The parliament had been summoned to meet as soon as possible; but that would be the first Sunday in Lent, for you cannot hold a parliament in winter. I had plenty of time to find out where Sir Geoffrey stood, and where I stood. If, after I had seen him, I still wanted to help him I could perhaps be of use in planning his defence. I had no influence among the barons who would judge him, but at least I knew how the ordinary bachelor knights of Lamorie regarded his desertion. Sir Geoffrey would be out of touch with local opinion, which he frequently misjudged even when he was living in the country; and I was afraid he might trust too much to that mysterious something up his sleeve which he thought would win him a pardon. He always looked on the bright side. He might not grasp that even a papal bull, counter-sealed by the King of France, would not alter the fact that he had deserted his lord in a time of grave danger to wander about Italy with a pretty woman.
The porter of the friary in the suburbs of Andreville made no difficulty when I asked to see Sir Geoffrey. Evidently my lord was not under close arrest, nor taking sanctuary by clinging to the horns of the altar. I was not invited in, but then that often happens when a layman visits a religious house on purely secular business; good friars reserve their hospitality for the needy. Instead I was told that Sir Geoffrey would come out to me, and in the meantime the porter gave me wine and little cakes on a tray.
Then my lord strolled out on foot and unattended, pleased to see me but not at all surprised that I had come. In face he looked actually younger than I remembered him; for I was the older by two bitter campaigns while he had passed his time in the peace and comfort of Italy. There were no lines round his mouth, no grey in his hair, no wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. He smiled pleasantly, without a trace of embarrassment. His fashionable wisps of moustache and beard sprouted from freshly shaved cheeks, and his chestnut hair hung rippling to his shoulders.
He was dressed as a penitent who was also a culprit awaiting trial. Tunic, hose and surcoat were all made of plain grey cloth, without blazon or badge. He wore no jewels, save for a thin gold chain round his neck. His coif was a net of black cords.
But the general effect was not that of a knight fallen into poverty and misfortune. His hose clung to his legs without a wrinkle, his tunic had been tailored to fit him, everything he wore was of the finest broadcloth except where a shirt of very white lawn peeped out with careful negligence at neck and wrists. The simple coif was knotted from pure silk, and his plain black shoes were of soft Cordoba leather. He carried neither sword nor dagger, since he was under arrest; but from his black leather belt hung a wallet of grey doeskin which any lady would have been proud to carry at a great feast He held his head high, walking with a gay dancer's step.
I thought at first: "He is dressed to win sympathy. But he will fail, since he is too proud to make himself look humble." Then I saw, more worthily, that Sir Geoffrey did not dress to make an impression on others but only to please himself. His clothing was appropriate to the best knight in Romanie, fallen under the temporary displeasure of his Prince.
He embraced me as an equal, calling me cousin; then he helped me to hitch my horse to a ring in the wall and walked with me in the street, his hand on my shoulder. After ten years in Romanie I should have been accustomed to walking in a town, but it still seemed to me odd every time I did it. We sauntered on the cobbles between white walls, with a hot sun blazing from a blue sky; the well-dressed burgesses pattered about their business without staring at the most notorious felon in Lamorie, for Grifons have very good manners. Suddenly I was reminded of our first meeting, long ago in La Cremonie. Romanie is a fair land, and I had been very happy in the service of Sir Geoffrey.
"My lord," I said without thinking, "the knights of Escorta are bringing money and horses for your use. Why don't you take the next ship for Acre? I will come with you, and together we shall fight the infidel until we recover the Holy Sepulchre."
"A very good life, cousin William," he answered gravely, as though he were genuinely considering it. "But I am too old to begin again, and we both have duties nearer home. What would become of my Isabel and your Melisande? No, I shall continue in Lamorie. I like it here."
"What will become of the lady Isabel when the Prince has escheated Escorta? My lord, you must face facts. The old life is over. The best you can hope for is forfeiture, probably imprisonment as well, perhaps even the axe or the rope. Get away while there is time. Your uncle will not pursue you, but if you stand trial you must be found guilty."
"What? Run away, as though I were ashamed of myself ? I have done no wrong, except to default on a service to my overlord. That's nothing worse than getting into debt; though of course the debt must be paid sooner or later. I gather you had a talk with Jeanne, so you must know that I didn't wrong even Sir John de Catabas. I shan't say so in public, of course. As I see it, chivalry demands that I put a slur on my own honour rather than insult the charms of a beautiful lady. My friends will know the truth, because they will accept my denials in private. Otherwise there is only this default of service. The high court must find me guilty, but it's not an offence that calls for serious punishment."
"We were in grave danger from the Grifons, my lord, and we looked for your lance to help us."
"Nonsense. From Grifons no one is ever in grave danger. Wave a sword at them and they run away. For a time you were in grave danger from Turks, which is quite another thing. You and I, who were at Pelagonie, know how dangerous they can be. But in the first campaign my loyal Sir John led you better than I could have done it myself; you won quite easily without any help from my lance. And in the second campaign Sir Ancelin de Toucy turned the tables on those pompous Grifon nobles; again a matter in which I could not have helped, since I cannot speak a word of Turkish. My absence made no difference. No, the court will find me guilty, and perhaps threaten all sorts of penalties. Then I shall produce a letter which I have here in my wallet, and they will be so pleased at my news that they would forgive me worse crimes than a pilgrimage to Italy."
Sir Geoffrey twirled his moustache and tossed his head, already seeing himself the central figure in a crowded parliament.
Agitation made me forget my manners. Hooking a finger into his girdle, I faced him so that he must listen until I had finished.
"My lord, you have a mesnie of loyal knights. We can rescue you from captivity, and get you out of the dominions of Prince William. I at least will fight for you, for so long as you are my lord. But after parliament has given judgement your fees will escheat to the Prince, and you will have no vassals. Then my loyalty must revert to your overlord, Prince William, and if I were to help his enemy I should be recreant. So you must make up your mind. Flee now, with the help of your knights; or face condemnation and punishment. After you have been condemned you will have no knights."
"Cousin William, you haven't been listening. I shall stand trial, and I suppose I shall be found guilty. But what with my eloquent plea in mitigation, and the letter I shall read to the court at the end of the proceedings, no harm will come to me. I shall leave Andreville a free man, and lord of Escorta. That's what will happen, mark my words. Come to the parliament and see for yourself."
He led me into a tavern. When the landlord came running to serve him he pressed me to share a flagon of costly Italian wine. But I realised that he had no money, for his wallet was fastened and sealed securely; so I said I preferred the local Malvoisie and paid for it before he could interfere. Like every other Grifon in Lamorie, the landlord valued the promise to pay of Sir Geoffrey de Bruyere as better than mint-fresh hyperpers. I did not want his faith to be shattered, when Sir Geoffrey was outlaw and penniless.
We talked for a while of Italy, and the prospects of the coming war between King Manfred and the Guelfs; when I took my leave Sir Geoffrey bade me carry his duty to the lady Isabel and say that he would soon wait on her. But I carefully did not promise to deliver his message, which I thought went too far even coming from the best knight in all Romanie.
As you will have seen, I had no chance to demand an explanation of my lord's conduct. Evidently he was not ashamed of himself, and confident that the parliament would not blame him though he must be found guilty of a technical default. When I got back to my lodging I decided that I was still bound by my oath of homage, at least until the trial. I would attend the parliament, and decide where my duty lay after hearing Sir Geoffrey's defence.
The high court met in the old round church of Santa Sophia; not on horseback in the open, as was the custom at Nicles. For Andreville is the seat of the law courts, a city of peace; and it is unusual for knights and barons to ride to it in arms.
Of course the church was crowded. The lords of parliament filled the circle under the dome, the necessary clerks and officials sat on the steps before the altar-screen, eager spectators crowded the doorways. But by this time Melisande had joined me, and she persuaded the Grifon sacristan to find places for us at the front of a steep narrow gallery. We looked down on coifed heads crowding below, shifting and turning and mingling; for all the lords must stand save for Prince William, who sat in a high-backed chair of state.
In a little cleared space before the altar-screen stood Sir Geoffrey, dressed in his neat and sober clothes of grey. It gave me a pang to see him in that splendid assembly, the only knight without a weapon. I don't hold with the Italian fashion of carrying swords in church, so as to make it easy to murder your enemies at the high altar; but on formal public occasions every knight should carry a sword or at least a dagger, to show his quality. Sir Geoffrey was alone, as well as unarmed. He looked so isolated and helpless that we must all feel sorry for him.
The trial began with endless time-wasting legal rigmarole. Andreville is a warren of lawyers, and they wanted to show the gentry how these things should be done. A parliament on horseback gets to business more quickly, since no lawyer can keep his horse quiet long enough to prove the obvious. Now someone must swear on the Gospels that there had been a Grifon invasion, and someone else that Sir Geoffrey had been summoned to the muster, and someone else that he did not come, and someone else that he later returned from oversea and surrendered to the Prince's justice, and the last one of all that the man in the grey surcoat over there was that Sir Geoffrey they had all been talking about. Everyone in court knew it already, but it had to be gone through at tedious length before the serious business of the parliament might begin.
At last the culprit was asked what he had to say. Sir Geoffrey tossed his hair, pointed a toe, put a hand on his hip, and launched out into a prepared oration.
At his opening sentence the audience rustled with surprise, and in her excitement Melisande pinched my thigh until I had to push her hand away. He was speaking, like any old-fashioned minstrel, of the over-mastering power of Love.
Love, he explained, conquers all. Then he said it again in Latin to make it sound more impressive. Love has misguided some of the noblest knights in the world, bringing them to sin and even to shameful death. Long ago Sir Achilles withdrew from the battle for love of the damsel Briseis; Sir Antony lost the empire of the world for love of Queen Cleopatra; even Sir Lancelot, the doughtiest champion of the Round Table, betrayed his lord for love of Queen Guinevere. The Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine, the fairest lady of her day and Queen successively of France and England, had wrecked a mighty Crusade by her fatal beauty. (At this there was a stir, for the indiscretions of Queen Eleanor were still well remembered. She was the grandmother of the King of England then reigning.) Love is a devouring force. The nobler the spirit, the more easily does Love overcome it. He asked his hearers to note that all the stories of disastrous Love dealt with noble knights. The grosser souls of burgesses and peasants were not so easily infected; while the clergy, by the special Grace of God, were notoriously immune. (Here he stared fixedly at the leman of the Archbishop of Patras, a grocer's wife and dressed beyond her station, who sat in one of the galleries.)
He himself was a knight, who had devoted his life to feats of arms as earnestly as anyone who sat in judgement on him. Just as once his horse had been pierced by Turkish arrows, when he had been chosen by universal acclaim to lead all the chivalry of Romanie in a desperate charge, so now Cupid's arrow had pierced his heart. (His cultured audience could follow the reference.) For love of a fair lady he had abandoned his duty. For more than a year he had been blinded by love. Yet this madness, though all-conquering, might sometimes be cured. The cure was, naturally, the example of a more noble knight.
So it had been with him, Sir Geoffrey concluded. He had been summoned before King Manfred, that stainless paladin. The King had reasoned with him, but the example of royal devotion to duty had been even more impressive. The King of Sicily was a worthy son of his famous father, the mighty Emperor, who had never been turned from his course by feminine charms. Sir Geoffrey had acknowledged his fault. Thanks to the virtues of King Manfred he had come home to submit to the judgement of his peers.
"What is he getting at ?" Melisande murmured in the pause that followed. "It wasn't like that at all. He wasn't in love with Jeanne, and he never touched her. Most of the barons know the truth, or have heard rumours of it. Besides, his chosen examples prove that he isn't speaking seriously. King Manfred notoriously neglects his duty; though his dissipation is hunting, not love-making. As for the Emperor Frederick, he was never influenced by love; but he kept infidel dancing-girls by the score and fathered bastards all over Italy. Is Sir Geoffrey quite deliberately making fun of the court? The barons would like to acquit him, if he gives them an excuse. But they will harden their hearts if he makes them look foolish."
Sir Geoffrey was speaking again:
"One last point, my lords. In strict law it has nothing to do with the accusation you are judging, but perhaps you ought to bear it in mind when you decide my sentence. I have here a letter from King Manfred. I shall ask a clerk to read it aloud, but I know what it contains. The King of Sicily sends help to his friends in Lamorie, three hundred sergeants and their pay for three years. They are even now on the sea. They will be at the disposal of the Prince of Lamorie to serve him as though they were his own vassals. The King makes only one condition. I am to command them, or they will go home again."
He ripped open the fastenings of his wallet, and with a bow handed a parchment to a clerk.
Sir Geoffrey led his rejoicing mesnie back to Carytena. He rode fully armed, himself bearing the banner of Escorta; for Sir John de Catabas had very sensibly announced that age and infirmity compelled him to retire to end his days in peace on his remote manor. Peasants came out to greet their returning lord, led by Grifon priests. Bonfires flared on the hills, and everyone was gay.
I turned to Melisande, riding beside me.
'There he goes, once more the best knight in all Romanie, not a whit older or wiser than when I was presented to him at La Cremonie, in the good old days when there were no Grifons in Mistra. With a destrier between his legs and mail on his shoulders he can't go wrong. The trouble comes when he sits in his hall in peacetime. Then he follows where his fancy leads him, and there's no telling what he will do next."
"None the less, the best knight in all Romanie," she answered. "You should be proud to serve him. But I wish I could have seen the guilty pair in Italy. Sir Geoffrey in love with his own prowess, thinking only of his superb strength and hardihood. And little Jeanne in love with her own beauty, thinking only of her well-shaped little body, which must not be marred by angry Grifons. What a couple they made! Each lost in self-contemplation, each utterly satisfied with his own person. Yet all the time they were together. What did they find to talk about? The wonder is that they didn't part in sheer absence of mind, not noticing that the other was no longer there. He never talks about her, have you noticed? Soon he will be describing the shrines he visited in Italy, quite forgetting that he did not visit them alone."
"The best knight of this degenerate age," said I, "and it's an honour to ride in his mesnie. But I wish he would sometimes listen to good advice. I can't see o
ur little Geoffrey ever getting a fee from his glorious and chivalrous godfather. Hallo, we must pull up for another address of welcome."
CONCLUSION
Sir Geoffrey went home to serve in the continual wars against the Grifons of Mistra and to defend his people from the rebellious Esclavons of the mountains. For Carytena was now a border castle, not nearly so pleasant to live in as when I first knew it. The Ghibelline sergeants whose arrival had won his pardon did not stay for the full three years of the treaty. King Manfred withdrew them after a few months, when he needed all his power to face the Count of Anjou. But the Guelfs won all the same, King Manfred was killed, and the Count of Anjou became King Charles of Sicily. So Lamorie joined the Guelfs and we all found ourselves faithful soldiers of Holy Church.
Prince William, nettled by the sneers of stout Ghibellines who reproached him as a turncoat, led his knights to Italy where they gained great glory fighting for King Charles at Tagliacozzo. But Sir Geoffrey and the mesnie of Escorta stayed at home, for now that the Grifons held Mistra raiding never ceased. It was not a bit like the Lamorie I had known in the old days; now it was a harried, hungry land, where peasants hid in caves and the cattle limped from being galloped into hiding to escape plunderers.
In the spring of 1271, more than sixteen years after I had first come to Romanie, Sir Geoffrey rode with some of the senior knights of his household to his other castle of Bucelet, down the valley. News had reached Carytena that the castellan was gravely ill, but when we reached the outer gate we saw the banner furled in sign of mourning, and the shield of Sir Thomas the old castellan hanging wreathed in myrtle over the main gate.
"God rest his soul, he was a loyal knight," said Sir Geoffrey, drawing rein. "I must call to condole with the widow, but we had better camp in the fields outside until after the funeral, which I suppose will be tomorrow. There are other affairs to be considered, for the welfare of the barony. Cousin William, come aside with me a moment."
Lord Geoffrey's Fancy Page 27
