The Plantagenet Prelude - Plaidy Jean. Страница 47

She laughed aloud and hugged him tightly. In this fine boy she could forget her disillusion with her husband.

Chapter VII

FAIR ROSAMUND

Henry made his way to Shropshire. On his accession he had ordered the demolition of any castle which had been erected as a stronghold from which the pillaging of the countryside took place. This had aroused the enmity of many of those who had owned these castles and Henry knew that if he did not continue to have the country patroled either by himself or his trusted friends these castles would be erected again.

He had heard that this was what was happening in the area of Shropshire and the news had been sent to him by a certain Sir Walter Clifford who himself was having a disagreement with the son of one of the chieftains of Wales.

Henry therefore decided that he would make for Sir Walter’s castle in Shropshire and settle this dispute.

When he arrived at the castle he was welcomed by Sir Walter who according to custom came into the courtyard to present him with the traditional goblet of wine, which he himself first tasted to assure the King that it contained no poison, and he himself held the stirrup while the King dismounted.

Then he led the King into the castle hall where the Clifford family were waiting to welcome him. He must forgive their awkwardness, whispered Sir Walter. They were overawed at the prospect of having the King under their roof.

There was the Clifford family, Lady Clifford and her daughters – six of them. Some were married and their husbands stood behind them, but the youngest of them took the King’s eyes for she seemed to him the most beautiful girl he had ever seen.

He paused before her and said, ‘You have a lovely daughter, Sir Walter.’

‘She will remember your royal compliment all her life, my lord.’

‘Nor shall I forget such beauty in a hurry. What are you called, maiden?’

‘Rosamund, Sire.’

‘Rosamund,’ he mused. ‘The Rose of the World, eh?’

Then he passed on, and was conducted to the bedchamber which was hastily being prepared for him.

All the cooks in the castle were set to work for even though the King’s eating habits were well known, every one of his hosts would want to produce the best feast of which they were capable. The King would expect it even though he did not wish to over-eat. Every acknowledgement of the honour done to them must be clearly shown.

A banquet was prepared and carried into the great hall.

Sir Walter gave up the head of the table to his royal guest as he had done his bedchamber for only the best in the house was good enough for the King. For once Henry sat down to eat and he was in a more thoughtful mood than was usual. He commanded that Sir Walter’s daughter should sit beside him at the table.

She came. He was struck further by the beauty of her fair complexion, and realised he was comparing it with Eleanor’s darker one. This girl was indeed rose-like, a little fearful to have caught his interest – which he liked in her – and yet eager to please.

‘Why,’ said Henry fondly, ‘I never saw a maiden whose looks please me more.’

He took her slender white hand and held it in his for a while and then he laid out his own beside hers and laughed comparing them.

‘There you see a hand, my child, that holds the strings that lead a nation. A strong hand, Rose of the World, but not so pretty a one as yours, eh?’

‘It would not be right, Sire, for your hand to be other than it is.’

‘The right answer,’ he cried. ‘You should always think thus of your King. He is right...whatever he is. Is that what you think, my Rose?’

‘Yes, Sire. ’Tis true, is it not?’

‘Your daughter pleases me,’ said the King to Sir Walter.

‘She hath a rare grace and beauty.’

He kept the girl with him during the evening and when night fell he said to her: ‘Hast ever had a lover, maiden?’

She blushed charmingly and said she had not.

‘Then this night you shall have one and he shall be the King.’

He stayed at the castle. Rosamund was enchanting. She had been a virgin but her father had been willing that she should be given to the King. Nor had Rosamund been reluctant; she must rejoice that the King had found her to his liking.

Sir Walter soothed his wife who would have wished their daughter to have been found a husband that she might settle down in respectable matrimony as her sisters had done.

‘Nay,’ said Sir Walter, ‘Rosamund will bring good to herself and the family. And if there should be a child, the King will care for it. To refuse our daughter to the King would anger him. They say his rages are terrible.’

‘We should have hidden our daughters.’

‘Nay, wife. Fret not. Naught but good will come of this.’

Rosamund was in love with the King. That aura of power had completely bemused her. She was an innocent girl and fearful that she lacked skills to please him, but he told her that her very innocence was at the root of her charm for him.

He found it difficult to tear himself away. He said: ‘I shall always remember my stay at your father’s castle.’

‘I shall remember it too,’ she answered.

‘You must not think of it sadly,’ he replied.

‘When you are gone I could not be anything but sad.’

How charming she was. How different from Eleanor. Was that why he was so enamoured of her? Her great quality was her gentleness, her acceptance of his masculine superiority. She was not without education but she lacked Eleanor’s erudition; she adored him and it was very pleasant for one who was surrounded by adulation to sense the complete disinterestedness of this beautiful girl.

‘I would I need not go,’ he said. ‘I would give a great deal to stay here and dally with you, my sweet Rose.’

But the Welsh were rising. He sent out an order that every archer in Shropshire must join his army and he went into battle against Owain Gwynnedd. The fighting was desperate and there were losses on both sides.

He had heard how his grandfather Henry I had often gone to Wales and how he had loved a Welsh princess Nesta, more it was said than any other of his numerous mistresses. Henry had often gone to Wales to see her, and his Queen was the last to hear of his infatuation with that woman. One of their sons, Henry after his father, was fighting with them now on his side against the Welsh.

During that battle Nesta’s son Henry was killed, and Henry the King came very near to losing his life. But for the bravery of one of his loyal soldiers he would have been killed, but the man had stood between him and his assailant and had run his sword through the Welshman’s heart before he could attack the King.

This was violent warfare and the King was determined to subdue these Welshmen. Finally he succeeded in driving them back and fortifying several castle strongholds. But he had to remind himself that it was not Wales alone that he must defend. He must return to London for how could he know that while he was engaged in Wales, trouble would not spring up in some other corner of his territories? Thus it had always been since the days of the Conqueror.

But first he would spend a little while with Rosamund. He had been thinking of her when he was not bitterly engaged in the battle. Other women had lost their appeal for him, but desperately he wanted to see this beautiful girl again.

There was great rejoicing in the castle when he arrived, and he exulted to see how pale Rosamund turned when he told the story of his exploits on the battlefield and how but for the bravery of his men – and one in particular – he would not be alive to tell the tale.

That night when Rosamund lay beside him in his bed she told him that she believed she was to have his child. He was exultant.

‘Rosamund,’ he said, ‘I love you dearly. I am a man who has known many women but have never loved – or perhaps only once – any as I love you. Think not that ours will be a light relationship and that you will see me no more. I shall come back to you...again and again.’