Roselynde (46 page)

"Whatever Richard realizes, the Queen must know." Simon
shrugged bitterly. "Well, and what if she does? What can she do? Can she
set one son against the other?"

"Simon, what am I to tell Sir Andre and Sir John? They must
have some guide to follow. You and I will both be out of reach. What shall I
tell them?"

Her anxiety drew him from the contemplation of an unpleasant
future to the practicalities of the present. "For this time the problem is
not great. First, unless they are summoned, they should sit still on their
lands and keep both their gates and their mouths tight shut. Second, if the
Bishop of Rouen or William Marshal summons them, they are to go. If the
Chancellor summons them, they are to refuse to go, politely if possible but if
hard pressed they may resist him with force. If Lord John summons them, they
must examine the summons most carefully. If it is written in the King's name
they may go. I do not think John will yet dare summon them in his own name. If
he should, let them go first to the Bishop of Rouen and profess fealty to the
King; then let the Bishop decide what they are to do. Likely he will send them
on to Lord John. If not, let us hope Lord John's anger will light upon the
Bishop instead of upon your vassals."

"Wait, Simon," Alinor begged. "I must set this all
plain in my mind so I can write it clearly."

They had stopped in a corner that could not be overlooked by any
window unless the person craned out of it. No one had come into the Cloister.
The odor of damp earth and new growth filled the sheltered walk.

"You will remember well enough," Simon said so harshly
that Alinor wondered why he should be angry with her and looked up.

His mouth fastened on hers at once and he backed her further into
the corner so that his big body nearly concealed her. He kissed her, bit her
lips, pushed her headdress off so that he could loosen the wimple from her
throat and ears.

"Simon!" Alinor protested halfheartedly. The pleasurable
sensations his lips invariably produced blurred the danger of their situation.

He kissed her ear and the sensitive spot behind the lobe of the
ear. He sucked gently at her throat. Alinor let her head fall back to
facilitate his caress. His arm tightened around her and rings of the mail bit
into her arm and back. The discomfort half roused her.

"Simon, stop," Alinor whispered. "If we are caught,
I will be sent back with the Queen. Beloved, only wait until the Queen's party
leaves. Simon—"

Alinor managed to retain her maidenhead, but more by virtue of
Simon's armor than by either her or Simon's virtue. There was no way to unarm
without ceasing to caress, and when Simon stopped kissing her Alinor regained a
modicum of common sense. Fortunately it was in one of her rational intervals
that footfalls and voices echoed around the Cloister. Even then it was
necessary to slap Simon's face to make him release her. Alinor stroked the
cheek she had abused in mute apology. Simon stared at her, drawing deep, shaken
breaths.

"I am not a tame cat," he muttered. "Stay away from
me. I am half mad and not to be trusted."

Without another word he turned away and went in through the
nearest door, weaving in his gait like a man overfull of wine. Alinor hastily
rearranged her wimple and headdress and fled away from the advancing footsteps.
She gained the safety of her chamber where she pressed her burning face against
the cool stone walls. This was not like Simon. What was wrong with him? Half
mad? Yes, but why? Jealousy writhed in her again. Has he never really desired
me? Alinor wondered. Has some other woman aroused him and left him to work out
his passion on me?

If that was true, the woman certainly was not in their party. Over
the next three days, Alinor took Simon's advice and avoided him. Had she hoped
to avoid exposure of Simon's feeling by that expedient, she would have hoped in
vain. Whenever they were in the same place, his eyes followed her, glittering
with an unnatural intensity. Alinor was terrified that the King would notice
and take offense, but if Richard saw he turned a blind eye. Berengaria teased
Alinor gently about her knight's fervor, but when she saw the anxiety in
Alinor's face, she forebore. Once when they were alone, Joanna asked whether
Alinor had quarreled with her warden; so she too realized that Simon's behavior
was not natural. However, she accepted Alinor's flat denial without pressing
the matter further.

The uncomfortable situation was soon over. Queen Alinor left to
begin her long journey home on April 2. To replace Alinor's troop of men, who
would accompany their mistress and incidentally serve as additional guards for
Berengaria, Richard sent those in his army whose devotion to God's cause he
felt was failing. The next day the King began his preparations for departure
and Simon, of course, went with him. To Alinor's blank amazement, their vessel
with two guard ships was the very vanguard of the entire fleet. Joanna's eyes
met Alinor's once when they heard how the fleet would be arranged, but she said
nothing and Berengaria did not feel there was anything odd in the plan. Their
ship was broad-beamed and not very swift so that it might give the most
comfortable accommodation. Thus it was reasonable they should start first; the
King would soon overtake them. Alinor listened to Berengaria's recounting of
Richard's explanation with downcast eyes. It was true they were broad-beamed,
not a racing galley; on the other hand, they were very light-laden.

For two days the ships progressed smoothly, although slowly, with
soft breezes. On April 12, however, the wind began to rise and by the middle of
the day the ship in the van of the fleet was running wildly before the wind,
completely out of steering control. Joanna and Alinor who had often been at sea
knew from the voices and behavior of the sailors that there was no immediate
danger and Berengaria, although chalk-white with fear, modeled her behavior on
theirs. Indeed, the three had too much to do to yield to their own fear and
sickness. It was first necessary to pacify their women, who had become so
seasick and hysterical that a few attempted to throw themselves overboard.

Once or twice there was a sighting of land, but that was a cause
for real terror. At the speed they were running, the sweep oar would break if
it were necessary to bring the ship about hard. Oars were useless in a sea that
tossed the ship like a chip in a freshet, and to drop the sail would bring
immediate disaster by permitting the vessel to turn broadside and be swamped.
The captain kept well away from the dark shadows on the horizon.

Night drew on. The women dropped into stupors of exhaustion one by
one until, at last, Joanna and Alinor crouched with their arms around
Berengaria, huddling together for warmth and comfort. Little by little the
waves quieted and the wind dropped. The men slept at their oars and scattered
about the free spaces of the deck wherever they had fallen like abandoned
dolls. Beorn and the captain, their tentative liking of each other rapidly
ripened into trust and friendship by crisis, stood alternate watches until a
quiet dawn broke and showed them they were safe. Safe, but where? Around them
the open sea smiled quietly under an open sky, but even the far-seeing lookout
clinging to the top of the mast could discern neither land nor sign of any
other ship.

Most of the main fleet, although also tossed about, managed to
keep together and sailed steadily on until they made safe harbor in Crete on
April 17. Here Richard was able to take account of his vessels. And here, for
the first time, the King and his companions realized that the vessel carrying
the women and twenty-four other ships were missing. Richard's fair complexion
flamed and Simon turned so white that Henry of Champagne, the King's nephew,
caught his arm to support him. Messengers were sent flying in every direction
to recheck the truth of the news and to determine who had last seen the missing
ships and when. Richard stormed up and down the shoreline, cursing the
incompetence of the captains of those ships and vowing bloody retribution upon
them. By the time the messengers returned, the worst of the King's rage was
spent. He was able to listen intelligently to the scraps of information they
carried. One ship was known to have foundered, but it was a heavy-laden
transport. No one had had even a single sight of the ship that carried the
women. It was not a particularly swift ship, but being so light-laden and
already in the van it had disappeared while everyone was battling the first
fury of the storm. Finally Richard thought of another possible source of
information.

"Simon, summon the captain of our own ship. Belike he can
guess from the direction the wind blew where the ships may be."

A moment passed. The King turned his head sharply to stare at his
liegeman, taking in the blind, staring eyes and ghastly complexion.
"Simon!" he exclaimed, then walked over and shook him. "Simon,
what ails you?"

"Alinor," Simon whispered, "my Alinor was on that
ship."

Under Richard's hand Simon's body shook like a man in the throes
of a violent ague. "And my Berengaria and my beloved sister Joanna,"
Richard snarled. "Man, will you stand and weep and do nothing? You chose
the ship and the crew. Do you so distrust your own judgment or the goodness of
God? Come," he added more gently, "summon the captain. If he can
point a road to us, we will follow."

Simon's dazed eyes raked the King's face. "Yes," he
muttered, "most assuredly I will follow her." But Richard's
decisiveness had broken his paralysis of grief and fear and he went to do the
King's bidding.

The captain offered some comfort in that he did not believe the
ship would have gone down. It was a very seaworthy vessel and lightly laden, he
explained. The problem was simply that the ship had been first to begin with.
"It will be far, far ahead," he judged, "unless the master was
fool enough to try to make for shore, and only a novice or an idiot would do
that."

The King looked at Simon, who shook his head. "Thirty years
at sea," he said, "and more than fifteen years captain of his own
vessel."

When Richard asked where the ship might be, he got no more
certainty. The captain shrugged and raised his hands to indicate helplessness.
"The wind was southeast, Your Grace, so doubtless they are ahead, but
where—that I cannot even give a guess. Each master has his own theory on how
one should run before a wind. Some run straight; some believe it better to run
at an angle, and of these some like the angle into the direction the wind is
driving while others like the angle away from that direction. Besides that, if
the master sighted land, he would surely steer clear of it. How wide he would
think safety required is another thing each man decides for himself. No, Your
Grace, I cannot guess."

"But they will be ahead, you say? There is no use in going
back toward Sicily?" Richard insisted.

"That, yes, ahead to the east, certainly."

Richard flew into a frenzy of activity, ordering the fleet to make
ready to put to sea again at once. They were to sail for

Rhodes where some of their lost ships might have made port. The
wind blew strong, but even so Simon spent every moment he was not under orders
staring ahead, wishing only that he could get out and push to increase their
speed. He could neither eat nor sleep and grew so haggard that Richard noticed
and offered to relieve him of his duties.

"No, my lord," Simon exclaimed in horror. "I beg
you to lay more tasks upon me. If I am free to think, I will die of fear."

Unfortunately so long as they were aboard ship there was really
nothing besides personal service that Richard could ask. That, however, soon
took more time than Simon had expected or desired. On the night of April 18,
Simon heard Richard muttering and went to see what his lord desired. To his
horror, he found the King wild-eyed, burning with fever. The King's physician was
urgently summoned and diagnosed a violent return of the quartan fever that had
afflicted Richard for years. Simon and the King's squires spent the night
alternately bathing Richard and trying to keep him well wrapped to induce
sweating. The fever abated a little in the morning, but by the time they made
port in Rhodes the next day, Richard was so ill that it seemed to Simon quite
reasonable that none of their vessels had been seen. Nothing good could happen
now, Simon told himself, as he supervised having the King carried ashore. He
was the only man in the group big enough to control Richard's delirious
struggles so that he was present when the King began to talk. Simon drove the
squires and servants from the sickroom and watched alone beside the bed, sometimes
weeping with pity as Richard laid bare his tormented soul.

Morning brought peace; sense returned to the King's eyes, and he
asked for news as Simon lifted his head to give him a drink.

"I do not know, my lord," Simon soothed. "I have
been here with you."

Richard smiled. "I must be sore sick if you have been too
busy to ask after news of 'your Alinor.' You do not wish to tell me bad
news?"

"Truly, my lord, I have heard nothing. The ships are not in
this harbor, it is true, but I have had no leisure to enquire further."
Simon found a tired grin. "It is not that you are so very ill, only that
you are so very strong. You threw little Harry de Vere right across the room
when he wished to change the cloth on your head, and you nearly broke William's
jaw."