The Brothers of Gwynedd

by Edith Pargeter

  So my lord had enough and to spare to occupy his mind, and with the business of local justice he dealt always in person and with great care for detail. And as I remember, we were in session with a difficult family dispute involving the moving of boundaries and the abduction of a girl, in the prince's court at Carnarvon in the first days of April, when a messenger came in from Cynan in London, bringing both letters and a verbal report, he said of great importance. But he waited, none the less, until Llewelyn had the case before him judged and brought to agreement, if not wholly amicably, at least in such a shewd knot that the parties could not break the accord without peril, and the girl restored to her parents undamaged. Then the prince withdrew, with none but myself in attendance, and in his own apartments the messenger came in to him.

  He was a groom about the court, Welsh like Cynan who sent him to us, a lusty young man who made his living where he could, but kept one foot fast-rooted on our side of the border. So do all good Welshmen, for this soil is not as other soil, its stony austerity holds all its sons by the heart. Short and thick and dark was this young man, the very pattern of his kind, even to his tongue, which was not short nor thick nor dark, but long and sinuous and silver. But his matter was nothing for our comfort.

  "My lord prince," he said, standing before Llewelyn still dusty from his ride, "I am the voice of princely events, and lack the art to tell them. My lord, it is no good news, pardon the bearer. Master Cynan's letter will bear out what I have to tell."

  "Speak out," said Llewelyn. "You are not the first to be burdened with an ungrateful errand; it shall not be your loss."

  "My lord," said the groom, taking him at his word, "on the thirteenth day of March, at a city called Viterbo, in Italy, Guy de Montfort, Earl Simon's third son, fell upon the lord Henry of Almain, the Lord Edward's cousin, as he was hearing mass in the church of San Silvestro, slew him with the sword, and dragged the body out of the church to be mutilated in the square. Master Cynan said you should know of it, for your better advising."

  Cynan could not have known, when he sent that dire message, that Llewelyn's envoys were at Montargis, nor with how fell a sound the news of Guy's catastrophic vengeance came upon our ears. He sent the word to avoid what now was beyond avoiding. We had chosen the worst of times.

  Llewelyn said, with a mute and mastered face: "Tell me all you know. How did this meeting ever come to pass?"

  "My lord, the new French king, Philip, was on his way home northwards through Italy with his crusaders, bearing back to France the bodies of his father, King Louis, dead of plague on the crusade, his young wife Isabella of Aragon, who died on the voyage home, his brother, the count of Nevers, and his brother-in-law Theobald of Champagne, the king of Navarre. All these high titles I learned from Master Cynan, who also writes them to you in the letters I brought. And with King Philip was also his brother, Charles of Anjou, whom the popes helped to the throne of Sicily some years past. This Guy de Montfort is now in his service, and his chief officer in Tuscany, so that he came to Viterbo to meet his liege lord. But when he heard that Henry of Almain was in that city with the French king's retinue, he was greatly disturbed, and came the next day to the church where he was, and killed and dragged him out, and so left him lying. My lord, this is all I know. Master Cynan has written more."

  With a mild voice and a shuttered face Llewelyn thanked him for his errand, and dismissed him to be fed and rested and remounted, with his reward in hand. His reward for a blow to the heart. Cynan's letter was indeed fuller.

  "God he knows, my lord," he had written, "what possessed the man to take his revenge thus, or, indeed, what possessed the Lord Edward to send his cousin with King Philip into Italy, where it was certain the vicar-general in Tuscany of Charles of Anjou must come to welcome his lord. There are those here who say that the Lord Edward sent his cousin, who was most dear to him, and once was a Montfort man, expressly to try to make peace with the Montfort brothers, and bring them to the king's grace, and it may be true. If so, he was sadly amiss in his judgment. Those two brothers, for Simon was in company with Guy when they entered the town, though he was not present at the church, did not know when they came to the meeting that Henry of Almain would be there in the royal retinue. This killing was not planned. They came, and then they heard of his presence. And Guy has sought him out and killed him. I know no more. It may be that you can read this riddle better than I."

  He had added a further writing a day or two later, when more was known:

  "The Lord Edward, who has wintered in Sicily as the guest of King Charles, and proposes to sail for Acre very soon, has been informed of his cousin's death. There was talk of his being sent for to come home again, the main crusade being postponed by reason of King Louis' death, and King Henry being in poor health, but now his Grace is better, and it is certain the Lord Edward will hold to his oath and sail for Acre at once. The murderer has been deprived of lands and offices, but is at large, and having strong support from his wife's kin in Tuscany, and they very powerful, will find both refuge and sympathy there. It seems likely little will be done to avenge the crime until the Lord Edward's return, but he will not forget."

  "Indeed he will not," said Llewelyn, laying the letters by with a steady hand. "He forgets few favours, but never an injury, and he greatly valued his cousin Henry. Well, it seems the madness of one hour can undo the work of years. Why? Why should he do so? What ailed him to throw away, if nothing else were at stake, all the sound work he has done for this new rule in Italy? All the laurels he has won? After six years!"

  I remembered then how I had seen this same Guy lying in his blood on the field of Evesham, vainly trying to stretch out a hand towards his sire as he died. "He saw father and brother killed before his eyes," I said, "their cause lost, their friends hounded and disinherited, the very dream in which he grew to manhood hacked to pieces. And he saw on the opposing part all those young men who had once followed and worshipped Earl Simon, and then deserted and brought him to ruin. To come face to face with one of them now, without warning, drove him to remember too much, and too bitterly."

  "But Henry was only one of many, and among the best of them, not the worst. Why single him out for vengeance?"

  "He was there," I said. "And he was, I think, the most trusted of those who withdrew their allegiance, and the most missed. And close kin, nephew to the earl, cousin to Guy, and sometime dear to both. It is not so hard to understand the impulse to kill, but the act was an indulgence he should have been able to deny himself. Now he has destroyed himself, and set back the hope of reconciliation by years."

  "And with it my hopes," said Llewelyn, "or so I dread. We are back where we began. Edward will not forget or forgive this act. It touches neither Eleanor nor me, but will her mother dare to stand upon that view? I doubt it!" The countess was ageing and weary, and sickened with all matters of state and all involvement in the tangled affairs of England, for to say truth, her world had ended at Evesham, and without Earl Simon she was but a shell filled with bitterness. "Well," he said grimly, "until I have an answer I have neither lost nor won. It's still a matter of waiting. At waiting," he said, ruefully smiling, "I have had much practice, and am grown expert. A man should enjoy doing what he does well."

  I would not say there was much enjoyment for him in those six weeks we spent waiting for the return of the monks of Aberconway, but at least we were busy enough to help the time to pass, and we made good use of the opening summer. Gilbert de Clare was continuing his building in stone at Caerphilly, and all Llewelyn's formal protests, though they had produced great agitation among the royal officials, and many promises and reassurances, had not caused Gilbert's masons to lay by their tools. This was the season for building, and he was in haste to raise the walls as high as possible before the next winter's frosts called a halt. But between our preoccupation with these weighty matters we had a good spring for lambs, and favourable weather for sowing, also activities not to be despised.

  Towards the end of May the b
rothers of Aberconway returned, having crossed the sea from France in the very ship which brought home under a mourning escort of knights the bones and heart of Henry of Almain, the heart to be enshrined in the king's church at Westminster, the bones to be buried in his father's abbey of Hailes. Since the news of the murder reached him, they said, Richard of Cornwall, king of the Romans, had turned his back upon the world, and was indifferent to the fate of his kingdom, and certainly to his own. It was barely a year before he followed his son out of this world, and was laid beside him in his own foundation. So those two sleep not ten miles from Evesham, where the king's felon and the people's saint takes his rest.

  Brother Philip and Brother Iorwerth, the one old and reverend, the other young, both lettered and learned, were received by Llewelyn with all the more serenity and grace for the passion of anxiety he had to suppress, but they knew his mind, and delivered their embassage directly, and I think he was grateful.

  "My lord," said the elder, "the letter we bring is but the formal acknowledgement of yours, and of your gifts, with the regard and respect of the Countess Eleanor. What further is necessary we were charged to deliver you by word of mouth. My lord, you will know by now that we came there to Montargis after the thing that happened at Viterbo, though we did not then know of it. The countess had already heard that news. She is deeply shocked by her son's senseless and terrible act, and more determined than ever that she cannot and will not countenance any move that will deepen the anger and suspicion that must follow. She pledged her word to do nothing that could touch or harm or disturb the realm of England, and she holds that the match you propose would be an infringement of her word. With the deepest regard for the lord prince's person, acts and motives, she will not attach her daughter to him or to any former ally of Earl Simon, for that would be to incur the displeasure and distrust of her brother the king, and in particular of the Lord Edward. She is adamant."

  Llewelyn said heavily: "I had expected nothing better, since this death. From my heart I am sorry, but sorry, too, for the lady. Well, you did your errand faithfully. It is no fault of yours that you can bring me no comfort."

  Brother Philip hesitated but a moment before he said: "My lord, after a fashion I believe I can. It was not possible for me to ask audience of the Lady Eleanor. But I have seen her, walking in the garden with her mother. And I have spoken with such of that household as I might. The lady is now eighteen years old." He raised his creased old eyes that were experienced in reading men, and looked upon Llewelyn gently, and saw that the prince would not question him concerning Eleanor, and yet longed to know, and to have her spoken of. Deliberately he said, measuring out words: "She is of great beauty and great nobility. Those who serve her have serene faces and are quick to smile, and talk with her freely and eagerly. I have judged both men and women by this measure, and I know its worth. And this lady is still unaffianced, in a land where her name, her face and her fortune are all magnets."

  "There have been suitors?" Llewelyn asked, burning between his rapture at hearing her praised, and his dread of having her snatched away into a French marriage. His voice was low and level. Too low, too level. Brother Philip understood the use of the voice, and the constraints that can be imposed upon it.

  "There have been many such, and of excellent repute."

  "And all rejected?" said Llewelyn. "Like me?"

  "Not like you, my lord, though all rejected. You the countess rejects, for reasons you understand. All others, though with the utmost gentleness, the Lady Eleanor has rejected. Her mother entertains all of good standing who come, but leaves it to the lady, and will not force her choice. And to this day, my lord, she refuses all."

  "She liked none of them?" said Llewelyn, carefully touching hope with aching delicacy, in case it should crumble away in his fingers.

  "She gives no reason, my lord. But so consistent is she, it does appear that she may have a reason, to her sufficient. It may well be," said Brother Philip, "that she holds herself to have been betrothed by her father in childhood. It may even be that she clings to that bond with heart and will, and is resolved to await its fulfilment."

  CHAPTER III

  Though Llewelyn took heart from what the brothers had told him, and held fast by his faith in his own resolution and the divination of the blind monk of Evesham, yet that year ever after seemed a dark and arduous one to us, and, for all the good summer season, brought little joy. It was not only the disaster of Viterbo, which was still spreading its echoes across the whole face of Europe as ripples wash outward from a stone cast into a still pool. It was also marked by a number of other deaths, closer to us, which in an unpractised unity such as Llewelyn had made of Wales, still unstable in its tensions between the old divisive ways and the new nationhood, made for changes and disruptions. Old princes passed, and left young, untried sons to step into their shoes. It was needful to keep a watchful eye and a ready hand upon every commote in the land.

  The prince's old and faithful ally in Cardigan, Meredith ap Owen, was already a few years dead, leaving three sons to rule his lands between them. Now there left us also, in the summer of this year twelve hundred and seventy-one, two others who had played a large and turbulent part in Llewelyn's rise to greatness. On the twenty-seventh day of July died the old bear, Meredith ap Rhys Gryg of Dryslwyn, he whose homage had been sold to Llewelyn to help to pay Edward's crusading expenses. He was past seventy years, and had lived through many changes of fortune. He died at his castle on the Tywi, and was buried at the abbey of Whitland, and his son Rhys ruled after him. And less than a month later, at Dynevor, only a few miles distant, died Rhys Fychan, widower of Llewelyn's only sister, and dear to him, the nephew with whom old Meredith had fought and feuded lifelong, as though, for all they could not live in the same country at peace, they could not live without each other, either. Rhys they buried at Talley, beside his beloved wife, and his eldest son, Rhys Wyndod, then turned twenty-one, divided up his lands with his two younger brothers, Griffith and Llewelyn, the last named after his uncle, the prince. All three knew they could rely on the help and support of their kinsman, and of his namesake, the child of the family reconciliation, the prince was particularly fond.

  But the death of their father was a shock and a grief to him, for Rhys Fychan was only three years his elder, and had been a loyal friend.

  "I am reminded of my own end," he said with a wry smile. "I have lived forty-two years, and he was but three years before me. And how if the same hand should fall upon me in my noonday? It well might; it has on many younger. What can any man do but live as if he had a life before him? I know no other way."

  If he had spoken so before the high steward, Tudor would have taken it as a text for the sermon that was always on his mind, how the prince of Wales, more urgently than any his predecessor, having so much more to protect and to bequeath, owed it to himself and his people to marry and get sons to follow after him. For though Tudor knew of the old betrothal to Eleanor de Montfort, he held that marriage to be impossible, even undesirable, and his concern for Wales kept him rightly fretting for the succession. The prince turned a stonily deaf ear to all the advice the council persistently gave, but Tudor did not give up hope of persuading him at last.

  Llewelyn read my face, too clearly, and laughed, though somewhat ruefully. "I know! Rhys Fychan at least left three sturdy sons to take his place, and I stand to leave all at risk. But without faith there is no security, to look for it and loose my hold on what is secure would be a sin. I do and will believe that I shall make good all that I have sworn, and if I cannot, I will die still striving. God can provide, and also take away, if he will, what he has provided."

  This I remembered, and so did he, in consternation and sorrow, when later we heard of the saddest of all the deaths of that winnowing year. With father and mother very far off from him in the Holy Land, Edward's heir, John, a child of five years, sickened and died. No doubt he had the best nurses and guardians a child could have, but his mother had torn herself away
from him to follow her lord, and a hard choice that must have been, and a hard deprivation for the child, and who knows if he did not die of it? A girl, the eldest, and a little brother were left, but the heir to the throne, after his father, had been taken, and men are quick to read signs and warnings into the bereavements of princes, ever since Pharaoh and his firstborn.

  "God knows I am sorry for it," said Llewelyn, grieving. "Even in sons there is no security. The quiver can be emptied in less time than it took to fill it. I hold by my own way. What use is there in bargaining with fortune?" And he said, as if to himself: "Poor Edward! He goes in the love and service of God, and God takes from him what he parted with, even for a while, only sadly and in duty bounden."

  I recall, looking back now at that time, that even as we spoke the Lord Edward's lady was again with child, the daughter Joan that was born in Acre on this pilgrimage. Before ever they reached England again she gave birth also, in Gascony, to another son, for she was fruitful, but her children died too often in infancy, or dwindled after a few years. It seemed that Edward, for all his giant stature and strength, could not breed true.