The Passionate Brood Read Online Free PDF Page A

like the way you used to cry out for something in the night, my pretty. Just another impossible dream. But you always forgot about them in the morning, didn’t you, my poppet?” And across the bright, stricken head she held so tenderly to her bosom Hodierna met the Queen’s surprised, questioning look, and nodded.
    “It certainly was time Henry found her a husband!” thought Eleanor. “But I wish he had forgotten his foreign diplomacy for once and found her a young one!”

Chapter Four
    Blondel de Cahaignes’ first morning at Oxford was anything but dull. He had already laid the King’s table and been sent to gather up the Duke of Normandy’s arrows when John Plantagenet came rushing down the Keep stairs shouting to all and sundry, “They’re coming back from Banbury! I was the first to see them from the battlements.”
    Instantly the whole Castle came to life. The inner bailey, drowsing before high noon, suddenly became alive with grooms and baying hounds and servants waiting to unload the pack horses. In the great kitchen the cooks hurried on the midday meal. Caught up in the general excitement, Blondel dumped his arrows on the first bench he came to in the armoury and ran out again into the sunshine, almost cannoning into John. They eyed each other with approval. “If you’re Richard’s new page, I’d nip in and hold his bridle before the others get a chance,” advised the youngest member of the family in his most engaging manner. “He likes brisk service.”
    Blondel grinned his thanks and dived under the elbows of the waiting grooms just as Richard and Robin came riding in. They were followed by a bunch of chattering pages and the Steward of the royal household, who had taken the opportunity of replenishing his stores. Blondel looked quickly from one to the other of the two tall, bare-headed young men and found that except for their height and a certain similarity of gesture they were not in the least alike. If Richard looked the stronger of the two it was because he lacked Robin’s sinuous grace. His comely head was capped by the smooth family auburn, while brown hair curled strongly from Robin’s thoughtful forehead. There was no mistaking which was the Plantagenet so—although there was plenty of competition—the new page slipped in first to hold his master’s horse. “Stout work!” approved Richard, amused at his enterprise. “I suppose you are young de Cahaignes?” And Blondel, who had spent so many anxious hours wondering what this man would be like, looked up with the appreciative smile that always lightened the solemnity of his face like sudden sunlight warming a grey mere. He was aware of three things he liked—virile warmth, a fine voice, and a sort of careless arrogance. He was too young to see latent cruelty in the firm mouth and in the lazy green eyes; but he did notice that Richard’s uncorrupted Norman sounded almost like a foreigner’s compared with Robin’s or John’s, and that his great horse stood a hand higher than any other man’s in the courtyard. And although the other pages were full of all they had done and seen at the fair, Blondel ceased to envy them.
    When the horses had been led away Richard and Robin stood by a flight of stone steps slaking their thirst while John plied them with questions. Half the garrison seemed to be crowding round, eager for news, and Blondel marvelled at the homeliness of it all and at how little it differed from home-comings at Horsted. Robin was telling them how he and Richard had put a fortune into the fair people’s pockets by entering for a competition in the wrestling booth.
    “Robin won, of course,” interpolated Richard, lifting his face from a second mug of ale. “He threw me twice.”
    “I had to,” explained Robin, “or the old hag would have got a ducking.”
    “What old hag?” asked John.
    “A fortune teller at the fair. Richard promised to keep his men off her if I won.”
    “She was a witch,” averred the men