It was no use trying to arrange something with Hurepel. He would just tug his bristly head and say the King would be horrified.
But why not? It was a well tried custom.
He talked to Blois and Count Archibald of Bourbon who was a great friend of the King and was very worried about his state of health.
It was a chance, Thibaud pointed out. It could do no harm.
It was amazing how easy it was to persuade them. They were men who took amorous adventuring as part of life; the King’s abstention had always made him seem a little odd and Thibaud knew that the men who indulged in what might be called a little vice, liked others to share in it too. Nothing could be more depressing for a man who enjoyed the occasional peccadillo to be with one who never did, but continued to live in virtue and was a pattern of morality.
Even the King’s best friends would like to see him commit one little act of indiscretion; and it could always be covered up by the assertion that the girl was put there just to keep him warm.
Thibaud found the girl. She was barely sixteen, plump, smooth-skinned and experienced.
All she had to do was slip into a bed and warm up the poor man who lay there, really very sick, and she might use whatever method she considered best. She must understand that all they wished was to warm the man, for he shivered with cold and there was nothing else which could keep him warm.
Louis lay between sleeping and waking – the dreadful shivering fits taking possession of him periodically.
‘I am so cold,’ he had complained, and more rugs had been found; their weight was heavy but it could not get him warm.
He wished that he was in his castle with Blanche. He thanked God for Blanche and young Louis and the rest of his family. It was only three years since he had been crowned a king – and he feared not a great one. He hated war and he constantly prayed that he could bring peace to France, but it seemed that God had decided differently. Philip had been so confident when John had come to the throne that soon the English would be driven out of France and the reason for this perpetual strife would be over. But it had not been completed. That was the trouble. If John had lived a little longer, he could have become King of England …
But it was no use. It had not happened that way.
He was aware of whispering voices in his room and he closed his eyes, having no desire to speak to anyone. He merely wished to lie still.
They were at his bedside.
Someone was in his bed. He roused himself. He was looking at a naked girl.
He must be in a delirium. But why should he dream of a naked girl? He had never desired naked girls. He was not a man to indulge in erotic dreams.
He cried out: ‘What means this?’ The shock of seeing the young woman had shaken off the lassitude brought on by his state. Standing by his bed, watching him, were several of his men. He recognised the Count of Blois and Thibaud of Champagne.
‘My lord,’ said a voice soothingly, and he recognised that of Archibald of Bourbon. ‘We but thought to bring some warmth into your bed.’
‘Who is this woman?’
The poor girl looked crestfallen.
‘She is one who will know how to keep you warm, Sire,’ said Thibaud quietly.
A dislike of the man rose within Louis.
He raised himself. ‘Who dared bring in this woman?’
‘Sire,’ began Thibaud.
‘You, my lord,’ said Louis coldly. ‘Take her away. I have never yet defiled my marriage bed nor will I do so now. You mistake much, my lords, if you think I am of your kind. I shall remember this.’
The girl stared from Louis to the men about the bed in bewilderment.
Archibald signed to her to go. When she had left he began to explain: ‘My lord, we feared for you. Your body was so cold and we could think of no way to comfort you.’
‘Leave me,’ said Louis, ‘and if ever one of you again attempts to dishonour me, remember this: you will incur my deepest displeasure.’
They slunk out, Thibaud inwardly convulsed with laughter, but the others deeply disturbed.
The affair seemed to have some effect on Louis, for he recovered from his bout of illness and the next day left his bed.
He looked very ill however and was deeply depressed by what he found in the camp. The heat was trying; the flies and insects an added affliction; nothing seemed to go right for his army and it was hard to believe that God was on their side. They had made an attempt to scale the walls at their weakest point; they had managed to throw a bridge across the river to the castle walls but this had collapsed and several hundred men had been thrown into the river. Many of them had been drowned, many more injured. It was a tale of disaster.
As he inspected his camp he came upon Thibaud of Champagne and he felt extremely uneasy, remembering that scene in the bedroom when he had awakened to what he had thought must be delirium to rind the naked girl in his bed and the Count of Champagne watching him in a manner he could only describe as sardonic.
This was the poet who dared write verses about Blanche. He told the world in his songs how he longed to make her his mistress. It was too much even for the most lenient and peace-loving King to accept. Blanche – thank God – was a virtuous woman. She had been as faithful to him as he had been to her. She had shrugged aside the impertinence of Thibaud but what would her reaction be if he told her the fellow had tried to put a naked girl into his bed?
Dislike for the man overcame him and it showed in his manner.
Thibaud was inclined to be truculent. He had had enough of Avignon. The siege was nowhere near over. He would like to remind Louis that he also was royal, a descendant from Louis his grandfather and the renowned Eleanor of Acquitaine. Why should such as he have to take orders from a cousin? – for their relationship was something like that.
‘They continue to hold out, Sire,’ said Thibaud, who should have waited for the King to address him. ‘If you ask my opinion, they’re good for many more weeks yet.’
‘I did not ask your opinion,’ replied Louis coldly.
‘Ah, then I withdraw it, my lord.’ The ironic bow. The gleam in the eyes, the mischief. He was thinking of that naked girl.
Whatever could have possessed Blois and Bourbon to do such a thing? They might have known what his feelings would be. They had been urged on by this man who had too great an opinion of himself and who had dared to cast eyes on Blanche.
‘We shall stay here,’ went on Louis, ‘no matter how long the people of Avignon hold out.’
‘Your vassals, my lord, owe you but forty days and forty nights.’
‘My vassals, sir, owe me their complete loyalty.’
‘They vowed but forty days and forty nights. That was in their oath. I have been here thirty-six and my time of service is coming to an end.’
‘Yet you will stay here until we have the town.’
‘I promised forty days and the nights that follow them, Sire.’
‘You will not leave us nevertheless. If you did, I would raze Champagne.’
‘You will find strong resistance, my lord, if you attempted to do that.’
‘Yet I will not suffer traitors about me.’
Thibauld smiled that insolent smile which angered the King even more than his words.
‘I am sure you will consider such an act well before you undertake it,’ said Louis. ‘It could bring great misfortune to you.’
Then he passed on.
The news spread through the camp. Thibaud is preparing to leave.
Philip Hurepel remonstrated with him.
‘You must not go now,’ he protested. ‘They cannot hold out much longer. The King will be your enemy for as long as he lives if you desert him now.’