The Forever Queen (69 page)

Prepared to drop the subject for now, Cnut shrugged. “Well, the decision is with God. Mayhap Richard will rally from his sickbed, or Robert will come down with a dose of the pox and be the first to die, then all will be settled.” He kissed the crown of her head. “When I travel to Rome next year”—the excitement at the prospect ticked in his voice—“I may well decide to visit Normandy, see how the tide turns for myself.”

Emma made no answer. She was pleased for him that he had received this invitation to attend the coronation of Conrad as Holy Roman Emperor, second of that name. He would be guest of the Pope, meet with the senior dignitaries of all Europe—but, oh, he was already so often gone, and Rome was so far away. For his sake, she had to match his enthusiasm, look to the event with eager delight. How good an actress she was becoming!

“I am off to see about the breaking in of that grey colt,” Cnut said, the cadence of his voice as jaunty as his step. At the door he turned. “I prefer your hair as it usually is. A single braid hanging down your back. Much prettier.”

May 1027—Winchester

My dearest wife,

How it is in my heart to have had you here with me in Rome! Rome! I can scarce believe I have been there, seen its glories, touched its past, and witnessed its holy present! How can I begin to describe the beauty, the richness, the grandness of this place that I have seen with my own eyes? Words scratched upon a parchment cannot do justice; such a task is impossible.

“Needless to say,” Emma stated with a laugh, looking up from the letter she was reading aloud to her daughter and the Earl Godwine, his wife and their children, “he then goes on to describe in great detail that very impossibility.” She read on.

The seven hills were lush and green, dotted profusely with olive trees and vines; through it all the meander of the river—alas I cannot say it sparkled blue, even in the dazzle of the sunshine, for the Tiber is more of a mud colour. It also stinks to high Heaven.

“As does the Thames,” Gytha remarked. “I wonder if it is as bad or worse come summer?”

“Oh, worse, I should think,” Godwine commented. “The heat is more in Italy.”

“Go on, Mama,” Gunnhild urged. “What does Papa recount next?” This though she had heard the letter on a dozen occasions already.

Emma scanned through a few paragraphs, selecting suitable reading material:

It was most odd to wander among the ruins that once served as functional buildings. Temples, houses, shops, marble-clad archways. The towering circle of the Colosseum, where so many Christians were martyred in blood. Rome is all glorious churches with ruined monuments scattered about. The Forum, where the Basilica and all the grand and important legal buildings stood, is nothing more than broken pillars of stone among the marsh meadow where cows now freely graze. It is called the Campo Vaccino, the Cow Field. No matter how imperial you may be, it is possible to end up covered in cow shit!

The children laughed. Godwine and Gytha smiled.

“It is true, that last,” Godwine admitted, “very true.”

“Cnut goes on to talk of his audience with Pope John, nineteenth of that name, and all the people he met at Easter, on the six and twentieth day of March at the coronation of Conrad as Holy Roman Emperor. Alfric Puttoc was there too, of course, having at last travelled to Rome to collect his pallium from the Pope. It was he, coming home ahead of my Lord husband with greater speed and urgency, who brought these letters.”

Although he did not make mention of it, Cnut was especially proud that Pope John considered England to be important enough now to welcome in his holy presence not only the senior Archbishop from Canterbury but the representative of York as well.

“Is the King coming home soon?” Harold, Godwine’s second son, asked, engrossed in brushing Cnut’s favourite hound, Liim. The dog was on his back, eyes closed in bliss, his paws limp, tail thumping as the boy patiently searched for fleas, gleefully cracking each one he found.

“He is on his journey home,” Emma answered. “He will be with us soon.”

“Is he to stop in Normandy again?” Gunnhild asked, skewing her neck round to squint up at her mother from where she sat curled at Emma’s feet. “Will he meet with Goda, your other daughter?”

Emma smoothed her child’s fair hair. She was nine now, a pretty lass, with wide blue eyes and dimpled cheeks. “No, dear, Goda is not with Count Robert.”

“Read me what he says of the husband he has found for me then, Mama.”

Emma obliged:

I have made the most wonderful arrangement for our beloved, Gunnhild. I have achieved, my dear wife, an agreement of betrothal between her and Conrad’s own son, Henri. Think, Emma! Our daughter, in maturity, will be the Holy Roman Empress!

Gunnhild was not certain whether she would enjoy being a Holy Empress. Mama’s chaplain often said she was not holy at all, especially when he caught her idling her thoughts when she ought to be reading her Bible, or when she sat daydreaming during worship. Henri sounded fun, though, and anyway, it was not to happen until they were both grown.

“I assume,” Gytha wondered aloud, “Cnut does fully intend for this marriage between your nephew Robert and Estrith to go ahead?”

Poor Estrith; when told of Cnut’s agreement, she had apparently been horrified. To have escaped the nightmare of being wed to Ulf—and if anyone had the right to agree with Estrith on the vile nature of Ulf’s character, it was his own sister, Gytha—only to be wed to an equally pompous man such as Robert of Normandy? Gytha sighed. Such was the fate of royal widows.

“Estrith is to sail to Normandy and meet Cnut there,” Emma confirmed. “How else can he neutralise any interest Robert may show in England? And Robert, despite protesting he has no wish to take a wife, must agree to the betrothal. His war with his elder brother is at a stalemate; with patronage from England, Richard stands no chance of lingering.” She shook her head. Why were men so impatient? Richard always had been prone to illness and agues; he had barely been from his bed for more than a few days at once. He would no more survive for long as Duke of Normandy than would a handful of snow near a heated brazier. All Robert had to do was wait, but, no, he wanted the power and the ducal coronet now. For that, he was willing to sacrifice his conscience, his whore, and his indulgent lust for boys.

She made no mention of the reason why Cnut was so eager to back Robert’s cause. Her sons by Æthelred were both of age, and Robert, unlike his brother or father, was a man who wanted more in his mouth than he could easily chew. It would be so easy for him to decide to fight for the boys’ right to the English crown. The only thing restraining him from such rashness was Normandy’s overlord, the King of France, who was, as with Richard, an ailing man of poor health. A tethering alliance through marriage was therefore inevitable, with poor Estrith the sacrificial goat.

Tactfully, Godwine returned to Emma’s letter. This was her own personal version. Others had been sent to the Archbishop of Canterbury to be copied and sent throughout the entirety of England. “It is interesting that the King has managed to procure more suitable arrangements for our pilgrims going to Rome. The tax levied against them at certain places on the journey was a scandal. Few except those of high means could contemplate going on pilgrimage, but now Cnut has opened the way, he is to be praised.”

“And to obtain a relaxation of the charges made to our Archbishops when in Rome to collect their pallia; that, too, was an outrage, one that for all these months had denied Puttoc the honour,” Emma added, delighted at Cnut’s triumphant political achievements.

She had resented his going when first Cnut had spoke of it, but to be the first King of England welcomed into Rome—how could she deny him that pleasure and respect?

Emma’s delight at receiving his letter was evident to all who knew her. The sparkle returned to her eyes, a lightness had come into her step; once or twice servants had even heard her singing. The only part of it which troubled her was his brief outline of future plans. To go, more or less immediately, and make an end of the war with Olaf of Norway. She would not have been pleased, either, to have learnt that he had written separately, if not in as much detail, of his intention to Ælfgifu.

He had signed his letter with such pride and determination. God was on his side, and no one was going to stop his intended retribution against Norway.

May He in His loving kindness preserve us in our sovereignty and honour, and scatter and bring to naught the power and strength of all our enemies.

And his signature for Emma, had been:

Cnut, your beloved and devoted husband.

For his official letter, in case any were in doubt of the blessed authority he now possessed in the name of the Holy Roman Emperor and of God, through His representative on earth, the servant of the holiest of saints. To England, and to Ælfgifu, he had signed

Cnut, dear to the Emperor. Close to Saint Peter.

Emma’s grievance was that he had made no mention of Harthacnut. The boy was at Roskilde with Estrith. Was he to stay there when Estrith left? Would Cnut be bringing him home to England? She wanted to see her little boy, to determine with her own eyes that he was well.

Another resentment against that Northampton slut. She had her sons constantly with her.

June 1027—Fécamp

The marriage of Count Robert d’Hiémois to Estrith Sweins’s daughter was a matter of distaste for himself, his betrothed, and her brother, the King of Denmark and England. Rarely were noble marriages expected to be of agreeable favour to the couple concerned; as rarely, were they as instantly hostile as this one.

“It was a moving ceremony,” Cnut observed untruthfully as the celebration feasting entered its third hour of entertainment. For the prestige of his reputation there was nothing Robert had left out. The food had been the most sumptuous ever prepared and served in Normandy, the jugglers and acrobats the best money could buy, the dancing bears expensive, the harpers unprecedented, and the decoration of the hall, a displayed mass of gold and silk, weaponry and jewels, breathtaking. A pity the sullen faces of bride and groom spoilt the proceedings.

Robert made no answer to Cnut’s comment, but clicked his fingers for more wine to be served. If the day had to be endured, it could at least be helped along by a good grape.

Cnut had swallowed the insult of being virtually ignored for the three days since his arrival here at Fécamp. Had it not been for the necessity of this alliance, he would have returned to his ship and left this Norman to his fate. As it was, he swallowed his pride and attempted, yet again, to be civil to his new brother-in-law.

“It will be good for our lands to be further united in property,” Cnut tried again, his gaze still roving the stone-built castle’s great hall for sign of the two young men he sought. He was not surprised he could not find Emma’s sons; Edward and Alfred would be prize fools to be here. He would dearly like to see the scrawny brats, to decide for himself whether they would ever be a match for his own sons, but given the open nature of his preference to see the both of them dead, it was no wonder they had declined any invitation to attend.

“For treaties to hold,” Robert said with narrowed, hostile eyes, “the men who made them must be willing to uphold the agreements. To do that, the parties involved must have wanted the thing in the first place.”

“I would remind you,” Cnut said slowly and with barely disguised menace, “my sister is not a woman to be treated poorly. She will not allow dishonour or disrespect. Neither will I.” How to convince this proud peacock that he would need to bend his knee to the command of his superiors if he wanted to successfully replace his brother as Duke?

Robert did not give two pickled eggs for what Estrith or Cnut wanted. All he wanted was the legal right to wear the ducal crown, and for that Richard had to be removed and himself set as Lord of Normandy. Above that wanting, he had a list as long as his arm for what he did not want. He did not want Estrith as wife; he did not want Cnut’s patronage, nor the Pope, nor the Holy Roman Emperor’s interference. All he needed was for Richard to die; the rest would be simple, but, damn the bastard, he refused to step into his grave. Ah, that was the rub—when had Richard ever been truly ill? Always he had developed a malady when something was required of him that he would rather not do. Robert had never known a man who could vomit on command with the absolute proficiency of his brother.

Robert was of the firm opinion that, given adequate arms and men, he could convince Richard that exile would be preferable to death, but to raise an army he required finance, and that he did not have.

Reading Robert’s thoughts, Cnut spoke his own. “I will undertake to back you in whatever the future may dictate for Normandy, whether that be at God’s instigation or your own. In return, you will advance no military aid to the sons of Æthelred, should they seek it. We are brothers now, Robert, united through my sister. Consummate the marriage and treat her with respect—that is all you have to do. Beyond courtesy to her, I care not what you get up to, whether it is to make war on your brother or love to your whores, be they the tanner’s daughter or beardless boys.”

Prudently, Robert made no comment, and neither, sitting on his left-hand side, did Estrith.

She was not a young woman, nor especially handsome or intriguing. Her quality was in her kindred to Cnut, and in her impeccable sense of loyalty and honour, the mainstay reason for her toleration of this sham. Estrith had adored her father, as she now adored her brother, for either of them she was willing to sacrifice her life and, as in the case of Ulf’s various betrayals, her conscience.

This marriage was not to Estrith’s liking, but what woman was fortunate in having her wishes taken into consideration where a husband was concerned? Whether she would tolerate Robert’s dalliance with the whore Herleve she would yet have to decide. A man’s past was his own and God’s concern; of previous indiscretions Estrith would be forgiving. The same applied to any future bedding for the practicality of need, as with any woman trapped in a loveless marriage—better by far to have your husband occupied in an insignificant whore’s arms than suffer unwanted attention. A mistress, however, was another matter entirely, particularly one who had already given the man a child. Herleve had borne a girl—no threat, no consequence—but the relationship, as far as Estrith was concerned, must end.