Twice Royal Lady Page 10

  Geoffrey watched without comment, but when the ambassadors had left he demanded, ‘Why you? Why not both of us? These are matters of royal prerogative. If I am to rule jointly with you when your father dies I should be signing such documents as well.’

  She hesitated, aware that they were on treacherous ground. ‘I do not know if the English barons are yet ready to accept an Angevin lord as their king.’

  He rounded on her, his face contorted. ‘What do you mean? Does your father rule or not? It is for him to decide who should rule after him, not them.’ He slammed his fist on the table. ‘I have letters from my father. The lords of Outremer have accepted him and he is married to Melisande. When Baldwin dies he will be King of Jerusalem – perhaps even before that. Am I to be nothing more than a paltry count for the rest of my days?’

  She regarded him in silence for a moment. His handsome features were flushed with anger and he looked like a spoilt child who had been denied a treat. Suddenly her patience snapped. This boy was not fit to rule a kingdom. She stood up. ‘Yes, my father rules and it is for him to decide. It seems that at present he does not see you as a future king.’

  After that he refused to speak to her for several days.

  Their sexual relations continued to be the main source of tension. He bedded her from time to time, usually in a mood of revenge for some imagined slight, but as the months passed and she failed to conceive she began to believe that she might, in truth, be barren. When her monthly flux arrived yet again, she brooded gloomily on the memory of her affair with Drogo and its after effects. She knew that she had committed a grave sin and wondered if this was God’s punishment. She reminded herself that she had confessed to Norbert and received absolution. That should mean that she had been forgiven. Norbert, after all, was one of the holiest men she had ever met. His reputation had grown steadily since their meeting at Mouzon and he was now the abbot of a new monastery at Prémontré. Surely, she reasoned, if anyone could release her from God’s displeasure it would be him. Her father’s injunction haunted her. ‘Make me a grandson and no one will dare to lift a sword against us.’ She knew, only too well, how greatly her position in Germany had been weakened by her failure to produce an heir. Had she had a son, she might now be the empress dowager, acting as regent for her child, in a position of power and security; instead of being married to this spoilt boy.

  One day he walked into the solar, where she was reading, and announced, ‘Rosanne has given birth to a son.’

  Rosanne was his mistress. She realized that this was something she should have expected, but nevertheless the news came as a shock. She tried to assume a manner of calm detachment.

  ‘Congratulations. I hope she and the child are both well.’

  ‘Both flourishing.’ His face had the expression she had seen before, when he had vanquished all comers in a tournament. ‘So you see, it is not me who is at fault.’

  She should have seen that coming. She bent her head over the book and said nothing.

  He went on, ‘Since this seems to be the only son I am likely to get – until Rosanne gives me another, of course – I have decided to bring him here to live in the castle. I want him to be brought up in a fitting manner.’

  This was not unusual. Her own half-brothers were brought up at her father’s court. But it was a blow. She said, ‘Surely it would not be wise to separate him from his mother so soon. You must wait until he is weaned, at least.’

  ‘Why? Rosanne will come with him. I shall put her in the room in the other tower, the room I slept in before my father left for Jerusalem.’

  She put the book down and rose slowly to her feet. They had come to a crossroads. ‘You will not.’

  ‘I shall! Who will stop me?’

  ‘No one. But if you do, I shall not be here. I shall return to my father and you can kiss goodbye to those Norman castles and any faint hope you ever had of succeeding him.’

  ‘Go then!’ he shouted. ‘Go! I shall be glad to be rid of you! This whole marriage has been a cheat and a deception.’

  The cavalcade that left the castle and rode towards the Norman border was very different from the one that arrived a year earlier. Geoffrey refused to send a proper escort with her. She had half a dozen knights for protection and her chaplain and Hugh, her steward, and Eloise. It was in this poor state that she returned to her father’s court.

  8

  ROUEN AND ENGLAND, 1129-32

  Henry was predictably furious, but his anger was directed as much at Geoffrey as at Matilda. He was incensed by the fact that he had allowed her to travel so poorly escorted, and he had been irritated by Geoffrey’s constant demands that he surrender the castles and recognize him as joint heir to the throne.

  To her he said bitterly, ‘So you could not do the one thing I needed of you. If he had got you with child it would not matter that he has thrown you out. Is he sterile, or is it you?’

  ‘He did not throw me out! I left because he wanted to bring his mistress and his bastard to live in the castle.’

  Henry grunted. ‘Well, that answers one question. The fault does not lie with him that you have not conceived.’

  She bit back an angry rejoinder and turned away. It was true that she had failed in the one crucial service she could have performed for her father and her country. But her father did not refer to the matter again. Adeliza, too, had failed to produce the longed-for heir, and it seemed likely that he did not wish to delve too deeply into the reasons for that.

  As soon as the opportunity arose, Adeliza took her up to her own chamber. She grasped her hands and exclaimed, ‘My dear, I am so sorry to see you back like this. Tell me what went wrong. Was he brutal to you?’

  She sighed wearily. ‘Not brutal, no. Unfeeling, perhaps. But he is only a boy. Perhaps I should have made allowances.’

  ‘But he must have done something terrible to make you leave him. What was it?’

  She related the cause of that final quarrel and Adeliza put her arms round her. ‘Of course you couldn’t allow that. How can he ever have imagined that you could?’

  She shook her head. ‘I have had time on the journey to think, and I realize now that I was at fault too. I was cold to him in bed. I never wanted to marry him and I vowed he should have no pleasure in the match, so I have only myself to blame if he never came to care for me. If only I had conceived …’

  ‘If you knew how often I have said that to myself! Why can I not give Henry the one thing he craves above all others? But it must be God’s will, and I try to accept that.’

  ‘I wonder. You told me once that the fault could lie with my father, not with you. I cannot give myself the same excuse. Geoffrey is potent, he has proved that. The fault is mine, and I believe it is God’s judgement for my sins.’

  ‘Your sins? What sin could you have committed that God would punish you so?’

  She hesitated, but the longing to unburden herself was overwhelming. ‘It was a long time ago. I was just a girl, but I knew very well that what I was doing was wrong. There was a young man, one of my knights …’

  ‘You let him make love to you?’ Adeliza’s eyes were wide with shock.

  ‘I encouraged him. I loved him so much and we had so much joy in each other … but then the terrible thing happened. I conceived.’

  ‘You conceived? Then you are not barren.’

  ‘I was not, then.’

  ‘What did your husband say?’

  ‘He was not with me. I was in Italy, he had returned to Germany. I told him the child was his … but it did not live. So you see, I committed a mortal sin and this is my punishment.’

  ‘Then you must confess and seek absolution.’

  ‘I did, years ago. I thought I had been forgiven but now …’

  Adeliza squeezed her hand. Compassion had taken the place of shock in her eyes. ‘Perhaps you should seek advice from someone else, another priest. It may be that there is something you can do, some penance …’

  She smiled bitterly. ‘I thought
I had served my punishment in my husband’s death and my marriage to a man I cannot love. It seems I have not.’ She got up. ‘Does it not seem to you, Adeliza, very cruel that we women are seen as having no value except as breeding stock? We have no more say in the matter than cattle, penned up to be serviced by whichever bull our master has selected.’

  Adeliza put her hand to her mouth. ‘Matilda, have a care. That sounds like blasphemy. The Bible tells us that the woman must be subject to the man.’

  ‘The Bible as written by a man!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘You must not speak like that! The Bible is God’s word, not that of mortal men!’

  She bowed her head. ‘You are right. I am prone to the sin of pride. I have been told that often before. I must struggle to correct myself.’

  Contrary to her expectation, it seemed Henry valued her for more than just her potential as a brood mare. Over the next months he made a point of involving her in the business of rule. She travelled with him around Normandy, and when he returned to England she remained in Rouen and resumed to some extent the role she had fulfilled as consort to the emperor. It appeared that her father was intent upon associating her in the minds of his vassals with the governance of his domains. To what end he never made clear, but she knew that the problem of the succession preyed on his mind. For her own part, she brooded in private moments over Adeliza’s suggestion that she should seek counsel from a priest, but she was loath to confide in any of the churchmen in Henry’s entourage. Far too often, in her experience, the assumption of holy orders was seen as a way to achieve advancement in the secular world, rather than as a way to escape it.

  When Henry returned to Normandy, ambassadors arrived from Geoffrey. After the audience her father sent for her.

  ‘Would you like to guess what that insolent puppy is demanding?’

  ‘A divorce? An annulment on some far-fetched pretext?’

  ‘Quite the contrary. He wants you back. He said you are his lawful wife and should be returned to him at once.’

  She tried to quell a rising sense of panic. ‘What did you tell them?’

  ‘That he failed to treat you with the respect due to my daughter and you will remain with me.’

  She drew a breath of relief.

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  Some days later word reached them that Geoffrey intended to set out on a pilgrimage to Compostella. Henry ground his teeth in fury.

  ‘That boy will do anything rather than stay at home and tend to the affairs of his county. I shall write and tell him to abandon the idea.’

  ‘I doubt,’ she said with some asperity, ‘that Geoffrey will be inclined to listen to your wishes in the matter.’

  ‘Then who will he listen to?’

  ‘Perhaps if he could be convinced that he will do God’s will better by remaining at home than by undertaking a pilgrimage … Perhaps Bishop Hildebert might have some influence. He has acted as intermediary before.’

  ‘Hildebert? Yes, you are right. I shall write to him and tell him to write to Geoffrey conveying my extreme displeasure.’

  In due course word came back from the bishop that Geoffrey had abandoned the idea of the pilgrimage. She remembered that it was Hildebert who advised her to give in to her father’s demands and marry him. She could not rid her mind of the thought that she was being punished for her earlier sin and that perhaps she was compounding that sin by refusing to return to her husband. What would Hildebert expect her to do now? She wrote to him, asking for counsel.

  He wrote back:

  My dear daughter in Christ,

  I have been greatly saddened by your breach with your husband. I am aware of the circumstances and it is clear to me that it is Geoffrey who is most to blame. I have written to him, begging him to put away his mistress and do everything in his power to reconcile himself with you and with your father. But I must also beg you to reconsider. It is written in the Bible that a wife should be conformable to her husband’s will, and you do ill to set your own desires above the instruction of Holy Writ. You say in your letter that you are troubled in your conscience and afraid that you may have deserved God’s displeasure. It would ease your mind to confess yourself to a man of God and perhaps to take some time for prayer and contemplation. My advice to you is to go on retreat for a time, perhaps a month, and I would suggest that you could not do better than to go to the abbey of Bec-Hellouin. The abbot there, Theobald, is a holy and wise man who will give you good counsel. Meanwhile, I commend you to God’s blessing. Hildebert.

  She told her father that she needed time to consider her future and received his permission to absent herself from court. She rode south, across the River Loire, with a handful of attendants and an escort of men-at-arms, and came to the wooded valley where the abbey sat amidst fertile pastures and fields of wheat. She was received with courtesy, lodging was found for her escort and she was given a simple room in the guest quarters. For some days she was content to allow the simple routine of monastery life to soothe her. She was not required to get up in the middle of the night to attend matins, or lauds, but she attended the services of prime and terce and sext and nones and vespers. Her favourite service was compline, sung just before the whole monastery retired to bed. She spent the intervening hours reading. She could not go into the library, which was reserved for the monks and where any female presence would cause a great disturbance, but books were brought to her and she read in the cloisters or the garden. At the back of her mind always was the recollection of Hildebert’s words. ‘It would ease your mind to confess …’ Eventually she found enough courage to beg a private audience with Abbot Theobald and, under the seal of the confessional, she spilt out the story of her affair with Drogo and its consequences.

  When she had finished, Theobald was silent for a moment. When he spoke it was not in the voice of condemnation that she feared, but one of gentle consideration.

  ‘It was a sin, certainly. But you were very young and it was a long time ago. I think, perhaps, you have already been punished enough. But you have confessed also that you are prone to the sin of pride and it is that that you must address. In the Bible we are told that pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. It is that spirit that made you so unwilling to subject yourself to marriage to a man you thought beneath you. You must learn to conquer that. Go back to your husband and make yourself compliant to his will. That is the way of salvation.’

  Some weeks after her return to Rouen, Henry sent for her. He had a letter in his hand.

  ‘Your husband writes that he wishes you to return to him and he will receive you with all honour and treat you as befits your station as his wife and my daughter. It seems he has been in correspondence with Bishop Hildebert, who has persuaded him of the error of his ways and he wishes to make amends. What do you say to his proposal?’

  She bowed her head. The thought of returning to Geoffrey still repelled her, but she knew now where her duty lay. ‘That must be as you decide, my lord.’

  ‘True, but I would like to know your thoughts on the matter. Are you prepared to go back?’

  ‘On certain conditions. He must put his mistress away, and the child too. I know he has acknowledged him and wants him brought up in a fitting manner, but I do not … I cannot have him growing up in the castle. It would be too bitter a reminder. I’m sure there are noble families among Geoffrey’s vassals in whose household the boy could be brought up. It is not an uncommon arrangement – as you know yourself.’

  He acknowledged the sally with a smile and said, ‘That sounds reasonable to me. And if Geoffrey undertakes to do that, and to behave honourably in future, you would be willing to return to him?’

  ‘If it is also your wish.’

  ‘It is true that I should prefer it. The alliance with Anjou is crucial, and I still have hopes of a grandson. But the decision is not so simple. When you returned from Germany I made all my principal English vassals swear that in the event of my death they would support you and any chil
dren you might have in the matter of the succession. Now some of them are saying that I promised that I would not marry you to a foreigner without consulting them first.’

  ‘Did you promise that?’

  He shrugged. ‘I may have said something of the sort. But no one raised a dissenting voice when I betrothed you to Geoffrey, so I took it that I had their consent. Now, however, I think it would be politic to make sure that we have their full agreement before returning you to him. We will go back to England and I will call a full council so they cannot afterwards pretend that they were not consulted.’

  ‘And if they decide against it…?’

  Henry gave her a grim smile. ‘They won’t, if they know what’s good for them.’

  The council met in Northampton on 8 September. She found it strange to be back in England. It was the country of her birth but she had spent so little time there that she felt she was among foreigners. Even their Norman French had a different accent and it was occasionally interspersed with words from the old English language, which she had never learnt. It was a relief to find her uncle, David of Scotland, there. He seemed to have a special affection for her as his sister’s child. He drew her aside and asked, ‘Is this truly what you wish? I would not like to see you forced to return to a man who treated you so disgracefully.’

  ‘If I am honest, Uncle, I think I was as much at fault as he was,’ she answered. ‘It will be best for everyone if I go back.’

  As Henry predicted, there was little argument from the assembled lords. They knew Henry’s temper too well to oppose him openly. She was to be returned to her husband, provided that he gave an undertaking to treat her honourably. She had the impression that most of them had little interest in her fate. In fact, she suspected that they would be glad to have her out of the way. They treated her with scant respect, and she responded with frosty dignity. Before they were allowed to leave, however, Henry extracted from them all a new oath of fealty to her and her sons, if any should be born.