Louis, Robert, Alphonse and then John all following each other and taking as little time as possible to do so. Four healthy grandsons. How Philip gloated! God could not have been displeased after all.
News reached the Court of France which astonished all those who heard it. Queen Isabella, widow of King John, had arrived in Lusignan with her daughter Joan who was betrothed to Hugh de Lusignan, but having set eyes on Isabella he had decided to marry her instead.
Philip laughed heartily.
‘I remember her well. When John made off with her they called her the Helen of the thirteenth century. To see her was to understand why. I believe quite a number of men were completely bewitched by her. John certainly was. As for Hugh de Lusignan he waited all these years for her. But I doubt not that he has married trouble.’
‘I doubt it not either,’ said Blanche.
Philip looked sideways at his daughter-in-law. She would be remembering her meeting with Isabella; and she would feel that natural antipathy to her which he supposed most women would feel towards one who must put them all in the shade.
He wondered whether Isabella had lost any of that allure. He doubted it. Women like that kept it to the end of their days and the fact that Hugh had taken her instead of her young daughter suggested that she still retained that potent power to attract men.
Blanche was uneasy yet she could not understand why the thought of Isabella’s being near should make her so. She had felt an inexplicable revulsion when they had met and in spite of what most people would think, it had nothing to do with envy of a blatant ability to attract men.
‘I trust Hugh will be happy with her,’ she said to Louis.
‘He has never married and it is almost as though he waited for her, so he must be sure of his feelings.’
‘I would suspect that she brought her daughter to Lusignan with the idea of marrying the bridegroom herself.’
Louis did not really believe that was possible, but then he was a very innocent man.
When news came to the court that Hugh refused to send her daughter back to England until Isabella’s dowry was sent out, the comment was that this would be Isabella’s doing. For all his valour Hugh was a quiet man.
‘Depend upon it,’ said Philip, ‘she will lead him by the nose.’
‘I wonder how she likes being the wife of a count when she has been a queen,’ murmured Blanche.
‘I’ll wager you she does not like it at all,’ said Philip.
‘Then,’ replied Blanche, ‘the chances are that she will attempt to do something about it.’
‘What can she do?’ asked Philip. ‘She married him of her own free will. She is back to what she would have been if John had not seen her riding in the forest. At least Hugh won’t hang her lovers over her bed.’
‘It is to be hoped that she will not take any and be satisfied with her husband.’
Philip shrugged his shoulders and Blanche’s uneasiness persisted.
For some time Philip had been plagued by the Albigensians against whom, because they were in the South of France, the Pope had commanded him to campaign. To go into battle with them was going into battle for the Church and it was an opportunity for a man to receive a remission of his sins where, before this sect has arisen, he would have to make the long, tedious and dangerous journey to the Holy Land to achieve the same purpose.
The Albigenses, so called because they lived in the diocese of Albi, were a people who loved pleasure, music and literature; they were by no means irreligious, but they liked to indulge in freedom of thought. Their great pleasure was to discuss ideas and examine doctrines and the Pope, recognising in this a danger, sent men of the Church to preach to these people and point out the folly and the danger of their discourse. The result was what might have been expected. The preachers were listened to at first and when it was discovered that they had not come to develop ideas but to prevent the discussion of them, were ignored.
The Church was watchful. It feared that irrefutable arguments might be put forward against it. Seventy or eighty years earlier Peter Abelard had been such a danger. His rationalistic interpretation of the Christian doctrines had caused him to be branded a heretic and St Bernard, the Abbot of Clairvaux, had thundered against him. His love affair with Heloise, who became Prioress of Argenteuil and Abbess of the Paraclete had been of use to Bernard and Abelard had been defeated.
St Bernard had visited Toulouse which was the centre of this unrest which had been brought about by the interference of the Church. The people of Albi had no wish to interfere with existing Church lore, merely to have the freedom to discuss and worship in their own way.
There had been attempts to carry out persecutions but these had come to little. Raymond, Count of Toulouse, was an easygoing man. He did not want trouble with Rome, nor did he wish to antagonise his subjects. When he died his son Raymond, the sixth Count, reigned in his place. He proved to be pleasure-loving, musical, cultured and was even more lenient than his father had been. At his court religion was freely discussed and he himself became interested in the new ideas.
With the coming of Innocent III to the Papal Throne the persecution of the Albigensians broke into a cruel war, out of which had grown what was known as the Holy Office or the Inquisition. The Church was determined to stamp out heretics and was prepared to go to any lengths to do this. Those who disagreed with the doctrines as laid down by the Church were tortured in various barbaric ways and if they refused to change their views – and sometimes even if they did – were burned alive at the stake.
Innocent had found a man useful to him in Simon, Count of Montfort-l’Amaury. This man had belonged to a family which, from small beginnings, had in a few generations enriched itself. The first Lord Montfort had adopted his name and title simply because he owned a small castle between Paris and Chartres. Marriage brought them wealth and standing and the earldom of Leicester, but the Count had quickly realised that the chances of advancing himself with John were not good and that he would be better under Philip of France, so he came to his Norman estates and lived there.
He saw a chance of making his name and fortune in the war against the Albigensians and as he had qualities of leadership and was also a fierce Catholic, he was soon renowned as the leader of the crusade.
In a short time he became the Captain General; and he was noted for his fierceness in battle, his genius for leadership and his fanatical cruelty.
Philip did not like de Montfort and deplored the campaign against the Albigensians. He was not deeply involved with religion and practised it out of a desire to placate the heavenly powers rather than out of piety. He had a strong sense of justice and from his father he had inherited a belief in moderation; and as the Counts of Toulouse were vassals of his he objected to the armies of the Pope fighting there.
Innocent had sent word to him that as a true Christian he owed it to his conscience and his God to fight with the army of the righteous.
‘The army of the righteous!’ cried Philip. ‘Who is to say which is the righteous? What harm have the Albigensians ever done to anyone but themselves if they are indeed heretics? And surely God is capable of dealing with those who defy His laws … if indeed they are His laws. But it may be that His Holiness has made a mistake in interpreting them.’
He wrote to the Pope. ‘I have on my flanks two terrifying lions – the Emperor Otho and King John of England – who are working with all their might to bring trouble upon the Kingdom of France.’ He had no inclination, he said, at that time to march against the Albigensians nor to send his son but he had intimated to his barons in the province of Narbonne that they might march against disturbers of the peace.