Lady of the English - By Elizabeth Chadwick Page 0,69
nose. She tried to sip from a cup of hot, honey-sweetened wine that someone placed in her hands, but her jaw was chattering too much. This would not do, she told herself. This just would not do.
“I have sent for your chaplain, madam,” Will said.
She nodded, feeling nauseated. “Tell me again. I cannot believe it is true. He was taken sick, you say.”
“Yes, madam. Late at night after a day’s hunting. He had 171
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dined well…we all had, especially my lord. It was lampreys, his favourite dish. He must have eaten a bad one, because he sickened in the night with purging and a fever. His physician said that lampreys had never agreed with him…”
“They used to make him belch,” Adeliza said in a distant voice. “But he was never ill beyond indigestion.”
“His condition worsened and it became clear that his life was in the hands of God, who chose to take him to His bosom.
There was nothing anyone could do.” Adeliza’s gorge rose. Clapping her hand to her mouth, she excused herself and was violently sick down the waste shaft of the latrine chute built into the thickness of the wall.
“Madam, are you all right?” She felt Juliana’s arm slip around her waist.
Adeliza nodded. “No more feathers,” she said, swallowing hard. Henry was dead and it was as if something had been ripped out of her. “I wasn’t there to comfort him. He died and I wasn’t there.”
“Madam…”
She shook her head at Juliana and, having smoothed her dress and rinsed her mouth with wine, returned to the hall.
William D’Albini was sitting on the hearth bench with his back to her and she saw him rake one of his hands distractedly through his tousled curls. There was more she needed to know, but not here. “Bring him to my chamber,” she said to Juliana.
“I will speak with him privately.”
ttt
Adeliza sat down in the window embrasure where the daylight was still bleak and clear, and folded her hands in her lap beneath the thick fur covering of the ermine cloak. Will D’Albini was ushered into the room and hesitated near the door. Then he cleared his throat, squared his shoulders, and came to kneel to her, his manner one of dogged resolution.
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She bade him rise and take the seat on the other side of the embrasure.
“I am sorry for your distress, madam.”
“I should have been there,” she said.
“There is nothing you could have done, and he had the best of care. He expressed his wish to be buried at Reading, and the earls present swore to escort his body there and remain together until they had discharged their duty to him. They are bringing him to Rouen first.”
“Has a messenger been sent to the Countess of Anjou?”
“As far as I know, madam.” He looked towards the window, his shoulders tense, then turned back to her. “Madam…the king did not name his daughter the Countess of Anjou as his successor.”
Adeliza stared at him in astonished dismay. “Then whom did he name?”
“I do not know, madam. All Hugh Bigod said was that he heard the king absolve his lords of the oaths they had taken to uphold the countess and her son.”
“Hugh Bigod?” Adeliza quivered. “Why would the king say such a thing to him? He is just a courtier, not a close confidant.
If my husband was going to make such a change, even in extremity, he would do it through a priest and with witnesses such as the Earl of Gloucester to hear him.” Will’s colour heightened. “Different people took it in turns to keep watch over the king. He said openly in council that the Count and Countess of Anjou had vexed him greatly and he was rethinking his plans for the future.”
“But he did not say what these plans were?” Will shook his head. “Many desired assurances that the Count of Anjou would have no part in ruling Normandy and England, and I believe he was trying to placate them. I do not know what his will was in this.”
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Adeliza gnawed her lower lip. She was not sure that anyone had known Henry’s mind except Henry himself. She felt as if she were falling down a deep, black hole. “So what is to happen now? Who is to take the reins?”
“I do not know, madam. When I rode out, a council was gathering to discuss what to do and how much store to set by the word