The Saracen: The Holy War, Robert Shea [best beach reads TXT] 📗

that a triumph will include tribute?"

Orsini's smile faded. "Tribute?"

Charles nodded slowly. "To be exact, I will require three thousand florins to be delivered to me tomorrow morning before I enter the city, to compensate my men, whose pay is in arrears. I will have further requirements, but I will not press you for all at once. Three thousand florins will be enough for tomorrow."

Simon saw von Regensburg and FitzTrinian grinning at each other.

Orsini's mouth worked several times after Simon translated Charles's demand for three thousand florins. "But, Your Signory, we welcome you as our protector, not as one who comes to—to take from us."

Charles laughed and threw his arms wide. "Protectors cost money, my dear Orsini. I am sure the great city of Rome can scrape together three thousand florins by tomorrow. It will not be necessary for me to send my army into the city to help you find the money, will it?"

"Not at all necessary, Your Signory," said Orsini, bowing, his face flushed to the roots of his black beard.

These Guelfo nobles apparently had thought that the count of Anjou had come to Rome purely out of some high-minded desire to serve the pope and the Church, Simon thought. They were starting to learn what Simon himself had gradually come to realize: that Count Charles did nothing that did not first and foremost benefit himself.

As for himself, Simon's deepest wish was to get away from all this slaughter and pillage and dishonor, and the sooner the better.

"Rome is an old whore who lies down for every strong man who comes along," said Count Charles. "All we needed was to show our resolution when that mob came at us, and Rome fell over backward."

The two men sat across from each other at a small camp table in[203] Charles's tent, sharing wine and succulent roast pork killed and cooked by Anjou's equerries. Simon stared into the flames of a six-branched candlestick standing on Charles's armor chest at the side of the tent, and thought that he would far rather be exploring the wonders of Rome he had heard so much about—the Colosseum, the Lateran Palace, the Forum, the catacombs.

Simon remembered his mother's warning of years ago: Charles d'Anjou uses people. How often, with Charles, had he suspected, feared, that she was right? But those boyhood years in Charles's household, Simon's weapons training under Charles, his feeling that King Louis was a sort of father to him and Count Charles a sort of uncle, all made him want to trust Charles. But it was becoming impossible to do that, especially since Avignon, when Charles asked him to betray the king's confidence. Even now, though he wished they could get back on their old footing, he found himself wondering whether that old footing had been an illusion. Perhaps all along Charles had been kind to him only the better to use him.

He was terribly afraid that he knew what Charles wanted to talk to him about tonight. He had seen the sorry quality of Charles's army, and he had been impelled, almost against his will, to take the lead when the Roman mob was attacking. If Simon were in Charles's position, he knew what he would want.

"You did just the right thing today, Simon," Charles said. "Those three cutthroats would never have let themselves be overrun, nor would I. But I hadn't paid them in a while, no fault of mine, and they saw that as an excuse to try to extract a promise from me of an additional monthly five florins per knight and increases for the common soldiers as well. They thought the sight of that mob would force me to yield to them."

So their refusal to act was a pretense, Simon thought. But he began to feel disgusted with himself. Of all of them, he was the only one who had been duped.

Charles went on. "They were testing my courage. They did not know me well. They know me better now. I would have stood my ground until they were forced to turn and defend themselves. But you settled things by taking those archers out into the field and driving the rabble off. And a good thing you did, because the situation was risky. They might have waited too long to attack, and we might have lost lives unnecessarily. It was a dangerous game they were playing."

And a dangerous game you were playing, Simon thought. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. Charles had used[204] him, just as Mother had warned, and he felt angry enough to speak frankly.

"It was mutiny. In my opinion you should have hanged those men. They are little better than routiers. But all you did was haggle with them."

Sipping from his goblet, Charles lounged back on his cot and laughed. "Ah, Simon, I forget sometimes that you have never been in a war. This is the way it always is. Especially at the beginning. These men—du Mont, FitzTrinian, von Regensburg, and their followers—are hirelings, and when one goes shopping for an army, one buys, not the best there is, but only the best that is on the market."

Simon wanted to lean back as Charles had done, but there was no back to the stool he sat on. Charles's furnishings were as meager as everything else about his army.

"I fear for you, uncle, I really do. Not only are your knights undisciplined, but you are so few in number." He instantly regretted saying that. It would give Charles an opening to ask him for help.

Charles smiled complacently. "And you think Manfred von Hohenstaufen, with his host of Saracens and Sicilians, will march up here and chew me up, is that it?"

"Well—perhaps."

Charles swirled his wine cup and drank from it. "A bigger army would have cost me far more to ship and far more to pay, feed, and quarter while I am here. I needed this much of an army to establish myself in Rome. I do not need more until I actually make war on Manfred, and that may be as much as a year from now. Tomorrow I will enter Rome in triumph, and I will have myself declared chief senator of Rome. Eventually Guy le Gros—Pope Clement, he is calling himself—will crown me king of southern Italy and Sicily. As my renown spreads, fighting men will come flocking from all over to join my cause. And they will have to come in on my terms. Then I will be ready to march south."

The whole reason Charles had first sent Simon to Italy—to engineer the conquest of the Saracens by Christians and Tartars—was that no longer important to him? Charles had said nothing about the Tartars since Simon arrived in Ostia last night.

"The new Holy Father has already proclaimed his approval of the Tartar alliance," Simon ventured.

"Excellent," said Charles, nodding. He stood up and poured more wine for himself and Simon.

Sitting down again on his camp bed, he went on. "Your guardianship[205] of the Tartars, too, has been superb, Simon. You proved that I judged wisely in picking you for that task. I am delighted."

Feeling pleased with himself, Simon took a long drink of the heavy red Roman wine. "Then, since the pope has publicly given his approval, shall I escort the Tartars to your brother the king, so they can plan the crusade?"

"The crusade?" Charles lay back on his cot, propped up on one elbow, and stared into his wine cup and said nothing further.

"Would it not be safest to conduct them to the king at once?" Simon pressed him. "Our enemies may still try to kill them, even though the alliance is proclaimed."

Charles shook his head. "The last attempt to kill them was many months ago."

True, Simon thought. The stalker in black seemed to have given up or disappeared.

"Yes, but that Sienese attack on Orvieto—"

Charles interrupted. "De Verceuil got the Tartars out of Orvieto safely. And that attack was aimed at the pope, not the Tartars. After all, who has been trying to kill the Tartars, and why? Manfred's agents, because they knew that if the pope approved the Tartar alliance, my brother would then give me permission to march against Manfred."

Simon remembered King Louis saying he wanted to be ready to launch his crusade by 1270, now only five years away.

"But preparations for a crusade take many years," Simon said. "Should not the Tartars go to the king now, so they can begin to plan?"

"I do not think they should visit my brother just yet," said Charles. "His mind so easily fills up with dreams of recapturing Jerusalem." Simon caught a faint note of mockery in Charles's voice. "The presence of the Tartars at his court might distract him from his more immediate responsibilities."

"Then what will we do with the Tartars?" Simon asked, nettled.

"Let them remain with le Gros's court in Viterbo. It honors the pope to have those strange men from the unknown East at his coronation. Then, when he comes here to present me with the crown, let them come, too, as my guests. Indeed, they can stay with me after that. They will be safer with me than they would be anywhere else in Italy. And it might interest them to see how Christians make war."

They would be safer still in France.

He could have taken Sophia and the Tartars to France together, leaving the Tartars safe and well guarded with King Louis, and then[206] going on with Sophia to Gobignon. And getting away from Charles and his war.

"How many more months will I have to stay in Viterbo guarding the Tartars?" he said with some irritation.

Charles put down his wine goblet suddenly and stood up. He seemed to fill the tent. The candles on the chest lit his face from below, casting ghastly shadows over his olive complexion.

"Simon, I feel I can speak more frankly to you than I ever have. It is nearly two years since I asked you to undertake the guarding of the Tartars. The way you acted today showed me that you've learned a great deal in that time. You have seen the world. You have seen combat. You have learned to lead."

He praises me because I was so quick to mow down a hundred or so commoners, thought Simon.

"Thank you, uncle," he said tonelessly.

"I did not summon you from Viterbo just so you could accompany me from Ostia to Rome, Simon. You saw what my routiers—as you called them—are like. And when I am inside the city I will be in much greater danger from that Roman canaille than I was in the field today. I need a good leader with me whom I can trust. I want you to stay here in Rome with me."

Simon's chest ached as if chains were wrapped around it.

"How long?"

"At least two months. By then Sire Adam Fourre, my chief vassal from Anjou, will be here with seventy knights and three hundred men. A small force, but one I can depend on. I will feel more in control of these brigands then."

"But who will guard the Tartars while I am here?" he asked, desperately trying to think of an excuse that would get him back to Sophia.

Charles shrugged. "De Verceuil can look after them."

For over a year now he had been guarding the Tartars with his life, at Charles's request. Now Charles hardly seemed concerned about them. It was bewildering.

And when will I see Sophia again? he cried inwardly.

He could simply refuse to stay in Italy a moment longer. He could just get up right now and leave, go to Viterbo and find Sophia.

No, he could not do that. He had come to Italy to redeem the name of the house of Gobignon, not besmirch it further. What a scandal if the king's brother were to charge that Simon de Gobignon turned his back on him when he was in peril. What would the king and the nobles say of him then in France? He must see this through, at least until Charles was securely established in Rome.[207]

But pray God Charles did not ask him to stay with him beyond that.

"You do not need to go back to the Tartars at all," Charles said. "It seems to me that phase of things is settled. I think it would be more important for you to go home, this summer, to Gobignon."

Simon's heart leapt with amazement and joy as the words sank in. "Yes! Yes—I want to—very much," he blurted out. "I want that more than anything else."

If I can take Sophia with me.

Charles came around the table and laid a heavy hand on Simon's shoulder. Simon, still seated, had to twist his neck to look up at him.

"Do you remember when we first spoke of your guarding the Tartars I promised even greater opportunities for glory? I said that you would ride in triumph through