The Young Lion Read Online Free Page B

in my presence?’ he demanded.
    Henry smiled slightly. ‘Stolen, cousin?’ He turned away.
    He had a straight nose, the audience could see, and straight brows bleached fair by the sun; but he remained standing in front of the King, so mostly they saw his back. Guillaume stood slightly behind him but Eustace pointed to a wall, ordering himaway. As he stepped back, women and some clerks remarked on Guillaume’s modesty and beauty. ‘An exemplar of knighthood,’ they whispered.
    Stephen smoothed his silver hair. ‘You wrote this yourself?’ he asked Henry.
    ‘I did.’
    ‘Your Highness,’ Eustace hissed. ‘I wrote it, Your Highness.’
    Henry ignored him.
    Stephen felt his son’s rage as a rising tide of panic within himself. How do they see me, these wild young men, he wondered. Do they regard me as weak?
    ‘You’ve studied well.’
    ‘Thank you, uncle.’
    ‘Uncle!’ The Prince leaped to his feet. ‘How dare you address my father as “uncle” in the presence of his court!’ For a moment his eyes fastened on Henry’s hard blue stare, then he rushed from the audience chamber, his page dashing after him.
    Courtiers stopped breathing. Even the bishops were disconcerted. Their fingers hovered motionless over their rosaries.
    Henry glanced after Eustace as if at a curiosity one might see at a fair. His cool look was deceptive: he seethed with excitement. At last he had seen the face, and begun to take the measure of the man he must defeat to win the throne.
    Now that Eustace had left, Stephen felt more at ease. ‘How old are you now?’ the King asked in French. They had been speaking formally, in Latin.
    ‘Fourteen, sire.’
    Guffaws echoed around the hall. Fourteen. This was the invader who had emptied castles and households from Christchurch to Canterbury as citizens fled before him.
    ‘And you have the audacity to ask me to give you gold so you can pay off your mercenaries and buy your fare home?’
    Henry gave the King a broad white grin. He has the grandfather, but he also has the father in him, Stephen thought. A solution to his embarrassing situation occurred to the King: he would ask the courtiers to decide. Like himself, almost all had owned estates in Normandy before this boy’s father, the Count of Anjou, had seized them for himself three years earlier.
    ‘My noble lords and ladies,’ he began. ‘Is this not the most brazen, audacious youth any of us has ever seen? He asks me for gold. And why? Because he has spent all his while attacking our kingdom in the south! His grandfather, the Great Henry, would weep for shame, would he not?’
    ‘Yes!’ the chamber cried.
    Henry felt a surge of murderous anger to hear his hero’s name invoked against him.
    ‘He’s a monster!’ a voice shouted. It was Eustace. I strike fear into the heart of the Crown Prince, Henry thought. Abruptly an antic mood swept through him. He turned to the courtiers with a broad smile and wiggled his fingers above his head. The hall erupted in laughter. Even bishops smiled; the attentive deacon had a fit of giggles. Half turning from them, Henry said, ‘Your Highness, it seems I’ve won my wager.’
    ‘Your wager, boy?’
    ‘I wagered with my commander of mercenaries that if I came here this morning I’d bring the joy of laughter to the court of King Stephen Blois.’ He waited for the yells and cat-calls to fade. A few of the older heads thought: this is the mark of a prince; he lives not in service to our expectations, but to a power within him.
    ‘So, lord King. I’ve given you laughter. Do you give me gold?’
    From the corner of his eye Stephen caught the quick movement of Eustace’s page in the doorway. Dissembling is the art of kings, and even those who are uncomfortable with it must practise it sometimes. Stephen practised it frequently, and effectively. He answered calmly,‘I know who you are, Henry, for we, indeed, are kinsmen. But there are many in this hall today who know only rumours about you.