Leaving, however, the Chroniclers’ views to themselves, let us look further at some of the facts which peep out in the narrative. Why, in the first place, we naturally ask, if the King was shot by accident, did his friends and attendants desert him? Why was he brought home in a cart, drawn by a wretched jade, the blood, not even staunched, flowing from the wound, clotting the dust on the road? Why, too, the indecent haste of his funeral? Why, afterwards, was no inquiry as to his death made? Why, too, was Tiril’s conduct not investigated? These questions are difficult to answer, except upon one supposition.
Let us note, also, that they are all ecclesiastics, to whom the revelations of the King’s speedy end had been made known, and that their special favourite, Henry, succeeded to the throne in spite of his elder brother’s right. It is, certainly, too, something more than singular that when the banished Anselm should visit Hugh, Abbot of Cluny, that the Abbot should tell him that during the past night he had seen William summoned before God and sentenced to damnation, and that the King’s death immediately followed: that further, on the next day, when he went to Lyons, his chaplain should be twice told by a youth of the death of William before it took place.[128] More than singular, too, are those words of Fulchered, spoken so openly and so daringly, “The bow of God’s vengeance is bent against the wicked; and the arrow swift to wound is already drawn out of the quiver.”[129]
Either all these persons were prophets, or accessories to the murder, or—for there is one more solution—the Chroniclers invented this portion of the story. If we admit this last supposition, we cannot receive the other parts of the narrative without the greatest suspicion. We have almost a sufficient warrant to read them in an exactly opposite sense to what they were intended to bear.
Let us remember, also, that Flambard, Rufus’s prime minister, who was universally hated by the clergy, and who had lately banished Godric, of Christchurch, into Normandy, was instantly stripped of his possessions by Henry, and Godric reinstated, and the banished Anselm recalled; and, lastly, and most important of all, that Tiril, who had just arrived from Normandy, was a friend of Anselm’s,[130] and, further, that Alanus de Insulis, better known as le Docteur Universel, who lived not long after the event, actually says that in his opinion it was caused by treachery.[131] Surely all these facts and coincidences point but one way. All tend to show, as plainly as possible, that Rufus fell by no chance, but by a conspiracy of his prelates, who held the crozier in one, and the battle-axe in the other hand.[132] The cause of their hatred is at once supplied by his refusing to pay St. Peter’s pence—denying the Pope’s supremacy—banishing Anselm—promoting Flambard—holding all the bishoprics and other offices which fell vacant[133]—by his cruelties to their different orders at Canterbury and Crowland, and throughout England, whose enmity died not with his death, but made them believe that the tower of Winchester Cathedral fell because they allowed him to be buried in its nave.
Reading, in the Chroniclers, the life of the Red King seems like rather reading a series of plots against it, not by the English, who were too thoroughly cowed to make the slightest resistance, but by his own prelates and barons.[134] His uncle Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, headed the first rebellion against him, as soon as he usurped the throne. William, Bishop of Durham, his own Minister, conspired against him. Bishop Gosfrith, with his nephew Robert, Earl of Northumberland, rebelled in the west. Roger Montgomery rose on the Welsh Marches. Roger Bigod in the eastern, and Hugo of Grentemesnil in the Midland Counties hoisted the flag of revolt.[135] Such was England at the beginning of his reign. In 1096, his own godfather, William of Aldrey, justly or unjustly, was accused of treason, and died on the gallows.[136] William, Count of Eu, kinsman to the King, suffered a worse fate for the same crime. His steward, William, also a kinsman of the King’s, was hung on a rood. Eudes, Count of Champagne, forfeited his lands. Others not only shared the same fate, but were deprived of their eyesight.[137] His northern barons, headed by Robert of Mowbray, goaded to desperation by the Forest Laws, rose in revolt. Roger of Yvery, son of the Conqueror’s favourite, led the Midland barons, and was obliged to fly, and all his vast estates, close to the New Forest, forfeited. Normandy, from whence Tiril had just come, swarmed with outlawed enemies, both churchmen and laymen. It was the nest where all the plots could be safely hatched.
Knowing all this, knowing, too, that the conspiracies became more frequent as his tyranny increased, we can scarcely avoid coming to but one conclusion as to his death.
It might suit the policy of the times to throw the guilt on Tiril, but Tiril certainly did not shoot the arrow. We have his own most solemn declaration to various people, and especially, not once but often, to Suger, the well-known Abbot of St. Denis, when he had nothing to gain or lose, that he had on the day of the King’s death not only not entered that part of the Forest, but had not so much as even seen him.[138]
Tiril, however, was certainly implicated in the plot. His haste to leave the country arose, probably, not so much from a wish to escape as to convey the news of the success to Normandy: and popular tradition mistaking the cause, with its usual inaccuracy, fixed on the wrong person as the assassin. In after years, however, from some scruple of conscience, he expiated his share in the murder by a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.
Who shot the fatal arrow we know not, and, perhaps, shall never know. We must not expect to get truth in history,—only, at the best, some faint glimmering. All is here confusion and darkness. John of Salisbury, who lived about the middle of the twelfth century, says it was as little known who killed the King as who slew Julian the Apostate.[139] The very spot where he fell is doubtful. One thing, however, seems certain, that he was slain, not, as the Chroniclers say, because his father made the New Forest, but through his own cruelties and excesses, by which he outraged both friend and foe.
It is not single passages which alone leave this impression, but still more the cumulative force of the evidence. The fact that all were gainers by his death, and the general abhorrence of the tyrant, are in themselves strong reasons. Not one, but all parties were bound together against him by the strongest of covenants—hatred. The marked and bitter prophecies, which would not have been uttered were not their fulfilment ensured,—the suspicious silence on all important points,—the pretended dreams and omens,—the abandonment of the body,—the want of any inquiry into the cause of death,—the connection between the Church party and Anselm with Henry I., and Anselm’s connection again with Tiril, all serve to show the depth and darkness of the plot.