Henry rotated his jaw as if chewing on gristle. “If the French try and march on the town, I’ll fire it. Let them have a taste of hell on their way to it.”
“Will the French come, my lord?” asked Jean D’Earley in a strained voice.
William looked at the youth. His two squires had stayed up late, polishing armour, checking buckles and straps, making sure that all the equipment was in order. Not that William expected any defects, but there had been no point in sending the youths to bed when it was obvious they wouldn’t sleep. Indeed, William suspected that the only inhabitants of Le Mans to have slept at all last night were the babies and the senile, too young or too old to know that a French army was massing across the river.
“I would say so.” William stretched, testing his muscles, knowing that today he would probably have to fight. Going to his scabbard, he drew his sword from its sheath and examined the edges. “Sharp as a harridan’s tongue, Jean, good work,” he said. “The time for negotiating is long past. Philip of France and Count Richard desire to see King Henry on his knees. It’s our job to thwart that desire, hmmm?” He included both squires in his glance.
“Yes, my lord.” Jean’s throat worked up and down. Jack nodded stiffly. William had no intention of letting either of the youngsters join the fray. They would have to be blooded sometime, but preferably not in what was likely to be bitter, acrimonious fighting with the added complication of fire. “Help me arm up,” he said and pointed towards his gambeson.
His nephew’s eyes widened. “You are going to mass in your mail?”
“If the French are going to attack, then it will be soon and they won’t wait while we dress to meet them,” William answered. “Let others do as they will, but I would rather be ready.” He thrust his arms into the gambeson sleeves and pushed his head through the neck opening. “Your great-uncle Patrick was ambushed and slain when riding escort without his armour. Had he been wearing it, the chances are that he would have lived.”
***
King Henry eyed William in disapproval when he came to church in his hauberk. One or two others, including Prince John, had thought to do so, but had been shamed into removing their mail at the church door. If William harboured a fear of being unarmed in the face of threat because of his uncle’s demise, then Henry was uneasy to see armed men in a church following the infamous murder of Thomas Becket. Invited to remove his mail, William declined. Scowling, Henry would not stand near him for the mass and was abrupt with him when it had finished, keeping his back turned as he waited for the groom to bring his palfrey round.
As Henry placed his foot in the stirrup, a panting serjeant ran up crying that the French were massing to attack. “They’ve found a fording place with their lances, sire!” the soldier gasped.
Henry cursed, swung into the saddle, and spurred his palfrey. William mounted up and hastened after him. Behind him there was a mad scramble as men sought to don their armour and collect their weapons. By the time they reached the Huisne, a handful of French knights had succeeded in crossing, more were splashing in their wake, and there had already been several clashes with King Henry’s Angevin defenders. Henry regarded the French advance with dismay. “There shouldn’t be a ford!” His chest rose and fell unevenly and his breath rattled in his throat. “There shouldn’t be one!”
But there was and nothing to be done. William signalled for his helm and a wide-eyed Jean D’Earley helped him don it. Two Angevin knights galloped to meet the foremost Frenchmen at full tilt. One shattered his lance to the hilt on a French shield and brought both of them down. The second encounter left the knights still in the saddle and swords were drawn. “Go, sire!” William gestured vigorously to Henry. “You are unarmed and in no state to fight!”
Henry stared across the Huisne at the oncoming French troops. Sailing amid the banners of France were those belonging to his son and supposed heir, Richard, Count of Poitou, the silks brightening with the advent of sunrise. Henry bared his teeth. “He wants Le Mans?” he snarled. “I will give him Le Mans and let him see how he likes it!” Rounding his horse, he galloped back into the city with an escort of serjeants and knights, leaving William and a contingent of hastily assembled men to hold off the French for as long as they could.
Baldwin de Béthune joined William before the town gate and gave him a fierce grin before donning his helm. “I hope your sword’s sharp,” he said. “By the look of what’s upon us, it’s going to be blunt by the day’s end.”
Inside his helm, William returned the grin, which was really more a baring of teeth. There was no hope of holding the town against the French now they had found such an easy crossing point. The best they could do was keep them at bay long enough for Henry and his troops to make an orderly retreat.
The fight, like the fight for Drincourt when he was a young knight, was one of hard battle in cramped spaces, of sudden sallies that gained ground, followed by forced withdrawal. The churned turf was littered with broken shields and lances; with pieces of abandoned equipment and corpses of horses and men. As William pivoted to strike at an opponent, his stallion came down on the sharp edge of an iron point and jinked hard sideways, blood welling from the gash. Cursing, William managed to disarm his opponent, forced him from his sound destrier and mounting it himself sent his injured horse back through the lines. The new destrier, a dappled Spanish stallion, was fresh and headstrong, and for a while he had to fight it as well as the French. His sword arm was white hot with effort, his shield arm was numb, and his vision a blur. He and Baldwin were doing no more than holding the French and their own smaller contingent was rapidly tiring.
“Christ, he’s fired the town!” Baldwin suddenly panted.
William lifted his head. He had been too preoccupied with gulping air to feed his starving lungs to notice the difference in quality, but now Baldwin had spoken, he became aware of the stench of burning that went way beyond the normal aroma of cooking fires.
“He said he would, rather than give it to the French…” He lashed out with his sword, buffeted someone with his shield, and plunged the destrier at a footsoldier. Baldwin struck several blows with his mace and bought them a few seconds of respite. There was a sudden flurry of reinforcement, but it was only a temporary relief caused by the King’s bodyguard as Henry himself arrived at the embattled gate. His lips had a bluish tinge and his face wore such an expression of grief and rage that William had to look away. What met his smarting eyes through the slits in his helm was the sight of the French and Poitevan soldiers rallying for another charge, the footsoldiers massing to cross, and the gathering pall of smoke along the city walls.
“The defence of the other gates is too weak, they’re going to fall,” Henry said hoarsely. “We have to withdraw. I’ll not let that hellspawn son of mine and his French catamite take me while there’s a breath left in my body.” He gave a jerky nod. “Pull the men back, Marshal. We’ll regroup at Fresnay.”
“Sire.” William rallied the men from the gate and followed Henry through the burning city towards the Fresnay road. Fanned by a stiff breeze, the flames were spreading fast, consuming thatch and wooden roof shingles, eating through beams, licking through straw, and bedding in outhouses and stables, filling the air with a grey fog alive with red sparks that stung like hornets when they alighted on flesh.
They rode past a merchant’s house, several-storeyed with wooden shingles; it was burning fiercely, the fire having spread from the warehouse next door. A woman was striving to rescue her possessions from the flames. William stared at her and felt his heart kick in his chest. Her face and waistline were softer and plumper, but there was no mistaking the way she held herself. “Clara?” Gesturing peremptorily to his squires to help, William dismounted and hastened to her aid, snatching a quilt from her arms. The underside was on fire and as the smoke filtered through the slits in his helm he began to cough. Jean hastened to help him unlace the helm and William dragged it off, red in the face and choking. “Fetch me my pot helm,” he gagged at the squire. “I can’t wear this.” He stamped on the quilt to put out the fire and felt dismay and shame as he gazed upon the singed embroidery beneath his boots. Somehow, the sight of the charred bedcover was more distressing than the sight of the house burning in its entirety.
Jean came running back from the packhorse with William’s lighter helm which had an open face and a nasal guard. Clara had retreated to sit on a painted coffer in her garden and watch her home burn.
“You have to leave, the French are coming.” William strode to her, grabbed her arm, and hauled her to her feet. “They’ll be on us at any moment.” He turned to cough into his sleeve.
She shook him off. “They can’t be any worse than Henry of Anjou!” she spat and gestured towards the house. “It’s not the French who have fired the town! Stephen said this would happen.”
“And where’s Stephen now?” William snarled. “You must get out!”
“Don’t worry.” She gave him a look from the old days, gleaming with mockery and challenge. “I’ve always chosen men who can take care of me. We took the wine out of the city two days ago, and put our money in a safe place. He’s gone to fetch the horses from the stables. I…” Her face lit up and, gathering her skirts, she pushed William aside and ran towards a barrel-bodied merchant and a servant who were hastening towards them on horseback, with a palfrey and two packhorses following on lead reins. William watched the man dismount and kiss Clara before boosting her into the palfrey’s saddle. With the servant he set about securing the painted chest and the more portable belongings to the packhorses, his actions rapid and efficient. Clara nudged her mount over to William and looked down at him. Numerous fine lines webbed her eye corners, she had a double chin, but her gaze was still as dark and bright as his memory of her. “I know you would have saved me,” she said in a gentler tone, “and I thank you, but as you can see, I did not need it.”
“No.” He glanced towards the man to whom he had lost her—a nondescript, broad town burgher with a paunch at his belt and unprepossessing features. William was both reassured and unnerved. “Godspeed you,” he said. “Make haste.”
“And you,” she said with a half-smile that held remembrance and farewell. For a moment their eyes locked, and then she was reining away and her man was fastening the last strap on the packhorse and leaping to his saddle, nimble despite his bulk. He nodded stiffly to William and without further ado clapped spurs to his mount’s flanks. He, Clara, and the servant faded rapidly into the smoke like a dream and William turned back to his horse, feeling saddened, yet perversely lighter of spirit.
William de Mandeville, Earl of Essex, rode up with his troops and confirmed to Henry that Le Mans was lost. “The French are pouring into the town through the gates, with the Count of Poitou at their head.” His breath tore in his throat. “Sire, you have to leave…”
