It was small wonder, Eleanor often thought, that she had remained enamoured of him.
He was always in her thoughts. She wondered what would have happened if she could have married him when she married Louis. That made her laugh. Henry had been but a baby at that time. She had never noticed the difference in their ages. Had he, she wondered?
Their passion was as strong as ever, and after their separations which happened frequently, they were united as they had been in the first days of their marriage.
She was, of course, learning to know him. His temper was quick and violent and when it arose everyone around him was terrified. His nostrils would flare and his eyes flash; he would kick inanimate objects and sometimes lie on the floor and pummel it with his fists.
These rages were terrible and when they occurred it was as though devils possessed him.
Eleanor, capable of showing anger herself, was horrified to see the extent to which Henry’s rages carried him. During the first years of their marriage she had seen little of this side of his nature because he had been so content with his marriage and his gaining of the English crown. But when any crossed him, these fits of anger would take possession of him, and once he had decided that any man or woman was his enemy he could never see them as anything else.
Nevertheless she understood him and she loved him and he was sufficient for her. She would have liked him to have joined her on those occasions when her troubadours were gathered about her. She would have liked Henry to have sung a song of love which he had written to her.
Henry had little time for such pastimes. So she sighed and decided that she would hold her little court without him.
There were many who were ready to sing their songs to her. She felt young again. Ardent eyes glowed into hers while delicate fingers - different from Henry’s blunt weather-battered ones - plucked at lute strings.
What have I done since my marriage to Henry? she asked herself as she listened. I have borne children - three in three years. I have either been pregnant or giving birth. She laughed. The duty of a queen of course but hardly fitting for the heroine of a love song.
Henry had seemed content. The death of little William had shocked him, not so much for the loss of the child but because he was his eldest son. They had young Henry - that was good - and Matilda, but Henry wanted more sons. He was constantly speaking of the plight of his grandfather Henry I who had had one legitimate son - though many illegitimate ones - and when that son had been drowned there was only his daughter to follow him. What had happened? Civil war.
‘We must get sons,’ said Henry. ‘We have my little namesake but look what happened to William. We need more sons and we must get them while you are of an age to bear them.’
He was in his early twenties - plenty of time for him. But her? The time when she would cease to be able to bear children was not so far away.
This was the first reference to the difference in their ages. It ruffled her like the faintest stirring of a rising wind.
And so she must go on bearing children. She could be a fond mother but she was a woman of too strong a personality to subdue it to that of others - husband or children.
Encroaching age, childbearing, those were matters for the future. Here she was in her beloved chateau surrounded by troubadours whose delight it was to sing songs to the lady of their dreams, and who could inspire them to such ecstasy as their Queen?
There was one among all those who sang to her who attracted her attention more than any other. This was a handsome young man named Bernard. He called himself Bernard de Ventadour but it was whispered that he had no right to the name. It was true that he had been born in the Chateau de Ventadour, but his enemies said that he was the son of one of the kitchen women and a serf. The Comte and Comtesse de Ventadour, as was the custom with so many, allowed the child to be brought up on their estate and so he would have had access to the castle.
That he was possessed of especial gifts was soon apparent, and as the Count and Countess loved song and poetry he was allowed to join their company of singers.
It soon became clear that he was a poet of no small ability and as both the Count and Countess encouraged him, his fame spread and many came to the castle to hear his verses.
The subject of these was, naturally, love, and every poet of the day selected the most beautiful and desirable lady of his circle to whom to address his words. The Countess of Ventadour was undoubtedly a beautiful woman and to whom should a member of her household address his poems but to the lady of the castle?
The songs of Bernard grew more and more daring and as he sang them he would sit at the feet of the Countess and give her the benefit of his eloquent love-hungry eyes. This was the custom; each troubadour had his lady; but most of the troubadours were of noble families and that the son of an oven girl and a serf should raise his eyes to a countess and sing of his longings was more daring than could be countenanced.
In any case the Count thought so. He told Bernard that there was no longer a place for him at the Chateau de Ventadour.
Bernard could do nothing but prepare to leave. He was not unduly disturbed, for he had heard that Queen Eleanor was in residence in her native land and his reputation as one of the finest poets in the land had travelled far.
He presented himself to Eleanor who received him immediately for she had long admired his poems and even set some of them to her own music.
‘You are welcome,’ she told him. ‘I look forward to hearing you sing for us.’
To express respectful admiration was second nature to Bernard. And now that the beauty of the Countess was removed it was replaced by a brighter luminary. Eleanor could not help but be pleased by the frank admiration, bordering on adoration, which she read in his eyes. It was comforting following on Henry’s implication that they must get sons while she still had time to bear them.
Bernard, now known as Bernard de Ventadour - as fine a name as any of Eleanor’s courtiers - became the favoured poet of the Queen’s entourage. He was constantly at her feet. Poems and songs poured from him and their subject was always Eleanor, the Queen of Love.
She could not but be pleased. Bernard had such a beautiful voice. He was writing some of the best poetry in France and it was to her. Such words intoxicated her.
Henry came once upon her circle of troubadours and sat down among them. His quick eyes took in the sprawling figure of Bernard de Ventadour at her feet and he noticed the soft looks Eleanor cast in the poet’s direction.