Checkmate (33 page)

‘Your Majesties, mes seigneurs, messieurs, mesdames … I have the honour to tell you that Calais is French once again.’

*

The cheering, beyond all controlling, went on for ten minutes. For ten minutes the Schiatti thumped her shoulders and pumped Catherine d’Albon by the hand. For ten minutes no single fact of the winning of Calais could be learned: the author of the triumph, its course, its culmination, its cost. Many broke into tears. Many shouted, still weeping. Many, like the demoiselle d’Albon, stood silent, their eyes brilliant, their hearts offering prayer.

Marthe said to her step-sister by marriage, ‘If you are feeling loyal, then I must ask you to accept my commiserations. On the other hand, you will now be free of your husband by April.’

Robertet had started speaking. The noise died. The words
glorious leadership
and
Duke de Guise
made themselves heard. Philippa said, ‘What did he say?’

‘He is placing credit where credit is expected. We needn’t, however, stay to applaud him. There is a door just behind you if you would like to complete your withdrawal.’

‘… and Marshal de France Piero Strozzi …’

‘I can’t hear him. He’s mumbling. Come on,’ said Gino Schiatti. ‘I want to see how Paris is taking it.’

‘… the efforts of Messrs d’Aumale and d’Elboeuf, le Duc de Bouillon and M. de Montmorency …’

‘There won’t be hunting tomorrow, devil take it. He’ll decree a thanksgiving service and celebrations. Mistress Philippa …’

‘… not without cost. Stubborn fighting … Aside from those lost in the water … The Master of the Camp, who had his foot clean blown off

‘Then that’s agreed. This way, Mistress Philippa. No, follow Marco. It is not necessary to obtain permission from your Queen? The occasion is without precedent.’

‘I thought you were bored?’ Marthe said. ‘Don’t tell me——’

‘… Among those whose sacrifice we who survive will long remember

‘Do you mind,’ said Philippa Somerville bitingly, ‘if before romping drunk in the city I satisfy myself whether I am merely unhappily married or widowed?’

The Secretary’s voice came to an end. Marthe betrayed a faint irritation. ‘Later,’ she said. ‘You can hear all the details.’

‘Such as whether Jerott is living?’ Philippa said. And turning, made a smooth but remorseless passage away from her.

Lymond’s sister made no effort to keep her. Over the heads of the courtiers she watched her make her inquiry. But when, hard on that, Philippa walked out of the room, Marthe broke off her discourse and moving swiftly, made her way through the same doorway.

It led to the guardroom; to a passage lined with the white and silver hoquetons of the Archers and, at last, to a long, empty gallery, of which one windowed wall looked over the garden. There had been no time for Philippa to reach the end of it, even had she been walking quickly. Nor had she thought of seeking sanctuary in any one of the rooms which gave on to it. Instead she had simply slowed up and stopped in the middle, and when Marthe came up behind her was standing perfectly still, her hands loose at her sides.

Marthe paused, her hand still on the door-latch behind her. Then she closed both leaves and watched Philippa’s head lift at the click of it. She walked forward and spoke. ‘Gino is pining. Did you learn what you wanted to find out?’

Philippa heaved a short sigh. Then turning, Lymond’s wife faced her inquisitor.

Her face was marked, past disguising, with the clear ribboned tracks of her weeping. ‘Yes,’ said Philippa thinly. ‘And so, I take it, have you.’

Unusually, Marthe was pale. But the mockery lingered, like a snow-print caught in ice after the thawing. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I know that our wanton is safe. And that you love him.’

He is safe
. The tears, defying all discipline began again, coursing down her no doubt clown-like cheeks and jumping off through the pearls co her bodice. Philippa said, ‘What a perfect day you must be having.’

‘I am pleased, naturally,’ Marthe said. ‘I gather Jerott and the others are equally blessed by fortune.’ There was a long cushioned stool in the window embrasure. With a hissing rustle of tissues, she sank on it. ‘So. I love the love that loves not me: I am his friend and he my foe? You have been excessively secretive. You were afraid I should tell Francis what you feel for him?’

‘I think you should,’ Philippa said.

The blue eyes stared into hers. Then unexpectedly, the fair face relaxed. ‘And receive my quittance, I gather. So he knows.’

Without speaking, Philippa regarded her. Then she said, ‘He has cause to suspect, but tact enough to ignore the situation. He has ties elsewhere. I think I told you as much.’

‘You did. You also said the paragon’s name was unknown to you. You cannot know how many mistakes he has made. He may be making another.’

‘It had occurred to me,’ said Philippa briefly. ‘I am quite sure he isn’t. Otherwise I should hardly be planning to marry again.’

‘I see. And who is to suffer in the cause of Francis’s nerve-storms? One of the Schiatti? The Duke of Paliano? One of the Dauphin’s young titled gentlemen?’

‘I thought,’ said Philippa, ‘of trying them one after the other.’ She stood quite still, facing her sister-in-law. ‘No one will suffer. Marriage, like law, is a practice. Aut bibat, aut abeat. Subscribe, or get out of it.’

‘Like Jerott,’ said Marthe. ‘And your families? Whatever your choice, you must make your romance convincing. In four weeks, nine Scottish delegates are coming to France to contract for the little Queen’s marriage. Pious, religious and unblamable princes who will repeat current gossip like jackdaws.’

Had it been anyone but Marthe, of the open eyes and dulcet voice and sleek yellow hair, one would have taken that at its face value.

It cost something: it cost almost more than she could manage to fight, and to keep on fighting, by this time. Philippa said, ‘I hadn’t heard, but I am sure that I’m going to. What has Queen Mary been telling you?’

‘It was Mary Fleming,’ said Marthe. ‘A pretty, uncritical creature, and a devoted admirer of Francis. She tells me Richard Crawford of Culter is one of the Scottish bridal Commissioners.’

Lymond’s brother. ‘Yes?’ said Philippa flatly.

Marthe smiled. ‘He is coming next month. And bringing with him Sybilla his mother.’

In one matter Lymond’s captains had forecast correctly. In the weeks of brilliant manœuvring which preceded the investment of Calais, neither they nor their leader had a thought for personal matters. And even when Calais surrendered, there was still a rose to replace in the chaplet. The remaining marshy square miles of the Pale, the last English possessions in France, had to be overrun and appropriated before the triumph was perfect.

Thus, while the Duchess of Bouillon’s daughter was bedded, the victors of Calais were casting already through the cold winter marshes, spreading fright and apprehension among all the lonely, Spanish-held strongholds.

The Duke of Savoy their commander was not there. For days he had been in Bruges, begging for money with which to pay the five German regiments hurriedly saved from disbanding, and for the twelve thousand more foot and horse he would have to raise, recall or seduce from their warm German ale-houses to replace the armies he had just dispersed for the winter.

Meanwhile, crowded on the frontier at Gravelines were his best Spanish captains, each with handfuls of Walloons and hackbutters. More were marching up from the south, where the French Jack-o’-lantern had beckoned them, but were still too far off to be comfortable. Nor could he cull men from Saint-Quentin or Ham or le Catelet. Those hard-won Spanish forts were under-garrisoned as it was.

Messages, earnest, courteous and sensible, passed back and forth between King Philip and his wife, Mary Tudor of England. It was understood that the Earl of Rutland was preparing an army to protect the English possessions round Calais. They said that the Earl of Pembroke was on his way with five thousand men to cross the Channel from Dover, and that a further five thousand were spoken for. It was known that eighteen English ships, no doubt laden with troops, had had to turn back from Calais because of the disastrous capture of Fort Ruisbank. Preparations were made to receive landings at Dunkirk; lighters and barges were assembled at Dunkirk, Nieuport and Ostend; carts for money and baggage were readied.

The Duke of Savoy, still awaiting his army, laid plans to encamp at Saint-Omer.

Three thousand unarmed refugees walked into Gravelines form Calais, and had to be sheltered and nourished. A lively, well-plenished band of four hundred enemy horse rode up to the Sluice before Gravelines, reconnoitred it and Dunkirk, and withdrew, neatly, leaving panic behind them.

Another troop stopped off at the English-held fortress of Hâmes, and called upon Edward, Lord Dudley, to deliver the castle. He refused, even to death. By the back postern, at the same moment, he sent a call of despair to King Philip: for guns, powder and spades, and a standard of three hundred foot-soldiers. No one sent them. The besiegers, on the other hand, had other business to attend to. They made a note to return and rode off, in high spirits.

On Thursday, January 13th, six days after Calais’s surrender, the town and fortress of Guînes was surrounded.

Lord Grey of Wilton had seen it coming. In fact, he got Mary, his wife, to ride for help that first weekend, when the French were busy sapping up to the fortress by trenches. It was done properly, with a safe conduct from the Duke de Guise, who would never subject an English Earl’s daughter to the inconvenience of a bombardment. All the same, she had a long message to convey to the Duke of Savoy which her husband had induced her to memorize. Unless relieved, Guînes was in great danger of falling. There was food for only thirteen days and powder for four. The French were trenching to drain the defence moats and had occupied the wreck of the town, emptied and burned by Lord Grey himself before they could stop him. The enemy had thirty-five siege guns protecting his workers while cutting. Lord Grey’s total garrison amounted to one thousand English and Burgundians, kindly sent in by the Governor of Artois.

They would, of course, fight to the death for their honour. But the Duke would no doubt see that if Guînes were lost, Calais could hardly be retaken. Whereas (Lady Grey was word perfect on this point) if a strong force were to relieve Guînes and repulse the French army, the occupiers of Calais might be besieged in turn and starved into submission.

It was all perfectly true. It was not Lord Grey’s fault that the Duke of Savoy had no army, and that those troops he had, he was saving to protect the Low Countries, not to lose lives and prestige in pulling English chestnuts out of a peculiarly horrendous French fire. Two small bands of Spanish soldiers were sent to help Lord Grey at Guînes, of whom thirty-five men got into the citadel and five only lived to get out of it.

By Sunday night, the cuttings had reached the ditches and started to drain them. At dawn on Monday, the bombardment began which was to subject the Mary bulwark between the fortress gate and the town to nine thousand cannon shot in forty-eight hours, dislodge the English counter-battery and breach the bastion.

At two o’clock on Monday afternoon the French sent several parties to wade the moat, now only waist-high, and examine the damage. Later, two bands of Gascons attempted to scale the bulwark and inspect it more closely, and retired, pursued by culvers and hackbuts and pots of wild
fire: shortly after, the French resumed firing. The eight deafening salvoes they delivered that evening tore open a breach which exposed all the Mary’s defenders.

Night, falling, saved them, but an English captain had lost his life, and a Spanish, and forty or fifty common soldiers. They had then been under siege for five sleepless days before the entire French armed forces. With Lord Grey were his twenty-year-old son Arthur, his cousin Lewis Davie, his nephew Austin Grey, his colleague Henry Palmer, an English captain called Bracknell and an experienced Spanish leader of Alva’s called Montdragon. The quality of the leadership was undoubted; and in Grey of Wilton’s case, supreme.

He knew the Pale, and its strengths, and its weaknesses. Marsh lay all around him: a wilderness of short, sour grass showing everywhere the white eyes of water, upon which floated the small hill of Guînes.

Marsh protected two sides of the fort’s moated ramparts. On the other two, the French were encamped. Lansquenetz straddled the highway to Ardres, which led south from the barbican entrance. And across the west ditch, Frenchmen held the burnt-out husk of the town and by daylight, if they were shrewd, would have ranged their batteries on its maundes, or on the commanding flat stage of the market place. One had only to count the ensigns, streaming from each moving body of troops, and scan the flagged pavilions which spread their skirts from bush to bush to recognize what one was opposing.

There was a particular pleasure, now and then in one’s life, in matching one’s skill with the best. He had expected to find it when he led the English troops at Saint-Quentin, but that had been a rogue victory, won through an old man’s mistakes. Arthur, he remembered had been elated, but he had seen again in his nephew’s manner that air of withdrawal which meant he would never make a first-class general, for all his brains.

God knew, one didn’t go into this business with any illusions. Over and over again, he had impressed the facts of life on these two boys. One battle in twelve might be won by a brilliant military stratagem. The rest stood or fell by somebody’s blunders. Only rarely, there came the feel of a great campaign evolved by a stylist: imaginative, comprehensive, irresistible.

That was the spice in the unseasoned meat of one’s livelihood. Savoy had been shown it this winter, and he and Wentworth were the targets. Wentworth had succumbed and so might Guînes, if the troops from England failed to arrive to relieve him. He had sent Mary to beg help from Savoy, but he knew, even if they had help to give, that they would withhold it until the English bands came. If there was to be failure let it be an English failure, as Calais was an English failure. If there looked like being a success, then the troops mustering at Saint-Omer would be marched in to deal the finishing blow.

That night, Lord Grey made a speech to his troops from the bulwark, thanking God for the day’s success, praising his men and exhorting them
to noble endeavours. In their hands, he said, lay the safety of Guînes; and he took oath before them, and asked his men to take oath in their turn, that the defenders of Guînes would die rather than betray any weakness, or surrender.

After that, they had to erect a new vawmure by entrenching six feet deep in the bulwark, and dawn of Tuesday showed that his forebodings were realized: the enemy had planted a big six-gun battery over the ditch in the market-place and another of three cannon on the ramparts, making a total of sixteen guns aimed at the cathouse and the flanking defence of the barbican. By the end of the morning the cathouse was intact, but not the flankers or the garden bulwark or the curtain wall; and by firing eight or nine regular salvoes an hour, the French were continually crumbling the breach.

The noise was punishing. One’s inclination, when it ceased for a moment, was to close the eyes and fall stunned into sleep, and this was dangerous, for the batteries only stopped when another sally was being made. That afternoon it was a regiment of Swiss who approached, with some French, and sent sundry small bands to examine the breach and to try and locate the numbers and stations of the gunners. But Grey was ready, and had the positions concealed. They harassed the reconnoitring party with hackbuts and watched them retire at length with qualified satisfaction: as soon as they were back in camp, the French cannon opened up once again.

The hours of darkness, once more, were spent in churning up mud in more trenching. Austin, at one point, came to try and persuade him to snatch some sleep and he did, for an hour: there was no point in leaving his men leaderless. He had no illusions about his command. The Spaniards were good, but they couldn’t get the last ounce from the English that he could. Bourne, helpless with gout, had lost his life defending the Mary on a stretcher.

Harry Palmer was able, but still feeling the shoulder wound he took at Bushing last month. He also made the mistake of mixing with the men far too much. They would go with him, but they wouldn’t rise, as they might have to, beyond themselves. That was why one talked to them of honour and glory. Men would fight well for their pay, but they would die for an aspiration.

Austin knew that. The trouble with Austin was that he believed so deeply in the chivalrous virtues that he found it impossible to refer to them.

In war—William Grey tried not to sound cynical—in war, it was alas the opposite nature one looked for.

The next day, Wednesday, the enemy opened fire with twenty-four cannon at daybreak, and the bombardment continued without ceasing for five hours or more, wrecking the curtain wall and driving right through the rampart and the new earthen countermure he had raised on it. He was on his feet all morning, moving between the Mary and Web’s Tower watching the
effects of the cannonfire, and had just had a bench put down so that he could rest on it while he gave some directions to Palmer, with Lewis sitting side-saddle beside him, when the first telling salvo burst on them.

It was not the first time he had been on the lee side of a direct hit on patched ramparts. Unhewn stone scythed through the air, and a blast of sky-darkening grit swept thudding against them. The bench he was sitting on collapsed, chopped through and broken by boulders. Overturned and rolling, with his hose ripped and his head battered and grazed by his morion, Lord Grey saw Lewis, sprawling, had found some protection behind a crate of currier balls. Palmer, half under the shards of the bench, was protecting his face with his arms, and after that first glance Grey did the same, letting his cuirass shield him as the fall of rubble grew lighter and he could hear, above the ring of the metal, the screams of the wounded and dying.

They suffered their first major losses there by the curtain, and by God’s grace only, he and the two men with him were unhurt. Then, immediately, they had to face the first assault in strength by the enemy. At first they came in twos and threes, moving out of the trenches to investigate. Then came the Swiss in close order, stepping into the ditch and marching up to the breach without faltering.

He had done what he could. Twenty of his best shots were in Webb’s, and on the other side, a score of Spaniards hidden inside the outworks set up a crossfire when the hand-to-hand fighting was at its worst. And it sufficed, for after an hour with no advance and heavy cost to both sides, the enemy blew the retire and the Swiss left as they had come, and withdrew behind the town’s wicker ramparts. Then the bombardment restarted.

Two salvoes brought down Webb’s Tower, and killed or maimed all the curriers—his best—who were in it. The firing continued: regular, deliberate shots aimed at the Spaniards still left in the outworks and covering the resting-up and reforming of the assault troops. It was a time for recharging weapons and dragging out balls and powder; for clearing the dead and hurriedly binding the wounded: for the bustle of men obeying and carrying orders, and for everywhere words of encouragement, of commendation, of exhortation before the next big attack should befall them.

He put two hundred fresh men into the bulwark just as the lines of steel helmets appeared again over the counter-scarf and began to move down to the moat. Many more than last time, and well slept and well armed and well led. Then, with pike and bill, it was man to man, face to face and body to body, as the afternoon wore on to dusk. All round, the human voice in all its keys from aggression to anguish to anger, supported by all the music made by metal striking on metal, or the resonance of metal on stone; or the tuneless percusssion of metal on hide, flesh and marrowbone.

The fortress held. With his supporting hackbutters dead, his fire
weapons finished, his munition boxes made inaccessible, Grey saw his men giving way inch by inch as the French, attracted by the easy fighting, began to cross the ditch unappointed and assail the widening breach. It was then that he thrust hackbuts into the hands of Austin and Harry Palmer and showed them where, concealed by the stonework, they could pick off the enemy.