say in the matter. She might have wished for a younger man but, equally, she might have been given a corpulent boor, who would then have squandered her inheritance and smothered her with his lard.

  Fortunately, Marshal had done neither. He was almost twenty-five years her senior, yet he was less set in his ways than many men half his age. He had never been conventionally attractive. His nose was too thin, his expression too serious, even in repose. The outdoor life had marked him and left its scars, though he enjoyed both music and literature. His humour was as dry as his skin, his manners stiff and somewhat old-fashioned. He had never found it easy to trade in small-talk, nor even to let his buttocks go numb after dinner, while the guests put the world to rights. Talk could be valuable – on occasion invaluable – but to hear the boasts and blatherings of wine-filled courtiers? No. When that happened he fidgeted in his chair.

  If a woman wished her husband to share the laughter and drown his friends in drink, then William Marshal was no prize catch. However, Isabel de Clare had never dreamed such dreams. She would marry whomsoever she was told to marry, but with luck he would be a man of authority and compassion.

  The middle-aged Marshal was both and, within a few weeks of marriage, Isabel felt sorry for those of her friends who were wed to callow, clear-skinned young knights. It seemed to her that she had gained the best of both worlds, for Marshal was not only mature, but still as lean and amorous as any strutting chevalier. He could sing and dance and recite the poems of Chrétien de Troyes. It was Marshal who had once knocked Richard Lionheart from his horse, Marshal who had been patronized by Eleanor of Aquitaine, Marshal who had served the kings of England longer than anyone else. And it was Marshal who had, supposedly, gained the favours of Eleanor’s daughter, the beautiful Marie of Champagne…

  This last achievement was one Isabel preferred to forget. It had happened a long time ago – if it had happened at all – and it signified nothing, other than Marshal’s undoubted popularity with women. She had known that before she married him, and she was still jealously pleased that women sought him out. Why not, so long as their expectations did not run high?

  And now, thirteen years after Henry’s champion had come to collect her from her lodgings in the Tower of London, Isabel de Clare was the mother of five healthy sons, and a daughter who squalled for attention. Perhaps because she was a stranger to court life, Isabel had retained her looks and gentleness of speech. It had taken her husband fifty years to become a hero of the West, but she had become a heroine of England in half the time…

  She greeted the messenger from Mirebeau as though he belonged to her, then sat him in a corner, armed him with food and wine, and questioned him until he sagged. He hesitated at first, torn between his enchantment with the chatelaine and his loyalty to Marshal. But it was not long before he was volunteering information, dwelling at length on the arrest of brother Ralf, rising up with fists clenched to show how the Arab – the Earl Marshal – how he had retreated, parried, then gone forward to break the bridge. He made a snapping sound with his tongue to show how Ralf’s nose had broken under the pommel.

  His audience loved it and queried it, to make him tell it again. He was not released from the corner until daylight flooded the room, and even then he was recounting anecdotes, and Isabel was mouthing encouragement, to keep them both awake.

  * * *

  In the days preceding Marshal’s arrival, his wife spent a fortune on clothes. Not only for herself, but for her priests and the members of her household; robes and polished belts for the local clergy, boots and fresh-scraped gambesons for the sergeant and garrison of Pembroke. Even the smiths and farriers were given new aprons, though the craftsmen quickly reverted to their old, scorched clothes. A new apron was the mark of the apprentice, and most of the men had been in the smithy a good ten years.

  She knew her husband would not approve of the extravagance, this man who had for so long saved his buckles and worn-out tunics. But he would appreciate the show. It was a fitting welcome for the hero, and Marshal was vain enough to enjoy it.

  * * *

  He came by way of Mortain, Barfleur and then, the weather permitting, Portsmouth. Even so, the voyage made him sick and he clung like a limpet to the bulwarks, the great Earl Marshal reduced to a vomiting wreck. He had made no secret of his weakness, and his friends were aware that he became bilious on the beach. But in this at least he’d had something in common with Richard Lionheart; both men had skirted puddles and turned green with the motion of the waves.

  Philip Augustus was another poor sailor, though in his case the English revelled in the knowledge that the fish was afraid of the sea. However well things went for him abroad, he had yet to conquer the Channel and his own queasy stomach.

  At Portsmouth the warlord was helped ashore, and the detail waited until he had regained his colour. Then, still unable to eat or drink, he led the prisoners and escort westward along the coast. He had spent the better part of August in the saddle, and wanted nothing more than to rejoin his wife and family and relax with the last of the summer. He knew he could leave the escort commander to see the prisoners safely to Corfe, whilst he, himself, rode on to Pembroke, and he was tempted to do so. King John would not care if he cut the corners from this particular mission. He would not care what the Arab did, so long as he stayed in England, leaving the monarch to take credit for Mirebeau.

  There were, however, two things that prevented Marshal from hurrying home. The first and more important concerned the constable of Corfe, a man with a well-earned reputation for prejudice and cruelty. He had once be
fore been given charge of French captives – eight knights taken in a border ambush – and of these eight, two had supposedly fallen to their deaths whilst trying to escape from the prison tower, another had been killed in a brawl with his fellow-inmates, and yet another had died of self-imposed starvation. Four had survived to be ransomed, but they had emerged from Corfe scarred and skeletal, and were buried within the year.

  The constable had denied all charges of brutality and appealed to his mentor, King John. The resultant investigation had dragged on for months, then absolved the constable of any premeditated crimes. In future, he was warned, he should keep a closer watch on his prisoners and fit a few more bars in the windows. He had taken the warning to heart and gone one better, bricking up every window and arrow-loop in the tower.

  Anxious though he was to see Isabel de Clare, Marshal was determined to meet the warden of Corfe and form his own opinion of the man. Otherwise, he too would stand condemned of prejudice.

  The second thing that delayed his homecoming was more personal. The Lusignan captives had been enchanted to see him draped over the ship’s rail and, since then, they’d been openly contemptuous of him. If he turned off now, short of the castle, they would assume he was too enfeebled to complete the journey. A nice revelation, that: the Angevin Arab, seasick and homesick…

  But he would not give them the satisfaction. Instead, he increased the pace and led the column on a final, jarring ride to Corfe. They reached the castle on the afternoon of 23 August, and Marshal went ahead to meet its keeper.

  * * *

  The man’s name was Saldon, and he had been warned to expect the prisoners. The warning had come directly from King John, and with it the information that the detail would be under the command of William Marshal. ‘Unless,’ the king wrote, ‘he has trotted non-stop to his marital bed.’ Elsewhere in the letter he referred to Marshal as ‘our stiff-necked earl’, and advised Saldon to stand his ground. ‘The Lusignan knights will be your responsibility, lord constable, so you must treat them as you think best. Marshal may hold other views, but you are the master of your own house.’