The Courts of Love - Jean Plaidy [171]
Henry sent a letter of warm welcome to Louis. He would be honored to receive him, and he would join his prayers to those of Louis for the recovery of Philip Augustus. He would make himself personally responsible for Louis’s comfort and safety while he was in England.
I imagined their meeting. Poor Louis, how did he look now? Particularly old and ill, I guessed, after the sea crossing. Steeped in religious fervor, frantic with anxiety, without the slightest fear of what would happen to himself. Louis had never, at least, been a coward. His hatred of war had had nothing to do with fears for his own safety.
Henry took a brilliant assembly to Dover to await Louis’s arrival. This would give him an advantage, for he would see Louis immediately he disembarked, racked with sorrow and probably ill after the crossing. Henry would be vital, glowing with health . . . a little patronizing to his rival. After all, he was opening his country to an old enemy; he was allowing him the benefit of praying at the Archbishop’s shrine. Henry was always one to seize an advantage.
I could picture it so well, remembering Henry as I had last seen him. Although he was showing signs of age, he could still ride through the day without fatigue and his immense vitality had not abated, whereas Louis would look like an old man. Henry would gloat over the contrast. Louis was considerably older than Henry in any case—as I was. A fact of which he had enjoyed reminding me. How I wished I could have seen that meeting!
Together they went to Canterbury. Louis would be talking of his only son and envying Henry, who had several. Henry had suffered every bit as much as Louis but this was due to the perfidy of his sons. Did they talk of their children? Did Louis mention Alais? If so, I was sure Henry would skirt around the subject adroitly. He was such an adept at amorous intrigue. I would never forget how he had kept Rosamund Clifford’s existence a secret for so long.
There was a great welcome for Louis in Canterbury. Henry had ordered that the bells of the city ring out as the French King entered it. The Kings rode side by side to the cathedral amid the crowds, silent, not because they did not welcome Louis but because this was a solemn occasion and all wanted to give the impression that they were praying silently that the life of the heir to the French throne might be saved.
In the crypt Louis knelt at the tomb of Thomas Becket. He remained there all through the day and night, begging Thomas to plead with God to spare the life of his son. When he left the crypt, I heard that he looked like a corpse himself. Stricken with sorrow, fear and old age, it seemed that it was for the King of France people should be praying as well as for his son.
Henry’s mind would be working fast. If Louis died, if Philip Augustus died, young Henry, married to Marguerite, could be King of France. Once that was what he had strived for, but did he pause to think now? His son would indeed be powerful; and he had already shown his father what he could do in his present state. Henry’s mind must have been very busy with possibilities as he joined in Louis’s prayers for his son.
Louis expressed his gratitude by promising the Convent of Canterbury free French wine every year and exemption from customs for goods exported for their use.
He was then ready to return to France, but Henry would not hear of it. The journey had exhausted Louis, as had the day-and-night vigil at the tomb. Henry would take him to Winchester and