SEPHEN’S REIGN BEGAN MOST auspiciously. early in the new year, still glowing from the success of his recent coronation, he received, via his brother Henry, a message from the Holy See: Pope Innocent cautiously endorsed the fact that Stephen, chosen king by the will of the people, was already crowned and consecrated.
“My informants at the church council debating the Countess of Anjou’s claims,” the Bishop of Winchester told Stephen, “reported that there was strong opposition among many of the cardinals and a small group of Norman prelates. They called you usurper and Hugh Bigod perjurer.”
Stephen, sitting in the great hall at Westminster, was uncomfortably aware of Matilda, big with child, seated next to him, listening with half an ear. He had never discussed with his wife any of the details of the King’s death, his agreement with Hugh Bigod, or even how he and his brother had long plotted for the throne.
“The fact that Bigod is now Earl of Norfolk was looked upon with grave suspicion,” Henry continued. “The Bishop of Angers, in particular, accused both you and—” At the frown on Stephen’s face and his imperceptible nod in Matilda’s direction, the Bishop paused, then ran a tongue over his lips. “Ah—not that it’s of any importance what false rumors and slanderous innuendo are being spread abroad. What else can one expect from the Angevin contingent? But if the Pope has backed us, the Countess of Anjou’s cause is well and truly lost, no matter what venomous accusations are made.”
Whatever the circumstances, the Pope had accepted him. This put the seal on his triumph, Stephen thought, as he made ready to attend his uncle’s funeral at the Abbey of Reading. Maud, he heard, would not be there. Rumor had it that she had threatened never again to set foot in England except to reclaim her throne. Stephen was relieved; he could not have faced her so soon. Instead, Robert of Gloucester had accompanied his father’s body across the channel. Stephen hoped for the eventual support of his old friends Robert and Brian. As one of the most powerful magnates in the realm, Robert’s endorsement was of particular importance. He knew, however, that such recognition might not be immediately forthcoming and was prepared to wait.
At the moment, Stephen was well pleased with what he had accomplished. Of course, there was always the gnawing guilt over what he had done to Maud, and the fact that he still loved her, but these were more than balanced, he persuaded himself, by the glory of being king.
After his uncle’s funeral—where Robert and Brian refused to speak to him and left immediately after it was over—Stephen, accompanied by his brother, rode on to Oxford where a church council had been convened. As many prelates still withheld their approval, the Bishop of Winchester had advised Stephen what subjects he must cover and the promises he should make in order to win them over.
In the great hall of Oxford Castle Stephen addressed the group of black-robed prelates:
“My lord bishops, I give you my solemn promise not to retain vacant Sees in my possession and to allow canonical free election. In addition, I agree to relax the harsher forest laws, and abolish Danegeld.”
Danegeld, the tax originally imposed on the Saxons to provide resources to fight Danish invasions and continued as a land tax when Duke William conquered England, was unpopular with the church but a good source of revenue for the crown. Keeping his own counsel, Stephen was deliberately vague as to when he would repeal the tax.
The peers of the church, however, seemed pleased with what he had to say, although, Stephen noticed, they spent more time fawning over the Bishop of Winchester, as if he were the true king, rather than himself. Henry was becoming a little … overbearing perhaps? Stephen was extremely grateful to his brother for his help in gaining the crown, but he was also beginning to feel very much like a prize bull, greatly admired while it is being led around by a ring through the nose.
When Stephen returned to London and told Matilda of his promises to the church she was jubilant. “I’m so pleased with the changes you will make,” she bubbled. “I always hated those savage hunting laws. And the tax was far too severe for all but the very rich.”
Stephen gave her an indulgent smile. “Let us hope that I’ll be able to keep my promises.”
“Surely you would not promise what you cannot mean to fulfill?” Her voice was aghast.
Stephen sighed. Matilda, bless her, was apt to see all of life in strict terms of black or white.
“How can I explain?” he began carefully. “One always means what one says at the time. But circumstances change. What is politic today might be anathema tomorrow. This is the way of the world.”
Her face immediately cleared. “That sounds like your brother talking, not you. You are a man of honor.”
“Let us hope so,” Stephen replied, not meeting her eyes.
The months went by and Stephen, continuing to ride the crest of the popular wave, felt he could not put a foot wrong. Until one day in late spring when Earl Ranulf of Chester, who, to everyone’s surprise, had supported Stephen rather than Maud, sent urgent word to Westminster that King David of Scotland and a troop of Highlanders had marched across the Scottish border and captured Newcastle. Dumbfounded at the news, Stephen dashed up the winding staircase to Matilda’s solar.
His wife, the new baby, Eustace, in her lap, looked at him in disbelief when he told her what her uncle had done.
“What can have possessed King David?” Stephen asked.
“Perhaps, unlike others, he takes as a serious obligation his oath to support Maud,” she responded, then bit her lip in consternation, obviously fearful she had offended him. “Forgive me,” she added quickly. “I meant no reflection on anyone.”
Despite his carefully worded explanations to her, Stephen was aware that Matilda had been shocked and dismayed at his usurpation of the throne. Not that she would ever reproach him, of course; she was far too loyal for that. But her unvoiced disapproval made Stephen uncomfortable. Living with a saint, no matter how devoted, had its disadvantages.
“If the people had wanted Maud to rule I wouldn’t have been chosen,” he retorted now, nettled by her response. “In any case, David of Scotland will rue the day he crossed my borders. I intend to raise the largest army he has ever set eyes on.”
Shortly thereafter Stephen marched north to Scotland with a huge force of men, the first true army that had been seen in England in thirty-five years. By the time he reached Durham, however, King David, realizing he could not withstand the English numbers, had already sued for peace.
Accompanied by the Earl of Leicester, Stephen met with the Scottish king in the cathedral at Durham.
“I would not have believed this of you, Kinsman,” Stephen said. “Do you forget the Queen of England is your blood niece? You must swear homage to me and promise never in future to take up arms against England.”
David regarded him with guileless blue eyes and a grim smile. “Aye, and the rightful queen is my other blood niece. By St. Andrew, my conscience will na permit me to swear homage to ye, Stephen, for I ha’ worn a prior oath of fealty to Maud.”
Stephen felt himself flush and could not meet David’s unflinching gaze. In the presence of this highly principled monarch, whose integrity was beyond question, he found his confidence ebbing.
“You’ve been guilty, Sire, of an unlawful aggressive act against England,” Robin of Leicester pointed out. “We must exact reprisals and take hostages to ensure your future loyalty.”
“Ye think to frighten me?” David retorted. “Stephen of Blois has na right to the throne and well he knows it. My conscience is na up fer sale like some I could mention.”
“No need to be hasty, Leicester,” Stephen said, as Robin’s hand fell to his sword hilt. “There’s no cause for talk of hostages and the like. Let us come to terms, Kinsman. I understand your reluctance to forswear your oath and will not press you. What do you require from me in order for us to keep the peace?”
Next to him he heard Robin’s sudden indrawn breath. “I strongly protest. Hostages must be taken. King David cannot be allowed to think England condones his actions.”
In the end Stephen ignored Robin’s warning, and the outcome was that David of Scotland reluctantly agreed to keep the peace in return for certain rights in the earldom of Northumbria. In addition, Stephen agreed to give the King a large part of Cumberland and Westmoreland. He could not explain, even to himself, why the Scottish king’s goodwill was so important to him.
When he returned to London his brother Henry was waiting for him at Westminster. By the look of exasperation on his face, Stephen realized that the news of what had occurred in Durham had preceded him. Did Henry have spies everywhere, he wondered, even at his brother’s court?
“How could you do it?” the Bishop asked in disbelief, following Stephen into Matilda’s solar. “How could you show yourself to be so weak a king?”
“Weak? Weak?” Stephen repeated defensively. “Is avoiding a war with Scotland weakness or sense? Why shed blood needlessly?”
“But you had David at your mercy! I cannot understand your reasoning here. A show of strength is what avoids war, not pandering to that old fool’s conscience. I never heard the like. The Scottish king should have been forced at sword’s point to swear homage; hostages should have been taken, as well as severe reprisals. Instead you have pacified him at your peril.”
“At my peril?” Stephen laughed. “Now that I have given him what he wants, what have I to fear?”
Henry threw up his hands in despair. “By the Mass, there are none so blind as those who will not see! You have pacified David at the expense of Ranulf, Earl of Chester. Carlisle is Chester’s patrimony and you have given it away to David as part of the agreement concerning Westmoreland.”
“What does it matter? Chester is one of my supporters; he will understand.”
“Will he? You have made a potential enemy of a powerful earl and shown yourself to be a weak sovereign. Our late uncle would never have behaved thus. In future make no decisions without consulting me first.” Bishop Henry flounced out of the room before Stephen could respond.
For a moment Stephen was filled with a murderous rage. How dare Henry treat him as if he were an idiot? While it was true enough that his dealings with the Scottish king had been impulsive, and equally true that he had forgotten that Carlisle was part of Chester’s holdings, still, it was inexcusable for Henry to treat him so shabbily. He wanted to follow his brother and smash that supercilious face, then saw Matilda staring at him in consternation, and tried to compose himself.
“One day Henry will go too far,” he said to her. “We all make mistakes from time to time, if indeed this was a mistake.”
“Calm yourself,” Matilda said, laying aside her needlework. “Remember, you are the king, not Henry. It’s for you to say what is right and what is wrong in lay matters. The Bishop forgets his place. You must remind him who rules.”
Soothed by her words, Stephen sat down beside his wife and accepted a goblet of wine from a hovering servitor. “He seems to think he governs the realm, not I,” Stephen reflected aloud. It occurred to him that when his brother became Archbishop of Canterbury he would grow even more powerful and influential. It was certainly something to think about.
ACROSS THE CHANNEL IN NORMANDY, Maud was having her own difficulties. In the town of Argent on the Norman border, Maud listened to Geoffrey’s groans in an upper chamber of a drafty, foursquare fortress. The chill room, containing only a narrow bed, rickety table, and three-legged stool, was bleak and cheerless in the dim light of an autumn morning. No hangings covered the damp walls, while a brazier of green logs produced more smoke than heat. Glancing out of a narrow slit in the crumbling gray stone, Maud glimpsed a curve of silvery sky under which a squat church nestled among the thatched roofs of a village surrounded by muddy fields.
Geoffrey groaned again. Maud turned from the window slit and walked over to the bed.
“My throat is parched,” he croaked.
Silently, Maud poured wine from an earthen pitcher into a wooden cup. Geoffrey hauled himself up on one arm, took the cup, drank thirstily, then made a face. “I would not give my sow this piss.”
“That’s all there is,” Maud replied evenly.
“I must return to Anjou,” Geoffrey groaned. “If I’m to die it must be in Anjou.”
“You’re not dying,” Maud said in a weary voice. “You have only a minor wound in the foot.”
“It might gather poison at any moment.” Geoffrey gave another piteous groan and turned his face to the wall. “Men often die from such wounds.”
Stony-faced, Maud watched him. She was not moved to pity for his plight since it had been Geoffrey’s behavior that had very nearly brought them to ruin. It had started several months ago when Stephen sent over to Normandy an accomplished lieutenant, the Earl of Mellent, to take command of the duchy. Geoffrey, who had been successful in a few minor skirmishes in Normandy, had boasted that he would do away with Stephen’s minion in short order. But he had found the Earl more than a match for him.
The Normans, whom Maud had expected to remain loyal to her, might indeed have done so had Geoffrey not run riot with his Angevin troops. Burning, pillaging, raping, looting, and desecrating churches, the Angevins had turned the Normans against them. Such was the hatred of the Normans that they had chosen to burn the city of Lisieux rather than allow the Angevins to enter it.
Hearing that Geoffrey had been severely wounded while besieging the fortress of Le Sap outside Lisieux, Maud, barely recovered from the birth of her third son, William, had herself raised an army from Anjou and Maine and ridden at their head to her husband’s aid. If they were to be successful in regaining the duchy, Maud knew the Angevins and the Normans must make common cause against Stephen’s forces. When she arrived two days ago, half fainting from fatigue, her body aching from hours in the saddle, Geoffrey’s camp had been in an uproar. To her horror she found that he had ordered an immediate retreat; nothing she said had been able to convince him that he was not dying.
“But I’ve raised a goodly number of men,” she told him in vain. “You must not desert the duchy now. We can defeat this earl if you will only stand firm.”
“I wish to die in Angers,” Geoffrey had moaned. “Send the troops back to Anjou and Maine.”
Now Maud did not know where to turn. Perhaps she should just give up. Nothing had gone well for her since Stephen’s betrayal, she thought in despair, tears of self-pity and frustration welling up in her eyes. It seemed as if God’s hand were raised against her cause while championing her cousin’s. There was a soft knock on the door of the chamber, and Geoffrey’s squire entered.
“A courier has arrived from my Lord of Gloucester,” he announced. “I left him in the hall with a cup of wine.”
“Oh! I will come at once.”
“You’re not leaving me alone?” Geoffrey whined, raising his head.
“No, my lord,” Maud replied. “I am sure Roland will be glad to sit with you until I return.”
The squire nodded. “Of course, Madam.”
Maud hurried down the twisting staircase, relieved to be out of Geoffrey’s presence.
The courier was standing in the hall before a glowing brazier drinking his cup of wine; a brown cloak covered his head and body.
“You’ve brought me word from my brother?” Maud asked.
The man tilted his head, and the hood of the cloak fell back revealing his features. He put a finger to his lips as Maud stifled a gasp: the man was Robert himself. Fortunately, the hall was empty at this morning hour.
“Robert,” Maud whispered. “Why aren’t you in England? Is it known you’re here?”
“Stephen knows me to be in Normandy, but he believes I’m at Caen. There were rumors that Geoffrey was wounded and lay at death’s door. I came to see for myself.”
Maud made a face. “He received a wound in his foot. It isn’t serious but he’s behaving as if he will die at any moment, insisting he be taken back to Angers at once. Nothing will move him. Brother, I am beside myself. Must I lose Normandy too?”
Robert put his hand on Maud’s arm. “The duchy cannot be won in a day. Patience.”
Maud bit her lip. Patience, as Robert knew, was not her strong point. “How do matters fare in England? Does—does the usurper suspect you?” She could not bring herself to utter her cousin’s name aloud.
“I doubt it. As far as Stephen is concerned, both Brian and I are now his supporters. As we arranged, Brian attended his Easter court. I pretended to be reluctant but finally allowed myself to be won over. Stephen also believes the King of Scotland is now on good terms with him, and no doubt envisions only calm seas ahead. Which is what we want him to believe.”
Maud nodded. Thus far the first part of the plan formed by herself, Geoffrey, Robert, and Brian—to convince Stephen that Maud’s main supporters had gone over to his side—was working well. The second part of the plan—Geoffrey’s invasion of Normandy—had suffered a setback.
As if reading her thoughts, Robert gave her a sympathetic glance. “Wait for Geoffrey to recover. He will try for Normandy again and next time be more successful.”
“You heard how his troops behaved? Like savages. Against the Normans, their own allies! Sweet Marie, I’m so ashamed.”
“Let me talk to him,” Robert said gently. “He has more to learn than I had previously thought, but then this is his first large-scale battle. Do not judge your husband too harshly.”
“How can I not judge him? We desperately need Geoffrey to win Normandy so we can be free to take England.”
Robert gave her a troubled look. “You’re still determined to invade England? Knowing that there will be a full-scale civil war if you do?”
“If there is war, whose fault will that be? It is my throne that has been stolen. Do you suggest I sit quietly by and let my inheritance, and Henry’s, be usurped by the House of Blois?” Maud’s body trembled with suppressed rage. “We have all agreed to invade. You can’t back out now.”
“Peace, peace. No one has suggested otherwise.” He took her hands in his. “Brian says the time is not yet ripe for an invasion but if Stephen continues on his present course it shouldn’t be too far away. I won’t ever desert you, surely you know that by now.”
Impulsively, Maud kissed Robert’s cheek. “Forgive me for doubting you. What would I do without your support? You’re my mainstay, my right arm.”
“I have some news for you,” Robert continued. “Your stepmother, Queen Adelicia, is to be married again to William de Albini, Lord of Arundel. He’s a staunch supporter of Stephen, but Alix still harbors tender feelings for you, I’m sure.”
Maud looked surprised. “I would have expected her to enter a convent after my father died, but I wish her well in this new marriage.” She paused. “Do you think we may count on Alix’s support when we make our bid for England?”
“I think it highly possible she will help you personally,” Robert said. “Now, I have very little time left, so take me to Geoffrey.”
As they mounted the winding staircase, Maud turned to her half-brother. “Tell me the truth—do you really believe the time will come when I will be welcome in England? The usurper is popular. Everyone loves him.”
“At the moment. As I’ve said, it won’t take the people of England long to discover the true nature of the man they have chosen to rule them,” Robert said with confidence. “Their love for the present king will die as his weaknesses become more and more apparent—which is already happening. Stephen is a warrior, not a commander.”
Maud said nothing. Does love ever die, she wondered, even when one knows the weaknesses ?