‘If you wish, I can read it myself.’ That surprised the Pope: few men of Drogo’s stamp were lettered. ‘I was taught by the priest of our family church, my cousin, who has recently been appointed, as you will know, to the See of Coutances.’
‘Geoffrey of Montbray is your cousin?’
‘He is, and no doubt the Duke of Normandy had some say in his elevation, since he looks to him often for counsel.’
‘The Duke did request he be given Coutances, it is true, and I was happy to oblige him. But this is wandering away from that which we are here to discuss, which is the sheer outlaw nature of the behaviour of the men you are supposed to lead. Listen!’
Leo started to read, looking at Drogo as each point was made. The abbot had been on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and like many travellers to the Holy Land he had taken in many a shrine en route. One such was the cave of St Michael on Monte Gargano, which was in the province of Benevento. The land around the shrine was overrun with Normans, and though they had respected the abbot as coming from their homeland, what had happened to him and what he had been told by the local Italian and Lombard population had made him seethe with anger and disgust.
‘“No Norman traveller is safe in that part of Italy, so much did the locals hate them, and passing through was no protection from reprisals. He had been threatened personally, had nearly lost his possessions, only saved by his clerical office, but had since met many who had indeed been robbed even of the clothes in which they stood, this after their horses had been stolen. Some had even been whipped by angry locals as retribution for the losses they had suffered in destroyed crops and torn-out vines…”
‘Need I go on, Count Drogo?’ There was not much to do but answer with a shake of the head. ‘But I shall, and I will enumerate the complaints I have had from Benevento, which might I remind you is my own fief. Homes and fields of corn burnt to a cinder, women raped and tiny children hoisted on the points of Norman lances…’
‘Your Holiness, you know that people exaggerate.’
‘Exaggerate!’ Leo shouted, in a voice more suitable to a soldier than a cleric. ‘I have seen these things for myself. It must cease and I will hold you, and you alone, responsible for seeing that it does.’
Drogo, who had been submissive, felt his gorge rise. Who did this ginger-haired sod think he was? He might be Pope but he was talking to a de Hauteville, one who was not, and never had allowed himself to be, browbeaten by anyone, especially in the company of not only Guaimar but also the whole papal entourage. He was about to shout back, he even had a notion of clouting the Pope round the ear, when a vision of his elder brother swam before him. William would have known how to deal with this, would have had the words to turn away the papal wrath while giving nothing in return. The Pope was asking for the impossible: the men he was talking about were warriors. What did he want them to do, take up the plough?
It took great effort to control his voice, but he did manage it. ‘I will do as you ask, Your Holiness.’
‘You swear on the Blood of Christ?’
‘I do,’ Drogo replied, crossing himself, as much from fear as from piety: that was not an oath to be taken lightly.
‘So be it, Count Drogo, but be assured I will hold you to that. Now, Prince Guaimar…’
Drogo listened and determined to learn. Guaimar deflected every complaint directed at him with consummate ease and silken replies, showing such ability that Drogo was jealous, something he related to Kasa Ephraim when he called upon him later that day.
‘Our prince has now had much practice at dissimulation, Count Drogo.’
‘I think he might have learnt from you.’
The Jew smiled, and even if he had aged, it was a pleasing thing. ‘You flatter me, Count Drogo, but you have come here to transact business, I think.’
It was Drogo’s turn to smile. ‘I think your ventures are safer than my coffers.’
Ephraim now transacted commercial undertakings for the de Hautevilles, trading in commodities on their behalf and increasing a wealth that was fed by land income and the tribute from the Lombard and Italian nobles of Apulia who looked to Melfi for protection: odd that some of that security had to be provided against men to whom he was titular overlord.
‘All business has its risks, Count Drogo.’
Thinking of his soul, Drogo replied, ‘None, my Jewish friend, compared to the risks of being in my position.’
Argyrus had worked hard to ensure that, when he struck, it had the desired effect. Money was his weapon, the means to pay for betrayal, but that was not the only tool in his armoury. Unaware that the newly elected Pope had left Rome for Campania, he had sent an embassy to the Holy City, to the Duke of Spoleto, whose lands lay to the north of Benevento, as well as selected people in that province, his aim to build a coalition against their common enemy. But first he had to decapitate the monster.
Drogo, not long returned from Salerno, was to be taken when he was at his most vulnerable, on a Sunday when he attended church on a saint’s feast day, the means of his assassination a disgruntled monk, found by Argyrus’s agents, who knew how to handle a sword. He assured those who recruited him that not only could he get close to Drogo de Hauteville, there were many men locally who would aid him, but the spider at the centre of the web made an impatient man wait until all else was in place.
Having served with the Norman-Lombard army outside the walls of Trani he knew the names of the most important leaders, not just the de Hautevilles. Humphrey, Geoffrey and Mauger had their own castles ands fiefs, and attended their own churches to hear Mass, but there were others capable of taking over from them, so men had to be put in place, reliable men who were not only willing to strike but able to recruit fellow assassins, for Argyrus was insistent that no one killer, acting alone, would succeed: look what had happened with William.
‘The one called Robert I know least well.’
‘He is stuck in deepest Calabria, my Lord, and though he is hated we have not yet managed to get anyone to accept the task of killing him.’
‘Yet all the others are ready?’
‘They are. They await only a day on which to strike.’
Argyrus had before him a list of Roman saints’ days and he calculated how long it would take to send messages to those recruited and awaiting the sign to act. He could not risk a lost opportunity: conspiracies were fragile things, and they became even more so the longer they went without execution. Looking a month in advance he put a finger on the Feast Day of St Laurence and deciding said, firmly, ‘That is the day I have chosen. See to it.’
Drogo, accompanied by his wife and a newly born son, saw Listo, dressed in his black Benedictine habit, and scowled, as it was not a sight that pleased him. In truth he felt slightly guilty at having sent him and his sister away, given it was not an action of which William would have approved, but then his elder brother had been a bit soft in that way. Drogo would not harm a peasant for no reason, but he had no love for the breed, seeing them as impenetrable and stupid in the main, and when occasion demanded that they suffer he had never been one to hold back. Their crops and vines he would destroy and the Good Lord help any of them who tried to resist.
To him St Laurence was a martyr especially to be venerated, not least because his saint’s day was always the occasion of a great banquet, and Drogo loved feasting and drinking, which always led to carousing. Also, since the same saint was the patron of prostitutes, there was no disgrace in having a few along to entertain him and his companions afterward, once he had sent his wife off to her nursing and her bed.
Gaitelgrima had gone ahead into the church, and he was waiting until all his companions were present, some ten in number, those Normans he counted as close friends, slightly put out that two of his brothers, Geoffrey and Mauger, whom he had summoned, had yet to arrive. Humphrey had got the backwash of the papal strictures on the way back from Salerno; the other two were going to get a lecture too, and be told to keep their men in check. When he had dealt with them he intended to call in all the Norman captains for the same purpose.