It was almost by chance I found him, as I stood in the inner ward, turning about to look if anything moved anywhere around me, or any shape broke the merloned line of the wall. And he was there, he or someone, a tall blackness swathed in a cloak, motionless against the sky above the postern gate. He neither saw nor heard me. His back was turned, for he gazed steadily out over the wall to the south-east.
I mounted the wooden staircase to the guard-walk, in the corner close to where he stood, and went to him without any great care to conceal my approach, but without any deliberate utterance, either, for it was so strange to see him standing like a carven man, black and still and cold in the February dawn. I knew by the infinitely faint bracing of his shoulders the moment when he knew he was no longer alone, and by the want of any larger movement that he knew very well who it was who came. His face was tight and pinched with the cold, as if he had stood out the night there, but it was quite still and calm, a dead calm, as if something had ended, something the passing of which was not yet recognisable as either to be mourned or welcomed. His eyes never shifted their gaze from the hills, but it was a drained, exhausted gaze, no longer urgent. He said not a word, but when I touched him he turned and went with me, and at the head of the stairway he withdrew out of my hand, and went before me down into the ward. And there was Elizabeth coming out from the tower door in a flutter of blue, dressed and cloaked and anxious, with Cristin at her shoulder.
There was light enough then to recognise us by manner and gait and stature across the ward, and we came as a relief to them, walking towards them as we did in the most commonplace way in the world. They could not see the frozen blankness of his face. Elizabeth cried out his name, at once glad and reproachful, and flew to take him by the shoulders, and suddenly he heaved himself out of his torpor with a shudder and a moan, and recoiled from her, evading the innocent embrace.
"Don't touch me!" he said in a soft, wild cry. "You'll soil your hands!"
The look of astonished hurt and disbelief on her face, in that first moment of doubt and uncertainty she had ever suffered from him, struck him clean out of the trance that had held him bound, and he realised what he had done. He flung up both hands and shut his palms hard on his cheeks, and shook out of him, like gouts of blood: "A bad dream—I have had a bad dream!" And before she had time to question or to weep, he leaned and caught her up passionately and tenderly into his arms. "Lisbet, it's over now! It's gone! All's well now—all's very well!"
The fright went out of her face readily. She laid her arms about his neck and caressed him, lamenting with the serenity of past and mistaken pain: "Where have you been? Why did you go away from me?"
He carried her away into the tower, back to the bed-chamber he had deserted, and certain am I they lay and loved like starving creatures until they fell asleep in each other's arms.
We two were left in the ward, between the dwindling banks of snow under the walls, looking after them with still faces. Until Cristin said: "I do not know what it is we have seen. But I know it is well that only you and I have seen it. And I hope that you and I have seen the last of it here. I think I should not like the echoes, if there were to be echoes." And she gave me her hand, as we went slowly back together into the hall, for the chill that was upon us needed some unlooked-for grace to warm it out of our bones.
And when David and Elizabeth appeared again among us, he was himself, alert, calm and rational, only perhaps a little quieter and more chastened than usual, like a convalescent out of danger and grateful for it. There was no more listening and prowling, no extremes of elation and depression, rather two or three days of harmony and reason. And as soon as the roads were reported passable, he took leave of Llewelyn, and his whole party left for home.
So for some time we believed, Cristin and I, that we had indeed seen the last of that night's alarm. Nevertheless, there were to be echoes. And she was right. When they came we did not like them.
CHAPTER V
On the sixth day of that same February the king's regents sent one William de Plumpton to Chester, to take delivery, or so they hoped or professed to hope, of the instalment of money under treaty which had not yet been paid, and which Llewelyn was withholding as a means of enforcing settlement of grievances. It was hardly a reasonable expectation that the envoy should get anything to take back with him, in any case, seeing the floods were still out wherever there was river or stream flowing, and the marshes round Rhuddlan remained a lake, so that it would have been almost impossible to reach Chester by the day of his visit. I do not say Llewelyn would have complied even had the season been favourable, but at that time it was pointless even to try.
By the end of February, when the court was at Criccieth, travel was normal again, and the regents sent to complain of non-delivery of the money. Llewelyn replied, as he did consistently in these exchanges, to the king personally, though whether his letters ever left England is doubtful…He wrote freely acknowledging that he was bound to pay the amount due, and informing King Edward that the sum was ready and waiting to be paid to the king's attorneys, provided the king fulfilled faithfully what was equally due from him under the treaty, in particular he asked that the earls of Gloucester and Hereford, and after them the marchers in general, should be ordered to surrender those lands they had illegally occupied and were as illegally detaining. Whereupon payment should be made immediately.
Whether this letter ever went overseas or no, it did bring a measure of response, for the king, or the regents in his name, ordered a commission to be sent in May to Montgomery, to arbitrate on the mutual charges of breaches of the peace, and to try to bring about a treaty with the earl of Hereford. I see in this the hand of the king himself, or else of Burnell, the most reasonable of the regents and the closest to his master's mind, whose chief difficulty in border matters was to curb the impetuosity of his colleague Roger Mortimer. Marchers make very poor arbitrators on marcher affairs, as judges do of their own cases.
We were again at Aber, towards the middle of March, when a messenger came riding in from Llewelyn's master-mason at Dolforwyn, which was almost ready to be garrisoned, though much work remained to be done as soon as the new building season made conditions possible. A small guard had camped in some discomfort through the winter, and it was Llewelyn's intention to visit the castle and give his mind to the siting of the new town as soon as he could. The message he received hastened that day, though not as we would have wished.
"My lord," said the envoy, a trooper of the guard, "I am bidden to tell you of suspected treason. At the end of January the prior of Strata Marcella sent to us to say that one of the brothers, on an errand into Pool, had seen unusual activity about the castle, and great numbers of armed men, it seemed to him in preparation for some foray, for he saw how they were busy about the stables and armoury, furbishing weapons and fletching arrows, and both the Lord Griffith and his son Owen—Owen especially—directing all, as if for some great move. He promised to send word again if this company set out with intent, but we had no further word from him until he sent to say that they must have left secretly, by night, for certainly they were gone from the castle, which was about its business as always, and no more men within than usual. My lord, you recall those days of heavy rain and great floods, The prior set watch, and the brother appointed saw a strong company come riding home into Pool, also by night, and in sad order, half-drowned and without any booty or prizes. We judge the floods turned them back. But we do not know from where, for the prior's watch was on the castle gates, and the castle is the end of all roads at that place."
"I know it," said Llewelyn, braced and intent. "It is all but in the river. It must have been no more than an island and a causeway then. True, they could have come from any point. And we do not know when they set forth?"
"No, my lord, only when they crept home again like drowned rats. And that was the night of the third of February. We have the prior's word."
"His word I take," said Llewelyn truly, for there was not a single
Cistercian house in north Wales that was not his loyal ally. "But your captain and the master of my works have their own opinion, I think. Speak out what they have to say."
"My lord," said the man warmly, "I speak out my own thoughts as well as theirs. Ever since you began the building of Dolforwyn, we have had word again and again how Griffith ap Gwenwynwyn resented your presence there. It was the common gossip of Pool that he feared for his market, and also kept close touch with Sprenghose in Montgomery, and made good certain the king's men there feared the same prejudice to their gains. I do not say the English have any part in what he planned. I do say he is ready to lean on them if he brings down judgment on his own head by his own actions, and has sought to prepare their minds to come to his support. We think Griffith planned to attack your castle of Dolforwyn by stealth, perhaps intending to blame the English, since they have shown concern about the foundation, and meant to accomplish this raid now, before you have a full garrison there to defend it. We think he meant to destroy what you have built, and your guard that holds it for you, but the winter barred his way. My lord, the upper Severn has been out of its banks more than three weeks, high over the water-meadows and into the rock of the hillside. Close as we lie, I believe they had no means of reaching us." And he said, watching the prince's face: "I do not think the lord prince is any way surprised."
"No," said Llewelyn, "no way surprised." He did not love this house of de la Pole, and was not loved by them, and only advantage had ever drawn or held Griffith to him, and only advantage would hold him now, and yet Powys could hardly be spared. He sat back in his chair, and thought, and there was no pleasure in it. For the sake of Wales he would not cut off Powys, not for his own life, if he might retain it by any decent means. But for the sake of Wales, just as surely, he could not let any treason pass unpublished and unpunished. He shut his eyes for some minutes, to look beyond the hour.
When he opened them again, he was resolved. "I will deal," he said. "I am grateful beyond words to your master, to the prior and his brethren, and to you for your honest embassage. Now I will deal accordingly."
It was late in March when Llewelyn set forth with his high steward and his immediate court to inspect and approve the work done at Dolforwyn, and there we kept the Easter of that year. It had been his intention to do so in any case, and his going there in state provoked no suspicion and gave no forewarning, nor did it occasion any surprise that while he was in the neighbourhood he should send for his greatest vassal to attend him, and bring his eldest son Owen with him. They came with disarming smiles, attentive and dutiful, the father a big, powerfully-made, greying man with strong features and a keen sense of his own dignity and state, the son almost as tall but lightly made and graceful. Both of them, I thought, were a little too effusive in their compliments, and their eyes a little too wary, but the relations between the princes, however profitable to both, had never been personally warm.
In the hall of Dolforwyn, still largely a shell, half-furnished for living, and before Tudor and most of the members of his council, his clerks and personal household, Llewelyn stood up before those two, and himself told them that they were under suspicion of deceit and disloyalty, against their sworn fealty to him and to Wales.
They started back from him open-mouthed, in utter dismay, I am sure not feigned, for they had thought their abortive moves had passed unknown, and been devoutly thankful for it. They cried out their innocence of any such offences, and their unswerving loyalty to the lord prince and their own fealty.
"At least, my lord," cried Griffith, "let us know our accusers. Whoever they may be, let them meet us face to face, and make their charges here, where we can refute them."
"There shall be proper opportunity at law for you to refute the charges," said Llewelyn, "and for this time, if you seek an accuser, I accuse you. The council are here to see that justice is done to you, according to Welsh law." And this he said with emphasis, knowing that Griffith had a way of preferring English law if he could get it, and also that the causes at issue between England and Wales, formerly always judged by an arbitration commission, had of late slipped nearer and nearer to becoming suits in the royal courts, which was by no means what he understood by the terms of the treaty, and posed perilous pitfalls for Wales in just such cases. He did not intend that Griffith should be allowed to inveigle this cause into a king's court.
"I do not know who can have poisoned your mind against us," protested Griffith vehemently, "but I swear there is no truth in what they have told you. And if I am to be able to defend myself, at least I must know of what I am accused. Can I prove every moment of my loyalty, and my son's loyalty? Let me know what acts are alleged against me, at what times and places, that I may be able to bring evidence to the contrary. And time—I must be allowed time to bring my witnesses."
"You shall have time enough," said Llewelyn. "We intend to set up here today a bench of judges to hear and examine both your evidence and mine, and take whatever witness they please in this neighbourhood. You shall have a day assigned, and a place, to answer. And the charge I think you should know, as you have said. It is known that at the end of the month of January you gathered in your castle of Pool a large company of armed men, with horses and supplies, and that they rode out secretly by night upon some as yet unproved errand, I say treasonous. Thanks to God who sent the floods, they never achieved whatever their purpose was. They were seen re-entering Pool, also in darkness, on the night of the third of February. And you, my lord Owen, were seen to be their leader."
"It is false!" cried Owen, paler than his shirt, and his voice cracking. "Whoever says so, lies!"
"When you come to hear the sworn evidence," said Llewelyn drily, "I think you will wish to take back that word."
The young man drew in his horns at that, doubtless wondering desperately with whom he might be confronted, and how much the observer could know. But still they argued sturdily, why should they do so, what cause had they ever given to be thought disloyal, and what advantage could there possibly be to them in raiding and pillaging in the depths of the winter, if that was what was suspected? Against what manor or maenol or settlement, to be worth so secret an enterprise?
"Against this very castle and settlement, which you never liked," said Llewelyn, "and which you have spoken against more than once. It does not deprive your own market, nor infringe your rights, I am building on my own lands, but as I have heard, you would not have been sorry to see this place razed—all the more, perhaps, if it could be put down to some lawless action by the Englishry, who have also been casting ominous eyes at it for the sake of Montgomery. In the end you may tell me where you rode. I would advise it. If this matter is cleared fully, there shall still be access to my peace."
After he had said this I saw those two, father and son, exchange one rapid and stealthy glance, and look away again, and I wondered if Llewelyn with his customary bluntness had not given away more of his case than was altogether wise, though I knew why he did it. It was his wish to show them at once that their best policy was to make a clean breast of the affair and accept whatever penalty was imposed, with the implicit assurance that it would not be extreme. He did not want outand-out hostility, for fear Wales should be maimed of one of its vital provinces. Nor, indeed, was his ever a mind for extremes, which produce counter-extremes in the recoil. What he had now suggested seemed rather to calm than to alarm them. They continued to protest total innocence, and absolute confidence, but they accepted a day some ten days ahead, the seventeenth of April, for the hearing, and the place was fixed at Llewelyn's manor of Bach-yr-Anneleu in Cydewain, which was handy for both parties.
"Very well," said Llewelyn, "name your arbitrators." And he himself for his part chose Tudor, with one of his brothers, and Anian ap Caradoc, who was one of his chief law clerks. Griffith named one of his own officers of Powys, and his justiciar, and one other whose name I have forgotten. It is a long time since I saw those documents. Then they chose and agreed on the prior of Pool, as a just
man bound to neither side, to fill the seventh place. And those two withdrew from Dolforwyn to set about preparing their defence. They went wary, anxious and wincing, but not desperate, and I think their heads were together even on the ride home.
The seven judges in the meantime were at liberty to examine and take statements around Pool and Dolforwyn, but I think Griffith had taken good care to get out of the castle any of those men who knew what had been planned, and little fresh information was gleaned, except the curious fact that the company of armed men, clearly a war-band, had left Pool castle not merely one night before their re-entry, but four. The poacher who had been out in the woods that night was none too anxious to tell what he had seen, but did so honestly, and the justices turned a blind eye to what else he had been about. It was a puzzling detail. In such weather, what could Owen have been doing with his men for those four days? Apart from that we got rumours and little more.
On the seventeenth of April the judges sat at Llewelyn's manor, and Griffith ap Gwenwynwyn and his son came before them. But it fell out somewhat differently from what we had expected, for as soon as the court was convened Griffith and Owen asked leave to speak, and said outright that they pleaded guilty to the offence with which they were accused, that they had indeed plotted treason against the lord prince, in despite of the fealty they owed him. They desired to confess their fault and throw themselves upon the prince's mercy.