It didn’t matter, because somehow everyone around them knew anyway, some mystic cord already binding them. She was almost bursting with the will to speak to him again. That rasping, growling voice declaiming of Alhazen, quick with passion for newness and ideas, ready for anything. Wanting everything. And yet he had let Bernard shut him up. She found herself with her arms crossed, as if she warded something off. She could not raise her eyes to see him leave. If she found him looking back at her, she would throw herself into his arms. And once he was gone, the space between them would grow cold. She felt as if some huge stone door were shutting on her, sealing off the world. Maybe this was done before it started. She lifted her eyes toward his disappearing back, bereft.
Eight
The Queen’s chief lady, Alys, was of the highest blood in Aquitaine, but she had been born on the wrong side of the blanket. So she served Eleanor, and did her needlework, and seemed content at it. Petronilla envied her this repose, this way of belonging. She leaned over and poked into the tangle of colored silks in Alys’s basket. Against the pale purple the green suddenly seemed much merrier. “Those are pretty, and prettier together. You have such an eye for those things.”
Alys made soft disparaging noises, smiling. Her modesty became her because she so obviously knew her praises were earned. She changed the subject. “Why didn’t you go to the feast? Isn’t the cathedral beautiful? The light there is so wonderful. The first time I saw it I wept.” She crossed herself. She had long, fine-boned hands, with perfect oval nails.
“Yes,” Petronilla said. “But it’s a long ride for monk’s meat.” They were walking up the street from the Little Bridge, where Alys had gotten the silken ribbons in the basket. The day was hot again, dry, with billowing big clouds gathering up out of the haze in the distance. Two pages followed them and Marie-Jeanne. “Besides, soon enough we’ll be riding every day.”
“We’re going on another progress?”
“We’re supposed to go to Poitiers,” Petronilla said.
“Poitiers!” Alys turned and beamed at her.
Petronilla felt that same excitement, just to say the name. In the course of the King’s progress they would spend the whole fall riding down to Limoges for Christmas, stopping along the way, for a while, at Poitiers. She had not been there in some years, and the ride to reach it seemed over the world. Yet she would see Poitiers again, and Eleanor was hinting now that they would not leave it. Whatever Eleanor was plotting, it centered on Aquitaine as much as Henry FitzEmpress.
Then, as they were coming up to the pavement before the palace, a horse jogged toward them, and the rider dismounted; even before she saw his face she knew by his long legs and easy grace it was Joffre de Rançun, her sister’s knight. She caught herself smiling to see him, glad of the veil to hide it. He took off his hat and came up, leading his horse.
“My lady.” He gave her a little bow, since they were among others. “You sent me to find the girl Claire. I did. She’s in the Hotel-Dieu.”
Behind her Alys let out a gasp. Petronilla licked her lips, her gaze meeting de Rançun’s. Impatiently she reached up and unhooked the veil. “What’s she doing there?”
“Afraid to go anywhere else, maybe.”
Alys said, “The poor child.”
Petronilla wheeled on her. “Go back to the tower. Marie-Jeanne, you also. Joffre, come with me.” She stepped to the side, so the other women could walk past her.
Alys hung back. “My lady, such an ugly place—”
“Go,” Petronilla said. De Rançun stood beside her, silently drawing the leathers of his reins through his fingers.
When they were gone, he turned to her. “What are you doing?” He was not bowing now. Since they had been children together he had treated both her and her sister with an easy, courtly informality when they were alone.
She turned and started off down the narrow street that led east along the island. “Well, someone’s got to do it.”
He walked beside her, the horse clomping along just behind. They followed the rutted, stony road down between rows of stalls and houses, past a donkey teetering under a mountain of firewood, past market wives carrying their bags of onions and nuts, their half-plucked chickens.
He said, “I’m sorry about Vermandois.” He meant Ralph, the husband who had cast her off, who had been Count of Vermandois.
She bit her lips. “I should have known,” she said. From the beginning, she had ignored a certain oiliness in his voice. What he stood to gain, marrying the Queen’s sister. She began to think she had loved him because he seemed to love her so much. Her gaze slid toward Joffre de Rançun. She wished—What she wished didn’t matter. On the left, past a graveyard, was a patch of meadow where a cow was tethered to graze. The long low barn of the Hotel-Dieu stood on the opposite side of the road.
“Well,” the man beside her said, “he is a swine, and I’ll tell him so if I see him again.”
“Good old Joffre.” She gave him a grateful smile.
They were coming up to the ramshackle almshouse. Grass grew on its roof and out of its rotting walls. In the yard a half dozen people in rags sat around waiting for the evening bread to arrive. She felt their eyes poke her as she came in, with the knight beside her, and was ashamed of having shoes and clothes. The big double door was ajar. She went in, then stopped, blinking in the dimness. The stink roiled her stomach. A moment later, de Rançun came up beside her.
Before her, as her eyes learned to see it, was a long, dark room, divided by two rows of posts that held up the roof beams. All around were people, many all but naked, hunched over, rocking back and forth, lying curled asleep: a man pacing back and forth along a wall, a baby wailing in the corner, a nun carrying a basin of water, people sighing and singing and calling out. So full the air of names, of pleas and curses, as a forest was full of birdsong.
She took a step forward, reaching to put up her veil again, and de Rançun went past her a little and nodded, and she saw Claire.
The girl sat with her back to the wall, her shoulders rounded, her head down, dozing. Petronilla’s hand rose to her mouth. Unwillingly she remembered that she had led Claire to this. She was guilty of this as much as Thierry. The girl was filthy and her face was bruised; she clutched a cloak around her as she sat, so Petronilla could not see her clothes, but her feet were bare.
Petronilla went forward, before she had even seen all this, went to the girl, and knelt down beside her. “Claire.” She put her hand on the dirty little shoulder. “Claire, wake up.”
The girl startled and tossed her head back, her eyes popping open, and turned toward Petronilla. Her face was bruised and filthy. She wore no coif, and her hair was matted. She shrank away, but Petronilla caught her hands and laughed.
“Where are you going? I’ve come to take you home, girl. Come along.” She rose up, lifting Claire by the hand. “Come along home.”
After the feast at Saint Denis was over, Eleanor went back into the church a moment, to glory in it again, but at once they were calling her out. Her horse was already brought to the steps. She mounted, and therefore had to join her husband.
With the afternoon sun on her left, they went back to the city through the meadows and gardens, past the markets of flowers and birds, toward the Seine, but just before they would have gone over the bridge, Henry of Normandy galloped up to them.
Eleanor and the King were riding side by side, not speaking; Thierry was on the King’s right, and behind them. Ahead were only a few pages and squires. When Henry cantered up they scattered, and he rode through them and stopped before the King’s face, right before the Queen.
She could not keep from smiling; her eyes met his for an instant, and a spark leaped.
“I have come to say good-bye,” Henry said, looking first at Louis, and then again at Eleanor.
She lowered her eyes, but she could not hide her smile.
The King said, puzzled, “Well, then, good-bye, my lord.”
For an instant the young Norman
held there, blocking the way; she wondered wildly if he contemplated seizing her away, right then, and her whole body rippled, although she knew it would be folly. But then he wheeled and galloped off.
“What did that mean?” Louis asked, blankly.
Beyond him, Thierry shot her a black look. “What did that mean?”
Eleanor kept her eyes down and her smile wide. She knew what that meant. She nudged her horse on, up over the bridge to the royal island.
“You’ve brought her back here?” Eleanor said. Barefoot, in her shift, she flung herself down on the window stool and stared at her sister. “You’re so softhearted.”
“Eleanor.” Petronilla sank down beside her. “She’s just a girl. Let her come back.” She reached up and raked her hand through her hair, damp with sweat. The ugly stink of the almshouse remained with her.
“She’ll just spy on us again,” Eleanor said. The other women had taken Claire off to clean her up. Eleanor had caught only a glimpse of her, but certainly she had no courtly look about her anymore.
“I saw what Thierry did to her,” Petronilla said. “She will not spy for him, of that I’m sure.” She did not say, I saw it, and I did not stop it. She took Eleanor’s hand. “We shall need her, anyway—Alys and Marie-Jeanne can’t do everything, and the progress is coming.”
Eleanor squeezed her fingers. “They’d just send somebody else, I suppose.” With her free hand she wiped her face. Her eyes had an inward, dreamy look.
“Did the Angevins like the church?” Petronilla said.
“Oh, yes. Ah, it was magnificent. And then afterward, for amusement, I had my own little disputation of scholars.” Her mouth quirked. She lifted Petronilla’s hand to her lips. “Send the child in; I’ll talk to her.”
Alys and Marie-Jeanne had done what they could for Claire: washed her face and hands, combed her hair, put her in her best clothes, given her some shoes, but Claire could not stop crying. She was terrified of Eleanor; and when she came into the midst of the other women, she could not lift her gaze from the floor.
Instead she sank down on her knees, her hands together as if she prayed and, sobbing and blubbering, confessed everything, that from the beginning she had run to tell Eleanor’s secrets to Thierry, who had given her sweets and money in exchange for gossip about Eleanor’s dreams, what she ate, what jokes she heard, and how she lost at tables.
The women of the Queen’s chamber made a circle around her. Petronilla went to stand beside her sister, who sat by the window, her hands in her lap. When Claire, panting, came to the end of her speech, Eleanor gave a little shake of her head.
Petronilla felt a start of alarm and put out her hand, but her sister waved her off. Alys and Marie-Jeanne stood behind Claire, their hands folded together.
Claire began to cry again, crumpling down over her knees, her hair tousled and damp. Alys had put some disguise over the great livid bruise on her cheek, but the swelling still marred her face.
Abruptly Eleanor said, “Well, my girl, have you learned your lesson? Will you go off again to Thierry with spying reports?”
Huddled at Eleanor’s feet, the child groaned, her teeth clenched. “No, my lady, I swear it. I promise.” Fresh sobs shook her. “I hate him. I hate him.” She lifted her head and spat vehemently, like a stable boy.
Eleanor laughed. “Well, I hope you will come to love me instead. I forgive you. You may stay with us.”
Petronilla swelled, pleased, reached out her hand, and touched Eleanor’s shoulder. Both of the other waiting women were beaming in an easy, sentimental joy. Claire looked up, her puffy, discolored face wide with surprise, suddenly hopeful. She lunged at Eleanor and caught her hand and began to kiss it.
“Your Grace—Your Grace—”
Eleanor snatched her hand away and, with her hand on Claire’s shoulder, held her firmly off. “Don’t blubber on me. You’re wetting my gown. Keep your pride, girl. Or get some, whichever it is.”
Claire said, “Yes, Your Grace, yes, Your Grace,” backing away on her knees. Eleanor lifted her gaze to the other waiting women, her eyes wide, her face grave. “And now we have the progress to come. With only three, and the two of us, here, your work shall be hard. Do we need to find another?”
“No, my lady,” Alys said. “We, who love you both, can do anything you require.” Marie-Jeanne came to Eleanor and kissed her on both cheeks, and Eleanor took these kisses gladly, raising her face to her old nurse, smiling. Claire had drawn back, tears on her face again, her gaze on Eleanor.
Then her eyes shifted, and she was looking at Petronilla, and she smiled.
Later, after prayers, when the women were readying the room for sleep, Eleanor said, “I hope you have been wise as ever in this, Petronilla.”
Petronilla said nothing. Claire was helping Alys shake out the bedclothes. Now that the girl was back among them, her suspicions came swarming in, against her will, her doubts twining around her good intentions, sprouting thorns. “I don’t know,” she said. “I never know what’s going on anyway, Eleanor.”
“Ah,” Eleanor said. “Leave it to me, then.”
Petronilla said nothing. All she knew now was that everything was changing. “What will become of us, Eleanor?”
Her sister said, “I don’t know. But I’m not going to sit here and rot away. I’m going to get back to Poitiers, somehow, and be free.”
“Poitiers!” Petronilla felt her heart leap. “Oh, let it be so, and soon.”
Eleanor put her arm around her waist and leaned her cheek against her sister’s. “I promise you, my dear one.” Her voice dropped to a luxuriant whisper. “We’ll be home again. And there, my darling, we’ll have our own court. With music, and stories, jongleurs and troubadours—” She laughed, exultant, as if it were already happening. “There’s a new age before us. I heard it, when the masters from the Studium talked at court—what Duke Henry said at our feasting. And we will rule over it. I’ll open up my palace to every new idea, every wonderful gift, you’ll see. I mean to make Poitiers the garden of the world.” She pecked a kiss onto Petronilla’s cheek. “I promise you.”
Petronilla heaved up a sigh. In her mind she saw the narrow hill-climbing streets of Poitiers; her imagination leaped past her sister’s words to the promise in them, a new life in a joyous place, where men and women moved happily and freely, where she no longer had to watch every word, or worry who ran with what tale to which enemy.
Then Claire came in again, carrying the dog-faced ewer.
A cold foreboding washed over her. She wondered if she had made a mistake. She stiffened on the stool, drawing a little away from Eleanor. “That makes me worry even more. Now that there’s so much to lose.”
Petronilla glanced toward the center of the room, where Alys sat sewing; Marie-Jeanne had the wardrobe open and was hanging the gown inside, tucking dried flowers into the folds of cloth. Claire was pouring the wine into cups. That at least she had learned to do gracefully. Eleanor reached out and smoothed back the sleeve of Petronilla’s gown where it had been rumpled. “Sometimes, my dear one, you have to risk something. Otherwise, there’s nothing gained.” Her eyes were merry, green in the sunlight, fearless. Petronilla turned to her, wanting that clarity, and laid her head on her sister’s shoulder.
Claire helped Alys shake out the Queen’s dress, trying to imitate the older woman’s grace. It had come to her, as she settled down into the relief of knowing she was back where she belonged, that she really didn’t know as much as she thought she did. It wasn’t that she wasn’t good, so much as she did not know how to be good.
Alys knew something, she carried herself well, and she had a way with face powders and the colors of clothes. But there was more than that. She kept thinking of the Hotel-Dieu, so cold, and then Petronilla’s voice saying, “Come home,” and how that had made her feel; she thought she wanted to be the person who could say that, and make someone else feel that way. Safe again. Wanted.
Eleanor was magnificent, too high above her to make p
retend with; that would seem like mockery. Petronilla, gentle Petronilla, was within her reach. She would try to be like Petronilla. Carefully she laid the Queen’s shift down into the chest.
Nine
From Paris the Count of Anjou and his sons rode westward toward Angers. The sun beat on them, the heat of the summer. In the middle of the second day, they drew rein at an inn, where they took over the back room, and the innkeeper brought them a keg of ale and a dish of eels and some bread. The Count hung on his younger son, trading empty compliments with him, and both looking sideways at Henry.
Henry could hardly bear even to sit down. He went out and supervised the changes of horses, but he had to go in again to eat. Everything his father did seemed intended to cross him up, keep him in knots, break his charge, and this sudden love for the younger brother was no different. The low, dusty room was so hot they were sitting around in their shirts and still sweating. He sat at the door, where the draft was, and remembered her magnificent green eyes.
He saw no way she could escape her husband. It amazed him such a man had her, that white-livered sickling. To think of them in bed together made him want to laugh, or puke. She would ride Louis, he thought, she would take the lead, and the picture of this flashed into his mind. He caught himself smiling, replacing the King in the bed with himself, on top.
His brother watched him narrowly. Geoffrey was tousled, his long hair matted from the windy ride. He was drinking too much and his face was flushed. He said, “Oh, my lord of Normandy, is it now.” He lifted his cup to his lips.
Henry grunted at him, contemptuous. With his knife he stabbed at the stringy meat in front of him. He ignored his brother, but he kept a careful eye on his father, slumped on the bench. The Count was eating the grilled eels. He shot a look at Henry.
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