Hugh’s eyes dropped. Dull red crept up from his mailed gorget. “Katherine - I had to see you - I - I bring you this.”
He opened his clenched hand, holding it out stiffly, his eyes on the rush-strewn floor. On his calloused palm there lay a massive gold ring, carved claws around a sea-green beryl.
“Take it,” he said hoarsely, as she did not move. “The betrothal ring.”
“I don’t want it,” she said. “I don’t want it!” She folded her arms tight against her chest. “I don’t want to marry you.”
His hand closed again over the ring; she saw the muscles of his neck quiver, and the scar on his cheek go white, but he spoke with control.
“It is arranged, damoiselle. Your sister consents, the Duke of Lancaster consents - and the Queen.”
“The Queen?” repeated Katherine faintly. “You’ve seen the Queen?”
“I sent her a message through Lady Agnes. The Queen is pleased.”
It was then that Katherine gave up hope. The Queen, the concept of the Queen, had always ruled her destiny as it had her father’s. She owed her life to the Queen, and all her loyalty. Of what use was rebellion anyway, for, as Philippa kept asserting, no woman followed her own inclination in marriage. She knew better than to doubt Hugh’s word. Brutal and stupid as he might be, he would also be bluntly honest. And now at her continued silence his ready anger flared.
“The Queen thinks me lack-wit to take you, no doubt! They all do. I see them sniggering behind their hands - that scurvy fop de Cheyne -” He scowled towards the window and the noises of the jousting. “His pretty womanish face. Pthaw!” And he spat on the floor.
“Why do you want to marry me?” said Katherine quietly, “since I bring you nothing but my unwilling body.”
He looked at her startled. Certainly he had not meant marriage until the Duke interrupted them in the garden. His assertion then had astonished himself. Was it an aura cast over her by the ducal protection, was it a cool integrity in the girl himself, and the increasing effect on him of her beauty, or was it the hunter’s instinct for capture and total subjection? His slow mind baulked at reasons. He knew only that his longing for her was an anguish tinged with fear. It would never have occurred to him to speak of love, so he found refuge again in the excuse he had given the Duke.
“By Saint Anthony and his temptations, maiden, I don’t know. You’ve cast a spell on me - or slipped me a love philtre.”
From weariness and futility, Katherine suddenly laughed. “I wish that I had a love philtre, so I might drink it too.”
At her laugh his heavy face brightened, his little eyes sought hers in sudden pleading. “The ring, Katherine, put on the ring,” he whispered holding it out to her again, “and say the vows with me.”
She bowed her head and held her hand out slowly. His blunt fingers shook as he pushed the ring down her middle finger where it hung heavy and loose as an iron shackle. “I, Hugh, plight thee, Katherine - my troth, as God is my witness.” He swallowed hard, crossing himself.
Katherine looked down at the ring and the square, freckled sweating hand that clasped hers. She exhaled her breath in a long sigh, “I, Katherine, plight thee, Hugh - my troth as God is my witness.”
So be it, she thought. Her aversion to him had not lessened, but she found a bitter new peace in the surrender. He leaned towards her for the betrothal kiss and she yielded her cool mouth, then drew back. He let her go, finding this quiet self-possessed girl far more awesome than the one who had fought him in the garden.
“My Katherine,” he said humbly, “will you come to the lists and see me joust now? I - I should like to wear your colours - - “
A sardonic voice spoke in her head. Ah yes, it said, this is what you dreamed of, little fool, those nights at Sheppey. This is the fairy tale come true - a knight who asks to wear your colours at the King’s tournament.
“I fear I’ve nothing to give you, sir,” she said flushing, “except - wait-” She looked at the Lady Blanche’s brocade dress and, quickly decisive, ripped the long green silk tippet from the left sleeve. “Will this do?”
He took the bright flimsy streamer and held it as though it burned his fingers. “Thank you,” he muttered. “I shall hope to do you credit. I’ll send back a page to guide you to the lists.” He turned stiffly in his armour and the door banged shut behind him.
Katherine sank on the window seat, staring at her betrothal ring. Her first jewel. Massive and unwieldy, it looked on her small roughened hand. It was a cabochon beryl carved with Hugh’s boar’s-head crest and far too large, since he had worn it himself. The beryl, like all stones, had talismanic powers, it gave victory in battle and protection to the wearer, and it had cost Hugh something to part with it, though he had other amulets to rely on.
Though Katherine knew nothing of this, she could not help but take pleasure in the possession of a ring and feel, especially now that Hugh was no longer near, a great lightening of mood.
She wound thread around her finger to hold the ring and gradually her natural optimism returned. She was honourably betrothed, she had pretty clothes to wear, and she would see the tournament after all. What excuse then for moping, and bewailing that the conditions surrounding these admirable facts were not as she had wanted them? “A bas la tristesse!” said Katherine aloud, and while she washed she hummed the gay French song she had heard in the garden. Hi, dame de Vaillance!
When she had dressed herself in the long green gown, fastened the girdle low on her slender hips and bound her hair into two silver-filleted cauls on either side of her face, much as Alice Perrers wore hers, Katherine looked in the hand-mirror and was startled, not by her beauty, which still seemed to her negligible, but by her air of sophistication. Her high white forehead and the delicate arched eyebrows looked exactly like those of all the noble ladies. If she pursed her mouth it became the two crimson cherry-halves so much admired. She could see that the miniver-trimmed surcote disclosed half-moons of bosom and clung to her long waist without a wrinkle. Even the Duchess had not so sinuous a line. I look like one of them, she thought proudly, a court lady. Except for her hands. They were yet reddened from the winter’s chilblains, and the nails ragged and short, for she still sometimes bit them.
Alice Perrers had pomades and unguents as well as face paints in her chest beneath the window. Katherine brazenly rummaged in the chest until she found a rosewater cream which she rubbed into her hands, so as not to shame the betrothal ring.
Honesty compelled her to admit that it was to Hugh she owed the extent of her transformation from the shabby little girl at Sheppey, and when the page he had sent for her tapped on the door, she followed him down to the lists with eager anticipation.
CHAPTER IV
When Katherine and her guide arrived at the lists it was in the intermission before the final melee. Outside the stockades, the common folk who had not been fortunate or agile enough to find perches on top of the barrier were milling about, gulping winkles and pasties and jostling for position near the cracks between the boards where they might see something of the jousting when it recommenced.
The page led Katherine through a gilded gate and up wooden steps to the huge Lancastrian loge, as Hugh had bidden him, and he found for her a space on a red-cushioned bench far off to one side and .directly under the brightly painted canopy that sheltered the loge.
The bench to which the page led Katherine was already fulsomely occupied by two ladies connected with the Lancastrian retinue: Lady de Houghton, and Dame Pernelle, sister of Sir Robert Swyllington, who was the Duke’s chamberlain at Pontefract Castle.
Both these ladies were women of mature years with a nice appreciation of their own consequence. As Katherine squeezed herself down beside them they received her flustered apologies with cold astonishment.
“Who in the world-” said Lady de Houghton to her friend, not bothering to lower her voice. Dame Pernelle shrugged, and both stout ladies, breathing heavily, for it was warm under the canopy, looked down their no
ses at Katherine and waited.
“Katherine de Roet, sister to Philippa la Picarde, Queen’s panterer. I’ve - I’ve just come to court, my ladies,” said Katherine nervously, trying to shrink into the smallest possible bulk.
“Ah-” said Dame Pernelle in a tone of enlightenment.
“The Guienne Herald’s daughter, ah yes - one has heard something.” She raised her eyebrows significantly and glanced down towards the dais where the Duchess sat in a carved gold armchair.
Katherine, quite aware of the disparaging emphasis on “Herald”, said quickly, “My father was knighted on the field at Bretigny, my lady. Shall I move to the end of the bench - it won’t crowd you so?”
Suddenly she was rescued, and in a way that silenced the ladies, though in no way decreasing their resentment. The Duchess, turning her chair to accept a cup of wine from a page, caught sight of Katherine, smiled at the girl and, seeing that she looked uncomfortable, raised her pale, bejewelled hand and beckoned.
Katherine, blushing hotly, for those on all the nearest benches craned round to see, most thankfully obeyed the summons and, clambering past the ample knees beside her, ran down the steps to the velvet-coloured platform at the front of the loge.
“Your first tournament, my dear, isn’t it?” asked Blanche gently. “Sit here where you can see well.” She indicated a cushion on the corner of the platform near her chair.
Katherine’s heart melted with gratitude.
The Duchess was today dazzling as the southern May, having dressed to please her husband’s taste, in full magnificence of jewels and ermine. Her silver-gilt hair was twined with pearls and she wore her gold and diamond coronet. She smelt of jasmine and Katherine adored her.
Blanche was accustomed to adoration, but she had the warmth of a great lady and she was drawn to the girl. She glanced at the boar-crested betrothal ring on Katherine’s childish hand, saw where the tippet had been ripped from the sleeve of her gift, and reconstructed what must have happened.
She leaned down saying, “I wish you happiness, my dear,” then turned quickly, her blue eyes focusing on the field as two heralds with trumpets marched solemnly towards each other. Blanche, whose famous father, Henry, Duke of Lancaster, had been the foremost knight in the kingdom, had witnessed many tournaments and appreciated each point of ceremony and honour. She listened intently to the heralds who announced a preliminary joust between John, Baron de Mowbray, and a Gascon knight, the Sieur de Pavignac.
These names meant nothing to Katherine and during the ceremonious exchange between the heralds and pursuivants on each side she had time to look around her.
The lists here at Windsor were very large, with stockades enclosing the hundred-and-fifty-yard field, and permanent loges built in tiers on either side for the spectators. The royal loge, canopied in gold and red striped silk, was in dead centre of the southern side, so that the sun might not bother the royal eyes. The King being present today, the lily and leopard flag fluttered over the canopy.
The Lancastrian loge adjoined the royal one, and Katherine had a good view of the King, who seemed in high spirits, laughing, calling out jests and drinking frequently from a gold and ruby cup presented by one of his squires.
Geoffrey Chaucer was not in evidence because, as Katherine found out later, he had not been able to attend the tournament at all. William of Wykeham, the King’s architect, had heartlessly sent Geoffrey on a quick trip to London after the precious pieces of stained glass needed to finish the west window of Henry the Third’s renovated chapel in time for the high ceremonial Mass tomorrow.
Nor was Alice Perrers to be seen. The Queen’s chair was occupied by the King’s daughter, the Princess Isabel de Coucy, and all the surrounding lords and ladies were of the highest rank.
The Queen’s waiting-women were huddled together on the last bench of an adjoining loge and Katherine could not have distinguished Philippa at all except that her sister got up and waved at her, accurately expressing by means of the wave her astonishment and approval at seeing her.
Katherine’s interest was jerked abruptly back to the lists as there came a roar from the crowd, a fanfare of trumpets from the heralds and a marshal waving his white baton, who shouted, “In the name of God and Saint George, come forth to do battle!” At either end of the lists the squires loosed bridles, and two great destriers thundered towards each other down the field. Clods flew from the hoofs while the riders, with lances poised to aim at the opposing shields, lowered their helmeted heads and braced themselves for the shock.
The crash of wood and metal was deafening, sparks flew from the armour, the crowd shouted approval, which soon changed to a groan of disappointment. At the moment of collision the Baron de Mowbray’s charger had veered too far left, the Gascon knight’s lance had thus glanced off Mowbray’s shield on to his hauberk and, lodging in the joint of the iron roundel which protected his shoulder, prised him out of the saddle, while the stallion was thrown back on its haunches. The baron lay on the ground, a helpless mass of armour. The Gascon knight raised his visor and grinned complacently towards the royal loge.
“Well done!” cried the King, tossing a jewelled medal of St. George towards the victor. “A noble course.”
But the crowd of peasants, servants and villeins who had hoisted themselves around the edges of the stockade were not so chivalrous. They booed the foreigner who had unseated their English baron and they booed the discomfited Mowbray, too, as his squires hoisted him on to his feet and he walked angrily off the field.
“That was bad luck for Mowbray - -his destrier is not worthy,” said the Lady Blanche judicially. “The beast was frightened.” Several of her entourage crowded around agreeing and discussing the best strains for chargers. Katherine listened and learned. She had wondered where the Duke was, and now she heard that he was making ready in the tents. For he was to take part in the final melee.
“I begged him not to,” said Blanche, smiling, “and the King nearly forbade it, since the Duke must not risk injury at this time when the Prince of Wales has such need of him, but my lord will not listen. He so loves deeds of arms.” She smiled and spoke with a rueful pride, but her eyes were anxious.
“Is it dangerous my lady?*’ asked Katherine timidly. “I - I thought the lances were blunted.”
Blanche looked down at the girl and thought the concern was for her betrothed. “So they are,” she said, “nowadays, but the melee is a mimic battle and there is always danger - when men fight, I suppose. Look, what’s this- -“
A knight in brightly polished armour and a covering jupon of blue silk embroidered with tiny deer had ridden up to the barrier in front of the Lady Blanche’s loge. His tournament heaume was crested with a stag’s head, and he raised the visor as he bowed, disclosing the gay teasing face of Roger de Cheyne. “God’s greetings, my Lady Duchess,” he called. “I crave a gage from the Damoiselle de Roet to bring me luck in the melee.”
Katherine turned as red as fire. She had ignored Roger since the night she had found that he was married, nor indeed had he made any further overtures. His action now sprang as much from a spirit of mischief, and desire to tease Hugh Swynford, as it did from his admiration of Katherine.
“She has a knight to wear her colours already, Sir Roger,” said Blanche, seeing that Katherine did not know what to do.
“I know, my lady,” said Roger gaily, “but I still may crave a token from her.”
This was quite true and proper. Blanche herself had at different times during the tournament flung flowers, ribbons and even scarves to various worthy knights. “Here, child,” she said quickly to Katherine as she plucked an iris from the bouquet by her chair, “stand up and give him this.”
Katherine, her heart beating fast, obeyed the Duchess, tossing the blue flower in a graceful arc, and Roger caught it neatly in his gauntlet. He kissed the iris and tucked it into a joint of his heaume, where it waved jauntily beside the stag’s head.
“Grand merci, ma toute belle damoiselle” he calle
d, kissing his hand and lowering the pointed visor. He spurred his stallion and cantered easily down the field towards the other contending knights.
The King himself had watched this pretty by-play with approval. It had been gracefully performed with the requisite style and spirit. So many of the knights had grown lax in these degenerate days, impatient of ritual, and skimping the full chivalric observances. In fact it had been with a view to restoring these and bringing back the glorious days of King Arthur’s Round Table that he had instituted the Order of the Garter twenty years ago. He inquired who the knight was, and his master herald, whose business it was to identify all coats of arms, replied that it was the young Sieur de Cheyne, one of the Duke of Lancaster’s men; but the King’s further inquiry about the favoured damoiselle the herald could not answer.
Katherine had subsided into confusion, wishing very much that the debonair Roger of the merry eyes and charming smile could be her knight in earnest, and interested to realise that even the Duchess saw nothing improper in this public attention from a married man. It was all part of the courtly game and not supposed to be taken too seriously.
Hugh Swynford, however, did take it seriously. He had watched Roger’s sally down the field with savage uncertainty, not quite sure at that distance exactly what had happened, and he awaited Roger at the barricade.- “Who gave you that flower?” He pointed his lance at the nodding blue iris.
Roger raised his visor and grinned. “La petite de Roet, may Venus bless her.”
“She’s betrothed to me.” Hugh’s eyes narrowed, he looked at Katherine’s green streamer which fluttered from his own helmet.
“Splendid, mon gar” said Roger cordially. “She’s a beauty, a prize.” He smacked his lips delicately and rode on, the blue iris bobbing in rhythm to the horse’s trot.
Hugh wheeled his destrier and beckoned to his squire. Ellis de Thoresby eagerly held up the helmet and shield. He was a brawny lad of eighteen, doggedly devoted to his master. Ellis had been born at Thoresby Hall in the heart of Sherwood Forest and he was quite as impatient as Hugh was of the finicking graces exhibited by many of the foreign knights.,