“How great a household do you have?”
Isabelle pursed her lips and then said decisively, “Two ladies, a chaplain, and a scribe—although in truth they are all in my lord Glanville’s employ not mine.”
He nodded. “Do you wish to keep them?”
She shook her head. “Not if I can have the choosing of others.”
“It is for you to say and order your own household as you desire.”
Isabelle felt a stirring in her solar plexus as if some part of her that had gone to sleep in chains was now awakening and discovering that its fetters had vanished. “Then I will have new maids,” she said. “There’s a chaplain, Walter, who has been kind to me. I would reward him with an offer of service. My baggage will fit in one coffer.”
“Then let it be forwarded and I will ask Theobald Walter to arrange for your clerk to come to our new lodgings if he desires employment.”
She frowned. “Is such haste necessary? Am I truly in danger?”
“Not you, my lady, no,” William said, “but I would be happier to be away from this place and among friends. If you have no objection to leaving immediately, then I would like us to be on our way.”
It was a command couched as a polite and deferential request. Isabelle noted it and wondered what would happen if she baulked and said that she wanted to supervise her own packing and that she was going nowhere with him. Not that she had any intention of cutting off her nose to spite her face. She would give anything to go beyond these imprisoning walls. She was the key to his wealth and status, but he was her key to freedom. “No,” she said, lifting her chin. “I have no objection.”
William handed Isabelle down into the boat. The weedy smell of the river was strong in her nostrils and the water lapped against the sides of the vessel in small green tongues that occasionally burst in a white saliva of spray. He had lent her his cloak, for although it was a bright summer’s day, the wind off the river was stiff. She seated herself on one of the benches along the boat’s sides and watched him gingerly do the same. Behind them, the Tower was a great, limewashed bulwark and it was the sight of the massive walls rather than the breeze off the water that made her shiver and hug the double woollen folds of the cloak around her body.
“Cold?” he asked solicitously.
Isabelle stroked Damask who had curled at her feet, and shook her head. “Some walls protect, and some imprison,” she said. “I was little more than a child when I came here, but it has never been my home the way that Striguil and Leinster are.”
William nodded. “There are always places of the heart,” he said absently, his own gaze upon the great walls of the Tower as the boatman and his crewman pulled away upstream. Isabelle looked over her shoulder once and then fixed her gaze on the gulls and cormorants wheeling above the water. She wondered where his places of the heart were, but it was too soon to ask him such a question. She could sense his tension, and see it in the way he kept his hand on his sword hilt. It was only as they continued upstream with nothing more untoward happening than a bare-legged pair of urchins on the riverbank casting stones at the boat that he breathed out and relaxed. She risked a glance at him from beneath her lashes. Now they were in the full light of day, she could see the shadows under his eyes and the gaunt hollows beneath his cheekbones. She had seen that look before—on her mother’s face in the days following the death of her brother and her own forced departure from Striguil. It came from the strain of bearing up, of shouldering burdens of grief and care and still managing to go on. Ranulf de Glanville had looked like that too in recent days.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
“To the lodging of Richard FitzReinier.”
“Ah,” she said. The name meant nothing to her. De Glanville had not seen fit to keep her abreast of goings on outside the Tower and she had had to rely on her quick ears and Walter the clerk for what small snippets of news came her way.
William leaned back against the side of the boat. “He’s a merchant and city dignitary,” he said. “When I was in the retinue of the Young King, he used to provide us with goods. We would tell Richard what we needed and he would obtain it—anything from a box of pepper to a warhorse. I’ve known him for a long time. He has a house on Cheapside close to the cathedral and he has offered us his hospitality while we are in London.” He looked wry. “I am afraid that I have been in too much haste to make good provision for a wife and her household, but Richard has come to my rescue and assures me that he has everything in hand.” He leaned forward. “I am sorry there has been no time for a proper courtship. To be blunt, if I am to be secure then the marriage needs to take place immediately.”
Isabelle realised this, but to hear him say so still made her stomach lurch. “How soon is immediately?” she asked, trying to sound practical.
“Today, if you can bear it. I will give you what time I can to compose yourself.”
Which was no time at all, Isabelle thought. A piece of waterlogged wood bobbed away from them on the opaque green water. Isabelle eyed it and thought that she could drift aimlessly like that—let fate take her where it would—or she could be a passenger in a boat with this man and steer a true course. “I can bear it.” She raised her eyes to his. The look he returned was unsettling. She had received stares like that from other men, but she had never been alone with them at the time and had never liked any of them enough to dare to make a tryst.
As they travelled upriver, she gazed at the landscape that had been so close but never seen: the jetties and wharfsides; the bustling dock at Billingsgate where a fishing vessel was unloading a bulging net of salmon. The churches and dwellings with their gardens running down to the waterside. She tried to hold herself on the surface of the moment and not panic. William Marshal pointed out landmarks and spoke with easy humour. He left her space to respond but did not let the silences drag out and put no pressure on her to reply. She supposed that such skill was part of being an accomplished courtier. Their boat passed under the arches of London Bridge and for an instant the world was dark and strongly scented with weed. The water churned beneath the keel of the boat and she felt moist spray on her face.
“It is best on a full tide,” he said with a smile. “But you need to be prepared to be soaked, and you need to enjoy danger.”
Isabelle considered. “I am Richard Strongbow’s daughter,” she said. “I think I would like to do this at high tide.”
He laughed and looked at her again and she knew that flying through the arches of London Bridge at high tide could not match the fear and exhilaration that were running through her just now.
Richard FitzReinier’s fine timber house stood on the west corner of Cheapside, the hub of London’s commercial wheel. The outer walls were plastered and painted blue, which immediately set it apart from its neighbours, and it was roofed with wooden shingles. In the height of luxury and refinement, the windows were glazed, revealing that its owner was wealthy beyond the norm. There were stables and barns and other outbuildings so that the site almost had the aspect of a castle bailey.
FitzReinier himself emerged to greet them: a tall man of slender bones and a small, taut paunch that spoke of the good living bought by success. He was clad in a striped tunic of blue and gold silk and rings gleamed on every finger. An ostentatious cross set with red stones hung at his throat. On first glance, a stranger would have thought him the knight and William the merchant.
“Countess,” FitzReinier said and flourished her an elaborate bow. “Welcome to my house. It is a privilege indeed.”
Isabelle inclined her head and from somewhere found an appropriate response.
“You will be wanting to prepare yourself for your wedding, my lady,” he added and indicated the fair woman who had belatedly followed him from the house. She was plump and breathless from hurrying. “I will leave you in the capable hands of Madam FitzReinier.”
