‘Where is Baldwin?’
‘I have no idea, Your Grace,’ was the abrupt reply.
Such a response to a gently posed question was strange, not least in the manner in which it was delivered. That this was so showed on the cleric’s round face, and he was about to enquire further when the young Lord of Lecce added in an even less respectful tone that he was eager to meet up with his uncle. The last thing he wanted to do was explain Baldwin to anyone before he had spoken with Bohemund.
‘Not ahead at Antioch, then?’ Ademar pressed.
‘No.’
‘He will be happy to hear his brother is near full recovered.’
‘I’m sure he will, Your Grace,’ Tancred replied, with no conviction at all, before jerking his head in lieu of a bow and dragging his reins to take himself and his horse away, calling over his shoulder, ‘The road ahead is clear, you have nothing to fear.’
‘Do you think he contrived in the murder of our knights?’ Bohemund asked, the shock of their death and the manner of it still evident on his demeanour. ‘Of the Turks I can believe it, but for a Christian to slaughter his fellows …’
‘I do not know, but some of his own Lotharingian lances think he might have contrived in the massacre.’
‘They came to you and said so?’
‘We fought them outside Mamistra and some of my men were taken captive.’ Mistaking the reaction Tancred added, ‘We killed and captured a few ourselves.’
‘Fought!’ Bohemund barked. ‘You and Baldwin’s men fought?’
‘Perhaps it would be best if I told all.’
Which Tancred did, from the start to the very end and he left nothing out, even those parts that did not reflect well on himself, though he was keen to stress that if any bad blood had been created between Normans and Lotharingians, Baldwin and his naked greed lay at the root of it. He was sure that could not be gainsaid, given Duke Godfrey’s brother had taken careful steps to ensure he had the greater number of lances under his command. When he finished, it was to look into an older face showing much concern, which was a relief — he was expecting to be chastised.
‘These cannot be laid as accusations in council, Tancred.’
‘For the sake of amity with the Duke?’
‘Godfrey is not responsible for his brother, even although, in his soul, he will take upon himself that burden.’
‘They are certainly very different people, and I would point out that even if they are not raised in the council these are rumours and claims that cannot be sat on. I can command the men I led to silence but I have no assurance I will be obeyed. Word will reach elevated ears by another route than that which is direct, while I, were I a member of the council, would also be obliged to ask where the disloyal swine has gone.’
‘You got no indication?’
‘Not a whiff, Uncle, if he is on a route it is not any one that will take him south. My guess is that he has gone off to look for conquests of his own and I would remind you he still holds Tarsus as his fief.’
‘I will speak to Godfrey in private.’
‘And the others.’
‘If they hear by rumour of what you say happened at Tarsus, it is to be hoped they think as I do, that such matters are best not raised, lest we fall apart as a host before we even reach Antioch. I cannot bring back the men I have lost but there is too much at stake to make much of their fate, though I will have Mass said for their souls.’
‘Then I hope no one whispers such rumours in the ear of Vermandois.’ The grim response that got made words superfluous, so Tancred changed the subject. ‘Let me tell you about the fortifications we are about to face.’
‘You have no need for they are famous throughout the world. Every returning Jerusalem pilgrim speaks of them.’
‘That does not tell you the tenth of it and, according to Raymond’s man, Peter of Roaix, who has spoken to the ardent Christians the Governor of Antioch evicted, the city is strongly garrisoned to a number he thinks might go as high as five thousand fighting men.’
‘It fell before, to Byzantium, and if they can take it so can we.’
Bohemund’s conversation with Godfrey was elliptical in the extreme, more a case of the impossibility of Baldwin being involved in the massacre of his men than that he had contrived with the Turks to have it committed, yet the trace of an allegation could not be avoided.
‘I wished you to hear of this from my lips rather than from any gossip that might circulate, Duke Godfrey, for that would likely come larded with malice.’
Godfrey, his broad face sad, sighed and crossed himself. ‘My brother has ever been troublesome, but I have to think he would not stoop so low as you suggest.’
‘I have suggested nothing.’
‘You have laid out a case, Count Bohemund, and while you have not levelled any blame it is clear that some doubt exists as to how Baldwin acted. It is my experience that such a charge, even if false, levelled against a man’s name is not washed away easily and, sad to say, his blood relatives suffer by association.’
‘That is why I came to you and alone, for you do not deserve such a blemish. I have lost men I valued and I grieve for them, but I will not raise the matter in council, for to do so would embarrass you and would hardly serve our cause.’
That got a half smile. ‘I have observed how often you have restrained yourself in council, Count Bohemund. You let others speak rather than take the floor in your own right, yet I think I observe you often disagree, much as you try to keep that hidden.’
‘I must employ more effort to compose my features, and be assured, I would not let pass anything I thought endangered us or the Crusade.’
‘That I do believe. It is to your credit and I thank you for coming to see me alone. Now I am doubly indebted to you.’
‘If you mean the incident with the bear, you owe me nothing.’
‘Allow me to decide where my indebtedness lies, Count Bohemund. Now, if you will forgive me I must say prayers for my wayward brother, who needs them whatever he has or has not done.’
If the tale of the massacre at Tarsus did circulate it was kept from public discourse and, in truth, Baldwin’s absence was a relief to everyone including, Bohemund suspected, his own family, so that, if it was insincerely regretted as it had to be, it was far from troubling, for his natural bellicosity was being visited elsewhere. The future was of more import than what Baldwin was up to — before them was a Byzantine map of Antioch and the surrounding environs and plans had to be made as to how to subdue the city.
If the mass of the population of the city was Armenian and many of them adherents of their branch of the Christian faith that did not signify much; there would be those who through convenience or a genuine belief in Islam had converted, some of whom would fight for the Turks as well, either out of that same conviction or to hold on to what they had gained from being allies of the alien occupation. It was ever thus with conquest: some under a new master put personal advancement above principle, the powerless majority were swayed by their bellies, and those who stood out against the new dispensation were either killed or banished, and Yaghi Siyan, the Turkish Governor, had already expelled those who might stir up their race and religious brothers against him, careful, as an insurance, to hold the Armenian patriarch as a hostage.
Even discontented, which they might become when hunger struck, the mass of the Armenian indigenes would have no weapons with which to oppose the Turkish garrison and certainly no power to affect whether the siege would succeed or fail. None present thought it was going to be a simple affair, yet taken it must be — if Jerusalem was no more that a six-week march to the south, Antioch was the key to any chance of progress and much more beside.