‘Oh God in Heaven! To think of her with that lecher!’

‘Brother, you must put her from your mind.’

‘What can you know of this? She is so exquisite. I had treated her with tenderness and care … I had put off the marriage solely because of her youth. I did not want her to be frightened. I loved her dearly, Ralph. I had planned our future together … and now to come back like this and find her gone … and gone to him. You know his reputation. How think you he will be with her?’

‘You must put her from your mind, I tell you,’ repeated Ralph. ‘She is lost to you. She will be going to England soon to be crowned Queen.’

‘She was snatched from me!’ cried Hugh.

‘You must face the fact, brother, that she may have gone with the utmost willingness.’

‘How could that have been?’

‘There is a certain glitter about a crown. I’ll tell you this, Hugh, there was a wantonness about her. You were bemused by her. God knows she is an exquisite creature. I never saw a girl or woman to compare with her. It may well be that you will have reason to rejoice that it has turned out as it has.’

‘You talk of what you do not understand,’ said Hugh shortly. ‘Isabella was betrothed to me. I love Isabella. I shall never love another woman as long as I live, and that’s the plain truth.’

Ralph shook his head. ‘Would to God it had been any but myself who let her go.’

‘Nay, Ralph, anyone would have thought it well to let her go to her family. We have been thoroughly deceived. But I shall not let it pass. I shall tell you this, Ralph, I am going to be revenged on John.’

‘What can you do?’

‘I shall kill him,’ declared Hugh.

‘Nay, do not act hastily. Do not speak without caution. Who knows what may be carried to him.’

‘I hope my words will be carried to him. I loathe him. I despise him for a cheat, a liar and a lecher. He should never have been given the crown. That should have been Arthur’s. And by God I swear I shall never forget this foul deed. He shall die for it and I shall send someone without delay to him to take him my challenge for mortal combat.’

‘You think he will agree to meet you?’

‘He must … in all honour he must.’

Ralph shook his head. ‘You cannot talk of honour to one who has none and knows not the meaning of the word.’

‘I have made up my mind,’ said Hugh. ‘I shall challenge him to mortal combat.’


His servants did not dare disturb John in his bedchamber, and it was dinner time each day before he emerged from it and then with great reluctance.

He was living in a world of sensuality where nothing was of the least importance to him but Isabella.

He had found that he was not mistaken in her. She was sexually insatiable even as he was and on this ground they were completely in tune. He had recognised this quality in her; it was at the very essence of her tremendous attraction. She was indeed the most beautiful creature he had ever seen; her immature child’s body was just beginning to blossom into womanhood and could be compared with the most perfect piece of sculpture except that it was living. He delighted in her. To guide her, to teach her in erotic arts was the greatest joy; and she scarcely needed tuition. Such was her sensuality that she reacted instinctively. For some time she had been trying to force open the floodgates of her voluptuous desires. She had tried with Hugh whose honourable instincts had restrained him; John had no such scruples and for a while she was glad of this.

So they retired early and rose late. The marriage bed was more important than anything during those first weeks.

John said during those days of his honeymoon: ‘I now possess everything that I could desire. The crowns of England and Normandy … and my most cherished possession of all: Isabella.’

One day when he emerged from the bedroom to take dinner which was awaiting his arrival at the table and which was served after midday, he was told that messengers had arrived from Hugh de Lusignan.

‘Hugh de Lusignan?’ he cried. ‘What does that fellow want with me?’ He grimaced. ‘Can it be that it has something to do with the Queen? I’ll send for him when I am ready to see him.’

He went back to Isabella who had risen languorously from the bed and was wrapped in a gown of blue lined with fur, her beautiful hair in disorder about her shoulders.

‘There’s a fellow to see me,’ he said. ‘He comes from Hugh de Lusignan. What insolence to send him.’

‘What does he want?’ asked Isabella.

‘That we have to find out.’ He lifted her face to his and looked into her eyes. Then he slipped the robe from her shoulders and marvelled at her beauty. She studied him through veiled eyes and she was thinking of Hugh who was so tall and handsome, and she was angry with him because he had resisted all the indications she had given him. She wondered briefly what would have happened if he had not.

She was a queen though and it delighted her to be a queen.

John pulled the robe up over her shoulders. He took her hand and pulled her to her feet.

‘I’ll not look at you now, my love, or it will be no dinner for us. I see that. You are more attractive than a thousand dinners.’

He went to the door and called: ‘Bring the Lusignan’s messenger to me now.’

Then he turned to her and drawing her to the bed sat with her upon it. He held her hand pressed against his thigh as the messenger entered.

‘So you come to disturb me when I am engaged with the Queen,’ he said. ‘What is your message?’

‘I come from Hugh de Lusignan, who challenges you, my lord, to mortal combat.’

Isabella said involuntarily: ‘Oh no.’

John pressed her hand. ‘Your master is insolent, my man, and you brave to bring such a message to me. I like not such messages and I like not the people who bring them. Has it struck you that I might decide to make you so that you could carry no further messages?’

Isabella saw the sweat which appeared on the man’s brow. She remembered him as one of Hugh’s esquires in the castle.

She said: ‘’Tis no fault of his that he brings such a message.’

John smiled. Everything about her delighted him; even her interference. She didn’t want the man punished. Therefore he should not be.

‘Nay,’ said John, ‘the Queen is right. The insolence comes from your master. You but obey your orders. Go and tell him that if he is so eager for death I will appoint a champion to fight with him.’

The man, delighted to get away, bowed his head and John waved a hand to dismiss him.

When he had gone John turned to Isabella. ‘Insolent fellow!’ he said. ‘He would invite me to mortal combat. Does he think that I would demean myself by fighting with him? Nay, he shall have his fight. There’ll be plenty who will be glad to do me the honour.’ He pulled the robe from her shoulder and buried his face against her flesh. ‘Think you he will report to his master that he saw us thus? ’Tis what I trust he will do.’ John began to laugh loudly. ‘Master Hugh will mayhap be more eager than ever for mortal combat when he realises all that he has missed in life.’

There was no responsive laughter from Isabella. She was thinking of Hugh – whose good looks had been such a delight to her – lying cold and still with blood on his clothes. But that would not happen. She felt that in combat it would not be Hugh who was the vanquished.

But she had lost temporarily her appetite both for dinner and sexual excitement.


When Hugh received the message he was filled with fury.

‘The coward!’ he cried. ‘Of course he is afraid of combat. He knows full well what the result of that will be. Does he think I’ll be satisfied with some mercenary captain whom he will pay to take his place? Did you see the King?’ he asked the messenger.

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘And the Queen?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Together?’

The messenger nodded.

‘How looked the Queen?’

The messenger looked puzzled.

‘Contented with her lot?’ suggested Hugh.

‘Yes, my lord.’

Such a child, he thought, and he wondered what would become of her.

He went to his brother and told him that the King had refused to meet him in person.

‘Did you expect him to?’ asked Ralph.

‘No. I always knew he was a coward.’

‘Such men always are. The best thing, brother, is to forget this insult. Find yourself a bride – a good and beautiful woman who will give you sons. There are many who would be happy to mate with the Lusignans.’

Hugh shook his head. ‘No, brother,’ he said. ‘At least not yet. There is one thing I am pledged to do and that is to take my revenge on John of England.’

‘How so?’

‘You ask that? You, a Lusignan, who understand the state of this country. The King of France has entered into a truce with him but it is an uneasy one. The Duke of Brittany – and he has many to support him – believes himself to be the true heir to all that John has seized. Rarely was a crown so precariously poised on any head. I am going to do all in my power to dislodge it. I swear this to you, Ralph, that ere long Normandy will not belong to its present Duke but to the King of France whose vassal I shall be. Richard was a friend to our family. John is an enemy. I shall not rest until I have taken my revenge on this voluptuary who has robbed me of my bride.’

‘Bold words, brother.’

‘And meant, Ralph, meant from the bottom of my heart. You will see.’


Even John had to realise that it was time he was on the move. Moreover, Isabella was ecstatic at the prospect of being crowned Queen of England. She was thrilled at the thought of crossing the sea because she had never yet seen the sea. Her excitement about her new life added zest to John’s days. He began to see things afresh through the eyes of a young girl and he found the experience exhilarating.