By slow stages William made the journey to Bayeux, his son riding by the side of his tutor, chattering merrily all the way. In obedience to his summons, all the nobles and chieftains from Normandy and Brittany were assembled there, and met him on the day appointed in the great hall of the castle. In spite of his illness, from which he had by no means recovered, William was a splendid figure as he sat on a carved chair placed on the dais, with the ducal crown upon his head, and looked down on the stalwart men gathered before him. By his side stood Richard in a green tunic, a small copy of his father, and he faced them with a smile in his eyes, till their hearts went out to him. Amidst a dead silence, William rose to his feet.
'I cannot speak much,' he said, 'for I have been sick unto death, but I have brought here my young son, to bid you accept him as your duke in my stead, and to tell you the plans I have made for his guidance, while he is still a boy. He will live here at Bayeux, and will learn the lore of his forefathers, and three good men and true, Botho, Oslac, and Bernard the Dane, have the care of him, as before in his early years. Besides them, seven other nobles will give counsel. This is my wish. Will you swear to abide by it, and to take the oath of fealty to your new duke?'
'We swear,' they cried with one voice, and then each man in turn took Richard's hand in his, and did homage. Then father and son bid each other farewell, for William must needs go on other business.
After this wonderful scene, in which he had played so important a part, life felt for a while somewhat tame to Richard, and at first he was rather inclined to give himself airs of authority and to refuse obedience to Botho. The count of Bayeux was not, however, a person to put up with behaviour of this sort, and in a short time Richard was learning his lessons and shooting and fishing as diligently as before. But this state of things did not last long. One evening a man-at-arms rode up on a tired horse and demanded speech of Bernard the Dane. It was a sad story he had to tell; duke William had been bidden, as all men already knew, on a certain day to meet king Louis at Attigny, in order to answer some charges of murder which had been made against him. It was the custom to allow three days of grace on account of the accidents that were apt to befall travellers in those rough times, but the appointed hour was past when William rode up to the castle, and found the door closed against him. Furious at being shut out, he ordered his men to force an entrance, and, striding up to the dais, dragged his enemy Otho of Germany from the throne by the side of the king, and beat him soundly. Of course, such an insult to the ally of the king of France could not be passed over, but instead of punishing it openly, William was entrapped into going to an island in the middle of the river, and there murdered.
At this news all Normandy was in an uproar, for, as has been said, William's subjects loved him well and grieved for him deeply; and by none was he more sorely mourned than by his cast-off wife Espriota, who had for these few past months been living near her son, and had seen him occasionally. But this was now at an end, for Richard was at once removed by his guardians to the palace of Rouen, there to attend his father's burial and his own coronation, which was in its way as important an event as that of the king of France, who had but little territory or power in comparison with some of his great nobles.
When the young duke reached Rouen he found that his father's body had been removed from the palace whither it had been taken after his murder, and was lying in state in the cathedral of Notre Dame, with the famous long sword, from which he had gained his nickname, on his breast. The grave had been dug close by, opposite to his father Rollo's, the first duke and conqueror of Normandy, and beside it was an empty place, where Richard guessed that he would some day rest. The cathedral was crowded that morning, and many thoughts of love and pity were given, not only to the dead man, but to the fair-haired boy of nine who stood by the bier, not overcome with grief for the father whom he had scarcely seen, but awed and a little bewildered at what would be expected of him. All through the long service Richard stood still, now and then gazing wonderingly at the multitude which filled the body of the cathedral. Then, after the coffin had been lowered into the grave, the great doors were thrown open, and he was led forward by Bernard and presented to his subjects, Normans, Bretons, and Danes, who welcomed him with a shout. The priest next came slowly down the chancel, and Richard, kneeling before him, received his blessing, and swore as far as in him lay to preserve peace to the Church and to the people, to put down tyranny, and to rule justly. Rising to his feet, the ring of sovereignty was put on his finger and the sword of government buckled to his side; then, taking his stand before the sacred shrine, the book of the Gospels being held by a priest on his left hand, and the Holy Rood or Cross by another on his right, he waited for the chiefs and nobles to take the oath of loyalty to him.
Now it was plain to all men that troubles were nigh at hand for the duchy. 'Woe to the land whose king is a child' it is written in Scripture, and Richard's wise councillors knew full well what they might expect from king Louis. They met together the night after the funeral, when the little duke, worn out by all he had gone through, was fast asleep, and consulted together how they could get the better of king Louis, and at last they decided that they would escort Richard without delay to Compiègne, where the king then was, and induce Louis to invest him at once with the duchy. No time was lost in putting this plan into execution; but even Norman cleverness was no match for the wiliness of the king. Blinded by their kind reception and by flattering words, they awoke one day to find that they had taken the oath of fealty to Louis as their immediate overlord, and thus it was he, and not Richard, whom they were bound to obey. Deeply ashamed of themselves, they returned with their charge to Rouen; but during their short absence the Danish party, headed by Thermod, had obtained the upper hand, and soon got possession of Richard himself, even persuading the boy to renounce Christianity and declare himself a pagan. This of course gave the chance for which Louis had been hoping. It was, he said, a duty he owed both to the Church and to Richard to put a stop to such backsliding, and forthwith he marched straight to the capital. After several skirmishes, in one of which Thermod the Dane was killed, Louis entered Rouen as a conqueror, and under pretext of protection took Richard into his own custody, and proceeded to administer the laws.
Perhaps if Louis from Beyond the Seas had been brought up in France he would have known better the sort of people he had to deal with; but when he was a little child his mother had been forced to fly with him to the court of his grandfather Athelstan, where he had grown up, learning many things, but not much of his subjects, several of whom were far more powerful than he. To these Normans, or Northmen of Danish blood, and to the Bretons, who were akin to the Welsh, the king of France, though nominally their sovereign, was really as much a foreigner as Otho of Germany. He was not going to rule them, and that he would soon find out! So one day they appeared before the palace and demanded their duke, and as he was not given up to them they broke into open revolt, and not only gained possession of Richard, but made Louis himself prisoner. In this manner the tables were turned: Richard was once more duke in his own duchy, and Louis was kept in strict confinement till he swore to Bernard the Dane to restore to Normandy the rights which had been forfeited at Compiègne. But even so the boy's guardians had not learned wisdom, for in spite of what had happened before they were persuaded by Louis on some slight pretext to allow him to carry Richard back to the royal town of Laon, and once there he was instantly placed, with Osmond a Norman noble, under arrest in the tower.
By this time, 944, Richard was eleven years old, and the strange life he had led since his father died had ripened him early. On many occasions when his life had been in peril he had shown not only great courage but self-control beyond his age. Danger he delighted in, it only excited him; but in the tower of Laon time hung heavy on his hands, for he was forbidden to go outside the walls, and he was growing weak and languid from want of exercise. Great, therefore, was his delight when one morning at the hour that Louis sat in judgment on the cases brought by his people, his guardian Osmond came to tell him that he had two horses standing at a small gate at the back of the courtyard, and would take him out for a day's hawking.