Sharon Penman - Time and Chance

“What are you waiting for, Uncle?” he said. “Come on in.”

After a barely perceptible hesitation, Ranulf did.

Henry’s squires had fallen asleep on their pallets. So had Rainald, who was sprawled, snoring, in the window seat. Roger held out longer, but at last he, too, was nodding drowsily and stifling yawns. “I’m going to bed now and leaving word that I’m not to be awakened until Friday.” Ignoring Henry and Ranulf’s gibes of “milksop” and “weakling,” he headed for the door.

They’d been conversing easily, interrupting each other freely, lapsing back into the bantering familiarity of a lifetime, almost as if the past six years’ estrangement had never been. They had discussed Henry’s plans for Ireland, where he meant to foil the ambitions of his Marcher lords, put a halt to the ongoing strife, and aid the Irish bishops in their attempt to bring Irish Church practices into conformity with Roman law. They had talked of Henry’s family, scattered throughout the Angevin empire like feathers on the wind: Eleanor in Poitiers with Richard and Joanna and Aenor, Hal in Normandy, Geoffrey in Brittany, Tilda in Germany, and John with the nuns at Fontevrault Abbey. And they had spoken of the smoldering tinderbox that was Wales.

North Wales had fragmented in the aftermath of Hywel’s death at Pentraeth. Gwynedd had been divided up amongst Owain’s surviving sons, with the lion’s share going to Davydd and Rhodri, Mon to Maelgwn, Nanconwy to Iorwerth, and the commotes in the west to Cynan. Few doubted, though, that this partitioned peace was doomed, kindling for yet another Welsh war of succession.

In the south, it was different. Rhys ap Gruffydd had none to challenge his supremacy, none but the might of the English Crown, and he had made a coldly calculated decision to ally himself to that alien power. He’d come to Henry near the Welsh border, offering hostages, horses, oxen, and fealty. Ranulf understood why he’d done so, and thought that Owain might have understood, too. But he did wonder if any mention had been made of the hostage son who had suffered for Rhys’s broken faith, the son now known as Maredudd Ddall, Maredudd the Blind.

When Roger shuffled sleepily off to bed, Henry had been telling Ranulf that he’d waived payment of most of Rhys’s proffered tribute, recognized Rhys’s right to lands claimed by the Marcher Houses of Clare and Clifford, and returned to him another son long held hostage at the English court. But now that he and Ranulf were alone for the first time, their conversation’s flow began to ebb, soon slowing to a trickle.

They studied each other silently in the fire’s erratic glow, listening to the crackle of flames, the raspy sounds of Rainald’s snoring, the rhythm of rain upon the roof. Henry sipped his wine, oblivious to what he was tasting. “I grieved for you when I learned of Hywel ab Owain’s death,” he said softly. “He was a brave man, a gifted poet, and good company.”

Ranulf inclined his head. “Yes… he was.”

“I was concerned on your behalf, too, Uncle, for I very much doubted that Davydd ab Owain would let you dwell unmolested in domains now his.”

“He did not.”

Henry waited a moment and then prodded, “Well?”

“I thought it best to depart Trefriw lest I drag my uncle Rhodri down with me. My elder son joined the service of Hywel’s brother Cynan, and Rhiannon and our younger children are dwelling now at my manor in Shropshire…”

Color had crept into Ranulf’s face, spreading upward from throat to forehead, and Henry set his cup down in surprise once he noticed the older man’s discomfort. Ranulf was quiet again and Henry shifted impatiently, but this time he did not prompt, waiting for Ranulf to continue on his own.

Ranulf was still deeply flushed. “I realize you might well think that this is why I am here, Harry, to mend fences now that I’ve returned to England. But that is not so. I came not to regain royal favor-”

Henry had been staring at him incredulously and now burst out laughing. “Jesus God, Ranulf! In all my life, I’ve never known a man so uncalculating, so lacking in avarice. Did you truly think I’d doubt your motives? After you turned down an earldom?”

Ranulf joined in his laughter, somewhat sheepishly. “You will admit it was an awkward coincidence, though, that I should seek you out once I am back on English soil. I could hardly blame you for harboring some suspicions.”

“And I usually breathe in suspicions as I breathe in air,” Henry conceded. “But not with you, Uncle.” He hoped that Ranulf understood his assertion for what it was, the rarest of compliments. Death had claimed his confidants one by one-his parents, his brother Will-leaving only Rosamund and Eleanor and his sons, who were still green, untried lads. “Whether it be the doings of the Almighty or your ‘awkward coincidence, ’ Ranulf, I am not likely to question it, just to be glad of it.”

Ranulf’s smile was still the smile of his youth, curiously untouched by time. “I’m glad, too,” he said. “I’ve missed you, lad.”

Henry’s answering smile never reached his eyes. “I ought to leave well enough alone,” he said, “but I’d not mislead you by my silence. I deeply regret our falling-out over the Welsh hostages. I am sorry that there are men who dwell in darkness because of my command. But in all honesty, if I had to do it over again… most likely I would, Ranulf.”

“I know.” Ranulf had spent much of his life watching those he loved wrestle with the seductive, lethal lure of kingship. It had proved the ruination of his cousin Stephen, a good man who had not made a good king. For his sister Maude, it had been an unrequited love affair, a passion she could neither capture nor renounce. For Hywel, it had been an illusion, a golden glow ever shimmering along the horizon. He believed that his nephew had come the closest to mastery of it, but at what cost?

Henry rose and padded barefoot across the chamber to pour more wine for Ranulf, spilling only a splash into his own cup. He detoured to snatch a blanket from his bed and drape it over Rainald’s shoulders before returning to the hearth. “The drawbridge is down, the parapets unmanned. You may not get another chance to catch me with my defenses in such disarray. Are there any questions you would put to me?”

Ranulf smiled and shook his head, and Henry’s brows shot upward. “Not even about Thomas Becket?”

“No.”

Henry studied Ranulf’s face intently, and then exhaled a breath soft as a sigh, for he saw that his uncle was utterly sincere, free of all doubts or misgivings about the manner in which Becket met his death. “A pity the Pope does not share your certainty,” he said, with a flippancy that did not deceive Ranulf in the least.

“I know that the Pope has dispatched two cardinal legates to investigate the killing, and I know, too, that both men are said to be strongly predisposed in Becket’s favor,” he said and Henry grimaced his agreement.

“I think we can safely assume that there will be some finding of fault.” “Is that why you are going to Ireland, then, to delay the reckoning with the Church?”

Henry feigned indignation. “Such cynicism ill becomes you, Uncle. Would you have me sit on my hands whilst my Marcher lords carve out Irish kingdoms for themselves?”

“But Roger told me that the Earl of Pembroke hastened from Ireland to meet you at Newnham and made an abject submission to assuage your wrath,” Ranulf pointed out, and Henry shrugged.

“Yes, he came to his senses right quickly. By that time, though, I already had an army assembled. If you go to the trouble of saddling a horse, you’re going to want to ride it.”

Ranulf was amused by his nephew’s ability to avoid giving a direct answer. “If lamprey is not your favorite dish, it ought to be, for your slipperiness could put any eel to shame. I know you can give me reasons beyond counting why you must go to Ireland, beginning with that Papal Bull you were granted some years ago to bring Ireland under subjugation to Rome. Nor do I doubt that you want to teach your Marcher lords that if they try to fly too high, you’ll clip their wings. But I still say that if the Irish isle was not even more remote than Wales, you’d not be so keen to spend the winter there.”