The Brothers of Gwynedd (136 page)

  I protested at this that the king had never attached any conditions to those concessions he had made previously, and none were attached to this.

  "They are understood," said David grimly. "By Edward at least, and they had better be understood by all those he takes under his wing. If he does not get value for his money he will take it, and with interest. It is better not to be in his favour. But if a man must, let him learn to fend for himself, and see to it that he sells nothing of himself in the process. Take what's given, by all means—since he makes no conditions, force him to stand to that. But never think he'll be outbargained easily. It is Edward who makes the rules. We break them at our peril."

  "And you?" I said, for this was a man deep in Edward's debt now speaking, at least in the world's eyes and Edward's.

  He smiled at me without resentment, though somewhat sombrely. "I have not broken the rules—yet! If ever I do, it
will
be at my peril. All I have done as yet is to make my own rules in return, and stick to them. If he lavishes favours on me, I put up my price still higher. If he bestows a rich bride on me, and thinks to own the pair of us, we join hands and form a league of our own. He has bought neither of us. He has not enough resources to afford us."

  "Neither could he ever come near the price of Llewelyn or Eleanor," I said with certainty. "They are neither of them for sale. When they give, it is a gift, not a price. They expect the same dealing from him."

  "You know that, I know that," said David readily, "but Edward does not know it. By all means keep them in innocence and him in delusion, but watch over them, Samson." He saw how I looked at him, and flinched, and as suddenly laughed, rising to herd me to the door with an arm about my shoulders. "For God's sake go back where you belong. I do not know if I threaten your peace, but God knows you are perilous to mine. Go see as deep into Edward as you do into me, and Llewelyn may be safe, if there's any safety."

  At the doorway Cristin was waiting, and for her sake he relinquished me, clapped me loudly on the cheek by way of farewell, and left us together. We went without a word said. At the gate I took her hand and kissed it. "God go with you, and God bring you back," she said, and with that blessing I went from her.

  To a Welshman the guest is holy, all that is in the house is his, he must not be questioned or prompted, when he leaves is his own concern. Blood feud, as of right, follows any violation of the sacred relationship. The home is not a spider's web, spinning gummy threads to bind and confine, but a hearth and a board open to guests and God.

  When he came back from the meal in hall it was late, but he asked me to attend him for a while before he slept. It was the hour when we talked together most freely, and I think he wanted with all his heart then to talk of her, but he was so full of her that his wonder and gratitude and joy found no words fitting, and his voice would cease in the middle of speaking, and his mind go away from me silently, back to the chamber in Windsor castle, and the woman rising to come to meet him.

  "I have lost and won," he said. "By God's goodness I see my gain outweigh my loss. Oh Samson, I only half-believe this grace is meant for me."

  He told, though haltingly, how the king brought him in to her, and when they were formally made known to each other, left them together. It might be true that Edward, having decided to permit the marriage, had also decided to take possession of it and make it his own festival, but it was not true that he used no discretion or consideration in so arranging matters. I said nothing to the prince of what David had said to me, for mention of the very name would have darkened the brightness of that healing evening. I resolved rather to watch how this thing developed, and speak out only if I must.

  "He will not be in any haste to give her to me," said Llewelyn, wryly smiling. "I know I must prove my good faith, he takes no man's on trust. But now I am sure that in the end all will be well. No, all is well now! I have seen her, I have looked into her eyes, and seen Earl Simon's eyes looking through them, the same nobility, the same truth, and accepting me as generously as he did. She was glad, Samson! It was with her as it was with me. Now I have seen her look at me as sometimes I have seen Cristin look at you, and beyond that no man can go. Such a spirit, and in a vessel of so much beauty!"

  Then in his rapture of humility and exaltation, so moved by his joy in her that he felt a saint's tenderness towards all things living, he bethought him of what he had said, and caught impulsively at my hand, reproaching himself for having so little regard for the deprivation I suffered, when he was promised such blessedness.

  "God knows," he said, "I wish I could share with you, whose waiting has been longer even than mine, the happiness that is held out to me. If I could lay Cristin's hand in yours, by any means in my power, I would do it. I am learning how much the happy owe their fellows."

  "You need not grieve for me," I said. "We were born in the same night and under the same sky. All the while that you have been with Eleanor at Windsor, I have been with Cristin. I have seen her, and held her hand in mine. In the same hour! Our stars have not betrayed us."

For all this hopeful beginning, and every indication on his part that the ending would be favourable, Edward made no haste, and offered no more such glimpses during that visit. Rather he concentrated on the stern business of preparing the administration of the Welsh lands he had taken into his own care, and though he expected Llewelyn to take part in all the conferences, and consulted him freely, it was Edward's will that carried all before it. The lands being now taken out of his hands, the prince could but advise, and intercede where he thought not enough weight was being given to Welsh custom and feeling, pleading the cause of his lost vassals even when he could no longer affect their fate. Edward showed every sign of listening with care, and wishing to retain their peaceful adherence by treating them fairly, but what he and his officers best understood was their own system of shires and sheriffs, and they tended to believe it must necessarily be best even for the Welsh.

  The prince, with Tudor, and Goronwy ap Heilyn and others, worked loyally with the king's men, and did what they could to ensure justice and peace. There were two judicial commissions set up during that month of January, to deal with all legal claims and cases in that part of Wales which was outside the principality, and therefore under the king's administration. One was to work in the eastern parts, the other in Cardigan and the west, and in both a balance was kept between English and Welsh members, for Edward declared his intent of appointing many men of Welsh birth to office in his new territories. Then there was also a third commission to be formed, to see to all the agreed restitution of lands and freeing of prisoners, to take the oaths of Llewelyn's guarantors, and receive his hostages, and even to view the lands he wished to bestow on Eleanor as her dower. With all this business the first two weeks of January passed very quickly, and the prince with his household prepared to set out for home.

  Certainly everything seemed to be moving very fairly, according to the treaty, and Llewelyn received so much reassurance from the king's actions concerning the judicial commissions that any doubts he might still have felt were quieted.

  "He is dealing honestly," he said, "and if his trust in me is slower to grow than mine in him, well, we are two men. It is for me to show him what he will not quite believe for the telling." And he set himself to act steadfastly and honourably within his truncated state, and wait for his reward with patience.

  I made occasion to seek out Cynan before we left for home, to let him know that his nephew was alive and well, and safe with us in Gwynedd.

  "I begin to wish I had run with him," said Cynan, sighing. "And yet if ever sound Welshmen were needed here, it's from this on. Every man trusted enough to get office under the king has a duty now to take his pay and stand between him and the englishing of Wales, for with all the goodwill in the world it will come to that. There are those who have turned their backs on the old country already, and are busy doing the king's work for him before he knows he wants it done. Tell your lord to keep a close eye on Griffith ap Gwenwynwyn, and get used to thinking of him now as Griffith de la Pole, for that's the style he demands henceforth, and everything he does goes with it. And being a convert, he'll be more a marcher baron than Mortimer or Bohun, and lean harder on his Welsh neighbours to show his zeal. He's got a family settlement on the English plan already—the eldest son gets all."

  I said that Griffith had tended towards the marcher ways for many years, moving by short steps towards becoming an English baron.

  "No short steps now," said Cynan. "Full tilt! De la Poles they'll be from now on, and even begin to believe in their Norman blood. And keep close watch when Griffith gets near the judicial commission, for he's bent on getting his revenge for the way the prince has always bested him. I judge he's already listing all the pleas he can bring for recovery of land, and in law there's endless mischief to be made."

  I took due note of it, for the possibilities ahead, in all the claims and counter-claims the turmoil of war leaves in its tracks, were already worrying our lawyers.

  "Who knows?" said Cynan before I left, patting his growing paunch and stroking his grizzled dark hair. "I may come and leave my bones in Wales, yet!"

I also went, in the twilight alone, to walk past the house in the canonry, and say farewell to Cristin. But it seemed that David also was contemplating a move from London, for the courtyard was full of a bustle of maidservants and grooms and knights, and through the open wicket I saw Godred among them, marshalling loads in readiness for the sumpter horses. He was as he had always been, fair and healthy and confident, as though time and even the long poison of jealousy and malice had no power over him. So I first thought, but when I looked longer and more narrowly I saw that all that comeliness and brightness of his seemed to have been clouded over with dust, as when a fair tree first shows the signs of drought. I waited a while, unseen, but he did not move into stable or house, and I was loth to go in and meet him, to goad either his anger or his misery. So I said my farewell unseen and unheard in the dimness of the winter evening, and went away. The fair warning Cynan had given us soon began to show fruit. We had been home in Gwyneed no more than two weeks when, at the, very first sitting of the judicial commission for east Wales, at Oswestry on the ninth day of February, Griffith ap Gwenwynwyn entered several pleas for damages to his lands and castle at Pool against Llewelyn, and in particular entered a claim to those districts of Powys which Llewelyn had retained after the conspiracy against his life, when he returned the rest of Griffith's lands into his keeping.