Robert reined in his horse in front of her, leaping down to the ground and striding forwards to throw his arms around her. I followed slowly behind.
‘Sister,’ he said. ‘I’m glad to see you safe.’
‘And you, Robert,’ Beatrice replied, as they broke off the embrace.
She was exactly as I had remembered, from her large eyes to her milky-pale cheeks and her fair hair, which was bound and all but covered by a wimple. Tall for a woman, she was also slender, with a good figure that it was hard to tear one’s eyes from, and delicate features that many men would have given anything short of their lives to hold and to caress. A silver band decorated her wrist, and she wore a simple linen gown, loosely draped in the English fashion and a perfect white in colour.
All of a sudden I was there in her chambers in Lundene again, feeling her pressed against me, the warmth of her breath upon my cheek, the softness of her lips upon mine. I felt that pang again, and tried to bury it, but it would not go away.
‘You remember Tancred, don’t you?’ Robert asked, clapping a hand on my shoulder as I dismounted and joined him.
Smiling, she turned to me. ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Although it’s been some time since we last met.’
My throat was dry all of a sudden and I swallowed to moisten it. ‘You look well.’
‘As do you,’ she said, glancing up and down, from my helmet to my boots. ‘You look like a lord.’
‘Lord and defender of Earnford,’ Robert put in. ‘Last month he pursued a Welsh raiding-party for an entire day just to avenge the men they had killed. Ten of the enemy were slain by his hand alone.’
I regarded him with a questioning look. Only last night he had sought to chastise me for my actions, yet now he made light of it.
‘Is that so?’ Beatrice asked, in a way that left me unsure whether she was impressed by that, or whether she believed it at all.
‘He exaggerates, my lady. It was only four.’
Robert laughed. ‘You are as modest a man as I have ever known.’
‘Not modest, lord,’ I said. ‘It’s the truth, that’s all.’
I glanced at Beatrice and her eyes, chestnut-brown, met mine. I gazed into them, searching for I knew not what. Some hint that she acknowledged what had happened between us all those months ago, maybe. But there was nothing.
She turned to Robert. ‘Fitz Osbern asked to see you as soon as you arrived. There is some business he wishes to discuss.’
Robert nodded. ‘Where is he?’
‘At the hall in the castle,’ she replied. ‘He and the castellan have been in council for the past hour at least.’
‘I’ll join them straightaway and see what it is he wishes,’ Robert said.
‘Let me take you to him.’ Beatrice gave a flick of her hand, and suddenly I noticed two maidservants waiting behind her at the entrance to the pavilion. One was plump and in her middle years, while the other was younger, probably not more than thirteen or fourteen summers old, with brown hair that fell loosely past her shoulders, and it was she who hastened away.
‘Has there been any further word about the Welsh?’ I asked Beatrice.
‘Nothing yet,’ she said. ‘At least, not as far as I’ve heard. But then people rarely think to tell me much about what’s happening.’
‘Fitz Osbern will know,’ said Robert. ‘I’ll find out from him, and when I do, I’ll make sure to tell you.’
The girl returned with a dappled grey mare. Without a word to her, Beatrice took the reins and climbed up into the saddle.
‘It has been good to see you, Tancred,’ she said. ‘I trust it won’t be so long before we meet again.’
‘I trust not, my lady,’ I said.
She smiled once more, warmly but without the affection that I had grown used to. It was as if we had barely met, as if she had forgotten everything that had passed between us, or else buried those memories so deep that they could no longer be raised up. It shouldn’t have mattered to me, and yet for some reason it did.
Beside her, Robert had also mounted up. ‘I’ll be back before long,’ he told me. ‘Keep a pot of stew and a jug of ale waiting for me.’
With that, brother and sister rode away. I watched them as they made their way from the camp towards the castle on the hill, and I was left standing there alone, numb with a strange sense of hurt and disappointment.
Ansculf was marshalling Robert’s men, sending some to take care of the horses while directing others to fill wineskins from the river. Some of Robert’s servants had travelled ahead with Beatrice and Fitz Osbern, and had set up camp in a good location, in the lee of a clump of birches not far from the water’s edge.
I signalled to Serlo and the others, who were pacing about, stretching their legs. Together we followed Robert’s men to their fire, where already a pot of water was boiling. The smell of carrots and fish filled my nose, but I did not feel hungry.
‘Start putting those tents up,’ I said to my knights as I unhitched my saddlebags from our horses, and then to the twins Snocca and Cnebba: ‘Fetch some more wood for the fire.’
We would need it, I reckoned: the wind was rising, changing direction, and the skies were clear. Even though the day had been warm, the night ahead would be a cold one.
Shaking my head to clear it, I got to work.
We retired almost as soon as it was dark. Robert came back from the castle shortly after that, though all I heard was his voice as he bade good night to the few of his men who were still drinking and playing dice in the dying light of the flames. I did not try to get up. By then I was bone-tired and barely able to keep my eyes open. Whatever news he had, it could wait until the morning, I decided, and that was the last thought to cross my mind before at last I fell asleep.
When next I stirred it was still night. Morning was some way off, for the birds had not yet begun to sing. All was silent, and at first I could not work out what had roused me. I strained my ears but could make nothing out, and I was about to roll over and try to get back to sleep, but then I heard movement: the muffled sound of feet upon grass.
Staying as still as I could, hardly breathing, I listened. There was someone just outside the tent, close by the fire, I reckoned, though it was hard to tell. They circled about, moving slowly, softly, as if trying not to be heard. It was unlikely to be any of my men or Robert’s, but who else would be lurking around our camp at this time of night?
Whilst on the march we usually slept two men to a tent, except that as a lord and a leader of men I always made sure I had one to myself. Whereas many barons were accustomed to taking whores and camp-followers to their tents, I had not shared mine with anyone since Oswynn. In those days my only bed-companions were my sword, which lay on the blanket at my side, and my knife, which rested beneath the rolled-up cloak I used for a pillow. Slowly, so as not to alarm whoever was out there, I reached for the latter, sliding the blade silently from its sheath. If it came to a fight at close quarters, a short blade was better than a long one.
Trying not to make a sound, I made for the entrance to the tent. The flaps were closed over but not laced up, and I opened them just enough to be able to see through. The stars were out but the moon was behind a cloud; the campfire had died long ago, leaving only gently smoking ash. Of whoever had been here there was no sign. Brandishing my knife in front of me, I ducked my head and ventured out.
The night was indeed cold. I was wearing just my tunic and my trews; I could move more quietly in bare feet and so I left my boots behind. Keeping low, I looked around. Eight tents stood around the fire, of which mine was one, but a few were pitched a short way back from it, and as I rounded the side of my own, I saw a short figure dressed in a black cloak, crouching in the shadows outside Serlo and Pons’s tent not half a dozen paces away.