The Courts of Love - Jean Plaidy [73]
I hesitated and betrayed myself. I wanted to be with him. I knew what he was suggesting and I felt reckless. The longing for Raymond would not diminish until there was another to take his place. Was it possible that that one could be this brash boy? He was the only one who had aroused these wild emotions in me since Raymond.
I said I would see him again . . . alone . . . that very day.
There was no finesse about Henry. I was glad. I was realizing how foolish I had been to try to replace Raymond with a pale shadow of himself. Henry was quite different. Henry was himself, and there was no one like him. He was without grace, frank, not exactly crude because he was, I discovered to my delight, highly educated; but he dismissed with contempt the graceful maneuverings of the courtly lover. I could match his rampant sexuality with my own, and for the first time since I had lost Raymond I was fulfilling my needs.
We delighted in each other. Two sensual people, each of whom had found the perfect partner.
When he said he had never enjoyed an adventure more, he meant it. When he said I was more beautiful than any woman he had ever known, he meant that, too. He was not one for pretty speeches. It was very refreshing.
For a few days I lived in a dream of contentment—not thinking beyond the next encounter. I could not have enough of him, nor he of me. He had no qualms about seducing the wife of the King of France. Perhaps he knew it was not the first time I had been unfaithful to Louis. Such as Henry would have no respect for Louis.
I was delighted to find that he was not merely the virile lover for whom I had been searching. He had a great respect for learning, and both his parents had wanted the best tutors for him. Master Peter of Saintes had been his first tutor, and when his uncle, Earl Robert of Gloucester, had brought him to England to join his mother, he had made sure that he had been given the best instruction. Soldier-adventurer that he was, Henry had taken to learning. I had known from the start that he was unique.
After our first wild rapturous encounter I felt alive as I had not since I lost Raymond. I was happy. I felt as though I was going to live again.
Every moment we could, we spent together. It was not easy for people in our position to escape alone. We had good friends, both of us, and recklessly we took advantage of that. Sometimes I used to marvel at what had happened. I was passionately in love with a man eleven years younger than I, who was not at all handsome, who was bowlegged, whose hands were red and weatherbeaten, who hardly ever uttered a compliment, who did not sing songs in praise of my beauty—in fact, he was entirely different from any man who had interested me before. It was amazing, but all the more exciting for that. I could think of nothing but Henry, and I was dreading the day when he would leave.
He talked about his childhood, of his overbearing mother, of her tempestuous life with his father.
“She is a very handsome woman,” he said, “determined to have her own way. She never forgets that she is the daughter of the King of England and the widow of the Emperor of Germany. I think she greatly regretted having to give up the title of Empress and then having to fight for her rights and failing to win them. All her hopes are on me now. I have to go on and win the crown of England.”
“And there is Stephen’s son, Eustace,” I said.
“Yes . . . and the King of France would send aid to him.”
“Louis has no stomach for fighting. It is only because of Vitry. He cannot forget that. He wants to help Stephen’s brother, the Count of Champagne . . . and that means Stephen’s son.”
“He will not succeed. I tell you this: I am going to be King of England one day.”
“I know you are. England and Aquitaine . . . they could be ours if we married.”
He was slightly taken aback and was silent for a few moments contemplating this glittering project.
I was the richest heiress in France. He was the Duke of Normandy, and his sights were set on the crown of England. Matilda had failed