As the Queen sat there, feeling increasingly uncomfortable in the gathering gloom, and bracing herself to retrace her steps—she thoughtshe knew which way to go—she heard what sounded like a soft footfall. Crunch. There it went again, to her left; someone stepping on bracken! It might be a squirrel or a fox, she told herself sternly, but nevertheless, she stood up and hastened along the path back to civilization, negotiating her way between the high hedges.
Crunch. It was behind her now. Crunch. Again! Someone was in the labyrinth, someone who was approaching by stealth and had not thought fit to announce their presence by calling out to her. She was almost running now, scared to look behind her, her spine tingling with fear, expecting at any moment to feel a hand clamp itself on her shoulder or—horror of horrors—a stab of pain as a dagger pierced her back. If Henry really did mean to marry Alys, her removal would be all too convenient. Yet she could not, even in extremis, imagine Henry being the kind of man who would send an assassin to kill her. Yet Henry, she knew, was prone to saying violent things in his ungovernable rages, things he did not mean—look what happened with Becket! Supposing he had said something similar of her: “Who will rid me of this turbulent queen?”
She was lost and desperate to get out but had to pause for breath or she would collapse. She came to a halt at a corner, her chest heaving, and looked both ways. Nothing stirred. There was only the sibilant rustling of leaves and the occasional twitter of a tiny bird. Then she heard it again. Crunch, this time followed by a faint cry that could almost have been a sob. Ahead of her. There was no rhyme or reason to it. Did the person stalking her know where they were going?
She would not run this time. She would tread silently, and keep her wits about her. She crept furtively along the paths, steeling herself to take her time and breathing shallowly. Then, turning another corner, she glimpsed, ahead of her, the trail of a gray gown disappearing into the briars. And that cry again, faint but distinct, and definitely a sob. A woman, then! But what woman? Her fear abated a little. She was equal to besting a woman! It was the brute strength of a man she had feared.
Eleanor followed carefully, keeping her distance, noticing that she was very near to the edge of the maze, for beyond stood the high wall of the hunting lodge. Crunch. It was behind her again, on the path she had just walked—but how could that be? She would have had to pass whoever it was, surely?
She was becoming a little weary of this game of cat and mouse, and increasingly chilled in body and soul. The light was fading fast, the moon rising, and all she wanted was to get back to her bower and the down-to-earth common sense of Amaria, so it was with enormous relief that she suddenly espied the entrance to the maze ahead of her. Yet, once through it, she did not immediately hurry back to the hunting lodge. She could see the two guards who always trailed her standing at attention by the garden door, so, taking courage from their presence, she concealed herself behind a straggling mulberry tree to watch for her pursuer emerging from the labyrinth—for without doubt they must soon do so. There was no other way out, and they could not remain there all night.
She waited, in increasing puzzlement, for nigh on half an hour, but no one appeared. Nor did she hear any more footfalls or other noises that might betray the presence of someone in the maze. The night was quiet, its peace unbroken. Then, just as she was deciding to go indoors, her attention was captured by the dim but unmistakable flicker of a candle in the upper room of Rosamund’s tower. She caught her breath. Someone was indeed playing games with her! Were they deliberately trying to frighten her? Tomorrow, she vowed, she would get to the bottom of this, and that person would be made to account for their purpose in disturbing the Queen!
Once back in the safety of her bower, she told a surprised Amaria and a skeptical Ralph FitzStephen of her experiences. FitzStephen had the maze searched, and the tower unlocked and inspected, but found nothing to account for what Eleanor had heard and seen. It was not until two mornings later that she was given a less than satisfactory explanation for what had happened, when Amaria brought the local laundry woman to see her. They had fallen to chatting on the banks of the River Glyne, as the woman washed sheets, and Amaria told her of the Queen’s fright in the labyrinth.
The laundress was nervous of speaking to so great a lady, but determined to tell Eleanor what she knew.
“That baint no ‘uman soul in that there maze,” she declared. “Shewalks. Some has heard her, heard her footsteps. They be all around, no rhyme or reason to them.”
“Who walks?” Eleanor asked gently. The laundress’s words had chilled her.
“Why, the Fair Rosamund, o’ course, lady, her as people say was murd—” She stopped in mid-flight, remembering to whom she spoke. “Begging your pardon, lady, it’s only what fools say. But shewalks, no doubt about it. And she’ve been seen up in that tower. Sheweeps for her sins! And another thing, young Matt, the miller’s boy, he’s seen her, in the maze! Well, not her, so to speak of—but he caught a glimpse of her gown; it were gray!”
Eleanor froze. She had not mentioned that detail.
She still did not quite know if she believed what the laundress had said when permission arrived for her to remove to Winchester so she could be present at Matilda’s confinement. If the tale was true, then why should Rosamund appear to her rival, Eleanor, the woman she had wronged in life?
“Stop thinking about it,” Amaria counseled in her blunt way. “It’s just gossip.”
“I’m not so sure,” Eleanor said thoughtfully. “It was a nightmarish experience, but I did not dream it. Can malice survive the grave? I can hardly believe Rosamund was trying to seek my forgiveness—it was an odd way to go about it, scaring me half to death like that.”
“It’s all nonsense!” Amaria snorted.
“I know what I heard, and saw,” Eleanor insisted. “You were not there. But we will say no more of it.”
“Mayhap, my lady,” interrupted FitzStephen, staggering into the bower with a pile of cloth-wrapped bundles in his arms, “there is no reasoning behind the appearances of spirits, and it means nothing at all—or you were mistaken in what you heard and saw; it could have been a shadow, or some small creatures of the night. Now, here are some parcels for you from the Lord King.”
Eleanor temporarily forgot her puzzlement as she unwrapped the gifts and exclaimed delightedly over the bold scarlet bliautlined with gray miniver that she found in the first, the saddle worked with gold and trimmed with fur in the second, and the embroidered cushions in the third. Nor had Henry omitted to send gifts to Amaria, of whom he soundly approved: for her, there were fine linen headrails and an amethyst brooch.
Peace offerings, Eleanor told herself. He won’t admit that he has again treated me—and our sons—unjustly, so he sends presents instead. Her spirits lifted and she had to smile. It was so typical of Henry—and it augured well for a happy resolution to all the quarreling.
As for that strange Rosamund business, she knew she would never convince herself entirely that it had not been a supernatural experience. And the appalling thought occurred to her that Rosamund had not yet found the eternal peace that is every Christian soul’s hope and desire, and that her shade was condemned to a relentless earthly purgatory in expiation of her sins. The notion chilled her immeasurably, for she herself was no longer young, and Divine Judgment could not be far off! Might she too be condemned to walk this Earth for eternity, at Poitiers, the place where she had plotted her husband’s betrayal—or, worse still, in the grim keep of Sarum? Heaven forbid! She had best start ensuring that she lived wisely and virtuously from now on. That would make a change, she thought, with the hint of a darkly humorous smile playing on her lips.