The Fatal Crown(4)
“Stop that weeping at once,” Henry commanded sternly as he towered over her. “A granddaughter of the Conqueror does not cry, no matter how great the provocation. Never did I see my mother shed a single tear.”
Beau began to howl. Henry reached down to pat the sleek gray head. Straightening, he again lifted his arm.
Maud swallowed convulsively, brushing the tears away with her hand. Tightly screwing her eyes shut, she squared her shoulders, tensing herself for the next blow.
“How stupid Maud is,” William said to Robert in a spiteful voice. “Imagine not wanting to be a queen.”
Henry glanced swiftly toward William, then down at Maud. After a moment he lowered his arm, slapping the whip thoughtfully against his thigh. Squatting down in front of her, he lifted Maud’s chin with his strong fingers.
“Your brother William is wrong, is he not? Surely you wish to be a queen, an empress?”
“Yes,” she whispered, with a defiant look at her brother, willing to agree to anything that would make the despicable William wrong.
Tossing aside the whip, Henry slowly lifted the crown from his head, and put it solemnly into her hands. The gold plates studded with sapphires and rubies felt cool and heavy against her fingers.
“Men have fought and died to possess this crown,” he said, his eyes fixed upon her in an unblinking stare. “Your grandfather, the great William, took it by conquest amid much bloodshed and suffering. Regard it well.” He paused as she looked down. “It represents power, wealth, respect. Everything that matters in this world. When you become an empress such a crown will be yours.”
With everyone’s eyes on her, Maud turned the glittering gold plates over and over in her hands. Such a small thing, really, to carry so much importance.
“To refuse this opportunity would be considered the deadliest insult imaginable, Daughter.” Henry leaned toward her, his voice low and conspiratorial. “After all, you have been promised to the Emperor, agreements have been made. Think of the disgrace. Would you bring his wrath down upon our house because you were too cowardly to leave home?”
“What would he do?” she whispered. Her father’s familiar odor of horses, sweat, and damp leather was particularly strong this morning.
“Attack England perhaps. His army is vastly superior to mine. To offend so mighty a prince—would you put us all at risk?”
Fighting back the tears, Maud knew further resistance would be futile. The whipping alone would not have budged her, but now she felt as if the welfare of the realm rested upon her shoulders. What could she do? There was no choice.
“I would not bring disgrace upon our house,” she said, feeling more alone than she had ever felt in her life.
“There speaks the true Norman princess! I knew you wouldn’t fail me.” With a smile of quiet satisfaction, Henry stood up, then reached for the crown.
Reluctantly, for the gold plates had started to have a reassuring pressure against her hands, Maud gave it back to him. Henry placed the crown on his head, then held out his hand to help her up.
By midday, as the church bells tolled for Sext, Maud stood in the courtyard, surrounded by her family and members of the court. The mild April morning had turned chill; the sky, heavy with dark clouds threatening rain, reflected her inner despair. She noticed three new children of noble birth, two of them twins, who had just arrived from Brittany and Muelan to be brought up at the court of the English king. Another boy, Maud’s first cousin, Stephen, son of her father’s sister, was also due to arrive today from across the channel. The look of abject misery on the faces of the three young strangers as they huddled together filled Maud with compassion. Her heart went out to them but a similar ordeal awaited her in Germany and she could offer no solace.
“It has cost this land dear to dower you properly, Daughter,” her father said, weighing the enormous procession of carts, men, and beasts assembled before him.
Maud’s eyes followed his. A goodly number of sumpter horses and carts carrying bolts of silk and wool, pelts of fox and ermine, jewels and ivory caskets, stood massed together while Norman and German knights, restive on their huge chargers, paraded up and down the courtyard. An array of waiting litters already held Norman ladies-in-waiting as well as her nurse Aldyth, clergymen, servants, and the Emperor’s ambassador, Graf von Hennstien, with his entourage. Two men-at-arms rode in the cart carrying a wooden chest with Maud’s dowry of thousands of silver coins.
Suddenly Henry looked round him with a scowl. “Jesu, where is the Queen? Go to the chapel and bring her here at once,” he ordered a servant.
A short while later Queen Matilda appeared, out of breath, her face white as alabaster. She was accompanied by her confessor and several priests. Gaunt, almost wasted from long hours of fasting, the Queen was dressed in a plain white wool gown. A simple wooden crucifix adorned her neck and thick flaxen braids formed a coronet around her head. As was usual for her mother during Lent, she had gone to chapel with bare feet, and Maud knew she would be wearing a hair shirt next to her skin.