The Lion of Justice by Jean Plaidy

Author:Jean Plaidy [Jean Plaidy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2010-04-10T04:00:00+00:00

Matilda’s Eyes are Opened

THE JUST LAWS of the King and the piety of the Queen were beginning to have their effect. When they appeared together people would cheer them. It was gratifying to Henry when he remembered how uneasy the first months of his reign had been. As for Matilda, she believed that she had achieved absolute perfection.

She had her dear little Matilda and she believed she would soon be pregnant again. Then, she was certain, she would have a son.

She told her attendants, ‘My happiness would be complete if I did.’

The King was affectionate and tender, though she saw less of him than she had at first. State affairs, he told her, were constantly calling him away.

Sometimes when she spoke of the King and his goodness to her and his people and how she considered that she had achieved the perfect union, she would notice that there was often a heavy silence, and once or twice she had seen her women turn away as though to control their features.

The poor gave her the title which in the past Saxons had bestowed on those queens who had been assiduous in their care for the needy: Hlaefdige which meant the Giver of Bread. She was glad that they had done this. It was an indication that she was carrying out her duties in the same pious manner as her mother had done.

She never failed to do some good deed whenever the opportunity offered itself. Discovering on a journey she made near Stratford that the people would find a bridge very useful at that point, she caused one to be set up. It was the first arched bridge to be built and the spot was called Bow after that. She founded the hospital at St Giles’s-in-the-Field and another at Duke’s Place.

These good works were noted and the people declared that England would be prosperous now that it had a Norman King – albeit he had been brought up as an Englishman – and a Saxon Queen.

But there were some to carp at them and to jeer at the affection they obviously had for each other. They did not behave as King and Queen, declared some of the courtiers who would have liked to see a return to the profligate court of Rufus. They sneered at them, calling them Gaffer Goodrich and Goody Maude, as though they were a married couple from one of the villages.

Matilda did not care. She was happy. She heard news from her sister Mary, whose marriage was not quite as idyllic.

Mary intended to visit her sister as soon as the opportunity arose. Eustace was a tolerable husband. He was many years older than Mary and she had discovered that he had a mistress. Mary wrote that she supposed it was to be expected in marriages such as theirs, because they were arranged for them.

Matilda felt indignant and extremely sorry for Mary. She could imagine nothing more sad than an unfaithful husband. She thanked God that He had given her Henry, the perfect one.

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