5 The Princess Sophronia
Four weeks, all but a day, had passed. And the whole kingdom had taken on an air of great excitement, of happy expectation. Every town and village and hamlet was making ready for a holiday. For the subjects of the King, without waiting for any royal commands, had decided there should be national rejoicing at his marriage.
It looked, the older ones said, as though it would be an even greater celebration than when the young King was crowned. For then he had been little more than a lad. And a country never feels quite safe from revolution, with a boy on the throne and a strong ambitious nobility thirsty for power. Nor had the people then known what manner of ruler this youngster would turn out to be. But after nine years of the Reign of Peace had rolled by, and the young King had shown his true greatness and generous nature, word had now been spread through the land that he was about to marry. And there was hardly one, even among the lowliest and most poor, who did not greet the news almost as though it were of a happy wedding in his own family.
This gladness was made greater still when it was learned that the King was marrying the lady of his heart, for love, and not a great princess to increase the power and wealth of the realm. Barbara was only a countess, a member of the lesser nobility, and had not even been seen by many; but it was said that her beauty was the rarest the land had ever known and her gracious kindness no less. Such a marriage of romance pleased the people far more than a great alliance to a neighbouring kingdom—which, as often as not, meant nothing in the end but more wars and trouble. And they nodded their heads sagely as they made their villages gay for the festival, saying it was just like the young King to marry the girl he loved, the same as they would have done themselves.
But of course the fluttering excitement was highest of all at the castle itself. Here, as the great day came nearer, the happy bustle of preparation had grown and grown; till now, on the eve of the wedding, the great palace buzzed like a beehive under an August sun at noon.
Everyone, even the Queen Mother herself, had been untiringly busy. For, while some hundreds of extra servants had been hired to do the actual work, it was necessary that they should be watched and guided every minute; and this was the duty of the old and trained retainers, the officers of the Royal Household, and the members of the King’s own family. The Queen Mother devoted almost her whole attention to Barbara’s new wardrobe. Gowns, gowns and more gowns! By the score, dressmakers, tailors, shoemakers, jewellers and glovers were busy in her apartments at all hours. The well-beloved little old lady was determined that her son’s wife should be the best-dressed queen that ever mounted the throne.
Never had so many guests been invited to the castle: dukes, bishops, princes and even kings of foreign lands. A whole army of carpenters and workers had to be called in to put up new buildings in an unbelievably short time to provide quarters for all. And this, in order that everyone should have apartments worthy of his rank, with furniture and silken hangings and what not, required a lot of planning and overseeing.
The Chief of the Royal Cooks lost a lot of weight from his enormous figure getting in and storing away hundreds of wagon-loads of good things to eat. He, too, was determined that his department should do its best, and better, at the great festival.
Then there were the games and entertainments to be looked to. The Master of the Horse, helped by Luke (who now showed great skill in riding and tilting), arranged a two days’ programme of tournament and joust, in which the foreign knights could try their lances against the nobles of the King. In this Giles’s friend, the good Count Godfrey, also aided.
And Geoffrey (busy enough already, raising wedding roses for a queen) was given a new task in the royal service. This was to search the country for players, acrobats, jugglers and singers to entertain the King and his guests. The Gipsy, who knew the haunts of such troupes, soon gathered to the castle a whole host of show folk. These rehearsed merry plays and masques and dances on the green sward above the Lower Lake, now dotted with their tents.