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‘I haven’t got them, Monseigneur,’ she replied.
There was a sudden change in Robert’s expression.
‘Do you mean to say you haven’t got the papers?’ he cried. ‘You promised me to bring them today!’
‘I’ve come straight from the Château d’Hirson, Monseigneur. I went there yesterday with Sergeant Maciot. We opened the iron wall-safe with skeleton keys.’
‘Well?’
‘Someone had been there before us. It was empty.’
‘What splendid news!’ cried Robert, who had turned rather pale. ‘You’ve been trifling with me for a whole month. “Monseigneur, I can give you the deeds that will put you in possession of your county! I know where they are. Give me an estate and an income, and I’ll bring them to you next week …” And then that week goes by, and then another … “The Hirson family are in the château; I can’t go there when they’re in residence …” “I’ve now been there, Monseigneur, but the key I had with me was not the right one. Have a little patience …” And now, on the very day I’ve got to produce the two documents to the King …’
‘The three documents, Monseigneur: the marriage contract of your father, Count Philippe, the letter from Count Robert, your grandfather, and Monseigneur Thierry’s letter …’
‘Very well then! The three of them! And now you come here and say foolishly: “I haven’t got them; the safe was empty!” Do you expect me to believe you?’
‘Ask Sergeant Maciot, who went with me! Don’t you realize, Monseigneur, that I’m even more distressed than you are?’
There was a wicked and suspicious glint in Robert’s eyes. ‘Tell me, La Divion’, he said in a different tone of voice, ‘are you by any chance trying to double-cross me? Is this an attempt to extract more money from me, or have you betrayed me to Mahaut?’
‘How can you even think of such a thing, Monseigneur?’ she cried on the verge of tears. ‘All my difficulties and my poverty are due to the Countess of Mahaut who stole everything my dear Seigneur Thierry left me in his will. I wish Madame Mahaut all the harm you can do her. Just think, Monseigneur, I was Thierry’s mistress for twelve years. Many people cut me because of it, but after all a bishop’s a man like another! People are so unkind …’
She began telling Robert her story all over again, though he had already heard it three times at least. She talked quickly; her eyes, beneath her straight brows, had the curious inward look of the utterly self-centred, of people whose thoughts are entirely and unceasingly concentrated on their own affairs.
She could obviously expect no help from her husband, whom she had left to go and live with Bishop Thierry. She realized that on the whole her husband had been very accommodating, perhaps because he had early ceased to be a man (Monseigneur would understand what she meant). It was to save her from poverty and in gratitude for all the happy years she had given him that Bishop Thierry had put her down in his will for several houses, a sum in gold and an annuity. But he had been afraid of Madame Mahaut and had felt obliged to appoint her his executrix.
‘She always disliked me, because I was younger than she was, and because Thierry in the past – he told me so himself – had been compelled to pleasure her. He was well aware that she would treat me badly when he was no longer there to protect me, and that the Hirsons, who are all against me – particularly Beatrice, Madame Mahaut’s lady-in-waiting, who is the worst of the lot – would contrive to throw me out of the house and deprive me of everything due to me …’
Robert had ceased to listen to her interminable complaints. He put his heavy coronet down on a chest and scratched his red head in thought. His splendid scheme was falling to the ground, for it was entirely dependent on the production of the documents. ‘Just one convincing little document, Brother, and I shall at once order a review of the judgements of 1309 and 1318,’ Philippe VI had said. ‘But you must realize that I can do nothing without that, however great my wish to serve you, or I shall be breaking my word to Eudes of Burgundy, with all the consequences that you can imagine.’ And it was no small document, but the highly important papers Mahaut had stolen so as to be able to lay her hand on the Artois inheritance that he had boasted of being able to produce!
‘And in a few minutes’ time,’ he said, ‘I have to be in the cathedral for the homage.’
‘What homage?’ asked La Divion.
‘The King of England’s, of course!’
‘Oh, so that’s why the town’s so crowded I could scarcely push my way through.’
So this fool of a woman saw nothing, heard nothing and knew nothing, so busy was she with her own ridiculous little concerns!
It occurred to Robert that he had perhaps been unwise to credit this woman’s tale; he began to doubt whether the documents, the safe at Hesdin and the Bishop’s confession had ever existed outside her imagination. And was Maciot l’Allemant also a dupe, or had he connived with her?’
‘Tell the truth, woman! You’ve never seen these documents!’
‘But I have, Monseigneur!’ cried La Divion, pressing her hands to her prominent cheeks. ‘It was at the Château d’Hirson, the day Thierry fell ill, before he had himself carried to his Hôtel d’Arras. “My Jeannette, I want to forearm you against Madame Mahaut, as I forearmed myself,” he said. “The documents she stole from the archives in order to rob Monseigneur Robert were not destroyed as she believes. Those from the Paris archives were burnt in her presence; but the duplicates from the Artois archives” – these are Thierry’s very words, Monseigneur – “I have always kept here, though I told her they had been destroyed too, and I have added a letter in my own hand to them.” Then Thierry took me to the safe concealed in the wall of his study, and gave me the documents to read. They all had seals on them; and I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw what villainy had been done. There were also eight hundred livres in gold in the safe. And he gave me the key in case anything happened to him …’
‘And when you went to Hirson the first time?’
‘I mixed up the keys. I think I must have lost the right one. I really do seem to have the most extraordinary bad luck. And once things start going wrong …’
She was off again. But Robert felt she was speaking the truth; people did not invent such a stupid story when they set out to deceive. He would have strangled her with pleasure could it have served any useful purpose.
‘My going there must have given the alarm,’ she added. ‘They found the safe and forced the locks. I’m sure it was that Beatrice …’
Lormet put his head in at the door. Robert waved him away.
‘But after all, Monseigneur,’ Jeanne de Divion said, as if she were trying to make amends for her failure, ‘don’t you think the documents could be easily reproduced?’
‘Reproduced?’
‘After all, we know what they said! I can repeat Monseigneur Thierry’s letter almost word for word …’
Vague of eye and waving a finger in emphasis, she began reciting:
‘“I feel greatly guilty that I have for so long concealed the fact that the right to the County of Artois belongs to Monseigneur Robert by the agreements made at the marriage of Monseigneur Philippe of Artois and Madame Blanche of Brittany, which were drawn up in duplicate and sealed. Of these deeds I hold one copy, and the other was subtracted from the archives of the Court by one of our great lords … I have always intended that, after the death of Madame the Countess at whose desire and on whose orders I have acted, should God call her to Himself before me, restoration should be made to the said Monseigneur Robert of the deeds I have in my possession …”’
La Divion might lose keys, but she could remember a once-read text. There were no doubt minds made that way. And now she was suggesting to Robert, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, that he should commit forgery. She obviously had no sense whatever of right and wrong, could make no distinction between the moral and the immoral, the permissible and the forbidden. Morality was what happened to suit her. Robert, during the course of his forty-two years, had committed almost every conceivable crime. He had killed, lied, denounced, pillaged and raped. But he had not yet been a forger.
‘There is also the old bailiff of Béthune, Guillaume de la Planche, who must remember things that could help us, for he was Monseigneur Thierry’s clerk at the time.’
‘Where is this old bailiff?’ Robert asked.
‘In prison.’
Robert shrugged his shoulders. Things were going from bad to worse. He had made a grave mistake to be so hasty. He ought to have waited until he had the documents actually in his hands before giving so many assurances. On the other hand, the King himself had advised him to make use of the occasion of the homage.
Old Lormet put his head in at the door again.
‘All right, I’m coming,’ Robert said impatiently. ‘There’s only the square to cross.’
‘The King’s making ready to go down,’ Lormet said reproachfully.
‘Very well, I’m coming.’
When all was said and done, the King was his brother-in-law and, what was more, only King because he, Robert, had so desired it. How hot it was! He felt the sweat running down under his peer’s robes.
He went to the window, and looked out at the cathedral and its two asymmetrical, fretted towers. The sun was shining at an angle on the great rose window. The bells were still pealing and drowning the noise of the crowd.
The Duke of Brittany, followed by his suite, was mounting the steps to the central porch.
Twenty yards behind him, the lame Duke of Bourbon followed, two pages carrying the train of his mantle.
Behind them again, came Mahaut of Artois’ retinue. She had good reason to walk with so firm a step today! Taller than most men, her face crimson, she was acknowledging the greetings of the people with slight but imperious inclinations of the head. There went a criminal, a liar, a poisoner of kings, and a thief who had stolen documents from the royal archives. And now, on the very point of confounding her, of being victorious at last, after twenty years of effort, he was going to be compelled to renounce his triumph. And why? Because a bishop’s concubine had lost a key!
Was there not justification for using base means against the base? Should one be over-nice about the means one employed to bring about the triumph of right?
And, after all, when you came to think of it, if Mahaut did possess the documents from the safe at Château d’Hirson – even if she had not immediately destroyed them, which she probably had – she could certainly never produce them or allude to their existence, since they were proof of her guilt. If similiar documents were produced in evidence against her, she would be caught. It was a pity he had not the whole day in front of him in which to think it over and get more information. He had to make his mind up within the hour, and entirely on his own.
‘I’ll see you again, woman; but not a word to anyone,’ he said.
Forgery was undoubtedly a serious risk.
He picked up his huge coronet and put it on his head. With a glance at the many mirrors that reflected him split into some thirty separate fragments, he set out for the cathedral.
6. (#ulink_53e3663c-c5b7-584e-860e-3250bea34c21)
Homage and Perjury (#ulink_53e3663c-c5b7-584e-860e-3250bea34c21)
‘A KING’S SON CANNOT kneel to a count’s son!’ said the sixteen-year-old Sovereign. He had thought of this formula entirely on his own, and insisted on it to his counsellors, so that they in turn should insist on it to the French jurisconsults.
‘Really, my Lord Orleton,’ said young King Edward III, when they arrived in Amiens, ‘last year you came over to maintain that I had a greater right to the throne of France than my cousin of Valois. Do you now suggest that I should throw myself to the ground at his feet?’
Like so many boys whose parents have lived dissolute and irregular lives, Edward III, now that he was on his own for the first time, was determined to act on sound and sensible principles. During his six days in Amiens, he had insisted that the whole question of the homage be reconsidered.
‘But my Lord Mortimer is most anxious to maintain peace with France,’ said John Maltravers.
‘My lord,’ Edward interrupted him, ‘you are here to guard me, I believe, not to advise.’
He could not conceal his dislike of the long-faced Baron who had been not only his father’s jailer but undoubtedly also his murderer. To have to submit to Maltravers’ surveillance and indeed his spying, for that was what it amounted to, annoyed Edward very much. He went on:
‘My Lord Mortimer is our great friend, but he is not the King, and it is not he who is to render homage. And my Lord Lancaster, who by virtue of presiding over the Council of Regency is alone in a position to take decisions in my name, gave me no instructions before I left as to the nature of the homage I should render. I refuse to render the homage of a liegeman.’
The Bishop of Lincoln, Henry de Burghersh, Chancellor of England, who was also of Mortimer’s party, but less under his thumb and certainly more intelligent than Maltravers, could not but approve the young King’s concern to defend his dignity and the interests of his realm, in spite of the difficulties it created.
For not only did the homage of a liegeman oblige the vassal to present himself with neither arms nor crown, but also to take the oath on his knees, which implied that the vassal was, as his first duty, the suzerain’s man.
‘As his first duty,’ Edward emphasized, ‘and therefore, my lords, if it so happened that, while we were making war in Scotland, the King of France summoned me to a war of his own in Flanders, Lombardy or elsewhere, I should have to abandon everything to join him, failing which he would have the right to seize my duchy. I cannot have that.’
Lord Montacute, who was one of the barons of Edward’s suite, developed a great admiration for his young sovereign’s precocious wisdom and no less precocious firmness. Montacute himself was twenty-eight.
‘I think we shall have a good king,’ he said. ‘It is a pleasure to serve him.’
From then on he was always by Edward’s side, lending him counsel and support.
In the end, the young King had his way. Philippe of Valois’ advisers also wanted peace and, above all, to bring the negotiations to a conclusion. The important thing was that the King of England had come. They had not assembled the whole kingdom and half Europe merely to afford them the spectacle of the negotiations ending in failure.
‘Very well, let him render merely simple homage,’ said Philippe VI to his chancellor, as if it were of no greater significance than a decision about some dance figure, or tournament entry. ‘I think he’s quite right; in his place, I should no doubt do the same.’
And so it was that Edward III advanced up the cathedral, which was packed with lords right into the side chapels, wearing his sword, his royal mantle, embroidered with leopards, which fell in long folds from his shoulders, and his crown. His fair eyelashes were lowered and excitement had enhanced the usual pallor of his face. The heavy adornments made his extreme youth all the more striking. He looked like an archangel; and all the women felt their hearts go out to him, indeed fell in love with him on the spot.
Two English bishops and ten barons walked behind him.
The King of France, his mantle embroidered with lilies, sat enthroned in the choir, a little higher than the kings, queens and sovereign princes about him, whose crowns formed a sort of pyramid. He rose with majestic courtesy to receive his vassal, who came to a halt three paces from him.
A great ray of sunlight was shining through a window and touching them as if it were a sword from Heaven.
Messire Mille de Noyers, the Chamberlain, a master of Parliament and a master of the Exchequer, stepped forward from the crowd of peers and great officers and took up his position between the two sovereigns. He was a grave-looking man of about sixty, who seemed not the least impressed either by his state robes or by the part assigned him. In a loud, clear voice he said: ‘Sire Edward, the King, our Master and most puissant Lord, does not receive you here in testimony of all the rights he holds by law in Gascony and Agenais, as King Charles IV held them by law, and which are not included in the homage.’
Then Henry de Burghersh, Edward’s chancellor, stepped forward to stand beside Mille de Noyers and replied: ‘Sire Philippe, our Lord and Master, the King of England, or any other for him or by him, renounces none of the rights he holds in the Duchy of Guyenne and its appurtenances, and declares that the King of France acquires no new rights whatsoever by this homage.’
These were the highly ambiguous formulas that had been agreed upon; they defined nothing, they settled nothing. Each word had a double meaning.
The French wanted it understood that the borderlands, which had been seized in the previous reign during the campaign commanded by Charles of Valois, were to remain directly attached to the Crown of France. This was a confirmation of the de facto position.
On the English side, the phrase ‘any other for him or by him’ was an allusion to the King’s minority and to the existence of the Council of Regency; but the ‘by him’ might in the future equally well apply to the Seneschal of Guyenne or any other royal lieutenant. As for the expression ‘no new rights’, it could be taken to signify the ratification of the rights already acquired, including those granted by the treaty of 1327. But it was not said explicitly.
These declarations, like every treaty of peace or alliance between nations throughout history, depended for their application entirely on the good or bad will of the Governments concerned. For the moment, the fact that the two princes had come face to face was evidence of a mutual desire to live in amity.
Chancellor Burghersh unrolled a parchment to which was attached the seal of England and read out in the vassal’s name:
‘“Sire, I become your man of the Duchy of Guyenne and its appurtenances, which I claim to hold from you as Duke of Guyenne and Peer of France in accordance with the Treaties of Peace made between your predecessors and ours, and because of what we and our ancestors, Kings of England and Dukes of Guyenne, have done in the name of the said duchy for your predecessors, the Kings of France.”’
Then the Bishop handed Mille de Noyers the parchment he had just read. It had been much shortened in the drafting when the liegeman’s homage was cut out.
Mille de Noyers said in reply: ‘Sire, you become the man of my Lord the King of France for the Duchy of Guyenne and its appurtenances which you recognize that you as Duke of Guyenne and Peer of France hold from him, and in accordance with the Treaties of Peace made between his predecessors, Kings of France, and yours, and because of what you and your ancestors, Kings of England and Dukes of Guyenne, have done for his predecessors, Kings of France, in the name of the said duchy.’
All this would furnish splendid matter for dispute on the day the two countries fell out.
Then Edward III said: ‘In truth.’
And Mille de Noyers replied with these words: ‘The King, our Sire, receives you, subject to the protestations and reservations above stated.’
Edward stepped forward three paces to his suzerain. He took off his gloves and handed them to Lord Montacute. He reached out his slender white hands and put them in the large palms of the King of France. Then the two kings kissed.
It was remarked that Philippe VI did not need to bend down far to reach his young cousin’s face. The chief difference between them lay in Philippe’s robustness which made him seem so imposing. But there could be no doubt that the King of England, who was still growing, would develop into a fine figure of a man.
The bells in the higher tower began pealing again. Everyone was pleased. Peers and dignitaries nodded to each other in satisfaction. King John of Bohemia, behind his handsome auburn beard that spread down across his chest, looked noble and thoughtful. Count Guillaume the Good and his brother Jean of Hainaut exchanged smiles with the English lords. Truly it was a good deed that had just been done.
What was the use of quarrelling, growing angry, threatening, bearing plaints to Parliament, confiscating fiefs, besieging towns, fighting to the death with great waste of gold, toil and the blood of knights, when with a little goodwill on all sides such admirable agreement could be reached?
The King of England took his place on the throne prepared for him a little below that of the King of France. It remained now only to hear mass.
Yet Philippe VI seemed still to be waiting for something. He turned to the peers who were sitting in the stalls and looked for Robert of Artois, whose coronet stood out higher than all the rest.
Robert’s eyes were half shut. Though it was pleasantly cool in the cathedral, he was wiping the sweat from his brow with his red-gloved hand. His heart was beating very fast at this moment. He had not realized that the dye was running from his glove and there was a bloody streak across his face.
Suddenly he left his stall; he had made up his mind.
‘Sire,’ he cried, coming to a halt in front of Philippe’s throne, ‘since all your vassals are here assembled …’
A few moments before, Mille de Noyers and Bishop Burghersh had spoken in clear firm voices, audible throughout the great building. But when Robert spoke he made them sound like birds twittering.
‘… and since everyone has a right to your justice,’ he went on, ‘it is justice I come to ask of you.’
‘Monseigneur of Beaumont, my cousin, who has done you wrong?’ Philippe VI asked gravely.
‘I have been wronged, Sire, by your vassal Dame Mahaut of Burgundy who by guile and felony has sequested the title and possession of the County of Artois which is mine by right of inheritance from my ancestors.’
