Lady of the English (55 page)

Matilda hastily broke the seal and opened the letter. Triumph coursed through her, and joy, but mingled with it was a thread of vile darkness because Geoffrey’s success emphasised her own inability to take and hold England. Her golden husband had achieved what eluded her. “That is wonderful news!” she said, swallowing the bitter and celebrating the sweet. Gesturing the messenger to his feet, she took a ring from her finger and gave it to him in payment for the tidings.

Henry had been listening to the exchange. “Papa has won?”

His grey eyes shone. “I knew he would!” He drew his toy sword and saluted the air. Robert had heard too, and Brian, and they were smiling broadly. The news spread through the hall like fire and with the same warming effect. England might still be a frozen struggle, but Normandy was achieved. Matilda turned away while she composed herself, because the letter contained other news that cut her heart.

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She heard Robert calling for a tun of the best wine to be broached in celebration. Tonight there would be feasting and toasts and she would wear her jewelled silks and furs to honour Geoffrey’s success—which was her success too, and Henry’s.

She would rejoice with a glitter so bright and hard that no one would see how she bled.

ttt

Henry was supposed to be preparing for bed, but when Matilda entered his sleeping chamber, he was still clad in the tunic he had worn to the feast. His bedcover was strewn with an eclectic jumble representing his interests: a bridle, a hawking gauntlet, a gaming board, two books, several pieces of parchment with diagrams and bits of untidy writing…and Rumpus, the terrier Maude of Wallingford had given him. Rumpus had spread an inscription of muddy paw and belly marks across the embroidered quilt. At the sight of Matilda, he began thumping his tail on the bed as if beating a drum, and she hastily looked away before she became the recipient of his enthusiasm. To add to the detritus, Henry’s clothing chest was open, spilling entrails of garments across the floor.

“Where is your chamberlain?” she demanded. Henry was too old to need a nurse, but there should be servants to attend to him.

“I said I could see to myself.” He gave her a mulish look. “I am old enough.”

“Are you indeed?” She looked round. “This place is a pigsty.”

“I was going to tidy it, but I had to take Rumpus for a piss first.”

That explained the muddy paw prints and why he was still in his clothes. “Do you often wander about the castle at night?”

He shrugged. “I talk to the soldiers if I can’t sleep, or I walk about and think. Sometimes I read or I write things, or I play chess with myself.”

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Given his prodigious energy, she suspected he did not spend much time in slumber. She wondered how well she really knew this child of hers. For certain he had the will and intelligence to be a king, and the education and the curiosity. She was unsure where his inclination to tear through life like a whirlwind came from, unless it was a trait that had been her father’s as a child and had become weighted down with time and the burdens of kingship.

“Your father wants you to return to Normandy,” she said.

“Now that you have spent time in England and have come to know the men who will help you rule when you are king, he needs you with him, because even as you will be a king in England, you will be a duke there and the barons need reminding.”

She watched him weigh up her words thoughtfully in a way that spoke of a calculating man, not an eleven-year-old boy, and, as she studied his expression, she knew it would not be long, irrespective of his years, before he truly was capable of governing a country. “When must I leave?” he asked. There was no regret in his voice but neither did she receive the impression he was eager to go.

“As soon as the wind is set fair for a sea crossing and your baggage packed.” She gave the wreckage of his room a meaningful look.

He jutted his jaw. “And when I come back to England again, it will be to rule it.”

Matilda swallowed. She might never be England’s queen, but she would be the mother of the greatest king Christendom had ever seen, of that she was certain, even if for the moment he had an unbroken voice and only came up to her shoulder.

“Yes,” she said. “That is your destiny.”

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Fifty-one

Castle Rising, Norfolk, Late Summer 1144

I can see the castle, Mama, I can see the castle! I was the first!” Wilkin leaped up and down on the ship, and pointed to a distant gleam of white, his voice shrill with excitement. Will had been telling him for a while to look out for the castle and he had been leaning at the prow, eager to be the first.

“Yes, indeed you were,” Adeliza said, and picked up two-year-old Godfrey in her arms to show him too. “See the castle.”

“Cackle,” said Godfrey.

“Almost there,” Will said to his three-year-old daughter, who sat on his shoulders, her pale gold curls ruffling in the stiff sea breeze.

Across the flat sandy heathland, the new castle at Rising stood like a gleaming white tooth in a gum. The surrounding ringwork was low and offered little defence, but that had not been his intent. He wanted Rising to proclaim itself and be an aesthetic haven amidst the chaos of war.

In the basketwork travelling cradle, six-month-old Reiner had started to wail like a little gull. The nurse picked him up, but Will gestured. “Give him to me,” he said.

“Sire, his swaddling is wet.”

“No matter. Give him to me while you find fresh.”

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Taking his youngest child in his free arm, ignoring the heavy dampness of the swaddling clouts, Will faced him towards the shoreline and the lime-washed gleam of Rising’s walls. He wanted all of his children to see this, whether they understood or not. Scaffolding still caged the edifice and not all of the stone was painted, but enough had been to give a fine impression, especially against the deep blue of sky and sea, and the green of the reclaimed land dotted with grazing sheep.

As the ship navigated the river channel, Will handed Reiner back to the nurse and went to stand beside his wife. Adeliza had been unwell for several months following their son’s birth and was still frail; he wanted to see the pink return to her cheeks and to give her something beyond the continuing conflict to think about. He had chosen to sail rather than ride because there was less chance of meeting opposition and the late August weather was fine and clear with a good breeze for the sails. The journey would be less wearing for his wife and the sea approach would show the castle to its best advantage.

There had been fighting in East Anglia earlier in the year as Stephen had subdued the rebellious Hugh Bigod, and there had been a skirmish at Lincoln with Ranulf of Chester, but for now the area was reasonably stable.

“You will see many changes since we were here last,” he said, slipping his arm around her shoulders. “Before it was only dreams and plans built on scant foundations.”

“Is that not the story of many a life?” she asked him with a smile.

His eyes sparkled. “Indeed, but not everyone sees them brought to fruition.”

Adeliza felt a warm pang of affection as she leaned against Will’s reassuring solid strength. He loved to plan and build.

She would come upon him sitting at a trestle surrounded by 440

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heaps of parchment covered in drawings and sketches. He often entertained master masons at his board and exchange ideas with them. He would sit on the floor with Wilkin, constructing miniature buildings out of pieces of wood and stone, and his big hands would be sensitive and knowing—as they were on her body. His childlike enthusiasm always pricked a tender spot within her. Far better the builder than the warrior intent on destruction. She knew this visit was only a lull, that he would go to war again once the harvests were in the barns and his lands visited, but for a while she had him and the children to herself, and perhaps here she could find the space to recoup the energy she had lacked ever since Reiner’s birth. She felt well today; the tingling sea air was rejuvenating.

Meandering upriver towards the castle, they passed a white dovecote with the Albini lion banner flying from its tiled roof.

A flock of birds took off from the shingles and haloed the building, their breasts dazzling in the sunlight. Godfrey pointed to them with a squeal, and Adeliza kissed his soft cheek. The briny smell of the river filled her nose and mingled with the green of the land. Grazing sheep lifted their heads to watch the boat sail past and the shepherd’s dogs ran along the bank, barking, which set Teri to barking too until Will silenced him with a sharp command and a click of his fingers.

The ship nudged in gently to moor at a landing stage that gave access to a small, moated building where grooms waited with horses and a two-wheeled cart lined with cushions for the nurses and children. Adeliza and Will had two matching grey palfreys, one adorned with a sumptuous padded ladies’ saddle.

Will helped Adeliza to mount and handed up to her a fat pouch of silver coins. “You will need this,” he said.

He had been busy planning not just the castle, but a town to prosper around it, and also a leprosarium. The hospital of Saint Giles stood outside the town wall and consisted of individual 441

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dwellings for twenty lepers attached to a small chapel, where they could attend daily prayers. The timber houses, white-washed and neatly thatched, were ready to receive occupants.

Adeliza’s task while at Rising was to select the first ones.

The master of the hospital and five lay attendants waited before the church to greet Adeliza and receive the bag of silver in alms. She spoke warmly to the master and bade him attend her on the morrow to discuss plans for the leper house, and then rode on into the town, noting the neat plots and thoughtful layout. The decorated west front of the new church, dedicated to Saint Lawrence, filled her heart and she gave Will a look brimming with love because his efforts were much more than a token gesture; they showed a true desire and enthusiasm to give glory to God.

Beyond the town, a short ride brought them to the castle, and having crossed the ringwork ditch they entered under the arch of the gatehouse.

“Portcullis!” announced Wilkin proudly, pointing at the jagged teeth above their heads. “That’s a portcullis!”

“Clever lad!” Will ruffled his son’s curls.

“Portcullis!” Adelis aped her brother, shouting the word from the cart much to everyone’s amusement.

Once dismounted, Adeliza gazed at the castle, perfectly framed in the gatehouse archway. The forebuilding was decorated with blind arcading and geometrical designs that echoed the church. Two rondels depicted amusing animal faces, the right-hand one having a distinct look of Teri. The great doors, banded in wrought-iron shapes and curlicues, stood open to reveal a long series of steps, rising under an archway and leading towards a vestibule.

“I wanted to build you a palace,” Will said with anxiety in his eyes. “I hope you approve.”

Her throat tightened with emotion. All the work on the 442

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outside (except perhaps for the rondels) was designed to her taste, not his. “I am overwhelmed,” she said. “Approve is not an adequate word.” She wiped her eyes on the corner of her sleeve.

He held out his arm. Adeliza laid her hand along his wrist and processed with him in courtly fashion through the first door and up the stairs, the children following behind with their nurses. Passing under an arch with decorated columns, she came to a vestibule facing a splendid series of arches curving one over the other, leading into a great hall with a fireplace set on a stone slab in the centre of the room. A hanging bearing the gold Albini lion decorated the end wall, with two carved and painted chairs set on the dais below it.

Adeliza felt as if her eyes were not large enough to take in all the detail. It was like having a serving dish piled high with so many delectable foods that just by looking you could almost lose your appetite.

Beyond the great hall lay the chapel, embellished with ornate arches and more blind arcading. Painting had begun and the main colours were blue and white, for the colours of the Virgin’s cloak and veil. A lamp burned above the altar, which was adorned by a silver cross and candlesticks.

Adeliza could only shake her head. Will opened his arms and she went into them and pressed her head against his breast.

“Why is Mama crying?” Wilkin demanded.

“Because this is a big surprise she was not expecting.”

Wilkin frowned. “I like surprises,” he said. “Doesn’t Mama?”

“Yes, she does; her tears are happy ones. Go with Bernice and she will find you something to eat and drink. Your mother will talk to you later.”

The nurses removed the children, and Adeliza knelt to pray.

Knowing her foibles, Will knelt with her, waiting until she was ready.

At length she raised her head and wiped her eyes. “I will 443

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have to explain to him now why sometimes people cry with joy,” she said wryly.

“But not just yet,” he said. “There is something else I want you to see.”

Adeliza shook her head. “I am not sure I can bear any more surprises. My cup is already overflowing.”

“You can bear this one, I promise.” Smiling broadly, he led her by the hand from the chapel, back to the hall, and then through to a well-appointed living chamber with two recessed south-facing windows and between them a large fireplace.

An ample bed stood at the back of the room, made up with mattresses, but as yet no hangings and covers.