times, perhaps? As evidenced by this morning's events?
ROBERT: All right, point taken. But I don't trifle with serious matters. Neither does Eleanor. And our minds work in rather different ways. Over the years we've had a fair number of what the diplomats would call "candid exchanges of views." The important thing is that we eventually learned never to let them become personal.
CUT BACK TO ROERT AND JUSTIN
JUSTIN: Well, whenever Nicholas does marry – whoever he marries – I shall have to send him along to you for advice.
ROBERT: And the wife to Eleanor. But just supposing for the sake of argument that we were to countenance its being Alison, what should we do about it? If anything.
JUSTIN: Well, let's consider the position. I stand more or less in loco parentis to Nicholas, as well as being his lord, but there's the uncle who will reasonably expect a say in the matter. And again, while you have jurisdiction over the girl, I can't see you leaving her father out of it. You said Tom was worried about the situation, without knowing who was involved. How would he react now?
ROBERT: Probably much the same. He said he'd lectured her on the dangers of getting involved with the gentry. It might have been better if he'd left it at that. But you know he's a rather embittered character. I gather from Cedric that he launched into one of his tirades about the fatuousness of basing marriage simply on romantic love.
JUSTIN: True enough if that's all there is to it.
ROBERT: Yes, but you can't expect a girl of Alison's age to take kindly to that view. And then another time he rather spoiled the effect by saying that the gentry always expected a bride to bring a dowry, and if whoever it was hoped to get one out of him, he had another think coming. Alison flounced out in a temper saying that N… would be mortally insulted by the very suggestion and wouldn't dream of asking for a dowry.
JUSTIN: But the uncle would certainly expect one – it would look very bad otherwise, apart from the practical considerations.
ROBERT: Quite so. Well, I'm very sorry, Master Nicholas, but there doesn't seem to be much future in it.
JUSTIN: That's more or less what I told him. Rather a pity, isn't it?
ROBERT: Now who's being sentimental?
FADE OUT.
Back to Contents
FADE INTO ANNE'S ROOM, PRESENT TIME
Friday night. Anne is alone, unable to sleep, and for the time being has given up the attempt. She is looking at the picture.
ANNE: Well, Alison Miller, at least I know who you were now. I wonder why I never thought to ask before, when for some reason tonight it feels so important to have found out. The jester's daughter. Not quite the grand lady I'd imagined. And there's some mystery behind your portrait. Who had the idea of painting you? Not a professional, it seems. And why? Obviously with affection. Was the painter someone special to you? There seem to be more questions than ever.
CUT TO ERNSCAR IN 15th CENTURY
Scenes of domestic activity around the castle.
ANNE (voice-over): What was life like in fifteenth–century Ernscar? Yours in particular. Were you really as sad as you sometimes seem? Curious how that expression comes and goes with the angle of the light. Does it reflect the pattern of your days, sometimes sad, sometimes gay? You look as though you might be capable of great happiness. And of bringing happiness to others. But that terrible sense of longing – it tears my insides. Was it tearing you apart, too?
I suppose a jester would be in an awkward position socially – constantly on familiar terms with the nobility, witness to their conversations, having to fit in with their ways and moods, but certainly not one of them. And not really in the ordinary run of servants either. A foot in both camps, and at home in neither. The Fool, the outcast. And the daughter must have been in much the same boat. Were you perhaps in love with some young man in service, who thought you too proud? Or was it secretly with an aristocrat who looked down on you? But even if he didn't, even if he loved you just as much in return, he'd have to give you up to marry an heiress chosen by the family. Or at best he might have kept you on as a mistress. Would he have done that? Would you have tolerated the position? It must have happened often enough – it still does, after all. Accepting second best when what you really want is not to be had.
CUT BACK TO ANNE'S ROOM, PRESENT TIME
She pauses, then puts the picture down impatiently.
ANNE: Oh, this is ridiculous. It's the middle of the night, I've had an exhausting day, I still can't sleep, I've probably had too much to drink, I'm almost certainly imagining things. Everyone agrees it's a poor painting – that stands out a mile. If it caught any subtlety of expression at all it was probably by accident. She may have been nothing like it, probably quite different. What's the sense in trying to read anything into it? As likely as not I'm simply projecting my own problems on to this poor girl.
CUT TO TWO YEARS EARLIER
Brief glimpses of earlier excursions taken by Anne and John together. The voice-over continues
ANNE: Oh, John, John, can't you see how much I want you? It's a constant ache when it isn't a biting pain. Two years, it must be, since we first dated. And it went swimmingly at first. I really thought this is it. But now we seem to have been simply drifting for ages. I just can't bear to keep on like this. That's what's tearing me apart. I don't want to push you too hard and spoil everything, but unless you make a move soon I think I'll have to break it off altogether.
(Firmly) Take yourself in hand, Anne Walsh. Sit down and think out what you're going to do. Make a definite plan for the morning. And even if you don't actually do any of it when it comes to the point, you may stop it bouncing around inside your head and at last get some sleep.
FADE OUT.
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FADE IN TO THE PARLOUR AT ERNSCAR, 1438
Robert and Justin are conferring quietly. Nicholas enters with a satchel.
NICHOLAS: Excuse me, my lords. A courier has just arrived and said that some of these messages might be urgent.
ROBERT: Thank you, Nicholas.
He takes the satchel, sorts the contents into "yours" and "mine" piles and returns the empty satchel to Nicholas.
JUSTIN: I suppose he's being looked after?
NICHOLAS: Oh yes. Cedric's taken care of that.
JUSTIN: Of course. Come back in an hour for any replies.
Exit Nicholas. Robert and Justin go through their mail, possibly with sotto voce comments such as "Damn!", "Can wait" etc. Nothing really urgent emerges. Eventually Justin explodes with exasperation.
JUSTIN: Honestly! Some people should never be let out of the nursery!
ROBERT: What's up?
JUSTIN: It's those two blockheaded young cousins of mine. You know they've been at odds with each other for years.
CUT TO SOME OTHER BARONIAL OR EPISCOPAL ESTABLISHMENT
The two cousins are ushered separately into a small room, shake hands ungraciously and begin negotiations. The conversion between Robert and Justin continues in voice-over.
JUSTIN: I persuaded them to meet on neutral territory to sort out their latest squabble. One of those good intentions that lead you know where.
ROBERT: What went wrong?
JUSTIN: It seems it started off tolerably well, with the two principals for once talking more or less reasonably instead of hurling insults at each other.
CUT TO A TAVERN
Two groups of servants are engaged in increasingly bitter mutual taunts.
JUSTIN: But meanwhile most of their servants had gone off to the tavern, and an argument developed into a brawl, and the brawl into an affray, and it ended up with several fairly serious injuries on both sides.
ROBERT: As so often happens.
JUSTIN: Quite. I'd have thought even Richard and William would have had the sense to keep their men away from the ale – or at least away from each other. But there it is. Naturally each side accused the other of starting it, each lord demanded compensation from the other for his servants' injuries, each obviously would
refuse to pay, so now they're on worse terms than ever. It looks as though they may bring their militias into it.
CUT BACK TO ERNSCAR
ROBERT: Hell! As if we didn't have enough troubles without our friends and relations fighting each other.
JUSTIN: Yes. I could cheerfully bang their heads together. I did think of trying to mediate again, and now I rather wish I had, but after the last time it didn't seem worth while.
ROBERT: What happened then?
JUSTIN: Each of them thought I was favouring the other, so it ended up a three-way row and the last state was worse than the first. I'm afraid I more or less washed my hands of them.
ROBERT: How did all this ill feeling develop in the first place? I never did hear.
JUSTIN: As usual, a storm in a tankard. It all concerns the inheritance of a small manor house. Nothing compared with the estates that they have already.
ROBERT: I've known bitter quarrels over less. Why on earth wasn't it made clear in the will? Or wasn't there one?
JUSTIN: There was indeed. The property came to me twenty years ago. But it's entailed, and one or other of these two would get it according to the legal provisions for the possessor's dying without lawful male issue. The snag is that they aren't certain which.
ROBERT: Surely they know which is the senior line?
JUSTIN: Of course. But there's some dispute about its legitimacy, just plausible enough for no one to predict how a judgement between them would go if it went to court. So neither of them will risk litigation.
ROBERT: Better than trial by battle, I'd have thought.
JUSTIN: Even they would see that – I think. But they now consider their honour to have been impugned, and the question of the inheritance is practically forgotten. Though of course they'll remember it when the time comes.
ROBERT: Inevitably. Can't you do something about it?
JUSTIN: Between ourselves, I've been trying to find ways of disqualifying both of them. But for the insistence on "lawful" issue I might have been tempted to sire a bastard myself just to avoid the whole wretched problem.
ROBERT: Ha! I've never heard that excuse before. Full marks for novelty if not for virtue, my old friend!
JUSTIN: I said, "might have been" tempted And I have been known to resist temptation. Occasionally. Fortunately I've never had too much trouble with that one.
ROBERT: I shan't ask what are the others. But it's rather a pity in a way. Just think, the first offspring might have been a girl, and so might the second, so perhaps you should have taken half a dozen mistresses to be on the safe side.
JUSTIN: Heaven forbid! It's bad enough when my two sisters get together.
ROBERT: I wasn't suggesting a harem. Six separate establishments. Might come a bit expensive, of course. Perhaps I could offer you a little love–nest on the estate here?
JUSTIN: All right, all right, have your little joke. It would be quite amusing in other circumstances. Have you any more serious suggestions?
ROBERT: Well, for a start, your ingenious little scheme wouldn't have worked anyway, because if illegitimacy were no bar the question wouldn't have arisen.
JUSTIN: I didn't ask what wouldn't work. Positive suggestions, please.
ROBERT: Let's see, then. The crucial point seems to be "lawful issue." I'm no expert on the law, but doesn't formal adoption confer all the legal privileges of an actual son?
JUSTIN: I'm not sure how it would bear on the entail. But I could have that looked into. Now that I think of it, for some reason it doesn't have the usual phrase "heir of the body" – probably a do-it-yourself job, old Ranulf wouldn’t want to waste money on a proper lawyer – so if nothing else we should be able to raise enough doubt for a good legal wrangle.
ROBERT: And even if it didn't eventually stand in law, it would at least get those two idiots on the same side to fight it, and for the time being that might be good enough.
JUSTIN: It's definitely worth thinking about.
ROBERT: Good, because I've no other ideas. And