Read Online The Brothers of Gwynedd by Edith Pargeter - Free Book Online
Authors: Edith Pargeter
Tags: General Fiction
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place in the window of a burgess's house overhanging the route, and took the children with them.
That was a brave show, bright with pennants and surcoats and colours, the horses as fresh and fine as the riders, for there had been no great hardship or exertion in that brief war, no armour was dinted, and no banners coiled. We saw the king go by, a fair horseman, and at his fairest when he rode in triumph, for he swung ever between the rooftops and the mire, higher and lower in his exaltation and abasement than ordinary men, and this was an occasion unblemished by any doubts. I had not yet learned to know the faces and devices of those closest about him, though they all looked formidable enough and splendid enough to me. I saw them as a grand cavalcade of bright colours and proud faces, not as men in the manner that I was a man. Or almost a man, for I had not yet my years. These lived on another level. I knew no parallel for it in Wales, where no man felt himself less a man than another, or bridled his tongue for awe of the great. Great and small surely we had, and every man knew his place in the order, and respected both his own and every other soul's, but not with servility. In this land I felt great wonder and pleasure, but I was never at ease.
I stood with my mother and her husband—for I never thought of him as father to me in any way—among a hot and heaving throng, pressed body hard against body, watching these great ones ride by. And suddenly my mother gave a soft cry, and struggled to free a hand, and as ever, to touch me, not him. And never did this happen but he was aware of it, and I aware of his awareness, as a pain most piercing and hard to sustain. But she never knew it, as though what he felt could in no wise touch her. So she handled me eagerly by the shoulder in his sight, and cried: "He is there! It is true, he's free!"
I doubt if I should have known the Lord Griffith for myself, for I had not seen him since I was five years old. He rode among a group of lords not far behind the king's own party, on a tall, raw-boned horse, for he was a massive man, full-blooded and well-fleshed, and had lost no bulk in his imprisonment. He towered almost a head over King Henry, and though he was white in the face from being so long shut away from the sun, he looked otherwise none the worse in health, and was now, like his lady, in very good spirits. At whose expense he was provided for this ride, both with clothes and mount, I do but guess, yet take it that as yet all he had came from King Henry. For he was fine in his dress, and his hair and beard, which were reddish fair like Rhodri's colouring, very elegantly trimmed. Close behind him rode a big boy of about fourteen, massively made like his father, but his thick crop of hair, which was uncovered to the sun, was fiery red, almost as red as the poppies in the headlands of the English fields. And that was Owen Goch, the firstborn son.
They passed by us, pale from their prison but bright with joy in their triumph, and people pointed them out for the Welsh princes, and waved hands and kerchiefs. The Lady Senena sat at her upper window motionless and silent, with tears on her cheeks, but her daughter leaned out and shook a silk scarf streaming out on the breeze, and called down to the riders so shrilly and joyfully that the Lord Griffith looked up, and saw his womenfolk weeping and laughing for pleasure at seeing him again live and free and acknowledged joint-heir of Gwynedd. Then the men below waved and threw glances and kisses as long as they were within sight, their chins on their shoulders, until the curve of the Wyle took them away, and the women embraced each other in floods of tears, and hugged the two little boys, and urged them to wave and throw kisses after their father's dwindling figure. For this was but the public presentment, and soon, when King Henry was installed at the abbey, there could be a private reunion even more joyful.
So it
That was a brave show, bright with pennants and surcoats and colours, the horses as fresh and fine as the riders, for there had been no great hardship or exertion in that brief war, no armour was dinted, and no banners coiled. We saw the king go by, a fair horseman, and at his fairest when he rode in triumph, for he swung ever between the rooftops and the mire, higher and lower in his exaltation and abasement than ordinary men, and this was an occasion unblemished by any doubts. I had not yet learned to know the faces and devices of those closest about him, though they all looked formidable enough and splendid enough to me. I saw them as a grand cavalcade of bright colours and proud faces, not as men in the manner that I was a man. Or almost a man, for I had not yet my years. These lived on another level. I knew no parallel for it in Wales, where no man felt himself less a man than another, or bridled his tongue for awe of the great. Great and small surely we had, and every man knew his place in the order, and respected both his own and every other soul's, but not with servility. In this land I felt great wonder and pleasure, but I was never at ease.
I stood with my mother and her husband—for I never thought of him as father to me in any way—among a hot and heaving throng, pressed body hard against body, watching these great ones ride by. And suddenly my mother gave a soft cry, and struggled to free a hand, and as ever, to touch me, not him. And never did this happen but he was aware of it, and I aware of his awareness, as a pain most piercing and hard to sustain. But she never knew it, as though what he felt could in no wise touch her. So she handled me eagerly by the shoulder in his sight, and cried: "He is there! It is true, he's free!"
I doubt if I should have known the Lord Griffith for myself, for I had not seen him since I was five years old. He rode among a group of lords not far behind the king's own party, on a tall, raw-boned horse, for he was a massive man, full-blooded and well-fleshed, and had lost no bulk in his imprisonment. He towered almost a head over King Henry, and though he was white in the face from being so long shut away from the sun, he looked otherwise none the worse in health, and was now, like his lady, in very good spirits. At whose expense he was provided for this ride, both with clothes and mount, I do but guess, yet take it that as yet all he had came from King Henry. For he was fine in his dress, and his hair and beard, which were reddish fair like Rhodri's colouring, very elegantly trimmed. Close behind him rode a big boy of about fourteen, massively made like his father, but his thick crop of hair, which was uncovered to the sun, was fiery red, almost as red as the poppies in the headlands of the English fields. And that was Owen Goch, the firstborn son.
They passed by us, pale from their prison but bright with joy in their triumph, and people pointed them out for the Welsh princes, and waved hands and kerchiefs. The Lady Senena sat at her upper window motionless and silent, with tears on her cheeks, but her daughter leaned out and shook a silk scarf streaming out on the breeze, and called down to the riders so shrilly and joyfully that the Lord Griffith looked up, and saw his womenfolk weeping and laughing for pleasure at seeing him again live and free and acknowledged joint-heir of Gwynedd. Then the men below waved and threw glances and kisses as long as they were within sight, their chins on their shoulders, until the curve of the Wyle took them away, and the women embraced each other in floods of tears, and hugged the two little boys, and urged them to wave and throw kisses after their father's dwindling figure. For this was but the public presentment, and soon, when King Henry was installed at the abbey, there could be a private reunion even more joyful.
So it
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