The Brothers of Gwynedd

by Edith Pargeter

  Such ease I got from this utterance, I marvelled how I could have kept from making the avowal long before. Nor was it the ease of surrender and despair, but of release from bondage. And she stood before me so flushed and warmed with the reflection of my release that she was like a clear vessel filled with light.

  "Now," she said, "you do me justice indeed, and I will do the like for you. Why should you or I go hungry for want of what is ours to feed upon without harming any man or committing any sin? When first I learned to know you, not knowing myself whether I was wife or widow, I loved you for your great gentleness and goodness to a dying man who owned he had used you ill. It may be I did wrong to choose you, but choose you I did, for once lost to me you might never be recovered, and I tell you now, such an election happens only once in any life, and in most lives never. If it was a sin, the sin was mine, and there is no man can blame you. I went with you because it was more to me to have your dear companionship than any other man's love and worship. God he knows I hoped for more, but I have had hopes before that came to grief, and the lot laid on me I could bear. But when you took from me even your dear companionship, in which my heart rested, that I could not bear."

  "I do repent me," I said, "that ever I did a thing so weak and so unjust as to abandon you. My love and worship is yours only, and yours lifelong, even if I never speak the words to you again. And my service and loyalty I can offer freely, before all the world. Forgive me, that ever I did you so great a hurt."

  "You have healed me," she said. "I give you my pledge for yours. I shall never love any man but you."

  "Yet we are taking from Godred what is rightly his," I said, though I meant no protest against what was now past changing, but only to make all things clear between us, that we might know what it was we did.

  "We are taking from Godred," she said steadily, "nothing that he has ever possessed. I was wed to him when I was fourteen years old; I never saw him until the match was made. And we are taking from him, I swear to you, nothing that he values, even if he had once possessed it. I am a dutiful and serviceable wife to Godred, all he has asked of me I have been and done, and will do, and will be. And I have no complaint of him. But my love he never sought, or needed, or regarded. I do him no wrong."

  Behind her the candles guttered, and a thread of tallow ran down from the flame. The curtain swung lightly, for the door behind it was still open. I felt the chill touch of the night wind, as though someone trod close on my heels. But when I stilled to listen for a moment, there was no sound. And such doubt and fear as remained in me I spoke out then, saying it would not be easy, that if she wished to take back her decision and remain in the south I would still be her faithful lover all my days, though apart from her, and such comfort as there was in that knowledge she might have without the heroic pain of nearness and silence. But all she did was to smile at me with that wild radiance making her face glorious, and to ask me: "Is that your wish?" And there was nothing I could do but say, no! Her peace I desired. My own was safe in her hands. My wish was to see her and to serve her and to be at her call if ever she needed me. But that if it cost her too dear, that I could not endure.

  "My mind is as yours," she said. "I will not willingly go a month, a week, no, not a day if I had my way, without the sight of you, and the sound of your voice. What you can endure, so can I. If you can make a sacrament out of your sorrow and deprivation, so can I. What I cannot do is to cease from loving you, and I would not if I could. It is the best gift God ever gave me, to love you and be loved in return."

  In these high terms we made our compact, Cristin and I. And then it came upon me that no more must be said, that the time to set the seal on so lofty a purpose was now, when all the words had been uttered that were needed between us, once for all time, and it remained only to prove what we had sworn, and make it binding for ever. And the way to do that was to bid her goodnight and commit her to the blessing of God, and so go from her without so much as the touch of hands, or too lingering an exchange of looks, as if we still had doubts, who had none.

  So I did. And she, with as deep an understanding, gave me my goodnight back again, and turned to continue lifting the folded gowns from the chest. From this night on we were to meet before other people, and carry our daily burdens encountering and separating as our duties moved us, demanding nothing, repeating nothing, and even if by chance we met without witnesses, there would be no such exchange again, as none would be needed. Neither would there now be any resentment or any loneliness or any greed, for if we had not that great bliss of love fulfilled in the flesh, yet a manner of fulfilment, stranger and after its own fashion more marvellous, we surely had.

  I went out from her like one in an exalted dream, and did not look back, for her image was within me. And I thought myself both blessed and accursed, but if the one was the price of the other, of what then could I complain?

  In the inner ward of Carreg Cennen there was a faint silvering of moonlight, and on the wall I could hear the feet of the watch pacing. Out of the shadows near the great hall a man came walking lightly and briskly, and whistled as he came. When he drew near to me he broke off, and haled me cheerfully by name, in the voice of Godred.

  "Samson!" said he, as though surprised to find me still among the waking. "You work late tonight." And since he halted in friendly fashion, I was obliged to do the same, though I would gladly have avoided him then. "I am looking for my wife," he said. "Surely she cannot still be packing her gowns and bliauts? But you're the last man I should be asking—the prince's own clerk, and a bachelor is hardly likely to be involved with a matter of stuff gowns and linen wimples. I must go and find her."

  Yet he lingered, eyeing me with the intimate smile I had observed in him ever since the turn I had done him at Carmarthen bridge, when he was unhorsed and in danger of trampling.

  "I've had no chance to speak with you," he said, "since this evening's news, there's been such bustle to be ready to leave tomorrow. But I hope you may think it, as I do, a most happy chance that Cristin and I are to come and serve close to you, in Gwynedd. True, Cristin will be mainly at Neigwl, where the lady makes her home, but it's none so far, and we have peace now to travel and visit. And since David is often in attendance on the prince, I shall hope to be close to you very often during the year. Are you pleased?"

  So pointblank a question, and in a tone so warm and trusting, what could I do but own to pleasure? Which I did with the more heart, seeing it had its own enormous truth, out of his knowledge, which yet did him no injury.

  "So all things work together for good," he said. In the light of the moon I could see the fair smoothness of his face, boyish and bright, and the round, candid eyes limpid brown under his tanned forehead and silvery-fair hair. "I rejoice at being able to serve near to one who has once salvaged my life for me—and once, more precious, my wife! I feel you," he said, in that high, honeyed voice that made speech into song, "closer to me than a brother. Forgive me if I presume!" And he linked his hands in most becoming deprecation before his breast, in the full light of the moon, and the fingers of his right hand played modestly with the fingers of his left, turning and turning the ring upon the little finger, a silver seal bearing the image of a tiny hand, severed at the wrist, holding a rose. I had no need to see it more clearly, I knew it well. Once I had worn the fellow to it, my unknown father's solitary gift to my mother. I watched the silver revolving steadily, quite without the spasmodic motion of agitation or strain. "Closer than a brother!" said Godred, softly and devoutly.

  "You make too much," I said, "of services that fell to me by pure chance. There is no man among us would not have done as much in the same case."

  "Oh, no, you wrong yourself," said Godred fervently. "There are many who would have done less. And perhaps some," he said, "who would have done more." This last in the same honeyed tone, too cloying, as honey itself cloys. "Now in the north I may be able to repay all. All!" he said, and uttered a soft, shy laugh. "But I must go find my wife," he said, and
clapped me on the shoulder with the hand that wore the ring, and so passed on, silvered by the moon.

  I would have held him back from her then, if I could, to spare her the too sudden and too apt reminder, yet I knew that she was armed and able. It was not that that clouded all my ecstasy as I went slowly to my bed. But I could not help seeing still the slow, measured spinning of that silver ring, white in the moonlight, and hearing the soft insinuation of his voice. And I remembered too well the flickering of the candles in the draught from the door, and the chill of some presence treading hard on my heels. And my own voice saying in its own excuse: "You are my brother's wife. You knew it before ever I did. You saw the ring…" I prayed hard and slept little. And the next day we rode for Gwynedd.

  I said to David, when he brought his tall English horse to pace by my pony on the way: "Well, are you content with your work?" For still I bore him some ill-will for the trick he had played me, even as I rejoiced, pain and all, at my great gain by it.

  Said David, shrewd and shameless: "Are you?" And he looked at me along his shoulder, smiling. "You have a look of achievement about you, you and Cristin both. Did you come to a satisfactory understanding?"

  "Not as you suppose," I said sharply, for I was sure in my own mind of what he had intended, and it was galling enough to have one brother soliciting me like a pander, leave alone my breast-brother joining in the game.

  "Never be too confident," said David, "of what I am either supposing or provoking, you might go far astray. But if you think you could have gone on living in the same world with her and utterly estranged, for God's sake, man, get sense. If you could, in your holiness, why should she have to endure the like?"

  I own that any smart I felt against him, by that time, was but the reverse of my gratitude, and I admitted to myself that he might well be honest in his concern. But I had to ask him one more thing, for it was on my mind and I could not put it by.

  "Tell me this, did you follow me there to see what passed between us?"

  "No!" he said, indignant. "What do you think I am, that I should spy on you?"

  So if he had not, another had. But I did not say so to him, for there were already possibilities enough for mischief. "Closer than a brother!" rang the soft voice in my memory, and still I saw the silver ring revolving with delicate intent about the long finger.

  CHAPTER V

  Llewelyn moved his court to Aber in the middle of November, as was customary, ready to keep the Christmas feast there, and at the beginning of December Meurig rode into the llys, on his way to his own winter quarters at Caernarvon, for he was thin in the blood, and liked to burrow and hide himself like a hedgehog through the frost and snow. He brought us all the news from England, having come direct from Shrewsbury and, sitting snug by the fire like a little grey cat, talked familiarly of kings and earls and popes, and the building and dismemberment of the grand dream of the Provisions.

  "King Henry has gnawed and tunnelled like a rat, and prised gently like frost among the ranks of the reformers, crumbling them apart with his papal bulls and his royal French alliance. He called all his barons to a conference at Kingston at the end of October, feeling himself ready to play the winning stroke. He offered everything possible in reason and magnanimity, amnesty for all who would accept the findings of the meeting. They have given in," said the old man, scornfully grinning, "and come to the king's peace, every man of them. He has been gracious and kingly. He has them all in his hand."

  "All?" said Llewelyn sharply.

  "All but one," said Meurig.

  "Ah!" said Llewelyn, satisfied, as though his own honour had been vindicated. "And what had the earl of Leicester to say at Kingston?"

  "Never a word, my lord, for he never went there. He and the closest who remained staunch were out in the shires, setting up their own wardens according to the Provisions. I do believe the lesser gentry in the countryside and the common people were ready to stand and fight if need be, but the barons were not. Half they feared what they were doing and what they had already done, and half they craved their old ease again, without too much need for thought, and believed the king's blandishments and swallowed his bait. First Hugh Bigod, that was formerly justiciar, and a good, fair man, too, but over-persuadable, he slipped away and spoke for compromise. Then the earl of Hereford, and then even Gloucester. So in the end they all went to Kingston as they were bidden. All but Earl Simon. And he spoke out on them for a generation of changeable and slippery men he could not abide, when they had sworn every one to do these things and see them done. He has shaken off the dust of England in disgust, and gone away into his French possessions, for he will not touch this mangled remnant they are busy concocting out of the grand design."

  "Then King Henry has won his war," said Llewelyn, with concern and misgiving, for though the desultory exchanges over peace had continued, they showed no sign of coming to anything, and a king triumphant and vindictive and in full control of his affairs again was less likely, for all his professions of goodwill, to want to conclude a genuine agreement with us.

  "I would not say his war has so far even begun," said Meurig, musing. "He has brought the great lords of the older sort to heel—all but one—but he has not given any thought yet to the lesser ones, or to those young men who were not consulted when the Provisions were drawn up, and have not been consulted now when they are swept away, but who may very soon find that they have come to like what was begun, and miss it sadly now it's done away with. It's too early to say anything is lost, or anything won."

  So things stood in England that winter. But at least we in Gwynedd received a Christmas gift rather more to our liking, for about the feast of St. Nicholas, after Meurig had left us, a messenger rode into the maenol from the castellan of Criccieth, and his news was matter for sober celebration. Meredith ap Rhys Gryg, still kicking his surly old heels in captivity, had at last given in, and indicated his willingness to renew his homage and acknowledge Llewelyn as his overlord.

  "True," said Llewelyn, gratified but undeceived, "I doubt if his mind towards Rhys Fychan or me has changed much, and once before he swore fealty and did homage, and was forsworn within the month. But at least he shows some sense at last. And we'll see what safeguards we can bind him with this time!"

  So they brought Meredith ap Rhys Gryg out of his prison, to a great meeting of the council of Wales at Conssyl. The old bear reappeared before us somewhat fatter and slower for his two years of confinement, but little tamed, though he behaved himself with stolid submission, and contained whatever rage he still felt. The agreement that released him we had drawn up with care, to protect the rights of his neighbours and kinsmen, and he had to give up his prize of Dynevor intact to its rightful owner again, and also surrendered his new castle of Emlyn, with the commote belonging to it. But otherwise he got back all his ancestral lands in return for his homage and fealty, and was received into the prince's grace and peace.

  As for the safeguards, they were hard but fair, and no one ever came to hurt through them. Besides the loss of his one castle—for Dynevor never was rightly his—he surrendered his eldest son for a time to live at Llewelyn's court, and was pledged on demand from the prince to render up to him twenty-four sons of his chief tenants, whose families would be sureties for his loyalty should it come into question. And if he broke any of the terms of the compact, he quitclaimed to Llewelyn all his inheritance and rights in Ystrad Tywi, which might be stripped from him without further ado.

  To all this he swore, and plumped down on his stiff old knees to do homage. And doubtless much of what he was forced to speak tasted of gall to him, for he was a wild, proud man. Yet by this simple act of submission, which was but returning to what he had freely sworn in the first place, and to one to whom he owed so much, he regained all his own but for the castle and commote of Emlyn, which I think was no harsh dealing. And his son, a grown man and with more sense than his sire, gave his parole cheerfully and had his liberty in Llewelyn's court, and hawked and hunted with the prince
to his heart's content while he remained with us.

  So this, the prince's first traitor, came to his peace as an example to all others both of firmness and magnanimity. And the only note of regret was struck by Llewelyn himself, saying, after Meredith had departed to his own country, and the news had been sent to Rhys Fychan in Carreg Cennen: "They will be riding home for Christmas, Rhys and the children. Pity, pity it is that Gladys could not have lived to take her boys back in triumph to Dynevor. It was her favourite home."

  The new year of twelve hundred and sixty-two was barely seven weeks old when the new French pope, imitating his predecessor, issued a bull supporting King Henry in all points. Pope Urban, it seemed, was determined not to allow the king to revive his son's claim on Sicily, for he thought to do much better with another candidate, but because of that he was all the more anxious to satisfy him of his goodwill on all other issues. Earl Simon, though forgetting nothing and abandoning nothing of his ideals, still morosely absented himself in France, and it seemed that everything in England was going tamely King Henry's way.

  Thus fortified, he sent out letters to his sheriffs denouncing all those ordinances made in the name of the Provisions. As for those who still feebly contended for a measure of reform, their position had been whittled down stage by stage until they gave way altogether at this blow, and wearily agreed to let the king's brother, Richard of Cornwall, king of the Romans by election, act as arbitrator on such matters as were still at issue. And decent man though Richard was, and sensible, yet he was Henry's brother. It did not take him long to restore the king's right to appoint his own ministers and sheriffs without consulting council or parliament, which was the whole heart of the matter. But at least he strongly urged on his brother the absolute necessity of coming to amicable terms with the earl of Leicester, and warned him to observe good faith in coming to such an agreement, and to adhere to it strictly once it was made.