The Fool (Bailey)/Chapter 10
CHAPTER X
FLINT AND STEEL
THE King was handling his new arrows and talking law to his new Chancellor, The King's fool chuckled as he drew the portraits of Chancellor and King. For King Henry was squat and bulky, with bristling red hair above a coarse red face, and shabby withal, but his Chancellor stood stately in a brocaded robe, darkly handsome, of a look to win hearts and minds. The King stabbed his finger with an arrow, swore and sucked it, and sucking continued to argue about what Gratian said in his "Decretum." The Chancellor set him right and the King flung back the book at his head; the Chancellor caught it, found the disputed place, and set it down in front of him, saying:
"God be with you."
"What, priest, when I am wrong?"
"Even so, my lord," and the Chancellor went out laughing.
"By my faith, I love that fellow." The King turned and slapped his fool on the shoulder. "And what is your work, brother?"
Bran held out his picture at arm's length. "Riddle me, riddle me ree, can you tell which the King may be?"
"Rogue," said the King with that short loud laugh of his, for the picture was so drawn that in it Thomas Becket was a King making mock of some bailiff or groom. "Am I so?" He tweaked Bran's ear. "Well, God made us all."
"Nanny, nenny, brother. You made Dan Becket. And, faith, he can deck it, until he shall wreck it."
"Now now?" The big brow gathered. "What has the fool against my friend?"
"Speak good words, brother. The fool is the older friend."
"And the old friend is jealous of the new?" Henry flung an arm about him. "Bran, Bran, you are a child."
"Nenny, brother. Bran fears naught nor needs aught." He touched the King's hand.
"What then? The man is a true man."
"Yea, yea. The man is true and the man is wise. But the violent man shall not live out half his days."
"Violent? God's body, he is the courtliest of us all. What, man, has he been harsh with my fool?"
"Na, na. He is blithe to Bran, he is good. But he is a hard man, Henry."
The King laughed loud. "Fear not, brother. I am hard enough."
"Said the flint to the steel. And thereof came fire."
"Oh, Bran, old Bran, you are a dreamer."
"Yea, yea. Old I am in my soul and I dream dreams. And I fear what I see in my dreams. Do you dream never, Henry?"
"I have only one life to live, brother," the King said, and started up and went off with his arrows and his book of law.
Bran went on working at another picture, a picture of a king in his crown washing the feet of beggars, and in a while the Chancellor came back with a sheaf of parchments. "The King is gone, friend?"
"And Thomas is come. God save us all."
"Now, what has Bran against poor Thomas?" He came and stood by Bran's side, and Bran looked up at him.
"You have a long nose, brother."
"I confess the nose. But it harms none but me."
"I like it not when a man has a long nose."
"You mislike me and know not why. It is not Christian, brother fool."
"Na, na, but human it is. Are you Christian, brother?"
"I trust in God."
"Then forgive your enemies."
"How now? Who is mine enemy?"
"A hit, a hit. That struck home, Thomas."
The Chancellor made merry no more. "You strike shrewdly, brother."
"Then forgive poor Bran."
"By my faith, I dare not. Nay, brother, I forgive no man who is a better man than I am."
And Bran watched him keenly. "Yes, you speak from the heart," he said. "There is greatness in you, brother. I am sorry for it."
"This is a strange fellow." Becket laid his hand on the big head. "What do you see that I see not?"
Bran thrust forward his picture of the crowned King serving beggars. "That is for me, brother?" Becket said in a moment. "Well, I need the lesson, God knows. And what is this other?" Bran drew it away, but he laid hands on the mocking picture of King and Chancellor. "Oh rogue," he laughed. "This must to the King."
"He has had it, brother, and is gone away merry."
"Aye, and where is he gone? For here is a day's work to do."
"Three things, yea, and four, Solomon, he had found that his wisdom might not know, and a fifth there is which is darker yet: the way of an eagle in the air, the way of a ship in the sea, the way of a serpent on the ground, and the way of a man with a maid. But who knows the way of Henry our King, cousin Solomon?"
The Chancellor looked at him gravely. "I would seek it out, brother."
"Yea, yea, if you were a fool," Bran said.
The King was among his people, away across the river in the fields beyond the abbey. There the guilds of Shrewsbury made holiday in honour of new rights of market, and there was archery and cock-fighting and bull-baiting and quarterstaff, play and joys less bloody, jongleurs and jugglers, and dancing and Shrewsbury cakes. In and out of the frolic went the King in his shabby short cloak, as hearty and jolly as any of them. He limped in his English, a man of many tongues, but he understood it, and he had a laugh for every jest and a knowing eye for every girl, and if any dared to know him and do him reverence there was a cuff and a coarse joke and he rolled on his way.
He was arm in arm with some merry wife in the circle about two dancing bears, shouting and rocking with laughter like her, when riding by came his Queen with Hugh Mortimer, lord of the Marches, and a splendid company. The King, who saw everything, saw her, but seemed not to see and roared to his bears. Queen Eleanor, checked to a foot's pace by the press of the crowd, would not see what she saw and rode like a statue of majesty.
"By the bones of the Conqueror this rabble needs a master," Mortimer said, but she answered nothing, and he pushed on and bade his men ride down who stood in their way. So they broke through and the crowd surged and scoffed and howled and turned to its sport again.
In a while after the King drew off, and trudging across-country came to a copse where a girl stood waiting. While he was still far off she had seen him and watched, her hand shading her eyes, but when he was come she stood as though there were no life in her, very still and pale and her eyes looked beyond him.
"Good child," said he, and he laughed and took her and kissed her.
She was at his will, she did not move in his arms. When he let her go she turned from him, her hand at her throat. He grasped it, and with it made her look at him. "Ah, my lord!" she cried.
"What now, Izan?" he said gently.
"That is my soul cries out in me."
"And is it not mine?"
"I do not know what I am, no, nor who I am now. I am here with you."
"Why, child, does that make you sad?"
"I cannot tell. You bid me come and I must come. You know and I know no more."
"Dear woman," he said and caressed her. She was small, this Izan de Bocland, and frail, her body lost in her flowing blue gown, her hands and feet like a child's, but from her delicate keen face looked forth a life eager and brave.
"What do you need of me, my lord?"
"To feel you with me, child." He drew her little arm through his, and since he could never be still, walked to and fro with her while he made her talk of what she had done all day, of all her tasks and her ways and her thoughts. A tale of the smallest things, of the simple life of a poor knight's daughter, but her talk was as though she showed him herself and gave it. And he listened while the darkness gathered about them till she fell silent and looked at him, her eyes dark as the night sky but her face was white.
"Dear life," he said, and kissed her. "Come to me again, come."
"My lord," she said like a prayer, and watched him hurrying into the dark.
To the castle at Shrewsbury the Queen had come long before him, and Roger Mortimer led her to her bower, and there in due form was grateful for the honour she had done him in visiting his poor lands and house.
She gave him her hand to kiss. "We have had good entertainment, my lord," and turned to her women and bade them bring the Prince.
"You are gracious, madame. I cannot pardon myself that you were troubled by the herds of these brute common folk."
"It is no blame of yours, Roger."
"By my honour, if I were lord in Shrewsbury it would be a sad town on the morrow." He looked at her keenly. "But the way is now to let the base rogues have their will. God's blood, it cannot last nor shall not."
"Is that a threat, my lord?"
"You are my Queen. None knows it as I know it, Lady Eleanor." He came nearer, looking down into her eyes; he was a man very sure of his magnificence, not without cause, for he was made in the grand style, large and handsome, with the fair bright colours of the old Norse race before it was made Norman in France. He took her hand. "My Queen," he said again.
And the women brought in her little Prince Henry, who came in a rage scolding and beating them. "Here is one who is made to rule, Roger," she smiled.
"Aye, there is royalty in him," the man said, and seeing there was no more to be done with her then made a graceful departure.
The King was late; the King was in a hurry, and his Court, hungry with long waiting, found him sitting down to supper before they were in their places, a distressing thing, but not new. On his own high table a third cup was set, and he looked at it and from it to the Queen.
"I have bidden Roger Mortimer," she said.
"A bold girl," he said with his loud short laugh. "But she says come and his mightiness comes not. Cry aloud, for he is a god."
"You are merry, my lord. God knows why. The man has been my host to-day. Now I am his."
"What shall be done to the man whom the Queen delights to honour? Nay, what shall not be done?"
"Aye, mock me," she said fiercely. "Be sure that I honour no man baseborn, no, nor of base likings, my lord."
"See where he comes! Do I bid the trumpets sound, Eleanor?"
And Roger came in dignity. He made the speech that was due, something about asking pardon, something about the honour done him.
"God's body, man, you should be a herald," the King cried. "Sit down to your meat or you will have us gone while you are empty."
Roger made the best of it. He risked a glance at the Queen and sat down and began to talk easily of horse and hawk and hound. The King would not have it. Eating, as his wont was, like a man who has but one minute to spare for the hunger of a day, he engaged Roger with great affairs. The right order of the realm, how it stood with the barons, how the commons fared, what was the need of the time, on all this the King urgently sought Roger's thoughts. No doubt that he was jeering at the man, he used no pains to hide it. But Roger came off well enough, making grave earnest of the business, like one conscious of ill-bred folly, but ruling it out of his thought.
"This is the sum of my mind," he said at last. "The common folk must have a master."
"Solomon Mortimer!" The King pushed back his chair. "My father chastised them with whips, but I will chastise them with scorpions, said Solomon." He turned and kicked at Bran. "Eh, fool, was it Solomon?"
Bran was huddled on his stool in a quest for marrow. "Peace, brother, peace," he mumbled. "Let me suck me my bone."
"God's body, it is well said. There is the King's part, Solomon: give the folk peace to suck their bones." He started up. "Yet there is some sooth in you. The land must have a master. Go, find him, Solomon." He flung out his hand to the Queen. "Come with us, my fool," he called over his shoulder.
"Oh Henry, my brother," Bran groaned at them, "is this your peace?"
When they came to his room of audience the King thrust a kiss on her and cried: "Good dreams, Eleanor," and fell into a chair and drew parchments to him.
She stood over him. "Let the fool be gone, Henry."
"God's my judge, I thought we were rid of him," the King laughed, and feigned to look round the room. "Aye, aye, all is well. Sleep sound, my woman. We have done with Roger Mortimer."
She stamped her foot. "You need no fool who fool it so well. Out, Bran. I have talk for your master."
"Heigho, come and go, hit me high, hit me low. Quoth I, Dan Shuttlecock." Bran lounged away. But the King tripped him up. "Lie down, brother. Nay, good wife, if you must talk, none so fit to hear as brother Bran."
Bran had made an elaborate stagger and a ludicrous fall but the Queen was in no temper to laugh. And from the ground he groaned. "Eleanor, Eleanor, hear poor Bran, queen is queen but man is man, woman may win what no queen can."
The King threw a strange look at him. The Queen cried out: "Why, then let all the world hear. I say you use me vilely, Henry—Henry the Angevin."
"My gentle girl of Poitou," the King laughed.
"It was a King that I came to wed. A King you are called, but no King indeed. A King of the greasy commons, a King of villeins and serfs. Not a baron in your land, no knight nor man nobly born but spits upon you."
"Hear the words of Solomon Mortimer."
"You, you have no friends but churls. You live among the hovels. You choose out men baseborn, no man's sons, to honour, like this son of earth that is your new Chancellor, like the fool who lies there. These are our King's men. Death of God, what a King! I am weary of it. Master Angevin. The King that is but a scullion is no King for me."
And here came in the Chancellor laden with his parchment sheaves. He stopped and bowed, and with something of a sigh was going out again.
"Nay, nay, it is naught, Thomas. Have you done, sweet wife?" the King laughed.
"Look to yourself," she cried. "Aye, there you are well set betwixt your clerk and your fool," and she stormed out.
The Chancellor sat himself down and smoothly began to talk of scutage.
"Oh Henry, brother Henry, here is no right but double wrong," Bran groaned.
The King started round. "You have your word, too? What is your word, wise man?"
"Both be wrong and neither is right, oh Henry, my brother, God give you light."
The red brow bent. "What wrong have I wrought, fool?"
Bran dragged himself along the floor to the King's feet. "Who is your child's mother, she is like none other."
"Bran, Bran," the King said, and his hand lay on the big head. "What a man gives that is he given."
"Yea, brother, yea."
"Aye, but he can give only what will be taken." And Bran bowed his head on the King's knees.