The Last English King

by Julian Rathbone

  ‘I’ll have all of it or none,’ he said.

  Edwin shrugged, picked the flesh out of his left palm with his right hand and put it all in his own mouth, letting the shattered shell drop to the floor.

  ‘You can’t be serious,’ he said.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About fighting us, arraigning us for treason, all that crap.’

  ‘I certainly am. The harvest is over. It’s been a good one -- there’s food in hand, and coin too. We’ll have no problem with the fyrd. Between us my brothers and I can put four thousand housecarls in the field. We’ll be fighting in the King’s name. You stand as much chance as . . .’ he searched his mind for a really telling, original comparison and found one, ‘as a snowball in hell. We’ll have you well sorted before winter sets in.’

  By which he meant: ‘before the King dies’.

  Edwin shrugged, strolled back to where Morcar was standing.

  ‘Yon fond fyoul wansa fecht,’ he said, lapsing into dialect.

  And at that moment there was a sudden pounding at the door.

  A young cleric burst in. The King had fallen into a deep sleep from which none could wake him. The whole gathering now ran, or in the case of those who had horses to hand, galloped back up to the castle. Harold, with Walt, Timor and the two rebellious brothers from Mercia were amongst the first to storm down the rush-strewn hall. The archbishops, carried in litters by their servants, were not far behind.

  Edward was lying back on his pillows with his arthritic fingers neatly linked on the coverlet that covered his chest. A crystal and gold rosary was laced through them. His colour was good, but his breath shallow and wheezy. The general air of cleanliness, neatness and peacefulness that surrounded him might have been ascribed by the superstitious to the sanctity of an old man about to enter the presence of his Maker. The more practical observer would have noted the presence of Queen Edith, dressed now in black watered silk apart from a white snood held in place by a gold coronet, sitting in the shadow with her ladies in attendance.

  As the men approached those that wore headgear doffed it and all fell silent, trying as hard as they could without actually walking on tiptoe to move quietly, grasping any armour or chains about them to stop them jangling. They made a semicircle around the King and for a moment nothing was said. Then the monks behind the Queen and her ladies began softly to intone the Miserere Nobis.

  ‘End of an era?’ whispered Morcar.

  ‘Let’s hope not,’ muttered Harold.

  Edward opened one glassy pink eye.

  ‘Barley soup,’ he said. ‘And then you can take me to Westminster.’

  They had had a fright. As they walked out into the open air, where a soft rain had begun to fall and the chickens were running into the stables for shelter, Edwin stopped and turned to Harold.

  ‘Let’s not mess about any more. You can’t take on William without us. You know what we want. Give it to us and we’re your men. Together we’ll see the Bastard off.’

  ‘What if I refuse?’

  ‘Then you really will have to raise the fyrd and shift us by force.’ Edwin turned and set off down the now greasy cobbles towards the postern. ‘Look. If you’re thinking we might go back to York without a fight or without getting what we want, that we might even be considering a deal with William, then think again. We’re not fools. William’s not coming here to redistribute England amongst the English.’

  Surprised at this hint of political acumen Harold looked at him.

  ‘You’re certainly right about that,’ he said. ‘None of us, none of us,’ he repeated, ‘should be in any doubt about that. All right. I’ll talk to Tostig. You’ll hear from me.’

  ‘Wanker. Fucking wanker. Spineless, spunkless, womanising wanker!’ Harold leant against the door and waited. Tostig continued to storm about the big first-floor room which he had rented from a prosperous brewer, looking for things to smash, but he had already run through what little there was, including a half-filled chamber pot. The bed remained, a stout oak-frame, and even that he lifted and thumped down every now and then. At last he calmed a little, enough at any rate to explain how very thoroughly he understood his position.

  ‘You know what you’re doing? This totally dishonours me. It dishonours my wife and her brother the Count of Bruges. Above all it dishonours you. Why are you doing this to me?’

  Harold pushed his back off the door.

  ‘I accept all you say. But I think a time has come when we must consider the possibility that there are things more important than individual honour, the honour even of a family.’

  ‘What sort of things? What the fuck are you talking about? The only thing you are putting in front of my honour and your own good name is the chance you might pluck a crown out of all this for yourself!’

  ‘That is not the case. I should as soon see the Atheling on the throne as me.’

  ‘So. What? What is this new thing that is so much more important than honour?’

  Harold turned to the window, pushed back the shutters. The room filled with the noise and smells of the street. Busyness and business, trading, making, doing. Distant hills and forests. Raining still, but not much, not much more than a light mist. Evening not far off. Sudden burst of laughter from a pub nearby where he knew his eight men were hoisting a few pints. Perhaps he’d join them. He turned from the window.

  ‘Not easy to explain,’ he said. ‘But put it like this. This, all this, the hides, hundreds, shires, earldoms and all who live in them, look to us to protect them. If we have a civil war now, over Northumbria, over a matter of honour, many people will be killed. Much of the country will be laid waste, villages pillaged, towns plundered . . .’

  ‘By what right do we rule, Harold? Answer me that.’

  Harold shrugged. Tostig went on.

  ‘By right of honour. Our name. Throw that away, as you will do if you turn me out, there’s no reason anyone should follow you or yours. You will forfeit the right to rule.’

  ‘Let me finish. If we fight for you we will win. We’ll get you back your Earldom --’

  ‘I’ve not lost it yet.’

  ‘And the name of Godwinson will be hated north of the Trent for a generation. Yet within months, weeks even, we shall be asking them to join us to fight the Norman. What’s left of us. And of them. And because we shall have just ripped them apart, burnt their villages, raped their women and killed their best men, they won’t. They’ll tell us to bugger off.’

  ‘But still we shall have our honour, our good name. Godwinsons may be hated and feared, but we will be honoured still, and they’ll be glad to keep us where we are.’

  ‘Oh shit! Just shut up, will you?’ It was Harold’s temper now that was going. ‘You just don't understand, do you? These people have a decent life, they’ll fight for it, but they look to us to lead them --’

  ‘But their lives will be the same whoever leads them. So. The Bastard wins. He won’t, but suppose he does. He’ll raise taxes, demand an armed man from every five hides, just as we do. He’ll boot out the thegns who supported us, and put in his own, just as we have in the past. But for the peasants, the farm-vvorkers, the townspeople, ordinary people it’ll all go on the same--’

  ‘It won’t. It will not. That’s what I’m trying to get across to you, into your thick skull. I’ve been there, I’ve seen how they do things in Normandy. Nine tenths live in slavery. The lords do what they like, they own everything, there’s no law or justice and they seem to believe that’s how God wants things to be, I know --’

  ‘Bullshit. You’ll bundle me out for the sake of the ordinary people?’

  Harold said nothing.

  ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake go fuck yourself.’ Again Tostig banged about the room, and for a moment it seemed he might even hit his older brother. ‘If you were doing it for the crown I would at least understand. But doing it because you think the crap out there in the streets and fields will be better off ruled by you than by William . . . well. Spare me. I’m off�
��

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘First through every estate I have between here and Dover, collecting the men whose lord I am. A couple of hundred, may be five if I’m lucky --’

  ‘I . . . we could use those men when the Bastard comes.’

  ‘They’re mine. I’ll take Judith back to Bruges, winter it out there, then I’ll be back. You bet your fucking fine feelings I’ll be back. Now get off my back.’

  Next morning the Witangemot met in the castle hall. King Edward presided from his bier, crown on, sitting up, smiling sightlessly as dull shapes passed in front of him. When below him, in the body of the hall, Archbishop Ealdred called the meeting to order, he nodded off and the crown slipped a little towards his left ear.

  There were about fifteen of them who were of any importance. The two archbishops, Harold and his two younger brothers Leofwine and Gyrth, Edwin and Morcar, a few more bishops and abbots. Behind them thirty or so of the major land-holding earls, ealdormen and thegns.

  Harold took the floor. Edwin and Morcar had, he said, joined with him that very morning at Mass in the Holy Church of Christchurch and given their solemn oaths that, when the King died (and we all hope and pray he may live for many years . . . amen, amen to that, said all), they would abide by the choice of the Witangemot and support by arms, money, land, kin and any other means they had whomever the Witangemot chose to succeed. And in particular they would resist any foreign incursion or invasion that might occur in support of any claimant not elected by the Witangemot.

  Moreover, they would withdraw the troops who were now camping outside the city walls and disband these and all other armies at present harrying the countryside round Northampton and other parts, sending all back to their homes without any further plundering or marauding.

  In earnest of which he, Harold, acting for the King, here pronounced and decreed that Morcar, brother of Earl Edwin of Mercia would take upon him the style and all the appurtenances, demesnes, emoluments (and so on, and so on) that went with the Earldom of Northumbria . . .

  It seemed to be all over. Sweating slightly and wondering now if after all he had done the right thing, Harold went over to Edwin who came to meet him, embraced him, took his right hand in his left and turned to face the assembly.

  ‘My lords,’ Edwin said, ‘Harold has spoken wisely and well. A state of perfect amity, love and harmony now exists between his family and mine. And, so all might know the truth of this, I hereby now and in front of you all offer to him Aldyth, my sister, to be his wedded wife, thus sealing in holy matrimony not only the bond between two people but two families for the common weal of all.’

  Harold’s face went white like white lead then the colour flooded back. His hand was still entwined with Edwin’s and for a moment Edwin too went pale but with pain as he felt the crushing grip squeeze the bones in his palm together. Harold looked out and over all the people assembled in front of him. On the faces of some he saw barely concealed smirks, on others worried frowns, but most were stonily passive, anxious not to reveal their reactions to what was clearly a carefully planned but still extremely risky move on Edwin’s part.

  They all knew the situation. Harold was not married, and really a man of his position should be. For thirteen or fourteen years he had had a mistress, Edith Swan-Neck, the wife of a thegn who had land in the ancient Danish settlement of Wexford. She remained just what she always had been - Harold’s mistress, a concubine. Such women can and should be cast off if political exigencies demand it. He could, of course, make what settlement he liked on her, and on their children, from his personal goods, that was no one’s business but his, but in the world of power and power-broking she was not a factor.

  There was, however, a much more serious aspect. Already, by stripping Tostig of his earldom and, apparently, forcing him into exile the sons of Aelfgar had struck a powerful blow against the Godwinsons both in terms of the prestige and the land they controlled - but this was much more serious. If, and clearly it was meant to happen, if Aldyth bore Harold a son quite soon, then that son would one day be a claimant to the English throne. And when that day came in all probability he would still be young if not actually a minor. If that was the case, then the Queen would become regent, and would naturally turn to her own kin to rule with her. In short, Aelfgar’s sons were making precisely the same move to consolidate their power and influence on the crown that the Godwinsons had made when they insisted Edward should marry Edith.

  Harold shook his head, not in refusal but to clear it. He let go of Edwin’s hand. The third factor, the one of most importance there and then, was that a public refusal in front of the Witangemot would be seen to be so discourteous, so humbling to Aldyth and her kin that all possible alliance let alone friendship between the two clans would be at an end. He chose his words with the greatest care he could muster on the spur of the moment.

  Edwin, my brother. The fame of your sister’s beauty and virtue has travelled to the ends of the earth.’ Since she was believed to be only thirteen years old her virtue at least would seem to be beyond dispute. ‘Such a paragon deserves to be wed with all the pomp and ceremony we can muster. We must take counsel together to be sure that this is the case. This is a matter which, with all the other affairs that beset us now, should not be entered into too lightly or with less than worthy preparation . . .’

  ‘But you will marry her?’

  Harold, now much recovered from the initial shock, took a step back and eyed the younger man slowly from head to toe and finally met his eye, until Edwin looked down.

  ‘Of course. When the time is ripe.’

  And that was all he said. He turned to go but Morcar now intervened.

  ‘Harold, there is one other thing to settle.’

  ‘There is?’

  Harold only half-turned, contrived to communicate a certain impatience beneath a veil of kingly, yes kingly, condescension.

  Morcar blushed but pushed on.

  ‘You have granted me the earldom of Northumbria. When the same earldom was granted to your brother Tostig, Waltheof, the surviving son of Old Siward, was only eight years old. He is now eighteen-’

  ‘Can Waltheof not speak for himself?’

  ‘My lord, I can.’

  From amongst the thegns assembled behind the brothers, a young man, very tall, very well-built, good-looking, too, stepped forward.

  ‘Well, Waltheof. What would you have?’

  ‘My lord, the earldoms of Northampton and Huntingdon, which your brother Tostig held as well as Northumbria . . .’

  ‘Enough. Tostig is on his way to Dover by now. He has renounced what is more valuable than any lands, namely the love I bore him. Take them -’

  There was a sudden stir behind him, and then a long coughing fit. The King.

  Recovering from the fit and supported now by his Queen, who had her arm about his shoulder and was mopping his brow, he sat bolt upright.

  ‘Tostig!’ he croaked, then cleared his throat. ‘Tosty?’

  He peered out down the hall, shaded his eyes with his hand, realised his crown was awry. He straightened it.

  ‘Tostig,’ he repeated. ‘Did someone say my Tosty has gone? Without a proper farewell to me?’

  Queen Edith whispered in his ear: ‘You were asleep, Eddie. He didn’t want to wake you.’

  ‘Ah. He always was a good boy, a good lad. He’ll be back, he’ll be back.’

  With his queen’s help he settled himself again into the pillows.

  ‘Tosty will be back,’ he croaked for the last time but with warm satisfaction in his voice.

  To all who could hear him it sounded like a threat, a curse even, reinforced by the way a sudden breath of cold wind gusted under the big doors and set the rushes slithering and lifting over the tiled floor.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  It was bitterly cold. A north-easterly like a banshee howled down the Thames from the city three miles away, cutting across the flats and marshes between, silvering the grey water with white wavel
ets chopped up by the ebbing tide and the river’s current. Grey spume gathered in the reeds. The same wind shredded the smoke from the thousands of hearths behind the Roman walls and carried the smells of the city (woodsmoke, the fumes from forges, tanneries and breweries, ordure both human and animal) right to the big west door of the newest abbey church in Christendom.

  Around it a vast crowd had gathered but huddled, diminished by the cold, pulling cloaks, animal skins and furs close round their bodies, grumbling, complaining at the delay. The reeves and counsellors of the greatest men in the land were disputing precedence. Since the king was dying a scant hundred yards away, in the great hall, precedence was important. The last man into the church would be seen to be the man most likely to succeed him.

  Three groups of mounted men stood out, two of them ranged against the third. On one side of the great door the brothers Edwin and Morcar, Earls of Mercia and now Northumbria, sat beneath their standards on shaggy but sturdy ponies that stamped and occasionally bucked with a sharp jingle of harness. Their thegns and housecarls, also mounted, clustered around them, maybe a hundred all told with another hundred or so grooms and freemen standing behind them. The housecarls wore their armour, helmets, byrnies of chain-mail, carried broadswords or battle- axes, leaf-shaped shields slung behind their backs; the men were armed with seven-foot lances and round shields, bossed and covered with polished leather.

  On the other side -- Harold Godwinson, Earl of Wessex, whose retinue almost equalled in numbers the combined followings of Edwin and Morcar. And behind him his younger brothers Leofwine of Kent and Gyrth of East Anglia.

  Walt, mounted on a pony, carried Harold’s standard with the base of its stave on his right foot -- the gold dragon of Wessex on a background faded from purple to red. Beside him, in support, rode Daffydd, the swarthy Welsh princeling.

  Walt looked up at the huge walls in front of him and shuddered, and not just with the cold. It was a monster, this building whose consecration they had come to witness.