"I wot myself best how I stand
For what I dree, or what I think
I will mysehen all it drink...."
He had written that in his poem on the unreliability of Fame, verses he had started at Kenilworth and never quite finished. He had abandoned it before the end since the royal "love tidings" he had meant to celebrate had not materialised. The little Princess Marie of France had died before she could be betrothed to Richard.
There were love tidings a-plenty now to celebrate. He glanced again at the new-wed couple. Henry, chunky and serious in his white velvet suit, was politely trying to entertain his pop-eyed bride by carving a horse out of bread. And Geoffrey looked at the King, whose betrothal to Anne of Bohemia, sister of the Holy Roman Emperor, would soon be public.
Richard at barely fourteen still resembled a golden meadow full of pink and white daisies. His German bride-to-be, a year older, was reputed to be lumpish and brown as a nut. It was hard to fit either the flowery conceits of courtly love, or the forthright pleasures of mature mating to these dynastic marriages of children.
Geoffrey's eyes veered to the Lady Elizabeth, the Duke's younger daughter. Her marriage yielded even less inspiration. At Kenilworth last summer when Elizabeth was sixteen she had become the Countess of Pembroke by means of an eight-year-old husband, John Hastings, who had promptly suffered an attack of measles and returned to his mama for nursing.
There was grave doubt that Elizabeth would wait until the years should bring virility to her little husband. At this moment her cheeks were flushed, her dark eyes bright with wine, or lechery, as she lolled against John Holland and teased him with pouting lips. The King's half-brother was no Joseph, and his repute for wenching was great. It was a wonder that the Duke did not curb his wild young hoyden, but the dallying pair were hidden from his sight behind a festoon of hanging bay-leaves, and none so easily hoodwinked as a fond father - except a husband.
There remained the Lady Philippa. Decorous as always, she sat smiling quietly at some quip made by her Uncle Edmund. Her pale hair was braided in the old manner at either side of her cheeks. She had much of her mother's gentle dignity, but never Blanche's beauty.
Of Philippa there had been many, abortive, love tidings. Scarcely a prince in Europe but had been mentioned for her husband, but none found to be suitable. So Philippa at twenty-one was as yet unwed, and happy that she was still virgin, Katherine had said.
Geoffrey's eyelids drooped as he thought with sudden impatience that though poetical eulogies of royal matings often produced pleasing rewards, he no longer felt the requisite chivalric fervour to do them justice. St. Valentine concerned himself with common folk as well as courtly ones, and the saint's influence on all folk was humorous enough to the onlooker. Yet it was no saint, nor Venus or Cupid, who moderated the affairs of love. No one but Dame Nature. And a gathering of amorous birds would serve to show various kinds of love as well as any gallant knights and languishing ladies. The turtle-dove, the falcon, the goose, the cuckoo and the eagle - he thought, much entertained with his idea - fowls of every kind, a parliament of fowls.
He started as a wand of jingling bells thumped him on the shoulder.
The Lord of Misrule stood on the inside of the board grinning down at him beneath a red-spotted half mask.
"Ho, Dan Chaucer!" shouted Robin. " 'Tis crime to doze when all make merry! In punishment we decree that you give us a rhyme. Come tell of love, my master! Tell us of love!"
Geoffrey laughed and rose. His loosened girdle fell off with a clatter of sword, another button popped off his surcote. "I am undone, Your Majesty," he twinkled to Robin. "Your pardon."
"Ay - granted - -ay," cried the young squire, shaking his fool's sceptre threateningly. "But sing to us of love!"
The young people on the dais ceased chattering as the King stood up, hushed the minstrels and watched expectantly. Richard had an eager appreciation of poetry as of all the arts, and though he preferred French, had read one or two of Master Geoffrey's English translations with pleasure.
Katherine rose too, and seeing that it was Geoffrey that Robin teased, walked a few steps down the Hall and smiled at him encouragingly.
Geoffrey bowed, lifted his arm in solemn invocation, and declaimed,
"Since I from Love escaped am so fat
I think no more to be in prison lean
Since I am free, I count him not a bean..."
He sat down.
There was a startled roar of indignation. "For shame, for shame," called Richard on a trill of his high childish laughter. "My Lord of Misrule, you cannot pass so ungentle an offence! What penance will you give him?"
Robin waved his sceptre as he considered. "By Saint Venus, I command that he shall kiss his wife!"
Philippa bridled at the shouts that greeted this, but Geoffrey promptly rose again and, seizing her by the chin, kissed her heartily on the lips. " 'Tis naught so great a penance," he cried, and her indignant splutterings died away.
Then Robin's usually level head forsook him. This brief time of power had made him drunker than the wassail. By all the rules of Christmas, no man could gainsay him, and he shouted exultantly, "Now shall each man kiss the lady of his heart!"
He whirled, and before she had the faintest conception of what he would do, Robin had covered the few steps between them and, grabbing Katherine around the waist, pressed his eager young mouth passionately to hers.
Few people saw it, because Robin's command was being obeyed, in a whirl of fumblings and giggles and coquettish screams.
Katherine was so astounded that for a moment she could not move. She had continued to treat Robin as a boy and had come scarcely to notice the adoring looks he gave her, but this was no boyish peck. It was a man's kiss, hot with desire, and when she finally jerked her head away, he whispered, "Three years I've waited for this, my heart's life. I shall die if you be not kind to me!" and he kissed her again.
"Jesus, my poor Robin - you're mad," she whispered, pushing at his chest that was covered with gilt bells. Robin held her tighter and muttered a torrent of love words against her cheek. She gave him a great terrified shove - as a voice spoke beside them.
"Here's a pretty little piece of Christmas mumming! 'Twould seem you play your parts well." The voice of stone, the eyes of murderous blue flint.
Robin's arms slackened.
She released herself and cried wildly, "To be sure, my lord - why not? The King of Misrule must be obeyed, it seems he feels most sportive, and has just told me he would kiss all the ladies."
"No!" cried Robin, past all caution, and still gazing at her through the mask. "I want only - -"
"The Lady Isabella," cried Katherine, seizing the arm of Edmund's fight-minded wife, and thrusting her at Robin. "Here's a king dies of love for you, my lady!"
Isabella giggled and preened herself, her voluptuous Castilian eyes gleamed at Robin. She hiccuped gently and clutched at the young squire's arm.
"My lord," said Katherine to John, moving quickly, "shall we not join the dancing?" Here at Leicester a special chamber had been built for dancing. The King and the bride already were gyrating hand in hand in the popular Pavo.
"Nay, my lady," said the Duke, "I do not feel like dancing."
"You're tired} my dearest lord, come to our solar, well rest awhile."
"I feel no need of rest." He did not look at her, the corners of his nostrils were dented white. He swung on his heels and strode under the minstrels' gallery towards the guard-room, where his men-at-arms were feasting.