Ken Follett - World Without End

Wulfric wanted to dance, as he always did when he had had a bellyful of drink. Gwenda partnered him for the first number, laughing as she tried to keep up with his cavorting. He lifted her, swung her through the air, crushed her to his body, and put her down again only to circle her with great leaps. He had no sense of rhythm, but his sheer enthusiasm was infectious. Afterwards she declared herself exhausted, and he danced with his new daughter-in-law, Amabel.

Then, of course, he danced with Annet.

His eye fell on her as soon as the tune ended and he let go of Amabel. Annet was sitting on a bench at one side of the hall of the manor house. She wore a green dress that was girlishly short and showed her dainty ankles. The dress was not new, but she had embroidered the bosom with yellow and pink flowers. As always, a few ringlets had escaped from her headdress, and they hung around her face. She was twenty years too old to dress that way, but she did not know it, and nor did Wulfric.

Gwenda smiled as they began to dance. She wanted to look happy and carefree, but she realized her expression might be more like a grimace, and she gave up trying. She tore her gaze away from them and watched Davey and Amabel. Perhaps Amabel would not turn out quite like her mother. She had some of Annet’s coquettish ways, but Gwenda had never seen her actually flirting, and right now she seemed uninterested in anyone but her husband.

Gwenda scanned the room and located her other son, Sam. He was with the young men, telling a story, miming it, holding the reins of an imaginary horse and almost falling off. He had them spellbound. They probably envied his luck in becoming a squire.

Sam was still living at Earlscastle. Lady Philippa had kept on most of the squires and men-at-arms, for her son Gerry would need them to ride and hunt with him, and practise with the sword and the lance. Gwenda hoped that, during the period of Philippa’s regency, Sam would learn a more intelligent and merciful code than he would have got from Ralph.

There was not much else to look at, and Gwenda’s gaze returned to her husband and the woman he had once wanted to marry. As Gwenda had feared, Annet was making the most of Wulfric’s exuberance and inebriation. She gave him sexy smiles when they danced apart, and when they came together she clung to him, Gwenda thought, like a wet shirt.

The dance seemed to go on for ever, Aaron Appletree repeating the bouncy melody endlessly on his bagpipes. Gwenda knew her husband’s moods, and now she saw the glint in his eye that always appeared when he was about to ask her to lie with him. Annet knew exactly what she was doing, Gwenda thought furiously. She shifted restlessly on her bench, willing the music to stop, trying not to let her anger show.

However, she was seething with indignation when the tune ended with a flourish. She made up her mind to get Wulfric to calm down and sit beside her. She would keep him close for the rest of the afternoon, and there would be no trouble.

But then Annet kissed him.

While he still had his hands on her waist she stood on tiptoe and tilted her face and kissed him full on the lips, briefly but firmly; and Gwenda boiled over.

She jumped up from her bench and strode across the hall. As she passed the bridal couple her son, Davey, saw the expression on her face and tried to detain her, but she ignored him. She went up to Wulfric and Annet, who were still gazing at one another and smiling stupidly. She poked Annet’s shoulder with her finger and said loudly: “Leave my husband alone!”

Wulfric said: “Gwenda, please-”

“Don’t you say anything,” Gwenda said. “Just stay away from this whore.”

Annet’s eyes flashed defiance. “It’s not dancing that whores are paid for.”

“I’m sure you know all about what whores do.”

“How dare you!”

Davey and Amabel intervened. Amabel said to Annet: “Please don’t make a scene, Ma.”

Annet said: “It’s not me, it’s Gwenda!”

Gwenda said: “I’m not the one trying to seduce someone else’s husband.”

Davey said: “Mother, you’re spoiling the wedding.”

Gwenda was too enraged to listen. “She always does this. She jilted him twenty-three years ago, but she’s never let him go!”

Annet began to cry. Gwenda was not surprised. Annet’s tears were just another means of getting her way.

Wulfric reached out to pat Annet’s shoulder, and Gwenda snapped: “Don’t touch her!” He jerked back his hand as if burned.

“You don’t understand,” Annet sobbed.

“I understand you all too well,” Gwenda said.

“No, you don’t,” Annet said. She wiped her eyes and gave Gwenda a surprisingly direct, candid look. “You don’t understand that you have won. He’s yours. You don’t know how he adores you, respects you, admires you. You don’t see the way he looks at you when you’re speaking to someone else.”

Gwenda was taken aback. “Well,” she mumbled, but she did not know what else to say.

Annet went on: “Does he eye younger women? Does he ever sneak away from you? How many nights have you slept apart in the last twenty years – two? Three? Can’t you see that he will never love another woman as long as he lives?”

Gwenda looked at Wulfric and realized that all this was true. In fact it was obvious. She knew it and so did everyone. She tried to remember why she was so angry with Annet, but somehow the logic of it had slipped her mind.

The dancing had stopped and Aaron had put down his pipes. All the villagers now gathered around the two women, mothers of the bridal couple.

Annet said: “I was a foolish and selfish girl, and I made a stupid decision, and lost the best man I’ve ever met. And you got him. Sometimes I can’t resist the temptation to pretend it happened the other way around, and he’s mine. So I smile at him, and I pat his arm; and he’s kind to me because he knows he broke my heart.”

“You broke your own heart,” Gwenda said.

“I did. And you were the lucky girl who benefited from my folly.”

Gwenda was dumbfounded. She had never looked at Annet as a sad person. To her, Annet had always been a powerful, threatening figure, ever scheming to take Wulfric back. But that was never going to come to pass.

Annet said: “I know it annoys you when Wulfric is nice to me. I’d like to say it won’t happen again, but I know my own weakness. Do you have to hate me for it? Don’t let this spoil the joy of the wedding and of the grandchildren we both want. Instead of regarding me as your lifelong enemy, couldn’t you think of me as a bad sister, who sometimes misbehaves and makes you cross, but still has to be treated as one of the family?”

She was right. Gwenda had always thought of Annet as a pretty face with an empty head, but on this occasion Annet was the wiser of the two, and Gwenda felt humbled. “I don’t know,” she said. “Perhaps I could try.”

Annet stepped forward and kissed Gwenda’s cheek. Gwenda felt Annet’s tears on her face. “Thank you,” Annet said.

Gwenda hesitated, then put her arms around Annet’s bony shoulders and hugged her.

All around them, the villagers clapped and cheered.

A moment later, the music began again.

Early in November, Philemon arranged a service of thanksgiving for the end of the plague. Archbishop Henri came with Canon Claude. So did Sir Gregory Longfellow.

Gregory must have come to Kingsbridge to announce the king’s choice of bishop, Merthin thought. Formally, he would tell the monks that the king had nominated a certain person, and it would be up to the monks to elect that person or someone else; but, in the end, the monks usually voted for whomever the king had chosen.

Merthin could read no message in Philemon’s face, and he guessed that Gregory had not yet revealed the king’s choice. The decision meant everything to Merthin and Caris. If Claude got the job, their troubles were over. He was moderate and reasonable. But if Philemon became bishop, they faced more years of squabbling and lawsuits.