The love-lorn young man came eagerly.
“I’ll wring Sholto’s neck for this!” muttered Richard, red to the ears. But she pushed the lute into his unwilling hands. “You owe me a song for the rose,” she insisted.
“In gratitude for that I would have spared you the pain of my voice,” he grumbled. But there was nothing else for it and, however unworthy the song, he knew there really wasn’t anything wrong with his voice. In his nervousness, the few elegant ballads in his repertoire eluded him, so after plucking uncertainly at the strings for a few moments he plunged full-throatedly into some doggerel that had become a guardroom favourite at home.
Give me a sword of shining steel,
A camp fire and a song,
And I will strew with Saracens
The plains of Ascalon.”
Give me a horse and—”
“But that’s all about war!” interrupted Berengaria, both hands clapped to her ears.
Richard stopped, affronted, the lute swinging from his hand. “Of course. Of what else should a fellow sing?” he demanded.
Berengaria uncovered her ears and began picking delicately at some moss in a crevice of the wall. “Men have sung about me,” she said, smiling up at him from beneath dangerously curled lashes.
“Oh, you mean love songs? I never tried to make any.” He ambled about among her roses, twanging the long suffering instrument uncomfortably. Out of the tail of his eye he could see its ardent owner grinning, and it riled him that such a slip of a girl could tease him so. “Very well, how is this?” he asked, brightening with sudden inspiration. He came back and struck an attitude beside her, burlesquing the Spanish lover. To the same old guardroom tune he sang,
Give me a lute and I will show
How kind your small hands are!
Give me your heart before I go
Dear lady of Navarre!”
Berengaria sprang up, clapping her hands delightedly. “Not so bad, Richard! Not so bad! It seems you are learning quite a lot in Pamplona.”
Richard said nothing. Somehow the mockery had faded out of the last two lines of his parody. He knew that he was learning something new—the best thing in life probably—something he had scarcely believed in. Something so elusive and beautiful that a man could go on working and fooling for years without experiencing the thrill of it. Until one day some woman smiled at him so that, without touching her, he could feel her taking possession of him, body and soul. And then all his conceits and infidelities would be jettisoned, leaving only humility and desire…
“Don’t stand there dreaming!” badgered Berengaria, with the cruelty of unawareness. “Give the man back his lute and come and show me if you can dance as well as you sing.”
He knew very well that anything more than friendship between them was forbidden, impossible. He must make this growing attraction stop now before she, too, got hurt. “I told you—I dance very badly,” he said gruffly.
But she caught at his resisting arm. “I’ll try to bear it with that unilluminated courage of mine!” she promised gaily. She had forgotten all about her headache, and he had forgotten his horse.
They danced until de Barre glowered and the King called her to partner a proud prince of Aragon. “Afterwards perhaps?” whispered Richard, letting her go.
“There are so many important people!” she sighed.
If he had had any sense he would have abandoned hope and responded to Henrietta’s roving eye. But what had first love and a Spanish summer night to do with common sense? And what Plantagenet, having held perfection in his arms, could cure himself with second best? He was still mooning after her from a window embrasure when his page came looking for him with an urgent message.
“The Duke of Aquitaine—where is he?” he was asking right and left as he pushed his way through the crowded hall.
Either people did not know or he did not understand what they told him until a girl said in Norman, “Over there, by that window. Glaring at every man who speaks to my princess.”
Blondel resented the implication that his master, who had scored in the lists, could be a wallflower at a party. “Nonsense!” he said. “Half these man-snatching Spanish women would give their girdles to dance with him!”
“I am a Spanish woman myself,” said Yvette, drawing up her five foot nothing of offended dignity.
“But you speak Norman. And what are you doing with my hood?”
“I was going to mend it.”
For the first time he really looked at her. A flaxen girl with blue eyes and a dimple, rather like the thanes’ daughters with whom so many Normans intermarried at home—only much more animated. “That is exceedingly kind of you,” he said. “And I’m sorry if I was rude. It’s pretty harassing looking alter an impetuous man in a strange country and I don’t know anyone yet, except the Count of Toulouse’s fat page.”
“And he won’t put himself out much to help you.”
They stood smiling at each other, jostled by the shifting crowd, until the memory of his errand drove them apart “A message from Normandy?” repeated Richard, bestirring himself as soon as he was told, and following Blondel out into the dark courtyard. “It must be from my brother Henry.”
Chapter Ten
Yvette rose at dawn to darn Blondel’s hooded cape. The nuns of Fontevrault had taught her to sew exquisitely. All the same, she had barely finished by the time Berengaria had begun to dress for the final day of the tournament. And Berengaria was almost as fussy about her colour scheme as Richard had been about his clothes the day before.
“I look hideous in this gold surcoat!” she declared, flinging the costly thing across the ladies’ bower.
“But the Queen had it made specially. She said for anyone dark and pale—”
“I am not pale,” snapped Berengaria.
It was true enough. There were roses in her cheeks that morning. So patient Yvette brought out the blue brocade.
“Not that. I hate it!”
“But only yesterday morning you said—”
“Yesterday is not to-day. Besides, it needs a fastening. I suppose you spent the time mending that page’s hood?”
What with unaccustomed late hours and her mistress’s rare displeasure, poor Yvette was near to tears. “I did it in my own time, Madam,” she said.
“Oh, I know. I’m sorry, Yvette.” On her way to the window Berengaria stooped to kiss the girl. She could see the people of Pamplona flocking to the lists and little puffy white clouds drifting lazily across the blue sky. It was a long time since she had felt so excited about a tournament. “After all, I think I’ll wear the white again,” she decided.
Her youngest lady fetched it joyfully. “I’m so glad. I love you in that. And everybody said yesterday they had never seen you look so lovely.”
Berengaria picked up her mirror to make sure. Exile, dowries, marriages—what did they all matter? They were a long way off. Whereas here was to-day—and to-morrow and to-morrow. “I must look my best for the final bout,” she explained, dividing her attention between mirror and window like the luckless Lady of Shalott. “Look, the people are taking up their places already, and the grooms are bringing out some of the horses. Your Anglo-Norman page is down there, with that roan of Sholto’s. I’m so glad someone remembered about it. And Nando is leading a pack horse. I wonder what that is for.”
“Someone going away perhaps,” suggested Yvette, down on the floor with her mouth full of pins.
“Not just before the best joust of all, surely!”
“I do hope the Duke of Aquitaine will win again!”
“You little traitor!” laughed Berengaria. “Why, only the day before yesterday you were backing my cousin.”
“Blondel says there is only one better all-round sportsman in England. He is very handsome, don’t you think, Madam?”
“Very,” said Berengaria, smoothing a delicate eyebrow.
“And his voice—” Yvette gave a tweak here and there to the white samite.
“D
ios mio!” laughed Berengaria, pirouetting for a final inspection. “I’m afraid it might beguile a girl into all kinds of foolishness.”
“And then, of course, his hair—like pale gold!”
“Pale gold? But it is almost red!” Yvette sat back on her heels to stare and Berengaria, red with confusion herself, put down her mirror with a bang. “Oh, go and finish your mending, do!” she ordered, realizing that they had each been thinking of a different man.
“It’s finished, Madam. Blondel said he wanted it this morning,” said Yvette, stifling her mischievous laughter. She jumped up to take a swift peep from the window. “Do you think I might take it down to him?”
“Oh, I suppose so,” smiled Berengaria indulgently. “I shall have to wait here in any case until Isabella and Henrietta come back from the garden with the fresh rosebuds for my wreath.”
Left alone, she turned back to the window, humming a half-remembered tune. Raymond was down there, punctual as usual, standing in the middle of an animated group discussing some last minute alteration with the Marshall. She could see Yvette run past him with scarcely a glance, making for the patch of shadow where Blondel and Nando were holding the horses. The tall roan was stamping impatiently for her rider and Berengaria found herself sharing the same impatience. Any minute now he would come out into the courtyard, striding with that long, soft tread of his, beckoning arrogantly for his page. “Give me your heart before you go—” sang Berengaria, realizing suddenly what tune she had been humming all morning, and stopping abruptly at the sound of hurrying footsteps on the stairs. “Well, Isabella,” she called over her shoulder, “have you stripped all my best bushes?”
There was no answer—only that long, soft tread behind her. She turned swiftly, with tumultuously beating heart. “Richard! What are you doing here?” she cried; for rarely did any man less nearly related than Raymond find his way to the room she shared with her women. But, taken off her guard like that, there was no mistaking the joy in her voice.
He came straight to her, taking both her hands in his. “I had to find you,” he said urgently. His face was set and white beneath the southern tan, and she noticed that he wore a plain and serviceable riding cloak. “Where is your armour?” she stammered. “Are you not going to tilt?”
He hardly seemed to hear her. “I had to come here,” he reiterated. “They meant to be kind down there. But they talked and talked. And all the time I was planning how I could see you before I go.”
“Go!” she echoed, all those sunny to-morrows drifting out of sight like the little puffy, white clouds. When he let go her hands she felt weak and empty.
He began padding back and forth. “It’s about Henry,” he said, in a stunned sort of way. “You remember what I said jokingly about murdering him? I little thought then…God forgive me! That was only last night, wasn’t it? And after I left you I heard that he is dead.”
“Dead! Oh, Richard, how terrible!” She stood desolately in the middle of the room, crucifying herself with his hurt as some women can—imagining how she would be feeling had it been her brother who was dead. Presently she said gently,” I am so sorry—so grievously sorry. Can you tell me about it?”
He stood looking down at the gay pageantry of Pamplona. Competitors and crowd, officials and servants—all the supernumeraries who were to have formed a frame for the uncertain issue of his fight. The medley of their voices came up to him, far off and shrill like the shouting of children playing on the seashore. Tents and trappings and gowns were so many gaudy blotches against the sombre background of his thoughts. He hated them because he no longer had any part in them. “Henry had gone to Normandy to raise some money for our crusade,” he was saying woodenly. “It seems he caught some sort of fever…Anyway, he will never come crusading now.”
Sensing her dumb participation, he turned with a reassuring smile. He was never one to unload his burdens on to any woman’s love. “Oh, you needn’t be too sorry for me! Anyone will tell you we quarrelled like curs. Aquitaine and Poitou have been laid waste by our disputes over patrimony. But he was one of us. Cleverer than I, of course—and much more fit to rule. And a good fighter, God rest his soul!” He crossed himself, standing quiet for a moment in prayer or thought.
Berengaria yearned over his bright; bent head. “Why must you go immediately?” she asked.
“Because of my lands,” he said crisply.
He was so oddly compounded of sentiment and common sense that she found herself saying with an almost motherly smile, “They won’t run away.”
“No. But they can be given away.”
“At least wait until after the tournament.”
He shook his head obstinately. “King Sancho has excused me, and your cousin understands. By the time I get back my father will probably have had John crowned.”
She had never seen that harshness on his face before. It made him look older and square-jawed and somehow frightening. “But your own father, Richard! Surely you can trust him?”
Probably she pictured him as some genial counterpart of her own parents. She had never known a harsh word. She had never seen disillusionment widening with the swinging inward of a bedroom door. Ah, well, he couldn’t tell her about that…Better she should think him unnatural, grasping…“I never wanted to be King of England,” he said slowly. “But now—don’t you see the difference it makes?”
“I see that you are now a very important person,” she said soberly.
He beat palm with fist, staring at her as if the whole of life were opening up before him. “Important enough to make it possible!” he cried.
Berengaria was too honest to pretend to misunderstand him; but, woman-like, she wanted confirmation. “To make what possible?” she asked.
He seized her hands impulsively, drawing her towards him. “To keep our private lives. To have happiness, love, ecstasy—like any common craftsman. We’re both young, and you’re so beautiful. Can’t you see that I am hungry with love for you, Berengaria?”
“So soon?” she whispered laughingly.
“Almost since I first saw you, I suppose—with your soft skin and your roses. Oh, I know I can’t expect you to care like that about me—in a day, or a few hours. But at least I could save you from marrying a lustful beast like de Barre or some senile old death’s-head like Sicily.”
He was so impetuous that in order to think she freed herself and turned away. “Oh, Richard, don’t torture us both!”
“Then you could care?”
She answered him obliquely. “There is always Ann.”
For him there would always be just two kinds of woman. The wanton, behind closed doors, and the soft-eyed saint bending above him with giving hands. Ann’s laughter had done that to him. And even Berengaria would never be able to give him back belief in any imperfect, household mate between.
“Ann be damned!” he stormed. “Nothing will make me marry her now.”
“But what about your father and Philip?”
It was true that his father might no longer force him to marry Ann, but he would probably do his utmost to prevent a union with Navarre. But with Berengaria caring—and he could swear she did—Richard’s natural optimism knew no bounds. “By God’s throat, I’ll bribe Philip somehow!” he cried, and took her in his arms.
He had so little time and no legal claim—nothing but passion with which to bind her. Briefly, fiercely, against the dividing years, he kissed her. Instead of international pledges and discussions about dowries, he held her against his heart and felt her unresisting body his. In that quiet room he staked an impossible claim against the diplomatic scheming of all Europe. Raging against leaving her, he knew that unless he was acknowledged heir to England he would not be considered important enough to get her. He hoped desperately that she would wait until his despotic father gave up some of the power. Had he been more experienced, he would have known that the very incompleteness of this hour might hold her. When other suitors came she would make comparisons. She would remember his unfini
shed kisses and care only that his hands were tender and his young mouth hard.
“They are coming back with my roses,” she whispered at last. “They mustn’t find you here.”
“If only I were free to begin negotiations with your father before I go! But I am afraid Philip will be still more tenacious of me as a brother-in-law now.”
“I will talk to my father. You know how kind he is. I will beg him at least to let me wait—”
Reluctantly, Richard released her and drew on his leather gauntlets. “It may mean years. You know I’m pledged for this next crusade?” He took a turn across the room, tramping unheedingly across her scattered finery and coming back to take her shoulders in his gloved hands. “Listen, sweet. If ever I sent for you would you have the courage to come?”
“Come where?”
“God knows! England, Cahors—the Holy Land, perhaps?”
She smiled through her tears. “You know it isn’t my kind of courage—but I expect I should.”
“You are wonderful! I suppose a man oughtn’t to think of dragging the woman he loves about the world like that? You’re so little, and you hate the sight of blood.”
She met his searching gaze with assurance. “When a man hands a woman back her dreams she does not count the material cost.”
“It may be harder than you think,” said Richard, with rare prescience. He took her in his arms again, but their kisses were tormented by the sharp edge of parting. “Sholto will send me news of you,” he said. “And I shall always wear your favour against my heart.”
Because he was going she had to tell him what she had really thought about his fight. “I was so eaten with pride in you I think God must be punishing me now. I even made up a name for you.” Standing on tiptoe she reached up and said it against his lips. “Richard Cœur de Lion.”
He laughed and held her close, trying to curb his strength so that he should not hurt her. “It is a fine name—Cœur de Lion,” he said, without a thought for how it might echo and re-echo through the years.
Passionate Brood Page 8
