She did not seem to take it that way, though, smiling and shrugging. “I could as easily ask you why men are so taken with simpering, biddable poppets.”
“I hope you are not including me in that lot,” he protested, laughing, thinking that he’d never known a biddable poppet in his entire life. Claudine’s reply took him by surprise.
“Actually, I was thinking of the queen and her husband.”
It never occurred to Justin that Claudine might be referring to Richard and his neglected consort, Berengaria. Whenever anyone spoke of “the queen,” it was Eleanor of Aquitaine they had in mind. In the same way, he assumed that the husband in question was the late king of the English, Henry, and not Eleanor’s first husband, the French king Louis, for Henry had been a living legend, a fit mate for the most beautiful heiress in Christendom, the only woman to ever wear the crowns of both England and France.
“What are they, the exception that proves the rule?” he joked. “Clearly all men do not fancy docile, gentle females, for none would ever call the queen ‘biddable,’ now, would they?”
“Jesu forfend!” she said, just as lightly, and he realized how long it had been since they’d been able to talk without constraints. “But you see, Justin, the old king did want a woman like that. Why else would he have turned from the queen to a meek little mouse like Rosamund Clifford?”
He found that to be an interesting question, and gave it some serious thought. “I am just guessing, but mayhap Rosamund was, well, restful. At times, marriage to Queen Eleanor must have been like riding the whirlwind.”
She considered that. “I daresay she could have said the same of King Henry. What of you, Justin? Do you want a Rosamund Clifford or an Eleanor of Aquitaine?”
“Must I choose one or the other? I’ve never been drawn to extremes, am most comfortable riding in the middle of the road. What of you, Claudine? If you could spin the wheel of fortune, what would you ask for?”
“I no longer know,” she admitted. “I was once so sure that I’d not want to marry again. That surprises you, does it?”
“Yes, I suppose it does. From what you’d told me, I thought your husband had treated you well.”
“He did. He was kind and indulgent, in an almost paternal sort of way. I was young enough to have been his daughter, mayhap even his granddaughter, after all. I was contented enough as his wife. But widowhood offered me something more precious than contentment—freedom. For the first time in my life, I could do as I pleased. That was a heady draught, Justin, a brew few women get to drink.”
“Not that many men get to taste it, either, lass.” The chess game forgotten, he regarded her pensively, seeing neither John’s spy nor the tempting siren who’d wrought such havoc in his life. “But you are no longer sure, you said, that you’d not want to wed again. What changed your mind?”
She glanced around, making sure none were within earshot. “Aline,” she said softly. “I’d never conceived, believed I was barren. Now I know better. So it may be that one day I’ll want more children. Not yet, though!” She smiled ruefully. “Not until my memories of the birthing chamber have got much dimmer.”
Justin’s memories of Aline’s birth were traumatic, too, even from the other side of the birthing chamber door. “We’ve never talked like this, have we? You think we can be friends, Claudine, after being lovers?”
“Why not?” Her dimples flashed as she added impishly, “In the best of all worlds, we could be both. I had plenty of time during my pregnancy to learn which herbal potions are most effective in preventing conception!”
He shared her laughter, but he was wary of succumbing to her charms, for there was no potion for the restoration of trust. “I do not think I am ready to get my heart broken again, thank you,” he said, mingling honesty with humor.
She pretended to pout. “Coward. Who knew the queen’s man was so easily affrighted?” An odd expression crossed her face then, as she heard her own words. “ ‘The queen’s man,’ ” she repeated slowly. “Jesu, could it be?”
“What is it, Claudine?” he asked, both puzzled and curious, and she leaned toward him, her dark eyes sparkling with excitement.
“Justin, I had the most outlandish idea! It makes perfect sense, though. I think I know why the Breton killed Arzhela.”
John had retired early to bed, though not to sleep. He was dozing in the afterglow of his lovemaking with Ursula when there was a commotion in his bedchamber. Recognizing the voices of Justin, Durand, and his squire, he jerked the bed hangings aside.
“I am sorry, my lord,” the squire cried. “I told them you were abed, but they paid me no heed!”
John’s gaze flicked from Durand to Justin. He was irked by the intrusion, but he remembered that the last time Durand had burst into his bedchamber uninvited he’d been bearing an urgent warning from the French king. “What is it? What could not wait till the morrow?”
“We think we know why the Breton murdered the Lady Arzhela and tried to have you slain.”
John was wide awake now and, knowing that he’d not be able to get back to sleep, decided he might as well be up and about. “Meet me in the solar,” he directed the men, and then instructed his squire to fetch his clothes. Ursula was sleeping peacefully, and he felt a dart of envy, for his nights were never as restful as hers. Even as a boy, sleep had not come easily, a fickle bitch that teased and tantalized and hovered just out of reach.
By the time John entered the solar, a fire had been lit in the hearth and wine flagons set out. Dropping down into a high-backed chair, he regarded them with open skepticism. “Well? Enlighten me.”
“You’ve been telling us all along that the Breton would not have silenced Arzhela out of fear of your retribution. I think you were right, my lord. The Breton was acting out of fear, but not of you. The man he feared was his master, the French king.”
John blinked. He opened his mouth to dismiss Justin’s claim as ludicrous, only to realize it wasn’t. “Go on,” he said tensely. “Tell me more.”
“It was Claudine’s idea. She called me ‘the queen’s man’ and a spark flared in the back of her brain. What if the Breton was ‘the king’s man’? It would explain everything!”
John was already beginning to see flaws in that theory. “I grant you that the Breton could well be working for Philippe. But you are forgetting the pact Philippe and I made in January. In return for French support, I agreed to cede much of Normandy. That accord gave him a vested interest in my kingship. Philippe wants to see me on the English throne as much as I do. He’d not have forged that letter.”
“I agree, my lord. The forgery was not Philippe’s doing. It was the Breton’s, and set in motion before your deal with the French king. Simon de Lusignan said as much, that the Breton came to him with the scheme months ago. When the Breton cast out the bait for Duchess Constance, you and Philippe were at odds, blaming each other for King Richard’s impending release. Then you mended your rift and made that pact. But it was too late for the Breton to stop what he’d started. They already had the letter.”
John’s eyes cut from Justin to Durand. “You agree with this?”
“I do, my lord. The Breton could only hope that his part would never come to light. But then Cousin Simon blabbed to his bedmate, and the Breton found out about it. He seems to have panicked, which is interesting in and of itself, showing us how much he thought was at stake. He killed Arzhela to keep her quiet, fearing that she’d confide in you. And that you, in your rage, would confide in your ally, the French king.”
“But it started to go wrong for him,” Justin said, “for mayhap the first time ever. Suddenly he had a lunatic on his hands, intent upon avenging the Lady Arzhela. When he failed to kill Simon, he was driven to truly desperate straits. If he could not find Simon to silence him, he could seek to make sure that you never heard Simon’s confession.”
John was quiet, staring into the leaping hearth flames, which had taken on the shade of molten gold. “That would explain something els
e,” he said at last. “If he is no longer offering his services to the highest bidder, has pledged himself as the French king’s man, then his insistence upon concealing his identity from the Bretons makes sense.”
They hadn’t thought of that. “Would he agree to such an exclusive arrangement, my lord?” Justin asked, and John smiled mirthlessly.
“Philippe would have demanded no less. I do not find it easy to give my trust, but compared to Philippe, I am as simple and naïve as any country virgin. He would have expected the Breton to serve his interests and his alone.”
“So, you agree with us, then?”
John nodded. “There has always been a piece missing from this puzzle. I never expected, though, that Claudine would be the one to find it!”
Rising, John began to pace the solar, moving from darkness to light and back to darkness again. They watched him in silence for a time, and then Justin asked quietly, “What would you have us do, my lord?”
John turned to face them. “It is time,” he said, “to pay a visit to my dear friend, the French king.”
XXIII
March 1194
Paris, France
The royal gardens of the French king jutted out into the River Seine like the prow of a ship. They would be magnificent in high summer, with raised flower beds of peonies, poppies, and Madonna lilies, trellised bowers of roses and honeysuckle, and well-pruned fruit trees. Now it was only mid-March. The day was mild, though, and it had seemed like a good place to await John’s return.
Justin and Durand were seated on the stone wall overlooking the river, Emma and Claudine on a nearby turf bench. A few other people sauntered along the pebbled paths; several young women were gathered in a bower, listening to one of them read from a leather-bound book; a man in cleric’s garb was playing ball with a spaniel. None of them were familiar to Justin, who’d never been to the French court before. He was disappointed that he’d not get to see the French king, for he was developing a healthy curiosity about Philippe.
He knew Philippe’s age—twenty-eight—and his pedigree—only son of Queen Eleanor’s first husband, Louis Capet. He knew Philippe had assumed power in his teens, had already lost one wife in childbirth, and had wed a Danish princess that past summer. And he knew Philippe had clashed bitterly with Richard in the Holy Land, returning to France as an avowed enemy of the Lionheart. But the man himself remained a mystery.
After learning that Claudine and Durand had met the French king, he’d begun fishing for insights into Philippe’s character. Durand had not been overly impressed by Philippe, but Justin doubted that he’d have been impressed if the holy martyr St Thomas had risen up from his tomb at Canterbury. “Shrewd, pious, implacable, and fretful,” was his concise verdict.
Claudine’s observations were more detailed. “He does not ever curse,” she reported, with the amazement of one coming from the profane court of the Plantagenets. “He has a liking for wine. He is not fond of horses and disapproves of tournaments. He is quick to anger, not as quick to forgive. He does not have John’s perverse sense of humor, which is probably for the best! For certes, he does not possess Richard’s fearlessness, but then, few men do. I would say he likes women. I agree with Durand, though; he is not sentimental. If I had to choose one word to describe him, it would be ‘capable.’ ”
“I heard,” Emma put in, “that he came back from the crusade a changed man. He was very ill whilst there, nigh unto death, and it left its mark. From what I’ve been told, he is more suspicious now, and his nerves are more ragged around the edges.”
“That is true enough,” Durand confirmed. “He goes nowhere without bodyguards. Wherever he was meeting with the Breton, you may be sure it was not at night in the cemetery of the Holy Innocents! John says he became convinced on crusade that Richard was plotting against his life. When his ally Conrad of Montferrat was slain by Assassins sent by the Old Man of the Mountain, Philippe suspected that Richard was behind it. Supposedly he was warned that Richard had connived with the Old Man, who’d dispatched four Assassins to kill him, too.”
Justin was shocked to hear of such vicious infighting among the crusaders. He’d imagined that men would put aside their rivalries in their joint quest to free Jerusalem from the infidels. Durand’s story made it sound as if they’d taken all their enmities and grudges with them to the Holy Land. “Who is the Old Man of the Mountain?”
“The leader of a Shi’ite sect who believe that murder is a legitimate tactic of war.” Durand’s mouth curved in a cynical smile. “In other words, they openly preach what other rulers merely practice.”
Now it was Claudine’s turn to be shocked. “No true Christian king would resort to murder, Durand!”
“I take it that means you do not believe Richard had a hand in Conrad’s killing?” Durand asked sarcastically.
Claudine and Justin answered as one, she crying, “Of course not!” and he demanding, “Surely you are not saying he did, Durand?”
“No—Richard is not one for planning that far ahead.”
Claudine seemed genuinely offended. “Richard is a man of extraordinary courage!”
“Courage is like charity,” Emma said dryly. “It covers a multitude of sins. When the Emperor of Cyprus surrendered to Richard on condition he not be put in irons, Richard agreed and then had shackles made of silver.”
Justin did not like the tone of this conversation any more than Claudine did. Richard was a celebrated crusader, whose deeds in the Holy Land had become the stuff of legend. He’d taken it as a matter of faith that Richard was a more honorable man than John, worthy of the sacrifices the English people had made to gain his freedom. He did not want to doubt his king, and he hastily changed the subject, calling their attention to the young woman just entering the garden, fair of face and clothed in costly silks.
“Is that the French queen?”
To his surprise, they all laughed. “What?” he asked, perplexed. “I do not see the humor in my question.”
“You truly do not know?” Claudine marveled. “So great was the scandal that half of Christendom was talking of nothing else—ah, but you were in Wales last summer! That explains why you did not hear.”
“Hear what?”
“The day after their wedding, Philippe disavowed Ingeborg and sent her off to a monastery, where she has been held ever since. Less than three months later, Philippe convened a council at Compiègne, where French bishops and lords dutifully declared the marriage was invalid because Ingeborg was related to Philippe’s first wife within the prohibited fourth degree.”
Justin was astonished. “If the marriage was dissolved, why is Ingeborg still being kept at the monastery? Why has she not been allowed to go back to Denmark?”
“Philippe would like nothing better than to rid himself of her,” Durand said, grinning. “But she claims their marriage is valid in the eyes of God and man, and is appealing to the Pope. What I find truly odd about the whole matter is that men say she is a beauty: eighteen years of age, tall and golden-haired. Now if she’d been a hag, I could better understand his skittishness!”
“It is very sad for her,” Claudine insisted, frowning at Durand. “She is a captive in a foreign country, surrounded by people who speak no Danish whilst she speaks no French. She has been badly treated, indeed. But for the life of me, I do not understand why she is being so stubborn about clinging to this hollow shell of a marriage.”
“Because,” Emma said coolly, “this ‘hollow shell of a marriage’ has made her Queen of France.”
Justin was too well-mannered to remind her that she did not value her own crown very highly, and Claudine shared Emma’s view that life in a remote, alien land like Wales was a form of penance, but Durand relished rushing in where angels feared to tread. Before he could pounce, however, Garnier came into view, obviously searching for them. Justin signaled to catch his eye and he veered in their direction. “Lord John is ready to depart,” he announced.
They were leaving the gardens when they enco
untered John himself, standing on the steps. At the sight of them, he waved his attendants aside and moved to meet them.
“Where the Devil have you been?” Not waiting for explanations, he continued on past them into the gardens. They looked at one another, shrugged, and followed after him. He’d stopped by the stone wall, was gazing out upon the river, silvered by sunlight. He did not turn as they approached, dropping pebbles down into the water.
“Well?” Durand blurted out, when they could stand the suspense no longer. “Did he admit the Breton is in his service?”
“No, but he did not deny it, either, and for Philippe, that qualifies as a confession. He acknowledged he has used the Breton in the past, and expressed dismay when I told him of the man’s crimes.”
“Is he willing to help us?” Justin asked, puzzled by John’s demeanor; it was obvious something was troubling him.
John nodded, flinging a pebble out into the swirling current. “We’ve come up with a plan to lure him out into the open. It seems the Breton has made a practice of finding informers all over Paris. Philippe says he has sources at the provost’s, at the hospitals, the gaols, even the Templars. It must have vexed him sorely when I moved out of the Temple into Petronilla’s dwelling.”
There was a faint splash as another stone broke the surface. “The provost is going to put the word out that an unknown man sought to enter the palace grounds. When he was stopped by the guards, he insisted he had to see ‘the king or the Count of Mortain,’ babbling wildly about plots and murder in an abbey. He was badly wounded, though, and died ere he could be questioned. It ought not to take long for word to reach the Breton. He is going to assume—to hope—it was Simon, but he’ll need to be sure. I’m wagering that he will come out of hiding to identify the body. And when he does, we’ll be waiting.”
They exchanged glances, encouraged, for the plan sounded promising. Eager to set it into motion, they waited impatiently as John continued to watch the ripples stirred up by his pebbles. It was Claudine who ended the impasse, saying softly and with more sympathy than Justin liked, “My lord John? What is amiss? Are you not pleased that this will soon be resolved?”