Four Sisters, All Queens (74 page)

The Flavor of Peaches

Paris, 1271

Fifty years old

S
HE TURNS SLOWLY
around. All around her they lie in their bejeweled coffins: Louis; Isabelle and her husband, Thibaut; Jean Tristan. Before her stands Philip, suddenly a man in royal robes, a fashionable point of hair beneath his lower lip, like a smudge. She wants to spit on her finger and rub it away.

“They died nobly,” he says in his new, man’s voice. He sounds like pain. She rounds on him, but slowly.

“Nobly? Drowning in a pool of vomit and shit? I’ve seen your father with this sickness many times. He is more helpless than an infant.” She glares at his coffin. She begged him not to take their children. “Was.”

They landed in Tunisia, far from the holy land, in the stifling July heat. Louis’s paltry force could not take the capital city alone, so they waited for Charles and the Sicilian troops he promised. And they waited. For more than a month they camped at the city of Carthage, outside the walls, enduring the sun, the flies, the thirst. Soon they were forced to drink from a brackish pond, the only water they could find. Almost immediately, they fell ill.

“He died in the service of God,” Philip says.

“Then God must be cringing in shame.”

Philip’s spine stiffens. “Mama, you blaspheme!”

“Do you think God would have wanted this?” She gestures toward the caskets. “And not only this, but hundreds, thousands of dead. Trust me, son, the Lord would not have conceived this campaign so poorly, nor executed it so disastrously.” Her gaze drops to her daughter’s casket. Isabelle, her father’s favorite, so pious that she would not choose a gown to wear without praying about it. “But your father did not consult God. He was too vain for that.”

Philip flinches. “Do not speak ill of my father.”

She laughs. “Another Capet who fears the truth? Do not live in illusion, as Louis did, or you will die as futilely.”

“You forget that we are now the King of France. You are forbidden to speak to us with such disrespect.”

She closes her eyes so that her son cannot see them roll. How did she bear such a tedious child? “Why Tunisia, Philip? I thought they had sailed for Acre.”

“Uncle Charles suggested it. He told Papa the Tunisian emir was friendly to Christianity. Papa hoped to convert him, then join forces with his troops and the Mongols for an attack on Egypt.”

Marguerite narrows her eyes. “How did Charles know the Tunisian emir’s religious views?”

“The emir owes money to Uncle Charles. A great deal of money.” He shrugs. “Uncle Charles has met with him many times in an effort to collect it.”

So—Charles manipulated Louis’s campaign to enrich himself. Where, she asks, is Charles now?

“He marched on Tunis after Papa’s death. But the emir begged for peace, so we did not attack.” He frowned. “Uncle Charles said that enough men had already died.”

“An unpopular decision, I’m sure.” Marguerite remembers the eager faces of the foot soldiers—peasants—who accompanied them on the first Outremer campaign. When they talked of their hopes and dreams, few ever mentioned Jerusalem, or God. These
men fought for the loot. They had heard tales of unlimited gold in Outremer. They braved death and disease hoping to enrich themselves. On this campaign, they never got a glimpse of Saracen gold. Charles got his share, of that she is certain, and much more. And Louis and her children are dead.

“Uncle Charles signed an agreement with the emir and sent me home to you. Aren’t you glad, Mama?”

“Of course I am glad to see you alive. But—” She looks down at the casket of Jean Tristan. A more pure and tender heart the world will never see. Jean of Sorrow, born and dead in Outremer, a desolate land watered only by tears. Her tears fall like raindrops about her feet and she follows them, sinking to the floor until she is surrounded by death.

If only she had a dagger at hand, or a vial of arsenic. What is the use of living? All her dreams, all her efforts to make a difference in this world have led only to this, to loss and sorrow and regret and death. What was the point of queenship? What was the point of anything?

Women have only the power that men allow them,
Beatrice said. How true were her words. Marguerite gave birth to eleven children—the greatest power of all, it seemed, but no, only six remain, two killed now by Louis. She saved Louis from death in Egypt only for him to die a much more ignominious death in Tunis. She restored France’s treasury, but Louis spent every livre she saved on his ill-conceived campaign.

Even her proudest moment, the signing of a peace treaty with England after two hundred years of fighting, came to naught. Their kingdoms ceased to battle each other, but neither lived in peace. The men of England attacked the throne, plunging their kingdom into a bloody civil war. The men of France burned Cathars at the stake, plundered the Jews, and raced off to Outremer at the first opportunity. Men will never be at peace, she thinks, until they can find it within themselves.

And now Louis is dead, killed by Charles; and her queenship, too, dead at Charles’s hand. Charles has taken everything from her:
her husband, her children, Beatrice, Provence. Her heart pangs. She will never see Provence again. Charles will not even allow her safe passage through his county. Her grandchildren will never know the poetry, the fruit trees, the gentle and kind people whose hearts are as warm as the Provençal sun. All that is lost to her now, because of Charles. He coerced her sister into changing her father’s will, and the pope agreed. Only the pope could overturn that ruling now.

She rummages in her purse for her handkerchief and finds the letter she received this morning, forgotten until now. She breaks the seal with her thumbnail, then unfolds it. The mayor of Marseille has written to her, inviting her to Provence. While King Charles tarries in Outremer, he says, he will send an army to Tarascon Castle to secure it for her.
Should you choose to fight for your right to Provence from there, you would find many men on your side, for we have had enough of Charles’s tyranny.

Her tears subside. In the past year, as she mourned her children’s deaths—Margaret, too, dead in childbirth this year—a new pope was ordained. Might he be more receptive to her petition? To change a will after a person’s death is unheard of, Louis’s chancellor has said. And what of the new king of Germany, appointed after Richard died last year? Might he support her cause, being in competition with Charles for the emperor’s crown? She could prove a valuable ally, holding Tarascon and with an army at her behest.

Marguerite’s pulse quickens. She sits up straight, the caskets forgotten. Not even God has the power to change a dead man’s will. Might this new pope be wary of Charles’s ambitions in Naples, Genoa, and Hungary? Might he wish to diminish Charles’s power by divesting him of Provence? He would certainly grant it to Marguerite, the eldest daughter of Count Ramon Berenger and the county’s original heiress.

She stands. If she regains Provence, she can help its people. The days of wine and poetry can return, and peace to that peace-loving land. At the very least, she might live out the rest of her days in Tarascon, on the banks of the tranquil Rhône.

Nothing to live for? She has Tarascon, and she has the love of Provence, and she has her own wisdom, gained after so many trying years. She can take her county back from that usurper. She will! The flavor of peaches fills her mouth as she hurries to her chambers, her letters to the mayor of Marseille and the German king writing themselves in her head.

Queen Marguerite of France
lived in Provence, fighting against Charles of Anjou for the right to rule with the help of her nephew, King Edward I of England, and King Rudolf von Hapsburg of Germany. After Charles’s death in 1285, her son, King Philip the Bold, awarded her an income from Anjou in exchange for Provence, placing the county at last in France’s domain. She died in 1295 at the ripe old age of 74, having outlived eight of her eleven children—and having steadfastly refused to testify in favor of sainthood for Louis, which was granted in 1298. She was buried under the altar steps at the Basilica of St. Denis near Paris, where her tomb—unmarked—probably still remains today.

Queen Eléonore of England
took an active role, after her husband’s death, in bringing up her grandchildren. She resided at Windsor for a time, then in various castles given by King Henry as part of her marriage dower. In 1286 she joined the Amesbury convent in Wiltshire, to which the fabled Queen Guinevere had supposedly retired after the death of King Arthur. She died at Amesbury and was buried there in 1291; her heart was buried in London. Her son King Edward I of England established a memorial for her in the Chapel of the Kings at Wesminster. Her son Edmund Crouchback became the first Earl of Lancaster and, in contrast to his mother’s love for white roses, adopted the red rose as his emblem.

M
Y SINCERE THANKS
go to my editor, Kathy Sagan, for her encouragement, support, and terrific ideas; to copyeditor Mandy Keifetz, for her excellent work; to the rest of the editorial team at Gallery Books; to Shereef El-Talawy, my Egyptian tour guide who made special arrangements for me to see the house in Mansoura where King Louis IX was imprisoned and who drove me to Damietta to see where the crusaders landed; to Bob Spittal, for saying, when I fretted over all the things this book could be, “Why don’t you just focus on the emotional lives of your characters?”; to my daughter, Mariah Jones Brooks, for listening to me read aloud and for taking such excellent author photographs; to Rich Myers and Todd Mowbray for reading early drafts and providing me with helpful comments; to Shanti Perez for allowing me to debut a chapter at the Flying Pig Reading Series; to the folks at Red Room, the online writers’ community; to Lois, Linda, and the other wonderful people at Auntie’s Books for their support of local authors; to Gillian Bagwell, Christopher Gortner, Mitch Kaplan, Donna Russo Morin, and Susan Higginbotham for their kind endorsements of this book; and to Pia Hallenberg Christensen, Sam Mace, Renée Roehl, Suzanne and Paul Markham, Nettie and Dan Simonsen, Amy Watson Logan, Karlee Etter, Pavarti K. Tyler, Michael Smith, Siarah Myron, Mike Petersen, Andrea Hubbard, Charity Doyl, and my many other friends and fans around the world who believe in me and my work, and help me to keep the faith.

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