The response was a lazy hand waved in the direction of the tower. It did not get them a greeting of any kind, nor a smile: if anything the look was one of suspicion from a woman with hard eyes and little humour. Long before the sun had caught metal atop the castellated donjon, lance tips most like, and looking hard into the glare, now they were near, the brothers could see the helmets of those set to watch out for approaching danger, men who must have first seen them, on so flat a landscape, a good half a league away.
The sound of clacking wood and grunting came to them as they cleared the huts and that revealed a large, fenced-off and sand-filled manege equipped with low poles set up as jumps, some followed by deep ditches, and thick upright baulks of timber showing the cuts where they had been smitten by hundreds of sword blows. Lance targets stood at the end of long balancing poles, while in a line shields stood at the height they would be when held by a foot soldier, next to a circular wood target marked with roundels. In the middle, two lines of tough-looking men were practising swordplay with round wooden staves.
Activity ceased as they rode past, every eye examining these newcomers, stares that were returned, but they did not stop, instead riding on to the square tower. Close to, this donjon did not look so white: the stones were streaked with the effects of age, moss was thick at the base, the mortar at the joins of the blocks was crumbling and there was some blackening around the door to show that at some time a fire had been lit at the base in an attempt to burn out the defenders. This was a fortress that had stood for tens of years, perhaps hundreds, perhaps long enough to have once been occupied by Roman legionaries.
The heavily studded door, topped by a carved armorial device, was now open; attack the place and the ramp that led to it would disappear inside, while the door would be slammed shut. Several floors below the living quarters of the defenders it would be the well that guaranteed a steady supply of water, stalls for horses and a byre for animals which would be kept alive to eat, just above them the storerooms full of hay, oats, pulses and peas, enough to keep fed the knights who would man the walls.
As the brothers dismounted a figure appeared in that doorway, which immediately brought half a dozen lean hunting hounds out from under the ramp where they had been dozing, not least because the fellow observing them had in his hand a piece of leg bone on which he had been gnawing. As broad as he was tall, in a fine surcoat decorated with a coat of arms, the man eyed them up through what appeared to be slits in his deep-purple face, making both brothers conscious of how they must appear: weary, dust covered and in garments that, after five months of travelling, were close to threadbare.
‘William and Drogo de Hauteville,’ William said in French, his voice rasping in a dry throat, ‘seeking to take service with Rainulf Drengot.’
The bone was tossed aside, which sent the dogs scurrying to fight over it as the fellow responded in the same tongue. ‘You are Norman?’
‘We are.’
‘From?’
‘Hauteville-le-Guichard, where our father has his demesne.’
‘I do not know it.’
‘It is in the Contentin.’
William was aware that some of the men they had passed had left the manege to follow them and were gathering to listen to the exchange. Though he did not turn to look he heard the growl in his brother’s throat and assumed he had. Drogo, amongst his other faults, was inclined to brawl, almost without cause being given and quite impervious to numbers, so he whispered a caution to tell him to stay still.
‘A land of rough folk, the Contentin, I’m told,’ said the fellow at the top of the ramp. ‘Ill-mannered and quarrelsome.’
‘Others may have told you that it is a land that breeds good fighting men.’
‘What others would they be?’
‘Duke Robert thought us the best.’
‘How can I ask Duke Robert? He is dead.’
‘God rest his soul.’
William crossed himself as he replied; they had heard in Rome that their one-time liege lord had died on his way back from the Holy Land. They had also heard that the whole of Normandy was in danger of disorder over the succession. It made no difference to him and Drogo; they were too far south and too strapped for the means of existence to think of turning back.
‘My father, brothers and I fought under his banner at Bessancourt when he aided the King of the Franks to bring his rebellious brother to heel.’
‘Before which, I am told, he named his bastard son as his successor.’
Even if he had worries about how such things might affect his family, it was not the way William wanted this discussion to go. ‘If you know of that battle you will know that we Normans won it. Henry, King of the Franks, could not have done so unaided. The men of the Contentin were in the front rank.’
‘Duke Robert was a fool to name his bastard as his successor and an even bigger fool to die while he was still a child.’ The man waited to see if William would respond to that, in fact, display his own feelings on the matter; he waited in vain. ‘So once you fought for Duke Robert and now you would like to fight for me?’
‘If you are Rainulf, yes. We were told by those who have returned to Normandy that we would be welcome.’
‘More than welcome,’ hissed Drogo. ‘Embraced.’
Rainulf looked over their heads at the men to the rear. ‘What do you say? Shall we try out these Contentin ruffians?’
‘Try out?’ demanded Drogo.
Rainulf looked past William to his brother, not in the least upset, it seemed, by Drogo’s angry glare.
‘Many men come here from our homeland and claim they are doughty fighters. Most are, some are not. It is best that we find such things out before our lives might be forfeit for an error of judgement. Behind you, in the manege, we can carry out all the tests we need to see what you are made of, both on foot and mounted. So, let us see your mettle.’
William was surprised. ‘Now?’
‘I can think of no better time.’
‘Our horses need rest.’
Rainulf smiled for the first time, but it was not warm. ‘If you can assure me that when I fight I will do so rested, then I will let you have that. But if you ask those fellows behind you they will tell you that Campania is a place of snares and ambush, where trust is a virtue that can get you killed, a place where a morning friend can be an afternoon enemy. So, it is best to be ready to do battle in an instant. You have your swords, and I see your lances and shields. All you need do is don hauberks and helmets and move your saddles to your destriers.’
‘A little time, perhaps till the sun cools?’
Rainulf shook his head. ‘Prepare to show us your quality, or prepare to ride out of here.’
By the time they had donned their mail and helmets, and moved the high-formed saddles to the destriers, Rainulf Drengot had arranged for another eight riders to be made ready. There was no need to explain to a Norman knight what was required — the basic fighting unit, the source of the success of their cavalry arm, was a convoy of ten lances which, unlike the mounted knights of other forces, operated as a disciplined unit and could be multiplied by joining several convoys together.
Drogo and William were separated. On one side of each was the shield of an unfamiliar neighbour, on the other their own shields touched that of another rider, neither of whom looked in their direction. Like the brothers, their animals were especially bred for the task, steady and fearless; they would have been constantly put through their paces against false shield walls so that facing the real thing became familiar.
Back in Hauteville-le-Guichard there was a valley field where they had practised these very same skills. Neighbours had often come to joust and train just as the de Hautevilles had gone to them. No festival gathering at the nearby cathedral town of Coutances had been complete without a show of equine and armed skill that, with spirited young men pitted against each other in what was supposed to be mock combat, had quite often descended into a brawl that drew copious blood.