The Sword and The Swan (47 page)

A quiver of shame passed through the weary king. Eustace thought that Henry must destroy so inveterate an enemy. That would have been his way because he would believe he could then win over the vassals. Rannulf's heir was only a boy. With his wife in the keep and available to be married to anyone the victor chose, Eustace would think he had all in his hands.

Stephen did not believe that Henry would choose that path. He would rather try to cozen Rannulf into joining him or, if he could not make him yield so far, take ransom and an oath of neutrality from him.

Stephen was not a murderer; to him it seemed that no one else could be.

Eustace, on the other hand, never doubted that Henry would murder a prisoner to achieve a purpose of his own. Nonetheless, he shook his head.

"It will not do," he said. "You must stop his vassals or Henry will have them and the east will never be secure."

"I will recall them in time. Let them at least bring Soke supplies. He will obey my orders. There is time."

"But there is no time! I tell you Henry is on the move toward Wallingford. I wrote you that I had that news last week."

Stephen rose and walked away from his son, his gait like that of a sleepwalker. "For me there has been too much time. Oh, God," he murmured, "release me from this torment. Let me die."

With those words repeating themselves like a litany in his brain, Eustace returned to his own quarters where he found a messenger from London awaiting him. The seal was his wife's and he very nearly cast the scroll aside, but he had to do something or burst. He broke open the letter and began to read.

After five minutes of perusal, he threw the parchment to the floor with a muffled scream of rage. How could a man be so cursed? To have an idiot wife as well as an idiot father. Who could conceive of the stupidity of women? She had received Gloucester, had she, and Gloucester had spoken of how regrettable it was that Eustace alone did not have the management of the war. Gloucester, the foremost rebel spy.

Eustace kicked the scroll into the empty fireplace and tore his hair. His hand fell on an empty goblet and he hurled it across the room. A stool followed that, and he had just grabbed the edge of a table to overset it when he paused and put the end he had lifted gently on the ground.

Ordinarily, whatever Constance was, Gloucester was not a fool. Ordinarily Gloucester did not make useless conversation. Therefore, if Gloucester had approached Constance, he must have had some reason. It was impossible that he should wish to seduce Constance; she was not sufficiently desirable. It was impossible that he should believe he could learn anything from her.

Hurriedly, Eustace picked the letter out of the fireplace and began to read it again. Puzzling out what Gloucester had been hinting at through the fog of Constance's misinterpretation was not easy, but after a third reading he shuddered and sought for a safe place to hide the parchment. It could not happen, he thought, but he did not reply to the letter.

Instead he applied himself to a plan for meeting and defeating Henry. The Angevin's troops had been moving and fighting steadily for months; they must be weary. The area around Crowmarsh was more familiar to Eustace than to Henry. Rannulf's vassals had to be rescued from Crowmarsh. Rannulf himself would have to be dealt with in another way, but the idea of rescue was good for it would make the men grateful to him.

Eustace rushed north again to fortify the land he had taken from Bigod, hurried back south to prod his father into taking similar precautions. He had news that confirmed his expectations. Henry's forces had arrived at Wallingford, but instead of assaulting and destroying Crowmarsh they had settled down to besiege it. Henry did not want to hurt these men; he wanted them to yield to him and join his forces.

The siege might have another purpose. When there are sufficient supplies a siege is very restful to men weary of fighting. Eustace speeded his preparations, and soon all was ready. Men and arms were ready, the route was decided upon, the plan of attack perfected. Still Eustace did not communicate with Constance. If she went ahead with such a shameful plan, a plan to murder her father-by-marriage, on her own, it was no affair of Eustace's. The immunity and large favors she might promise Gloucester were not binding upon him. If they met Henry and defeated him, Eustace planned to string Gloucester from the ramparts of the White Tower by his thumbs or his heels.

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"You should never have come here," Rannulf sighed, twisting restlessly on the hard pallet. "How many are there now encamped about us?"

"I do not know, my lord," Catherine replied indifferently.

She had been in the hold five weeks, five weeks in daily and nightly attendance upon her husband, and they were further apart than ever. Rannulf had permitted the men and horses to rest for several days; he wished to try once to drive off the small force that was besieging him. But the force did not stay to fight.

When they were gone and Crowmarsh was free, Catherine had pleaded to stay one week—only one week to see if she could cure Rannulf's fever. Then she would go willingly. Otherwise, she said, her face burning and her eyes flashing, he would have to beat her unconscious or tie her screaming to her horse. Rannulf did not like the alternatives and he wished to be well. Her ministrations had already done him more good than any other treatment he had received. Before the week was out, however, Henry and his full army were upon them. Then they had really quarreled bitterly.

"You cannot withstand a whole army," Catherine had cried. "Yield."

"I have not been offered a chance to yield," Rannulf replied. "Can I yield if the terms are death? What terms will be offered, if I show myself ready to accept defeat without fighting?"

"You will never yield. You will see us all die to salve your pride."

"So much will I humble my pride, that I will beg safe-conduct for you and for your men. When you are free, you can make what terms you like."

"No, Rannulf, no. I had rather stay with you."

But Rannulf quarreled no more. He sent a herald with his petition. The herald returned with the reply that there was yet no one in the camp with sufficient authority to give or to deny safe-conduct. When Henry came, they would give him the message. Rannulf did not change his quarters as Catherine had feared, but he withdrew into some fastness within himself and thrust back every attempt of Catherine's to make amends. He resisted her with kindness, with more courtesy than he had ever shown her before, but with iron-hard determination. Five weeks had passed, but still there had been neither an attack nor an answer to Rannulf's request. He was certain that Henry was now in the besiegers' camp and that the refusal to communicate with him was deliberate, but there was nothing more he could do.

"I should go myself and see," he said restlessly to Catherine.

"You have two able captains on the walls at this moment. Is no one but you able to count? With your ears you can hear that there is no fighting. The Angevin's men do nothing today that they did not do yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that. They build a dike and a palisade."

"You should not have come here, Catherine."

"Is that the sixteenth or seventeenth time you have said that this morning?"

Rannulf turned restlessly again. "Are my arms and armor laid ready?" Catherine did not reply but shifted her body so that he could see the pile of accoutrements. "I cannot understand why they do not attack. Now they have more than enough men, and the defense here is laughable. Or why do they not ask us to yield? What nonsense is this earthwork with spikes above? We could not come out and do battle with a whole army, so why do they expend so much labor to keep us in? There must be some purpose in this. They can scarcely do it to give us the pleasure of picking off their men with our crossbows."

"Oh, Rannulf, you have told me the purpose yourself. They hope that Stephen will come to save the keep."

"He would be a fool to come. To keep Henry here while he swallows Bigod is his purpose."

"Does not all the world know that Stephen is a fool?"

"Your life and liberty are as much at stake as mine, since the safe-conduct has not been granted. Catherine, you should not have come here."

"Eighteen," Catherine said, and could not help but laugh in spite of her weariness and depression.

Rannulf cast a sharp glance at her, looked away, and laughed also. A moment later, however, he had lifted himself upright and reached for a shirt. There were footsteps hurrying up the stairs. Catherine frowned angrily, but made no protest except to hold him back with one hand so she could tighten the bandage on his thigh.

"Do not rise, my lord." Andre's voice came up the stairwell before his body appeared. "Nothing is yet taking place, but a large army is corning from the east, and—"

"Do not rise!"

Andre stood well out of range because Rannulf's voice was that which usually preceded a well-placed clout. "But there is nothing to disturb yourself for. They must have come to relieve us, not to attack. The men have all been called from the earthworks and are facing the river in arms."

"If that is supposed to be a reason for me to continue to lie abed, I am sorry I agreed to give you my daughter. Little of value as she is, it seems a shame to cast her away on a fool."

Since Andre was accustomed to such fond words from his prospective father-by-marriage, he did not blanch. Since it was also useless to argue with Rannulf, the young man sighed and began to help him dress and arm. Catherine remained seated quietly, her hands folded in her lap. Armed, Rannulf took a step toward the door but turned as Andre disappeared down the stairs.

"A paragon," he murmured sarcastically.

She understood he referred to her hypocritical meekness in the presence of others, but she did not rise to the bait. When he passed down the stairs also, Catherine slipped to her knees and began to pray. Rannulf checked the defensive positions of the men who would remain in the hold, made sure that the drawbridge ropes and pulleys were well greased, that the horses were saddled, lances laid ready. It took time because he was meticulous in matters of fighting, but it soon became apparent that Andre had been perfectly right. There had been no need for him to rise so soon. He would have had time enough to accomplish all if he had lain abed some hours longer.

"Andre, your eyes are younger than mine," he snarled impatiently. "What are they doing now?"

"The same as before, my lord. From the gestures, arguing, and I should say many against one."

That makes sense, Rannulf thought. Having gathered the men and come so far, Stephen has again stopped dead. Probably all are trying to bring him to order an attack and he, as usual, is full of doubts. The proof of Stephen's love for him was triply bitter. It merely showed the king again to be a fool, merely further demonstrated his instability of purpose, but it also shouted aloud that Rannulf's loyalty and devotion were inferior. He had been willing to yield to Henry; he knew he would have done it if he had had the chance, and his shame was a physical thing he could smell and taste. Her fault, with her beauty and her sweet voice and her tenderness … and her rebel sympathies. Rannulf hated Catherine, hated Stephen—and hated himself.

Andre looked at the sun. "Well, it will soon be noon. They must—ah, that must be a herald."

Rannulf sighed with relief. Let them fight or let them retreat. Let them do anything so long as it was done and ended. The herald forded the river, stopped, and then moved on with an escort. A short conversation ensued which seemed to find ready agreement from the leaders of the Angevin force. The herald turned away, but instead of riding back to the river he was led to the gates of the half-built wall and allowed to pass through, his escort remaining on the far side.

"I would have words with the earl of Soke," the herald called.

"I am here," Rannulf replied.

"The king desires you to come to him for the better judging of what is to be done in this case, and Henry, duke of Normandy, gives you safe-conduct to pass through his lines and to return if you so wish it."

"I come," Rannulf called. "Lower the bridge," he said quietly to the men-at-arms when he was mounted, "but if you see the gate in the dike open, draw up again even if I be not over. Trust not overmuch to good faith."

"I come also, my lord."

Rannulf turned his head to see Andre also astride a horse. "Pest! I thought you desired to wed my daughter, not me. Will I never be rid of you?" But if there was treachery in the air, it was better to have a friend, and he called out to the herald, "Is there safe-conduct for my squire?"

"For your whole troop to the last man if you desire it, Lord Soke."

Rannulf thought briefly of taking Catherine and her men with him, but he dismissed the idea. If there were to be a battle there was not enough time for them to be thoroughly clear of the area, and she would be safer within the keep.

"Come then," he said to Andre.

A few minutes later he understood why the safe-conduct had been so broad. Robert of Leicester rode out and clasped his hand. "I do not understand why Stephen wants you," he said urgently to Rannulf, "but Eustace is with him, so watch carefully where you walk and what you eat and drink."

"Aye. Robert, why did you not gain safe-conduct for Catherine?"

"She did not need it. As Soke's daughter she would be safe whatever befell. Henry does not forget his friends." It was not a lie, but Catherine had been left in the keep for just the purpose she had accomplished. If Stephen had not come and Henry had been forced to ask for Rannulf's submission, her presence would have been a large factor in Rannulf's agreement. "If Stephen has shifted his purpose again," Leicester continued, "urge truce upon him."

Rannulf bit his lip so suddenly and so sharply that blood beaded out on it. Leicester was offering him a last chance to secure a pardon from Henry. "Robert—" He put out a hand helplessly, really agonized because he desired that pardon which would permit him to live in peace on his own land. "I cannot. You know I cannot. Stephen has the advantage here. His army is as large as Henry's, and Henry's men are caught between his and the hold of Crowmarsh. How can I urge truce on Stephen when he must know this is his last chance to hold his kingdom?"