The White Ship

by Nicholas Salaman

  At last she drew me onto her on the bed and we engaged in the longest, fiercest, most utter act of love I have ever experienced. I think my soul came out of my cock. And then we had another one; gentler, sweeter, calmer, caressing, like a long, liquid, slithery Amen. And then we fell asleep.

  I woke once or twice to hear noises outside, the sound of voices that could barely be heard and creatures snuffling in the wood. Juliana was the only person I have ever known who could sleep with her eyes open. At least, that is what she told me.

  Finally I woke up to early sunlight and an urgent tugging from a naked Juliana. She had been washing herself from the ewer in the corner.

  ‘Wake up! We have to get back.’

  I sprang up, not tired at all. That wine must have had a clever cordial in it. I felt I could do it all again, and put a hand up to her breast, but she pushed it away and started dressing.

  ‘No time for that. He’s coming back today.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Merle told you?’

  She smiled.

  ‘Who is she?’ I asked.

  ‘Get your clothes on.’

  I bundled them on and we went downstairs. There was no sign of the girl, but an old crone was stirring a kind of pottage in a pot on the fire. She turned as we came down.

  ‘There you are,’ she croaked. ‘Sleep well, did you?’

  ‘Very well,’ I said.

  ‘You’ll have some gruel?’

  Juliana took some and lapped it like a cat.

  ‘No thanks,’ I said.

  The woman took a bowl and thrust it into my hands.

  ‘You’ll have some gruel,’ she said.

  I took it reluctantly, but, on tasting it, felt an instant uplift and dash. If I had been feeling good before, this was an extra shot of the bolt.

  ‘Thank you,’ I told her, finishing the bowl and handing it back. ‘I’d like that every morning.’

  She and Juliana exchanged glances.

  ‘You can’t,’ she told me, ‘greedy pig.’

  ‘That’s telling him,’ said Juliana. ‘Come on, we must go.’

  XX

  We hurried back to the lake taking a path through the woods that seemed a much straighter route this time.

  ‘The way changes,’ was all Juliana would say.

  At the little summerhouse on the shore, we found the boat Perrine waiting for us as we had left her. I took a good look round before we pushed off in case there was some peeping eye, but could discern nothing.

  ‘Come on, scaredy-cat,’ said Juliana. ‘You find a threat round every corner.’

  ‘And there usually is one,’ I said. ‘The question is whether it chooses to come out or not. I have lived a harder life perhaps than you.’

  ‘You do not know what it is like to live under a conqueror,’ she said, eyes blazing as only hers could. ‘The English are abused at every turn. My mother had to be Prince Henry’s whore before she could win back her land.’

  ‘I am sorry,’ I said, and felt so too.

  ‘Row hard,’ she told me, ‘and we will not be missed. Eighteen castellans have now risen against my father; the Count of Anjou has joined the rebels and taken a castle. My husband will be stirring the pot. He will not be looking for me – or you – when he returns.’

  How had she come by this news? I thought it better not to ask, and applied myself to the oars. The lake had a light morning mist around it, which mitigated our exposed position. The revels of the previous night had served us well and no one seemed to be stirring. We landed quickly, drew up the boat and hurried into the tunnel. At the far end, by the door to the keep, Juliana stopped.

  ‘You go on,’ she said. ‘It is better that we enter the castle separately.’

  I was distraught at having to leave her after all that had passed between us, and started to tell her so.

  ‘I know,’ she said. ‘Go now, quickly.’

  I was cast down, but she was right. She gave me a chaste kiss. I pushed the door ajar, saw no one around, and hurried up the stairs to the hall where a few squires lay propped against the wall, dead to the world. Noises from the kitchen proclaimed that others – scullions and bakers – were already up and at work. I flitted across the room and made for the stairs.

  ‘And what have you been up to?’

  It would have to be Fulk, of course.

  ‘Sleeping in the forest on Midsummer Night. Waiting for enchantment. Something you wouldn’t understand, Fulk.’

  The only way with Fulk was attack. He was momentarily set back. He glared at me but frankly I was too tired. I just prayed that Juliana would not come up at that point. I turned and climbed the stairs up towards my cupboard.

  ‘You wait till we have a melee,’ he shouted. ‘Then you can kiss my arse.’

  What the hell was he talking about? I slept late that morning. Luckily my little pupils were also tired and played sluggard. Juliana told me later that she had climbed by a secret staircase to the postern gate, and walked in the herb garden before falling asleep sitting upon a bench and waking with dew upon her.

  XXI

  When I came downstairs the arrival of the Duke’s messenger had brought a buzz of excitement. Henry had sent out a military summons to the whole of Normandy – whether it would be answered, least of all by Eustace, was moot to say the least. The messenger, a knight called Bourdet, had ridden in haste and had still further to go. He was refreshing himself in hall before leaving south for Mortagne. I approached him on hearing this last piece of news.

  ‘My father is the Comte de Perche,’ I told him. ‘Will you please give him my salutations and tell him that I am well, and that I hope that he is?’

  ‘I will do that willingly,’ he replied. ‘I too hope that he is well and the Duke wishes it also. We hear that there is trouble from the tenants of the Comte of Bellême, whom the Duke imprisoned for the trouble he caused. The Duke has transferred the Bellême lands to his own nephew, Theobald. Theobald is a good general, but he has made these same estates over to his brother Stephen who is less of a soldier. Stephen now has to defend the whole of the south of Normandy, and the Duke needs your father’s support since Mortagne is but a day’s ride from Bellême, and the whole of the south of Normandy is aflame.’

  ‘I am sure that he will give it,’ I replied, knowing that my father, if a bit of a duffer, was staunchly loyal to the Duke.

  ‘I am relieved to hear it, as I am sure the Duke will be. These are difficult times and the bedrock of the duchy seems to be melting.’

  ‘Melting, is it?’ an all-too-familiar voice broke in.

  It was Eustace, just arrived, clanking hot from his machinations with Amaury de Montfort and God knew who else, and smelling of horses, metal, sweat and drink. The news nexus had not let us down.

  ‘My lord,’ said Bourdet, rising from the table.

  ‘Sit down, man,’ cried Eustace, tempering minimal politeness with crassness. ‘So to what do we owe the pleasure?’

  Bourdet resumed his seat and repeated the details of his mission.

  ‘A military summons,’ growled Eustace, ‘when all the duchy is at sixes and sevens. The Duke cannot keep order. He offends the barons, takes away their castles and gives them to his favourites.’

  ‘I will not argue with you, Comte. I am here to deliver a message which I have done.’

  ‘I have friends who have suffered from the Duke’s foolishness and inattention. He forgets past favours and promises, and stirs up rancour from Alençon to Dieppe and from Vernon to Cherbourg.’

  ‘He is your liege lord and therefore he can require your assistance.’

  There now ensued the spectacle, fatuous if it had not been such bad form, of Eustace climbing onto his high horse.

  ‘Do not you tell me, knight, what I can or cannot do. Who do you think you are? You come into my castle and throw your weight around. Get out of here.’

  Bourdet put down his beaker of water, and rose to his feet.


  ‘You forget, sir, whom I serve.’

  ‘I forget nothing …’

  Eustace’s face was now registering a familiar shade of purple.

  Bourdet held his hand up.

  ‘I urge you, sir, to say nothing now that you might regret later. I will leave now since I have far to go, but I urge you to consider the Duke’s summons. It may go ill with you if you ignore it. I am but the messenger. Please …’ he lifted his hand as Eustace started to rumble and harrumph again, ‘I will see myself out.’

  The Duke’s envoy left the room and we heard him and his attendant descending the steps outside the hall. The majority of those present had the grace to look ashamed; this was no way to treat a visitor let alone a royal envoy.

  ‘Well done, Eustace,’ Juliana’s voice rang out from the foot of the stairs. ‘You certainly know how to make enemies. Was it so necessary to insult the Duke’s man?’

  ‘It is necessary for a man of honour not to dissemble his true feelings,’ spluttered Eustace. ‘A man of honour nails his colours to the mast.’

  ‘But they are not your colours; they are Amaury de Montfort’s colours; they are Comte Baldwin’s colours; they are the Comte of Maine’s colours; they are Louis of France’s colours. Troublemakers the lot of them.’

  ‘You speak of matters you know not, madam. Kindly keep your opinions to yourself and we can laugh at them in private.’

  With that, Eustace sat down, poured a goblet of wine and turned his back on Juliana. I thought she was going to pour the whole pitcher over him, but she controlled herself. Her parting shot, as she turned to mount the stairs, was much more lethal.

  ‘God Almighty, Eustace, you do try my father’s patience. It surprises me that you still have any castles left. But you won’t have them for long, and then we shall see who is the ruler and who the ruled. Good evening to you.’

  XXII

  There was to be no respite for Duke Henry for whom – though I had not yet met him – I felt increasing sympathy (to be the father of Juliana he must have done something right).

  July and August brought him more trouble while we at Breteuil picked strawberries and cherries and saw the harvest come in. Eustace and his merry men, some of whom were not so merry at being separated from their homes and loving families, were kept on the qui vive while he cantered around drumming up support for faction and strife, and offering his services to those too cynical to refuse. Juliana kept herself in touch with the news of her father’s troubles, and I am convinced sent him details of her husband’s activities and his foolish dealings with dangerous men.

  Next came news that Gilbert de l’Aigle – head of a great family with estates in southern Normandy and England, and a faithful servant of Henry’s who had fought for him at Tinchebrai – had died suddenly. His son Richer looked to succeed to his father’s estates in England. The Duke, however, reckoned that Richer’s brothers Geoffrey and Engenulf de l’Aigle had a superior claim since they had served the Duke as soldiers of his household. This infuriated Richer who sought the help of the French king, Louis, who was ever eager to press a little thorn into Henry’s flesh. Soon Amaury de Montfort was offering soldiers and support, and along came all the rest of the plotters and malcontents.

  The Duke decided to accede to Richer de l’Aigle’s requests on the advice of none other than my father of Perche, but it was too late to stop the French king and his mischievous intervention. Louis – tall, pear-shaped – won the surrender of the Château of l’Aigle with a sudden pounce in spite of his corpulence.

  We heard all about it not long after the events unfolded, as the grapes ripened on our vines, and the nodding wheat yielded to the scythe as it had always done, disturbing the dormice and unleashing the conies. The upheaval furnished Eustace with yet more material for his travels, especially as Amaury de Montfort was a key player in all the plotting and machination, but it all still seemed far away to me; someone else’s business. Until, all at once, there it was knocking on my door.

  Juliana was a favourite daughter of the Duke. Perhaps he was missing the reassuring company of his wife, perhaps he was feeling his age, but whatever the reason, it was all getting too much for him and he asked – requested, commanded – Juliana to make the journey to Rouen and stay with him in his castle. He could no longer trust his own circle, he told her. He was beginning to fear for his life, and he was usually a sanguine man. She had to go.

  I said goodbye to her sorrowfully. It was late August, that wobbly time when you can feel summer coming to an end, and winter blowing its little distant horn. There is dampness in the air. Vapours cling to the grass, mists shroud the trees. Bread grows mouldy, and swine, if they have any sense (which they do), start to feel apprehensive about Michaelmas when good pigs turn into ham.

  ‘It is the end of something good,’ I told her.

  ‘Rubbish,’ she said. ‘I will be back. Winter’s a good time. Fires and hot ale and spiced wine, dancing and music, caroles and Christmas …’

  ‘There’ll never be another summer like this one.’

  She went the next day, and of course everything else started to go downhill. The little girls were sad and missed their mother. We talked about her every day and tried to imagine what she was doing far away in Rouen. I am afraid I was an inadequate substitute, but they clung to me. Their father, when he was there, simply frightened them. The running of the castle began to slide. The moat grew weed. The rushes grew foul and the steward cheated on the meat. The trenchers were served up with mould on them, the wine was like mule piss, the small ale sour, and the servants surly.

  September came with a fine early harvest of apples and pears, and cider-making began. I received a short, hurried, secret note from Juliana telling me that her father feared for his life – there were indeed suggestions of a plot to kill him – and that she must stay at least until the beginning of October.

  Michaelmas arrived and the pigs’ worst fears were realised. Pork, left over from the salting, appeared in hall rather too often and indifferently presented by a listless cook. The steward had salted away the best cuts to be sold by himself, elsewhere.

  The little girls were beginning to decline irregular verbs, and starting on the easiest bits of Ovid. I wrote them a series of stories in Latin featuring the exploits of two young witches called Case and Tense. It was pretty good rubbish, but they seemed to like it.

  I had some conversations with the lovely, dark-eyed Alice in Juliana’s absence. She told me a little of her past as daughter of a country knight and tenant of the Comte de Carentan, brought up in a remote manor house near Barfleur. She had led a life of excruciating boredom, tempered by reading, which her mother (who was related to the Carentans and had married beneath her) had insisted she was taught to do, and was relieved when her mother found her a position at the neighbouring Château de Bayeux. There she attracted the notice of the Duke – who sent her as companion to his daughter at Breteuil. That was how things happened in Normandy.

  Alice was devoted to Juliana, hated Eustace, and had a mighty wish in due course to see more of the world. We spoke a great deal of Juliana, and any feelings I might have had for Alice (I could not help recalling the dream I had had on my first night in the château) were tempered by the respect we both had for the Comtesse. I did not ask Alice if she had any intimation of being part of my dream, or of me being part of hers. It would have been disloyal to Juliana to start such a hare, but I could not help feeling that there was more than connection between us.

  Soon it was time to pick the grapes and make the thin liquid that sufficed for wine, served to the rank and file in hall, on which the steward made a profit. The left-over sourish grapes also added a quality of freshness to the drab diet that was our daily portion. The steward could not think what else to do with them. They were fit for us or the pigs, and the pigs had been slaughtered. Even the pages and messengers were starting to complain about the food. God knows what the scullions were saying.

  I received a second, longer letter by
secret devise from Juliana, which I can give you verbatim since I still have it with me.

  Dearest leman mine,

  I hope you are as well as I am, and thinking of me just as much as I think of you. There is much afoot here, most of it bad. There has been a conspiracy among some of the very closest of my father’s companions, even those who sometimes eat with him, to remove him in favour of his nephew Stephen. We do not think Stephen knew of this, though it is possible. How they proposed to remove him, I cannot say, but it is more than possible it involves murder.

  My father moves around, changes his room, his bed, increases the number of his guard, even sleeps with a shield and sword in his grasp. Who was behind the conspiracy we could not at first discover but finally it emerged. The culprit was none other than one of his trusted treasurers, a secret malcontent called Herbert, so smooth and affable on the surface you would not believe.

  When my father found out, a dreadful punishment was inflicted on the man – he was blinded and then castrated like a dog. I heard the screams as I stood on the topmost tower to get away. It took place, as is customary, in the marketplace for the people to see. My father is not a bloodthirsty man but certain rituals have to be performed in Normandy, he says; justice must be seen to be done. Otherwise he will be considered no better than his brother Robert who could not or would not keep order, and whom he himself deposed on the urging of the Church.

  Now for the good news. My father feels much safer now that the plot is uncovered and the chief architect put out of action. He says I can return to Breteuil after the first week of October when he has called a great council meeting at Rouen. Aren’t you happy to hear that, little Latin leman? Only a few days to go! Give a close fart to my husband, not that you would do anything so unmannerly. Keep yourself clean of limb, pure of mind, and constant of heart, and forget about the first two so long as you cleave to the third.